{"id":215,"date":"2005-12-21T01:52:00","date_gmt":"2005-12-21T08:52:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/?p=215"},"modified":"2014-04-05T10:12:20","modified_gmt":"2014-04-05T17:12:20","slug":"terminating-the-terminator","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/2005\/12\/21\/terminating-the-terminator\/","title":{"rendered":"Terminating the Terminator"},"content":{"rendered":"

Down in Graz they’re in a tizzy. A faction of folks said they wanted the Governator’s name removed from the stadium. They’re all mighty disappointed in him after he refused to commute the death sentence for Tookie. So out of control are they that the press says they’re talking of renaming the stadium after Tookie<\/a>. The head of the communist party was on the radio yesterday talking about how it shouldn’t make a bit of difference to the business interests in Graz, but others lamented that removing the Schwarzenegger brand was going to lose them money.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Arnie made a preemptive strike. (Sideline here about how one of the big differences culturally is that Austrians seem to sit around and talk about stuff where Americans – even adoptive ones – appear to be more about action.) He asked them to pull his name from the stadium and he’s sending back his medal of honor. He’s quoted in the local paper as saying that this is sad for him because “in his heart, he’ll always be an Austrian.” Except, one might conclude, the part of his heart that he’s using to adminster the death penalty. <\/p>\n

People here are saying that the folks in Graz are nuts. They’re actually taking Arnie’s side, saying that Graz deserves to be dumped by the stellar actor from Total Recall. (Another cultural concept is today’s vocabulary word: schadenfreude<\/a>.) I’ve been mystified for oh so long about Arnie’s deificiation because after all, he shot to his glamorous success not here in Austria, but in the US. It’s always seemed to me to be a spotlight on Austria’s shortcomings that their golden boy should be one who bailed. Highlighting him as a paragon of Austrianism seems, well, I’ll just say it: stupid. <\/p>\n

So yeah, I guess they are nuts in Graz, but not for breaking up with Arnie. They’re nuts for worshipping him in the first place. It’s not just a local boy made good thing, they’ve really gone out of their way to claim him as one of their own. But he hasn’t been for some time now. This is the second sentence that he’s failed to commute. Austria is staunchly anti-death penalty. The Governator is a Republican and Europe as a whole is rabidly anti-Bush. Mr. Schwarzenegger is an American now, with his Hummer and his Kennedy wife and his cuddly relationship with the White House. He’s might be bigger than life in Graz, but he’s just bigger than Graz, period – and not in a good way. Graz should have dumped him a long time ago and made a name for themselves with their cool architecture<\/a>, hip art scene, inviting old city… Graz has plenty of charms to recommend it without a steroid bloated botox injected Republican as it’s representative.<\/p>\n

Graz, look in the mirror and get a grip. You’re talking about renaming your stadium after a convicted killer and gang member? Have you no sense of shame or decency? Talk about your self esteem issues. Have a good cry, get a bucket of ice cream and some Julia Roberts movies, then Get Over It. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Down in Graz they’re in a tizzy. A faction of folks said they wanted the Governator’s name removed from the stadium. They’re all mighty disappointed in him after he refused to commute the death sentence for Tookie. So out of control are they that the press says they’re talking of renaming the stadium after Tookie. … <\/p>\n


…read more.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-215","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-austria","masonry-post","generate-columns","tablet-grid-50","mobile-grid-100","grid-parent","grid-50"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=215"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9048,"href":"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215\/revisions\/9048"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=215"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=215"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=215"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}