Banks at HRA: The deBlasio Administration Selects its Leadership

http://nyti.ms/1csPqWf

Like Johnny Caspar the mob boss says in millers crossing "running things, kid, it ain't easy"... Managing and leading is the challenge it will be interesting to see how well Steve Banks does at HR A or if he would have better served on the outside keeping the city's policy In Line and helping to shape it.. One can only hope this is a sincere move, an experiment, on the administration's part and not a cynical effort to coopt potential critics

--Anthony Napoli

Deep in the Heart of Brooklyn

'The Mighty Storm'

"The Mighty Storm" by Peter Bradley Adams recorded in Nashville

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=1aLcubTtju8

http://albumstreams.com/s/peter-bradley-adams/the-mighty-storm

 The album of the same name is available for live stream listening at album streams 

http://albumstreams.com/s/peter-bradley-adams/the-mighty-storm

The "Mirror Man": Art Spiegelman Retrospective

The Jewish Museum's presentation of Co-Mix: An Art Spiegelman Retrospective presents an exceptionally detailed summary of the life and work to date of the artist best known for his groundbreaking graphic novel, Maus.

The exhibit presents work from his high school days through the present with exhaustive coverage of Maus and remarkable ephemera including the typescript letter used by the Nazi's to document the arrest and deportation of his parents to Auschwitz as well as a stuffed mouse that served as a reference tool for the author. 

From The New Yorker: Maurice Sendak and Art Spiegelman discuss literature and childhood.

The exhibit is decidedly small scale, the largest works are those that are the basis for his famous New Yorker covers. If you have followed Mr Spiegelman's work much of this will already be familiar. But the opportunity to observe many of the original sketches and finished drawings, to admire his creativity and the vision that  brought about the Pulitzer Prize winning Maus, and the personal history behind it all, is something not to be missed.

Museum link here http://www.thejewishmuseum.org/exhibitions/art-spiegelman

Through March 23.

--Anthony Napoli

Deep in the Heart ofBrooklyn 

My Roman Ruminations: "The Persian Drunkard Follows Me"

"Got the fever/down in my pocket,
The Persian drunkard follows me/
You can take me to your gate but I can't unlock it/
You see you forgot to leave me with your key/
But where are you tonight Sweet Marie"

Absolutely Sweet Marie by Bob Dylan from Blonde on Blonde

http://m.izlesene.com/video/5146239#

Ai WeiWei Art Destroyed by Protester at Miami Museum

Part of a work by artist Ai Weiwei was destroyed at the Perez Museum in Miami  by a Miami-based artist as a protest against what was termed the lack of representation of local artists in Miami Museums. Ai Weiwei's work has itself featured the repurposing and sometimes destruction of Chinese antiquities.

Full story here http://nyti.ms/1e2DVEw

"Colored Vases" by Ai Weiwei

Whistle blowing, Big Data and the Left

Slavoj Zizek on Snowden, Julian Assange, the N. S.A., cloud computing, the Leftist imagination and whistle blowing link here from The Guardian http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/sep/03/snowden-manning-assange-new-heroes

Steve Fuller on Zizek on Snowden, the N. S.A., cloud computing, the Leftist imagination, and SZ's "fetishism of BIg Data" link here http://sociologicalimagination.org/archives/13940

'Thistle and the Drone': US Dials Down Dronefare to Explore Peace Talks with Taliban

In Akbar Ahmed's 2013 volume The Thistle and the Drone, the American University scholar explores the deep cultural divides that exist between traditional tribal peoples throughout the world, but especially in Muslim inhabited regions, and the globalized technocratic cultures that are impacting the world of traditional tribal peoples - the thorny thistle of the title. 

Perhaps evincing access to  Prof. Amed's interesting book, subtitled 'How. America's War on Terror became a Global War on Tribal Islam',  the US military has dialed back drone attacks as the Pakistani government attempts to wage peace with the Taliban, story here http://m.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/us-curtails-drone-strikes-in-pakistan-as-officials-there-seek-peace-talks-with-taliban/2014/02/04/1d63f52a-8dd8-11e3-833c-33098f9e5267_story.html?wpisrc=al_national

More on Dr Ahmed's book and work here's http://www.brookings.edu/experts/ahmeda

A Super Bowl Query: What's More American than America? Duh.

Alexandra Petri in the Washington Post has the last word on the Super Bowl and --more importantly-- the Super Bowl commercials. Roll over, Slavoj Zizek

http://m.washingtonpost.com/blogs/compost/wp/2014/02/03/is-there-anything-more-american-than-america-the-answer-in-8-super-bowl-commercials/

The "Dalton" Gang vs. C.S.A.

DITHOB has discussed the troubling, visionary statement of what might have been had the Confederate States of America succeded and defeated the United States of America in the Civil War:
Kevin Wilmott's brilliant "alternative history"and faux documentary film, produced by Spike Lee, C.S.A.: The Confederate States of America.

In the NY Times, an article about the showing of the film by the Dalton School which resulted in confusion and apologies to Parents in what clearly is a misunderstanding of the tone and scope of the film. Far from a satire, CSA looks at race in America in unflinching and painful terms, through the lens of alternative history, and compels viewers to consider how far we have come and how far we have to go in coming to mutual understanding and acceptance of a multicultural Ameruca. That the Dalton incident would occur the same week that business media discusses the release of the next Cheerios commercial during the Super Bowl, which features a biracial cast, and on the same day the NYT reports on Mayor deBlasio's intent to settle stop and frisk cases and address the policy, only serves to underscore Mr Wilmott's epigraph to CSA: he quotes George Bernard Shaw -"if you are going to tell people the truth, better make them laugh. Otherwise they will kill you."

--Anthony Napoli, Deep in the Heart of Brooklyn

Grimm and Grimmer: "Explosio, Ergo Sum"

DC police investigating possible charges against Rep. Grimm for threatening bodily harm on federal property http://www.silive.com/news/index.ssf/2014/01/report_officials_discussing_po.html

Thinking About the Reunion Up There

In memory of my dad and Uncle Joe. "Fugue for Tinhorns" aka "Horse Right Here" from Guys and Dolls 1955. Up there: Sisters and Brothers all together again.
-Anthony Napoli, Deep in the Heart of Brooklyn

Unrest in the Ukraine

Eastern Orthodox clergy separate anti-government protestors from government forces in Kiev in Ukraine. AP's Sergei Grit's remarkable photo, positively medieval in its imagery, looks like it could be an outtake from Andrei Tarkovsky's Andrei Rublev (http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrei_Rublev_(film) Only the bloody aftermath, as police violently broke up what was described as a peaceful

Protest, showed that this was Real Life, not Art. Story in the NY Times which published this front page photo on the protest and aftermath here http://nyti.ms/1cc8Xh1

Beware of the "Devil Baby" on the Streets of New York

A promo for a forthcoming film called "Devil's Due" opening on January 17 featured a twisted and hilarious stunt by design and effects firm Thinkmodo: a robotic demon baby in a baby stroller, operated long distance, rolling around the streets of Manhattan, scaring the bajeebers out of passers by. It's freaky and frankly hilarious. Article here

Getting to Know You: Mayor deBlasio Takes the Stage

I cannot speak for the pizza-with-fork thing, but Mayor deBlasio's humor, demonstrated at press conferences and  announcements, has proven disarming after 12 years of the stern no nonsense style of his predecessor who seemed uncomfortable with humor. Mayor BdB's self deprecating approach laced with simple humor leaning toward the somewhat silly and obvious is something I think many Dads do indeed relate to as a means of interacting and relating with our kids as they move into junior high and high school years. I think it is a means of establishing a normative relationship with children more commonly used by Dads rather than Moms as the kids enter the rebellious adolescent years. Since I think it's goal is to appear somewhat non-threatening and a way to maintain communications and a less authoritarian stance with kids when it is not necessary to be the stern authoritarian dad laying down the socializing law, it seems an intuitively logical approach for the Mayor to take as he explores various personae which he can express in governing. Whether the corny jokes, off the cuff and shamelessly delivered will last  is probably not in doubt, it is woven into the warp and woof  of who he is. As for the pizza with silverware thing, it does seem more of an affect that may disappear. I cannot believe that he would go into Smiling Pizza on 9th and 7th and gobble a slice with the ubiquitous flimsy NYC pizzeria knife and fork. Maybe dressed for work as he was at Goodfellas on Staten Island he didn't want to make a mess. But as Errol Louis said on NY1 last night, for a guy who is supposed to be NYC's new populist mayor, "What the hell was that ?"

Michael Howard Saul in the WSJ discusses the cringeworthy Dad style of humor with deBlasio aides and NYC comedians here http://on.wsj.com/KaYneD

-Deep in the Heart of Brooklyn

Bridge Over Troubled Water: Maddow's Alternate Theory of the Christie Bridgegate

Rachel Maddow brilliantly posits an extremely convincing alternate theory of why a NY Gov. Christie staffer caused traffic chaos in Fort Lee, NJ last September. It was a political issue but one that had nothing to do with Ft. Lee Mayor Mark Sokolich's failure to endorse the NJ governor in his reelection bid. It actually may have to do with the Governor's anger over his renomination of a NJ Supreme Court judge that the NJ State Senate Democrats were attempting to torpedo. Although the full facts aren't in, MSNBC's Maddow makes a very convincing case http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/watch/an-alternate-theory-of-the-bridgegate-scandal-111611971764