The Wire

This post has been a long time coming. It was recently encouraged by my buddy Josh. Josh, consider this your shout-out. You're now as famous as I am.

The way I like to talk about The Wire is that it's more than just the best show ever made, because I feel like it is the obligatory response for everyone. It ranks #85 on Stuff White People Like, as if everyone is "required to like it". Whenever anyone talks about it, all that's said is that it's "the best show ever". That's such a cop out. Let's talk about why.

People talk about literature, art, and music as "classic", "original" and "a masterpiece" but we don't typically see that for television. Some movies are starting to be given the same credentials, but television shows don't seem to be given the same praise. I believe The Wire is truly broadcast literature, art, and a social commentary on the state of failing American cities like Baltimore. It's an original story told in a masterful way that is engaging and captivating through the entire series.

I think The Wire speaks to the evolution of TV as a recognized medium for truly stimulating entertainment. It's not just the boob-tube anymore, where you can sit and lose brain cells while watching Jersey Shore. We're now creating shows that capture your attention and are thought-provoking. Shows like Lost, Mad Men, The Sopranos, etc. that are more than just the 48-60 in each episode. Of course, if you sit around and watch True Life, you might not be making any serious mental progress.

Most TV shows or movies are created based off something else - usually a book or "based on a true story." The Wire isn't that at all. While it draws some of it's characters based on real-people (mainly the criminals), it's an original story, which makes it that much more interesting in my mind. I get tired of movies where critics say "the book was better" - although it is usually true - and enjoy the fact that The Wire has no book component. It is it's own story. Like I said, we're seeing that developing more and more with TV, and I think it's great. You can't say the same for movies, as we're seeing Shrek 17, a re-boot of Spiderman (which didn't that JUST come out??) and real original movies like Piranha 3D.

What makes The Wire so excellent is it's originality in storytelling. Everything is projected as "real". There is no extra TV shenanigans to make the story feel like it was made for TV - no music, no necessary romances (because that usually ruins shows anyway), no hero that always wins (i.e. Jack Bauer), they don't dumb down the language to a 4th grade reading level, etc. The Wire is REAL. You don't see that in most shows. They talk like real people talk in Baltimore. Because it's HBO, there is no censoring of the content. They portray the police and politicians as corrupt and inept as the criminals - which is very believable to happen within your own local government. It's a show you have to actually watch. You can't have it on in the background. You have to put down the laptop and cell phone and focus for 60 straight minutes. In the 2010 ADHD tech world, that's incredibly difficult for anyone to do.

The show's true focus is on Baltimore, which used to be a thriving city for the working-class, has now become a broken, rundown city, full of empty rowhouses. There's not as much money as there used to be, so people turn to drugs, which leads to violence. In 2009 alone there were over 230 murders in the city. The reality is that most of these people are African-Americans who have fallen through the cracks. The city is falling apart, and The Wire tells the story about how it's citizens, weather they be drug dealers, police officers, politicians, young children, the working-class, etc. must deal with the consequences. The show doesn't portray Baltimore in a good light, because there isn't much good light to shine on (outside of Inner Harbor of course). You could say that about other cities in this country as well - Detroit comes to mind following the fall of the major motor corporations - who seem to be making somewhat of a comeback.

The Wire depicts an all-too-brutal view of how crime operates. How the police are held back by the judicial system and the law to clean the streets. Even if they were close to conviction, the crime crews scare any witnesses by threatening murder. It's an unwritten rule on the street that I personally don't know but have heard of - nobody snitches, because you'll be beaten up, or worse. It's seen from the very first episode, where a man stands up against the crime organization in court, and soon after is found dead. Most crime shows don't go through all of the legal procedures and show how many things can go wrong, which leads to the continuing crime.

The also can be said for within the police scheme. Do you really know how your local Homicide division solves crimes? Do you know what goes on in your local city hall? That's what The Wire depicts - things we've never really witnessed but is essential to our safety and survival in cities.

Even the portrayal of the newspaper - how they are failing and have to cut costs. An institution like a newspaper that represents the basis of American independence is losing money and falling apart. Our independence is dying.

In Season Four, the focus is the educational system, and how inner-city schools struggle to teach the children because of the violence and disruption even in grade schools. These kids have very little parental supervision and support, and are almost forced to hustle for any money. Their childhood innocence is stripped right away. The Wire makes you sympathize with the drug dealers, who literally don't know any other way to succeed unless they are out on the corner - and have accepted that they will die young while on the corner. It shows how the American political system has failed these people. These people don't vote, because it doesn't matter to them. They don't pay taxes, won't be getting any Social Security, etc.

Since 9/11, the government's focus has been on the war on terror, not the war on drugs, which is allowing the drug trade to grow and not have the same federal watch dogs as it used to. It now falls on the local police, who used to just deal with typical murders. The war on drugs is the same as the war on terror, but it's happening on our home turf. It's unspoken amongst politicians and the upper-class, but it's real and it's out there. People in Baltimore are terrorized to stand up in court because of the threat of death. How is that very different than what's going on in the Middle East? We're losing both wars, and not committing enough to work on it.

Then there are the characters that The Wire has created that all feel like protagonists fighting against each other. The cop who would do anything to see them win - McNulty - and how he doesn't do things by the book. The number-two drug dealer - Stringer - who tries to turn drug dealing into a true business coalition so everyone can deal peacefully. The modern day Robin Hood - Omar - who steals from the rich and gives to the poor. The Union president - Sobotka - who turns to drug trade to see his Union stay afloat. The homeless addict trying to get by and be clean. The kids trying to grow up in school, sling, and prove their street cred to their elders. None of these people feel like a true "bad guy". Rather, they are all trying to succeed within the limitations with which they are given, and don't know any other way. You root for all of them, but know that they all can't succeed because of the system within which they operate. They all are full of hope to succeed, but all fail.

The plight of The Wire is that it never really received the recognition it deserved. Never won an Emmy or any real distinguished award. It was never given the chance, maybe because it felt too dreary and was depressing at some points. I'm not sure. It doesn't need the awards to prove it's excellence. It's slowly caught on and more and more people are watching it - even though it began over 8 years ago now. It's losing it's cool as "the best show that no one's seen or heard of" and transitioning to "the best show ever made". I always am in awe of how original and real the story feels. I remember the first time I saw it in 2005 and thought that this was groundbreaking and exciting on an entirely different level than anything I had seen. When a friend asks me for a show to watch, my first response is The Wire, and I'm jealous of the experience they have for watching it the first time. The story is still as good later on, but the excitement is lost.

The show will be the best ever for a while, and look forward towards more shows that tell an original story like The Wire once did.

I've been trying to think of a quote from the show to end this post with, and there are so many to choose from, so I'm going to go with a cop-out quote that summarizes the entire show: In this, all the pieces matter - Lester Freamon.

Rethinking the Educational System

When you're unemployed and in summer mode, you have a lot of time to think. This post counts as having too much time on my hands.

I'm not a political junkie. I know that George W. Bush tried to enact a "No Child Left Behind" educational policy, which from my understanding was generally a failure. It sounds like the goal was to meet certain objectives that made the results more important than the process (i.e. only thing that matters is the scores - doesn't matter how you get there)

I think it's time we re-evaluate how America does education. It's still far and away the best system in the world, which is why so many international students come to learn. However, I believe that it is somewhat failing in truly "preparing" students for the "real world."

Think about how many things you learned in high school that, unless it pertains to your specific current career, you probably won't remember. Chemistry sticks out in my head. When have I used Algebra? Trig? Calculus? The history of the Aztec/Mayan empires? Couldn't tell you. I can talk about things that I found interesting and was engaged in - a few classes on government, my English classes, and I remember Latin. I hated Latin, but it was great to actually understand it and own it.

My point is - there's so many classes that we all take that we don't remember. It's like the concept of the show Are You Smarter Than A 5th Grader? Because you may know more about how the world works, you may not know if a rhombus has four equal sides or if that's a parallelogram.

I know that the idea is to give youth a "general basis in all disciplines" and then hopefully they choose to study more of their interests in college and beyond. So nearly 70% of my educational time was on material irrelevant to what I wanted to do? I don't know what my future holds for me, but I am absolutely positive that it won't have anything to do with me in a Chemistry lab coming up with the next vaccine.

What I think could be done - and this is somewhat of a rip off of season 4 of The Wire - is to give students truly an education on how our society works. Call it a "life" class. Teach the students about things that are actually important to them fitting in and succeeding - how to work. What's involved in taxes? What's a 401k? How to build credit? How do mortgages function? How do you pay your bills? What is a good interest rate for a bank? The stock market. Health insurance? Everyone should know the details of Obama's health care bill - because it relates directly to them. Weather they like it or not doesn't matter - but they should be aware of it. Stuff that we can use because this is how society has been set up.

In those American Revolution classes you'd always learn about the Boston Tea Party and "No Taxation without Representation" stuff. What does that really mean for us now over 200 years later? How do I not only pay my taxes, but where do they go? I think that would be more helpful and beneficial than knowing the periodic table (I'm really ripping into Chemistry. You can see that it was my least favorite subject).

If you were to argue that by taking away any class to incorporate this "Life" class, then let's just add it onto the schedule - make the day longer or do something. In The Wire they took most of the "inner-city" troubled youth who seemed destined to be working the Corner and have an average life expectancy of 22. They didn't teach this kids how 2+2=4. Instead, they tried to teach them just general life behavior - how to order food at a restaurant, teamwork exercises. There was no real grades, because that wasn't the point. It was about teaching these kids how to live in the world and hopefully provide other options for them besides selling dope on the streets. I know that The Wire isn't real, but it's a feasible concept. The problem with it was that we are acknowledging these kids' likely outcome and stereotypically treating them different - as if they don't matter. I'm not sure that's the right answer, but something like what they did in the show would be more helpful than your average math class.

Which brings me to another point - the grading of education is weak. I don't know how to fix it. But it's garbage that I can take the same class as you - with different teachers - and our experience and our grades can reflect two totally different classes. Student X worked extremely hard to get a C, while Student Y didn't work so hard and cruised to an easy A. X knows much more than Y because X worked harder because the way it was taught was more difficult, but at the end of the day, when you judge purely on report cards, student Y did "better."

Think about those classes in college or high school that everyone took. The only difference was teachers. I can think of one class in college where all my teacher had us do was write press releases every other week. My friend was in the same class but different teacher, and she was stressing out over having to create a huge event for the school - for class! Two totally different learning experiences, two totally different work ethics, two totally different outcomes.

Then when you are making the transition from high school to college, or from college to grad school etc, your GPA is one of the key items of note. Using our friends X and Y from a few paragraphs ago, X may know much more than Y did, but Y had the easier teachers, and therefore was chosen before X. I know there's many other variables (pun intended) than just grades - but at the end of the day, it all comes down to GPA. And that can make the difference in being accepted or rejected from Z.

Another random annoyance - how we give tests. My grade on a test doesn't reflect what I know about a certain subject. The example that comes to my head is when a teacher asks a question on a test and you don't have the answer - but you could correctly answer questions that the teacher didn't ask. That shouldn't mean you fail the test - it's not a real accurate way of measuring how much you know. So much of test are just straight memorization. Does that prove I know a lot about European political parties or that I can remember how Parliament works "for the test" and then forget about it 20 minutes later. That's the flaw, that we learn it not to better ourselves, but to "pass the test" and then move on.

Again, I don't know the way to fix that, because we need to measure how well you are doing in class, but need it to be more regulated so that it is truly fair.

It's interesting because coming out of college I feel prepared to have a job - but I'm not sure about how to handle everything else that comes with being a "working" man. The stuff I mentioned above - how does it all work? Why don't I know that? Why wasn't that taught to me as part of my "education"? I know I'm not alone with that thought.

***ADDENDUM AUGUST 4, 2010***

Another thought came to mind - college is the exact opposite of the rest of the world. In high school, class goes from 7ish till 3ish. College is whenever you set it, and typically for around 16 hours a week. Then when you have a "real job" it's somewhere between 9-6 five days a week. Why give all that freedom in college? I know the stock answer - "to allow you to explore your passions and interests." I'm sure some people follow through. I'm sure other people didn't and instead slept, partied, slept some more, etc. I guess that is more of a "showing your maturity" issue, but it's kind of silly when you think about it.

With that said, I'm excited about going back in a few weeks. Oh wait.

Inception

I waited a few days to write this so I could let the movie sink in. If you haven't seen it yet, what are you doing? It's the movie of the summer. I don't claim to be a movie expert, and don't usually see the "award-winning" movies, but this was probably the best movie I've seen in a real long time, and wouldn't be surprised if it is a strong candidate for movie of the year.

SPOILER ALERT SPOILERS I'M CORRUPTING YOUR BRAIN AND RUINING THE STORY DON'T READ THIS.

I got in this debate with my buddy after we saw it - was the whole thing a dream? It's entirely feasible that the entire movie was just Cobb's imagination, that he had been lost in limbo the entire movie, and was just continuing to go down the rabbit hole.

ARGUMENTS FOR: The end scene doesn't make sense - if he came out of limbo he wouldn't see his kids in the same scenario as he's had them left in his memory. They should be older, but if they're not, that EXACT scenario wouldn't happen unless it was a dream. That's why his totem didn't show any signs of stopping. But it's also that Christopher Nolan was messing with us.

Also when Cobb comes out of limbo and back onto the plane, no one seems shocked to see him. As if he was always supposed to come back. How could he have kicked back through that many dreams when he missed his chance 3 or 4 times?

If he was in his own dream the whole time, wouldn't he get what he wants? I.E. seeing his children, getting over his guilt of killing his wife, etc.


ARGUMENTS AGAINST: The totem would stop spinning in the "real" world.

He couldn't re-enter his own dreams twice (based on what we know,) but they never really explained how dreams work and what the "rules" are - or even how it came to be. They mentioned that this used to be a military exercise, but how did they get access to it?

That was my only problem with the movie - they never explained how it all works. How do they get the things they need? Is there a Matrix-like ability for them to summon whatever the desire (guns, cars, clothes, etc) ? We're just supposed to accept this world where this technology exists. Let's roll with it.

I'm out of ideas for and against, but just wanted to voice my opinion.

Sweet dreams.

The Lebroncalypse Is Over

I meant to write this a few days ago, but I went on a weekend vacation.

So the LeBronocalpyse happened. It was strange. It was exciting. It was something I'm not sure we'll EVER see again. The hysteria, the suspense, the drama, the hype, it was non-stop. The 3-hour SportsCenter was all LeBron LeBron LeBron.

It was a mess.

First of all, I don't hate LeBron. I think he's a little too proud of himself for doing nothing, but that's our fault. If I was on Sports Illustrated when I was 17, I would refer to myself as a King too.

In the end (or maybe it was all along) LeBron "will be taking his talents" to Miami and join Wade and Bosh. Cleveland is up in arms. Their hometown (and only) hero left them. However, I don't think they should be mad at LeBron. He gave 7 great years, and couldn't close mainly because he wasn't given the pieces needed to win. He can't do it himself.

So he left. Cleveland should be proud that someone from that city can be successful, instead of showing the lack of class to burn his jersey in the streets and threaten him with death threats. I know he meant the world to that city, but they should be more appreciative towards what he did and be happy that he's going to try to win.

I think the three guys had it in their minds that they would try to play together if they could. The haters all say that LeBron can't live up to the legends because he's not doing it on his own; he's joining forces with Wade & Bosh. People say - Bird and Magic would never play together. What people forget is that players used to HATE each other. Jordan loved beating his players to an absolute pulp. In today's league, everybody is buddy-buddy, and hang out enough at games/events etc that they are actually friends. The three hung out at Team USA Redeem Team and enjoyed playing with each other. They weren't really winning in their respective franchises (winning, but not championships besides Wade). Why keep the cycle of misery going? If it's fiscally possible, why not?

The other thing is Jordan DID do it with help - Scottie Pippen wasn't appreciated enough, but he was an excellent player. Rodman was Rodman. Garnett couldn't do it until he teamed up with Pierce and Allen. Nobody is hating on Garnett. Kobe - as great as a player as he is, really needed Gasol and Fish to make it work. No one player wins it by them self.

BUT the way LeBron handled everything was incomprehensible. Why did we have to have a one-hour special? I know I wrote earlier it's "because I can" but I can't believe ESPN green-lit that idea. Remember, ESPN made no money off that - all the advertising dollars went to the Boys & Girls Club. It was all so staged - and LeBron was so poorly prepared - that the entire event was comical. I was laughing the entire time.

LeBron's a 25 year old kid. He's empowered his friends around him to help make decisions that they aren't really in the best position to make when it comes to business decisions like how to handle making the biggest decision in the NBA in the past 25 years.

Whatever, it's all done now. It's going to be a fun few years for Miami, and I think it'll be good for the league to have this superpower - and to see if it works out. Somehow, I think it will. I'm not sold that they will win multiple championships, but I would bet at least one - pending the parts around them. Kevin Durant is still going to be better than all three of these players. You heard it here first.

Go Sixers......

LeBronMania

Is LeBron James a Free Agent?????

That question was clearly sarcastic. The abnormal amount of hype that has stemmed from his current free agency has been building for almost two years now. Two years before he was free, media couldn't stop asking "LeBron, where do you think you will be in two years? Can you predict the future and tell us now?"

There's a new rumor every 16 seconds. The only thing I'm still waiting to hear is that LeBron going to play for the Dallas Cowboys. It's seriously all speculation.

We're coming down the the finale of this hysteria (I think) with LeBron having a one-hour special on ESPN where he will announce his decision. What in the HELL is he going to talk about for one-hour? Here let's count how long this SHOULD take:

(me imitating LBJ) - "After some long and thoughtful talks with my family, friends, and God, I have decided to (fill in the variable - stay in Cleveland, go to the Bulls, go to Miami, go back to outer space, quit, etc)"

I counted out how long that took - I'm estimating 10 seconds. Maybe 20. So that's 20 seconds of a 44 minute program, and the other 16 going towards commercials. How do they fill the other 43 2/3 minutes of television programming?

It's going to be so obnoxious that everyone should HATE LeBron. Especially if it turns into a "this is how great I've been since High School when I was featured on SI and my games were shown nationwide on ESPN, and since I've won 2 MVPs, a gold medal, and ZERO NBA Championships" type deal. 44 minutes of that and I think I'll break my television set.

This really speaks to how big WE have made LeBron. It's our fault. I remember talking about him when I was 14. Now I'm 22, and still talking about him. And I'll probably watch all 60 minutes of that ridiculous program. And then I'll probably write a post about it. And then we'll talk about it until well into his first season with team X.

I think LeBron is a great player. I was lucky enough to see him live (Game 3 of the 2010 Eastern Semis), and he is a physical specimen that I don't think we've seen ever. He scored more points in the first quarter than the entire Celtics team. He may go down as one of the greatest of all time. Not the greatest, because I really don't believe we'll ever see another Michael Jordan. Partly because he revolutionized something that can never really be changed again - the marketing of sports athletes. Jordan was the first athlete to be EVERYWHERE. Now it's no big deal. You see more of Peyton Manning in the off-season than any other NFL player. It's how the marketing of sports works, and I believe Jordan's the prime reason that it happened.

LeBron's going to go play somewhere, and this chapter of LeBronMania will end, only to follow with "What Ifs" and "Will He Regret Not Choosing X". Like it or not, LeBron isn't going anywhere, until we have a new LeBron to hype - which I'm hoping is Kevin Durant, who I really think should be better than LeBron in a few years. Long Live the Durantula!