Mojosmusings
1.31.2005
Is Your Senator Hot or Not?
OK, this is pretty funny.
Coming next, Is Your Senator a Spineless Douchebag or Not?
(features Democrats who supported Rice and Republicans who support massive wasteful spending increases) ¶ 11:34 AM 0 comments
Coming next, Is Your Senator a Spineless Douchebag or Not?
(features Democrats who supported Rice and Republicans who support massive wasteful spending increases) ¶ 11:34 AM 0 comments
1.30.2005
The limits of interpretation.
I started reading the intro to Stephen Mitchell's new translation of Gilgamesh last night, and now I'm sort of afraid to read it. Here's the part that's getting me. On Page 15, he's talking about Shamhat's journey with the trapper to find Enkidu and, uh, civilize him with eros.
OR MAYBE, MR. MITCHELL, IT IS A TOTALLY MINOR AND FUNCTIONAL PLOT DEVICE AND WAS NEVER INTENDED TO CARRY ANY SIGNIFICANCE AT ALL.
Sometimes, I forget the sheer level of bullshit that can be built on the flimsiest of foundations. And I was a classics major.
See it online at Amazon.com Here
¶ 1:46 PM 0 comments
The waterhole is a three day's hike through the wilderness, and the poet could easily have inserted dialogues here between the young priestess of Ishtar and the trapper. What was she feeling on the long and perhaps physically taxing walk? Was she afraid? What did she ask him about his life, about Enkidu? Was he dazzled by her sexual presence? Was he tempted? Did they make love, or was that forbidden? What did he ask her, and what did she answer, about the life of the city, about her experiences in the temple, about Gilgamesh the king? The poet compresses all the dramatic possibilities of these three days into two lines:
'For three days they walked. On the third day
they reached the waterhole. There they waited.'
The economy of his art is exquisite.
OR MAYBE, MR. MITCHELL, IT IS A TOTALLY MINOR AND FUNCTIONAL PLOT DEVICE AND WAS NEVER INTENDED TO CARRY ANY SIGNIFICANCE AT ALL.
Sometimes, I forget the sheer level of bullshit that can be built on the flimsiest of foundations. And I was a classics major.
See it online at Amazon.com Here
¶ 1:46 PM 0 comments
1.29.2005
Could it actually happen?
This is a pretty long list of DNC members who have endorsed Dean for chair. Is it possible the Democrats might have the cojones to do this? At least it would be an opposition party again...
¶ 7:58 PM 1 comments
1.27.2005
The 13 Members of a Genuine Opposition Party
The 12 Brave Democrats are: Akaka (HI), Bayh (IN), Boxer (CA), Byrd (WV), Dayton (MN), Durbin (IL), Harken (IA), Kennedy (MA), Kerry (MA), Levin (MI), Lautenberg (NJ), Reed (RI). And of course, Jeffords (VT).
Putative "leading" Democrats from super-blue states, including Clinton (NY), Lieberman (CT), Corzine (NJ), and Feinstein (CA) went along to get along.
The will be rewarded by being screwed by the Bush Administration anyway.
Here's the full list: U.S. Senate Roll Call Vote on Rice's nomination ¶ 10:38 PM 0 comments
Putative "leading" Democrats from super-blue states, including Clinton (NY), Lieberman (CT), Corzine (NJ), and Feinstein (CA) went along to get along.
The will be rewarded by being screwed by the Bush Administration anyway.
Here's the full list: U.S. Senate Roll Call Vote on Rice's nomination ¶ 10:38 PM 0 comments
1.25.2005
Why I love Lore
He's like a guy I would know, but I don't. But anyway, this bit about IPods was funny.
¶ 11:26 PM 0 comments
Neal Stephenson would have been embarassed to make this up...
Even in his brand- and franchise-soaked dystopia Snow Crash, Neal would have been embarassed to come up with this (reprinted without permission from W S J -- sue me).
Chinese Youth League
Turns to a New Path:
Madison Avenue
Ogilvy & Mather Joins Group
To Promote Capitalism;
A Picture of Mickey Mouse
By GEOFFREY A. FOWLER
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
January 25, 2005; Page A1
BEIJING -- As a university student, Li Wenbin is required to attend training sessions run by the Communist Youth League of China. He learns how to advance the cause of the Communist Party and to help the elderly. And, in one recent exercise, he learned how to sell Chinese mothers on a new flavor of Tang.
Across China, programs organized by the 70 million-member league are coaching young people in today's paramount ideology: capitalism. Some pitch fertilizer on roadshows to farmers, while others teach tots to draw pictures of Mickey Mouse.
They are working with Red Force, an unlikely marketing joint venture between the Communist Youth League and New York advertising firm Ogilvy & Mather. In exchange for helping clients including petroleum and chemical giant Sinochem Corp. and Hong Kong Disneyland make pitches to Chinese shoppers, Ogilvy has groomed more than 3,500 youth-league members in doing promotions and running a business. (See related article on page B1.)
Founded in 1922 as a training ground for the Communist Party, the youth league is still intimately tied to the affairs of the often-opaque Communist Party. China's President Hu Jintao was the youth league's first secretary -- its highest rank -- in 1984.
Now the league hopes Red Force will aid it in a new kind of revolution: finding jobs for the first generation to grow up under China's economic reforms. For all its economic promise and racing growth, China is pumping out more college graduates than it can employ -- about 2.8 million new ones in 2004, a third more than in the previous year.
Gathering at Beijing's Great Hall of the People in July 2003 for their 15th National Congress, league officials admitted they were losing appeal. "We used to stress our role as an educator of youth. But now we should listen to the young people's needs on an equal basis," said Ma Chunlei, deputy secretary of the league's Shanghai branch, according to official reports.
The league's transformation opened the door for its unusual partnership with Ogilvy, which is part of the sprawling British marketing company WPP Group PLC. On a hunch at the end of 2002, Estela Kuo, the managing director of Ogilvy's field marketing unit, gave officials at the social services center of the league her "elevator pitch" for a joint venture.
"We need young people, and I know the mission of the CYL is to help young people get better lives," she remembers saying. To her surprise, the league called her back at 8 the next morning. "They said, 'This is a great idea, but we'll have to do it very carefully,' " recalls Ms. Kuo.
The league's new efforts remain a sensitive topic since it doesn't want to be seen as a profit-driven institution. It rarely speaks to the foreign press and didn't respond to repeated written questions about Red Force. But in state-controlled local press reports, the League's Central Committee has identified Red Force as a top model program.
It targets young people like Mr. Li, who found the league's sober communist morality lessons of little help in the face of a jobs crisis. "The biggest influence of the youth league to me is [teaching me] to love the country and love the Party," says Mr. Li.
A 22-year-old from a lower-middle-class family in Guzhen county, he says his parents, whose lives were largely directed by the state, promised him "full freedom to design my own life." But lately, choosing his dream career -- be it as an army officer or a tycoon -- has given way to finding a job of any sort at all.
"Job-hunting is getting tougher nowadays," says the e-commerce student at Mingxing College, who will graduate in the spring. "I can feel the stress on campus."
One year in, Red Force's training sessions are so popular it has had to turn students away. At a Beijing session last month, Ogilvy staff taught the entire two-day seminar, beginning with a lecture on communication and personality style, as well as an overview of mantras of Ogilvy corporate culture: "Deliver your brand to the last mile," repeated Ogilvy executive Jeffrey Wu.
Students listened to four hours of case studies on how to promote everything from fruit to phones, all the while scribbling notes on the vocabulary of marketing. There was "P.O.P." (point-of-purchase display), "on-site events," and even "promotion girls" -- the attractive women hired to sit at bars with products to "become friends with the customers."
There was to be a test on all of this: an assignment, given on the last day, to create a promotional event proposal for an imaginary youth brand. Those who e-mailed in a report would be considered for future employment by Red Force.
As an enticement, Ms. Kuo closed the session by offering a few jobs right away. "We are holding a promotional event for Swatch and need four promotion girls to help," said Ms. Kuo. "The requirements are to be at least 160 centimeters [5 feet 4 inches] tall, and have no distinguishable [regional] accent." Amid cheers from the auditorium, dozens of girls swarmed around Ms. Kuo to sign up.
To Ogilvy, which already has about 2,000 employees in China, Red Force is serious business. The agency has developed roots in China since it agreed to a joint venture with the Shanghai government in 1991. Like big clients, including Unilever and Motorola, it wants to extend its reach into China's hundreds of smaller cities.
"If Ogilvy had to build that network on our own, it would take years. But our clients cannot wait -- and the market cannot wait," says Ogilvy's Ms. Kuo.
For example, Hong Kong Disneyland, which plans to open China's first Disney theme park in September, hired Red Force to hold six storytelling sessions with children in southern China. Red Force members at the youth league's "youth palaces" read aloud "The Prince and the Pauper" and guided potential Disneyland vacationers to draw pictures of Mickey Mouse, sing Mickey songs, and meet Mickey.
"This is an innovative way to use established infrastructure to reach out to kids in China -- like YMCA in the U.S. -- to involve the children through community activities and provide a positive learning experience that aims to instill creativity and imagination among kids," says Disneyland spokeswoman Esther Wong.
Ta Lina, a public-relations student at Beijing Communications University, says she sat in the front row of the December Red Force training seminar because she appreciated Ogilvy's prestige. David Ogilvy, the British advertising legend who founded the agency and created the classic "man in the Hathaway shirt" campaign, is a hero in China. Ms. Ta, who is 22, has read three of his books translated into Chinese, all of which were national bestsellers.
Ms. Ta sees marketing as a ticket to opportunity -- and away from her backwoods hometown of Hohhat in Inner Mongola. "I think the PR and advertising industry in China will be very large. I'll have many opportunities to get a good job," she says in perfect English. "I want to be independent, and make my own life."
¶ 9:50 AM 0 comments
Chinese Youth League
Turns to a New Path:
Madison Avenue
Ogilvy & Mather Joins Group
To Promote Capitalism;
A Picture of Mickey Mouse
By GEOFFREY A. FOWLER
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
January 25, 2005; Page A1
BEIJING -- As a university student, Li Wenbin is required to attend training sessions run by the Communist Youth League of China. He learns how to advance the cause of the Communist Party and to help the elderly. And, in one recent exercise, he learned how to sell Chinese mothers on a new flavor of Tang.
Across China, programs organized by the 70 million-member league are coaching young people in today's paramount ideology: capitalism. Some pitch fertilizer on roadshows to farmers, while others teach tots to draw pictures of Mickey Mouse.
They are working with Red Force, an unlikely marketing joint venture between the Communist Youth League and New York advertising firm Ogilvy & Mather. In exchange for helping clients including petroleum and chemical giant Sinochem Corp. and Hong Kong Disneyland make pitches to Chinese shoppers, Ogilvy has groomed more than 3,500 youth-league members in doing promotions and running a business. (See related article on page B1.)
Founded in 1922 as a training ground for the Communist Party, the youth league is still intimately tied to the affairs of the often-opaque Communist Party. China's President Hu Jintao was the youth league's first secretary -- its highest rank -- in 1984.
Now the league hopes Red Force will aid it in a new kind of revolution: finding jobs for the first generation to grow up under China's economic reforms. For all its economic promise and racing growth, China is pumping out more college graduates than it can employ -- about 2.8 million new ones in 2004, a third more than in the previous year.
Gathering at Beijing's Great Hall of the People in July 2003 for their 15th National Congress, league officials admitted they were losing appeal. "We used to stress our role as an educator of youth. But now we should listen to the young people's needs on an equal basis," said Ma Chunlei, deputy secretary of the league's Shanghai branch, according to official reports.
The league's transformation opened the door for its unusual partnership with Ogilvy, which is part of the sprawling British marketing company WPP Group PLC. On a hunch at the end of 2002, Estela Kuo, the managing director of Ogilvy's field marketing unit, gave officials at the social services center of the league her "elevator pitch" for a joint venture.
"We need young people, and I know the mission of the CYL is to help young people get better lives," she remembers saying. To her surprise, the league called her back at 8 the next morning. "They said, 'This is a great idea, but we'll have to do it very carefully,' " recalls Ms. Kuo.
The league's new efforts remain a sensitive topic since it doesn't want to be seen as a profit-driven institution. It rarely speaks to the foreign press and didn't respond to repeated written questions about Red Force. But in state-controlled local press reports, the League's Central Committee has identified Red Force as a top model program.
It targets young people like Mr. Li, who found the league's sober communist morality lessons of little help in the face of a jobs crisis. "The biggest influence of the youth league to me is [teaching me] to love the country and love the Party," says Mr. Li.
A 22-year-old from a lower-middle-class family in Guzhen county, he says his parents, whose lives were largely directed by the state, promised him "full freedom to design my own life." But lately, choosing his dream career -- be it as an army officer or a tycoon -- has given way to finding a job of any sort at all.
"Job-hunting is getting tougher nowadays," says the e-commerce student at Mingxing College, who will graduate in the spring. "I can feel the stress on campus."
One year in, Red Force's training sessions are so popular it has had to turn students away. At a Beijing session last month, Ogilvy staff taught the entire two-day seminar, beginning with a lecture on communication and personality style, as well as an overview of mantras of Ogilvy corporate culture: "Deliver your brand to the last mile," repeated Ogilvy executive Jeffrey Wu.
Students listened to four hours of case studies on how to promote everything from fruit to phones, all the while scribbling notes on the vocabulary of marketing. There was "P.O.P." (point-of-purchase display), "on-site events," and even "promotion girls" -- the attractive women hired to sit at bars with products to "become friends with the customers."
There was to be a test on all of this: an assignment, given on the last day, to create a promotional event proposal for an imaginary youth brand. Those who e-mailed in a report would be considered for future employment by Red Force.
As an enticement, Ms. Kuo closed the session by offering a few jobs right away. "We are holding a promotional event for Swatch and need four promotion girls to help," said Ms. Kuo. "The requirements are to be at least 160 centimeters [5 feet 4 inches] tall, and have no distinguishable [regional] accent." Amid cheers from the auditorium, dozens of girls swarmed around Ms. Kuo to sign up.
To Ogilvy, which already has about 2,000 employees in China, Red Force is serious business. The agency has developed roots in China since it agreed to a joint venture with the Shanghai government in 1991. Like big clients, including Unilever and Motorola, it wants to extend its reach into China's hundreds of smaller cities.
"If Ogilvy had to build that network on our own, it would take years. But our clients cannot wait -- and the market cannot wait," says Ogilvy's Ms. Kuo.
For example, Hong Kong Disneyland, which plans to open China's first Disney theme park in September, hired Red Force to hold six storytelling sessions with children in southern China. Red Force members at the youth league's "youth palaces" read aloud "The Prince and the Pauper" and guided potential Disneyland vacationers to draw pictures of Mickey Mouse, sing Mickey songs, and meet Mickey.
"This is an innovative way to use established infrastructure to reach out to kids in China -- like YMCA in the U.S. -- to involve the children through community activities and provide a positive learning experience that aims to instill creativity and imagination among kids," says Disneyland spokeswoman Esther Wong.
Ta Lina, a public-relations student at Beijing Communications University, says she sat in the front row of the December Red Force training seminar because she appreciated Ogilvy's prestige. David Ogilvy, the British advertising legend who founded the agency and created the classic "man in the Hathaway shirt" campaign, is a hero in China. Ms. Ta, who is 22, has read three of his books translated into Chinese, all of which were national bestsellers.
Ms. Ta sees marketing as a ticket to opportunity -- and away from her backwoods hometown of Hohhat in Inner Mongola. "I think the PR and advertising industry in China will be very large. I'll have many opportunities to get a good job," she says in perfect English. "I want to be independent, and make my own life."
¶ 9:50 AM 0 comments
1.24.2005
You know you're old
when you learn about new obscene hand gestures the kids are making from The New Yorker.
On the other hand, there is a certain pride in not knowing that. ¶ 7:38 PM 0 comments
On the other hand, there is a certain pride in not knowing that. ¶ 7:38 PM 0 comments
1.22.2005
"I'm not asleep"
Somewhere, my father is laughing at me for all the times I said "I'm not asleep!" as he tried to tip-toe out of the room. Well, not somewhere. Upstairs.
¶ 9:12 PM 0 comments
1.21.2005
having a sick kid sucks
and she's just got a little tummy virus, not even anything serious as far as we can tell. but still...
¶ 8:08 PM 0 comments
1.20.2005
Rick Perlstein calls it
Once again, the insightful Rick Perlstein lays out the future, which is getting small enough to be drowned in the bathtub...
¶ 9:33 PM 0 comments
Joe Biden -- plagarist and wuss
Remember the whole Joe Biden plagarism thing? Well, for a brief shining moment there back when he was interrogating Paul Wolfowitz in hislast senate appearance, he looked like he might have both a conscience and a backbone. Actually, he looked like he might come over the table and attack him. But what did he do yesterday? Vote to confirm Condi Rice, while Kerry and Boxer had the sack to vote against her.
Uh, Democrats, being an OPPOSITION party means OPPOSING the ruling party. 49.9% of the country agrees with you. You are not alone, Democrats. Stand the fuck up on your hind legs and be an OPPOSITION party.
Beats being a whipped poodle.
argh ¶ 1:03 PM 0 comments
Uh, Democrats, being an OPPOSITION party means OPPOSING the ruling party. 49.9% of the country agrees with you. You are not alone, Democrats. Stand the fuck up on your hind legs and be an OPPOSITION party.
Beats being a whipped poodle.
argh ¶ 1:03 PM 0 comments
City mouse, country mouse...
So as we watch El Presidente Arbusto take office yet again, we are reminded of the great city-mouse/country-mouse divide that put him there. Blue cities, red hinterland. So for today, the country mice have won...
¶ 1:00 PM 0 comments
1.19.2005
www.notonedamndime.com
This kind of stuff is only useful in the sense that it keeps people who are already established in their opposition feeling like they belong to a community. It will have absolutely zero effect on the Bush admin directly, and the fact that there is a substantial portion of the population (roughly 40%) that is virulently opposed to Bush is already widely known and not news, so it won't even be a media event.
If it became a media event, it could easily be spun as something that hurts small business owners and demonstrates "typical liberal arrogance."
Everyone would be better off wearing shirts that say "I'm here, where is W?" and volunteering at a homeless shelter or something.
But really, what liberals need to do is stop thinking in terms of public protest and role up their sleeves and do what the Republicans did after Goldwater. Start at the local level, build an infrastructure, and think in 50 year time-lines. Heck, it only took 16 years to get from Lyndon Johnson's win in 1964 to Ronald Reagan's in 1980, and we've essentially been living under a Reaganesque system ever since... ¶ 3:58 PM 0 comments
If it became a media event, it could easily be spun as something that hurts small business owners and demonstrates "typical liberal arrogance."
Everyone would be better off wearing shirts that say "I'm here, where is W?" and volunteering at a homeless shelter or something.
But really, what liberals need to do is stop thinking in terms of public protest and role up their sleeves and do what the Republicans did after Goldwater. Start at the local level, build an infrastructure, and think in 50 year time-lines. Heck, it only took 16 years to get from Lyndon Johnson's win in 1964 to Ronald Reagan's in 1980, and we've essentially been living under a Reaganesque system ever since... ¶ 3:58 PM 0 comments
Blogger sucks today
I've had like three posts not go through just now, and they were so inconsequential to begin with, I can't bear to repost them. I maintain my daughter's blog in plaintext HTML with an FTP to an IPP and it works every damn time.
¶ 3:36 PM 0 comments
Don't go see "Appleseed"
My friend Woodie encourages everyone not to go see "Appleseed" a recently dubbed-into-english anime film that was not just ruined but completely destroyed by bad acting and voice characterization. Says Woodie "This can can only appeal to porn-and-violence-addled fanboys who've never read a book that wasn't published by Del Rey." So, consider yourselves warned.
¶ 3:36 PM 0 comments
Home office etiquette
What do you do when your home office has a window that faces your front door, you're on a teleconference making a presentation, and the UPS guy is ringing your bell and doesn't see your frantic hand signals to just leave your box of toner on the doorstep?
¶ 3:31 PM 0 comments
1.18.2005
Rachel Ray Interview
My 20-month old daughter is obsessed with Rachel Ray of the Food Network. Here's a weird interview that I found online.
I think I liked her better in the old episodes before she started wearing so much lip gloss...
¶ 10:45 PM 0 comments
I think I liked her better in the old episodes before she started wearing so much lip gloss...
¶ 10:45 PM 0 comments
Some good blogs...
See, this blog isn't really very good yet. I just started it, and also, I'm not really personally committed to the whole confessional blah blah that blogs imply. My friend Chris has an interesting blog, though, that you can check out while you wait for me to get off my ass and write something amusing, witty, trenchant, etc.
¶ 10:42 PM 0 comments
Kroooooooooog
What does it mean that the only people in the national media who have the balls to tell the truth about Bush's "big lie" strategy are a Princeton economics professor (Paul Krugman) and a comedy show host (Jon Stewart)?
¶ 10:39 PM 0 comments
¶ 10:39 PM 0 comments
