Remember those flying cars they keep promising us? Well, for those of you who are tired of waiting, here's the next best thing: a personal flying wing. Don't expect to see it in your local Wal-Mart anytime soon, but it'll probably be in the next James Bond movie . . .

It's nice to know our esteemed commander-in-chief is making sacrifices for the war effort. Next thing you know he'll be giving up filet mignon in solidarity with senior citizens who are having a hard time affording both food and medicine. Don't you feel better knowing how much he cares?

According to Wired, scientists have created human beings that can glow in the dark. Well, not actual human beings, mind you, but human embryos which, they assure us, were destroyed following the experiment. Uh, yeah, sure, if you say so. I mean, what Trekkie-turned-scientist is going to be able to resist the urge to create his own exotic, irridescent alien dancer?:

And we all know that genetic engineering was responsible for Alice Cooper's Devo/Gary Numan phase. Can there be any other explanantion?:

Time magazine - which has never met a foreign intervention it didn't like - is suggesting that the United States should invade Burma in order to get disaster relief to those suffering in the wake of a deadly cyclone. Let me first state, to erase any doubts about my patriotism, that I'm with us, not the cyclone. But just what kind of idea is this? According to the article:

"But the risks would be greater this time: the Burmese government's xenophobia and insecurity make them prone to view U.S. troops — or worse, foreign relief workers — as hostile forces."

Really. You don't say. I can't think of many nations, xenophobic or not, that wouldn't regard uninvited foreign troops on their soil as anything but "hostile". Even if the Canadians were to invade us with the intention of bringing free health care to our 48 million uninsured, I'd still regard them as hostile. Remember how the Somalis reacted to our humanitarian mission there? And our troops in Iraq are still waiting for the grateful Iraqis to shower them with sweets and flowers. When will we learn?

"But what about the suffering victims?" you ask. "How can we stand by and do nothing?" Good question. How can we stand by and do nothing about the women who suffer under the feudal monarchy in Saudi Arabia, or the citizens of Zimbabwe, with their corrupt and authoritarian government, or the people of Darfur? Yet, in those cases, we do stand by and do nothing. We can't save everyone everywhere, you know. So why make Burma a special case?

Better yet, why not make the American people a special case? We have a government that's failed us in so many areas - health care, jobs with good wages, affordable college education, you name it - yet we maintain this belief that this same government can make a difference in the lives of people on the other side of the world, despite its proven ignorance of other peoples' cultures. A nation that was unable to save New Orleans is supposed to save Burma?

As we've discovered so many times, the best antidote to an uncaring, authoritarian government is the people who live under it. Foreign intervention only muddies the waters. The Burmese people know who's responsible for their suffering; let's not give the military junta an excuse to rally people around the flag in the name of repelling "imperialist aggression."

So feel free to stage benefits for the people of Burma, or send donations, even if the junta uses the resulting aid for its own purposes, and let's keep the troops at home.

Whenever I cover a band or a nightclub, people inevitably ask me to take their picture, or else they begin mugging when they see the camera aiming at them. I usually oblige; it's a digital camera, so I'm not worried about wasting film. I just prefer to capture people in a more natural, candid moment. Sometimes, though, semi-posed photos can actually turn out pretty good. I like the lighting in this one. I had the shutter speed at about 1/4 of a second, and used just enough flash to freeze the people without overwhelming the red light of the nightclub. Doesn't this look like a 1970s disco album cover?

Our government can't come up with a way to provide 48 million Americans with health insurance, but they're bending over backward to make sure that no one is left behind when over-the-air analog TV signals disappear in 2009. Then again, maybe all those converter boxes will only pick up Fox News. . .

Disco was everywhere in the late '70s. And like glam rock in the early 70s, a lot of people jumped on the bandwagon, resulting in some extremely strange disco/rock hybrids and accompanying cheesy videos. Here's a few Carter-era artifacts I found while trolling Youtube:

Bob Welch, "Ebony Eyes"

I always thought this 1977 song was by Steve Miller, but it turns out it's by ex-Fleetwood Mac guitarist Bob Welch. Looks like Napoleon Dynamite stole some of his moves from this guy. That woman in the video looks a lot like Valerie Bertinelli, but I don't think it's her:

Exile, "Kiss You All Over"

David Carradine fronting a band of zombies? No, it's Kentucky's own Exile, from 1978, before they fell off the disco bandwagon and jumped on the urban cowboy one instead:

John Stewart, "Gold"

Formerly one third of the Kingston Trio, and the writer of the Monkees' "Daydream Believer," John Stewart hit the dance floor with this 1979 classic. Like Welch, he also had a Fleetwood Mac connection: that's Stevie Nicks on background vocals:

Of course, every movement develops a backlash, and disco was no exception. Here's the Damned with 1981's self-descriptive "Disco Man":

Quite a harsh attitude directed at guys who only wanted to dance (and get on the charts), if you ask me. Disco rock sought to conquer the great divide between music that you danced to and music that you rocked to, a disconnect that plagues rock and roll to this very day. "Death before Disco": Why can't I have both?

Sychronicity abounds. A couple of days after I uploaded a clip from "They Live," my girlfriend and I went to see the play "Tales of the Lost Formicans" at UNCG. Like "They Live," it also involves aliens interacting with humans, except that in this case the aliens are looking back at human society after it's collapsed, rather than enslaving it with mind-control techniques. Basically it's the tale of a typical American family dealing with various dysfunctions behind the facile normality of suburban life. You know, like "The Ice Storm," or "American Beauty," or the Monkees' "Pleasant Valley Sunday." Except with aliens.

As a child of the Reagan Revolution and its stultifying obsession with 1950s-era family values, I can identify with playwright Constance Congdon's take on Middle American alienation and despair. While my friends and I were dealing with our parents' divorces and career struggles, TV was bombarding us with "Family Ties," "The Cosby Show" and "Growing Pains," all shows featuring intact families, usually with parents who held comfortable, upper-middle class jobs. It wasn't until "Married with Children" came on the air in the late '80s that we had a show that reflected our cynical attitudes towards the American Dream:

Despite its vulgarity and sexism, "Married," like "Formicans," tapped into a feeling that the nation's best days were behind it, Reagan's protestations to the contrary notwithstanding. All that was left was to look back nostalgically on past glories:

In the 20 years since "The Lost Formicans" and "Married with Children" debuted, we've learned to embrace our dysfunctions, thanks to Jerry Springer and reality TV. The idea that behind the door of every suburban home lives a family roiled with angst and despair has become a cliche. As our nation heads inexoriably into its end-of-the-empire phase, we're left with the feeling that, as one of the characters in "Formicans" put it, "the aliens are in control. And they're idiots."

A new study shows that being poor is, quite literally, a pain in the ass.

There's an interesting article in Orion magazine about how big business, advertisers and the government have spent the last century selling Americans on the whole work more/consume more philosophy while stifling any real debate on the alternatives. For those of us who like to think that we're autonomous agents making informed decisions in a free society, it's pretty sobering, going well beyond anything dreamed up by Philip K. Dick. In fact, it turns out everyday life is much closer to the world portrayed in John Carpenter's classic "They Live," starring Roddy Piper:

And it's still going on. The New York Times recently exposed the role that supposedly "objective" TV analysts played in drumming up support for the Iraq War. Perhaps 24-hour news channels should come with the disclaimer "We're not journalists, but we play ones on TV."

What does it mean to live in a state of manufactured reality? Well, it's probably not good for your emotional stability or mental health. You know things aren't quite right, but you can't pin down why. After all, those people on TV tell you everything's OK. Support the troops, buy more crap, it'll all work out. The economy's fine, victory in Iraq is just around the corner. This is the United States, land of democracy, the greatest nation on the planet, of course your government cares about you. Talk about cognitive dissonance. How can you make decisions when you can't trust the information on which you base them?