Breaking Bad... and Me.

About a week ago, I gave in to heavy pressure from my son and started watching Breaking Bad on Netflix. I am now into season two and feel that I have watched enough to form an opinion. What follows is a review of what I have seen so far.

I should say at the outset that I have a strange, almost neurotic aversion to depictions of drug use in movies or on television. Simply put, it makes me queasy. It’s the oddest thing since I can watch the goriest war movie, or other violent productions without hesitation, but show someone shooting up and I reach for the Pepto-Bismol. When I shared this weakness with my secretary(another recent Breaking Bad addict) her response was, “Don’t be such a baby!” So, there’s that. But after listening to my son rave about this show 24/7, Pam and I decided to give it a shot.

The central plot revolves around a 50 year old high school chemistry teacher named Walt who is married to an oddly irritating woman named Skyler, who is pregnant with a “surprise” baby. They also have a physically handicapped high school aged son boringly named Walter Jr. Early on Walt is diagnosed with a rather advanced case of lung cancer, strange since Walt isn’t a smoker. He spends practically all of season one hiding his diagnosis from his family while coughing his head off all day and night. The viewer gets the impression that although Walt is a long time teacher in the New Mexico school system, he somehow has very bad insurance, and is otherwise in precarious financial shape. With this terminal illness hanging over his head, and a baby on the way, Walt decides to do what anyone else might do under the same circumstances…he decides to put his chemistry knowledge to work cooking crystal meth for profit. In this enterprise, he is assisted by one of his former reprobate students, Jesse, himself a small time Meth chef who spends most of his time sampling the inventory and acting like the 20 year old meth addict loser that he is. Just to make the story even more bizarre, Skyler’s kleptomaniac sister Marie is married to a foul-mouthed DEA agent, Hank, whose job it is to hunt down Meth dealers. In other words, on paper, it’s difficult to root for any of these people.

So, how come eight shows in, I find myself feeling such an emotional attachment to Walt? How come I’m growing so fond of Jesse and his baggy pants, oversized sweatshirts and his constant use of the word, “Yo”? How come despite Hank’s degenerate brand of humor and his psychopathic fondness for gore, I actually like the guy? This is the genius of Breaking Bad.

Walt rationalizes his turn to the drug trade as a desperate eleventh hour bid to provide for his family, and in the beginning, it may have even been true. But as the show goes on, I get the impression that Walt is a man who has gone through life playing it safe and doing what he was told to the point where he has nothing but regrets. Now that he knows that the end is near, the violence, chaos and danger of the drug business has empowered him somehow, making him feel more alive than he has ever been. Along with the money has come a blurring of lines. Why are some things legal and other things illegal he asks his DEA brother-in-law? Aren’t the legal lines we draw as a society arbitrary? I can only assume that future seasons of the show will show fresh rationalizations.

The show is expertly written, superbly acted and brilliantly directed. There are scenes that you want to watch again simply because the humanity was so electric, the emotions so raw. Walt is a man capable of going either way, capable of both great tenderness and raw violence, an almost meek man who loves his family but can come up with the idea of an acid bath to destroy the evidence of a dead body. The central idea that pulses through this amazing show seems to be the question of how far would you go to provide for those you love if you knew you were about to die? Would you respect the law? How ruthless would you be willing to become?

Captivating television.

Two South Carolinas

I had a business appointment in South Carolina over the weekend so Pam and I decided to make the most of it by driving down a day early and making a little getaway out of it. Amazing what a couple of days sitting around on a beach listening to the waves can do for your mood.  It was a wonderful 48 hours.

Not much planning went into this particular trip. I picked a hotel online just a couple of days before we left. I chose the Surfside Beach Resort because it was only 15 minutes from my client’s house and because it had the word “resort” in the name, leading me to believe that it wouldn’t be some dump out by the airport right across the street from a strip club. Well, it was on the beach, and there were no strip clubs to be seen, but to call this place a “resort” is sort of like calling the State Penitentiary “all-inclusive.” As we were checking into our room, the cleaning lady was exiting with a spray bottle of air freshener and a gas mask…not a good sign. For the first thirty minutes or so our room smelled like orange peel, desperately trying to hide something else more sinister. This is what happens to you when you start watching Breaking Bad.

But we didn’t come to Surfside Beach to lie around all afternoon in our room, so we hit the beach around 2 in the afternoon and suddenly realized that we had walked onto the set of Jersey Shore. Everywhere we looked there were heavily tattooed men and women, large people with loud mouths and stern rebukes that dripped from their lips at their children whose only sin seemed to be, wanting to have fun in the water. Cigarette butts littered the sand around us and more than once I found myself picking up empty Doritos bags that someone had thought too much of an inconvenience to throw in the trash. Mr. Thicke’s summer anthem belched from a boom box somewhere nearby. Pam and I looked at each other and realized that we weren’t in Hatteras anymore.

The second night we drove 20 minutes further south and had dinner at a Frank’s. It was then that we realized that our hotel was in the East End and Frank’s was in Short Pump. The parking lot told us everything we needed to know about the place. The total net worth of the vehicles parked there would be enough money to balance New Jersey’s budget. The atmosphere of this place was magical, complete with outdoor seating under 100 year old live oaks covered with Spanish moss and Christmas lights. Fans hung strategically from the tent roofs making every seat comfortable. A jazz singer whispered Ella Fitzgerald tunes quietly in the background as Pam and I enjoyed two delicious entrees and marveled at the well dressed, perfectly coifed southerners who filled the tables around us. After dinner we took a driving tour of the island where all of these people, no doubt were staying. Pawley’s Island, that arrogantly shabby enclave at the southern most end of the Grand Strand that stubbornly refuses to get with the commercial program of the rest of Horry county. There are no restaurants, no gas stations, and no stores of any kind anywhere on the island. Nothing but old homes with even older shrubbery nestled in between the Ocean to the east and a marsh to the west. Magical.

On the way home we passed through Conway South Carolina, the first half of which looked typically elegant with its beautiful homes and finely trimmed lawns. Then abruptly the appearance of a pawn shop announced that we were now entering the wrong side of town. Over the next three miles we counted no less than 17 signs advertising bail bonds, featuring towering billboards featuring the face of some very shifty looking attorney asking the question, “Made Bail?? Talk to Joe Axelrod Today!!”

‘Merica!!

Horrified at 6 AM!!!

This is getting out of hand. This morning I pull up the weather channel website to check out the forecast and there on the side bar to the right is a picture of Miley Freaking Cyrus with the tagline, “We can’t help but stare at Miley Cyrus.” Ahh yes, the face that launched a million pageviews. Et tu, Weather.com?

Not to be outdone, when I clicked on the forecast for Myrtle Beach, the bottom right hand corner featured the most frightening photograph I’ve seen since that Buddhist monk sat himself on fire in Saigon 45 years ago. Even writing a description of it will be harrowing. I thought of cutting and pasting the thing but this is a family blog and I don’t want any angry fan mail. It’s a picture of a man (I think), leaning back suggestively on one elbow wearing a white dress shirt unbuttoned all the way down the front. This deeply tanned man has done this ostensibly to reveal his pectoral muscles which are the size of basketballs. These things are so gigantic, the over-flexed muscles have apparently swallowed his nipples since none are seen. It’s as if he has had breast enlargement surgery using bowling balls. It is the single most disturbing visual image I have come across in my adult life. What is it an advertisement for you ask, why, a new perfectly legal steroid formula for all you serious body builders out there. Well, if you want to end up looking like this dude, I suppose you better be serious. Compared to his otherworldly pecks, the poor man’s head sits atop this heaving mass of muscle looking for all the world like an afterthought, a swiveled raisin atop a truck load of cantaloupes. I swear, I may never visit weather.com again.

Which makes me wonder why this particular ad ran on this particular website? Everyone knows that Google knows everything about all of our predilections, our buying habits etc. What does this bizarre ad say about…me?? I’m 55 and a member of American Family fitness, do they now assume that I would be interested in turning my chest into a flotation device? Well, just in case someone at the NSA is reading this, let the information gatherers over at Google know that I’m perfectly happy with my C cup, thank you very much.

Shheeeese!

Irony and Unintended Consequences

How ironic that on the 50^th anniversary of MLK’s “I have a Dream Speech,” our President will be speaking at the very same time that he is scrambling fighter jets and bombers to rain down destruction on Syria, a country that hasn’t attacked or invaded us and with whom we have very little trade or interaction. The reason given for this action is that chemical weapons have been used in that country’s civil war and our intelligence services are pretty sure that Bashir Assad was behind it. I say “pretty sure” because this morning brings news that the intelligence we have connecting Assad to the chemical weapons attack is “not a slam dunk.” For instance, we aren’t totally sure who controls the chemical weapons stockpile in Syria or for that matter, where they are  located, and at this hour there remains no solid evidence linking Assad himself with the order to use them.

Now, back when Barack Obama was a US Senator from Illinois, it was exactly this sort of thing that sent him into high dudgeon when George W. Bush was in the White House. “The President does not have the power under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve stopping an actual imminent threat to the nation,” he intoned back in 2008 as a candidate for W’s job. Vice-President Biden went even further back then, claiming that if Bush went to war in Iraq without first getting approval from Congress it would be grounds for impeachment. Of course, it certainly isn’t news when a candidate for President says one thing on the campaign trail, and dramatically changes his tune after he gets his first daily intelligence briefing as President, but still, at the very least, both of these men seem to owe old George an apology.

Just a thought before I wrap this up. What happens if one of the bombs floating down from 35,000 feet happens to land smack dab in the unknown location of Syria’s chemical weapons stockpile, spewing deadly gas throughout Damascus killing thousands of innocent people? Will our President be brought up on war crimes charges at The Hague? Will he have to return his Nobel Peace prize?

God save us from the unintended consequences of our folly.

What Do The People Really Want?

On Monday morning I wrote about the very real probability that the United States was about to open military hostilities with Syria. The readership of this blog responded with a collective yawn, a few scattered page views. Yesterday, I wrote about a raunchy performance by Miley Cyrus at the MTV awards show and everything blows up, the most page views I’ve had in over a year. Apparently, even at a sleepy back water media outpost like The Tempest, sex sells.

Everyone I know complains about the media. It’s too biased; it’s too infatuated with the sensational, too enamored with flash, while ignoring “real” news. After writing a blog for nearly three years now, I can say without hesitation that, while the political and cultural bias of the media is a reflection of them, their promotion of the sensational is a reflection of us.

If this blog was my living, if I depended on page views for my income, in order to survive I would constantly have to write about the salacious. It is guaranteed to attract readers… period. Works every time. The fact is that people aren’t interested in the federal budget deficit. They aren’t interested in government corruption, malfeasance, or the erosion of our Fourth amendment rights to privacy. They don’t even seem all that concerned about our participation in yet another military adventure in the Middle East. But let a twenty year old spoiled brat shake her bottom on an awards show and all of a sudden Americans snap to attention.

Let me be clear on this. When I say “Americans,” I’m talking about myself too. When I click on the Drudge Report or the Huffington Post, I too tend to be drawn to the most provocative story. When I’m browsing through the first page of the Wall Street Journal, what do I read first, the story about the possible nominees to replace Ben Bernanke at the Fed, or the latest embarrassing sexual depravity to be unearthed about Anthony Weiner? Too often, it’s Weiner. Which one of these stories will have the biggest impact on our nation and actually affect my daily life and prosperity? Seeing as the Chairman of the Federal Reserve is the most powerful man/woman in the world, the answer is self-evident, but my eyes can’t resist the dirt on Weiner.

Maybe it’s all a giant conspiracy. Maybe the big shots in the media think that if they can keep us all excited and exercised about Miley Cyrus, Anthony Weiner, Alex Rodriguez and Lady Gaga, we won’t notice that the wheels are flying off the country and we’re headed for the Grand Canyon.

Bread and circuses.

Miley Cyrus and Will Smith

This is the photograph that greeted me yesterday morning when I opened my laptop. The MTV awards show had taken place on Sunday night and as is routine for this particular showcase of the very latest trends in vulgarity, former teen Disney star Miley Cyrus had disgraced herself on stage. This was the reaction of the Will Smith family.

I haven't quite known what to say or even think about Ms.Cyrus' performance. Considering the venue, I don't consider it all that unique. Honestly, I haven't watched any awards show, much less this one in a very long time. I take it as a given that an awards show celebrating contemporary music would just be too embarrassing to endure, not to mention too depressing. But, there must have been something different about this Cyrus thing because even reliably libertine celebrities seemed turned off. So, I hunted around YouTube until I found the clip. I watched her entire performance and felt nothing but anger and disgust...at her father. Billy Rae Cyrus, that one hit wonder country singer from twenty years ago spent all of his daughters childhood trying to be her "best friend." He indulged her every whim, denied her nothing and in so doing created this narcissistic train wreck I saw prancing around the stage in a vinyl bikini. She had the look of someone who hadn't been said "no" to by anyone in the last ten years. There she was laboring under the illusion that sticking out her tongue at spastic angles and gyrating her backside wildly in front of a 35 year old married man made her look sexy. The giant form hand that she constantly used as a sexual prop only added to the embarrassment, making her look not provocative, but silly. So while all of this was going on, what did dear old Dad do? He took to Twitter to say how much he loved the performance and to remind us all to pray for world peace. Meanwhile, the Muslim world watching this display is confirmed in their belief that the West is beyond redemption.

Which brings me back to the picture of the Will Smith family. Everyone is holding up this photograph as proof that Will Smith was horrified by what he saw. Maybe he was. But when I saw it, I thought, "What in the world was Will Smith thinking buying front row tickets to this event for his children??" He's a sharp guy, he knows what goes on at the MTV music video awards show. I'm sorry that his kids had to see such a disgusting display, but this one is all on Dad.

Give War a Chance

 The big news this week appears to be the deteriorating situation in Syria. With each passing day since last week’s gas attack in Damascus, the war drums have been beaten by conservatives and liberals alike. Pressure is being applied on our government to “do something.” The “international community” is said to be up in arms. Even the French have made noises about dusting off their old bolt action rifles, you know, the ones that they threw to the ground at the first whiff of diesel fuel from Nazi tanks back in WWII?

Our President clearly doesn’t want to get involved in another Middle Eastern blood bath. He’s probably playing cards somewhere in the White House right now trying to avoid running into John Kerry, and in his defense, who wouldn’t? But, one gets the feeling that the pressure will become too much, and he will eventually order some sort of cruise missile launch. Maybe this will satisfy the “do something” crowd, but maybe it won’t. My question would be, if you decide to launch cruise missiles, at whom do you aim them? Which side of this civil war represents America’s interests?

Bashir Assad is a very bad man with a hot British wife. By all accounts he is classic despot who cares little of his own people and has a particular hatred of the Jews. In this way he is much like half of the despots on the African continent, and would fit in nicely among the thousands like him long dead and burning in hell. The Rebels on the other hand are a conglomeration of jihadists, Muslim Brotherhood wannabes, anti-Semites, anarchists who love watching things explode and the occasional Syrian nationalist yearning to be free. John McCain thinks they’re swell. So, I suppose we’re on their side.

But, before we fire up our military response, I would like someone to tell me what vital American interests are at risk here? Is Syria a major oil producer? No. Do they provide us with some product or service that we can’t live without? No. Is Damascus a top tourist attraction for major donors to the Democratic party? No. Then, why in the name of James Monroe are we about to start lobbing bombs at them?? When the African genocides in Darfur and Ruanda were blazing hot and in the midst of killing a million people, I don’t recall any American military intervention. What makes Syria with its “mere” 100,000 casualties so special? Is it because they are so close to our ally Israel? So what? I’m pretty sure that the Israeli military is more than capable of handling the Syrians, especially since they are busy killing each other!

No, no, a thousand times NO! What’s going on in Syria is none of our business. If we wonder why the people in the Middle East hate us so, we need look no further than the Made in the USA sticker on that unexploded shell that accidently hit the hospital which the Rebels were using as a headquarters. The videos of dead children’s body parts strewn through the streets of Damascus will go viral and we will get treated to more charming footage of enraged Arabs burning the American flag. I say, if they want to have a civil war, they don’t need our help. In fact, we had a civil war once. We killed each other to the tune of 600,000 dead. Our enemies gleefully watched and our friends had the good sense to stay out of it. We ended slavery and are a better nation because of it.

Give war a chance.