Elliot Crown

Images operate the same way that memories do; images have this deep-seated attachment to your mind and I like to think that the images ingrain themselves into people…It really makes them want to stop for a minute and read the article. And hopefully it’s not a terribly biased article. And hopefully the image, in itself, …

Miami's Community Avengers

Have No Fear the Community Avengers are Here! As the right wing mob mobilizes to shut down democratic debate on health care reform; as Van Jones is forced from the White House through distortions of the truth and plays on racial and political fears; as the recession deepens – the masked marauders known as the …

Oh Yes They Did! – artnet Magazine

My take is a little different. If anything, I think activists are already excessively focused on the media. People often judge the success of a demonstration primarily on how much media coverage it receives, rather than seeing demonstrations as a place to gain confidence, meet people and groups, and build the core of a long-term …

Politics as Product

Happy Spokesmodel Selection Day to one and all. I am certainly not the first to comment on the commodification of American politics in general and this race specifically, but a little more can be said before we’re on the next distraction tomorrow. This election has been primarily a contest between the values of experience and …

Laugh at a Campaign Pitch? Sure. Visit the Grandparents? Not So Much. – NYTimes.com

MIAMI — When Sarah Silverman told young Jews to get their lazy rotund rear ends to Florida to persuade their grandparents to vote for Senator Barack Obama, one question loomed: Would they go? This weekend was the first big test, a kickoff for the so-called Great Schlep, and so far, momentum has been building with …

I’m Rubber, You’re Glue …

by Jonathan Alter Published Aug 23, 2008 From Newsweek magazine issue dated Sep 1, 2008 It’s hard to predict what will stick. ‘It’s the economy, stupid’ was a hand-scrawled sign hung in Little Rock. When NEWSWEEK reported earlier this summer that the McCain family owns at least seven houses, few outside the hothouse of politics …

Get Your War On: Terrorist Watch List

This is a new video from 23/6.com a political-ish comedy site. The video is about a serious issue, but treats it in a comical-ish way. Which is a fine strategy if done well, but I there’s just not quite enough substance here. All you really get from the video is that there’s a terrorist watch …

Game Culture

Play is one of the earliest and most important activities of mammals; helping adolescents learn the skills they need to survive. Games take the free play of the animal kingdom and apply rules and constraints, which have the ability to teach and develop the values and beliefs of a culture. The chess queen developed as …

How George Carlin Changed Comedy

via: Time When the culture began to change in the late 1960s — when the old one-liner comics on the Ed Sullivan Show were looking pretty tired and irrelevant to a younger generation experimenting with drugs and protesting the War in Vietnam — George Carlin was the most important stand-up comedian in America. By the …

John Pilger – Freedom Next Time

This is great speech by journalist John Pilger on the powers and dangers of corporate media. I think what’s most interesting about it is that he breaks from the Left/Right dialectic that plagues social change movements and takes liberalism to task for some of its crimes. The liberal Clinton administration increased the size of the …

Hans Haacke

Hans Haacke lecture Gallatin School, New York University, April 15, 2008 S&S: As a political artist, how can you know when you’ve been successful? Haacke: I’ve been asked that question many times, and that question requires one to go around it before one really avoids it. I believe it is a relatively new phenomenon that …