Approximately 41.3 million people in the US watched the 2010 Oscars on Sunday, up 14% on last year and the best audience for the awards show in five years.
Sunday night’s surge in viewing for the 82nd Academy Awards can probably be attributed to the nine nominations garnered by Avatar even though it only won three awards, losing out in the best picture and best director categories to The Hurt Locker.
The uncertain outcome of the contest between Avatar’s director, James Cameron, and his ex-wife, The Hurt Locker’s director, Kathryn Bigelow, meant the three-and-a-half-hour-long ceremony was more popular than last year’s Oscars, when Slumdog Millionaire dominated the awards.
You can’t tell me that the challenge of directing The Hurt Locker even comes close to than directing Avatar. It always kills me how some independent film that hardly anyone saw turns out winning. I think that Cameron WAS the best director of the BEST movie, Avatar.
I predict that viewership will drop again next year to levels below that of the 2009 awards show.
Yes, the only reason we watched this year was to see how Avatar fared when they handed out the awards. The people of America and the world voted with their pocket-books for Avatar, which grossed $720,607,444 domestically as of 3/7/10. Hurt locker grossed about $14,700,000 and was released almost six month sooner than Avatar. The graph below tells it all.
Tags: Art, Entertainment, Stupid
By JOSEPH L. GALLOWAY
McClatchy Newspapers
Over the last 12 months, 1,042 soldiers, Marines, sailors and Air Force personnel have given their lives in the terrible duty that is war. Thousands more have come home on stretchers, horribly wounded and facing months or years in military hospitals.
This week, I’m turning my space over to a good friend and former roommate, Army Lt. Col. Robert Bateman, who recently completed a year long tour of duty in Iraq and is now back at the Pentagon. Here’s Lt. Col. Bateman’s account of a little-known ceremony that fills the halls of the Army corridor of the Pentagon with cheers, applause and many tears every Friday morning. It first appeared on May 17 on the Weblog of media critic and pundit Eric Alterman at the Media Matters for America Website.
“It is 110 yards from the “E” ring to the “A” ring of the Pentagon. This section of the Pentagon is newly renovated; the floors shine, the hallway is broad, and the lighting is bright. At this instant the entire length of the corridor is packed with officers, a few sergeants and some civilians, all crammed tightly three and four deep against the walls. There are thousands here. This hallway, more than any other, is the `Army’ hallway. The G3 offices line one side, G2 the other, G8 is around the corner. All Army. Moderate conversations flow in a low buzz. Friends, who may not have seen each other for a few weeks, or a few years, spot each other, cross the way and renew.
Everyone shifts to ensure an open path remains down the center. The air conditioning system was not designed for this press of bodies in this area. The temperature is rising already. Nobody cares.
10:36 hours: The clapping starts at the E-Ring. That is the outer most of the five rings of the Pentagon and it is closest to the entrance to the building. This clapping is low, sustained, and hearty. It is applause with a deep emotion behind it as it moves forward in a wave down the length of the hallway.
A steady rolling wave of sound it is, moving at the pace of the soldier in the wheelchair who marks the forward edge with his presence. He is the first. He is missing the greater part of one leg, and some of his wounds are still suppurating. By his age, I expect that he is a private, or perhaps a private first class.
Captains, majors, lieutenant colonels and colonels meet his gaze and nod as they applaud, soldier to soldier.
Three years ago when I described one of these events, those lining the hallways were somewhat different. The applause a little wilders, perhaps in private guilt for not having shared in the burden. Yet now almost everyone lining the hallway is, like the man in the wheelchair, also a combat veteran. This steadies the applause, but I think deepens the sentiment. We have all been there now. The soldier’s chair is pushed by, I believe, a full colonel. Behind him, and stretching the length from Rings E to A, come more of his peers, each private, corporal, or sergeant assisted as need be by a field grade officer.
11:00 hours: Twenty-four minutes of steady applause. My hands hurt, and I laugh to myself at how stupid that sounds in my own head. My hands hurt. Please! Shut up and clap. For twenty-four minutes, soldier after soldier has come down this hallway – 20, 25, 30. Fifty-three legs come with them, and perhaps only 52 hands or arms, but down this hall came 30 solid hearts.
They pass down this corridor of officers and applause, and then meet for a private lunch, at which they are the guests of honor, hosted by the generals. Some are wheeled along. Some insist upon getting out of their chairs, to march as best they can with their chin held up, down this hallway, through this most unique audience. Some are catching handshakes and smiling like a politician at a Fourth of July parade. More than a couple of them seem amazed and are smiling shyly.
There are families with them as well: the 18-year-old war-bride pushing her 19-year-old husband’s wheelchair and not quite understanding why her husband is so affected by this, the boy she grew up with, now a man, who had never shed a tear is crying; the older immigrant Latino parents who have, perhaps more than their wounded mid-20s son, an appreciation for the emotion given on their son’s behalf. No man in that hallway, walk ing or clapping, is ashamed by the silent tears on more than a few cheeks. An Airborne Ranger wipes his eyes only to better see. A couple of the officers in this crowd have themselves been a part of this parade in the past.
These are our men, broken in body they may be, but they are our brothers, and we welcome them home. This parade has gone on, every single Friday, all year long, for more than four years.
Did you know that? The major media hasn’t yet told the story. And probably never will.
That tells you a lot, doesn’t it.
I checked this out on Snopes.com and they show it as a Mixture, which means it is partially true. It is unclear which portions are fabrications, in that he did not say them, but the text below sure makes sense to me.
Remember Lee Iacocca, the man who rescued Chrysler Corporation from its death throes? He’s now 82 years old and has a new book, ‘Where Have All The Leaders Gone?’.
Lee Iacocca Says:
‘Am I the only guy in this country who’s fed up with what’s happening? Where the hell is our outrage with this so called president? We should be screaming bloody murder! We’ve got a gang of tax cheating clueless leftists trying to steer our ship of state right over a cliff, we’ve got corporate gangsters stealing us blind, and we can’t even run a ridiculous cash-for-clunkers program without losing $26 billion of the taxpayers’ money, much less build a hybrid car. But instead of getting mad, everyone sits around and nods their heads when the politicians say, ‘trust me the economy is getting better..’
Better? You’ve got to be kidding. This is America , not the damned, ‘Titanic’. I’ll give you a sound bite: ‘Throw all the Democrats out along with Obama!’
You might think I’m getting senile, that I’ve gone off my rocker, and maybe I have. But someone has to speak up. I hardly recognize this country anymore..
The most famous business leaders are not the innovators but the guys in handcuffs. While we’re fiddling in Afghanistan , Iran is completing their nuclear bombs and missiles and nobody seems to know what to do. And the liberal press is waving ‘pom-poms’ instead of asking hard questions. That’s not the promise of the ‘ America ‘ my parents and yours traveled across the ocean for. I’ve had enough. How about you?
I’ll go a step further. You can’t call yourself a patriot if you’re not outraged. This is a fight I’m ready and willing to have. The Biggest ‘C’ is Crisis! (Iacocca elaborates on nine C’s of leadership, with crisis being the first.)
Leaders are made, not born. Leadership is forged in times of crisis. It’s easy to sit there with thumb up your butt and talk theory. Or send someone else’s kids off to war when you’ve never seen a battlefield yourself. It’s another thing to lead when your world comes tumbling down.
On September 11, 2001 , we needed a strong leader more than any other time in our history. We needed a steady hand to guide us out of the ashes. A hell of a mess, so here’s where we stand.
We’re immersed in a bloody war now with no plan for winning and no plan for leaving. But our soldiers are dying daily.
We’re running the biggest deficit in the history of the world, and it’s getting worse every day!
We’ve lost the manufacturing edge to Asia , while our once-great companies are getting slaughtered by health care costs.
Gas prices are going to skyrocket again, and nobody in power has a lucid plan to open drilling to solve the problem. This country has the largest oil reserves in the WORLD, and we cannot drill for it because the politicians have been bought by the flea-hugging environmentalists.
Our schools are in a complete disaster because of the teachers union.
Our borders are like sieves and they want to give all illegals amnesty and free healthcare.
The middle class is being squeezed to death every day.
These are times that cry out for leadership.
But when you look around, you’ve got to ask:
-
‘Where have all the leaders gone?’
-
Where are the curious, creative communicators?
-
Where are the people of character, courage, conviction, omnipotence, and common sense?
I may be a sucker for alliteration, but I think you get the point.
Name me a leader who has a better idea for homeland security than making us take off our shoes in airports and throw away our shampoo?
We’ve spent billions of dollars building a huge new bureaucracy, and all we know how to do is react to things that have already happened.
Everyone’s hunkering down, fingers crossed, hoping the government will make it better for them. Now, that’s just crazy. Deal with life.
Name me an industry leader who is thinking creatively about how we can restore our competitive edge in manufacturing. Who would have believed that there could ever be a time when ‘The Big Three’ referred to Japanese car companies? How did this happen, and more important, look what Obama did about it!
Name me a government leader who can articulate a plan for paying down the debit, or solving the energy crisis, or managing the health care problem. The silence is deafening. But these are the crises that are eating away at our country and milking the middle class dry.
I have news for the Chicago gangsters in Congress. We didn’t elect you to turn this country into a losing European Socialist state. What is everybody so afraid of? That some bonehead on NBC or CNN news will call them a name? Give me a break. Why don’t you guys show some spine for a change?
Had Enough? Hey, I’m not trying to be the voice of gloom and doom here. I’m trying to light a fire. I’m speaking out because I have hope – I believe in America . In my lifetime, I’ve had the privilege of living through some of America ’s greatest moments. I’ve also experienced some of our worst crises:
-
The ‘Great Depression,’
-
‘World War II,’
-
The ‘Korean War,’
-
The ‘Kennedy Assassination,’
-
The ‘Vietnam War,’
-
The 1970’s oil crisis,
-
And the struggles of recent years since 9/11.
You have the power of the vote, Use It!!!
Tags: Advice, Government, Politics
Recent Comments