Recently in politics Category

Dear Mr. Shark,

We are delighted to tell you that you have been nominated for a Richard H. Driehaus Foundation Individual Artist Award, the first actual Shark to be thus uhhhmmmmm......'honored'

As Paul Klein has publicized, the City Council is on the verge of passing an ordinance that is bad for Chicago, bad for its citizens and particularly bad for the art community. Sharkforum supports his attempt to organize a challenge to this action.

An alternative ordinance has been proposed that will not be considered unless you act. The following groups are involved: Sharkforum, Bad at Sports, the Chicago Artists Coalition, Lumpen, ArtLetter and others.

I wish to introduce a new word and a new phrase into the international artworld dialogue. The Dictatorship of the Consensoriat. Please assist me by using it every chance you get. Forming neologisms is one of my favorite diversions, especially now that I have been learning Latin. It may be a slightly arcane hobby, but I enjoy it, and terminology can control far more of ones thought processes than we are often happy to admit — therefore, why not grab the bull by the horns and begin to develop our own phrases for what we feel it is necessary to discuss or critique. Shakespeare created words like amazement and radiance, which have become commonplace. These made-up words have stood the test of time because they expressed notions people wanted to articulate, and because they were understandable. Let's hope I can do something similar, if less inspired. In fact, Shakespeare, in his plays, sonnets, and poems, used approximately 17,677 different words —and of those 17,677 words, 1,700 were brand-new, coined by him.

Two recent books make the same powerful case against the current administration in diametrically opposite ways.

“Destined for Destiny”
the Unauthorized Autobiography of George W. Bush
by Scott Dikkers and Peter Hilleren
pub. by Scribner, 167 pp., $19.95

“Out of Iraq”
by William Polk and George S. McGovern
pub. by Simon and Schuster, 143 pp., $15.00

It takes neither Sherlock Holmes, nor Dr. Watson, nor one of the Hounds of the Baskervilles to sniff out the foul stench that has come to comprise the American political debate. Two recent books make this point in different ways. “Destined for Destiny,” by Scott Dikkers and Peter Hilleren, and “Out of Iraq,” by George McGovern and William Polk offer, by turns, gut-busting and sobering views of our current malaise.

ABC, renowned for its blatant pro-Bush and anti-Kerry propaganda during the last election, including its link to the Sinclair Broadcasting group, those radical conservatives behind the Speed-Boat smear, is up to similar tricks with a perfectly-timed, patently bogus "docudrama" on the 9/11 tragedy.

Here's my thoroughly personal report from the conference in Boston. A bit looooong for a blog entry, but short considering all the activities at the conference.

An old saying goes like this:
"What you don't know can't hurt you."

Another favorite amongst artists and pseudo-intellectuals goes something like this:
"What doesn't kill me makes me stronger."

Lately the news has me wondering.

Originally posted December 15, 2005 -- I attended a panel discussion the other day, "Local Engagement: Museum Curators Speak" which featured four "younger" curators (although they weren't all young, and some had been in their posts for a number of years) as part of the ongoing "Artists At Work" series sponsored by the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs under Barbara Koenen's capable supervision. (Check out their excellent website, here,)

Patrick Fitzgerald, U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Illinois since 2001, gets the nod as The National Law Journal's 2005 Lawyer of the Year. Writes the mag's Leigh Jones, "No one else in 2005 roiled politics inside the Beltway and the media that feed on it like the prosecutor from Chicago, Patrick Fitzgerald."

Drunken Santas Run Riot in Auckland