Film review: Hitchcock (2012)

I have seen almost all the Alfred Hitchcock films. I enjoyed most of them because he showed how you could build up suspense without gratuitous violence and gore, and he avoided horror merely for the sake of it. In particular, I liked the fact that he never resorted to the supernatural. All the weird things in his films always turned out to have rational explanations at the end. [Read more…]

Blowback from the NSA spying

The story about the NSA spying on the leaders of other governments is turning out to have legs and is causing some serious discomfort to the Obama administration. While governments and elites (including elite media) don’t care if the rights and privacy of ordinary people are trampled, they get up in arms if those of the elites are. This is why the story of the wiretapping of these national leaders is getting so much play. The suggestion that president Obama knew about the tapping of German chancellor Angela Merkel’s cell phone and her conversations is causing particularly acute discomfort. [Read more…]

Work-life balance issues are not just for professionals

The question of work-life balance is often posed in the context of professionals trying to juggle careers and family. It is good to be reminded from time to time about the real lives of young people who struggle against great odds to just make ends meet, many of them having to juggle many duties and shoulder responsibilities that the rest of us did not have to think about until we were much older. [Read more…]

The new media versus the old

The new media venture by Glenn Greenwald has caused the traditional media to sit up and take notice. The combination of Greenwald’s blockbuster scoops on the NSA, his openly expressed contempt for the way that much of traditional media operates, and the deep pockets of the financier underwriting it, has made them realize that the cozy world in which they operate is soon going to be under serious attack. [Read more…]