* except, of course, for Culp from James Robinson's Starman, who proudly declared himself to be "a villian, black as night

That being said, even though I don’t necessarily agree with T, I could see why he might be right. To simplify the argument extremely, the difference to me is that liberals see the media as contributing to culture and therefore having a real effect, where as conservatives believe in personal responsibility and therefore don’t really believe that culture can have real effect. Therefore to a conservative liberal biased media is merely bemusing, while to a liberal conservative media has a destructive quality.

Even though you disagree with me, I 100% agree with this conclusion. Of course there are exceptions on both sides, but in general I think your overall point stands.

That's why I think its much harder for a conservative to be as preachy and over the top with expressing his beliefs in entertainment than for a liberal writer. When a liberal writer does it, more conservative readers will either be bemused with "Oh brother, another hippie rant" or they'll just bitch about the preachiness and threaten to boycott the book. When a conservative writer does overtly unapologetic conservative stuff, he's advocating evil and the rollback of civil liberties and human rights. It's why Denny O'Neil's blatantly biased stuff is viewed as preachy but ultimately praiseworthy because it's well-intentioned and principled, while Ditko's biased stuff is viewed as the rantings of a deranged crackpot, even though ultimately both are just two equally personal manifestos taking opposing sides to the same argument.

So my point to the earlier commenter is just because Willingham is not as in-your-face with his views as Winick doesn't mean he's not truly conservative. He simply can't afford to be as in your face with his views as Winick because his views are too unpopular.

Things will look liberal biased to you because you are conservative and conservative biased to me because I am liberal. Neither you nor me nor anyone can look at bias objectively, as we ourselves are biased.

Well, I had been a hardcore liberal for much longer than I've been a conservative. I'm not a lifelong conservative. So I actually have seen the media from both sides, as a liberal and a conservative. I found myself dealing with contrary political views in my entertainment MUCH less as a liberal than as I now do as a conservative. The one exception is the abortion issue. Even the more liberal entertainment sources seem afraid to show a sympathetic female character getting an abortion, or at least being relatively unaffected by one. I believe Greg Burgas made this point a few weeks ago too.

To T, we could argue about who is the more sensitive, what with conservatives stocking up with enough arms to ride out the apocalypse now Obama's been elected, but its fairly pointless either way. Things will look liberal biased to you because you are conservative and conservative biased to me because I am liberal. Neither you nor me nor anyone can look at bias objectively, as we ourselves are biased. The argument is useless. A more important question for you to ask yourself, T, would be why so many more people in the media are liberal than conservative.

That being said, even though I don't necessarily agree with T, I could see why he might be right. To simplify the argument extremely, the difference to me is that liberals see the media as contributing to culture and therefore having a real effect, where as conservatives believe in personal responsibility and therefore don't really believe that culture can have real effect. Therefore to a conservative liberal biased media is merely bemusing, while to a liberal conservative media has a destructive quality.

I gather there was some sort of bus boycott about 5 decades ago ...

I only THOUGHT I couldn't stand Styx till I moved to this hideous hellhole (Montgomery, AL), whose only claim to fame in the last 50-odd years (ever since Hank Williams' death ... he's buried about 2 miles from where I'm sitting here typing, as it happens ... & Nat King Cole's departure, I guess) is producing Tommy Shaw. Like that's something to be proud of. Bleahnhhh.

(anyone who’s admitted, IIRC, to listening to Styx makes himself an utter laughingstock by calling just about ANY band, Pixies or not, “shitty”),

Oh, c'mon. Styx is awesome. (But you have heard of/enjoy Pulp, so I'll let that one slide.)

Toodles!

1. Marillion
2. ABBA
3. Led Zeppelin
4. Prince
5. James

Mock away!

Oh, and Kirby was a hack! I mean, seriously - everyone's square! What's up with that?

It DOES appear to be true that the otherwise estimable Greg has amazingly abysmal taste in music (anyone who's admitted, IIRC, to listening to Styx makes himself an utter laughingstock by calling just about ANY band, Pixies or not, "shitty"), but what the hell ... he knows his comics, & that's why he's here. (He may also be on a blog somewhere called something like "Music Should be Unlistenable Dreck," but just to be on the safe side I'm not going to go Googling.)

I mean, my gf has ABYSMAL taste in TV -- she's pretty much a junkie for *shudder* reality shows -- but that doesn't make her evil or anything. It just means she has abysmal taste in TV.

That was well done. I almost wrote an actual response.

There are so many things, but Brian probably doesn't want that kind of language in the comments.

As for the Pixies, screechy guitars can be very awesome and are extremely representative of "rock and roll", the singing is not at all off-key, actually (listen to Gigantic for inarguable proof), and the lyrics aren't meaningless, they're just incomprehensible to you. It seems like your complaint is really that the music isn't obvious enough for you, and that's the talk of a philistine. No one should be proud of that kind of sentiment.

Also: I hope Hellblazer #250 marks the start of a long relationship between Grampa and Vertigo. His work is really deserving of wider, mainstream recognition.

And, yeah, Cammo is the new artist on the series.

Speaking of artists, Valentine de Landro is supposed to be the regular artist on X-Factor. I'm not sure why he didn't do this issue, but he's solicited to draw the series through the March issue, at least. Maybe the book will finally settle on an artist after so many shake-ups. You should, by all means, go through and make a list of how many artists have worked on the title because it has been ridiculous. I can think of at least four others off the top of my head (Ryan Sook, Dennis Calero, Khoi Pham, Pablo Raimondi), and I'm sure I'm forgetting a few. Has any other book seen that kind of artistic turnover in such a short amount of time? Maybe Supergirl...