Sentential Links #149

Click these links, or the stock market will go down. Unless it goes up.

:: There are a certain segment of conservatives who literally cannot believe that anybody would see the world differently than the way they do. They have not just forgotten how to persuade; they have forgotten about the necessity of persuasion.


:: Remember when [Mitch] McConnell opposed an open amendment process when Republicans were in the majority? Remember when McConnell used to believe "up or down vote" were the four most important words in the English language? (I hope that when the filibuster shenanigans begin, the Senate Democrats actually force the Republicans to filibuster, instead of using the mere threat to carry the day. I expect the weapon will lose some potency if the evening news is full of footage of Republicans droning on from the Senate floor.)

:: But this is key: never let a fear of failure prevent you from trying – writing or any other creative endeavor. Why? Because we ALL fail. No matter how successful we are we all have our AfterMASH’s and COP ROCKS and STUDIO 60’s. Writing isn’t about winning awards, it’s the need to express yourself. If you have something to say, say it.

:: What cheerful thing shall we talk about today? How about poison!

:: I'm probably going to lose about a thousand coolness points for admitting this, but there was a time, many years ago, when I actually liked the work of -- prepare your gasps of derision now -- Thomas Kinkade. (That's it, he's off the blogroll!)

:: That makes me LAUGH. Cary Grant comparing himself to Gene Wilder - as though they would ever be cast in the same roles. An ordinary chap!! Beautiful!

:: But then part of my resistance to Pine's portrayal of Kirk might be how Abrams has apparently chosen to interpret Kirk, i.e., as a troubled and reckless kid looking for a place to belong. That's not my Kirk. The Kirk of the original series was an explorer at heart; he was driven by duty and the urge to see what was Out There, not a desire to find his "true worth." (Someone e-mailed me to say that since it's a reboot, they pretty much can re-interpret anything they like, which might be true, if not for one thing: Leonard Nimoy is in this movie, which to me implies that we're not actually seeing a Casino Royale-style start-over-at-square-one type of thing, but rather, an attempt to have it both ways. I don't know. This movie is probably its own Kobyashi Maru test for me: even if it's Teh Awesome, I probably won't be able to completely like it.)

:: Novelette: a short story beefed up by an author who couldn't stretch the idea out long enough to make it a novella or novel.

And there we have it. Tune in again next week!