News and views noted along the way.
- Climate Change Is ‘Bo-Ho-Horing’ – “Has the climate change ‘brand’ been ruined? Scientist-turned-filmmaker Randy Olson says that the problem with trying to raise awareness about global warming is that it’s the most boring subject on earth… It [Al Gore's documentary] made a ton of money which made some people think that suddenly the topic was unboring. Which produced a spate of climate documentaries that were all boring, and eventually resulted in an Oscar-nominated documentary filmmaker friend saying to me they all blend together — all the same shots of melting glaciers, polar bears, carbon emissions … blah, blah, blah. By 2008 another friend was at a gathering of indy film distributors in which they were saying, “\’no more environmental documentaries!’, there’s no audience for them. And by 2010 a producer friend of mine said, ‘Even the Green Channel doesn’t want ‘green programming’ ‘.”
- Missing J. D. Salinger - “Phantom evidence for the military and sexual influences on an elusive writer, in a maddening new biography.”
- Queen Trapping Nut Thieves Among News Corp. Trial Nuggets
- Turkey’s Erdogan says ‘dark alliances’ behind graft inquiry – “Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan denounced ‘international groups’ and ‘dark alliances’ on Saturday for entangling Turkey in a corruption scandal that has exposed deep rifts between him and a U.S.-based Muslim cleric who helped him rise to power. Sixteen people, including the sons of two ministers and the head of state-owned Halkbank, were formally arrested on Saturday, local media said, in a corruption inquiry that Erdogan has called a ‘dirty operation’ to undermine his rule.”
- The civil war within Turkish political Islam – “The increasingly open and dramatic power struggle between Erdogan and the Gulen movement, who were formerly close allies, is an important story, but not one that’s easy to follow, especially since much of it remains shadowy and under-the-surface… On Thursday, in the latest development, Erdogan announced a sweeping purge of the police force, charging that it has been infiltrated by a “criminal gang” engaged in a “political plot” against him, his government, and Turkey. It’s no secret to anyone who this “criminal gang” is supposed to be. Even people with no love for Erdogan have been increasingly alarmed by the way the Gulenists were building up their own version of a Deep State inside the police, the judiciary, and other arms of govenment, as well as education, the mass media, and business.”
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