Top 50 (or so) Forelle Flicks

A developing list:
rank, title, (rotten tomotoes %)

1. Amadeus (97%)
   
2. Sling Blade (95%)
   
3. Longitude (80%) kf mini-review
   
4. No Country for Old Men(94%)
5. To Kill a Mockingbird (100%)
6. Seven Samurai (100%)
   
7. Breaking Away (94%)
   
8. Fargo (92%)
9. Ghost World (92%)
   
10. Pulp Fiction (96%)
    
11. L. A. Confidential (98%)
    
12. Bang the Drum Slowly (95%)
13. The General (81) -- severely underrated
    
14. The Maltese Falcon (100%)
    
15. The Big Sleep (94%)
    
16. Silence of the Lambs (95%)
    
17. Frida (75%)
    
18. Shackleton's Antarctic Adventure (not rated)
    
19. Dr. Strangelove (100%)
    
20. The Misfits (100%)
21. Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels (71%) -- severely underrated
    
22. Irma La Douce (88%)
    
23. Lonesome Dove (100%)
    
24. Being John Malkovich (92%)
    
25. Ran (95%)
    
26. Hi Fi (91%)
27. Lonely Are the Brave (100%)
28. It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World (72%)
29. Some Like It Hot (97%)
30. The Player (100%)
31. Risky Business (100%)
32. The Invasion of the Bodysnatchers (100%)
33. Gandhi (85%)
34. Red Rocks West (100%)
    
35. Magnolia (86%)
36. The African Queen (100%)
37. Hear My Song (91%)
38. The Gods Must be Crazy (94%)
39. About Schmidt (85)
    
40. Amelie (90%)
    
41. House of Flying Daggers (88%)
    
42. Raise the Red Lantern (96%)
    
43. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (97%)
44. Once Were Warriors (94%)
45. Defending Your Life (96%)
46. Breaker Morant (100%)
47. The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada (84%)
48. Cat Ballou (100)
    
49. The Unforgiven (96)
    
50. The Spanish Prisoner (89)
    
51. Psycho (98)
    
52. Little Big Man (95)
    
53. The Dish (96)
    
54. The Informer (89)
    
55. The Night of the Iguana (88)
    
56. Zorba the Greek (the other movie in the Dr. Strangelove year)
    
57. Zulu (100)
    
58. About a Boy (94)
    
59. Men in Black (90)
    

Other 100%'ers from Rotten Tomatoes: The Wizard of Oz, The Godfather, Blood Simple, Taxidriver, Apocalypse Now, On the Waterfront, North by Northwest, Airplane!, The Princess Bride, Chinatown, The Birds, Remains of the Day, Cool Hand Luke, Das Boot

Anybody can go with GWTW, Citizen Kain, Lawrence of Arabia, Sound of Music, Clockwork Orange, etc., but they don't need me for their place in the pantheon.

Kucinich - Gravel 2008 . . .

The landslide winners of the white house after dubya's incredibly ill-considered libby leniency.

Why not? The same kind of deal let jimma carter into the white house.

bush has totally diddled the gop for 2008, which leads me to revisit my suspicion that the racketeers currently in the wh plan on holding it by coup. Occam's Razor: The simplest answer that fits all the facts is most likely to be true.

Note: dubya couldn't even do this on the up-and-up. libby still has a quarter-million dollar fine and a criminal record.

Political Asylum

Another tinkering example

---

Given the negative economic and environmental effects of U.S. sugar programs, why do they persist? Because Congress often decides to confer benefits on a favored few at the expense of the general public. In this case, the favored few really are few—about 42 percent of all sugar program benefits go to just 1 percent of sugar growers. These large sugar growers, such as the Fanjuls of Florida, are a notoriously powerful lobbying interest in Washington. Federal supply restrictions have given them monopoly power, and they protect that power by becoming important supporters of presidents, governors, and many members of Congress.
The Washington Post lamented the political corruption caused by the federal “sugar racket.” More than that, sugar policies are a textbook case of economic damage done by big government intervention in the marketplace. -- Chris Edwards

No wonder we're getting pumped full of high fructose corn syrup.

More importantly, this is an excellent example of how a moderate subsidy can end up costing more than 10 times as much at the checkout counter.

Cato Institute Tax & Budget Bulletin

to resist the temptation of tinkering

Russell Roberts at Cafe Hayek addresses another harebrained scheme produced by the inability of humans to resist the temptation of tinkering. He quarrels, correctly imho, with the following proposal:

Globalization has brought huge overall benefits, but earnings for most U.S. workers -- even those with college degrees -- have been falling recently; inequality is greater now than at any other time in the last 70 years. Whatever the cause, the result has been a surge in protectionism. To save globalization, policymakers must spread its gains more widely. The best way to do that is by redistributing income. -- Kenneth Scheve and Matthew Slaughter

YIKES!

Some of it whacky

I have a problem with charlatans who steal defense dollars, who are draining the integrity of science and the credibility of our national defense. The linked article:

Pentagon Spends $78 Billion a Year on Weapons and Space Research, Some of it Whacky,

says that about 10 billion (of 78 billion) a year goes to fringe science like "gay bombs" and psychic teleportation.

In her book "Imaginary Weapons," military expert Sharon Weinberger writes that the federal government is spending taxpayer money on war technology at a pace of about $50,000 per second. -- abc news

So the tab for charlatanism is about $6,000 per second! You can buy a lot of bulletproof vests with that.

Today's mixed metaphor

A caller on npr this morning said, paraphrased, if feinstein and pelosi lived in my neighborhood, they would be singing a different picture.

mixed metaphor -- a combination of two or more metaphors that together produce a ridiculous effect. -- WordNet

My favorite mixed metaphor was when dikembe mutombo described defending against shaquille o'neal as "no walk in the cake."

Mr. Wizard RIP

Back in the day, I could count the people I knew who had teevees on one hand. I always tried to visit when Mr. Wizard was on.

Read Marty Kaplan's remembrance.