Campaign ’04: Last Week’s Story Line (Ronnie R.I.P. Extravaganza)

George Wilson Reagan

If you’re not completely burned out on Reagan at this point, here’s another item on the Bush-Reagan bootstrap effort. If you happened to miss it, the Bush campaign website “disappeared” it’s regular home page all last week in favor of a colossal cross -promotional memorial to the Gipper. To...

Conventional Warfare

The “No RNC Poster Project” is planning to blanket New York this summer with posters protesting the Republican Convention. According to their site, the posters will “…be on the streets, in storefronts and apartment windows, on picket signs, everywhere you – or the invading Republicans – look.” To keep...

Short Break

I’m taking advantage of Reagan-o-rama to catch a short break. I’ll be posting again on Saturday. (…By the way, the traffic has been great and so has the feedback. Thanks to everyone for the support!)

Red Handed

Last September, as a guest on Meet The Press, Vice President Cheney was asked if he had any role in Halliburton receiving contracts to help rebuild Iraq. He made a complete denial. Time Magazine, however, has obtained an internal Pentagon e-mail sent by an Army Corps of Engineers official–whose...

Reaganesque

Mark Fiore’s flash cartoon also plays up the “Bush piggyback” theme. Watch it here. And while we’re going for laughs, I thought this post at tomburka.com sums up this week’s interminable Reagan “super sizing.” This is it: GOP To Rename Buildings, Monuments, Schools, President Bush After Reagan Republicans today...

The BAGnews Cartoon: The Lord And The Flies

White House preparing for memorial speech like it’s the Super Bowl. send this cartoon to a friend!

The BAGnews Cartoon: The Lord And The Flies

Bush preparing for funeral speech like it’s the Super Bowl.

Abu Ghraib R Us

Joe Previtera, a twenty one year old student at Boston College, was arrested Wednesday after dressing as a hooded Iraqi prisoner in front of a military recruitment center on Tremont St. in downtown Boston. Apparently, police weren’t amused by the political statement. Previtera faces misdemeanor charges of disturbing the...

Sex And The Shifty

I apologize if I’m late on this, but somehow I hadn’t heard about arch-conservative Lynne Cheney’s homoerotic novel, entitled “Sisters,” until I read Frank Rich’s piece (“Mr. Bush Won’t Be at The Tonys”) in last Sunday’s Times. The graphic above comes from a wonderful layout at whitehouse.org, which has...

Uplink Of An Eye

Yesterday, I mentioned two highly regarded political films aiming for a general audience. I forgot to mention one other. “Control Room,” is a documentary by Jehane Noujaim which premiered at the Sundance Festival in January. (Joujaim was the director of “Startup.com” about the decline and fall of an internet...

Politics As Spectacle: Reagan24/7Reagan24/7Reagan24/7

“The oldest social specialization, the specialization of power, is at the root of the spectacle. The spectacle is thus a specialized activity which speaks for all the others. It is the diplomatic representation of hierarchic society to itself, where all other expression is banned. Here the most modern is...

Starring Big Brother

The challenge of a political film aimed at a broader audience is to be hard hitting without compromising dramatic or entertainment value. The Corporation, favorable reviewed in the the New York Observer, chronicles the most dominant institution in modern culture. According to it’s website, the film “is a critical...

BAGnews Cartoon: As Compared To Reagan

Is the tremendous fawning over Ronald Reagan just nostalgia, or is there more to it? During the last presidential campaign, the Bush people did their best to foster a comparison between Bush Jr. and the Gipper. Perhaps the strong reaction to Reagan’s death this week is as much a...

Mirror Mirror On The Wall, How Badly Do I Want To Get Out Of Here Before This Place Falls Apart?

Is Condi Rice losing it, or is it just her ineptitude showing through? I think it’s the latter. Up until recently, Rice’s preoccupation with appearance (see my previous character analysis) has saved her from seeming out of her league. After the p.r. beating she took during the 9/11 hearings...

Ronald Reagan (1911-2004)

(image: robbie conal)

GOP Getting Bigger Around The Middle?

Ben Smith’s analysis in the May 31 New York Observer seems dead on. Republican moderates seems to be seizing the momentum from the more extreme wing of the party. Whether you’re talking about McCain, Giuliani, Kean, Powell, Spector, Lugar or Schwarznegger, it seems there’s a real power shift going...

BAGnews Cartoon: Dispensing With Authority

send this cartoon to a friend! You have to appreciate Lakhdar Brahimi’s undiplomatic candor. (It’s the same manner Han Blix displayed in the run-up to the war.) In a political situation characterized by duplicity, here is the (supposedly) key player in the “transfer of power” matter-of-factly referring to Paul...