Hermain Cain sings

A couple of observations about the sexual harassment allegations against Cain.

1. If this is the result of a leak by one of Cain's rivals the most likely candidate is another GOP'er. Getting it out now is of zero use to Obama, who can't even be sure that Cain will be his opponent in the general election.
2. The hope of Cain's enemies has to have been that his notoriously disorganized campaign would spin apart when the first scandal hit but
3. If Cain can emerge from this still standing he'll have gained tremendously. In a perverse way these allegations could end up helping Cain at the national level because they keep him in the spotlight. If he survives it will be by strength of character rather than political spin simply because his organization is so rudimentary and unpolished that spin is beyond them.
4. Don't forget that far worse allegations came out about Clinton in 1992 and he still survived to take the Democratic nomination.

Finally, check out the video of Cain singing at the National Press Club. In a lifetime of watching politics this has got to be one of the most unusual things I've ever seen. But what really struck me was two things: First, the CSPAN cameraman doing a perfect slow zoom out while Cain sings. And the second being the fact that when he was done the audience (largely journalists) stoop up and cheered.

http://reason.com/blog/2011/10/31/herman-cain-sings-amazing-grac

Dead Island Trailer

Well, the Dead Island trailer is tearing up the internet, and rightfully so. It's a genuine work of art and what it accomplishes in only three minutes is nothing short of miraculous. I have to admit that by the time I got to the end of the trailer I had the wind taken out of me.

Now, based solely on that trailer, a game which has by all appearances been in development Hell for four years has been given new life. What's ironic is that as a general rule trailers have very little to do with the actual game or movie they're advertising. Observers who think that this may herald some new found maturity in gaming are probably wrong. The game developer is Techland in Poland, the studio which produced the trailer is Axis Animation in Scotland. Pity the poor Poles who now have to come up with a game worthy of the hype and their own trailer. There's a more than even chance that the game itself will suck and the only thing people will remember about it in five years is that trailer.

That makes the recent rumors of Hollywood interest even more ironic. If some producer in California is really interested in an adaptation they should bypass Techland and find out who created the trailer at Axis--in other words, don't talk to the game guys, talk to the people that make movies instead. Consider that Axis also did the wonderful opening animation for Mass Effect 2 and that nothing in the rest game was as eerily beautiful as the 60 seconds which opened it.