Framed

After watching and deconstructing Citizen Kane in class, I found this image on the Movies Subreddit. It features several frames from the film, one of which we analyzed in a discussion. More "9 Frame Films" can be found here. 

When I saw this, I tried to rationalize why the creator of this image would include these shots. Some of these frames show Kane's beginnings, such as the top and middle center.

However, one frame that caught my attention was the top right frame. This shot is when Susan has walked out and Kane is left alone in his empty mansion. his loneliness is emphasized by the tunnel of arches and doorways. He seems to be miles away from the only other person there, separated  by his wealth. 

I'm leaving the rest of the frames open to you. What stands out to you? Post your thoughts in the comments below. 

Agents of Change?

Recently Marvel  revealed a trailer for an upcoming television series called Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. The show is coming to ABC and features members of the government organization in The Avengers. Below is cast photo from the show. 

A cast photo not unlike others shown in class: we have the lead actor, in this case Clark Gregg, in front with the rest of the cast surrounding him. Just to Clark's left is Ming-Na Wen, a Chinese-American actress, who you might know from Mulan. According to the Wikipedia page, she is "an ace pilot and weapons expert." So here we have a minority character who has expertise in essential areas of the S.H.I.E.L.D.organization, possibly giving her some authority over the others in those fields. While the show has yet to air, I hope that it  breaks stereotypes and tokenism that we've seen in so many other shows. 

What do you think? Post your thoughts in the comments below. 

Two Thumbs Up

After 46 years of being a film critic for the Chicago SunTimes, Roger Ebert died at age 70. An  article about his life can be found here. 

A co-inventor of the "thumb up/thumb down" rating, had a passion for film, reviewing up to 306 movies a year. However, Roger Ebert did more than just review films. In 1966, a censorship board prohibited films from being screened in Chicago. Ebert took a stand and "immediately began lobbying for elimination of the censorship board." He helped ease the restrictive measures on certain films in Chicago. More recently, Ebert suggested a revised film rating system to replace the current one used by the MPAA. According to Amy Wallace of the LA Times, he wanted to add modifier to the current ratings to make them more specific and useful to parents. 

Payback

Last week, Tesla Motors announced that it had plans to repay a government loan off early. After borrowing $465 million from the government, Tesla is expected to have paid back the loan by 2017, five years ahead of the previous schedule. The article can be found here.

I think this is a good step for environmentally friendly companies. If Tesla can set a good example, them perhaps others will follow suit. I also hope that Tesla's actions will make others look at green and environmentally friendly technologies as a more feasible and lucrative option. 

However, another part of the article mentioned emission credits, which allow companies to circumvent environmental regulations. Due to the nature of the cars Tesla produces, they surpass the regulations. But companies that don't can buy their way out, and Tesla declined to disclose the companies that did this. I don't think that companies should be able to do this and remain anonymous. They should be held accountable for their shortcomings. 

What do you think? Will Tesla Motor's behavior influence others to accelerate green technology? Should other companies be able to buy out of the regulations? Post you thoughts in the comments below. 

On the Air

This past month,  Justice Sonia Sotomayor has come forward against allowing cameras in the Supreme Court. These cameras would broadcast the courtroom proceedings over television and possibly stream footage to the Internet. The article can be found here.

Sotomayor supports her stance against recording courtrooms with the reasoning that viewers would not understand what was going on. In an interview, she said that  "Very few of them understand what the process is, which is to play devil’s advocate." She believes that someone watching the case at home would not see the full case and make assumptions. A viewer's opinion of her would be skewed without context. 

However, Sotomayor is not the only Justice against this. Justice Elena Kagan also has criticisms about televising the courts: she fears that "people might play to the camera" in  an attempt to make themselves more appealing to the public. I do see why this would be a concern, but witnesses in court are sworn to the truth. However, I don't see why witnesses or defendants playing to the cameras would have any effect on the outcome of the trial. Anyone viewing at home has no bearing on the trial, and both sides are already trying to convince the justices that their side is the right one. Appealing to others would get them nowhere. 

What do you think? Should the public have the ability to see what goes on in America's Supreme Court? do you think camera coverage change anything about the trials? Post your thoughts in the comments below. 

Shots Fired

This past week, former police officer Christopher Jordan Dorner set off a mass police search after attempting to take revenge on the LAPD. On Thursday, a blue Toyota Tacoma became the target for a hail of gunfire by several police officers when  they suspected it was his truck. The article about this can be found here. 

The two occupants of the truck escaped with their lives, but they were injured. Despite this, I still think that a mistake lie this is unacceptable. Had the vehicle in this situation matched Dorner's, I would understand their reaction. However, Dorner's truck that the police were looking for was a gray Nissan Titan. While the two trucks look somewhat similar, the colors were entirely different. The police should have exercised a lot more discretion before opening fire. A show-of-force or other tactic should have been used before shooting. 

What do you think? What could have the officers done differently? Were they right to fire when they did? Post your thoughts in the comments below?

On Target

On Saturday, the White House released a picture of President Barack Obama shooting a shotgun. The picture is from last August when he was at Camp David for his 51st birthday. The accompanying article can be found here.

 

The release of this picture seems like Obama is trying to show that he sympathises with the conservative gun owners. He owns at least one gun, and he knows how to use it. Why would he want to take yours away? Obama also stated that he has " a profound respect for the traditions of hunting." This would suggest that he acknowledges those who advocate for second amendment rights for hunting and sport. 

I think that while it might take a bit more to convince everyone that he isn't completely set on taking away everyone's guns, this is a good step in the right direction. Having evidence that he is familiar with firearms is much better than only saying that he understands them. What do you think? Was releasing this picture a good move for the White House? What results might come from this? Post your thoughts in the comments below .

Prosecuted to Death

On January 11, 2013, Aaron Schwartz, a co-founder of Reddit.com, committed suicide after he was prosecuted for trying to release articles from the database JSTOR. However, a Tumblr by a friend of Schwartz says that while JSTOR dropped the charges, a different "prosecutor had the excuse he needed to continue his war against the “criminal." Instead of dropping the charges like the others, MIT's prosecutor pursued Schwartz as though he committed a much worse crime. I don't think this treatment was fair at all, especially when it drives the defendant to suicide. 

I believe that if the charges had not been so harsh, that Aaron might not have killed himself. I think that the punishment he faced did not fit the "crime" at all. What do you think? Were the charges just? What do you think the prosecutors should have done to better handle the case? Post you  thoughts in the comments below.

Reflecting on the Past

One World Trade Center, left, and nearby buildings are reflected in the glass of the glass façade of the National September 11 Museum in New York, in this file photo.”


This picture, featuring the new One World Trade Center, is an important artifact to recent American history because it depicts America’s resilience. Even though the original towers fell years ago, there is a new building slowing taking their place. Rebuilding in the wake of the tragedy that was 9/11 coincides with the narrative arc that Kurt Vonnegut spoke about “Man in a Hole.” Said plainly, the story goes like this: “somebody gets into trouble, gets out again” (349). This common story theme could be used to describe America after 9/11. We suffered the tragedy of the attack, fell into the proverbial hole, and now we are climbing back up the other side of that hole. We aren’t completely out yet, but we are getting there, as seen from the partially built One World Trade Center. In the drawing Vonnegut made of the “Man in Hole” story arc, the line doesn’t just go back to its original height. In the presentation, Kurt addresses this, saying, “It is not accidental that the line ends up higher than where it began” (349). After 9/11, we aren’t going to be where we were before, but we will be better. Not only are we rebuilding the World Trade Center, but we are building a newer, presumably better building. The new tower in the picture suggests that we can end up higher that before.


Years after the attack, another tower is rising up in the place of the twin towers. I think this shows how life goes on after 9/11. For a while the only thing at the site of Ground Zero was a pit of rubble. But we couldn’t just let it stay like that. We still needed a World Trade Center despite the old one falling. We went on working, and now we have a new one. However, it didn’t take this long for life to start going again. Even during the attack, life went on. An example would be the picture we discussed in class. In that picture, there is a delivery man walking with a package while the towers burn in the background. This man didn’t continue to work because he didn’t care about the tragedy, but because he had to. He had a job, and that needed to be done. America also followed a similar path: We were attacked, but we kept going. We kept working, and life went back to normal for many people.


Just because life went back to normal doesn’t mean that what happened didn’t matter. The museum serves as a reminder of the tragedy that happened that day. However, Foner tells us that 9/11 “drew new attention to essential American elements of the history of American freedom” (1069). Despite the fact that many people died, Foner finds another meaning to the attack, that it emphasized our freedom. Did we lose our freedom because of this attack? No. We lost a few civil liberties, but that’s an entirely different discussion. We kept going, we built another tower. We remained free after the attack. Our freedom showed that the attack didn’t change much in the long run. Foner goes on the say that “freedom is essential to American’s sense of themselves and as a nation” (1069). We didn’t lose our freedom, which is what identifies us as a nation. Fighting back physically against the people who perpetrated the attack may have been hard, but keeping our nation free may have been the best thing we could have done. We lost 3,000 people on 9/11, but despite the loss, we rebuilt the towers, stayed free, and will probably come out on top, above where we were before. The picture of the new tower represents all these things, and for that, is an important artifact in recent American history.

Grounded

This past week, two Boeing 787 planes in Boston experienced problems. Battery fires, fuel leaks, and other problems kept several aircraft on the ground. However, more problems happened in other 787's in other places around the world. More on these incidences can be found in this article. 

While some flaws and defects in a new airplane are expected, these recent events are a bit worrying. The 787 has been out for over a year, and almost 50 have been delivered to airlines.  I know Boeing is doing what it can and will fix whatever caused the failures, but multiple cases like this is disconcerting. 

What do you think? Do you think these problems could have been avoided? Should Boeing have done more to prevent it? Post your thoughts below. 

Paying Off Debt

After Congress gets done dealing with the fiscal cliff, another problem arises: the debt ceiling. But instead of better spending, people are talking about minting a trillion dollar coin to fix the crisis. 

I don't see how this would work at all. Essentially, I see this as printing money to pay off debts. Even the economist in the video said that it wouldn't work in the long run. Congress needs to find a better solution to the debt ceiling than this. Given their previous track record, I don't have high expectations for Congress, and I only hope that they don't go with this ridiculous plan. Even if this plan did manage to work, there would still be $15 trillion more to pay off. I think this plan that it is incredible anyone thinks this would work, and I think Congress needs to work harder on serious issues like these. 

What are your thoughts? Do you think that are better alternatives to the coin? What are they? Why do you think so many are giving this idea credit? Post you thoughts below.