Aim Higher
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When I was growing up, I knew there were spitoons in bars because there also were spitoons in Chinese restaurants, a common feature of the table cubicles. They were as ubiquitous as the visits of the mobile tuberculosis clinics. Spitoons are the architecture of consumption.
The United States Senate also has spittoons spread across the Senate Chamber as they are considered a Senate tradition.[11] Similarly, each Justice on the United States Supreme Court has a spittoon next to his or her seat in the courtroom. However, the spittoons function merely as wastebaskets; the last time the spittoon was used for its customary purpose was in the early 20th century.[12]
The spitoon figures in Howard Hawks’s film, Rio Bravo, as both humiliation and redemption.
For the next thirty-three seconds, the camera, in front of Dude, pans and follows him as he makes his way into the bar. The medium shot allows the audience not only to see the saloon’s other patrons and Dude’s tattered clothes in their entirety but also his shaky hands. He clenches and unclenches his hands and moves them from the tips of his pants pockets to his face, twice. The second time comes after a waitress walks by carrying a tray of shot glasses, which Dude stares at longingly. This repetition is illustrative of Hawks’ mastery of visual storytelling; rather than using dialogue to identify Dude as an alcoholic, he shows us his alcoholism. After the waitress passes by, Dude stops in the middle of the saloon and looks around, as hopelessly lost as when he first entered. With the desperate Dude standing in the middle of the bar, looking for a lifeline, Hawks then cuts to the villain: Joe Burdette (Claude Akins).
Unlike Dude, the audience is not privy to Joe’s face when introduced. He is standing at the bar, with his back to the camera. He uncorks a bottle of booze, pours himself a glass, and tosses the cork on the ground. The bartender gives him a look of disgust, signaling this is a bad man. After spending four seconds on Joe, Hawks then cuts back to Dude for two seconds, who, again, rubs his hand on his face, and then back to Joe for two more seconds, who pours himself a drink and notices Dude staring at him. Hawks then cuts to a close-up of Dude’s face, who wipes his mouth with his hand once again. The camera shows the hesitation in his mouth and the longing in his eyes. We return to Joe, who finishes pouring the drink and then holds it up to Dude with a sinister grin on his face. The camera cuts back to the close-up of Dude, who nods, bites his lip and smiles, as if he is disgusted by his newfound luck. However, as will happen again and again throughout the film, just when Dude thinks he has caught a break, his luck runs out. The camera cuts back to Joe, who retracts his offer to give Dude a drink and instead rummages in his pocket for a gold piece, which he takes and tosses into a spittoon to Dude’s immediate left. Hawks then cuts to the spittoon for a brief second, allowing the coin to fall inside with a clash and the sound of a trumpet blast. This sound signals a shift in the scene’s tone and shows that danger is coming. The music grows harsher and louder. The camera returns to Dude, though this time with a medium shot, allowing the viewer to get a full view of Dude looking down at the spittoon and then back up at Joe. In these two seconds, with his arms hanging limp by his sides, Dude looks desperate. Hawks cuts back to Joe, who laughs and leans back against the bar. He is the one with all the power.
filmschoolrejects.com/...
Cinematically it’s about power, not spittle, just as it’s never about buildings but about the value of the property. The carbolic acid in the spitoon is more important than the spitoon itself. It is ephemeral but not epiphenomenal. Just like some measure hotels by their amenities or their location. Eric Trump is one tough sucker for such structures, much like his dad believes he’s a master builder rather than a baiter or a tout for a strip show.
“WHOEVER SAID LESS IS MORE never had more. And they’ve certainly never stayed at the Trump® International Hotel & Tower Panama. . . .”
You can’t make this stuff up. Or can you? As it happens, I have stayed at the Trump® Ocean Club International Hotel & Tower in Panama City, and I can personally attest that whatever one may think of Mies van der Rohe’s celebrated formula, “more” is definitely not the Trump® Ocean Club International Hotel & Tower—regardless of what the ad copy says. It’s a fat, unlovable building that should probably be paying monthly royalties to the Burj Al Arab, the svelter sail-shaped tower in Dubai it attempts to impersonate.
Guests enter their rooms to be greeted by Ivanka Trump herself, appearing in a prerecorded video to extol the many fine features of the project. Ever the soul of tact, Ivanka makes no reference to the problems that plagued the building long after its construction was ostensibly complete. As late as 2013, two years after the official opening, portions of the internal elevator shafts remained unclad, the ganglia of their wires and cables exposed. Nor does Ivanka mention the windows in the lobby, often covered in perma-fog due to some failure of the HVAC engineers. Certainly she says nothing about the fact that only months after its completion, Fitch Ratings downgraded the building’s bond rating from B- to CC based on the lack of demand for its 627 ultraluxurious condominium units.
This, as the promotional materials assured us, was “opulence at its absolute finest.”
[...]
Truth to tell, the great sin of the Trump Organization over the past three decades has not been the consistent perpetration of bad architecture. Many of the companies’ projects are fine, or at least do no harm. The problem is one of attitude. Just as philosopher Harry Frankfurt distinguished bullshitting from lying by pointing out that the former is simply indifferent to the truth, the problem is that all the Trump company’s buildings, good or bad, just don’t care one way or the other.
www.artforum.com/...
Mar 05, 2018 · PANAMA CITY — A workman wielding a crowbar pried off the silver T-R-U-M-P name from the Trump International Hotel and Tower here in Panama City on Monday as the majority owner of the hotel declared victory in his fight to oust the American president's family business as managers of the property.
www.nytimes.com/...
There’s no essence to virtual capital, but it is why we do not have spittoons in bars anymore. As visceral and vernacular as spitting in the face of power might be, civil society has consequences. It would be so Trumpian for Eric to sue the bar or the server because the Secret Service wasn’t able to wrestle the spittle to the floor.
President Donald Trump’s son Eric says he was spit on by an employee at the Aviary, a cocktail bar in Chicago, on Tuesday night. The employee was taken into Secret Service custody but was later released.
www.thedailybeast.com/...
From the Aviary's response to the incident: "As fellow Americans and citizens, we should all aim higher." (sic)
Watching tonight’s debate could be like a drinking game because “policy”
Thursday, Jul 4, 2019 · 7:50:36 AM +00:00
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annieli
The debate over keeping all documents in the ongoing dispute about potential tax evasion confidential is just the latest in a line of bizarre developments surrounding the former Trump Ocean Club property. Not only has the building been credibly accused as the site of massive money laundering operations, but last year a management scuffle broke out at the building, with the new management kicking out the Trump Organization wholesale. Shortly thereafter, a Panamanian law firm representing the Trump Organization issued a letter to then-Panamanian President Juan Carlos Varela threatening potential “repercussions” to Panama if the government didn’t intervene on behalf of the Trump Organization.
thinkprogress.org/...