low culture

The prize for today’s Tuesday Trivia Tournament goes to Cindy, who correctly identified the phrases as the slogan for FOX’s new Joe Millionaire series kicking off next week. Congratulations, Cindy!
But, given the close ties between the G.O.P. and FOX’s parent company, News Corp., the slogan First we lied to America. Now we’re taking on the world! could just as easily be inscribed (in Latin, maybe) on Karl Rove’s stationery. I don’t know about you, but I’m not looking forward to the international fall-out from the new Joe Millionaire: we haven’t exactly been endearing ourselves to our Old European friends of late, and pulling a mean prank on their lovely daughters probably won’t make us any more popular at those Friday afternoon ice cream socials at the United Nations. How will we look Kofi Annan in the eye when we ask for more sprinkles?

The old maxim holds: if you want a friend in the blogosphere, get a dog. No one ever said posting your half-cocked opinions on matters great and small for the sixteen people who read blogs would win me any popularity contests. But I must respond to Elizabeth Spiers’ counter-attack on my ever so polite suggestion that her New York Magazine colleague David Amsden’s pants are on fire.

Buried deep within an article in today’s New York Times documenting the growth of Shanghai’s skyline throughout the 1990s, and the subsequent backlash that has resulted, is this gem of a factoid:
“…the skyline — the pride of local officials — became more formless as residential towers cropped up in every corner of the city. With increasing frequency, residents are filing complaints based on an obscure law mandating that every home or apartment must receive at least two hours of sunlight a day.”
For all those who have ever suffered economic hardship, or, at least, have ever lived in first-floor/subterranean apartments (which often implies economic hardship), let it hereby be known that there is a better way! The Red China way!

Good morning! Today I’m trying something new. I’m gonna call this The Tuesday Trivia Tournament (nice, right? took me an hour to come up with it). Answer the below question in the comments area and at the end of the day, I’ll tell you the answer. The winner will receive the First Annual low culture Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Field of… Excellence! Here goes:
The following statement appeared last week in a magazine (either in an article, headline, or advertisement). Tell me what it refers to and, if possible, who’s behind it:

First we lied to America.
Now we’re taking on the world!
Get those thinking caps on. Bonus points for creative incorrect answers.

Straight from the slangin’ mouth of Whatevs‘ Uncle Grambo comes this possibly unintentional critique of LA in the guise of a rant against trendy “white trash chic” boutique Von Dutch:
i know that VD is trendy in Los Angeles, but shouldn’t you be following the rest of the civilized world and realizing that Los Angeles fashion trends are nothing more than leftover hand-me-downs from NYC?
Yep, VD sure is trendy in Los Angeles. Even Beck says in a creepy voice, “I can smell the VD in the club tonight” on “Milk & Honey” from his LA-centric 1999 album Midnite Vultures.
Added incentive to link: Britney Spears showing off her VD

Today’s award for making very good use of an unlimited MetroCard goes to The Times‘ Lola Ogunnaike who filled this report from every part of the city:
Jae Song, who caught “Kill Bill” at the Loews 19th Street East Saturday afternoon, came expressly for the film’s much discussed brutality… Mr. Sheikh, a college student, stood outside the Loews Kips Bay Theater Saturday evening smoking a cigarette… Billy Hemmans, a self-professed samurai movie expert, stood outside the Magic Johnson Theater in Harlem Saturday evening… “It was an average action film,” said Jolynn Krystocek, an art student who saw “Kill Bill” on Saturday afternoon at the Kips Bay theater in Murray Hill… The gore bothered Kristi Tucker, who caught the film with her brother at the Loews on 42nd Street on Friday, opening night…. “I liked the music,” said Ang Phurba, a sherpa breathing from an oxygen tank outside the Regal Entertainment Theatre atop Mt. Everest…”
Okay, that last one was fake.
Gory ‘Kill Bill’ Tops Weekend Box Office by Lola Ogunnaike

Buried in today’s Times article on HEEB Magazine‘s expansion fantasies is this analogy from new editor Joshua Neuman:
I’m trying to emulate Vice in that this is more than a magazine, but a lifestyle. As Vice is to cocaine, we are to chocolate layer cake.
What’s so Jewish about chocolate layer cake? Might I suggest a more apt analogy?
As Vice is to anonymous butt-sex (warning: dirty, dirty link), we are to speed dating and settling down with a nice doctor in the suburbs in your thirties.
A Sardonic Jewish Magazine Expands Its Ambitions by Bill Werde