2003-06-22 | 10:49 p.m.

corduroy licorice was polishing his stand-up comedy routine for the town talent show and really wanted to add a steven wright joke that he loved, but he knew he wasn't a plagarist down deep. he couldn't take a joke.

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according to an article in the new york times, the white house has taken liberties in editing a new report by the epa to remove references about the risks of global warming. in place of the cautionary statements, dubya's minions have inserted soft shoe double-talk like this:

"the complexity of the earth system and the interconnections among its components make it a scientific challenge to document change, diagnose its causes, and develop useful projections of how natural variability and human actions may affect the global environment in the future."

that's the first time i've heard the u.s. government call itself "the complexity of the earth system and the interconnections among its components."

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movie review:

herod's law is a mexican film that tells the tale of a fool who becomes the pawn of a corrupt government. he is hand-picked for his cluelessness to temporarily take the office of mayor (recently left empty by one murdered by his constituents) in a backwater village until the next election.

when this film was about to be released in mexico, the government tried to ban it because it contained political messages critical of that government. it ended up being a huge hit and having a huge impact on the 2000 elections in mexico.

i applaud the movie and its makers for creating such a influential piece of art. unfortunately, i didn't really enjoy it as a film-goer. it had some funny moments, was well-acted and i always like to "visit" a culture i haven't before (in this case, mexico in the late 1940s). my problem was that it was too literal an examination of greed and corruption in government. it basically took the national problem and miniaturized it into a remote village setting. i was hoping for a bit more allegory or poetry. ah, well. at least i got to brush up on my spanish cuss words.

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