Monday, February 04, 2013

Electric moments

Why did the dome go dark? Was it sabotage? Was the outage linked to the power-intensive halftime show by Beyonce? Was she just too fly? If Americans demanded the same level of accountability of their political leaders that they're demanding of the operational staff at the Louisiana Superdome, we'd have ourselves a government.

-
There was more than a little schadenfreude involved here-- the Superdome got a heavy and immediate influx of cash for rebuilding in the aftermath of Katrina, and results were extraordinary. But getting corporate cash back into the city through the Superdome was seen as the lynchpin of the region's rebuilding effort, and meanwhile, entire neighborhoods, the city block after city block of homes and small businesses that actually give the city its unique culture, went neglected. Even today, seven years later, many of these neighborhoods remain threatened as city leaders decide which New Orleanians they want to welcome back.

-
I didn't bother to watch most of the game, but evidently the 49ers lip-synched the first half, then were able to quickly battle back in the third quarter thanks to the power outage conspiracy. Baltimore finally won out at "The Wire." CBS analyst Dan Marino made out okay too. He fathered another love child during the 34-minute delay.

---

Here's a great article explaining why "30 Rock" dealt with race better than almost every other show on television. It never congratulated us for having come so far, but instead recognized that we've come nowhere close to where we need to be. It recognized the cultural and socioeconomic limitations of an African-American presidency, but also knew that it couldn't exist in its distinct form without it. The conventional wisdom is that TV shows that deal with very topical references, like "30 Rock," wind up aging very badly (see "Murphy Brown"), but I'll be curious to find out in this case. What a funny, funny show. The last episode, which aired Thursday, ranks right up there with the all-time finales. As with "Newhart," the model program for delivering transcendent final episodes, I was busting a gut right up to the closing seconds. Thanks again for everything, Tina Fey. Now quick, do something else.

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home