DFW

News of his death brought a dark cloud to an otherwise happy weekend. David Foster Wallace's piece on Roger Federer made me get a grounds pass for my first US Open in 2006.

After a couple aborted attempts, and a rendering of the book into three physical parts, I read The Infinite Jest in 2004 while studying public finance at Wagner. Both dealt with our desires and how to measure and realize them. I used to be a bit embarrassed to claim the Infinite Jest as one of my favorite books, as being a bit macho, but after reading the Memories at McSweeney's, there's no need to apologize for loving the work of a modest man who left a giant footprint.

Update (9/18): Jason Kottke provides a great collection of DFW links.

Reading Off The Syllabus

Each semester I attempt to maintain some personal reading with my course reading. I've had mixed luck in the past, but one home run was reading the Infinite Jest while in my Public Finance class. Both ultimately came down to the understanding the pursuit of happiness, whether its public goods & market failure or addiction & the junior tennis circuit.

I'm taking a class in Public Finance in Developing Countries now, and had the fortune of landing Confessions of an Economic Hitman by John Perkins from my book swap just before classes began. Confessions of an EHM is an anecdotal autobiography (with a several endnotes) on how he, as an forecasting economist for MAIN (think Bechtel, Carlyle & Halliburton) inflated estimates to convince developing countries and the World Bank to enter in huge debt agreements. A twist of how the pitch was always based on how great the endeavor would be for the county, and keeping on the low down how much more insured is the profit of his firm. While his style is over the top and didactic, its evident he really is trying to clear his conscious.

Contrast this with public finance theory, where between the lines there are implications of the winners and losers, but the text reads in a scientific neutral. The last two things to come to mind are:

1) how developing countries, whom have relied heavily on taxes on international trade, have been advised to reduce rates in order to spur growth and reap higher revenues. But now research shows that revenues have not increased for developing nations. They fail to mention how corporations are enjoying paying less in tax;

2) Venezuala keeps popping up in the news. Mostly Victor Chavez, and how he's painted as a socialist dictor threatening their stability. Pat Robertson called for his assassination. He survived a coup in December 2002. But what we don't get a sense of is a) how popular and charismatic he is, and b) how oil wealth was bypassing the country before his rise to power, and how contracts we rewritten to put more mineral wealth into the national treasury. Why is the news down on Chavez? Because he has not let Big Oil do as they please . The Documentary The Revolution Will Not Be Televised is a great perspective on how distorted our view of Venezuala is (and can I get a shout for my man Gil Scott Heron and my favorite cut!?!).

I'm moving on to Dominique LaPorte's History of Shit A look at human waste disposal from a Marxist perspective. I'll keep you posted on how it all comes out.

The future is now

917Press has admittedly become blogged down in political anxiety, so I thought it'd be good to report on the powers of good.

Earlier today I attended the NYU Presidential Service Awards, where SNEAC, student network exploring arts and culture were accepting an award for programing after their first year in existence. SNEAC was founded by friends Whitney, Sarah, Jude, David and Carol. Among other fun stuff, they hosted a screening of Chisholm '72, and send out a bi-weekly "Sneac recommends" listing.

Of interesting note, relative to the issue's treatment in mainstream news, students doing work with LGBT issues were strongly represented, perhaps this trend will carry out it and illuminate the troglodites that run public opinion now.

Lastly, Whitney brought home the Russian Futurists' "Our Thickness." I found the Russian Futurists (aka Matthew Adam Hart) on a couple blogs (see 4/6/05), as I did with Andrew Bird. The music is catchy, the lyrics subversively dark, good stuff all around.

The long ride home

Whitney and I were coming home from the Puck Building, where the Wagner school has its home. As usual we were waiting for the downtown R train at spring street which has one of our favorite MTA public art pieces. Along the platform, there are several silhouettes of New Yorkers walking about, done in stainless steal, black granite and some red flagstone. The silhouettes are done with such remarkable precision that Whitney remarked how one can easily imagine what the face and clothing could or should be. So tonight, we just missed the train and decided to walk down the other end of the platform to look at the other figures. As we returned to our usual place on the platform, a W train stalled.

Another passenger was checking out the figures too, and commented to us how one can easily imagine what the face and clothing could or should be! She said she lived down the street from the artist. We then learned that the project took about a year. The artist took thousands of pictures of people, chose a large sample, which had to be vetted by the MTA for appropriateness and representative diversity. Then she cut the figures and their accoutrements with water cuts, allowing for the incredibly detailed assembly between the three elements, which are then embedded into the tiles of the station. The MTA has a site of all its public artworks, but this piece doesn’t have its site yet.

The stalled train ended up forcing a reroute of trains around the station, so we walked to Spring, mistakenly took an uptown train to West 4th, and finally got on an A train to our beloved Brooklyn. The trip was long, but totally worth it to learn more about this artwork we enjoy so much.