The Real McCain 2: Electric Boogaloo

A guy I know told me a couple weeks ago that I wasn't going to like it, but he's voting for McCain, and some gibberish about not wanting the US to be negotiating while the bombs are falling. First, I'd be amazed if he'll even bother to vote. Second, he doesn't seem to get that the only real threat of bombs falling on us is Russia, and that the US militaristic policies and "fuck you" attitude is what's driving the Russians to gear up in case they need to defend themselves from the missiles we're trying to put in Eastern Europe, and our invasion/occupation of Iraq and our posturing towards Iran. McCain is the definition of "shoot first, let God sort out the corpses" so if anyone is going to bring bombs down on us, it's McCain. He also doesn't seem to realize that Iran's allies include Russia and China, who if nothing else, could sink us economically if not militarily, especially since we've now decimated, demoralized and outsourced our military over the past six years just trying to "keep the blood to shoe level" against the "insurgents" in Iraq.

This same guy is still waiting for some big payout from his union... a union that "conservatives" like McCain work vigorously to dismantle, while Republican energy and "free trade" policies are decimating the very industry that helped create the American middle class. He's receiving grants and scholarships to go back to school, so he can work towards a degree where he can become an educator... McCain and the Republicans are doing all they can to make it difficult for students to receive financial assistance to go to college, so his theoretical vote for McCain endangers his current education, as well as his future career prospects. I could go on and on regarding the ways that voting Republican is voting against his own best interests. He's simply subscribing to the culture of fear the Republicans and so-called conservatives have created, and celebrate every year on this day. Sadly, he's not alone.

By the way, President Bush, have you brought Osama Bin Laden to justice yet?

No?

Ok... just checking.

Candy

Oh yeah, this is supposed to be an art nude blog...

The ATM is now closed...

Slacker Uprising

Don't say you've never got nothing from visiting this site... apart from lots and lots of photos. Here's your chance to sign up to download the new Michael Moore movie for FREE on September 23. It's called "Slacker Uprising" (trailer below) and documents Moore's 60-city tour through 20 swing states in an effort to get out the vote among young people. Looks like it should be entertaining and certainly timely... check it out, or run the risk of ending up like Miss IXI here.

Ups and downs

UP: The seminar I went to the other night was pretty interesting and informative, and borderline inspirational. It is encouraging to hear true tales of people paying real money for photographs. A friend claims the people who run these seminars make their money off photographers, not photography. I would dispute that to contend they make money on BOTH ends.

down: Have far too much on my plate, and am too easily distracted. It did help to have a gun to my head for a while there, but I'm not sure that's the answer.

UP: The shoots last weekend went great, and everyone even showed up!

UP: While the plan is to keep September almost free of shoots, there was one I couldn't pass up, and I'm looking forward to working with her again.

down: My September roadtrip isn't going to happen. Maybe October, maybe spring.

down: It seems I was a topic of conversation yet again. When Oscar Wilde said "There's only one thing worse than being talked about, and that's NOT being talked about" -- he was full of shit.

UP: Someone called to clear the air.

down: All those who DON'T call to clear the air, and steer clear instead.

UP: I've been invited to be a part of another art show the weekend of the 13th, which is always gratifying.

down: Still don't have pieces ready to hang, and while I could show stuff I've had around for a while, I'd really really rather not. Just don't know how I'll get them done in time.

UP: A model friend may come out of retirement for a shoot with me soon.

down: Then again, she may not.

UP: No cavities.

down: Dentist wants me to use special prescription toothpaste that costs $13 a tube. Oh, and get serious about flossing.

UP: The more we learn about Sarah Palin, the crazier and more corrupt her record and background appear to be.

down: The right wingers and middle america seem to think she's for real, figuring since they'd like to "have a beer with her" that somehow qualifies her to be vp or even president. She's teflon, too -- despite mountains of evidence and allegations and bad policy decisions, nothing sticks to her -- not even the same "inexperience" accusations the right is making against Obama.

UP: Tomorrow's Friday... and less than 2 months until election day.

down: it's 90 degrees out, and they were setting up Halloween displays at Walgreens today.

UP: Big ups to Miss Viv in an NYC elevator, probably on the security camera, too.

CSI BG

Noticed that in this picture from the Squirrel House, there's a small object on the floor right by Sadie's foot... a stick?

Hollywood to shut down

Don LaFontaine, the guy who did the "In a world..." voiceovers for movie trailers has passed away. Now how will we know what the hell is coming soon to a theater near us?



On an unrelated note, Jerry Reed has headed on to that big truck stop in the sky. He was Burt Reynolds' sidekick in the "Smokey and the Bandit" movies, and had a number of hit country singles, including "When You're Hot, You're Hot" and my favorite from when I was about 12 years old, "Lord Mr. Ford". Sort of like Glen Campbell, he started out as a hotshot guitar virtuoso before he branched into singing and TV and movies. Lots of great stuff from Jerry's heyday to be found on YouTube, but for starters, check out this one of Jerry and Chet Atkins tearing things up...

Baby, Baby...

Seems to be a lot of baby talk in the air... going to a seminar thing today primarily for maternity and baby photographers, but I'm hoping it will have some good information in general, plus I'll get to check out a friend's new studio up in Columbus. Edited some overdue shots of Angie from late in her pregnancy, including the little global warming kind of statement above.

Then there's the whole flap over Sarah Palin and her unmarried 17-year-old pregnant daughter and even speculation if Palin faked her 5th pregnancy, and a lot of Maury-Povich-worthy notions. The McCain campaign now says they knew about the pregnant daughter when they selected Palin, but the reality seems to be they wanted to acknowledge the story before The National Enquirer broke it. Honest. And now lots of people are saying "leave the kids out of it." In general, I agree with that, except when a huge part of your "credentials" for the VP nod is that you're an abstinence-only proponent with a knocked-up daughter. Abstinence-only sex education is like telling your kids not to eat sweets or drink soda, and then forbidding them to brush their teeth.

That, and if another part of your "credentials" is that you have a son who enlisted last year on Sept 11 and is shipping out to Iraq THIS Sept 11 -- if you get credit for the son, you also get the heat for the daughter. Perhaps the shotgun wedding will be held on Sept 11, too.

It's all summed up nicely in this editorial by Mary Mitchell from the Chicago Sun-Times: "When an unmarried 17-year-old girl comes up pregnant on the South Side of Chicago, Republicans don't make it sound like a beautiful thing."

It's not the baby, it's the hypocrisy, baby.

Hystery in the Making

In finalizing details for a shoot last Friday, I mentioned to the model, Rebecca, that McCain would be announcing his VP pick at a rally not far from where we were planning to shoot. She thought it would be fun to "crash" the event, so I went to my nearby Republican campaign office and scored tickets to the big fiasco. As a venue, the Nutter Center is THE most fucked-up place to see anything -- worst parking scheme, worst building layout, worst acoustics -- so compound that with the added security of a presidential campaign stop and I knew we were in for a fun time. So we were there for the announcement that Sarah Palin would be McCain's VP pick. Rebecca was initially crestfallen, imaging the 18 million Hillary voters who were presented as all belonging to the PUMA (Party Unity My Ass) movement, all breaking ranks to vote for John "Five Plane" McCain and Governer "Hockey Mom" Palin.

Like virtually everyone else in the building (McCain included), I had no idea who Palin was, or what she stands for. Having had a little time to haunt some of my political resources, it's pretty clear that her primary qualification is that she's a woman, and she's supposed to appeal to the fundamentalist right-wingers and "young earth" creationists. And she definitely appeals to McCain on a VPILF level, as she greeted him with an air kiss and he was repeatedly checking out her ass during her speech while fiddling with his wedding ring. But the cost is huge for McCain, in that it completely deflates his entire argument that Obama lacks experience to be president, especially since McCain's health is so dodgy, and casts further doubt on his judgment, the crux of Obama's campaign (judgement over experience). The video below does a good (and entertaining) job of summarizing what a reckless move this is for McCain...and the video seems to have been produced by a Republican.

But still, it makes me wonder if they have something else up their sleeve... so, just in case, do what you can.



The photo at top is Engel, who also does a great job of pulling off the sexy librarian look. :)

Quick One

Just a quick shot of Theda to let y'all know I haven't forgotten about ya.

More later...

Katie West Print Sale

Realizing now that I should have mentioned this earlier, but the awesome self-portraitist Katie West is having what she swears is her LAST online print sale, and it's been extended to Friday August 29. Visit her journal to see what photos she's offering, and take advantage of the absurdly low price of $10 a print, plus postage. Seems like a great investment to me.

Katie's book, Low Self-Esteem, is out now, too, and it's full of her trademark images -- moody, playful, dreamy, but always beautiful.

You won't find the image at the top of this entry for sale in her journal, or in her book. It's one that I shot of her last year when I had the opportunity to work with her. Hoping to make that happen again soon!

Want

Events and conversations of the past few days, weeks, months have led me to question almost every aspect of myself as a photographer, and as a person.

There was a song by Joe Jackson a number of years back (I'd probably be shocked if I looked up just how long ago... jeez, 1988?) called "You Can't Get What You Want 'Til You Know What You Want" which was an unwieldy title for a pop song, and at the time, it seemed kind of stupidly obvious. I was just out of college at the time, so of course, I knew everything back then.

Nowadays I'm not so sure.

Seems lately people have been asking "what do you want?" in the sense of what direction do I want to take with my life, and what I want to get out of it, and I guess what do I want to leave as a legacy, if such a thing is possible. I remember my Dad talking about how "values clarification" was the key to everything, in the sense that figuring out what's important to you is the first step to pursuing that. 

At the same time, I'm having trouble figuring "what do I want?" in more immediate situations, too. What do I want to achieve this year? Where do I want to live? Do I want to attend this event, or take part in that? Where do I want my work seen? What do I want to sell it for? Do I want to be a photographer for hire? What do I want to achieve with tonight's shoot? Even a simple question of "what do I want for lunch?" is rarely clear cut.

I'm also one to immediately dismiss my wants as either stupid, impractical or unattainable, which doesn't help in achieving them.

Recently, I stumbled onto a reference to the concept of the Fox and the Hedgehog, taken from the Greek poet Archilochus. It contends "The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing." Do I want to be a fox or a hedgehog? I guess at this point, I'd have to say I'm a fox, in that my life is so divided and various aspects rise and fall in importance and influence. Or maybe that's just being a dilettante. But maybe I need to figure out what that one big thing is for me. (You can also refer to Curly's "One thing" from the City Slickers movies.)

At 45, I'm probably past the midpoint of my life, and may be at a good time to sort it out and chart a course. And also in my photography... I guess I've been something of a "fox" in that regard, dividing my time between studio and location work, nudes and portraits and even glamourish, color and black and white, and a variety of stylistic approaches. Looking around, it seems that the "hedgehogs" may be on the right track... photographers who have developed a readily identifiable "signature style" and to an extent staked their claim to that style -- although it sometimes seems to me like they've put all their eggs in that one basket, so to speak. Or I have established that style and don't recognize it because I'm so close to it?

All of this aimless pondering is newly complicated by a situation that happened recently, in that a couple of friends of mine were put in something of a bad situation, indirectly triggered by me taking pictures in their home. I don't want my friends to deal with that kind of fallout in return for being generous to me.

I don't want drama, but I don't want to be clueless about my personal surroundings nor oblivious to situations that may concern me. So, where do I go from here?

What do I want?

The Wrecking Crew

Listening to the audiobook of The Wrecking Crew by Thomas Frank, which is just a staggering account of how the "conservative" movement has been working from within to destroy the functions of the US government so they could be privatized and plundered. Really worth checking out if you're political at ALL, especially if you consider yourself a conservative -- you can see what's being done in your name.

We've seen various huge, obvious examples of it over the past few years -- huge tasks the military used to do itself have been outsourced to private contractors, the effort to divert social security funds into the stock market, dismantling FEMA from being a highly efficient operation to a blundering bunch of criminal sub-sub-contractors, with nobody accountable to anyone. Frank's book shows how it's happening throughout the government.

It occurred to me at one point, and Franks later confirmed it, that some of these "conservatives" have such hatred of the government and are SO far to the right, they are wrapping around the spectrum to practically being anarchists. It's a really grim prospect. Seems my best option for surviving it is to create some bogus non-profit "foundation" like the "Free Americans United for Freedom" or something and start sending out urgent fund-raising letters, promising contributors that the foundation is dedicated to "uniting free Americans in the defense of freedom" which is obviously something that is frail and under attack. Care to contribute? Simply click here.

Video tribute to Katie

The friends of Katie Reider who are running the 500Kin365.org tribute site posted this video montage that was played at Katie's memorial service. Bittersweet would be the word for it...

Katie Reider Through the Years


You can still go to the site and contribute a buck or so to help out... thanks.

Gaslighting...

Here's Alkemie Jane, by the stove in her kitchen. Is it a gas stove? I don't recall.

Read more about political gaslighting in "State of Confusion"... heard a great interview with the author on the Jeff Farius Show. If you want to give it a listen, right click here to download a free MP3 of the July 13 episode of the show, then jump to about 1 hour 28 minutes into it. To read more about "gaslighting" in general, check the Wiki.