Movies stumble at end of Republican administrations (but music does okay)

Something that comes to mind is that artists tend to be overwhelmingly liberal. I was looking today at the list of Golden Globe nominees, and while actually I haven't seen any of the movies, I was wondering why it seems to be such a bad year for movies of substance that I am interested in seeing.

I also know that I hardly know of any good movies from the Reagan years.

Putting these random pieces of data together: poof, my new theorem is that the movies tend to suck in Republican administrations especially towards the end.

The reason is that the liberal artists are so frustrated and angry with the government that they get distracted and go to protests and spend time helping the Dems get elected that the movies suffer.

On the other hand, I think music tends to still be pretty good in Republican years. I think it's because music is a better medium for protest, and doesn't require such a huge undertaking as a movie does.

For men, prospective female mates can't be too smart

NYT More than 10 years ago, I heard that an ex-employee in my department had once commented that he wanted to marry a girl that was dumber than him and shorter than him -- this despite the fact that he was pretty short and people also questioned his mental faculties. He be waiting a long time, people snidely remarked. However, this lends credence to data cited by Dowd in this piece (from an earlier article in the Times) that men just like to marry someone not quite as smart or ambitious as them. They just generally don't go around saying it.

I wonder though for me that if I were to wait for someone smarter than me, I would be waiting a long time. :)

On the other hand, why should I discriminate? Gays have be trading the need for submission or dominance for versatility for a long time.

Dems should stop with the objective reasoning and go for the kill

Link A couple of the examples in the article seem to make sense. Perhaps one of the hallmarks of the Dems approach is to try to use logic to persuade -- even though it's supposed to be the mommy party (Ok, I won't say that again). I like the idea of adopting the sneaky tricks of the Republicans to go after emotions. We need a campaign that goes after the non-intellectual masses of Americans in a simple basic way. No more high road, just go after the knee jerk low road reaction.

For example, not gun control, it's stopping terrorism. Not abortion, but reducing recent-immigrant population growth. Not hate crimes legislations, but equal nightclub accessibility. And haven't you realized that Bush and the Republicans are f*cking idiots. Don't be an idiot.

Laughter as a social lubricant

Permalink A study shows the reason why a nervous laugh can be normal.

People who don't like intimacy? schizoid?

Link A NY Times article about a psychotherapist who met a severely introverted man who attempted suicide after being pressured to have a girlfriend by his parents at the age of 35. The doctor believed the man just didn't take well to dealing with people. I can sort of empathize -- I mean people can be trouble, but dealing with them is at least interesting, at best fun and at worst frustrating, still nothing worth doing oneself in over. But I digress, the psychotherapist basically disputes the widely held idea that one should force such people to conform to norms by being more "normally" social. He said what was best for this guy was just to leave him be. Seems sensible to me. Plus, maybe the guy was gay.