Lucid Culture

[slightly edited repost from the DDDB email list]
In Monday’s NY Daily News, Forest City Ratner released new renderings of Frank Gehry’s designs for three buildings in the Atlantic Yards luxury housing disaster’s Phase 1 (the arena, “Miss Brooklyn” now renamed–simply–Building One, and one other building.) MAS’s “Atlantic Lots” renderings in the Post and the new Gehry designs were the substance of what NoLandGrab.org aptly described as a “Monday Morning Tabloid War“.

Described as “ridiculous,” “ugly,” and “awful” by experts and random New Yorkers, the new red, white and blue building designs have not been well received; the reception has been even worse than that accorded the poorly received earlier redesign released in May 2006. (The new Port Authority chief, Chris Ward, doesn’t like the redesign either.)

Most telling about the floundering state of the project is that though Phase 2 comprises the bulk of the project, the new designs only show Phase 1. Both Phase 2 and the building planned for Site 5 (where the PC Richards and Modell’s on Flatbush currently stand) were left out of the new renderings. Also absent is the existing and surrounding neighborhood — the model floats in a dark, decontextualized void.

Community Rally On Atlantic Yards Called For

May 3rd, 2 PM
752 Pacific Street
(near Carlton Avenue)
in the “footprint” of the proposed project.

Call a Time Out on the Atlantic Yards Bait and Switch:
A Community Rally to Tell Governor Paterson to Halt the Atlantic Yards Project

If you only come to one Atlantic Yards rally…this is the one to come to (and bring your friends!)…

A major community rally will be held Saturday, May 3, 2pm at 752 Pacific Street. The Council of Brooklyn Neighborhoods, Brooklyn Speaks, and Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn will join with community leaders and elected officials in calling for a freeze on all Atlantic Yards activities. The three sponsoring organizations represent thousands of New Yorkers that have had differing perspectives on issues raised by the Atlantic Yards proposal, but all agree that the current state of affairs is intolerable.

The following elected officials have confirmed attendance: NYS Senator Velmanette Montgomery, NYS Assemblywoman Joan Millman, NYS Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries, NYC Councilwoman Letitia James, NYC Councilman Bill Deblasio, NYC Councilman David Yassky, NYC Councilman Tony Avella.

DDDB has always maintained that Atlantic Yards is not a feasible project. Recent developments in the financial markets and statements by the developer have made that certain, and call the entire project and its purported public benefits into question. The only thing currently with a timeline is the arena and its luxury skyboxes and acres of demolished vacant lots. Meanwhile our neighborhoods are being blighted by unnecessary demolitions for a project that is now a big unknown.

DDDB’s position remains the same as it has from the beginning—the project is bad for many reasons from process to finance to design, and we oppose it. The project should be scrapped; it’s time for a new plan to develop the rail yards in a democratic, fair and responsible way with genuine community participation.

So come on out on May 3rd — bring your friends, join your neighbors, fellow New Yorkers, elected officials and community leaders in telling Governor Paterson:

> No More Demolitions!
> No More Eminent Domain!
> No More Subsidies!
> No More Changes to Infrastructure!

You can download a rally flier and handcard to distribute at: http://tinyurl.com/4uk8zx

Public transportation to the rally:
Subways [Map]:
2/3 to Bergen Street
B, D,M,N,R to Pacific Street
Q to 7th Avenue
C to Lafayette or Washington Avenues
2,3,4,5 to Atlantic Avenue

BUS:
65 On Dean Street (Eastbound), or Bergen Street (Westbound)
45 on Atlantic Avenue

In a move straight out of 1984 (the book), Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels has just signed into law a bill requiring any bookstore selling “sexually explicit materials” to register with the state. According to Publishers Weekly, stores will have to pay a $250 registration fee. Failure to register is against the law. 

According to the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression (ABFFE), the law is so broad that it could be applied to a mainstream novel, for example, the latest Danielle Steele.

Just in case you were wondering, Tipper Gore had nothing to do with this.

And in what looks like a blatant antitrust violation, amazon.com now requires that all print-on-demand books sold on their website be manufactured through their proprietary on-demand printer, whom they recently purchased to compete with Ingram Book Distributors’ popular Lightning Source supply system. This is especially disconcerting since amazon is a major source of sales for small or independent publishers whose books are kept on disc and printed as orders come in, rather than being manufactured and stored in a warehouse.

This just in: India has just successfully tested a missile capable of delivering a nuclear warhead at a distance of just 435 miles. Presumably, a successful test means that at the end of the flight, the missile crashes.

Isn’t this like building the kitchen over the septic tank?

When asked by a stock analyst if the Barnes and Noble bookstore mega-chain would be interested in gobbling up its biggest rival chain, Borders Books & Music, a spokesman for Barnes and Noble stated that though they had no strategic plan to acquire the country’s second-largest bookseller, they would be interested in speaking with Borders’ investment bankers. According to Publishers Weekly, this came to light in the wake of an almost ten percent dip in B&N’s net income for their fiscal year ending last month. The decline in earnings was attributed to the deterioration in music sales (which comes as something of a surprise, that music made up even this relatively small a percentage of B&N’s overall sales).

Despite perilous economic conditions, every poll indicates that those Americans who actually read are doing so at a record clip. Expect that to finally come to an end when books are only available at one central location who have complete control over pricing.

Imagine this happening under Jimmy Carter. Or Nixon, for that matter. It wouldn’t. Thank you Ronald Reagan for destroying antitrust protection for consumers.

Here’s who’s taking money out of your pocket in order to cover their losses in the Bear Stearns fiasco, whose holdings are now guaranteed by the United States treasury:

Texas multimillionaire investor James Barrow, of Barrow, Hanley, Mewhinney & Straus Inc., owns almost ten percent of the company. Billionaire British golf enthusiast Joseph Lewis, a native of the Bahamas, owns just a bit less.

Florida multimilllionaire investor Bruce Sherman, who runs Legg Mason subsidiary Private Capital Management Inc. owns about five percent, as does another multimillionaire, former Bear Stearns chairman James Cayne (who resigned two months ago, just before the firm imploded). These are the people your tax dollars are going to bail out. Not ordinary Americans whose pensions, property and lives’ savings may be at stake, but a secret society of super-rich robber barons who, even if their Bear Stearns holdings were reduced to zero, would still have the means to live comfortably for the rest of their lives without lifting a finger.

Here’s a proposal, not a modest one, but in cases like these we need to make immodest demands in order to walk away with even meager results: if the government must guarantee anything (which is an eminently debatable issue), why not limit guarantees to small holders and let the big gamblers live with their losses? Let’s say a Federal or state employees’ pension fund held a small piece of what’s left of Bear Stearns. Why not save the retirees from destitution, instead of making a vast, multibillion dollar money grab, transferring wealth out of the pockets of middleclass American taxpayers and into the secret accounts of ultra-rich Wall Street gamblers? Why should the American middle class continue to subsidize the gambling addiction of a cabal of billionaires, many of whom aren’t even American citizens?  

THIS MESSAGE WAS DELIVERED VIA BLACKBERRY WIRELESS

ellie boo

now wil u mry me lk u prmsd u wd

tm dc pos

xo cashley

ps in st barts w yr ducatzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

This one’s a doozy, Bush at his classy best. Baseball World Champions the Boston Red Sox were recently called to the White House for a meet-and-greet with the man most likely to pardon former Sox and Yankees hurler Roger Clemens. Mercurial, hard-hitting Boston outfielder Manny Ramirez did not attend. He also skipped the Sox’ most recent trip to the White House after their 2004 championship. Referring to the absent slugger, Bush chortled, “I guess his grandmother died again. Just kidding.” 

O Albion! Thy fecund shores

Hath ne’er produced such orat’ry

As had the haven of the New

Adhesive, though, to mimicry

The Lethen waters now he tastes

In state awaits his animus

With gimlet eye, a dram of rye

And p’raps some cannabis

On August 4, 1964, wanting to invade South Vietnam, the Lyndon Johnson administration claimed that a US warship, the Turner Joy, had been fired on by the Vietnamese in the Gulf of Tonkin. Using this as a pretext to justify the invasion, Johnson sought and won approval from Congress. Years later, Johnson admitted that the incident never occurred.

Today, US Navy Vice Admiral Kevin Cosgriff, Commander of the US Fifth Fleet, stated that several small Iranian vessels moved rapidly on a collision course with a convoy of three US warships in the Straits of Hormuz, turning away just in time to avoid contact, then dropping unidentified white containers in the water near the last ship in the convoy, the USS Ingraham. He stated that the US ships were about to fire on the Iranian vessels until they suddenly changed direction, averting an exchange of gunfire.

Several months ago, battle orders were issued to US naval personnel stationed in the Persian Gulf.

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.