Ross A. Lincoln

It's easy to indulge in casual stereotyping, and to accuse the opponents of gay marriage of "bigotry," "homophobia," "a stunning lack of historical knowledge" or "total failure to show basic decency." You might even point out that their arguments against the legality of gay marriage "don't make any fucking sense." But friends, that kind of rhetoric is just the same old hatred rearing its ugly head, hatred which America's political left must finally admit to, and confront.

A close friend and I have an ongoing game we call "I can't believe it's not a parody". The objective is to find songs that are 100% serious and have not been created by a comedian, and yet are impossible to believe to not be kidding. Once upon a time this was quite the difficult game, but in recent years, it has become so easy that it's almost beginning to feel like time to changes...

We are, after all, a nation of prudish, preening moralists who bemoan our decay but simply cannot disguise the tenting in our pants at the thought of killing wayward a-rabs, of violent, homoerotic gay bashing, of militaristic imperialist fantasies, of obscene gore, and most of all, of hypersexualizing women while demanding their purity.

Norway's dance club mastermind Annie emerged on the music scene in 1999, with a Madonna-sampling bit of pop brilliance called "Greatest Hit" that created considerable underground buzz, which she capitalized on by spending... the next 5 years... recording her debut album. Despite the ominous overtones that usually accompany such obsessive tinkering, that record, Anniemal, was brilliant from start to finish, chock full of songs spanning various dance styles that felt shockingly new and warmly...

Last Thursday night, an improbable collection of DJs, Douchebags and Dorks gathered in a posh Downtown penthouse for a sneak preview of DJ Hero, the latest entry in Activision's increasingly ginormous Guitar Hero video game series. The appetizers were exquisite, the ambiance (provided by actual, non video game playing DJs) was redonkulous, and DJ Hero, a game which finally does for knob twiddlers and air-scratch nerds what the main Guitar Hero series did for vicarious cock-rockers, was, well, pretty damn good in the same way that the Dead Sea is kind of brackish and Sir Paul McCartney has a couple of extra dollars lying around.

"Being in a band right now just makes sense". So says Nathan Buckley, co-founder of Downtown's-by-way-of-Echo Park The Half-Hearted. Maybe it's the economy, the last eight years, or the fact that the Nobel Peace Prize is apparently less difficult to recieve than student of the month, but we're inclined to agree - it's either that or take up painting.

The successful passage of Prop 8 took those of us who aren't bigots by surprise in the same way Barry Keenan took Frank Sinatra Jr. at gunpoint. Having assumed that California was different from the Medievalists running the American South, the codification of anti-gay hatred was a stroke-inducing reminder that the State most associated with GLBTQ rights is also the State that inflicted Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan and Howard Jarvis on the World. Obviously,...

Roman Polanski Drugged And Raped A 13 Year Old Girl. My apologies if saying this in plain terms offends the delicate feelings of those of you who apparently believe that his career of mostly mediocre films makes him some kind of irreplaceable genius. My further apologies if, by using the accurate terminology to describe what happened, I have caused anyone to run for the fainting couch. I hope you understand how deeply and sincerely sorry I am for my rudeness. By way of apology, let me just say that Roman Polanski drugged and raped a 13 year old girl, and anyone arguing that he should not see justice, that justice has already been served, that somehow this wasn't a big deal, or that he has already paid some kind of karmic debt, is a creepy rape apologist who ought to be ashamed.

"Hector thinks of himself as a mix of Henry Miller, Ernest Hemingway and Hunter S. Thompson." So says co-writer and director John McKinney of Hector Quince, the titular character of his short film Hector Quince: Author, premiering tonight at Cinespace. In it, Hector, having just completed his first successful novel and contemplating his next move, inadvertently ends up in the middle of some seriously dangerous happenstance that might just be his own fault. McKinney...

UPDATE: Chris Bowers at Open Left has a much more detailed breakdown of the Baucus plan. It's far, far worse than implied yesterday. And if you care about this sort of thing, it also looks like Max let an insurance industry shill write the whole thing, and made sure that those overtly part of the insurance sector read the bill before the White House. ** ************* Tomorrow, President Obama is set to give a...