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Ginandtacos feels compelled to note the passing of Aaron Hawkins, the 34 year-old U of I graduate who was the mind behind Uppity-Negro.com.

Better writers and closer friends have said more than we could say, so we will content ourselves with stating the obvious: Hawkins and his website will be missed.
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A lot.

It must really suck to be a deer in today's world. With sprawl, pollution and ecosystems in disarray life must be hard on poor Bambi. And at 12:01am Monday, it's about to get even worse – because that's when the Clinton passed Assult Rifle Ban is set to be repealed.

I mention deer only because while doing research about the topic I came across this post by user JesusCyborg on a gun board: "You don't think guns are awesome? Well to each their own. I do. I can't wait to get my hands on an assault rifle so I can pump some deer full of lead."

So maybe that is that. Maybe a bunch of rednecks will take uzis and AK-47s into the woods and hunt nature the way we conduct our foreign policy: with overwhelming unilateral military force (will the deer will have to wage an asymmetrical war, kidnapping journalists and getting box cutters that fit in hooves?). Maybe there is nothing to really fear here.

But the police, who probably have more of an expertise than 'jesuscyborg' in these matters, disagree. There is talk of a more 'militaristic' approach to policing. Armored vehicles will become more prevalent among law enforcement. AV's will have to become standard for simple robbery cases. As anyone who has been around law enforcement or guns knows, there is a world of difference from a deer rifle and an uzi, if only for the mental state of the person holding it. As the man points out above, guns are 'awesome', and bigger assult rifles in your hands are the equivalent of a hit of PCP in the "I can take on 6 cops" department.

above: what the framers had in mind.

Will the government step in? "I think the will of the American people is consistent with letting it expire, so it will expire" said majority leader Senator Bill Frist of Tennessee. "If the president asked me, it would still be no," chirped in Representative Tom DeLay of Texas. President Bush said he supports a renewal and would sign it, but he hasn't pushed very hard. Or at all for that matter. Great job having it both ways; I hope no crackheads jump you with an Uzi on the way to cash all those NRA checks.

"But Mike, even with the ban criminals already have access to these guns if they want them." Maybe my formal background in math logic is working against me, but doesn't then repealing the ban mean even more criminals will have access to them? And worse, with the market flooded won't prices drop, allowing your more broke, desperate and likely to shoot you for a Social Security check variety of criminals larger access to these weapons? And isn't that a bad thing? There is only so much you can argue the tautology "more access will result in more access."

"But Mike, with the weapon ban repealed I can purchase assult rifles to protect my wife, children and three-step ranch home." That is an excellent point, and ginandtacos.com would love to help you out. Now for various PR reasons, the gun industry is keeping it's mouth shut with how much it is salivating at the idea of expanding this market come Monday, so it is hard (and techinically still illegal) to find places online where you can order these guns. And legally (damn Clinton!) guns of this nature that are produced before Monday have to be 'marked' with law enforcement stickering, reducing their sales worth, so we have a few more days before actual production. But come the time, we will have a running list of online ordering sites for the new weapons with which you can "shock and awe" the deer, cheating spouses and late-night gas station attendees of America.

Until then, here are the semi-automatic fruits of what is to come:

Israel Military Industries is expected to re-introduce theUzi (link to catalog model) to the US, along with other new models.

Illinois's very own Aramlite released a press statement, saying that orders are going out now with empty slots for flash suppressors and bayonet slugs (both illegal under the Clinton law), and a certificate for a free install of both if it was to ever become legal again. Like say Monday.

I'm not a hunter, but do people ever bayonet deer? more to come.

From: Erik Martin
To: mike

There comes a point in every man's life when his girlfriend gets off of work at 9 oclock in the pm in Champaign, and he decides he must call mike in Chicago to see if he can get show times for a movie. It is not often that such a movie exists that warrents this type of behavior, but last friday such a cinematic masterpiece was showing.

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Courtesy of our friends over at shykiss.com:

I've shit out things more attractive than that. I wonder what manner of guy gives money randomly to the busted girls on the internet? I mean, it's already a matter of degrees: there are, you know, normal people who talk to actual live humans, and then there are creepy guys who sit around and stalk hot girls on the internet.

But what kind of guy stalks the ones who have bodies like Gumby and could probably drive a Winnebago up the vadge they use to get people to like them?

Is there some subcategory of guy who is somehow not "cool" enough for the decent looking internet porn headcases?
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Perhaps ginandtacos should branch out into this booming Ugly Porn industry…..
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it's like the Valley of Broken Toys, only more saggy and shapeless.

I have no idea what everyone is talking about with "Sky Captain and the City of Tomorrow." Critics appear to be loving the movie as it is an almost totally digital experience that isn't a complete failure (a la the recent rash of Star Wars prequels and the two Matrix sequels). I'm not cynical enough where I can associate "not a failure" with "good" – even for Hollywood summer releases.

This movie invokes a world of sci-fi serials and images of what people in the 1930s would have thought the future to look like, but it falls flat after that.

I wasn't looking for much, but the two basic rules of making an American adventure popcorn movie is (a) make the lead likable and (b) bring the audience into all the excitement. Jude Law is given a lot of time to look pretty, but doesn't have any sense of anything other than male model about him. Any excitement to be had is sucked away by the digital effects – but not for the reason that most of these movies fail with too many special effects.

The coloring of the film is where effects work has been done.
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Everything has a deep saturation to it; newsrooms are all in brown, skylines blue, etc.
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The lighting is done in a way that it looks good – technically that's a feat. The highlights don't bleed into the whites, the characters all look sharp, and everything has it's proper hue. I guess some critics were drawn in by this look of vintage sci-fi magazines aged to odd colors in old bookstores – I had the opposite reaction.

All the odd coloring kept me at a distance. With everyone visually at odds to me, I couldn't really feel one thing or the other for anybody. This is fine for the first act or so, but at some point they should have dropped the heavy effects and let the audience actually enjoy the story and characters. The story being kinda dumb doesn't help. Not even Angelina Jolie, in an outfit suitable for female comic book characters and/or sex industry workers, could make this movie interesting.

Skip it.

Work today sucks. These links do not.

1) Dave Kehr's New DVD reviews. I'm a huge fan of Dave Kehr. His reviews for the chicago reader and the chicago tribune from 74-92 still stand strong today. He's a brilliant critic, with just enough theory and humor behind his writing to get you to think about your favorite movies in a brand new way. However, ever since taking off for New York he hasn't found a good venue for himself (outside of Film Comment). He's been reduced to doing bi-weekly profiles for the New York Times; nobody from Chicago should have to take a backseat to Janet Maslin and her nytimes cronies.

Now he has finally found his outlet. Every Tuesday he reviews the latest DVDs coming out. With the way DVDs are now perfectly timed to theaterical releases and other DVDs, he can take jabs at what is playing at the weekly googloplex or form a column of serial reviews around a singular idea. That link has all of his columns (scroll down) for free in the backlog. It's probably the most entertaining and clever writing on movies that is done weekly – Enjoy!

2) William Shatner covering Pulp's Common People. Either you get it or you don't. This is the first track off his upcoming album, Has Been (shorter clips at that website), which will feature duets with Aimee Mann, Ben Folds (also the producer), and Henry Rollins among others.

If you don't get it, but want to try, I'd recommend renting the movie Free Enterprise. The movie stars a very young Eric McCormack, who is no doubt embarrassed as hell that this movie was one of his first starring roles. For those who already get it, Star Trek Series One Season One is now available in stores!

I used to be the biggest Next Gen fan, but as I get older I'm far more into the original series. The Next Gen is very, to put it bluntly, corporate, with all the staff meetings and flat hierarchies and team-building tasks. There's a lot of problem solving through communication between teams and rational dialogue. The original series has a lot more fighting and go-go dancers. The set design is straight out of an Eero Saarinen retrospective, and the special effects are campy beyond belief. And there is almost always someone in a rubber lizard suit chasing people. What world would you rather live in?

Yes, we all know that super stores in the United States are some of the most surreal places known to man. Nearly everyone I know used to go to Meijer (midwestern superstore) ages ago with no shopping agenda, just to pass some time in awe and wonderment at the fact that they could literally buy anything.

However, with the recent growth of super Walmarts and the whatnot, the novelty has sort of worn off.
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Well, these stores couldn't let that happen could they? There is no way that they could just let our interest in their mind numbing absurdity wane.

It recently came to my attention that in Boise Idaho…..

a couple was married in a Walmart!

This is one of those moments that you really wish you were kidding.

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You are desperately hoping that someone is playing a horrible joke on you. However, in the words of the bride:

"It never dawned on me to have it anyplace else."

Yes clearly what they were actually thinking is that all of their friends and relatives are lazy and cheap. They were going to put off buying a wedding gift until the absolute last minute, and they desperately wanted a bargain.

Speaking of bargains, some people choose to start their married life at Walmart while others apparently would like to end theirs at…

Costco's Universal Casket Department?


There is little room left to make fun of this. We stepped into this story a bit late, every news source in the country has already made all the relevant jokes- particularly those in Chicago where the market is being tested. One of my favorite was when WLS radio personality Roe Conn asked the question: "when are they going to go on sale? Perhaps around the holiday season?"

Some sources are skeptical that Costco can actually successfully break into the casket business:

"Third-party suppliers have been around for a while now," said Walkinshaw. "Costco is pricing caskets at $800, but many funeral homes offer caskets for much less than that amount. I don't think this will change the landscape of the market."

Yeah, so anyway, America’s superstores, for all your marriage and death needs.

1) A Message From White House West. Everyone may have already seen this, but in case you haven't do yourself the favor. You can right click on the quicktime links to save it to your computer, which is a good idea as you'll end up watching this a hundred times.

I'm trying to find video of Farrell at a recent fundraiser for the Natural Resources Defense Council, where he dressed in the flight suit to do the Bush impression. Look at that picture – is Will Farrell funny at everything? And for the love of god, go see Ron Burgandy again already.

2) The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou Trailer. I'm so excited for this movie. The setups, framing and costuming (not to mention facial hair) of Wes Anderson's movies grows continuously bizarre. I remember one of my favorite memories of seeing Bottle Rocket was the yellow jumpsuits and bizarre Texas backgrounds – everything was so stylized yet so natural. You used to be able to order those jumpsuits but they they have since been discontinued.

Each subsequent movie has upped the ante in these areas, and this movie is no different. Watch that trailer again. Notice the Zs in the black sweaters. Notice how the acedemic panel ("revenge.") has a 16th century Italian Master type painting for the background and is set in an opera hall – not exactly what I picture when I think academia. When they have the "Bill Murray" title for the credits look at the background of his office setting – there's a whale turning over! Some people criticized Royal Tenenbaums for being too much an excercise in style, but I say bring it on. The actors are top notch and can definitely fill out the amazing scenery. And the facial hair.

side note: It's co-written with Noah Baumbach, whose Kicking and Screaming is easily my favorite of the mid-90s Miramax-funded "people in their mid 20s saying Very Clever Things while Hanging Out" genre. A friend pointed out that because of the 1995 movie's wonderful "I haven't been-to-Prague been-to-Prague" speech (the first clip under K&S here) everyone who has moved to Prague since then – and I know more than a few – should at least admit that they are being a bit of a cliché. And maybe even apologize.

I knew one guy who was reading "The Unbearable Lightness of Being" before moving over to Prague. The movie called doing that a cliché back then, and this guy was doing it in 2002. I told him that the book was a bad guide as the Soviets were no longer occupying the country. I don't think he got it.

1)

Public Schools Have Higher Test Scores Than Private Schools

For some of you this may be a bombshell, but for all of you who went through the Catholic High School System this should be no surprise: Charter Schools have lower test scores than similar Public Schools. The report was put together by the American Federation of Teachers using the government's own numbers, and is reprinted here. Evidently the government delayed released the charter school's scores until the last possible moment.

Everyone I know who went through a public high school, no matter where they stand on the No Child act or school vouchers, will generally accept the argument that private schools are better than public ones. I went to a (Catholic) private school, and never accepted that for a second. Nevermind the idea that you can mandate religion classes instead of, say, writing or reading classes. Whenever you run something for a profit you are bound to cut corners and get creative in improving your bottom line in ways that do nothing to help with education (was anyone else subject to the daily 30 minutes of commerical watching that was the Channel One experience?).

2)

Governor Blagojevich to Pharmaceutical Industry: Fuck You.

Sometimes I'm damn proud to live in Illinois. Yup, our Governor is starting a (perhaps illegal) program to import drugs from Canada and European countries at a cheaper rate. "The federal government has failed to act," Gov. Blagojevich said in a statement. "So it's time that we do."

Don't even get me started on the nonsense of this debate. I absolutely hate that the Pharmaceutical Industry wraps itself in the Free Market rhetoric while they remain the most protected industry this side of New Deal agriculture. Bush moves to change tariffs a point to help protect U.S. steel and everyone shits themselves. An army of lobbyists push the President to make it illegal to import a product at a cheaper price from a foreign source (imagine him doing that to semiconductors from China!?!?!?!?) and sign a bill that prevents Medicare from negotiating lower drug prices and nobody blinks. Granted, I'm not a big city economist, but the idea that the government should be working very hard to artificially keep prices high seems a bit off.

And don't give me the "they need the money for research" scare tactic either. If anyone produces the cure for cancer or AIDS I'll post a mea culpa immediately. But the extra funds for research line is such a canard. Nevermind that the NIH, through taxpayer dollars, does a significant amount of the research that is then bought out by the industry. Some estimates say that a third of drugs marketed by the major drug companies are now licensed from universities or small biotech companies. What's more important is that so much of the research goes to changing existing drugs just enough to re-patent them. Quote Dr. Sharon Levine, associate executive director of the Kaiser Permanente Medical Group:

If I'm a manufacturer and I can change one molecule and get another twenty years of patent rights, and convince physicians to prescribe and consumers to demand the next form of Prilosec, or weekly Prozac instead of daily Prozac, just as my patent expires, then why would I be spending money on a lot less certain endeavor, which is looking for brand-new drugs?

Which is why millions and millions of dollars is spent R&Ding Clarinex, so that it can get out the same year as Claritin loses it's patent; nevermind that it's virtually the same drug that produces the same effects (the same can be said about Prilosec/Nexium and a million other combos). I'm sure somewhere the AIDS vaccine is in its final test stages.

But perhaps I'm being mean. Years of ripping off Americans with inflated rates for drugs has finally cultimated in one scientific breakthrough: we now have the means to keep Mike Ditka's cock rock hard throughout the night.

And you gotta love that.