Thanos 'arrested' following jaunt down Yonge St.
Spoilers ahead! Don't read further if you still plan on seeing Avengers: Infinity Wars.
Thanos proved too much for the Avengers in the latest movie from the Marvel Cinematic Universe but he met his match with Toronto police.
The main villain in Avengers: Infinity Wars was "arrested" Friday afternoon following a run-in with an officer near Dundas Square.
Behind the mask was 42-year-old Frank Coraci. Armed with Thanos's body armour, several Infinity Stones and a handler to avoid bumping into pedestrians, Coraci took to Yonge St. to bring a bit of laughter to Toronto following the van rampage on April 23.
"I couldn't walk two steps without someone asking for a selfie," Coraci said.
Among the selfie-seekers was Sgt. Noel DeGuzman, who stopped Coraci as he made his way down Yonge. While Coraci initially worried that he was about to get in trouble, it turned out that the constable was a fan and requested a photo for his daughter.
Coraci said the scene was largely the DeGuzman's idea.
The sergeant noted that he was pleased that he was able to do "what the Avengers couldn't do," quoting a tweet that circulated with the photo.
DeGuzman said the photo put a smile on his daughter's face.
With Infinity Wars becoming one of the highest-grossing movies of all time, fans quickly circulated Thanos's defeat at the hands of Toronto police on social media.
"Straight out of the comics!" wrote one Reddit user, who pointed out that Thanos has indeed been arrested before, rather than taken down by the Avengers.
Thanos: I have an infinity gauntlet.
Const. Lam: I don't care.
While Internet users speculated that the costume was put together for the Toronto Comic Arts Festival this past weekend, Coraci said his costume was unrelated.


The piston is located at the end of the piston rod and acts as a movable barrier in the compressor cylinder. It is generally made from materials such as aluminum or cast iron and has a hollow center. Small-diameter high-pressure cylinders may be provided with a combined piston and rod machined from a single piece of bar stock.
To reduce friction and improve compression efficiency, the piston will be provided with segmented compression rings as shown in Figure 11 -11. To prevent piston-to-bore contact, the piston may also be provided with removable wear bands that are in continuous contact with the cylinder wall. The compression rings and wear bands are replaced at regular intervals and typically made from soft materials such as brass, Micarta, Teflon, and the newer thermoplastics.


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Bocustom vinyl wristbandsllywood star Khan gets bail after serving two days in jail for poaching
5 Creative Ways To Ask Guests Along With Sweet 16 Birthday Party Understand Emo. Emo has many explanations. It"s a musical genre combining hardcore music with sad, emotional lyrics. It"s an abbreviated way to label someone emotive. It"s a life style. It"s a combination of some or all these elements of style, fashion, culture. It"s open for debate and often is dependent someone"s personal sentence. The term "Emo" loosely describes emotional rock, and most Emo"s like Indie sound clips. The trick is that, however tough we are outside, we all like fantasies deep inside. So utilize it. For me, the character Albus Dumbledore in the Harry Potter series will be much appealing. Through his eyes, every problem is really an opportunity and is pretty fun. Along with the calculations in no way mistaken. Sweeties Candy Cottage in Huntington is a top seller of the cool wristbands, and business been recently brisk. Its owner, Lisa Hodes, told Newsday reporters, "It"s unbelievable, I didn"t have this much traffic around my five associated with owning this store." Sweeties Candy Cottage sells Silly Bandz for between $2.50 and $2.99 a load. If you an old prom dress or other formal dress gathering dust in your closet, obtained the perfect beginnings connected with a cheap and uncomplicated Halloween prom queen outfit. Find a satin sash and write what "Homecoming Queen" or "Prom Queen" on in fabric paint. Get yourself a cheap costume tiara or make a tiara yourself using heavy gauge wire and beans. For those wanting to be able to something different this year, why not send the special woman in existence on a Mother"s Day cruise aboard the Spirit of Philly? Or participate in a stroll to raise money for cancer wristbands. There"s still to be able to register for that Susan T. Komen Race for solution at the Philadelphia Art Museum this Sunday. Single mothers should be celebrated too, and not all have are shrinking or support to contribute towards their homes. Making an online donation to The Restoration House in your mother"s name will enable these strong women to improve their standard of living. Birthday parties, political rally"s and fundraisers are the type of events that customize wristbands for their attendees. The guests then possess a keepsake to consider the party. These wwjd wristbands are timeless, so cool. These simple, yet elegant, wraps throughout the cooking . goose bumps away by giving the correct quantity of ambiance. There"s no need to weigh yourself down carrying a sweater around your waist, also known as a jacket up to you. The Original Chilly Jilly is offered in nine colors, and folds appropriate into a coordinating drawstring bag. Plus, at $30 a piece, it"s affordable enough to obtain several colors, and wear one on the variety of occasions. Free shipping should be part of this package worth. Choose a company that"s used long enough to create a track record - you want your custom wristbands well done. If a company isn"t responsive, look elsewhere. After you have ordered, should really receive your order in three weeks or a lesser amount of. If a company can"t guarantee that for you to order, it"s advisable to reconsider dealing these people. Custom rubber bracelets most stylish fundraisers, school spirit boosters, or tips on how to raise knowing of a worthy cause. Their versatility is limited only because of your imagination. Remember, ordering them should be simple and involved!
MUMBAI - Bollywood star Salman Khan, jailed on Thursday for five years for poaching, was granted bail by an Indian court on Saturday in a case being followed by tens of millions of fans and a movie industry that banks heavily on his popularity.
Bollywood actor Salman Khan (2nd L) arrives at a court in Jodhpur in the western state of Rajasthan, India, April 5, 2018. [Photo/Agencies]
The actor will be freed from jail on Saturday after completing the necessary formalities, his lawyer Mahesh Bora told reporters.
Khan"s fans set off firecrackers outside his home in Mumbai and outside the court in Jodhpur in the northwestern state of Rajasthan after the actor was granted bail.
Khan, 52, was found guilty of violating Indian wildlife laws by killing a blackbuck, an endangered species of antelope, in 1998.
The case was brought by members of a community known as the Bishnoi, who revere antelopes. The community had pursued the case against Khan for almost two decades.
The actor may not leave the country without the court"s permission, said Mahipal Bishnoi, a lawyer for the Bishnoi community.
Khan has had other run-ins with the law.
In 2015, a Bombay High Court overturned Khan"s conviction in a hit-and-run case in which he was accused of running over a group of people sleeping on a city sidewalk, killing one and injuring four.
Last year, another court in Jodhpur acquitted Khan in a separate poaching case, ruling that there was no proof that Khan had killed an endangered gazelle.
Khan has made a series of blockbuster hits in the last few years with the latest in December, "Tiger Zinda Hai", grossing more than 3 billion rupees ($52 million) at the box office.
His next film, "Race 3", is an action thriller scheduled for release later in the year.
Khan has also signed a deal with global e-commerce giant Amazon that gives its Prime video streaming service exclusive worldwide rights to his catalogue and upcoming titles.
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The X-Men Take to the Stars in 'S.W.O.R.D.' #1
Enter the Reign of X! Read our top 5 takeaways from this debut issue, new on Marvel Unlimited.
by Robyn Belt
Have you tried Marvel Unlimited yet? It's your all-access pass to over 28,000 Marvel comics, available at your fingertips. Sign up now to get 50% off your first month.
FOLLOW THE "REIGN OF X" ACROSS THESE TITLES!
After the Dawn Comes the Reign.
S.W.O.R.D. (2020) #1
New this week on Marvel Unlimited: One giant leap for mutantkind! The mutant nation of Krakoa has quickly become a major force on the world stage... but why stop there? Krakoa relaunches the Sentient World Observation & Response Directorate in S.W.O.R.D. (2020) #1—a fully independent organization dealing with all things extraterrestrial on behalf of all of Earth. Al Ewing and Valerio Schiti, the team behind EMPYRE, bring us the tale of mutantkind looking to do for the galaxy what Krakoa did for the planet.
Read our top takeaways from S.W.O.R.D. #1 below, and see what other new titles hit MU this week!
NEW ON MARCH 8
AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #54 LAST REMAINS TIE-IN!
CAPTAIN MARVEL #24
GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY #9
JUGGERNAUT #4
KING IN BLACK: NAMOR #1 KING IN BLACK TIE-IN!
MARAUDERS #16
S.W.O.R.D. #1 MAJOR DEBUT!
SPIDER-MAN #5 SERIES COMPLETE!
STAR WARS #9
STRANGE ACADEMY #6
THE RISE OF ULTRAMAN #4
VENOM #31 KING IN BLACK TIE-IN!
WARHAMMER 40,000: MARNEUS CALGAR #3
1. THE PEAK, AKA S.W.O.R.D STATION ONE
What is S.W.O.R.D.? While this orbital space station has existed for years, the "Peak" got a fresh reboot during the X OF SWORDS event. Mutant champion Cable, wielding the mythic "Light of Galador," used his sword to unlock the event's Deus ex machina in X OF SWORDS: DESTRUCTION #1. Formerly an alien prison, S.W.O.R.D. is now mutantkind's extraterrestrial base of operations, an observation deck for research and front line response. Welcome to the mutant space program!
2. ABIGAIL BRAND: DIRECTOR OF S.W.O.R.D.
Since its inception, S.W.O.R.D. has been led by mutant interplanetary spy Abigail Brand. After resigning from her command of Alpha Flight, Brand has given Krakoa's mutants access to her station, although she still expresses a disconnect with their goals. But despite reservations, she is an official ally, using her expertise and unusual background to expand S.W.O.R.D.. The daughter of a blue-furred alien and a human woman, Brand knew from childhood that she was destined to protect the cosmos, a dream that was realized when she became the leader of the first ever Sentient Worlds Observation and Response Department. Read her earliest appearances in 2004's ASTONISHING X-MEN!
3. FRENZY, AMBASSADOR TO EARTH
Joanna Cargill, AKA the mutant powerhouse Frenzy, is in charge of S.W.O.R.D.'s diplomacy and negotiation efforts. And her "diplomatic technique" is in full swing with issue #1!
A one-time radical who never accepted being under humanity's heel, Joanna found her earliest mercenary gig as one of Magneto's Acolytes. It took a few years and a cabinet position in Genosha for her allegiances to fully sway, but she did become a full-fledged member of the X-Men, most notably in X-MEN LEGACY. Now, the sky is the limit. Literally.
4. MAGNETO: COUNCIL REPRESENTATIVE
Magneto, Krakoa's co-founder, is another principal player to the S.W.O.R.D. operation. With historical ties to both Fabian Cortez and Frenzy, Magneto's role aboard the station is to act as a liaison of Krakoa, making sure that Brand's missions are fully outfitted on the medical, and technical, fronts. In the first issue, Magneto has made it abundantly clear that S.W.O.R.D.'s primary role is to push limits throughout the universe, exploring the potential of interstellar science and exploration. And this isn't his first (space) rodeo—as the creator of Asteroid M, Magneto has previously spread his mutant-first agenda to the stars and beyond.
5. "THE SIX"
The Control, AKA Wiz-Kid. The Power, AKA Fabian Cortez. The Shield, AKA Armor. The Guide, AKA Manifold. The Eye, AKA Peeper. The Foundry, AKA Risque.
Just as Krakoa has "The Five" to perform the Resurrection Protocols, "The Six" are specific operatives of S.W.O.R.D.. These vastly-powered mutants use their powers in concert to teleport across galaxies and even the Multiverse. Additionally, five teleporters are required to amplify their translocation: Blink, Gateway, the Vanisher, Lila Cheney, and the "transmutational" Amelia Voght. Their first mission saw The Six obtain a mysterious obelisk-looking object from a cross-dimensional portal. And its true purpose has yet to be revealed!
[RELATED: Welcome to the Dawn of X]
Continue the next phase in X-Men history weekly with the "Reign of X" lineup, new series and storylines that spin out of the X OF SWORDS crossover epic!
Follow Marvel Unlimited on Twitter and Facebook to stay tuned in to weekly announcements, articles, and more, all at @MarvelUnlimited. Follow us today to join the conversation with thousands of fellow fans, and let us know what you're reading!
In this article: Marvel Unlimited, Magneto (Max Eisenhardt), X-Men, Krakoa, Abigail Brand, S.W.O.R.D., Manifold, Gateway, Joanna Cargill, Amelia Voght, Empyre, Vanisher (Telford Porter), X of Swords, Cable (Nathan Summers), Lila Cheney, Blink (Clarice Ferguson)
Moon Knight Must-Reads
Get up to speed on the Fist of Khonshu in some of Moon Knight's best stories!
See Marvel's Greatest Stars Honor Historical Figures In New Women's History Month Covers
New variant covers from Sara Pichelli, Betsy Cola, and more coming in March
Rob Liefeld's Greatest Deadpool Story Returns To Comic Shops In Deadpool: Bad Blood!
Deadpool's hit graphic novel is serialized in comics form this April!
Read the first issue of 'X Lives of Wolverine' on Marvel Unlimited, before starting his chronological origin in Infinity Comics series 'Life of Wolverine.'


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Katrina to join FB, Instagram, Twitter!
KKF admin
News / Site
Welcome Kat to the madness! The actress has decided to finally make her presence felt on social media
Katrina Kaif is among the few stars — like Saif Ali Khan- Kareena Kapoor Khan and Ranbir Kapoor — to have stayed away from social media. But now she is ready to dip her toe in the communicating pool. From this month, the actress will maintain three social media accounts. Katrina will officially be on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.
While she has held a temporary Twitter account, that she endorsed, it was started and operated by the beauty company for which she is a brand ambassador. Katrina celebrates her birthday on July 16 and she plans her social media 'launch' around that date.
A source close to the actress says, "Katrina was not convinced about joining social media but she now realises that it's one of the most powerful tools to convey one's thoughts and opinions and she has decided to jump in and test the waters. The first film that she will promote on social media is Baar Baar Dekho, which releases in September. Her reasons for joining the social media are more personal than professional. She wants to have a platform to say what she wants, and also connect with her fans directly. First, she plans to join Facebook and Insta and then she will make her presence felt on Twitter. She wants to start with a personalised introduction on FB. She will be handling the accounts herself and not through managers or a digital company."
Source: DNA India
We can't wait to see Katrina Kaif join the social sites & come a little closer to her fans reach. It means a lot to us Katoholics!
♡ The KatrinaKaifFans.Org Editor Note
Katrina's secret to a flat tummy!
Ranbir-Katrina to unite for a love song?
Katrina on a mission to educate girls
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For the Q4 as a whole, total earnings are expected to be up +8.8% from the same period last year on +6.9% higher revenues. The revisions trend for Q4 estimates has been very favorable, with earnings estimates holding up a lot better relative to other comparable periods. Earnings growth is expected to be positive for 13 of the 16 FATI sectors, with double-digit growth for the Energy, Technology, Construction, Industrial Products, Basic Materials and Autos sectors.
Q4 earnings growth for the Energy sector is the highest of all sectors, with total earnings for the sector expected to be up +174.9% from the same period last year on +23.7% higher revenues. Excluding the Energy sector, total Q4 earnings for the rest of the S&P 500 index would be up +6.2%. Earnings growth is expected to be strong for the Technology sector, with total Q4 earnings for the sector expected to be up +14% on +8.5% higher revenues. Finance sector earnings are expected to be up +3.5% on +2.3% year-over-year growth in revenues. Earnings growth is expected to be negative for three sectors in Q4 – Consumer Discretionary, Conglomerates and Transportation.
The big banks will most likely be taking headline-grabbing charges related to the impact of tax law changes on deferred tax assets and the 'deemed' repatriation of foreign earnings; the latter being a factor in Tech sector earnings. But all of these will be one-time non-cash charges that will have no bearing on core earnings.
For full-year 2017, total earnings for the S&P 500 index are expected to be up +7.7% on +5.3% higher revenues. Index earnings are expected to be up +12.3% in 2018 and +9.6% in 2019.
Earnings expectations do not reflect any tax law changes at this stage. Given the direct and indirect favorable impact of tax cuts on corporate profitability, estimates will most likely be going up following the enactment of the legislation.
Reinsurance Group of America, Inc. is primarily engaged in life reinsurance and international life and disability insurance on a direct and reinsurance basis. In addition, the company provides reinsurance of non-traditional business including asset-intensive products and financial reinsurance.


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Meet Louisa May Alcott – Nov 20
Darlington with Heritage Theatre Guild proudly presents History Alive! Life Stories of Famous American Women: The extraordinary life of Louisa May Alcott at Darlington on Sunday, Nov 20, 3pm. This is a unique opportunity to "meet" Louisa May Alcott, the author of Little Women, a Civil War Nurse & Reformer, in an intimate setting. $10 general admission.
Enjoy this one-woman play with actor, historian, and Darlington Teaching Artist, Pat Jordan, as Louisa May Alcott (1832-1888). Explore the time in which she lived, when America's views on education, philosophy and human rights were radically changing. Learn about her struggles and successes, her eccentric father and hard-working mother, and about the sisters who inspired Louisa's most famous work, Little Women. Performance will conclude with a Question & Answer session. Experience History through the power of First-Person Performance!
The Heritage Theatre Guild's priority is to make America's past entertaining and engaging while adhering to rigorous standards of authenticity.
Purchase Tickets Online >


We are delighted to be able to offer members and supporters of the Friends of Gedling Station the chance to visit the station building and grounds.
In this tour, led by members of the FoGS Steering Group, you'll go inside the building (formerly the station master's house, waiting rooms and ticket office), visit the platform, and see where the tracks once lay - areas all usually inaccessible to the public. You'll also hear about the history of the site and have the chance to share your ideas for its future.
For insurance purposes, and as numbers are capped, pre-booking is essential. To book please email us at FoGS@gedlingstation.com or visit our Facebook event page.
There is a cost of £2 per person (payable on the day), which will support FoGS's campaign to save the building.
Our thanks go to the Gedling Youth Club Management Committee for allowing this visit.
We recommend wearing good footwear and, if possible, bringing a torch.
FOGS was delighted to welcome Nottingham Railways Remembered (NRR) for a two hour tour in and around the station site and buildings.
Twenty members of the group attended, with one travelling all of the way from Llandudno!
Our thanks to Gedling Youth Club for providing access to the inside of the building.
We were delighted to visit the Station building and grounds with a group of Nottingham Trent University Architecture students. As part of their 'Digital Heritage' project, these 6 second year students will be creating a computer model of the station building in its heyday and working with Simon to visualise some future plans.
Our thanks go to Simon Middlecote (FoGS) and Tom Hughes of Nottingham Trent University, and also to Gedling Youth Club for providing access.
Members of the FoGS Steering Group, supporters and local residents attended this meeting as observers.
We were able to visit this former station building, now Virgin Active, for a private tour and even went inside the old clock tower.
The station, designed by T. C. Hine, opened in 1857 to serve the Ambergate, Nottingham, Boston and Eastern Junction Railway (incorporating 'the back line'). It closed to passengers in 1944, and to goods traffic in 1988, was damaged by fire in 1996 and subsequently restored, and is now a listed building.
Our thanks go to Debs Gallagher and Josh Beeston.
Our thanks go to everyone who came along to hear about the history of the station, and the sad fate of other stations built on the same railway line at Netherfield, Daybrook and Basford. They were amongst the very first to hear about the new information and sources discovered in recent weeks by our history volunteers - including the identity of the original station master.
This event was made possible by Diana Willis of Nottingham City Libraries.
'We would like to thank everyone who attended our SOCIAL EVENING at Gedling Memorial Hall on a very cold, snowy and icy Friday March 2nd. This was an informal evening for all FoGS supporters to come together and have some fun. Len Hale, 98 years young and a former railway worker on the 'Back Line,' was our Guest of Honour, and our thanks go to local folk singer Marc Block for performing.
Additional thanks to: David Ingleby (Great Northern Railway Society), who travelled from Lincolnshire to show new material about Gedling Station; Neil Kendrick for loan of the PA system; GVPS committee members and Marie and Janet for help with refreshments and the quiz and raffle.
A display and talk by the Friends of Gedling Station (FOGS) & the Gedling Village Preservation Society (GVPS), at Carlton Library, with the kind assistance of Inspire.
'Our Save Gedling Station talk at Carlton Library (1 February) was a resounding success. The display was hugely popular and the talk attracted 70 people which is a record attendance for a talk at this library. We wish to thank INSPIRE, Caren the Library Manager and all her staff for putting up with us for six weeks! We presented Caren with some flowers to say thank you.
We'd like to thank everyone who came to see the display, and especially those who signed up to our newsletter, took flyers, left us stories or email us later with memories and personal histories.
Over 60 people came to our talk - an amazing turn out! Thank you for the interest that you showed, your questions, and offers of help. It was great to hear your stories, to be offered items saved from Colwick, to sign up a brilliant history research volunteer, and to meet Sam Taylor, who has offered to share his photo collection with us. More news on these coming soon!
As a new group, formed in winter 2017, Gedling Station and 'the Back Line' is our first event.
It would be a real help to us if you would take a moment to fill in this 5-question survey, to help us plan future activities.
Click on the picture to visit the survey.
We would like to thank everyone who has completed our survey so far.
Can you help us to arrange occasional events?
Could you help on the day?
Do you have photos, stories or documents, old or more recent, to share with us?
We're currently recruiting people to join a new small team of volunteers who can help in organising or running events and activities..
If you'd like to get involved (whether you have a lot or a little time to spare) or have photos or stories that we could use we'd love to hear from you.


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Powered By The Truth | What Mainstream News Doesn't Want You To See
Gas Prices Hit A 7 Year High As Biden Allows China To Hack U.S. Pipelines.
Posted on May 12, 2021 by notanewsnetwork 2 comments
Thanks to Biden's First Day Executive Order to allow China to access to U.S. power grid A U.S. energy company says a cyberattack forced it to temporarily halt all operations on a major pipeline that delivers roughly 45% of all fuel consumed on the East Coast.
Colonial Pipeline said the attack took place Friday and also affected some of its information technology systems. The company transports gasoline, diesel, jet fuel and home heating oil from refineries primarily located on the Gulf Coast through pipelines running from Texas to New Jersey.
The Alpharetta, Georgia-based company said it hired an outside cybersecurity firm to investigate the nature and scope of the attack and has also contacted law enforcement and federal agencies.
"Colonial Pipeline is taking steps to understand and resolve this issue," the company said in a late Friday statement. "At this time, our primary focus is the safe and efficient restoration of our service and our efforts to return to normal operation. This process is already underway, and we are working diligently to address this matter and to minimize disruption to our customers and those who rely on Colonial Pipeline."
Oil analyst Andy Lipow said a key concern about a lengthy delay would be the supply of jet fuel needed to keep major airports operating, like those in Atlanta and Charlotte, North Carolina.
Colonial Pipeline said it transports more than 100 million gallons of fuel daily, through a pipeline system spanning more than 5,500 miles.
The FBI and the White House's National Security Council did not immediately return messages seeking comment. The federal Cybersecurity Infrastructure and Security Agency referred questions about the incident to the company.
A hacker's botched attempt to poison the water supply of a small Florida city raised alarms about how vulnerable the nation's critical infrastructure may be to attacks by more sophisticated intruders.
Anne Neuberger, the Biden administration's deputy national security adviser for cybersecurity and emerging technology, said in an interview with The Associated Press in April that the government was undertaking a new effort to help electric utilities, water districts and other critical industries protect against potentially damaging cyberattacks. She said the goal was to ensure that control systems serving 50,000 or more Americans have the core technology to detect and block malicious cyber activity.
Since then, the White House has announced a 100-day initiative aimed at protecting the country's electricity system from cyberattacks by encouraging owners and operators of power plants and electric utilities to improve their capabilities for identifying cyber threats to their networks. It includes concrete milestones for them to put technologies into use so they can spot and respond to intrusions in real time. The Justice Department has also announced a new task force dedicated to countering ransomware attacks in which data is seized by hackers who demand payment from victims in order to release it.
GAS PRICES HAVE NOW HIT A 7 YEAR HIGH
JUST IN – Gas stations in the southeastern United States face significant and widespread outages as the Colonial Pipeline shutdown stretches into the sixth day. Gas prices hit a 7-year high.
— Disclose.tv 🚨 (@disclosetv) May 12, 2021
Gas prices are skyrocketing. Gas shortages are hitting parts of America.
We knew this would happen when President Biden cancelled the Keystone XL Pipeline and reversed our America-first energy policies.
— Governor Kristi Noem (@govkristinoem) May 12, 2021
tagged with all time high, America, biden, Biden Admin, Election, gas prices, trump
Pingback: Biden's Policies Have Destroyed America In Record Time. Inflation is Soaring, Crime has Spiked in Cities, War in The Middle East, American's Can't Fill Up Their Cars, And 10x More Kids are In Cages. | Not A News Network
Pingback: Biden's Policies Have Destroyed America In Record Time. Inflation is Soaring, Crime has Spiked in Cities, War in The Middle East, American's Can't Fill Up Their Cars, And 10x More Kids are In Cages. – Not A News Network
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This fall's genre pilots and renewals
All four of the major networks have checked in and announced their fall line-ups.
CBS today announced their fall line-up, marking the last of the networks to do so. They don't offer much, however, as the only genre show they even have planned for the fall is the J.J. Abrams' Person of Interest, in which a wealthy man discovers a way to detect crime before it happens.
The only other show they will have which comes close is Unforgettable, another detective series, this one about a detective who remembers every detail of her life. Not fantasy, but close – there are real people with this "condition," but the show will likely not depict the condition accurately.
Fox will be doubling that challenge by giving us two new programs. One new show is Terra Nova, a dinosaur adventure seemingly developed for a family audience. Think Swiss Family Robinson meets The Flintstones; It's nothing like that, but it will likely appeal to a younger audience.
Joining Terra Nova on the Pilot's table is Alcatraz, a 4400-esque show about mysteriously appearing people who also happen to be dangerous criminals.
Fox also has a pseudo-fantasy detective show, like CBS. The Finder is about a man who has a supernatural ability to locate lost things. Also, geeks everywhere were very excited to hear, a month or so ago, that Fringe is returning for a new season.
We already knew that NBC is dropping The Event for next season, which we're just hoping will wrap up well at this point. It's being replaced by Grimm, in which a detective who can see monsters has to hide the fact that he can see monsters for, likely, no sensical reason.
NBC is also getting, you guessed it, a pseudo-fantasy detective story. In Awake, a detective is trying to figure out which of two completely different post-coma worlds is the real one, and which is the dream. Expect not to discover the truth in the first episode.
ABC has dropped No Ordinary Family – which is fine: It wasn't very good – and V – which is disappointing to many, but not unexpected. In their place they've picked up Once Upon a Time, for a net change of -1 genre series.
They do however also have the new Charlie's Angels series, which may become a geek favorite and Pan Am, which looks like a feminine version of Mad Men, and has Christina Ricci in her first big, non-genre role, which is too bad. I'd rather she made it into a show I was actually going to watch.
Unless you count Charlie's Angels, ABC really didn't jump on the pseudo-fantasy detective show bandwagon.
CB Droege -
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Jezebel Interview
Ani DiFranco Is Tired of Talking About Herself (So Here She Goes Again)
Photo: Danny Clinch
Filed to: ani difrancoFiled to: ani difranco
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A few minutes into my hourlong interview with feminist singer-songwriter Ani DiFranco about her new book, No Walls and the Recurring Dream: A Memoir, she told me she was scared to release it. How's that for marketing from a woman who has long prided herself on anticapitalist principles?
"I have felt steady dread and anxiety since turning it in," she explained. Her book covers her early life through about the first decade of her career (it ends around the early 2000s), and by her own estimation, is notably lacking in dishy content. And yet: "I feel very fearful right now." The look in her eye as she said this was one of tentative terror, as though behind me were gray skies and a cyclone heading her way.
DiFranco's admission was as disarming as it was disillusioning. That she would express such vulnerability so matter-of-factly to a stranger about the very piece of media we had met to discuss was yet another example of the communicative intimacy in which she has traded publicly for some 30 years now. This is the Ani that, at one point, dorms full of college students, particularly young women, thought of as a friend. She is the kind of person who looks you in the eye and shares and shares, regardless who you are.
But at the same time, the fear of speaking out and transmitting her truth, especially now that it's been committed to paper and is coming out whether she likes it or not, struck such a contrast with that very Ani that I thought I knew. When I asked her what exactly she was afraid of, the first thing on the list was, "Being seen, being judged." I thought she was used to both of those things by now.
"I had some kind of internal voice that said, 'I'm invincible.'"
The contrast is most striking with the young woman in the book, whose percussive style of abusing music out of her guitar, melodies slipping out of the strings like prisoners against bars, was devised in part to command the attention of the apathetic bar patrons who were unwittingly attending her early gigs. The young DiFranco of No Walls slept in bus stations when necessary and told a particularly shitty dude who drove her across several states to an early college gig to fuck off, effectively leaving herself stranded and having to fend for herself yet again. "I had some kind of internal voice that said, 'I'm invincible,'" she said of the matter-of-fact bravery she recounts in her memoir.
These days, DiFranco's tune is more along the lines of: "I'm fallible." At 48, she acknowledges openly that she is past her prime in terms of exposure and commercial viability. She told me that upon review, she found her own book to be subjective and that if she had to do it again, she'd probably write it differently. And her reputation as a social-justice crusader took a hit in 2013 when she announced she'd be hosting a songwriting retreat at a former slave plantation called Nottoway. If the miscalculation was somewhat puzzling coming from a white woman who'd explored topics like redlining and lynching's legacy continuing with the death penalty in her music for years at that point, it was utterly baffling that she stated in her initial written response to the backlash: "I did not imagine or understand that the setting of a plantation would trigger such collective outrage or result in so much high velocity bitterness." For what it's worth, DiFranco told Jezebel that she learned a lot from the experience and the way she responded to it.
This is not to excuse DiFranco or explain for her, but as early as her third album, she was talking about doing things imperfectly. Her scrappy aesthetic has long made room for the not-quite-right: She occasionally forgets her lyrics onstage, she frequently snaps a guitar string while throttle-playing, she has a 19-album discography that only has occasionally captured in the studio what power her songs posses onstage.
Her book, too, is imperfect: She can be frustratingly oblique about what she's talking about at times. She mentions coming from an unhappy family but we only see flashes of why that was so. With arresting bluntness, she admits openly that she cheated on her first husband Andrew "Goat" Gilchrist but doesn't elaborate on the ins or outs, so to speak.
Regardless, DiFranco is raw, sensitive, and thoughtful throughout her memoir. On her early days of scraping by in New York, she writes, "I got so used to roaches that I would no longer jump or startle even when they were on me." She writes page after passionate page tying her belief that reproductive freedom deserves to be considered a civil right with a philosophy that states that life begins before conception. She gets in a few words about her musician peers that, while not quite dishy, are pointed in their own ways. (On Bob Dylan: "Bob felt like a man who lived in fear that someone would discover and expose him as a fraud. I am not saying he is a fraud." On playing an early gig with Tori Amos: "I remember cowering from the tension as she stopped in the middle of a song once to chastise the disrespectful audience. I had such a self-effacing way of approaching an audience myself, I would just try to trick them into listening, and here she was approaching the challenge from the other direction.")
She writes about being so unhappy with her job as a touring artist in the early 2000s, when she was in what most outsiders would consider her prime, that: "It was only a matter of time before it would feel to me like [her label Righteous Babe Records] was this big, primitive, coal-burning machine and my job was shoveling coal. I had a sustainable business model only insofar as I stayed deep underground, gasping." DiFranco would probably rather be caught dead than be labeled a pop star, but this feeling of propping up an entire industry that had formed in the wake of your former passion for entertaining, reminded me a lot of the fatigue you can detect from Britney Spears.
She's also very funny in her bluntness. "My gold record plaque hangs over my toilet as I type," she writes in one section. In another, she recounts her embarrassment when she realized, in Italy, that "Ani" is the plural form of "anus" in Italian.
No Walls and the Recurring Dream ultimately offers a trip back in time that I didn't realize how happy I was to take. DiFranco's music meant so much to me around the time of college, and before reading her book and researching this piece, it had been years since I really did a deep dive into her discography. As such, it was preserved in amber, the memories it brought back were that of the intense, sense variety. Looking back at her career, which her book invites you to do, it stunned me just how many great songs she has, and just how excellent she has been when in top form. Show me a weirder, scarier, more paranoid, more tampon-present love song than "Swan Dive."
DiFranco and I met at the Café Standard in mid-April. Salman Rushdie, randomly, was sitting at the table next to ours as she told me about writing her book for about two years "in stolen mommy moments" (DiFranco has two children, 12-year-old Petah Lucia DiFranco Napolitano, and 6-year-old Dante DiFranco Napolitano). She spoke in a kind of croak and her affect was wary and subdued, but she was not what I would call reserved. She is the kind of interview subject who is engaged in the process, who seems to relish every question as a challenge of how to answer concisely and honestly. Below is a transcript of our discussion, which has been edited for length, clarity, and flow.
Image: Viking
JEZEBEL: You say in your book when discussing your songs, "I feel as though I've discerned a difference between writing from life and autobiography." There, you're referring to refining your truth into art. And here, you're writing…
ANI DIFRANCO: Straightforward autobiography. Or is it? Or is it just another story? I guess I couldn't help but reflect on that mirror in a mirror in a mirror. Looking at my book that I wrote once it was in front of me, I was like, "Wow, that's very subjective." If I had to do it again, I'd probably do it differently. I don't know why I told those stories and not those, and talked about those people but not them. But I tried not to think of this as the be all end all story. It's just another…whatever. Another offering.
Did you write it from your "spleen," as you do music, according to the book?
Yeah, exactly. And trying not to calculate or worry about it.
Looking at my book that I wrote once it was in front of me, I was like, 'Wow, that's very subjective.' If I had to do it again, I'd probably do it differently.
There are some things, though, that you don't talk about in the book pointedly, it seems. We understand that you were married to Andrew "Goat" Glichrist, you cheated on Goat, you split from Goat, but we don't see that split. We don't see [drummer] Andy [Stochansky] departing your band. How did you draw those lines of what went in the book and what was off limits?
I just sort of took one step at a time through the telling and I found my way to where I ended up. Some stuff I wrote and deleted. Some stuff I went back and elaborated on. I didn't dish on any of us in a deep way, myself or others. I think the middle way is probably where the most truth is. I'm not my best moment, and I'm not my worst moment. I'm somewhere in the middle and I think all the people in my life and the people that I wrote about, I tried to treat us all the same way. Like, here's a portrait from my hand of this person. My best friend I was talking to the other day, they were saying how disappointed they were at the lack of dishing. "There's not a single blowjob in this fuckin' book! What good is this?"
Honestly, for me even telling what happened was kind of excruciating. It was a little hard for me to even want to go there. What I got excited about was my ideas. I tried to not go too heavily into pontificating, 'cause that's all I really wanted to do, is share ideas. I don't want to talk more about what happened. I was trying to strike a balance between what I was compelled to do and what other people are compelled to read.
Is part of the wariness to go back and rerecord the things that happened a result of getting sick of talking about yourself?
[Nodding emphatically, exhaustedly even] Yeah. And it's funny because then I feel like I upped the oversharing ante with the book. And after recording the audiobook version, I never want to share anything again. So, you heard it here first: I'm done. That's it.
I never want to share anything again. So, you heard it here first: I'm done. That's it.
Is that because you had to reread what you had written in such explicit detail?
Yeah. Writing it down, there's a certain amount of putting the little mule blinders on and just create and don't worry. But then sitting down in front of a microphone and speaking these intimate thoughts that I somehow brought myself to put on the page, I didn't see it coming. I didn't prepare myself for that.
You live in New Orleans. Is Righteous Babe now based there?
Righteous Babe is now based where most businesses are: In the ether. In this person's house, in that person's laptop. I finally came to the realization that having a cathedral to heat and cool and keep the lights on and all of that kind of infrastructure is not really that meaningful. So the venue still exists in Buffalo but that's no longer the Babe headquarters.
Is that a result of the ever-changing music industry?
Yeah, I mean, I'm just another example of downscaling. The bubble of profit in the music industry for everyone burst some time ago. For me, it was steady growth for a decade or two and now it's a sort of consolidation of resources and everything.
Do you take that personally?
No. I try not to feel bad about it. My whole world is populated with artists, some of whom had moments in the sun, some of whom were very brightly lit, but it all, ya know... Even a Bruce Springsteen is past his prime at some point. You have to accept that, and what happens next and who are you now. Those are just the challenges that you're lucky to face if you have any kind of success.
In the book you write, "It was exciting for my career to be on the way up, yes, but in many ways, it got better on the way down." Was it ever difficult to face "the way down" as it began, or have you always been so zen about it?
I think I've always been pretty zen. I believe that the universe will hold me. I believe that the universe will not let me starve. And beyond that I've been lucky and I have to stay grateful and not worry that something becomes less or that something becomes harder. Life is nothing if not humbling, so you can either accept it or die resisting.
Is part of your reaction to reading this book aloud similar to that which you have with your records, which you write about ending up hating, almost invariably?
I don't know because this is my first book experience. I don't know what the lasting effect on me will be, but I have felt steady dread and anxiety since turning it in. I just want to get through the next few months. I just want to see July on the calendar and know somehow it went out into the world and whatever the reactions were from the near and dear to the stranger, I survived it and life continues. I feel very fearful right now.
I feel very fearful right now.
Being seen, being judged. I'm afraid of hurting people. One unique aspect of this project was letting people into the process, like, "Here read a version and tell me what you think." That was fascinating.
Fascinating?
Yeah, I let 20 people into the process and everybody picked up on different stuff. Everybody had different suggestions. Different people warned, "Take this out!" "You can't say that!" I had to navigate through that. A lot of warnings about a lot of different aspects of what I was putting out there. I know from a life of putting yourself out there that there's a certain amount of blowback and criticism and people that will feel hurt or angry. I had to really decide to leave in what I left in and hope that the overall effect is what I intended, which is that I love and respect all the people in this book. And I'm trying to be balanced and fair but real. I guess I sort of open the book with that: What is the degree of real that is appropriate to be with other people in any moment?
The idea of feedback and its corrosive effects has long been a theme in your work—it comes up in various ways in "In or Out," "Not a Pretty Girl," "Joyful Girl," "Little Plastic Castle," etc. It reminds me of Joni Mitchell, who has expressed a similar sensitivity to feedback. What I interpret from her and what I think I interpret from you is that the sensitivity that has allowed you to open up and express also makes you vulnerable to the effects of that expression.
Totally. I think that's the plight of the artist and many people who are not artists, just the sensitive among us. It's a gift and a curse. Maybe also for women because you're not often in a position of defining the terms of discourse, it's like you're starting from a somewhat disempowered place when you're speaking, even of your own experience. It will be gauged and defined by something outside yourself, which of course exists on so many levels in the power dynamics of society—you're queer, you're a person of color. Your experience will be interpreted by the other and they may or may not hear or see you as you see yourself or as you intended to be heard. It's a dicey business.
For women because you're not often in a position of defining the terms of discourse, it's like you're starting from a somewhat disempowered place when you're speaking, even of your own experience. It will be gauged and defined by something outside yourself.
It seems like there's no solution. You just gotta ride the wave.
Yeah, and continue to put your truth out there.
"Would you prefer the easy way?"
You're good, doing all your homework.
We've talked about the negatives but were there positives in writing this book? Was it all fun or stimulating?
Yeah, if I survive the next couple of months, I'm gonna say, "Positive experience," because I feel like the overall effect that I took away from the writing process was of deeper gratitude. I had some oversimplified memories, as we do. It was like Memento, the three words on a Polaroid, that's what our memory is. To sit down and try to go deeper than that, it's like, "Right, I can't reduce you to 'asshole,' like I did for the last 30 years. You're a person who gave to me as well as took away. You're fallible, like me. You're somebody I love as well as somebody I've been hurt by." I think the overall effect for me was to look at people in my life with renewed appreciation. I made myself go there. No more writing off that moment or that person.
You write matter-of-factly about your relationship with a man you refer to as The First Boyfriend, who was in his 30s when you were 15. You write that "to my undiscerning eye it looked consensual and balanced," but you don't dwell on the optics.
I was certainly aware, as a 15-year-old dating a 33-year-old, that the gaze of the world was like, "Mmmm, that's uncool." But for me I felt like, "I'm grown, I'm making my own choices and I choose this relationship." I considered myself empowered within it. Looking back, I'm more standing with the rest of the world. In that moment it was important for me and in so many moments, it was important for me to tell myself, "I'm in charge. I got this." It's the only way forward.
I'm not my best moment, and I'm not my worst moment. I'm somewhere in the middle.
The situation that inspired the song "Gratitude," in which a man in England let you stay at his place and then "insisted I use my body to pay him rent," did you always consider that on the spectrum of rape? ("Rape is a black dot in the center of a dark smudge in the center of a very big grey cloud that dissipates and pales at the edges.") You approach the subject with a degree of humor in that song.
I think that's more of a reflection thing that happened much later. You just consider it the way it is. Whatever the hand you are dealt, that's the way it is. And even getting to the point where you're rebelling against the way it is is a journey. I told that story and other little snippets just to try to be real about, yeah, the negotiating, the power dynamics. But it could have been a litany of those. It could have been endless. Endless stories.
Why did you choose to refer to those guys by pseudonym instead of naming them?
Well, to not do damage. Their names aren't important. Maybe he regrets that night. It's funny, I've been working on a record now for several years, I'm finally done. It's called The Prison Music Project and it's all songs written by prisoners, many of them lifers. It's a lot of different singers, most of them women, which is interesting, all the writers are men. This fellow whose song I sang murdered somebody, a woman, when he was 19. He's my friend now, you know? We have corresponded ever since the inception of this project. He's been in prison for 40 years. He was 19 when he committed that act. He deeply regrets it. He's awake now. He was not awake then. He did not understand his connection to other people the way he does now. He's actually a very sensitive feminist, artistic, gentle soul who went all the way to the dark side, and I believe has a valuable story to tell because of it.
When I first found out about the details of his crime, after we had already become friends, it was like (gasps). For people who do that kind of [criminal-justice] work, it's like to humanize murderers, to find the good in a person who fucked up as bad as you can fuck up, to continue to love that person like their mother would, is the work of the gods, the goddesses. Seeing what it means to continue to give love and respect somebody's humanity. If I can do that with my friend the murderer, I can do that with my friend who sort of forced me to do a one-nighter, you know? I really feel that we have to make space for the awakening of ourselves and each other. This culture now of writing people off…
"Cancel culture."
It's just gonna get us nowhere.
But do you think certain lines can be drawn? For example, R. Kelly, [an alleged] serial abuser of women, [alleged] rapist of teenagers? Or, to draw a more personal example, could you see yourself forming this relationship with a convicted pedophile?
Whew. I know women who work in criminal defense who don't take cases like that because it's just too hard, and I get it. And right, we all have to draw the line somewhere with how much it impacts and hurts. I just think it's so important to know that the R. Kellys, etc., are everywhere. That we are R. Kelly. If you really, really go back, you have to write off a lot of our male heroes at least. There's a lot of abuse of women by men who are canonized and deified. It's just before full consciousness. Same thing with race. You have to appreciate people's context and their fallibility. I think if the reality of R. Kelly's personal behavior makes listening to his music too hard, don't listen to his music, by all means. And in fact maybe stop supporting him as an artist because you feel like you're enabling bad behavior. But you can't write him off as a human being or stop expecting him to grow and listen. Okay, let's wake up, but we can't kick each other off the planet. We're still here together so let's wake up together.
About Prince, with whom you collaborated, you write, "In addition to his obstinate independence, I could relate to his way of being heterosexual but queer as the day is long." Did Prince ever identify to you as queer?
No. I love the word "queer," I've always embraced it because I love how open-ended it is. I think that some straight people are really fuckin' queer and have very queer sexual lives and some gay people are very straight. I think of queer as unconventional. So yeah, I mean, it was much easier to write about Prince because he's gone and I don't have to worry about…I know what it's like to be defined by others and I don't think I would have written that little section as freely if he were here to go, "Fuck that!"
I don't know where you are with identity now. Do you use the term "bisexual?" Do you prefer the term "queer?"
I like "queer." "Bisexual" always sounded very medical, like something you do to a frog in 9th grade science or something. I think the irony is I'm pretty fuckin' hetero, which is unfortunate for me because many of my deepest connections are with women. But, naw, I just like what's in boys' pants better. That's what turns me on.
I think the irony is I'm pretty fuckin' hetero.
About playing the Michigan Womyn's Music Festival, you write, "Everywhere we went, some woman seemed to be dedicating herself to protecting some other theoretical woman who might be triggered or feel tacitly oppressed by some tiny detail of the known universe." That attitude, more generally applied, reminds me of how many people behave on Twitter.
Boy, I hope that we can find the balance. At some point we just have to: "So, you're offended. Now what?" You string that person up? I think it's almost like, I don't know, it seems a little naive to me to think that we can live in a state of outrage. It's an outrageous world, for sure, but you have to function in it. So that involves a lot of humility, a lot of forgiveness. To each other. And it might be me that needs forgiving tomorrow. This culture of perfection-or-else is not sustainable.
And you experienced that to the greatest degree with the Nottoway debacle.
Mmmhmmm.
My interpretation of your responses was that the first one you sent was an explanation.
Ani DiFranco Cancels Songwriting Retreat At Former Slave Plantation
Today in "whaaaaaaaat," feminist icon Ani DiFranco has cancelled her four-day…
And people did not want an explanation.
They wanted you to say you were sorry.
But you wanted to show your thought process and it ended up biting you in the ass.
Right. Yeah. That's one of the things I learned. It's so huge and complex. That impacted my life so deeply on so many levels and it was devastating. One of the things I can say in a sound bite that I learned is if the pain of racial injustice is awakened in people, it is so huge and so deep and so real that it doesn't matter what the details are. It doesn't matter to parse fact from fiction. It doesn't matter to dissect the he said/she said. Your job as a white ally is to affirm the pain, is to affirm the rationality and the real basis for it and to listen and to apologize for being involved in something that in any way ignites it once again.
And definitely trying to explain myself was in no way useful. It's a real bummer because you are, of course, aware of all kinds of other things surrounding the legitimate discussion. You just have to put all those things down and be the ally. Do the listening. Affirm what you heard. Don't try to explain yourself. This is not time for more of your story, even if you too experience injustices or hurts from other people, it's not the time for that.
You write that you sympathize with both sides regarding Michfest's trans-exclusionary guidelines: "I understand the need for trans women to find community with and be accepted by other women, and I understand the need for people with reproductive systems, perceived female at birth, to make space to process their particular relationship to patriarchy." The need for an exclusive space, I don't get that, as a stupid man. Could you explain to me why? It seems to me that in your life, as a cis woman, you encounter many other cis women with whom you can discuss reproduction. To have an institution that excludes such a tiny piece of the population would seem only to serve to hurt those people.
I feel pretty strongly that the staunchness of the vibe there was not helping that festival or feminism in general. But I do know and have experienced how [for] women, it's sort of the eternal circumstance to be always put to the end of the line. This is now again: "It's not the time for you to have what you need in terms of a space to process your relationship to patriarchy, to support each other over maybe even something as specific as living in this world with a reproductive system and all that that means." I think women are asked again and again and again to move over and make room for somebody else, you know? So I can feel that dynamic of it. I can empathize with the feeling of you're shutting down this experience that I really need affirmed by the people who share it exactly, and you're telling me I don't have a right to that space. There is no space yet for that! I constructed a space and now you're saying, "That too is not your space that you crave." I think it's hard for anybody outside of a very specific group to experience it the way that group does. I agree on one level, ooh maybe this group should be a little bigger. Maybe that's the way through here. But I don't want to tell you that your experience doesn't deserve a place. Within Mish there [was] a tent only for black women to go and process what it means to be a black person with ovaries. I don't want to say to that tent, "You should let me in!"
I guess when the segregation dovetails with the status quo, that's when my antennae go up. Trans people are told practically everywhere, "Not here."
Yeah, exactly. I think it's just…that's all I was trying to do: Let's not be quick to say to cis women, "Move over again." Maybe that's the right thing to do, cis women, in this moment, but be careful, society, of telling women that again.
In the book, you talk about jokingly embezzling $16,000 from yourself—your merch money—to buy a Mustang. This section comes right before a reprint of your letter to Ms. magazine, in which you made it clear that your goal in forming your own business was for creative freedom, not to be an entrepreneur who made more money per unit than Hootie & the Blowfish. Something I have long wondered is how you negotiated turning a profit while being anti-capitalist. I know you have to give yourself a salary, but personally did you have rules about how much you were allowed to profit off of your hard work versus how much money you put back into Righteous Babe?
Just an instinct. Nothing that could be written down. Nothing that is fixed. My instinct was to turn around a lot of that profit—and in fact now, with all of the downscaling, it's like, "Maybe too much! Shit!"—to activists, to other artists, to people in the world that are doing the work that I want to see done, that I appreciate. I have no problem with profit as a necessity. Everybody needs to be able to make a living wage doing what they do in this world. Profit as a motivation is what I don't dig. The profit's gotta be what happens when you are following your purpose and you have to find the balance.
I Googled your net worth and some random site that isn't quite clear on its sourcing estimated it at $10 million.
Wow. All right!
That's not true?
Probably not. Yeah, I mean I guess I'm no longer the owner of that cathedral in Buffalo but that is potentially worth a few million dollars. That kind of thing. The record company. What is Righteous Babe worth? That's a very esoteric proposition to figure out. But yeah, no, there's no $10 mill in the bank.
The book really hits home how much the entrepreneurship was a byproduct of your determination for creative freedom. I knew those things were both conversant in your career, but I did not realize the actual relationship.
That was kind of a nauseating irony for a long time. Maybe this book will help me make my case for who I think I am, but I still [read] "singer/songwriter/entrepreneur" more often than not. It's just like…whatever. I hope that longevity will be my answer. I can survive everybody else's opinion and I will end up myself in my last dying breath.
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These mystical write-offs emerge in political rhetoric as giant subsidies to big corporations, illusory money floating through the corporate air. In an election, politicians want to eliminate them all. The right accuses the left of passing out subsidies like candy. The left accuses the right of hypocrisy, especially toward the dreaded evil Big Oil.
Subsidies and write-offs, however, are not the same thing. The difference lies in the way taxation works. The primary method of business taxation is through a corporate income tax. Companies are taxed on their income or profits rather than gross revenue.
A company makes a product and sells it for $100, but the cost of materials, labor, the store to sell it in, etc. was $90. The company profit was $10 and they pay tax on the $10. But companies and their expenses are quite complicated, so there are rules and regulations deciding what the company can count as an expense and therefore "write-off" against their final cost.
Traditionally, we refer to something as a subsidy when the government actually makes a payment to a company to support a specific task. Government grants or loan guarantees subsidize the cost of doing business and usually specific businesses or tasks — something that can be thought of as the government picking winners and losers. They pay for some favored tasks or products but not for others.
The rise in more direct subsidies for renewable energy projects has created impetus on the right and left to talk imprecisely about subsidies. Renewable projects have been more likely to benefit from direct subsidies like loan guarantees, grants or above-market subsidized power purchase agreements.
Politicians of the right will announce they want to eliminate all subsidies, renewable as well as oil and gas. Politicians of the left claim the right opposes only renewables and won't touch huge oil subsidies.
Activists are led to believe the government doles out billions of dollars to oil companies who certainly don't need the help.
We should, without question, eliminate all the subsidies regardless of energy type in the tax code. Don't eliminate some but not others, get rid of everything and use the savings to lower rates for everyone.
Some special credits and research allowances qualify as small subsidies and should be eliminated, but other proposals would simply treat expenses differently for some companies and not others. For example, to create the illusion of large oil and gas subsidies, opponents act as if treating them the same as other businesses is a distortion and suggest making an exception of them so the government can collect more money.
The "section 199 deduction" is available for domestic producers of products, music, roads, almost anything. Good or bad policy, it is not an oil subsidy. Already oil producers have had it reduced — just for them — to 2/3 of the rate of other companies. That's the direct opposite of a subsidy. The President and others have proposed eliminating it entirely for oil and leaving it for all others. Eliminating it for all or keeping it for all are both defensible options. Punishing only one sector is punitive gamesmanship but par for the political course.
Most expenses are deducted from revenue immediately, like cost of materials, labor and rent. Some large capital expenses are depreciated — deducted in pieces over time like a mortgage. For minerals and other natural resources, depreciation takes the form of a depletion allowance — deducting a percentage of revenue as an expense. Again, any changes — like the sensible provision allowing all business expenses to be deducted immediately rather than over elongated periods — should be made for all business and no one sector singled out. In fact, allowing immediate expensing would not only encourage investment, but also eliminate judgment calls about what is or isn't the appropriate period of depreciation.
Too often tax changes are made to single out one unpopular sector. Tax neutrality — and a neutral government should be our goal — demands that tax rates and rules apply to all sectors equally without credit or exception. Subsidies involve special treatment instead of allowing companies to benefit by the same rules.
Today is the Ides of July — or Quintilis if you aren't fond of Julius Caesar –and a good time to remind us all what we do and don't know about taxes — that perennial political football. Tax myths abound and all too often color political debate. But a look at tax data tells us more about our economy and system than the insipid polemics that disease what passes for public discourse.
The individual income tax provides about half of all revenue for the federal government. In 2015, the individual income tax will provide $1.48 trillion, about 46% of all federal revenue. By contrast, corporate income taxes provide 10% of federal revenue, $341 billion in 2015.
Corporate taxes are also much more volatile. in the recession they plummeted to less than half their previous value and have increased by 147% since 2009. Individual taxes fell during the recession by just 22% and have climbed by 61%.
Individual income taxes are also much more progressive than you think. A huge percentage of Americans pay no income taxes at all — though of course they do pay other taxes like payroll taxes. in the tax year 2010, the most recent for which we have this calculation, 41% of tax returns had no liability or negative liability, up from 25% of returns just 10 years prior.
Remember though that those people aren't outside the system altogether. They still pay payroll taxes if they work at all and other federal excise taxes.
By the way, this calculation has nothing to do with whether or not you got a refund — a refund is just the difference between your liability and pre-payments withheld.
The income tax is also much more progressive then you think. The much reviled top 1% of earners paid 38% of income taxes even though they only made 22% of all income. The progressivity follows at every level. For example, the top 10% of taxpayers made 48% of income but paid 70% of taxes. In contrast, the bottom 50% made 11% of income and paid just 2.8% of taxes.
By the way, to be in the top 25% of taxpayers in 2012 you needed a family income of $73,300 while a $125,200 would put you and your family in the top 10%.
The system is not just relatively progressive but getting more so. Ten years prior, the top 1% paid 33% of taxes not 38% and the top 10% of earners paid 64% not 70%. Go back even further, before the Reagan reforms of the 1980s and you find that thirty years ago the top 1% paid 19% (now it's 38%) and the top 10% paid 45% (now it's 70%). Much more progressive indeed!
In New Hampshire, we filed 680,000 federal income tax returns with total taxable income of $32.3 billion. That led to New Hampshire residents paying $6.1 billion in federal income taxes in 2012. In that same year businesses, residents, and non-residents paid a combined $3.1 billion in state and local property taxes in New Hampshire.
The businesses we work for paid an additional $554 million in the state's combines business tax in the comparable fiscal year. The business taxes were paid by the firms that employ approximately 95% of us.
Most nominal businesses aren't really businesses. About 77% of them are called non-employers — for most of them an accounting or tax filing tool to account for some sideline self-employment income.
The 4900 firms (3.7% of the nominal total) that have at least 20 employees account for 80% of the jobs. Just13,500 employers have at least 5 employees make up 95% of the jobs.
And that's the average number of companies that have paid the Business Profits Tax over the last few years (15, 865 last year). So the companies paying the state's business taxes account for 95% of the non-government jobs in New Hampshire.
Over the last twenty years, business taxes are becoming worse and worse. Since 1995, they have risen from just 14% of the state's operating budget to 25% this year. We don't rely on our largest revenue source to the same extent the federal government does but we're getting there.
You needn't fear the Ides of July like old Julius was troubled by March but the next time someone pontificates on taxes you might want to look behind the numbers.
As reported in the Nashua Telegraph, a Legislative audit of the Division of Economic Development, within the Department of Resources and Economic Development found that in 2011 and 2012, $875,750 was improperly given out as tax credits, while an additional $121,000 worth of tax credits were not given to business that were eligible to receive them. This mismanagement accounts for nearly half of all the tax credits granted by the Division. The specific programs in question are the Economic Revitalization Zone (ERZ)[i] tax credit and the Coös County Job Creation (CCJC) tax credit, both administered by the Department of Resources and Economic Development (DRED).
The ERZ tax credit is awarded to businesses that make capital improvements and create new jobs in specifically designated areas. Each year a total of $825,000 worth of credits are available. If there are more applications for credits then there are available, each applicant gets a proportional share. The Coös County Job Creation tax credit is designed to encourage full time, year round jobs in said county. The applying company is eligible for up to $1000 per job created, and there is no cap on the total number of credits issued each year.
4 were awarded to businesses located outside of Economic Revitalization Zones, totaling $237,400.
1 application missed the deadline, but was awarded $188,200 in credits for the following tax year, in violation of the law.
6 were awarded for part time employees totaling $6,500. The credit explicitly requires employees to be full time.
2 were awarded $1,500 for employees making below the minimum wage, in violation of the terms of the credit.
According to the auditors, one employee was responsible for reviewing and approving all of the applications.
From the report, it appears that these issues are due to a lack of oversight and competence rather than corruption. The auditors noted several problem areas, including a lack of controls over the application and award process, as well as a lack of safeguards to ensure compliance after the credit has been issued. For example, if a business was received a credit, but ended up cutting jobs, or moving out of state, there is no recourse for the state to get that money back.
The final recommendations include developing administrative rules for regulations, standards and forms relative to the tax credits and implementing policies that ensure adequate controls over calculating and awarding tax credits, consistent application of the same criteria, reviews, and obtaining supporting documentation to calculate tax credit awards.
The Division, to their credit, agreed with the recommendations and is taking steps to correct the problems with the tax credit programs highlighted by the audit.
[ii] Note: Some applications had multiple infractions.
The brokered deal on the Medicaid Enhancement Tax and lawsuit is a partial solution to an imperfect situation that will require difficult choices but it may still be the right choice to make. The complexity of the tax and the schemes surrounding it make evaluating and understanding the tax, the choices, and the possibilities difficult but let's give it a try.
The Medicaid Enhancement Tax (or MET) was a convoluted scheme developed in 1991 to borrow from the hospitals and leverage money from the federal government at no cost to the hospitals. In the first decades it wasn't a real tax, it had no cost to hospitals, and was something they could hardly refuse to go along with. It took almost 20 years but the folly of trusting a money hungry government finally hit them like a 2×4 to the face.
The no-cost favor hospitals did the government had created a structure to collect hundreds of millions of dollars. In 2009, the government took some money off the top. In 2011, hospitals were hit with a de facto tax increase of $250 million. When your taxes go up that much, you take action.
The hospitals stopped being cooperative doormats, hired good lawyers, and – despite the famous lyrical prediction to the contrary – fought the law and the law lost.
That put the government in an odd spot. If they took no action, about $370 million for the current budget would either not be collected or refunded while only $50 million of spending would go away.
Your perspective on what should happen next might depend on your thoughts about the lawsuit. If you believed the state's appeal of the decision would be successful, you might not think any action necessary but few believed such a thing. Most people – and this includes me – believe that the tax would remain unconstitutional and there would be a $320 million budget hole.
This put hospitals in the driver's seat. They were willing to negotiate a settlement that included more money for the state but insisted in exchange on some reversal of the earlier $250 million tax hike. There is no possible settlement that will not create a spending problem of some sort.
Theoretically, the tax was always collected to fund uncompensated care (largely free charity care that hospitals provide low income patients) and for Medicaid underpayment. Remember that Medicaid is not the government paying for health care. It is the government paying about a third to a half of what private insurance pays the same provider for the same service and expecting the provider to eat the rest of the cost. In theory, the MET is to help cover some of those underpayments.
The current proposed plan mandates that a minimum portion of the tax collected to fund uncompensated care actually does so and that those payments are made proportional to charity and Medicaid care actually provided. Even after we made a fake tax a real tax, some money went to such payments but that amount will probably rise by $125 million – half of which would be paid by the federal government.
There is a substantial difference between how much we will collect and how much we will return to hospitals. The remainder must be used – as it is used now voluntarily – to support regular Medicaid provider payments which we have to make either way. That additional amount can be thought of as the portion of the scheme that is a real tax. That amount is likely to be around $80-100 million less in the next budget than it is today. That's a big hole but it's after the election so politicians are happy.
The precise language of the law is being tweaked to eliminate drafting errors and some inconsistencies so it is a bit of a moving target. To make matters worse, there is not yet a fiscal note attached to the bill that is publicly available. I remain convinced that no legislation should be passed that does not include a fiscal note – the official financial analysis – that is available to the public for a week before the vote.
All that having been said, something has to be done or the state will have a huge financial hole. If lawmakers are confident the State would win an appeal to the Supreme Court, they might vote against this incomplete agreement. However, I think the state would lose an appeal and so do most lawyers I know. In the battle between a crap shoot and a beat up used car, the jalopy wins.
Every legislative session there are 3 or 4 issues which dominate the media's attention but some of the most important long term decisions pass by with little notice. You'd be forgiven for thinking the gas tax, gambling, and Medicaid expansion are the only three issues before the legislature. These are important but you'll forgive me if I take a moment to talk about the state budget.
Too often legislatures focus o the budget one year and completely ignore it the next year. The budget passed last year was balanced in its own way but had a few problems that the legislature wants to correct. The most important correction is a simple but controversial partial correction to the state's rainy day fund.
Recall that our budget is balanced on the basis of a two-year estimate of revenues. Estimating 24 months of revenues in an uncertain economy is necessarily imprecise. Lawmakers, typically but perhaps not always, try to estimate cautiously which tends to leave a small remainder at the end of the two year cycle. By a state law honored more in the breach than in the observance, that residual is supposed to be set aside for a rainy day.
No one wants to create a slush fund with the remainders so the fund has a cap on its total amount (larger amounts should obviously be returned to the payer) and relatively strict rules about when withdrawals can be made.
The last two year budget ended with $72.2 million that should, by law, have been transferred to the rainy day fund. Instead, lawmakers spent it. That is, they spent most of it. At the time spending decisions were made, rather than balancing projected revenue and spending, they took about $50 million extra to enhance their spending thoughts instead and "temporarily" suspended the law that requires it be put in the rainy day fund.
In the final accounting, it turned out that there was more money than they thought. What to do with the extra $15.3 million? Predictably, one group has spending eyes. A second group, the Republican leadership of both houses, wants to deposit it into the rainy day fund. It's about time.
Suspended state law would have required a $72 million deposit. Republicans want to deposit just the $15.3 million the compromise state budget hasn't already spent. Oddly, that's too much for the governor. Rather than be satisfied that she's managed to tap into $57 million she's not supposed to have, she wants to spend most of the extra as well. Ridiculous.
The $15.3 million should merely be an opening good faith deposit. The first of two fiscal years of this budget will see about $25 million in revenue above the budget – depending on business tax receipts the next two months. That money should also be set aside, by law, to get us to half of what should have been deposited.
This is not merely a side issue unrelated to important things. Rather, it is a test of whether or not the legislature can discipline itself. We have state laws that create structures to impose modicums of discipline. Those laws turn from discipline to cynical mockeries of the taxpayer if they are merely suspended every budget season.
Some lawmakers are under the mistaken impression that we are still laboring under the supposedly dramatic cuts of the 2011 passed budget. The state's operating budget (general and education funds plus a handful of relabeled funds) that year was a merely a reversal of the prior increase. That prior increase was not supported by tax dollars but by a one-time windfall (borrowing and a bailout). The pre-bailout amount of $2.336 billion became $2.327 in the dramatic cut year.
That cut itself was almost entirely erased in the current budget. The pre-cut operating budget was $2.465 billion. After a brief decline, operating spending came back up to $2.457 in year two of the current budget. This time, however, the spending is supported largely by tax revenues not by hundreds of millions of dollars of one-time windfalls. The money that should have been put in the rainy day fund amounts to 1.2% of the two-year budget (compared to 9.8% one-time cash in the borrowing and bailout budget).
Future budgets are dictated by current discipline. We can save ourselves a lot of trouble tomorrow by exercising discipline today. Until the proposed Rainy Day Fund deposit is $72 million, all calls to spend it instead should be resisted. Proposing $15.3 million is a pittance and ought not be controversial.
Because the numbers are so large, most people don't bother to look at federal taxes and end up making assumptions that are at odds with the actual numbers. Federal taxes and the federal budget are very different from political rhetoric and muck of media reporting.
Every year the federal government adds to its historical analysis of who paid income taxes and how much they paid. Based on the rhetoric that floats around during the budget crisis that seems to return every few months, you might get the wrong idea. Interestingly, the federal income tax — the largest share of federal revenues — is remarkably progressive and has been getting more so for the last 30 years.
While the only certainties in life are said to be death and taxes, the federal income tax is an exception. Everyone may hate taxes but we don't all pay them. Almost half of Americans, about 47 percent, don't pay any income taxes. I don't mean they get a refund of some of their pre-payments. Their annual tax income tax bill is either zero or negative (meaning their refunds exceed payments). That number varies by year and is a little higher in the early years of the recession but even in good times it was 40 percent.
One analyst, by the way, remarked that perhaps the 45 percent of people in polls who are happy with the tax system aren't actually crazy as we might think but rather just the people who have nothing to be annoyed by because they don't get a bill.
Everyone knows that richer people pay more in taxes because they have more money. If you make ten times what I make then I suspect you pay ten times in taxes. But is it proportional or do the wealthy manage to avoid their fair share as some think?
According to the 2010 data, the top 1 percent of all tax filers made 19 percent of the total income in the country. Their share of taxes, though, was much higher at 37 percent — almost twice as much as their income share would lead you to think. In contrast, the bottom 50 percent earned almost 12 percent of all the income but paid just 2.4 percent of the taxes. Instead of twice their income share, they paid one-fifth. Very progressive indeed as is every income split in between those bookends.
But do rich people pay less of a share than they used to? In fact, the change over 30 years has been remarkable. In 1983, the top 1 percent of earners paid 20 percent of federal income taxes and the bottom 50 percent paid 7 percent.
So, over the course of 30 years, the richest 1 percent has gone from paying three times the share of the poorest 50 percent to paying more than 15 times as great a share (and if you look at the year by year data it has been a steady progression over that time).
For those keeping track, the bottom 50 percent in 2010 was incomes under $34,300. The top 1 percent consisted of people earning more than $369,000.
The other great federal tax myth is that current levels of taxation aren't anywhere close to balancing the budget. We can't support the current government without big changes or so we are told.
Actually revenues grow every year — some years more than others and some less but, barring another huge recession, they will rise each year. According to the Congressional Budget Office, even with the current anemic growth assumptions, taxes will grow by an average of 5.8 percent each year over the next decade.
That could balance the budget without reducing spending. In fact, the lag for revenues to reach current spending levels is only three years. In other words, if we froze spending at the current dollar level, natural revenue growth would provide a surplus in three years.
Politicians in Washington can't possibly freeze spending (though, of course their colleagues at the state level actually reduced spending in states across the country). But, let's say they decided (an unnatural act for politicians) that come hell or high water the budget had to be balanced in ten years. Would huge spending cuts be required?
Not at all. Mild restraint would be required. Spending could grow at 3.7 percent and we would achieve balance in ten years. Why is that so problematic? Current spending projections anticipate spending to grow by 5.4 percent. Apparently, growing but by a little bit less is a Herculean task that we have no realistic hope of ever expecting the Lilliputians we send to Washington to accomplish.
A Look at Manchester's Bond Rating Downgrade and why the Tax Cap is not to blame.
Last week the City of Manchester saw its general obligation bond rating downgraded from Aa1 to Aa2; in layman's terms it went from the second highest to the third highest ranking category affecting $193 million in outstanding general obligation (GO) debt. The bond rating agency Moody's also downgraded the school facility revenue bonds to Aa3, affecting $77.3 million in outstanding bonds.
The long term outlook for the city's debt was also changed from negative to stable, indicating that further downgrades are unlikely.
But is the tax cap really to blame for the downgrade? The key to the rating downgrade is the size of the city's reserve fund, which dropped below 20% of revenues due to the recession and the sluggish recovery's impact on tax collections. While a tax cap can limit the ability of the city to rebuild those reserves, the real culprit is the Recreation Fund.
The Recreation Fund, which consists of McIntyre Ski Area (which has been leased to a private group since 2009), a pair of ice arenas, and a golf course, have been operating in deficit for several years, requiring the transfer of a total of $5.8 million from the city's general fund, with the understanding that it be repaid. The Recreation Fund currently carries this amount on its balance sheet as 'due to other funds'. Given the nature of the debt, Moody's considers it very unlikely that the city will recoup this money from the Recreation Fund and therefore factored in the write off for the full amount against the General Fund reserves.
This means that the downgrade would have happened with or without a tax cap in place. The write off of the Recreation Fund deficit, which reduced the city's Reserve Fund below the threshold for holding onto the Aa1 rating, is solely to blame. Had the tax cap not been in place there is a possibility that the outlook may have been rated positive rather than stable, but that would purely be speculation. Of the factors that could increase the city's rating, two are directly related to the pressures placed on the city by the Recreation Fund, with the third being sustained economic growth.
http://jbartlett.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_white_v1_360x70.png 0 0 Joshua Elliott-Traficante http://jbartlett.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_white_v1_360x70.png Joshua Elliott-Traficante2013-08-06 15:02:412013-08-06 15:02:41A Look at Manchester's Bond Rating Downgrade and why the Tax Cap is not to blame.
Massachusetts is simply not doing enough to help the New Hampshire economy. The news is full this week of stories about tax increases south of the border that should benefit us. But the changes are likely to have only a muted impact on the economy up here. In the past, we've been able to count on Massachusetts to drive more jobs and business our way. We may have to work harder in the future.
For decades, New Hampshire's economy has benefited from a competitive advantage that drives jobs and people into our state. Tax advantages over Massachusetts (and the smaller economies of Maine and Vermont) have helped encourage businesses to locate in a state with no income tax, retail business to move to a state with no sales tax, and in general have created an idea in business development circles of New Hampshire as the low-tax island in the high-tax Northeast.
As other states adopted taxes on income or sales, New Hampshire resisted. In 1970, we abolished a dozen taxes on capital and replaced them with a Business Profits Tax. Much of our tax policy focused on the competitive advantage we had and tried to maintain over our neighbors. The phrase "New Hampshire Advantage" is used so often in legislative debate that its meaning is becoming obscured.
The advantage we seek to maintain is one related to reputation and behavior. We want people to buy, invest and locate in New Hampshire. The changes to tax law governing limited liability companies were fought and ultimately repealed four years ago fundamentally because they reduced or perhaps eliminated the incentive for entrepreneurial, startup companies to locate here as opposed to Cambridge.
But our neighbors can also be our best friends. Raising income or business taxes, for example, sends existing Massachusetts businesses looking around to see if there are friendlier fields nearby.
The changes taking effect in Massachusetts will spur some sales increases here, but they are actually much less damaging to Massachusetts and helpful to us than they might be. Gov. Deval Patrick wanted to raise income taxes, which would have done much more for us.
Raising cigarette taxes in Massachusetts by $1 per pack will probably increase cross-border sales. Tobacco sales are almost unaffected by 10 cents here and there. The 10-cent reduction in New Hampshire's tax last year had no impact on sales (as some of us warned). When cigarettes cost $5 per pack, raising the price by a dime doesn't get anyone to stop smoking, and lowering it by a dime doesn't get anyone to drive here.
But a $1 increase probably will get more than a few north-of-Boston smokers to pop across the border to stock up. Every time Massachusetts increases cigarette taxes, New Hampshire cross border sales go up, as do some additional ancillary sales (liquor, for example). This will have a modest effect on tax revenues, but a very limited effect on jobs and business growth.
The other notable tax increase is a three-cent hike in the Massachusetts gas tax. The new tax is also indexed for inflation, so it will rise automatically without a vote. That's a clever way to raise taxes without political fingerprints (so we need to avoid doing that here).
The gas tax will have almost no cross-border impact. Prices for gasoline are much less uniform than for most goods. They bounce up and down a great deal. No one's going to drive very far to save 3 cents a gallon on gas that costs something like $3.70 when they aren't quite sure if it's factored into the price (near-border gas is often priced with the neighboring state in mind, regardless of tax). After all, at current prices the average driver is actually using 15 cents of gas for every mile he drives.
Patrick might be helping New Hampshire more with his new software service sales tax. The tax bill imposes a confusing new tax that has been called "the most sweeping software service tax in the nation." Businesses are on the verge of revolt. An enterprising neighbor state that was friendly to software firms might take advantage of this stupidity and make sure companies realize that fertile fields exist just a hop, skip and a jump to the north.
Deval Patrick may not be doing as much to help us as some of his predecessors have, but I think he's probably given us at least one nugget to work on.


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Tag Archives: Starship Troopers
BFI, Film, Interviews
I can remember it for you wholesale: The making of 'Total Recall', 30 years on
November 24, 2020 Josh Slater-Williams	Leave a comment
"Total Recall was one of my favourite experiences. When was it released? 30 goddamn years, my god."
Michael Ironside may not immediately remember just how long ago it was that Total Recall was released, but few have been able to forget Paul Verhoeven's slippery sci-fi action blockbuster since it came out in 1990, nor his memorably intense performance as Richter. The primary heavy in this adaptation of Philip K. Dick's short story 'We Can Remember It for You Wholesale', Richter is in constant pursuit of amnesiac protagonist Quaid (Arnold Schwarzenegger) across both Earth and Mars, leaving a trail of devastation in his wake.
One of Canada's most prolific actors, with more than 260 screen credits to his name, Ironside is perhaps best known to a certain generation for various antagonist and authority figure roles in fondly remembered films from the 1980s and 90s, including Verhoeven reunion Starship Troopers (1997), Tony Scott's Top Gun (1986), David Cronenberg's Scanners (1981) and Charles Burnett's The Glass Shield (1994).
Ahead of the release of a new 4K restoration of Total Recall, Ironside spoke to us via Zoom about both Verhoeven collaborations; his own lifelong affinity for science fiction; the on-set experience of making one of the last massive-budget movies based around mostly practical special effects; and how he thinks Cronenberg's scrapped adaptation of the story might have turned out…
Full interview for the BFI
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The modern exterior hides a sensitive restoration of the old station building/hotel inside. Usual range of Fullers beers, Pride in reasonable condition. First pub of the day visiting where we lived in the 80''s.
Probably the best station pub in London at the moment. Good range of Fullers beers with a few guests. Probably not the place to spend an evening, but a nice place to call into for a pint en route to elsewhere.
Fancying a drink after the train back to London, I initially tried the Cider Tap (soon to close) at Euston only to find they had stopped serving by 9pm (very strange for a weekend). So I grabbed the opportunity to have a swift half at the Mad Bishop & Bear. This is a Fullers pub, generally with a guest ale or two. It is situated in the retail development up a couple of escalators. But it is still fairly busy. Departure screens ensure you don't miss your train or you can at least check what time the next one is, if you do happen to stay for one too many. On my visit, they had Fullers London Pride, ESB & Olivers Island, Gales Seafarers & Redwood, St Austell Tribute & Tomos Watkins The Last Inch. I went for the Redwood, which I wasn't too keen on. Still a handy place to know about and certainly the best of the 2 pubs at Paddington station. I've just noticed that they offer a CAMRA discount too.
Fullers pub co outlet in Paddington station. Not somewhere I'd venture to again in the future unless there are no other options. Chain pub feel, medicore beer, indifferent service, through other feel to the place.
Spacious and adquate bar high up in Paddington station. A fair range of ales, including several guests, and a place that seems less frenetic than its Fullers counterpart at Kings Cross.
Couldn't understand why the sign to the Gents is in LMS maroon, here at the very fundament of all things Great Western, but with a decent pint to hand, I didn't lose too much sleep over it.