... recommending a re-introduction.

He could have been Prince and Micheal Jackson rolled into one. But he actually had ambition, self-confidence, and wasn't affraid to talk about it. So of course, people hated him for that.

No, he's not Kanye west.

He's Terrence Trent D'Arby and as debut albums go, his was a great example of pop at the time, and pretty ambitious as well. Thing is, he knew it and said a lot of stupid stuff about it, causing a wee bit of a backlash.

But I've been listening to it more and more, and it's solid. It's good. It's the hardline! In a way, I'm hearing a lot of it in other artists today.

I recommend that you go out right now and re-introduce yourself to Introducing the Hardline According to Terrence Trent D'Arby. You'll love it. It's a way of life

That is all

... musing about text, context, and Lady Gaga,.

Here's a list of names: Stephen Colbert, Andy Kaufman, Bruno, Borat, Andy Warhol, Vitamin C, Peter Gabriel, David Bowie, Flavor Flav.

These are all people who played a character as part, if not all of, their lives. It was tough from time to time to tell where the conceit ended and the real person began. Interviews, press, appearances were all as that person, the invention. Maybe at some point they were subsumed by that personality (like in the case of Warhol), but most of the time there were two personalities at play.

Here's another list of names: Billy Mays, The Taco Bell Chihuahua, Britney Spears, Rick Astley.

These are all people who's appreciation was on an ironic level. Admit it, it was. People admired them more for the fact that they were trainwrecks of one level or another, or an idea so lame that it became a meme unto itself. At that point it crossed into people who did NOT know that the appreciation was ironic so they had to convince themselves that it was something more, something they were missing. "Gimmie More" by Britney Spears was only a hit in the novelty sense: the song was crap and the video was worse, but a $0.99 purchase on iTunes is something you think no one will notice - until they look at the sales chart.

Here's another name: Lady Gaga.

When she first popped up on the scene I thought she was just another disposable hit machine: a single, a follow up, and then sink back down. I did have to admit there was something compelling about watching her, and something calculating: "Poker Face" seemed like it was written to try to cash in on the poker craze but had the misfortune of being released at the tail end of the fad (okay, so I was wrong about a couple of things there).

But she didn't go away, and so I listened. And what I found were songs that weren't even double entendres; they were single entendres. There was no there there. It was a level of vacuousness that kind of surprised me. And then the way she danced...and the outfits...and then it hit me: She was part of the first category of people I listed. She was a great a experiment in pop. Create a completely fame obsessed artist, have her songs reflect what appears to be a buy-in but is really having a laugh, collect all the money and raise the level of discourse. In this way she'd be what Vitamin C was supposed to be.

You gotta admit, we all thought it at some point. And when the video for "Paparazzi" came out, well it seemed REALLY plausible. I'll admit, the video has some great moments in it, some really knock-out visuals (the dance with the crutches hits me in a weird place). But there's something missing there. It's something that Colbert, Bruno/Borat, and Kaufman all had, and it was missing in this video. It's not easy to notice.

It's a tell.

If you read a transcript of Colbert there are times when you wonder what people find funny. Sure there are some jokes, but if you take it out of context there's no way of telling if they really are (This is why Tim Robbins has not allowed the soundtrack to Bob Roberts to be released). But when you see Colbert, there's something in the delivery, the demeanor which tells you it's a joke. You have to be looking for it but not looking right at it to see it. That's also the reason why some conservatives think he's playing a character that puts a joke on the liberals, they're reading the text but not getting the context.

This lack of a tell become even more apparent in her interviews, where she talked about being awestruck at meeting Springsteen and her love of Warhol's 15 minutes of fame prediction. This is where the scales started to fall from my eyes: He always meant that as being sarcastic - fame will be disposable as opposed to sought after and people won't care why they're famous.

And now she's talking about wanting to work with Morrissey.

So what's happening? She's entering the realm of the second list: the implied artistic. Since people are realizing that their attempt to categorize her as performance art is failing, they're trying to rationalize her in the other extreme - what does she mean?

I'll tell you what she means: She means nothing.

Read the article in Rolling Stone. She's no different than the other stars/starlets. There is no artistic expression. She just wants, like the title of her album, the fame. "Paparazzi" is not a warning tale, or a damming statement: it LIKES the drama its creating in the video. The last frames say it all - it does not matter why the camera is taking your picture so long as your picture is taken. It's like she's the Madonna of the TMZ age.

And it's not just her: The Pussycat Dolls sing about wanting to become famous and the accouterments that go along with that: cars, groupies, riding on planes. It's all the text of fame, but none of the context. They don't care how it happens, so long as it happens. The development of the talent, the skill, the dedication, becoming truly great at something (the CONTEXT) is secondary, simply a means to an end (the TEXT).

People will say "Well, you have Flav in your first list, he's just as craven." Yes, he is. And he's cashing in on years of developing a talent and being the best hype man in the business, and an underrated MC in his own right. He paid the dues, he developed his talent, and then sought to reap the windfall. That he decides to do it in this manner, with dating shows, is fine. Tila Tequila is the opposite. I shouldn't have to explain that.

Look, I'm not saying it's wrong to be famous, or to make money. As much as it sickens me, we live in a Capitalistic Democracy. But there is such a thing as not being craven, and craven is really what Lady Gaga and a lot of her ilk are. And there's no point in trying to rationalize it or explain it away. You're singing about a disco stick and your muffin. You want everyone to scream your name. You yell at people to buy stain removal products.

You. Are. Craven. Not. Talented.

... excited about the Mercury Prize

If there's one date that Apple fans circle, it's the World Wide Developer's Conference Keynote. This presentation, often given by Steve Jobs, highlights the new things that Apple will be introducing over the next few months. Most of the times there's things that everyone expects, and then a couple of "I did not see that coming" moments. Everyone leaves excited and ready to get their hands on whatever was being talked about.

If there's one date that Anglophile Indie Rock fans circle, it's the announcement of the shortlist for the Mercury Prize. This presentation, often given by Jools Holland, highlights the best new albums released in the UK over the last few months. Most of the times there's things that everyone expects, and then a couple of "I did not see that coming" moments. Everyone leaves excited and ready to get their hands on whatever was being talked about.

I try to follow UK music as closely as possible, and I'm often still surprised by who makes the Mercury shortlist. I won't lie to you, some of the best acts I've found in the past few years (Burial, The Streets, Polar Bear, The Go! Team, Bloc Party) have been as much for their Mercury Prize nonimations as any other writings or radio play. And most of the times, I get the winners even when they never reach their potential afterwards (as Gomez has been unfairly accused of) or when I don't like the band at all (Anthony and the Johnsons: I'm sorry but our tastes don't mesh at all).

So today I ran into work, did my conference call with my Moscow office, and then checked out the nominations. They are:

• Florence and the Machine – Lungs
• Kasabian – West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum
• Bat for Lashes – Two Suns
• La Roux – La Roux
• Glasvegas – Glasvegas
• Speech Debelle – Speech Therapy
• Friendly Fires – Friendly Fires
• The Horrors – Primary Colours
• Lisa Hannigan – Sea Sew
• The Invisible – The Invisible
• Led Bib – Sensible Shoes
• Sweet Billy Pilgrim – Twice Born Men

I think that Bat for Lashes was a lock to get a nomination, and Friendly Fires, Glasvegas, and Florence and the Machine had been tipped since the last prize was won. In there there is hip hop (Speech Bebelle), art rock (The Invisible), and folk (Sweet Billy Pilgrim).

Do I know a lot of these acts? Not really. I think I'm split about 50/50 between who I'm familar with and who I'm not, which is normally how the Mercury Shortlist pans out. But I know I'll leave excited and ready to get my hands on whatever was being talked about.

Look lively: MMA and Hockey.

Today in the Globe and Mail, Jeff Blair (whom we admire) wrote the following:

here's a reason Ultimate Fighting Championship and mixed martial arts have their disciples: Some people like watching other people beat the hell out of each other. If you can gussie it up with a few rules and persuade people they aren't merely interested in it because of the gore - make them feel as if they don't need a shower after they've watched it, or that they're somehow smarter than the yobs who watch pro wrestling because of the so-called spiritual elements of the serious martial arts - so much the better.

Now, I'm no fan of MMA in the slightest, and not because of some class issue, but just because it's kinda boring.

I'm also not a fan of fighting in hockey, especially when it becomes either attempted murder, or done to "send a message". I have a bad day at work, I don't pick a fight with the janitor to prove a point.

I'm also a fan of consistency in journalism.

Ergo, I applaud Mr Blair's stance, and urge him and every writer at the Globe, and every commentator and sportscaster at TSN to say the following after every hockey fight:

Here's a reason fighting in hockey has their disciples: Some people like watching other people beat the hell out of each other, and enjoy bullying other who don't. If you can gussie it up with a few rules and persuade people that it's what makes them Canadian- make them feel as if they don't need a shower after they've watched it, or that they're somehow smarter than the yobs who watch pro wrestling because of the so-called "Nationalistic element" - so much the better.

... angry at Toronto "sports fans"

I was in Chicago in 2002 for some training. It was April and the baseball season was young. I was on my own and decided to take in a ball game. The only game in town was the Hated White Sox vs Moderately Loved Indians, so I hopped on the red line down to the Sox-35th stop and got my ticket.

The game was over pretty quickly. The Indians had nothing and then had even less after Maglio Ordonez hit a grand slam. No matter how you measure it, it was a bad game. But here it was, a cool April night and in one of the worst open-air ball parks in the majors and people stayed. They watched the scoreboards to see how the Hated Cubies were doing, and also cheering when the Sainted Tigers won their first game of the season. I got involved in a conversation some other people were having about who was better: Magic's Lakers or Jordan's Bulls (and for Chicago, an alarming amount of people were all about the Lakers). It was a fun night.

In 2005 I was in New York City with Dawn and we went to see a Hated Yankees game. They were playing the Sainted Tigers in a pounding drizzle and beating them handily. Again, it was a miserable game and again, people where there cheering on the Hated Yankees and getting involved in the game. I even got to see Fred Schuman on the subway on the way home.

Tonight I was watching the Beloved Jays play the Hated Red Sox. The field was packed, but I knew it was packed with Red Sox fans, and not just locals who cheered on the Hated Sox. I had seen families in Sox gear all day long.

This happens any time a team like Boston or New York comes to town. Some are people who can't get tickets to their own home games and have an easier time of it here. Some are people who follow their team. All of them are people who love their team. These people LOVE their team. They LOVE them. And not just when they're winning. They love them in the rain, they love them in blowouts. They get involved. They get angry. They quarrel, but they never get to the point of despair. In the end they love them.

Tonight something snapped. I thought of all the teams in Toronto, all those people at the Rogers Centre, all those people at US Cellular in April, and Yankee Stadium in the rain and it dawned on me:

Toronto does not deserve its teams.

This city loves its Leafs, but it's a sad love. The fans know they back a mediocre team, but instead of getting angry they just create heroes out of these players: In any other city Tie Domi, Darcy Tucker, Vesa Toskala, Thomas Kaberle would be riding the bench waiting for the 6th line to come up. Here, they don't pay for a meal.

Go to Jays game in the spring and early summer, and you'll see as many Leafs jerseys and hats as you will baseball gear. And if the Leafs happen to be in the playoffs, more people will be watching or listening to the hockey game in the concourse than the ball game right in front of them. Go there later in the year and you'll see a mix of people rooting the other team and "Jays fans" who aren't even paying attention to the game past a certain point unless the Jays are winning. The Angels have the Rally Monkey to get its fans going. Here the team has to start the rally before the fans get involved.

In every sport but hockey it's not so much that the city loves a winner, but it will only abide by a winner. When the Jays were winning you couldn't get a ticket, and the city was nuts about its team. The new park, the way the team was run, this was supposed to be new model franchise. But once the luster fell off, everyone stopped going. "Oh, it's too expensive, and the SkyDome isn't that nice." Funny, U.S. Cellular is considered one of the worst fields in the majors and is not a cheap night out, but they had a good crowd. It's not the architecture, people.

It's time to face facts: Toronto only cares about its Leafs, and really it would be best if all other teams just gave up and left. And I don't mean out of spite: I mean this in the way I would tell someone who feels they were being taken for granted in a relationship. Go now, while you still have a chance somewhere else. All of you.

Argos? You had celebrity owners, Rocket Ishmail, and a big Grey Cup. The place was packed. People worried that the CFL would lose its traditional Western roots. The next year they booed Ishmail out of this city to the point where he lost it and never recovered as a player. "What have you done for ME lately," was pretty much the mood of the city, and even a little bit of "we're too sophisticated for football. The team has never really recovered either. Sure they've had a couple of good season, but they're not a draw even on a Friay night when they're the only game in town.

Rock? They won the National Lacrosse League championship their first few years in Toronto. It was a hot ticket, and oh so Canadian. Now? I bet you didn't even know they were playing. As soon as things got tough, they became an answer to a trivia question.

Raptors? On and off, saved by the fact that high draft picks after poor years pay off pretty quickly in the NBA. But people couldn't chase out Stoudamire and Vince Carter (both rookies of the year) fast enough as soon as they showed a little bit of humanity.

Don't look so smug, TFC. Toronto LOVES the shiny, and there's a shiny new park and everyone can pretend they're in Europe. But the worst thing that can happen to you? Having a good year. Because a couple of years after that you'll have a bad year, and then the year after you'll be able to see the designs on your seats during game time. "Oh no, we have a good base and a great park." Mmm hmm...did you get that song from the Jays in 92-93, because the tune sure sounds familiar to me.

Now you'll say "But Toronto's a hockey town." Really? So you couldn't get tickets to the Leafs. Did you go to a Marlies game? No, you didn't. Did you go to OHL games? No, you didn't. "We need another team in the area because we're such a hockey town, unlike Phoenix." Phoenix recently had 6,000 people watch a high school hockey tournament. Dallas, another sun belt city where hockey shouldn't thrive, has more ice rinks per capita than any other city in North America. Chew on those numbers. You've got a big kids hockey league: a bunch of people pretending to be Maple Leafs.

I'm going to call a spade a spade: Toronto is not a sports city. Toronto is a Leafs city. I think it's time that every other sport at every level realized that there will never be a market here for them unless they bring it themselves.

Until that time, I say they leave Torontonians to play with their Leaf dollies in the sandbox on their own.

...presenting a Joy Division three-pack

So let's start with the original:

And now the AWESOME cover:

And the net effect both should have on you:

... taking on National Myths, 72 style!

Gvalentino: ... and that's why another hockey team in Canada is a bad idea.

Horace Oser: Oh man, you nearly made me spit up my Tim Horton's double-double. How can you say that? Hockey is CANADIAN, Don Cherry told me.

Gvalentino: Yes, but football is American, but even they realize that they've saturated the market there, and they can add as many teams as they want but they'll never gain another fan unless they go outside their borders.

Horace Oser: Yeah, but they're wrong. Toronto is a hockey town, and Canada is a hockey country, and we proved that in 72. CA-NA-DA!

Gvalentino: Well...

Horace Oser: What?

Gvalentino: Well, see, I don't think 72 was the best thing for hockey in Canada. In fact, I think it was one of the worst things to ever happen.

Horace Oser: Oh man, I have to pull my toque over my eyes, I'm so angry! How can you say that?

Gvalentino: Well, first of all it's July and secondly the Canadians didn't win the series.

Horace Oser: Yes they did! I'll bet you this Molson that Paul Henderson scored the winning goal.

Gvalentino: It was 8 games. It was an exhibition series and not meant to determine anything, but as a sign of international goodwill and a way to spread hockey. The only reason that Canada "won" was because of a tied game, otherwise the series had as much of a chance of going 4-4, or 8-0, or 6-2. The point of the series wasn't to win, but to play.

Horace Oser: That doesn't matter. Paul Henderson scored the greatest goal in history.

Gvalentino: Paul Henderson scored an ugly goal. There was a complete lapse, he flailed at an open puck and went over a prone goaltender. To be honest, if he HADN'T scored that goal it would have been more remarkable. The sad fact is that since everyone grew up seeing that goal, they kept trying to score that goal. The number of finesse players went down, except for a few blips, and the number of pokey/prodey/work-a-day goal scorers went up. You look at most goals today, and it's three guys flailing around the net and the puck slipping in. And the call is normally something like "There's the guy who killed his friend, the guy who tired to kill another player, and the racist all hitting the crease for Canada!"

Horace Oser: Huh?

Gvalentino: More on those guys some other time. The point is that the whole series was not an indication of Canada playing better, it was Canada just whacking away until something worked, in a series that had no winning conditions except the one they created in their head. And even that would not have been possible if Bobby Clarke hadn't done one of the lowest acts in sports ever and fractured Kharlamovat's ankle at the instruction of his coach. How very sporting. How very dickish.

Horace Oser: But the Soviets were playing rough also.

Gvalentino: Doesn't matter. That just invalidates your argument.

Horace Oser: How? Give me a second to have a Laura Secord Candy.

Gvalentino: I like Gagnon's better.

Horace Oser: What's that?

Gvalentino: Never mind. The point is that you want to claim that the 72 Series showed that hockey was Canadian, and that they played a better game. But you also seek a pass for the sloppy plays and gross misconduct based on "they started it". Doesn't matter. If you want to be better, you play better than the other person. You want to claim supremacy, then you beat them on your terms. If they want to claim goal differential means they win the series in the end, then you claim that this was in the spirit of goodwill and international relations then you say they cheapened it. You want to say they are beating you up, you say it's because they can't compete and you out skill them. You don't try to end a man's career so you can wrap yourself in the flag and eat free meals on it for the rest of your life.

Horace Oser: You're a downer, man. You don't need to say that.

Gvalentino: No, I don't, but I'm tired of people pointing to it and then not noticing the the steady 40 year decline of hockey in Canada. You can only have so many games against Russia with people holding up banners that say "Remember 72" before you notice that the only tournament that Canada wins, the Juniors, is ignored by the rest of the world and they don't even want to host it.

Horace Oser: I bet you even hate when Rocky wins at the end of the first movie.

Gvalentino: He loses in Rocky.

Horace Oser: NO!

Gvalentino: Yes. He loses on a 2-1 decision. He just has a moral victory, but no real victory.

Horace Oser: Man...you just hate winners and Canada. Unlike me who loves all things that are completely Canadian. I'm gonna take my Timmies and listen to good music like Bryan Adams, Celine Dion, and Alanis.

Gvalentino: Well...

... thinking about the BJ and Doc Show

Anyone who's hung out with me any amount of time between Spring and Fall know that I loves me my baseball. That and a broad nose are about the only two things I inherited from my father, who was actually scouted by the Yankees back in the day. True story.

Now, anyone who's read my blog this year has also noticed that I haven't written much about the Beloved Blue Jays, and there are two reasons for that. When they started playing really well I didn't want to jinx it, and then when they went into their little tail spin I didn't want to add to their woes. Such is the life of a baseball fan. April may be the cruelest month, but baseball is the cruelest sport and for the same reason: It dares to give you hope.

Two things this week involving The Beloved Jays have indicated that the well of hope has run dry and now it is safe to both praise and bury Cesar.

The first was the release (ie: firing) of reliever BJ Ryan. Ryan came over from the Hated Orioles with a reputation for being the fiercest closer in the majors. Sure, Riviera is the most dominating, but take a look at Robert Victor Ryan: he's huge, he has a thousand mile stare, and he runs from the bullpen to the mound. He stands, starts his wind up, and then tosses a 91 MPH fastball down the middle of the plate with a motion that borders on a balk. Before you know what's happened he's got the ball back and he's started the wind up again. Most pitchers are accused of slowing the game, but with Ryan in it sped up. He'd come in in the 9th, throw 6-9 pitches, and that would be it.

His signing, along with AJ Burnett in the same year, was supposed to signify that the Beloved Blue Jays were going to pitch you into submission. However, there was a little wiff in the air. "Ryan can really only throw the fastball, and he tires out easily. Also, he's never been injured..."

Two seasons ago baseball karma caught up with him. He came back from Tommy John surgery, but he never really came back. His velocity was shot, his control was gone, and even worse his confidence had completely eroded. What used to be a terrifying mountain of a man on the mound looked like a misbegotten moppet. His contract was too large, and his abilities too weakened to be traded and so The Jays and Rogers ate $15 million.

This was a mercy killing, as sad as it is to say, and overdue. Of all the players on a ball team, the closer has to be the most consistent. He has the smallest margin for error. Once he's lost what makes him special he loses his confidence, and once that's gone it's lights out. Sure, the Jays could have just bumping him up and down from the majors to the minors like a Steely Dan song, moving him around the rotation but that would hinder his recovery and disrupt the flow of the team. BJ Ryan had the chance to be one of the greatest closers of his generation. He may yet, but it won't be with the Jays, and I can hardly blame them for that.

But before they released him, they also announced that they were ready to hear offers for Roy Halladay. Now, most athletes in Bippity Town are overpraised by the local media (only in the GBTA would Tie Domi be considered a Hall of Famer), but Doc is the real deal. I put no qualifiers on this: he is the greatest pitcher pitching today. To watch him pitch is to watch a master at work. He focus and control are legendary, you can see it from the rafters. The man just does not blink. And if Ryan worked quickly, Doc went even faster and would pitch the whole 9. I've been to games that have lasted just a little over the 2 hour mark when he pitched. It's very rare to leave the Roger's Centre after a night game and see a little light on the horizon.

So the Beloved Jays are ready to let him go. And how do I feel about that? I'm happy.

I'm not happy to see him go. I'm devastated. This is like when I was a kid and Gary Carter left the Beloved Expos for the Hated Mets. This is pretty much the end of the Jays for this season, a season that started with such promise, and now looks to be another lost cause.

Letting Halladay go, however, is the best move for the team and the man. Here's the deal:

• He's the only really tradeable commodity that they have. Wells has too large a contract to move, and there's a hint of sulphur in the air about Rios. Lind is too valuable and young to give up, as is Hill. Halladay is a proven commodity, and will immediately improve any team he is on. Plus he still has another year on his contact so a contending team can actually bank on extended services from him. This also means that the Jays could get more in return for him in a trade.
  
• If they wait until the deadline, or the off season, his value goes down. They do it now, they are teams that have the money but are nibbling at the heels of the contention that are going to be interested. They wait until the deadline and the pool of interested people dries up.
• He deserves it. He's the greatest pitcher, and he's going to the hall of fame. Let him win a ring somewhere, but he'll always have that first Cy Young with the Jays
• He's loyal. This is the weirdest reason. He likes Toronto, likes the organization, and has put up with leaner times than now. Because of that he also knows that any promise of "re-sign with us and we'll build a team around you" can't be counted on. They've had enough time to do that and haven't, and he'll walk leaving the Jays with nothing to show. In essence the team is saying "Look, we want to keep you, but we also know we can't give you the team you need. Can we see about sending you there?" (He has a no-trade clause). Yes, it reeks of "It's not you, it's me," but in this case it is the truth.
  
• Also, the last two seasons he has had injuries. These have been because of him pushing himself harder and harder because he couldn't count on the bullpen. So trading him may also add a couple of seasons to his career.

There's another thing here: 2010 and 2011. Most sports executives are dreading those years. Why? Because it takes a couple of years for any economic hardship to hit the professional sports leagues. So after this year of declining revenues, there's going to be less joy to go around. There is an upside to this for some of the smaller markets (though I'm not an Economicalamalist) in that there might be a lot of bargains on the free agent market at that time. It might be possible in a couple of years to buy Roy back, if only because the Jays have respected him and not burnt any bridges. (Yes, it's a long shot)

Now, where does he go? This is fun. Most of the teams mentioned have been the usual suspects (The Hated Yankees, The Hated Red Sox, The Hated Phillies, and The Hated Angels). I doubt the Beloved Jays would trade him in their own division unless they got a lot in return (a shortstop, pitcher, and a good prospect at either position), so it looks like either the AL West or the NL.

A lot of people bring up The Hated Dodgers. I find this funny for two reasons. The first is that Doc has never been comfortable batting. I won't get into that right here, that's another rant. The other is best summed up in three words: Manny Being Manny. Manny is a showboat, a character, and plays it up. Doc is all focus. Now, he's dealt with egos before, but he's never had to deal with a large showboating personality. I think moving to Chavez Ravine would cause for a very caustic clubhouse between Manny Being Manny and the laser-like focus of Doc. The first time MBM came up to horse around in front of Doc in the dugout during a game would be his last.

So, after all of this it looks like this era, the Doc era, of the Beloved Jays is coming to a close. Depending on what they get for him, it could be the start of a whole new team as they already have some solid prospects. Conversely it could be the start of another rebuilding process, and with The Hated Orioles ready to make their move it means that the hardest division in baseball is only going to get harder.

But that doesn't matter. I'll still be watching every year, no matter who is in the rotation. Why? Because baseball gives you hope. Baseball is long. Baseball is having to give every man the same chance as the man before, and it's not over until the game says it is. The book says we might be done with baseball, but baseball ain't done with us.

But mostly, I'll be watching because baseball is cruel.

It gives you hope.

...thinking about McNamara, history, and language

There are two movies that seem very dry, very boring, almost clinical but which I will watch almost every time they are on TV. One is a dramatization of a historical event where the script is mostly a direct transcription of recordings and memos from the event. The other is a documentary featuring a man in his 80s staring at a camera and talking about his life and what he's learned from it.

The films are Thirteen Days and The Fog of War, the first featuring a fictional portrayal of, and the second featuring a very real, Robert Strange McNamara. McNamara was Secretary of Defence under Presidents Kennedy and Johnson and is considered the architect of Vietnam War. He died on July 6th, 2009. (It was more important to carry a dancer's funeral, but I come not to praise Ceasar....)

McNamara ranks up there with Nixon's White House Counsel John Dean and Mark "Deep Throat" Felt as the more interesting and divisive people in US History. All three were men who worked for presidents on matters that caused them great strife, whose names became linked with those controversial events, and whose attacks of conscience at different points in their lives caused them to re-evaluate their stances. In McNamara's case, it led to a complete reversal regarding Vietnam, though far too late to do any good.

McNamara is know for bringing the concept of "Systems Analysis" to the Department of Defence. It's hard to understate how revolutionary this was at the time, even more so with the constant spectre of nuclear war hanging over the world. (To this day, my parents won't talk about the Cuban Missile Crisis. They just won't.). He and Kennedy not only changed the way the military would react to a situation, but also how the deployment of the military could be used to actually communicate with other leaders.

One of the reasons I love Thirteen Days so much, other than being a vision of the Cuban Missile Crisis that isn't talked about all that often, is that it shows how much of communication is not so much in the things we say but in emphasizing with all parties that are involved. One scene of the movie is JFK and RFK puzzling over two telegrams from Moscow, one very belligerent and one almost conciliatory. By wondering what was the mindset behind those communiques they determine that one was sent by an inner cabal of party members trying to usurp Khrushchev and that the more conciliatory one was probably the true intention. They choose to ignore the first one and reply to the second one, anticipating that the Soviet Union would understand that the message was that the US was no more interested in war than the USSR was, and they are willing to talk. We're here today, so we know how that ended.

But one scene even more than that shows the effect that McNamara had on geopolitics. It may be fictionalized, the the intention is there. It also shows what would be his undoing.

He is in the war room where they are tracking the movement of Soviet ships around the US blockade of Cuba. One makes a move and a general starts to grab a phone to order a strike. McNamara emphatically stops him and utters a line that I fell in love with instantly. If I were ever to tattoo words on my body, there is a better than average chance that those bolded words would be them:

This is not a blockade. This is language. A new vocabulary, the likes of which the world has never seen! This is President Kennedy communicating with Secretary Khrushchev!

Think about that. It's chess. A boat moving over to this side is not a boat moving into position. It's a feint, it's a dare, it's a way of talking without saying anything. It's a way of raising the stakes without having to make a wager. You move your boat and we fire, there is only one way that conversation can end, and it's not pretty. You move your boat here, but we move ours here, we say that we see what you're doing, and are willing to make sure that you don't get away with it. Now, what do YOU want to do about that? It's parrying. It's dodging. It's a DEBATE. And the reason the debate works is not because you're looking at superior forces. It works because you're thinking that there's someone telling that boat what to do, and that person is You.

Now, imagine that Robert McNamara is the head of a European nation at the start of World War I. While it's folly to reduce the causes of that war to a couple of simple things, most will say that one of the major factors that led to the escalation of the conflict was the system of alliances, and that once those countries started mobilizing everyone went to the mattresses.

Now, imagine someone using McNamara's logic...we deploy a few troops here and here, we don't occupy territory, but we prevent them from doing so, and everyone can soon retreat with honour. (The Franco-American war of the late 1790s was pretty much that). Think how different history would have been.

It's also the reason for his later failures in Vietnam. He forgot about the empathy, and while he did pressure Kennedy and Johnson to get out of Vietnam in the end he failed, and I think at that moment he started seeing it as a chess game again, only he didn't think there was another person controlling the pieces' movements. The second you take empathy and rationality out of any conflict/discussion/moment, that is the moment you have lost.

There is so much more to McNamara, and so much we will never understand. But there is something that he understood that has stuck with me my entire life: All interactions are language, and language has meaning, intent and nuance. It also has a person behind it, and attention must be paid to that.

This is language.

... looking for old Presentation College alums

Devotees of the site probably know about the ongoing brief history of g valentino which has been an attempt to sum up my life, or parts of it at least. If you've been playing along at home, you'll know that it's best listed as

Minto born, Barbados raised, Halifax educated, Toronto employed, Moscow paid

For most of my life those circles did not intersect: when I went to Halifax, no one from Minto came etc. They really only converged, in a most interesting way, when I got on Facebook. For the first time ever, people who knew me in Minto were talking to people who worked with me in Toronto, who were also getting good stories about University me from people in Halifax.

Notice anything missing?

One part that seems to have fallen into the ol' memory hole is Barbados. It seems that no matter how hard I look through Google, or Facebook, or twitter I just can't seem to find the people who I went to school with in Barbados.

Well, here I go. I'm going to do that thing that hundreds of failed book pitches begin with: A guy puts out a random call on the Internet to find some old friends.

Yes, I'm going to write a post and mention the name of my old school, Presentation College in Barbados, many times over. I'm hoping that saying something about Presentation College in Barbados, which was in Verdun, not too far from Four Cross Roads, might mean that someone like me just doing a silly little search on the web will find this.

My three years in Barbados at Presentation College weren't the best of my life, I'll admit. It was that awkward age, and I was the outsider and was probably actively trying not to fit in. I was moody, short tempered, and way too sensitive for my liking. I think the condition is called "adolescence" but I'm not Dr Leo Spaceman.

But those three school years (when I went to Presentation College), 1995-1998 probably did as much to make me into the person that I am today. It was the first time I had lived outside of New Brunswick, let alone Canada. I got a different perspective on life just at the time when you're normally starting to think you know everything. I studied a lot of things that have stuck with me, and a few very weird things that I still love to drag out (like the fact that the flag of Switzerland is a perfect square, solving simultaneous linear equations using matrices, or how to prove the Sine Law in trig, which is a lovely little proof that I still doodle sometimes when I need to concentrate on something. See, it starts with constructing an equilateral triangle ABC and dropping a perpendicular from A to bisect BC at a point D....I'll stop now.)

I also picked up some weird compulsions there, like a craving for flying fish that cannot be satiated. Or the fact that a nice warm smell of roti can make me hungry like *snap* that. I still maintain that Upper 10 is a premium beverage, and that there's nothing finer than a Pineapple Juice-y, or a Grape Fruitee. Sometimes when I get very agitated I fall into a White Bajan accent, or suck my teeth like so *suqueeeeee*. I also picked up an odd habit of calling everyone "Sir", which amuses my boss to no end.

But for all these effects that living in Barbados had in my life, it's like it just stopped existing after I left. Sure I've seen a few of the gang when I went back to visit, but it's been close to 20 years since I last set foot on the island. I went back to Presentation College at that time. It's not a school anymore. It stopped being one about 2 years after I left. The last time I was there it was being used as a community centre to help people who were down on their luck get back up and running again. It was in better shape than it ever was when I was a student there. As cheesy as this sounds, I was glad.

The odd part about these people falling through the cracks is that like your hero here, a lot of us have weird names that should just make Google pop, but haven't. I'm going to list a few of them here, mostly to see if anyone anywhere knows of them and can direct them to this page.

• Brendan Briggs was the first person who really befriended me when I moved there. He was from Yorkshire. He and all his siblings has been born in Yorkshire because his father was a cricket nut, and the only way you could play for the Yorkshire side was to be born there (and be male). Brendan was the only boy out of the 5 of them and had little to no interest in cricket. I used to try to teach him how to play golf, which his father resented because it was going to ruin his cricket swing. Brendan moved back to the UK after the first year I was there. We wrote for about a year, and I promised to come and see him but my father put the kibosh on that. Haven't heard from him since. He had a sister named Imogen.
• Edward McTurk was Guyanese and pure mid 80s. He was the one who introduced me to military fiction and military sci-fi. Of all the people I met, he probably most defied description, but was also one of the funniest and smartest people I've ever known.
• Joel Schmidt was another Canadian. His father worked for one of the banks, I do believe. He and I were in constant competition for top ranks in our classes, which he won more often than not (In my more petty moments I attribute that to his ability to draw a straight line in art class, while my art for lack of a better word could be described as "Exhibit A in a mental competency hearing'")
• Gomesh Thani was actually the first person I met when I went to Presentation, on orientation day. We always had an interesting relationship, but he could tell a story like no-one's business. A lot of the the rhythms I use when I tell a story are based on an hilarious monologue he'd tell about his father arguing with a gardener.
• Gregory Watkins was one of g-d's most unfortunate creatures. He lived in Barbados, in the middle of a sugar cane field, and had an allergy to sugar cane pollen. He was also a great and graceful footballer. A familiar sight most of the year was Greg, running down the pitch, his arms slightly out and to the side, with a stream of tissue coming out of one hand. We called him "Kleenex". One of the most natural artists I've ever know.
• Jason Markle, who I have seen in living memory, was the first Canadian I met there. He also introduced me to Dungeons & Dragons, and actually had an awesome selection of music and computer games. I guess he was the root of my nerdiness.
  
• Padmore John. Most of us went by our last names there. Not Padmore. This was mostly because when you have an awesome name like "Padmore", you wear that like a badge. Also, "John" was too close to a first name. He was another funny gent and storyteller.

I'm sure there are other members of the core group that I'm forgetting, but this is as good an introduction that I'm likely to give before I get into a whole bunch of weird and half remembered stories.

So I toss this out to the world. There's contact info on the page if you are any of these people. Just drop a line, and lemme know that I didn't dream the whole thing. As always I can be reached at gvalentino at gmail dot com.

So...how YOU doin'?