Author: colter

As if to underline my “you never know” statement about the Virginia Tech[1] shooter, along comes a story about some weirdness at the Dallas Press Club, where recently departed President Elizabeth Albanese turns out to be the center of a scandal involving potentially nonexistant awards judges, a history of mental illness and an interstate rap sheet.

I have worked with Elizabeth for the last three years on the website for the annual Katie Awards, honoring excellence in regional journalism and media. She was one of the better clients I’ve worked for; she always seemed to keep a lot of plates spinning without complaint or error. She was always pleasant and positive and appreciative. I never would have suspected that she might commit fraud. The article is long and informative, so I’ll leave that up to you to read. Suffice it to say that it looks like she’ll be in a heap of trouble and the Katie Awards may be devalued right out of existence.

You just never know.

1.) Notice I didn’t say “VT,” because I keep reading that as “Vermont” when I see it, and suddenly in my mind the pastoral tranquility of Vermont is shattered by more random violence.

So, another rampage in the US by a heavily armed nerd. Like Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris before him, Cho Seung-hui has been described as an outcast, someone who apparently held a significant grudge against the upper caste of his social environment. The pundits, like the rest of us, are trying to figure out what causes this sort of thing, what are the warning signs, how can we prevent this in the future? Is there a causal connection between the video games and the music and the movies and this aberrant behavior?

I think the truth is, you never really know. You can look at a guy’s life and point to particulars and try to connect the dots and run the numbers, but lots of equations start with nerd + violent games + heavy metal, and thus far only a handful have equaled multiple homicide. From my group of friends, that equation has equaled doctor, lawyer, and cheese specialist/film editor (or whatever the hell Flounder is up to these days).

You can look for outward signs, but our interior lives are our private universes and most people probably have things they’ll never tell another living soul, ever. Even blogs only hint at people’s secrets. If you happened upon a typically nerdy blog entry like this, you’d never guess the author was a confessed rapist, murderer and would-be cannibal.

We’re just going to have to deal with the fact that sometimes there’s nothing you can do. Sometimes there are no signs. Sometimes people just crack.

Russian billionaire Boris Berezovsky has been quoted as saying he intends to finance the overthrow of President Vladimir Putin. He admits to having spent $50 million on the Ukrainian “Orange Revolution” of 2004. He expects the coming revolution will cost him around half a billion dollars.

Pause for a moment to consider that Russia spent much of the early 20th century having to contend with working-class proletariat revolutionaries, and now at the dawn of the 21st century it has to deal with a billionaire. What can we glean from this? The irony runs deep. It tells us that capitalism has worked for some folks in Russia, and while communism is fairly well dead in the former Soviet Republics, the people may yet be freed from the ruling iron fist of Putin by a member of the super-bourgeoisie.

While we’re on the subject of Russian history, check out these amazing propaganda posters from various phases of Russia’s history.

My Pittsburgher bowl cut sister from another mother posted this breath of fresh, fiery air regarding the Don Imus teapot tempest that I have to pass it along. It is a column by Kansas City Star writer Jason Whitlock, and this provides a nice summary of his rant:

“I don’t listen or watch Imus’ show regularly. Has he at any point glorified selling crack cocaine to black women? Has he celebrated black men shooting each other randomly? Has he suggested in any way that it’s cool to be a baby-daddy rather than a husband and a parent? Does he tell his listeners that they’re suckers for pursuing education and that they’re selling out their race if they do?

When Imus does any of that, call me and I’ll get upset. Until then, he is what he is — a washed-up shock jock who is very easy to ignore when you’re not looking to be made a victim.

No. We all know where the real battleground is. We know that the gangsta rappers and their followers in the athletic world have far bigger platforms to negatively define us than some old white man with a bad radio show. There’s no money and lots of danger in that battle, so Jesse and Al are going to sit it out.”