For the second year in a row, the masses' enthusiasm for the five films nominated for the Best Picture Academy Award didn't match the critics' enthusiasm. Only The Departed, of the five, eclipsed the $100 million mark, and of the five, only The Departed parted me from $10. I was entertained. It captured the Irish mob culture in Boston that is, thankfully, gone.

I didn't see the other four nominees. I am not alone. The Queen did domestic sales of $53 million, Little Miss Sunshine did $60 million, Babel did $34 million, and Letters from Iwo Jima did $13 million. In other words one film was a blockbuster, two did decent business, and two didn't do so well at the box office. The best movies aren't always the most seen movies, but it would be nice for the broadcasters of the Oscars if the audience watching the show had also watched some of the movies honored.

Whereas I am disgusted by the great unwashed's television choices, I find myself revolting against the elites when it comes to cinema. I can't comment on this year's films that I haven't seen, but I have been burnt so many times in the past by critics that I just can't muster any excitement to see all five Best Picture nominees--a ritual in which I used to partake. Critics seem to be overwhelmingly left-wing, with their politics magically transforming bad movies into good ones. By virtue of seeing so many movies, critics also tend to celebrate not what's best, but what's most unusual, what stands out from the crowd. I guess if I saw three movies a day I might get bored easily too. Occassionally, the masses get it wrong. But critics do too. Why, exactly, did they nominate Cider House Rules, for instance, a few years back? Knock Americans for seeing 2 Fast 2 Furious in droves, but dare ridicule the critics for liking The Hours and suddenly you become a rube.

Alas, as I write, Drudge reports that The Departed has won Best Picture honors. Things may not be as bad as I had thought. The critics and the filmgoers agree.

Even in its day, Firing Line was highbrow TV. Can you imagine anything even remotely like William F. Buckley and Joe Sobran's conversation with Kenneth Minogue on "Is There a Conservative Ideology?" appearing on a television talk show today? Here's part one, part two, part three, part four, part five, and part six of the conversation. Sorry, WFB didn't do a ticker, he let his guests speak without interruption for minutes at a time, and he never utilized the four-way split-screen of talking heads all saying nothing at once. I realize that the Firing Line model could never get O'Reilly-type ratings, or even Olbermann-type ratings for that matter. But with hundreds and hundreds of channels, isn't there room on cable for one thought-provoking, rather than thought-deadening, discussion show a la Firing Line?

I haven't decided if bald Britney Spears is more Pedro shaving his head in Napoleon Dynamite or Naomi Watts' character dressing up like an Amish girl in I Heart Huckabees. In other words, is it more of a drug thing or a revolt against being a sex symbol. I know, I know. Pedro didn't do any drugs in Napoleon Dynamite--at least on screen. But maybe his character, in some deleted scenes, got hold of some dynamite angel dust or some really out-of-this-world qualudes. This, undoubtedly, is what caused Pedro's burning scalp, and, indirectly, the drastic haircut. I have often thought that only hard, hard drugs could make someone think that his head was burning to such an extent that he needed to shave his hair off as an emollient.

Anyhow, I feel violated that I'm even pondering such a question. I killed my television six months ago. My life is better. At the risk of sounding self-righteous, I get grossed out by tabloid coverage in a way that I didn't when I had television. I think it is because television manufactures normal. When you don't watch regularly, and catch something as dehumanizing as the round-the-clock coverage of a celebrity's death, it strikes you as abnormal, unnatural, and base. Their normal isn't mine, at least not anymore.

I didn't find out about Miss Spears' meltdown until yesterday. I haven't watched a single story on it because the television that I own doesn't get any channels. I don't feel deprived. Do you for seeing it? When you say that you don't watch television, people think you're nuts. But when you see television after not watching it, you think that people are nuts.

The Anna Nicole Smith death, unlike the latest Spears meltdown, I did see. I wonder if Britney saw it too, and took it as a reverse "This Is Your Life." I was on the road last week, and just about every channel on the limited number of stations at the Holiday Inn gave saturation coverage to the former Playboy Playmate's death on par with what one would expect if 9/11 happened again. Give the people what they want, I guess. I couldn't escape Anna Nicole until I found a South Park repeat on UPN. What bizarro times we're living in when the most intelligent show on TV is a cartoon?

Television news has become more like supermarket-checkout tabloids and less like the news. It's entertainment news. Occasionally, politics is thrown in there. But even then, it's political gossip, presidential horse-race talk, celebrity supporters of causes, and other pap that appeals to people on a tabloid level and not on an issue or, God forbid, an idea level. It's not that politics is the only topic that the news should cover, but celebrity sightings--unless they are of Elvis--should never make the cut. I can't put my finger on when things went south. Tonya Harding? OJ? Monicagate? But I know that they did.

It's like the "boiling the frog" analogy. CNNFoxNewsMSNBC didn't become National Enquirer Television overnight. They did a story on porn here. They did a piece on a shark attack there. Then, when the viewer momentarily snaps out of the zombie state that television induces, he realizes that missing girls, celebrity divorces, and starlets behaving badly have become the news. By then, it's usually too late. The viewer has been hooked. The frog would have jumped out of the pan had the burner been turned up at once. But since the "temperate warm" gradually made it's way to "scalding hot," the frog stayed in the pan.

Rather than pay for expensive news bureaus in hot spots around the world, the cable networks air unpaid talking heads who give opinions. Rather than air the news and suffer the ratings consequences, they air "news" about what's getting ratings on the other channels. They call it cable news, but it's something else. Walter Cronkite would be turning in his grave if only he were dead.

You can't program the networks. But you can program your own television and deprogram yourself. I hate to preach, but while I'm at the pulpit I suggest that you turn your television off. Not for a few minutes, but for good. If you can't make that radical a commitment, why not, provided that you're so religiously inclined, give it up for Lent (which starts today)? Think of it as an act of protest. Turn the screen towards the wall. When guests come over, tell them that your backward facing set is an art piece. That's the best use for it. Read a book. Take a walk. Listen to music. Go running. Don't watch television, you're only encouraging them. Can I get a witness? An Amen?

There is nothing inherently bad about television. It could be uplifting. It could be interesting. It could be entertaining. But it's none of the above. It appeals to the lowest common denominator, which is pretty low these days. Strangely, as the selection of stations has grown the overall quality has diminished. Competition is not supposed to work that way, is it? When there were three networks, one could watch ABC, or NBC, or CBS. Now there are 303 stations, and all that is on is the E! Channel.

The editing process has begun on my third book. There remains a great deal of work to be done, which explains the light blogging. Bear with me on the blog. As for the book, all I can tell you is that this book will be for me what Blue Steel was for Derek Zoolander. Look for it some time next year from Crown Forum.

"This must be said: There are too many 'great' men in the world--legislators, organizers, do-gooders, leaders of the people, fathers of nations, and so on, and so on. Too many persons place themselves above mankind; they make a career of organizing it, patronizing it, and ruling it."
--Frederic Bastiat, The Law, 1850

"Environmentalism as a metaphysical ideology and as a worldview has absolutely nothing to do with natural sciences or with the climate," Czech President Vaclav Klaus courageously told a Prague daily newspaper. "Sadly, it has nothing to do with social sciences either." I don't use the word "courageously" in a thoughtless manner. In Boston, where the mercury has dipped into the single digits too many days in the past month, columnist Ellen Goodman has likened doubters of man-made global warming to those who deny the Holocaust. In Europe, the political pressure to conform on this scientific issue is even greater. Klaus is a brave man. The environmentalcases fear those who don't fear them. All it takes, after all, is one man to shout, "The Emperor has no clothes!," and the group lie begins to crumble. Klaus, an intellectual and not a yahoo, did this, and did this in such an unapolagetic way--see the final three questions and answers in the exchange for an amusing example of this--as to make others feel comfortable pointing out inconvenient truths.

"Open Thread" Fred says, "Open the thread!" I acquiesce. Say anything about anything. But don't do it anywhere. Do it here.

I was scheduled to give a talk this Monday at Mercy High School in Farmington Hills, Michigan. But I won't be speaking. The school's principal rather abruptly cancelled the invitation.

The student pro-life club invited me to speak on Margaret Sanger, who, apart from founding Planned Parenthood, was a rather outspoken racist, an anti-Catholic bigot, and an enthusiast of concentration camps, eugenics, and forced sterilization. One would think that Sanger, and not someone criticizing Sanger, would be controversial at a Catholic school. Alas, the topsy-turvy world of Catholic education offers many surprises.

Carolyn Witte, the school's principal, lamely rationalizes her decision by noting that the "content" of my speech, of which she has no idea, "could be misunderstood." By such standards, every speech might be banned. Last year the school attempted to block a student-led 9/11 memorial by claiming that the flags the students intended to hang outdoors were a fire-hazard--a characterization the local fire department found laughable. In its efforts to silence speech it dislikes, the school's administration is setting a horrible example for its students.

Mercy is a private high school. It's not a college. It's not tax funded. The standards on free speech, then, differ from, say, Michigan State. Had they not wanted me to speak, they had every right to do so prior to contracting with Young America's Foundation to host me. But once an agreement is reached, disinviting a speaker becomes a breach of contract. I purchased plane tickets. I coaxed a relative to take off work and mind my son in my absence. I prepared a speech that I have never given before. My student hosts, and Young America's Foundation, also put quite a bit of work into organizing the event. But, because liberal administrators wish to shield a liberal icon, all that work and money has gone down the drain.

There is a rather inglorious side to Margaret Sanger that gets pushed into the dark. I was hoping to put some light onto it at Mercy High School. That it's not safe to offer criticism of an abortion-rights icon at a Catholic high school demonstrates why the mythology surrounding Planned Parenthood's founder has persisted for so long.

Twenty-four years ago, Jamal Jafaar Mohammed bombed the U.S. and French embassies in Kuwait. Now he sits in the Iraqi parliament. Remember all that talk of democracy serving as an antidote to terrorism?

Guitar World has released its list of 100 greatest guitar solos. Surprise! The list is actually quite good. Alas, it's not my list, which I provide below, and it's not your list, which you will kindly provide in the comments section.

10. Estranged, Slash...GNR went bad with the ballads, but this is the best of the bunch.
9. Purple Rain, Prince...this one helped The Kid win the battle of the bands against Morris Day and the Time.
8. Johnny B. Good, Chuck Berry...he's the guy who started it all.
7. Freebird, Gary Rossington/Allen Collins...there's a reason people call out for this song.
6. Voodoo Chile, Jimi Hendrix...late-version Hulkster used to enter the ring to this.
5. Sultans of Swing, Mark Knopfler...the man has fast fingers.
4. The End, Paul, George, John...it's pretty easy to guess which solo belongs to which guitarist.
3. Stranglehold, Ted Nugent...appropriately titled, as the song inspires unstable people to commit violent acts.
2. Comfortably Numb, David Gilmour...he used to do this one live, above the wall, with light silhouetting him from behind.
1. Stairway to Heaven, Jimmy Page...about 5:56 of the studio version comes the greatest sound ever recorded, until 46 seconds later.

Due to the inundation of my flynnfiles email account with missives sent by robots, I have decided to shut down the email account linked through the contact button above. The robotmail to humanmail ratio was running about 1,000 to 1. I just couldn't keep up with it. Rather than run the risk of unanswered mail, I decided to shut it down. If you've emailed me in the last month or so, and I haven't responded, don't take it personally. Within the next few days, I'll hopefully have updated contact info posted. Until then, use smoke signals or bongo drums.

Aparets is the winner of the Super Bowl Pool. Congratulations. He correctly picked the Colts, the Under, and, even though he didn't need it, came closest on the tiebreaker pick by selecting a total of 45. Some thoughts on the big game: The best team won, but this wasn't the best Colts team...Sloppy weather makes for sloppy play...The artist currently known as Prince's halftime performance was the off the hizzook. But where was Morris Day doing the bird? Tina and Wendy?...The Bears need a new quarterback. Don't say that Rex Grossman brought them to the Super Bowl. The Bears brought him to the Super Bowl...If your friend asks if you want to share a Snickers bar with him, it's code that he wants to be more than a friend...The AFC continues its recent Super Bowl dominance, winning eight of the last ten...Of course, that string followed an NFC streak of twelve in a row...Has there ever been a postseason with so many muffed point after attempts?...Peyton Manning won a Super Bowl, which means he will appear in even more ads!