Author: VD

WHAT I DID NOT LIKE

1. Faramir was one of my favorite characters in the books. He is markedly less noble here, although most of the damage was already done in The Two Towers. His heroism, as well as his admiration for his older brother, does not come across well.

2. Denethor was an epic tragic figure in the books. Here, he comes off as petty and vindictive; a crazy man, not a great man crazed by the loss of his beloved son. The handling of the Denethor-Faramir relationship was probably the biggest disappointment to me, aside from Liv Tyler’s unaccountably tepid Arwen. She’s beautiful, but bland, bland, bland.

3. Horses don’t charge for over a mile. They also don’t charge walled positions. Silly. This happened several times.

4. The Great Sleepless Eye as spotlight. Sauron can see across Middle Earth, but not through a rock right in front of it? What was that? Minor, but very weird.

5. The tiny size of the Army of the West, and the way it gets surrounded. Ever heard of a defensive square, gentlemen? Or better yet, a fighting withdrawal using the seven hills of the book? It didn’t make sense and it wasn’t dramatic. Again, minor, but a strangely inept touch. The same sort of thing happened when Eomer’s riders surrounded Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli. If you crowd too much, no one can do anything. What was the point? Yes, they’re surrounded. We get it. Oh, they’re really, really, really surrounded? Come on.

6. Elrond’s reduction in stature. I’d prefer to have seen him remain aloof, even bitter.

7. The siege of Gondor seemed rushed. I thought the siege of Helms Deep came off more powerfully.

8. Aragorn seemed rather lacking in authority when he confronted the dead. He was such a stud taking on the Nazgul and the orcs; I found this a little surprising and disappointing.

THINGS I REALLY, REALLY LIKED

1. The Riders of Rohan were perfect. Theoden’s transformation from deceived victim to triumphant victor was great. His line about being able to enter the Hall of his Fathers without sorrow or shame brought tears to my eyes. I loved Theoden in the books, loved him even more in the movies.

2. I had my doubts about Eowyn. While the actress didn’t quite fit my mental picture of her, she gradually grew on me. In The Return of the King, she comes into her own. I hope we’ll see more of her and Faramir in the extended DVD.

3. The charge of the Rohirrim. Yes, they didn’t fight the Oliphaunts in the books. No, it made little tactical sense considering their superior speed. But holy cats, it was so freaking cool!

4. Legolas rules, again.

5. The devotion to the close relationships of the hobbits. Some may have felt that the ending(s) was too drawn out, but I say no. These four had been through Hell and back, been irreparably changed – even maimed – and a quick Hollywood wave-and-ride-into-the-sunset would have been wrong, wrong, wrong. I never found Frodo terribly interesting in the books, but Elijah Woods did an outstanding job of bringing him to life. By the end, I wanted to weep with Sam.

6. The last fight with Gollum was much better than I imagined it could be.

7. The horrors of war and its effects on the women and children was tremendously powerful in each movie. The grief of the women and children as their men rode out on Faramir’s hopeless charge on Osgiliath was overpowering. Also great was the constant reminders that the men were fighting to protect those they loved. They rode willingly to die, that their loved ones might live.

8. The power of the Nazgul ripping apart the retreating cavalry of Gondor. And then, the aerial assault on the city walls.

9. Grond. It WAS Grond, nightmarish and terrifying.

10. The crotchety old hobbit glaring at the returning heroes, as he did at Gandalf before. There is the unconquerable strength of The Shire. He who refuses to be impressed by the glamour of the great will never lick the boots of a tyrant.

11. Loved the lighting of the watchtowers. Huge tension, plus it demonstrated some of the tactical realities involved. Very cool stuff.

12. The final scene. Sheer perfection. In a hole in the ground….

(My apologies to regular blog readers. There wasn’t room for all of this in today’s column, and I didn’t want to force any newcomers to wade through the last few days of posts.)

Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.), a presidential aspirant, portrayed the success with Libya as an exception to the Bush Doctrine. “Ironically, this significant advance represents a complete U-turn in the Bush administration’s overall foreign policy,” he said in a statement Saturday. “An administration that scorns multilateralism and boasts about a rigid doctrine of military preemption has almost in spite of itself demonstrated the enormous potential for improving our national security through diplomacy.”

Let’s see. Two American enemies have been beaten down and smacked around. Immediately after this, an old American enemy decides to make nice. Can you spot the connection? Jean-Francois Kerry can’t. Ironically, it is those who believe George Bush is too synaptically-challenged to be President who will consider this a persuasive argument. I am not a Bush fan, but neither do I recommend making the mistake of confusing a glib tongue with intelligence, much less wisdom.

Congratulations to St. John’s and its now-legendary coach, John Gagliardi. Not only did the man collect his 4th NCAA Division III national championship, but he and his team did it in style by knocking off Mount Union, the top-ranked defending champions who were on a 55-game winning streak and had outscored their opponents 249-6 this year.

24 – St John’s

06 – Mount Union

John Gagliardi is one of my heroes. Not because he’s a winner 414 times over, but because of the way he wins. You have to read about him to believe him. In the world of football, he is the ultimate maverick.

I was actually surprised by this. Sure, it’s no secret that the Vikings offense can explode from time to time, but I expected the defense to wilt under the pressure of the hammer that is Priest Holmes. Skoal Vikings! This season has been a pleasant surprise, regardless of how it turns out, and I hope that our insane owner will not go off the deep end and fire Mike Tice. The guy may not be a rocket scientist, but considering how the geniuses of the league have fared of late, he increasingly appears to be a solid coach. Anything short of one more year would not be a fair shake.

It will be interesting to see if he can further strengthen the defense without the benefit of George Leary. Strange season this year, setting up for a playoffs that could be one of the most difficult to predict in years. Right now, Rams and Eagles look tops in the NFC – both look better than the other at home – and I like the way the Colts are playing, but I don’t like them at New England in December.

I love THIS game.

I received an email from a Democrat who’s running for the Arizona Senate. I can’t believe I’m going to write this, but if I lived there, I honestly think I’d vote for her. AZ Republicans and Libertarians, check out this out:

“I am a stanch gun rights defender who scores 100% regularly with the GOA. I believe in the right of freedom of speech, even speech which is unpopular. I believe in withdrawing from NAFTA, GATT, and the WTO, and believe American sovereignty should remain sacrosanct against the flood of international bodies. And I pledge to uncover the truth about all POW’s no matter how many military brass and politicians are embarrassed by the facts. I will be a legitimate maverick to the Washington establishment, instead of being bosom buddies with them. I believe the authority of Washington must be severely curtailed. Additionally, I support the elimination of both the wage tax and the IRS. You might find it difficult to believe that I am a Democrat. But I am. My name is Liz Michael.”

Sure, she’s probably lying, but considering that the alternative is John McCain, I’d sure take a flyer on her.

AG writes: Hey, I’m trying to use OpenOffice to make the alphabet and phonics slides like you suggest. Actually, it’s something that I have been wanting to do for a long time but have been spurred on by your article. Also, the fact that I was reading at age 3, and my daughter will soon be 4 and is not reading yet…well, this shames me into finally working with her more diligently and with more purpose. I also have a two year old son that I can start with, and another infant daughter that can be taught before too long. Anyway, are you aware of a way to randomize an OpenOffice presentation? Being such a proponent of open source, I would hope that you could provide a link to such a method.

I’m working on learning about this now, but unfortunately the list of OO macros did not include an Impress random slideshow. If anyone knows about one, let me know. In the meantime, I’ve been cheating – one of my old machines is booted to Windows specifically to use Powerpoint with the random macro added. But I’ll get there with OO Impress, it just might take a little work first. To be honest, it hasn’t been a real priority.

Ramesh Ponnuru of NRO writes: In several recent debates, various conservatives have been accused of betraying their professed commitment to federalism. The accusations have sometimes come from liberals, but more often from libertarians and other conservatives. It’s no use replying to the liberals that they are no respecters of federalism themselves; since federalism is not part of their political creed, violations of it are not betrayals of principle. But many libertarians say they believe in federalism too. So it has been possible for the conservatives in the dock to accuse the libertarians of hypocrisy right back. If the accusers were right in each of these instances, one would have to conclude that a true federalist would oppose each of the following:

All right, let’s see just how big a hypocrite this Christian Libertarian happens to be….

federal tort reform

I don’t know enough about this to have an opinion. Certainly, the current court system is a disaster. But I don’t understand how it could be hypocritical to reform the federal courts. Those are the courts with which I’m primarily concerned.

federal legislation to restrict state taxes on the Internet

I’m for anything that restricts taxes of any kind. Also, a detailed perusal of Federal and state tax regulations shows that many states have signed over their income taxing authority to the Federal government, as well as a number of other taxes. This is why the amount of your state income tax is derived from your Federal income tax. It is also why you probably do not owe state income tax, if you are not liable for the Federal tax. I think Ramesh needs to do more homework on this one before listing it here.

a federal constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage

For it. But the Supreme Court has already federalized the question. I don’t understand how, once the issue has been made federal by the Left, the Right is supposed to throw its hands up and surrender. Rolling it back to the states is preferable, to be sure.

federal laws against medical marijuana

against it

federal legislation to combat rape in state prisons

No opinion.

federal bans on partial-birth abortion and cloning

If there is a federal ban on murder, then it seems easy enough to justify the abortion ban by simple definition. I’d rather leave cloning up to the states.

Roe v. Wade

against it

a federal ban on some kinds of state broadband regulation

against it

a federal ban on state laws criminalizing sodomy

against it

Interesting, to see how the Libyan colonel has been quick to ditch his WMDs subsequent to Hussein’s capture, in a manner that ensures he’ll find favor with the West. You’d think this would have some impact on a certain former student of dentistry in Syria, although I can’t imagine it will make any difference at all to the mullahs in Iran. They are already tottering, and giving way on this sort of thing would almost certainly finish them off as the only thing they have going for them is that their people are still afraid.

People ruled by dictators are like sharks. Once they scent weakness, it isn’t long before someone is strung up by their feet. Sic semper tyrannis.

What I don’t understand is this dreadful urge to rule over other people. It seems that if you study the life of almost any dictator, you learn that it is only a matter of time before they begin retreating into seclusion, driven their by their fear of those to whom they know they are doing wrong. Castro appears to be an exception to this, but any man who wants to give speeches lasting nine hours is clearly already off his gourd.

I’ve been going on and on about McNabb being overrated ever since the initial ESPN blow-up. I have not changed my mind in the least, nor will I, even if the Eagles win the Super Bowl. Want to go there? Fine, now use that argument on behalf of Trent Dilfer. In light of these ludicrous surveys, I’d like to point out a salient fact. THERE ARE AT LEAST 23 OTHER PLAYERS INVOLVED IN THE RESULTS OF AN NFL GAME!

ESPN asks: Who should be the NFC Pro Bowl QB?

62.6% – Donovan McNabb

15.5% – Matt Hasselbeck

12.4% – Brett Favre

09.6% – Daunte Culpepper

Unbelievable. Obviously, the secret to being considered an NFL great is to a) play in the NFC East; b) play for a top playoff team; c) have a great defense. This isn’t a race deal – the massively underrated Culpepper is black and Favre, a white media favorite, has been overrated for the last two years. At least Steve McNair is finally getting his due – although Manning will rightly win this year’s MVP.

Culpepper: 257/397 64.7% 3022 yds 7.6 avg 21 TD 9 INT

D. McNabb 235/419 56.1% 2736 yds 6.5 avg 12 TD 9 INT

Daunte also has twice as many rushing TDs (4) as McNabb (2), and racked up his superior statistics while playing in two fewer games. So what could possibly account for the Eagles being three games up on the Vikings other than the greatness of McNabb? Perhaps the fact that the Eagles are sixth in scoring defense and give up 4.7 fewer points per game than the 24th-ranked Vikes might have a little something to do with it.

You know that Monday’s column is written on The Return of the King, right? Anyhow, it’s done and turned in.