As the resident WGA strike expert here on the blog, I thought it’d be a good idea to update on the situation at hand:

As the strike entered it’s fourth week on Monday, the two sides finally met with one another again. Talks resumed throughout the week, but nothing concrete was hashed out. A glimmer of hope spread through the Internet community on Monday, when Deadline Hollywood Daily’s Nikki Finke, one of the best covering strike, claimed that a source told her that the strike is “done, basically.” Moreover, Finke said her source told her this:

“It’s already done, basically,” the insider describes. That’s because of the weeks worth of groundwork by the Hollywood agents working the writers guild leadership on one side, and the studio and network moguls on the other. I was told not to expect an agreement this week. But my source thought it was possible that the strike could be settled before Christmas.

But after all that commotion early in the week, the broadcast silence by both sides subdued the buzz, until today when both sides spoke. Sadly, they both say they’re no where close to a new deal. Supposedly, the producers basically hashed out the same deal they offered the writers weeks ago and obviously, the WGA told them to stick it. The deal offered by the producers is as follows:

* For streaming television episodes, the companies proposed a residual structure of a single fixed payment, based on 1.2% of producers’ receipts after a six-week promo window, amounting about $250 for a year’s reuse of an hour-long program.

* No change in the Internet download formula, currently paid at the DVD rate.

So either Finke’s source was way off, or both sides are spinning their wheels until things get closer to nut cutting time. I’m not sure who to believe anymore. Either way, talks resume AGAIN on Tuesday.

As always, check Variety’s strike blog for up-to-the-minute coverage on the entire situation.

The Pop Culture Register

Barker is a sophomore majoring in journalism and business.

Earlier this week, “Empire” magazine’s Web site displayed a series of eerily placed playing cards that began to reveal themselves slowly. Eventually, the cards were replaced by a brand-new image of Heath Ledger as the Joker in “The Dark Knight.”

The picture is yet another step in the film’s excessive “underground,” viral marketing campaign. Throughout the summer, the Web site www.whysoserious.com ordered fans to complete tasks online that unlocked small nuggets of information about the film.

And while this seems to be working for “The Dark Knight,” it’s solely because the film is highly anticipated even without the viral marketing. However, it seems more and more movies that would be easily forgotten are trying to concoct an uber-creative marketing strategy that will allow them to obtain surprising box office success. The bad news is, it’s not really working.

Films have tried this experiential marketing in a few different ways. Some have attempted to springboard off of their cult status online before the movie is ever released (“Snakes on a Plane”); others have used cryptic, yet gripping taglines (“The Matrix”); and even more have tried shocking and eye-catching posters (“Captivity”). The main problem is that not one film has been able to put all the elements of buzz together to create a sustainable marketing push that puts the film over the top.

But there may be hope for that just yet: “Cloverfield.” Or “01-18-08.” Or “Monstrous.”

It’s this type of shadowy behavior that we’ve seen from the beginning with the J.J. Abrams-produced monster movie that arrives in theatres in January.

This summer, a mysterious two-minute clip depicting the destruction of New York City via a handicam hit theaters and the Internet, which caused an eruption on blogs and talkbacks. People began dissecting the trailer just as the film’s creepy official Web site posted two random pictures that were movable.

As Abrams noted at Comic Con, the title of the film and footage of the monster will not be available for a while. Posters were released with three different titles, and MySpace pages were created for all the film’s major characters. All the while, the speculation continued throughout the summer. Finally, a new trailer was released in front of “Beowulf” a few weeks back, with more of the same footage, only this time the title was revealed as “Cloverfield.” So even when Abrams does release information, it’s not really information.

Although the people behind this film have to be really excited about the marketing they’ve done so far – aside from print ads, they seem to have captured all the mediums – they have to aware of the cautionary tales that have built up a lot of hype and then completely failed. “Snakes on a Plane” was a massive hit with a segmented audience online, but that never made a difference because no one else came to see it.

The biggest worry that the producers of “Cloverfield” should have is whether or not their film is actually any good, because the buzz is only going to take them so far. And based on the past films that have used buzz to cover up their flaws, I’m guessing they’ve got a lot to worry about.

At my dinner table this Thanksgiving, there were three conventional Democrats, three people too far left to call themselves Democrats and one socially conservative Republican. Even though the Republican was outnumbered 6-1, the lefties felt uncomfortable when the topic of abortion came up in conversation, and the righty felt attacked. No inflammatory words were exchanged; rather, our Thanksgiving discomfort was caused by all parties’ apprehension and fear of the opposing political abyss.

This is not an unusual situation. It is the state of the union.

We often hear politicians, normally Democrats, heralding the idea that our country is divided politically and consequently we need a president who will unite us all. We hear that our country is divvied up into red states and blue states, that our differences only grow in this age of partisan bickering, that as long as we cling to labels (Democrat or Republican, liberal or conservative) we will never achieve understanding and remain in a political standstill, etc, etc.

The Democrats have said and keep saying that we need to overcome our differences and work together.

But bipartisan cooperation on the level of national politics rarely works. It can effectively happen only if there is some middle ground in an argument, when often there is not. Take the abortion debate, for example: The two ideological camps base their argumentation on different premises. Pro-lifers oppose abortion because they believe in fetus rights, and pro-choicers support legal abortion because they believe in women’s rights.

Thus argumentation has its limits.

Furthermore, bipartisan cooperation is normally invoked by the group with less power, or by the group who most fears losing power, in an effort to bridge the distance between themselves and what they think voters want.

Political strategy aside, the logic of cooperation and tolerance in American politics is contrary to the logic of power and even the logic of democracy. Democracy is not based on consensus; it is a dictatorship of the majority. And once the majority speaks, the elected power can (theoretically, within reason) do whatever they want.

Granted, I’m simplifying some things here. But I’m trying to illustrate that bipartisanship is contrary not only to reason, but also to our own governing system.

Indeed, why tolerate views if we totally and fundamentally disagree with them? Why should we cooperate with those who believe something completely contrary to our own ideas?

So this brings us back to my Thanksgiving dinner.

It’s true – our country is divided. I find that political affiliations get in the way of friendships and relationships with family members. Therefore, the only time I will opt for tolerance and cooperation is on the personal level.

The national political stage is the place for ideologies to battle and win or lose – not to compromise and find middle ground. The reason political parties exist is to provide different options for how to run a country.

But when it comes to Thanksgiving dinner conversation, I eat my own words. I try to tolerate and even understand my conservative relative’s ideas. When something you disagree with is staring you in the face, you’ve got no other option.

Of the many misconceptions floating around about feminism, the one I hear most often is that feminists don’t respect housewives.

The debate erupted again only a few days ago in Russian class, of all places, as we read and discussed a ’90s interview with Naina Yeltsin, wife of Boris Yeltsin. In the article, Naina discussed her domestic duties with the journalist; she talked about Boris’ favorite dinner (Ural-style pelmeni), caring for her kids and grandkids, and her apartment in Moscow.

Some of the class found the interview offensive. In broken Russian, some of the class argued that the interview glorified and reinforced the traditional woman’s role of caregiver and domestic provider. Others said, don’t hate on Naina – she is happy to be a homemaker and it is unfair to criticize her.

Nevermind that we were talking about Russia, or that Naina’s interview might have been contrived for political reasons: The issues the interview raised for an American class are what’s relevant. The class outlined the two sides of the American feminist housewife debate: either that women shouldn’t be confined to domestic roles, or that women can be homemakers if they want to (so shut up).

Both arguments are right. And wrong.

The perceived anti-housewife feminism has roots in the American early ’60s, when suburban, educated, white, upper-middle class woman Betty Friedan wrote “The Feminine Mystique.”

Friedan’s book spoke to the other women like her, who had been reared in the socially dynamic ’40s, watched their mothers replace men in the workforce during World War II, worked themselves or had gone to college. The progress flickering in the eyes of young women was soon extinguished by the socially repressive ’50s. When men returned from war and there was no room for women in the workforce. And so the discourse of happy homemaker was propagated to prevent women from infringing upon men’s roles.

Friedan and her generation felt a certain existential malaise at home. (It was the Existentialist ’50s, after all!) And so Friedan declared emancipation from the drudgery of housewifery, and the “Second Wave” of feminism erupted on the scene to become one of the major social movements of the ’60s.

Since then, feminism has expanded beyond white picket fences on suburban lawns; but nonetheless the Friedan-feminism of liberation from traditional feminine roles remains predominant in the common perceptions of feminism.

Feminism is a diverse school of thought; there is no definitive word on what it is and isn’t. Even so, I am certain that feminists do not intend to condemn homemakers; we intend to criticize the social beliefs and institutions that have historically defined gender roles. In the past, this has meant criticizing the social factors that prevented women from entering the public sector and workforce.

Therefore it is not true that feminists disapprove of homemaking as a profession or condemn women who work inside the home. On the contrary, feminism has expanded the roles of women and provided choice and respect when it comes to choosing a career, whether it’s at home or not.

General Pervez Musharraf gestures at something during a news conference. (B.K.Bangash/AP Photo)

The Spin Zone

Thomas Wachtel is a sophomore majoring in journalism and political science.

“It is the policy of the United States to seek and support the growth of democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture, with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world.”

President Bush said that during his second inaugural address. Those are pretty strong words – they don’t leave a lot of room for maneuvering. Statements like those can make trouble for politicians.

Take Pakistan as an example. In 1999, Gen. Pervez Musharraf took power in the country via a bloodless coup. In case you were wondering, military leaders and coups aren’t really all that conducive to spreading democracy in the world. Amnesty International has a laundry list of warnings and complaints about Pakistan, ranging from the unlawful killings of criminal suspects to violence against women.

Now it appears to be getting even worse. On November 4, Musharraf declared emergency rule, which included steps such as suspending the nation’s constitution and firing its high court’s chief justice (who is now under house arrest). He’s done things like arrest members of the opposition and make it a crime to publicly oppose the government’s actions. He said this was “the simplest way to save Pakistan” from terrorist threats and destabilization – though analysts have said that his real goal is simply to save his political future and reinforce his power.

Basically, he’s actually doing all of the things that crazy liberal conspiracy nuts like me claim our president is doing or is trying to do.

And yet, although the White House did try to stop Musharraf from declaring emergency rule, President Bush continues to support him.

It’s fairly obvious why Bush’s support for Musharraf hasn’t dwindled. Pakistan is a key U.S. ally – really, one of very few – in the war on terrorism and its support is especially crucial, considering that Pakistan is believed to be a prime hiding spot for Taliban leaders and for Osama bin Laden (remember him?).

Essentially what’s happening, then, is that the United States is supporting one unsavory character in order to pursue others – which, coincidentally, was exactly how we got in this whole mess to begin with. Perhaps you remember photos of Donald Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam Hussein, or the support we lent bin Laden to fight the Soviets in the 1980s. Will this come back to bite us, like those situations did?

Perhaps more importantly, though, we are making a pretty big sacrifice here. In order to fight the concept of terrorism, the United States is supporting regimes that are clearly not very free. We’re supposedly fighting for the American way of life – liberty and freedom, the ideals that we hold most dear. By siding with people like Musharraf, we’re sacrificing those ideals to win a fight. We need to look in the mirror and ask ourselves: How can we fight for freedom by sacrificing that very freedom? If we lose what we are, is the fight really worth winning?

In a leaked military manual from Guantanamo Bay detention facilities (worth reading in full if you have the time, or you can just go to the Wired article here), you can find all sorts of neat information, like which items may be given as “comfort items” (like extra toilet paper) and how to deal with hunger strikes.

What you also get is the four levels of access the Red Cross should have to detainees.
- Unrestricted Access
- Restricted Access (only short questions about health)
- Visual Access (looking at a prisoner)
- No Access

So, you may remember the Bush Administration making a huge deal out of the access that Guantanamo detainees get to the Red Cross. It turns out, yeah… not so much.

Proponents of the Guantanamo Bay prison camp note that it’s much nicer than, say, prison camps in North Korea. But even if it were effective, it’s a public relations nightmare. “We’re not quite as terrible as North Korea!” doesn’t make for a particularly good bumper sticker.

Hot-headed junior members of the intelligentsia used to write manifestos. But ideological convictions – the all-consuming, radical and inflexible kind – have gone out of style among young people, to invoke that favorite New York Times cliche once more. Regardless of dubious theories about the political sloth of the youth, it is certain that ideology (even the word itself) is suspicious these days. Thus no one writes manifestos anymore.(I guess we write blogs instead; they’re not as committal.)

Fear of ideology is probably a reaction to the ideologically-motivated failed utopias, genocides and wars from the last century. At present, our government exploits this fear, and would have us tremble before the threat of Islamofascism. If American foreign policy takes action based on an antagonistic “us” vs “them,” mentality, well, Islamofascism is the ideology of “them.” It is a propagandistic catch-all term, conflating and obscuring Islamic beliefs, invoking fear of Nazis and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in one fell swoop.

But before the Islamofascist “them,” there was the Communist “them.” American propaganda against, as well as atrocities done by, communist governments contributed to the burial of communism as a popular political ideology. The word “communism” has come to mean much the same thing as Islamofascism: It is an enemy to ‘freedom,’ inherently repressive, fundamentalist, anti-American. As a result, people believe communism equals repression, therefore capitalism equals freedom. I have actually heard students in a “Communism in Eastern Europe” history class attribute civil liberties to the free market.

Misunderstandings of and hostility towards communism abound; no one has a good idea of what it is and no one wants to these days. That is why Alain Badiou’s Thursday lecture, “For a Revival of the Communist Hypothesis” was so unexpected.

Here, at IU, was a real-live Communist! Alain “Vive Mai ‘68” Badiou is a French philosopher and political activist. Although his Thursday lecture was delivered in a language half-way between French and English, I was all the same inspired to revive the hypothesis. It forced me to reexamine my own ideology, or lack of one.

Badiou is known for proposing a theory of universalism. He has written several books on the topic, but his Thursday speech specifically illuminated how communism and universalism are the same.

Marx saw society in two parts: the workers, and the owners. Communism aspires to a society with no divisions; it aspires to a universal state shared by all people (classlessness).

Whereas communism intends to unite, capitalism, for Badiou, recognizes no universal but money, and divides its subjects into ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots.’ Capitalism reduces human beings to their most animalistic tendencies, that is, to competition with one another, thereby necessitating winners and losers. No one can ever be equal in this system.

In Badiou’s framing, communism is not just an economic system, or a left-wing ideology, but “zee destinée of humanité” to realize the universal.

In the spirit of the French student uprising in 1968, he instructed the students in the room to have a vision, and to build this universal. “You should do that,” were his final words. And we should.

How do you toe the line of “a new style of politics” and the old smash-mouth politics that gets people elected? Oh, probably something like this. It’s worth watching the whole thing, but here are some highlights.

Hitting Republicans and Blue Dog Democrats? Check.
“The era of Scooter Libby justice and Brownie incompetence and Karl Rove politics will finally be over.”
“I am running for president because I am sick and tired of Democrats thinking the only way to look tough on national security it talking and acting and voting like George Bush Republicans.”

Hitting Hillary (obliquely)? Check.
“When I am this party’s nominee, my opponent will not be able to say that I voted for the war in Iraq…And he will not be able to say that I waivered on something as fundamental as whether it is okay for America to torture because it is never okay.”
“Not answering questions because we’re afraid our answers just won’t be popular just won’t do it.”

Sticking with ‘04 hold-hands-kum-ba-yah-uniter-ism? Check.
“I don’t want to pit blue America against red America, I want to lead the United States of America”

C’mon Rachel, I know you want to hit him… Try it. You know I’m an Obamaniac, but I have been frustrated with his middling rhetoric for a while now. Finally, though, here he is hitting on all cylinders, taking down Hillary with glancing blows: about the difficulties of polarization, about the divisiveness of the Clinton years, about Hillary’s foreign policy closeness to the Bush Administration. You can see the other speeches here: (Dodd, Edwards, Richardson, Satan)

7 weeks till the Iowa caucuses. With the polls showing Clinton, Edwards and Obama in a statistical dead heat in Iowa, it’s game time. Hillary’s got a new slogan: “Turn up the heat. Turn America around.” Turn up the heat? Oh, Hillary, if you want it, you’ve got it.

The Pop Culture Register

Barker is a sophomore majoring in journalism and business.

For almost all television fans – not just die-hards that get jacked for up-fronts – the worst has officially happened. As of 12:01 this past Monday morning, the Writers Guild of America is on strike against the major studios and producers, halting new script production on most shows. The writers have demanded larger residuals on DVD sales and a pay system for the creation of “media items” such as online content.

The problem is, I don’t think everyone knows about this catastrophe, or if they do know, they’re not sure exactly what it means. And while this news is disheartening on the surface, the situation is about to get much, much worse.

First, the writers’ choice to strike – which is a valid one – has permitted the programs to have only a limited number of episodes already shot for subsequent weeks. Only a handful have aired, and most shows – like “Heroes” or “Desperate Housewives” – have only 11 or 12 episodes finished, meaning that the networks will only be able to air new scripted programming until Christmas.

Obviously, it’s good that audiences will still have their favorite shows around for a bit longer while the writers behind them spend time chanting, “Network bosses, rich and rude, we don’t like your attitude.” However, if the strike continues after the holidays – a time when most shows take a break – audiences tuning in for new episodes will be met with television poison: reality shows. If you think “The Singing Bee” or “Nashville” were bad, just wait for the junk the networks will trot out in 2008.

The only bright light in that situation would be midseason returners and replacements such as “Lost,” or “24,” which have been shooting since the summer, backlogging at least eight episodes. But those shows’ scribes have stopped as well; by March there would be no new scripted shows left on television.

Second, the strike will not only affect audiences, but the shows themselves as well. Without scripts to produce, some staff and crew could be laid off, and some shows cancelled completely. Struggling new shows such as “Journeyman” or “Carpoolers” that have yet receive a full season pickup could just as easily be scrapped because the strike will destroy their audiences. The “Heroes” spin-off “Origins” has already been scrapped . Also, the creation of new pilots – which begins to vamp up after the holidays – will suffer massively, meaning the fall 2008 TV season could also be chockfull of awful programming.

While it appears the strike will continue for an significant period of time – a story in Wednesday’s Variety magazine suggests it “could easily bleed into the middle of next year” – there is a faint glimmer of hope remaining. And while the effects won’t be seen as quickly in film, the strike could become a problem in that medium as well, leaving entertainment audiences with virtually nothing original to turn to. Guess that means we are actually going to have to entertain ourselves or get outside and exercise. WGA, producers, please don’t let it come to that.

…this story or its headline?

Apparently, the tourists at Disneyland are just so hefty that they had to strengthen the boats and deepen the canals of the It’s A Small World ride to accommodate “heavier loads.” Disney, wishing its visitors to continue filling up on giant turkey legs and cotton candy, has insisted that the boats need repair just because of age.

Isn’t it strange, though, how obesity has morphed from a sign of wealth to a sign of poverty? I guess Disneyland’s conversion is just a sign of the times, from bigger airplane seats to ever-increasing portion size…