Monday, November 11, 2013

Context can be everything

The other night I was driving home and listening to Peter Tilden on talk radio.  He is my favorite weeknight talk show host and I usually find him to be right on the money with the news he discusses.  However, he bought into a conclusion made by another media source and it looks like what he claims was said wasn't what was really said.

What he stated was that Tom Cruise had compared shooting on location to doing a tour of duty in Afghanistan, in terms of the workload and being unable to see his daughter.  After all, he'd read this:  http://www.tmz.com/2013/11/08/tom-cruise-suri-lawsuit-deposition-afghanistan-war-olympics/?adid=hero4.  If you don't want to go to TMZ.com, here's an extract:

As we reported, Cruise recently sat for a deposition in his $50 million libel suit against a magazine publisher that claimed he abandoned daughter Suri -- and his quotes are GOLD.

First, the Middle East -- Tom says his location shoots are just like serving a tour in Afghanistan, "That's what it feels like. And certainly on this last movie, it was brutal. It was brutal."

The problem is, what they reported was taken out of context.  Here's an excerpt from his deposition:

Q.  Now, your counsel had publicly equated your absence from Suri for those extended periods as being analogous to someone fighting in Afghanistan.  Are you aware of that?

MR FIELDS:  Objection to the form of the question.

You may answer.

MS MCNAMARA:  Yeah, you can answer.

A.  I didn't hear the Afghanistan, but that's what it feels like, and certainly on this last movie, it was brutal.  It was brutal.

So he did not say what he was accused of saying.  At least not in those words.  But I still find his statement that his last shoot felt like serving a tour of duty in Afghanistan; because he has no idea of what such a tour is like.  He may face some small risks here and there on-set, but he isn't at risk of being blown to bits by an IED, or taken out by a sniper while on a Search and Destroy mission.  No one is going to attempt to infiltrate his set with the intent of killing every American there.  He isn't living in tents without air conditioning, eating MREs.  Hell, the man hasn't flown on a commercial jet more than once in the last four years.

What he said is not what he's being blamed for saying.  What he did say is still wrong and he should apologize.  Or else embed himself for six months with a combat unit and then come back and see if he still feels the same way.

* * *

Another talk radio host was talking this evening (Sunday) about the tragedy that is going on in the Philippines, where more than 10,000 people have died from Typhoon Haiyan.  He described it as being five times more powerful than Hurricane Katrina and intimated that all the problems that those of us who aren't dealing with the storm's aftereffects are trivial in comparison.

They may be.  I'm sure that my issues involving health, finances and the strain of trying to work part-time are nothing compared to someone who has lost loved ones along with their home.  Who is dealing with nowhere to sleep, no food to eat and nowhere to turn for help.

I don't want to minimalize this event either, but it needs to be placed in perspective.  In 1931 there were floods in China that killed somewhere between 1,000,000 and 4,000,000.  In 1887, when the world's population was not even 1/3rd of what it is today, over one million people died when the Yellow River flooded.  That was 0.005% of the entire population of the world at the time.  Even if the death toll of Typhoon Haiyan were to triple to 30,000, it would still be "only" 0.00043% of the total population of the world.

Every single life lost is precious and a tragedy.  But the hyperbole has got to stop.  When someone is depressed, they don't need to hear someone ranting at them that their problems are insignificant in comparison to the difficulties being faced by victims of a natural disaster.

Five years ago, tropical cyclone Nargis caused over $10 billion in damage and killed more than 138,000 people.  It was barely a blip on the news here.  Where was the hyperbole about a storm that may have killed five times as many people as Typhoon Haiyan did?

* * *

Random Ponderings:

If you're teaching someone, should you worry as the course approaches the end and they are still struggling with things you would think would be second nature by now?

How could someone on a trivia game on television not know that Leatherface came before Jason Voorhees and Michael Meyers?

I don't know why the four survivors from the famed Doolittle Raid are calling their reunion this weekend the "final" reunion, but I salute their bravery, courage and longevity.  Their bold, daring mission inspired a nation.  RIP, Lt Col Doolittle.

If Tim Tebow moves to the broadcast booth as he is rumored to be doing, will they create a "Tebow-cam" to catch him doing his signature move?

Jimmy Kimmel doesn't deserve to be fired for what a child says on his program.  Choosing to allow children on the show without being able to censor/edit their remarks might be a firing offense though.  It was a bad decision, but he did not advocate or endorse genocide.

Apparently CBS is using one of its hour-long dramas in determining how to handle their erroneous reporting on what happened in Benghazi.  The main character on "NCIS" has a strict policy of never apologizing and so far the network won't apologize for its error in this report.  What was said by Lara Logan on tonight's episode of 60 Minutes was not a real apology.

If Richie Incognito really believes he was Jonathan Martin's "best friend" on the Miami Dolphins, I'd hate to see how he treats his worst enemy.

* * *

November 10th in History:

1202 – Fourth Crusade: Despite letters from Pope Innocent III forbidding it and threatening excommunication, Catholic crusaders begin a siege of the Catholic city of Zara (now Zadar, Croatia).
1293 – Raden Wijaya is crowned as the first monarch of Majapahit kingdom of Java, taking throne name Kertarajasa Jayawardhana.
1444 – Battle of Varna: The crusading forces of King Vladislaus III of Varna (aka Ulaszlo I of Hungary and Wladyslaw III of Poland) are crushed by the Turks under Sultan Murad II and Vladislaus is killed.
1520 – Danish King Christian II executes dozens of people in the Stockholm Bloodbath after a successful invasion of Sweden.
1580 – After a three-day siege, the English Army beheads over 600 Papal soldiers and civilians at Dún an Óir, Ireland.
1619 – René Descartes has the dreams that inspire his Meditations on First Philosophy.
1659 – Chattrapati Shivaji Maharaj, Maratha King kills Afzal Khan, Adilshahi in the battle popularly known as Battle of Pratapgarh. This is also recognised as the first defence of Swarajya
1674 – Anglo-Dutch War: As provided in the Treaty of Westminster, Netherlands cedes New Netherlands to England.
1702 – English colonists under the command of James Moore besiege Spanish St. Augustine during Queen Anne's War.
1766 – The last colonial governor of New Jersey, William Franklin, signs the charter of Queen's College (later renamed Rutgers University).
1775 – The United States Marine Corps is founded at Tun Tavern in Philadelphia by Samuel Nicholas.
1793 – A Goddess of Reason is proclaimed by the French Convention at the suggestion of Chaumette.
1821 – Cry of Independence by Rufina Alfaro at La Villa de Los Santos, Panama setting into motion a revolt which lead to Panama's independence from Spain and to it immediately becoming part of Colombia
1847 – The passenger ship Stephen Whitney is wrecked in thick fog off the southern coast of Ireland, killing 92 of the 110 on board. The disaster results in the construction of the Fastnet Rock lighthouse.
1865 – Major Henry Wirz, the superintendent of a prison camp in Andersonville, Georgia, is hanged, becoming the only American Civil War soldier executed for war crimes.
1871 – Henry Morton Stanley locates missing explorer and missionary, Dr. David Livingstone in Ujiji, near Lake Tanganyika, famously greeting him with the words, "Dr. Livingstone, I presume?".
1898 – Beginning of the Wilmington Insurrection of 1898, the only instance of a municipal government being overthrown in US history.
1910 – The date of Thomas A. Davis' opening of the San Diego Army and Navy Academy, though the official founding date is November 23, 1910.
1918 – The Western Union Cable Office in North Sydney, Nova Scotia, receives a top-secret coded message from Europe (that would be sent to Ottawa, Ontario, and Washington, DC) that said on November 11, 1918, all fighting would cease on land, sea and in the air.
1919 – The first national convention of the American Legion is held in Minneapolis, Minnesota, ending on November 12.
1940 – The 1940 Vrancea earthquake strikes Romania killing an estimated 1,000 and injuring approximately 4,000 more.
1942 – World War II: Germany invades Vichy France following French Admiral François Darlan's agreement to an armistice with the Allies in North Africa.
1944 – The ammunition ship USS Mount Hood explodes at Seeadler Harbour, Manus, Admiralty Islands, killing at least 432 and wounding 371.
1945 – Heavy fighting in Surabaya between Indonesian nationalists and returning colonialists after World War II, today celebrated as Heroes' Day (Hari Pahlawan).
1951 – Direct-dial coast-to-coast telephone service begins in the United States.
1954 – U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower dedicates the USMC War Memorial (Iwo Jima memorial) in Arlington National Cemetery.
1958 – The Hope Diamond is donated to the Smithsonian Institution by New York diamond merchant Harry Winston.
1969 – National Educational Television (the predecessor to the Public Broadcasting Service) in the United States debuts the children's television program Sesame Street.
1970 – Vietnam War: Vietnamization – For the first time in five years, an entire week ends with no reports of American combat fatalities in Southeast Asia.
1970 – The Soviet Lunar probe Lunokhod 1 is launched.
1971 – In Cambodia, Khmer Rouge forces attack the city of Phnom Penh and its airport, killing 44, wounding at least 30 and damaging nine aircraft.
1972 – Southern Airways Flight 49 from Birmingham, Alabama is hijacked and, at one point, is threatened with crashing into the nuclear installation at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. After two days, the plane lands in Havana, Cuba, where the hijackers are jailed by Fidel Castro.
1975 – The 729-foot-long freighter SS Edmund Fitzgerald sinks during a storm on Lake Superior, killing all 29 crew on board.
1975 – United Nations Resolution 3379: United Nations General Assembly approves a resolution equating Zionism with racism (the resolution is repealed in December 1991 by Resolution 4686).
1979 – A 106-car Canadian Pacific freight train carrying explosive and poisonous chemicals from Windsor, Ontario, Canada derails in Mississauga, Ontario, Canada just west of Toronto, Ontario, Canada, causing a massive explosion and the largest peacetime evacuation in Canadian history and one of the largest in North American history.
1984 – The first Breeders' Cup takes place at Hollywood Park Racetrack.
1989 – The longtime leader of the People's Republic of Bulgaria Todor Zhivkov is removed from office and replaced by Petar Mladenov.
1989  – German citizens begin to bring the Berlin Wall down
1995 – In Nigeria, playwright and environmental activist Ken Saro-Wiwa, along with eight others from the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (Mosop), are hanged by government forces.
1997 – WorldCom and MCI Communications announce a $37 billion merger (the largest merger in US history at the time).
2006 – Sri Lankan Tamil Parliamentarian Nadarajah Raviraj is assassinated in Colombo.
2006 – The National Museum of the Marine Corps in Quantico, Virginia is opened and dedicated by U.S. President George W. Bush, who announces that Marine Corporal Jason Dunham will receive the Medal of Honor.

Famous Folk Born on November 10th:

Martin Luther
William Hogarth
George Jennings
Gichin Funakoshi
Winston Churchill
Andrei Tupelov
Claude Rains
Jack Northrop
Ernst Otto Fischer
Mikhail Kalashnikov
Russell Johnson (I had no idea he was a WWII veteran...thanks for your service, sir)
Richard Burton
W. E. B. Griffin
Roy Scheider
Lt. Jack Geoghegan
Donna Fargo
Dave Loggins
Ann Reinking
Debra Hill
Jack Clark
Roland Emmerich
Mackenzie Phillips
Vanessa Angel
Michael Jai White
Tracy Morgan
Ellen Pompeo
Brittany Murphy

Movie quotes for this week will be from great "war" films.  Today from "Lawrence of Arabia":


Prince Feisal: Well, General, I will leave you. Major Lawrence doubtless has reports to make upon my people and their weakness, and the need to keep them weak in the British interest... and the French interest too, of course. We must not forget the French now...
General Allenby: [indignantly] I've told you, sir, no such treaty exists.
Prince Feisal: Yes, General, you have lied most bravely, but not convincingly. I know this treaty does exist.
T.E. Lawrence: Treaty, sir?
Prince Feisal: He does it better than you, General. But then, of course, he is almost an Arab.

#2

Auda abu Tayi: It is Auda of the Howitat who speaks.
Sherif Ali: It is Ali of the Harith who answers.
Auda abu Tayi: Harith! Ali, does your father still steal?
Sherif Ali: No. Does Auda take me for one of his own bastards?
Auda abu Tayi: No, there is no resemblance. Alas, you resemble your father.
Sherif Ali: Auda flatters me.
Auda abu Tayi: You're easily flattered. I knew your father well.
Sherif Ali: Did you know your own?

#3

T.E. Lawrence: The Law says the man must die... If he dies, would that content the Howitat?
Auda abu Tayi: Yes.
T.E. Lawrence: Sherif Ali. If none of lord Auda's men harms any of yours, will that content the Harith?
Sherif Ali: Yes.
T.E. Lawrence: Then I will execute the Law. I have no tribe and no one is offended.

#4

Auda abu Tayi: Thine mother mated with a scorpion.