1. Black and White or Color; how do you prefer your movies?
Color. (I'm not always deep. I'm a fan of the old Twilight Zones and a few old movies... 12 Angry Men comes to mind... but I generally want some color. Goodnight and Goodluck was alright but I'd much rather read about the McCarthy era in a book.)
2. What is the one single subject that bores you to near-death?
Sports. Like Huey Freeman says: "And today in sports, a black man somewhere ran with a ball and jumped with a ball and threw a ball and people got really excited as if they hadn't seen it a million times before"
3. MP3s, CDs, Tapes or Records: what is your favorite medium for prerecorded music?
8-Track.. lol... I used to DJ so I appreciate vinyl. I feel like I'm practically Amish since I've never downloaded music onto an I-pod or burned a CD on my computer. But seriously, I guess I'm still a CD-person.
4. You are handed one first class trip plane ticket to anywhere in the world and ten million dollars cash. All of this is yours provided that you leave and not tell anyone where you are going … Ever. This includes family, friends, everyone. Would you take the money and ticket and run?
With ten million I could take care of my family, friends, everyone.
5. Seriously, what do you consider the world’s most pressing issue now?
This is kind of a cop-out because it's kind of amorphous but I would say global north-south issues.
6. How would you rectify the world’s most pressing issue?
Among other things, political power needs to be decentralized, shared among different countries. We need a stronger UN, and other international bodies. Third world countries should democratize (on their own terms), develop and cooperate.
7. You are given the chance to go back and change one thing in your life; what would that be?
I have an answer but I'm not sharing.
8. You are given the chance to go back and change one event in world history, what would that be?
First I will get onto a soapbox and suggest that history actually isn't determined by individuals or specific events... especially if you think about Guns, Germs and Steel.
I also saw Butterfly Effect one too many times so I'm actually really skeptical as to how effective any changes would be.
But for the moment I'll say I would prevent exposing Europe to the Black Death. That way, Europe's Dark Ages would have progressed very differently, and so would the early encounter between the Indigenous people of the Americas and the Europeans.
9. A night at the opera, or a night at the Grand Ole’ Opry – Which do you choose?
Since I don't speak Italian, I will say Grand Ole' Opry.
10. What is the one great unsolved crime of all time you’d like to solve?
The 2000 Presidential election.
11. One famous author can come to dinner with you. Who would that be, and what would you serve for the meal?
Sushi with Suheir Hammad.
12. You discover that John Lennon was right, that there is no hell below us, and above us there is only sky — what’s the first immoral thing you might do to celebrate this fact?
I'm Muslim, but I have a certain amount of respect for Buddhism. I really do think that certain vices really do have real spiritual consequences which we experience even in this life. So I'm not actually certain that I would go out an rob a bank or something. Um.... eat a ham sandwich?
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