The Great Depression spawned many colorful additions to the canon of American slang: “Okie” has a harmless, rustic quality, “hobo” a loose-at-the-heels shabbiness, and “bindlestiff,” a merging of the German words for ‘bundle’ and ‘stick,’ a wonderful air of rootlessness about it. The Bindlestiff Family Cirkus and Autonomadic Bookmobile Roadshow (pictured left) have traveled like […]
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Posted inNews
Logan’s Run
Call it a recasting of “The Fall” and the Christ myth, call it social commentary, call it post-apocalyptic retread, but most of all, call it fun. Logan’s Run is one of those films that will earn you blank stare of disbelief if you admit to never having seen it. Michael York stars as our square-jawed […]
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Big Stakes
N.C. House, District 63Though she is the incumbent, Rep. Jennifer Weiss, a Democrat from Cary, is actually staging her first electoral bid at the polls next week. Appointed to this House seat after the death of Rep. Jane Mosley late in 1999, Weiss has plunged into campaigning just as she dove into legislative issues once […]
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Progressive Voices
N.C. Senate, District 16Orange and Chatham voters will elect two state senators in a race that has added some new wrinkles to this area’s political fabric. Here, as with so many other local races, Democratic incumbents have snagged Independent endorsements based on their track records, not merely their rhetoric. Of course, sometimes the record and […]
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On reality
“The real political spectrum in this country is not left to right; it’s top to bottom.” JIM HIGHTTOWER, SPEAKING AT THE COMMON SENSE FOUNDATION’S DINNER IN RALEIGH
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Movie Spotlight: Stagecoach
It’s no shocker that we recommend you see Stagecoach this weekend. John Ford’s 1939 western is one of the American Film Institute’s 100 greatest films of all time; it won several Academy Awards and is generally credited with creating the western genre as we know it. Oh, and the film also catapulted a little known […]
Posted inLetters to the Editor
Point and click
Hal Crowther’s “Alone on the Cliff” [Oct. 18] is yet another attempt at high-brow censorship from the intellectual elite. I’m tired of bow-tied professors and talking heads predicting the “end of civilization” because of the success of a few television shows like Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? and Survivor. I assume Crowther has a […]
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Reliable Veterans
N.C. Senate, District 13Voters in state Senate District 13–which covers Durham, Granville and parts of Wake and Person counties–have a chance to return two lawmakers who will work for more equitable state spending policies. Democratic incumbents Wib Gulley and Jeanne Lucas both support closing billion-dollar tax loopholes for corporations and creating a more progressive tax […]
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On progressives
“Getting our side rolling is like loading frogs in a wheelbarrow.” Jim Hightower, speaking at the Common Sense Foundation’s dinner in Raleigh
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On stage
Ever wonder how Sesame Street‘s giant, shambly dog, Barkley, got around? Inside him was an acrobat named Fred Garbo, a fellow who has gone on to found a theater company that takes seriously the term “light on your feet.” The Fred Garbo Inflatable Theater Company (pictured) features Garbo and his lovely partner, the Brazilian-born ballerina […]
