- Hey soccer fan, if David Beckham is going to “save” soccer in America, then why is the sport’s most famous and promising young player fleeing Major League Soccer to go play professionally in Portugal with the Benefica soccer club? Freddie Adu, a guy who’s been on the sports radar since his early teens because he was such a prodigy at such a young age, is fleeing American soccer to go play in a place where people actually give a crap about the sport. Soccer (i.e. futbol) in Europe is to Europeans what the NFL is to Americans, so clearly it’s the right move for Adu. He’ll get more money, more fan interest and the chance to play against the best competition in the world. His departure also serves to underscore the hollowness and irrelevance of Beckham coming to MLS. If the biggest young star is leaving for greener pastures, that’s a clear condemnation of the MLS and a surefire statement that Beckham is nothing more than a washed-up, broken-down former star player who can no longer compete at the highest level and whose primary asset at this point is no longer his on-field skill set but rather his name and notoriety. Of course, if Becks keeps missing games because of the ouchie in his ankle, even that notoriety isn’t going to matter much. If you notice, already coverage of the MLS and the L.A. Galaxy have faded to nearly zero less than two weeks after Beckham’s first MLS game. Yeah, but he’s going to save soccer in this country, sure he is soccer fan…………
- A few thoughts on last night’s episode of Greek, bearing in mind that we now know the end point for this season. With the last new episode set for mid-September, last night’s episode dealt in large part with the issue of one of the show’s central characters, Calvin, and his homosexuality. That storyline was advanced by a visit from Calvin’s father, who was on the campus of Cyprus-Rhodes University to help his old fraternity, the Omega Chi’s, win an intramural floor hockey game. Despite the proverbial “dork who wants to play sports and conjures up a magical game despite having no athletic ability” storyline with protagonist Rusty, the episode was still good, although the comedy was more on the back burner than in previous episodes. The drama between Rusty’s sister Casey (Spencer Grammer) and her nemesis, Zeta Beta pledge Rebecca Logan (Dilshad Vadsaria) is a little soap-operatic, but still entertaining. The bitchiness and cat fighting is pretty funny, actually, but not as humorous as scenes with Rusty and his uber-dorky roommate Dale (Clark Duke). Plus, how great was it that Rusty’s frat, Kappa Tau, was willingly “tricked” into haven a drunken rager with the Zeta Betas the night before their big game versus the Omega Chi’s, even after they knew up front that it was a set up to help the Omega Chi’s win the game? You gotta love a group of guys who love drinking, partying and hot chicks so much that they’re willing to get slobbering drunk the night before the big game and still show up to play. Besides which, you can’t not like any show that makes a pointed, sarcastic joke about Dick Cheney shooting a hunting buddy in the face and uses it as a way for one character to teach a lesson to another character, which also happened in this episode. So far, the ratings and reception for the show have been very good, but no final decision on renewing it for a second season has been made. Here’s hoping ABC/ABC Family have the good sense to treat this show better than another great summer series, Traveler, and renew it for another year. As always, if you missed this week's episode, you can watch/record it Friday at 9 p.m. on ABC............
- O.J. Simpson is chipping away at his debt to the family of Ron Goldman, bit by bit. To be fair, he’s not doing it willingly or even of his own accord, but he’s still doing it thanks to a federal bankruptcy judge in Miami. The Goldman’s were awarded the cursed proceeds from the Juice’s how-to murder book, If I Turned Two People into Human Pez Dispensers, Here’s How I Did It. With the book canceled after widespread outrage over its potential release, I don’t know that this decision will go too far in satisfying the $38 million wrongful death judgment against Simpson over the (alleged) murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman. Nor can I fathom what it would feel like for the Goldman family to receive profits from a book written by the wrongfully acquitted (allegedly) killer of their son about exactly how he “theoretically” sliced up two people and got away with it. And in case you’re out there asking the obvious question, Juice…….yes, you are still the worst guy in the history of the modern world and the race isn’t even close.
- What to do with a year-plus of free time when you’re suspended from the NFL….what to do, what to do…….how about getting involved with a low-rent pro wrestling outfit? Adam “Pacman” Jones, the suspended Tennessee Titans cornerback who recently lost an appeal to Commissioner Roger Goodell to at least attend training camp this year even though he is suspended, is close to a deal with Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA) that would bring him on board in a non-wrestling capacity. Jones’ agent was sure to clarify that Jones would not be actively participating in-ring, which would be a violation of his contract with the Titans. Actually, the Titans are probably hoping he does wrestle and violate the contract so they can void the deal and release him. But even if he’s within his legal and personal rights to be a part of TNA, it might not be the best step for Jones. If you’re looking to clean up your image and get back in the good graces of the Titans and the NFL, associating with the shady world of low-rent pro wrestling isn’t the best way to go about it. Instead, you might want to try not getting arrested, not having any members of your posse involved in shootings outside of strip clubs and not having police seeking you for questioning in any such incidents. The legal advice is free, a gift from me to you, Pac, make good use of it……….
- Speaking of guys going on benders the night before big games, how about Andy Roddick blaming his loss in the semifinals of the Indianapolis championships tennis tournament on………a fast food bender the night before the match. Yeah, that’s right, dude is claiming that downing some fast food grub late in the night prevented him from being at his best the next day. On one hand, I understand where Roddick is coming from. After all, I make it an explicit point of emphasis to avoid any and all things Taco Bell and McDonald’s at all times, partially because of the scare a few months ago with tainted veggies used in Taco Bell grub but mostly because I’m not sure most of the crap on the menus of these places actually qualifies as food. So if A. Roddick downed a couple of bean burritos with some guacamole, an order of nachos bell grande, a chili cheese burrito and an order of nachos late at night, I can see where he might not be right the next day. On the other hand, how the hell do you allow that to happen? First of all, you’re a professional athlete, man, not a competitive eater. Maybe Joey Chesnut or Kobayashi can get away with cramming copious amounts of unsavory, unhealthy grub down their pie holes and not suffer major consequences, but you’re a professional tennis player. A big part of what you do is based on physical fitness, which involves eating right so your body has the right fuel and nutrients. You’re not getting those nutrients from a Quarter Pounder with extra cheese, bacon and mayo, my man, nor are you getting it from a double-decker taco with guacamole. Ultimately though, even if you were weighed down by a fast food bender, you still can’t use that as an excuse for losing a match. It’s weak, it’s pathetic and it might explain why you can’t seem to win the big matches any more, Andy.
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
Monday, July 30, 2007
Thank you to NutriSystem, the weekend box office winner and a perjury investigation for our friend Alberto Gonzales
- Speaking on behalf of all guys who grew up in the late ‘80s and ‘90s, I want to extend a sincere thank you to NurtiSystem. Up until now, the commercials featuring various past-their-prime athletes and actors extolling the virtues of various weight-loss programs have been alternately creepy, annoying and just plain hokey. However, when I saw the commercial featuring former Boy Meets World babe Danielle Fischel (better known as Topanga), I was pumped. For any guy who grew up watching that show, Fischel was definitely someone you crushed on at some point. Problem is, even back then, she wasn’t the most svelte girl around. She was on TV and she was still pretty cute, but she wasn’t thin by any stretch of the imagination. Thing is, if you can keep control of your weight and physique at that point in your life, in your teens and twenties, that doesn’t bode well for you. You should be at your physical peak at that point, with your metabolism as high as it’s going to be, so that’s your best shot to be in great shape. So it wasn’t a major stunner when, post-Boy Meets World, Fischel packed on the pounds in a hurry. Unless you made a point of looking for her, you didn’t see her on TV or in movies. Following that sabbatical from the public eye, you can imagine how great it was to see her show up on a NutriSystem commercial recently, in no small part due to the fact that she looks better now than she ever has. She even has her own quasi-Baywatch moment, jogging in a revealing bikini on the beach, showing off her new body and bringing back some great memories for all the Topanga fans out there. Even if this is just a temporary fix and D. Fischel eventually swells back up to a portly size, I’m grateful to her and NutriSystem for giving her one shining (and thin) moment in the sun.
- Clearly, the four founders of Bad Newz Kennels are a tight group, bound by an unbreakable oath and a closeness that cannot be measured or described in mere words. Well, until one of them is offered a plea deal by the feds and rolls on the other three to save his own ass. The rat in question would be Tony Taylor, one of the four defendants in the federal dogfighting case that centers on Atlanta Falcons quarterback Mike Vick. Taylor was cited in the original indictment as the person responsible for scouting the Virginia property used for the dogfighting operation, constructing many of the buildings on the property and being a leader in the effort to kill dogs who either wouldn’t fight or lost their fight. Now, Taylor has rolled on his three co-defendants and struck a plea deal with the feds, with his sentencing not until December. I’m sure that sentencing will hinge largely on how effective he is at helping the government build its case against the other three defendants and in testifying at their trial, set to begin Nov. 26. Obviously this is “Bad Newz” for Vick, because the charges against him focus mainly on conspiracy to create a gambling endeavor across state lines and conspiracy to engage in animal fighting and in such cases, each person charged is held responsible for the group’s actions as a whole and the crimes of one are the crimes of all. Thus, with Taylor admitting to what he’s been charged with and implicating Vick and the others, that casts a pretty damning shadow on their protestations of innocence. Surely Vick’s attorneys and the attorneys for the other two men will attack Taylor’s credibility and the credibility of the other four main witnesses in the case, but even if they prove that the witnesses are bad people and stand to benefit from testifying (at least in Taylor’s case), that doesn’t mean they’re not telling the truth. Unfortunately for Vick, there isn’t going to be a plea deal coming for him, partially because he maintains his innocence by mostly because he’s the one the feds are after and they’re not about to cut him any breaks. If I’m Mike Vick right now, I’m doing everything I can to enjoy these next few months of freedom because the chances that he’s going to prison seem to increase exponentially by the day.
- In a development that should surprise exactly no one, The Simpsons Movie was the big winner at the box office this weekend, raking in $71.8 million and outdistancing second-place finisher I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry by nearly $53 million. I’m the first to admit that I am not now, nor have I ever been, down with the whole Simpsons phenomenon. I just don’t find it funny to watch an animated, adult-oriented cartoon with lowest-common-denominator humor, but despite all of that, I’m glad to see any movie at all out-earn the debacle of a picture that Chuck and Larry is. A ginormous collection of gay jokes and Jessica Biel as the token eye candy doesn’t make a worthwhile movie, so props to any film that takes that movie off the top of the earnings list. And yes, I know that I might be one of the 0.7 percent of Americans who aren’t down with the Simpson phenomenon, but I’m OK with that, so don’t waste your time or energy trying to convince me that I need to get on board with it.
- Is anyone else looking forward to a potential perjury investigation of Alberto Gonzales as much as I am? This investigation would be the ultimate slam-dunk, akin to investigating Jose Canseco for steroids, Isaiah Knight for racial insensitivity or Willie Nelson for drug use. The true problem facing Congress should it choose to investigate ol’ Alberto for perjury wont be finding acts of perjury he’s committed; it will be deciding which act of perjury to investigate first. “This is going to have a devastating effect on law enforcement throughout the country if it’s not cleared up,” warned Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt. and the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. What, you mean having the highest-ranking member of the legal system in our country blatantly ignoring the law, acting illegally and then lying about it to Congress and the American public might be bad for law enforcement? It should be interesting to see how the W. administration tries to get Gonzales out of this mess, because I don’t think the same “I am a member of both the legislative and executive branches and also a member of neither branch at the same time,” excuse that Vice Lord Dick “Shotgun Blast to a Friend’s Face” Cheney used in refusing to turn over documents demanded by the national archives.
- Speaking of Jose Canseco……he might be a scumbag, he might be a lowlife and he might be a publicity seeking, attention-grabbing tool, but that doesn’t necessarily discredit what he has to say about steroid use in Major League Baseball. Two years ago Canseco wrote Juiced, a book about baseball’s steroids culture that led to Congressional hearings, the public excoriating of Mark McGwire and the outing of guys like Ivan Rodriguez and Rafael Palmeiro as alleged roid’ users. Now Canseco has apparently burned through his savings and needs more money and/or more attention, because in a recent interview with a Boston radio station, he hinted at the fact that he’s sitting on more material that could be used in a second book, this time containing “stuff” about New York Yankees slugger Alex Rodriguez. Canseco was squirrelly and evasive when asked if that “stuff” was steroid-related, but I doubt it is. I’m not casting aspersions on the validity of whatever Canseco is alleging; I’m simply saying I don’t believe it has anything to do with steroids. If he had that kind of information, it would have come out long before now and he wouldn’t be waiting for a second book that he doesn’t even have a publishing deal for to reveal it. Based on the fact that large chunks of what he claimed in his first book bore out to be true (some parts were total falsehoods and have never been substantiated, so bear that in mind), I think you have to consider what Jose has to say if and when this second book is published. At that point you can weigh what he says and decide if you believe him, but the fact that he was right about many details in the first book buy him, in my mind, a modicum of credibility and the right to be heard if and when he speaks out again.
- Having never performed an exorcism on a family member or even been inspired to attempt to perform an exorcism on a family member, I can’t exactly wrap my head around what Ronald Marquez was thinking, but I’ll give it a shot. Marquez, 49, was attempting to perform an exorcism on his 3-year-old granddaughter at the family’s Phoenix home when a concerned relative called police. The police showed up, scuffled with Marquez and ultimately had to use stun guns to subdue this maniac, who was literally choking the life out of the toddler as part of the exorcism. After the Taser blasts, Marquez released his hold on the child but then stopped breathing. He could not be revived and was pronounced dead on arrival at the hospital. The family member who called police said Marquez had also attempted an exorcism on the child on Thursday, so clearly he was bent on getting this thing done. As for wrapping my head around what he was thinking and what went on here, here goes: Ronald Marquez was insane. I thought only crazy characters in poorly made horror movies became convinced that a young child was possessed and tried to choke the evil out of them. Maybe Marquez saw The Omen one too many times, maybe he’s always been insane, but there is no logical or sane explanation for choking a 3-year-old almost to death because you believe they are possessed by demons. Even if you do believe in people being possessed by evil spirits, are you telling me there was no priest or minister you could call to do a normal, conventional exorcism? I’m not up on the proper procedure for those events, but I feel safe in stating that choking someone to death is not part of the protocol.
- Clearly, the four founders of Bad Newz Kennels are a tight group, bound by an unbreakable oath and a closeness that cannot be measured or described in mere words. Well, until one of them is offered a plea deal by the feds and rolls on the other three to save his own ass. The rat in question would be Tony Taylor, one of the four defendants in the federal dogfighting case that centers on Atlanta Falcons quarterback Mike Vick. Taylor was cited in the original indictment as the person responsible for scouting the Virginia property used for the dogfighting operation, constructing many of the buildings on the property and being a leader in the effort to kill dogs who either wouldn’t fight or lost their fight. Now, Taylor has rolled on his three co-defendants and struck a plea deal with the feds, with his sentencing not until December. I’m sure that sentencing will hinge largely on how effective he is at helping the government build its case against the other three defendants and in testifying at their trial, set to begin Nov. 26. Obviously this is “Bad Newz” for Vick, because the charges against him focus mainly on conspiracy to create a gambling endeavor across state lines and conspiracy to engage in animal fighting and in such cases, each person charged is held responsible for the group’s actions as a whole and the crimes of one are the crimes of all. Thus, with Taylor admitting to what he’s been charged with and implicating Vick and the others, that casts a pretty damning shadow on their protestations of innocence. Surely Vick’s attorneys and the attorneys for the other two men will attack Taylor’s credibility and the credibility of the other four main witnesses in the case, but even if they prove that the witnesses are bad people and stand to benefit from testifying (at least in Taylor’s case), that doesn’t mean they’re not telling the truth. Unfortunately for Vick, there isn’t going to be a plea deal coming for him, partially because he maintains his innocence by mostly because he’s the one the feds are after and they’re not about to cut him any breaks. If I’m Mike Vick right now, I’m doing everything I can to enjoy these next few months of freedom because the chances that he’s going to prison seem to increase exponentially by the day.
- In a development that should surprise exactly no one, The Simpsons Movie was the big winner at the box office this weekend, raking in $71.8 million and outdistancing second-place finisher I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry by nearly $53 million. I’m the first to admit that I am not now, nor have I ever been, down with the whole Simpsons phenomenon. I just don’t find it funny to watch an animated, adult-oriented cartoon with lowest-common-denominator humor, but despite all of that, I’m glad to see any movie at all out-earn the debacle of a picture that Chuck and Larry is. A ginormous collection of gay jokes and Jessica Biel as the token eye candy doesn’t make a worthwhile movie, so props to any film that takes that movie off the top of the earnings list. And yes, I know that I might be one of the 0.7 percent of Americans who aren’t down with the Simpson phenomenon, but I’m OK with that, so don’t waste your time or energy trying to convince me that I need to get on board with it.
- Is anyone else looking forward to a potential perjury investigation of Alberto Gonzales as much as I am? This investigation would be the ultimate slam-dunk, akin to investigating Jose Canseco for steroids, Isaiah Knight for racial insensitivity or Willie Nelson for drug use. The true problem facing Congress should it choose to investigate ol’ Alberto for perjury wont be finding acts of perjury he’s committed; it will be deciding which act of perjury to investigate first. “This is going to have a devastating effect on law enforcement throughout the country if it’s not cleared up,” warned Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt. and the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. What, you mean having the highest-ranking member of the legal system in our country blatantly ignoring the law, acting illegally and then lying about it to Congress and the American public might be bad for law enforcement? It should be interesting to see how the W. administration tries to get Gonzales out of this mess, because I don’t think the same “I am a member of both the legislative and executive branches and also a member of neither branch at the same time,” excuse that Vice Lord Dick “Shotgun Blast to a Friend’s Face” Cheney used in refusing to turn over documents demanded by the national archives.
- Speaking of Jose Canseco……he might be a scumbag, he might be a lowlife and he might be a publicity seeking, attention-grabbing tool, but that doesn’t necessarily discredit what he has to say about steroid use in Major League Baseball. Two years ago Canseco wrote Juiced, a book about baseball’s steroids culture that led to Congressional hearings, the public excoriating of Mark McGwire and the outing of guys like Ivan Rodriguez and Rafael Palmeiro as alleged roid’ users. Now Canseco has apparently burned through his savings and needs more money and/or more attention, because in a recent interview with a Boston radio station, he hinted at the fact that he’s sitting on more material that could be used in a second book, this time containing “stuff” about New York Yankees slugger Alex Rodriguez. Canseco was squirrelly and evasive when asked if that “stuff” was steroid-related, but I doubt it is. I’m not casting aspersions on the validity of whatever Canseco is alleging; I’m simply saying I don’t believe it has anything to do with steroids. If he had that kind of information, it would have come out long before now and he wouldn’t be waiting for a second book that he doesn’t even have a publishing deal for to reveal it. Based on the fact that large chunks of what he claimed in his first book bore out to be true (some parts were total falsehoods and have never been substantiated, so bear that in mind), I think you have to consider what Jose has to say if and when this second book is published. At that point you can weigh what he says and decide if you believe him, but the fact that he was right about many details in the first book buy him, in my mind, a modicum of credibility and the right to be heard if and when he speaks out again.
- Having never performed an exorcism on a family member or even been inspired to attempt to perform an exorcism on a family member, I can’t exactly wrap my head around what Ronald Marquez was thinking, but I’ll give it a shot. Marquez, 49, was attempting to perform an exorcism on his 3-year-old granddaughter at the family’s Phoenix home when a concerned relative called police. The police showed up, scuffled with Marquez and ultimately had to use stun guns to subdue this maniac, who was literally choking the life out of the toddler as part of the exorcism. After the Taser blasts, Marquez released his hold on the child but then stopped breathing. He could not be revived and was pronounced dead on arrival at the hospital. The family member who called police said Marquez had also attempted an exorcism on the child on Thursday, so clearly he was bent on getting this thing done. As for wrapping my head around what he was thinking and what went on here, here goes: Ronald Marquez was insane. I thought only crazy characters in poorly made horror movies became convinced that a young child was possessed and tried to choke the evil out of them. Maybe Marquez saw The Omen one too many times, maybe he’s always been insane, but there is no logical or sane explanation for choking a 3-year-old almost to death because you believe they are possessed by demons. Even if you do believe in people being possessed by evil spirits, are you telling me there was no priest or minister you could call to do a normal, conventional exorcism? I’m not up on the proper procedure for those events, but I feel safe in stating that choking someone to death is not part of the protocol.
Sunday, July 29, 2007
Beckham is worthless and so are some ESPN analysts
- There he is, David Beckham, leading the soccer revolution in America in that most soccer of ways, sitting on the bench because he has a boo-boo. Becks has missed his second straight game with an ouchie on his ankle, an injury I’m sure is devastating…..to a soft, Euro soccer player. Beckham has already been a ginormous disappointment and his MLS career has barely begun. This guy isn't going to change the way soccer is perceived in America because at the rate he’s going, he can’t even change the perception or performance of a crappy team in a second-rate soccer league. Have you heard anyone raving about Beckham and how exciting following Major League Soccer has become for them since his arrival? More likely, even the people who took the most interest in Beckham coming to America paid attention for all of one game then realized, like most Americans, that they don’t give a crap about the sport and that the only people who truly enjoy it are under the age of 12 and enjoy soccer because it gives them an excuse to go out and run around with their friends, drink Capri Sun and eat orange wedges. Thanks for nothing, Becks, you’ve been every bit the non-factor I knew you would be.
- Those pesky cameras stationed at bank ATM machines are there for a reason. An ATM located at a truck stop in Mansfield, La. began giving out $20 bills instead of $5 bills this week, but authorities claim they already know who took the bonus $7,000 given out by the machine and plan to track them down to recover the cash. Some people run right back to the bank when a teller or ATM gives them even a few dollars more than they were supposed to receive, while clearly some people are content to take the money and run. If that sounds like you, three words of advice: wear a disguise. Slap on the fake nose, mustache and plastic glasses, wear a wig and make sure you cover the license plate on your vehicle just in case. If you’re one of the honest few, take heart in knowing that for once in a world where the liars, thieves and crooks get away with it most of the time (sometimes they even get elected president!), this time doing the wrong thing is going to catch up with someone.
- Good news for all of my stoner readers (put down the Doritos and Cheetos, guys, I’m talking to you) - Trey Anastasio is back with a new album. Potheads worldwide have been really bummed out, dude, ever since Anastasio’s former band, Phish, called it quits. The group was famous for, um, shall we say inspiring a heavily mellow, weed-loving band of followers, so when they broke up, dude, it was bad, man. Anastasio is back with his new album, XXXXXXX, which tries to recapture to Phish vibe and succeeds for the most part, although Anastasio clearly needs to do his own thing and build his own style as well. I’ve never been a Phish fan, nor have I been a fan of being able to get a contact high from a ticket stub two weeks after a concert, but for all you pot-smoking, mellow stoner dudes out there, you’ll want to get your copy of this album ASAP.
- Being a pro football player does not necessarily mean you’re smart. In fact, it often appears to mean that your skills lie solely on the football field and don’t extend to the more, shall we say cerebral parts of life. Take former players and future hall of famers Emmitt Smith and Deion Sanders, two men who were legendary on the field and are now saying legendarily stupid things off of it. Both have tried feeble attempts at rallying to the defense of embattled Atlanta Falcons quarterback Michael Vick as he faces mounting federal charges related to a dogfighting ring he and three friends allegedly ran in Virginia. Smith was the first to stick his foot in his mouth, first insisting that the feds were only going after Vick because he’s the “big dog” in the case and they want to attack him to put pressure on those who are really behind the criminal activity, or so Smith theorizes. Emmitt then went on to say that it’s no big deal even if Vick has attended one, five, ten or even twenty dog fights and bet on the events. How magnanimous of you, E., to absolve Mike Vick of blame for some of the most heinous, reprehensible and disgusting acts that most of us have ever heard of. I didn’t even know that was within your power to grant that kind of pardon, so thanks. Then you have Deion, who tried to make an excuse that maybe it’s ok for Vick to be involved in this mess because he wanted to prove he had the biggest, baddest dog on the block, so to speak, and that perhaps Vick, being a pro athlete, identified with those tough dogs and being the top dog. The delicious irony is that both of these guys are paid football analysyts for major TV networks, although I have to second the thoughts of Sports Illustrated writer Peter King when he says that the suits at ESPN must be seriously wondering if they made a terrible mistake in hiring Smith. He’ll have to do better than these moronic comments, otherwise he’ll end up being just as bad and just as unwatchable an analyst as his former Cowboys’ teammate and ex-ESPN analyst Michael “Terrell Owens’ Stool Pigeon” Irvin.
- Those pesky cameras stationed at bank ATM machines are there for a reason. An ATM located at a truck stop in Mansfield, La. began giving out $20 bills instead of $5 bills this week, but authorities claim they already know who took the bonus $7,000 given out by the machine and plan to track them down to recover the cash. Some people run right back to the bank when a teller or ATM gives them even a few dollars more than they were supposed to receive, while clearly some people are content to take the money and run. If that sounds like you, three words of advice: wear a disguise. Slap on the fake nose, mustache and plastic glasses, wear a wig and make sure you cover the license plate on your vehicle just in case. If you’re one of the honest few, take heart in knowing that for once in a world where the liars, thieves and crooks get away with it most of the time (sometimes they even get elected president!), this time doing the wrong thing is going to catch up with someone.
- Good news for all of my stoner readers (put down the Doritos and Cheetos, guys, I’m talking to you) - Trey Anastasio is back with a new album. Potheads worldwide have been really bummed out, dude, ever since Anastasio’s former band, Phish, called it quits. The group was famous for, um, shall we say inspiring a heavily mellow, weed-loving band of followers, so when they broke up, dude, it was bad, man. Anastasio is back with his new album, XXXXXXX, which tries to recapture to Phish vibe and succeeds for the most part, although Anastasio clearly needs to do his own thing and build his own style as well. I’ve never been a Phish fan, nor have I been a fan of being able to get a contact high from a ticket stub two weeks after a concert, but for all you pot-smoking, mellow stoner dudes out there, you’ll want to get your copy of this album ASAP.
- Being a pro football player does not necessarily mean you’re smart. In fact, it often appears to mean that your skills lie solely on the football field and don’t extend to the more, shall we say cerebral parts of life. Take former players and future hall of famers Emmitt Smith and Deion Sanders, two men who were legendary on the field and are now saying legendarily stupid things off of it. Both have tried feeble attempts at rallying to the defense of embattled Atlanta Falcons quarterback Michael Vick as he faces mounting federal charges related to a dogfighting ring he and three friends allegedly ran in Virginia. Smith was the first to stick his foot in his mouth, first insisting that the feds were only going after Vick because he’s the “big dog” in the case and they want to attack him to put pressure on those who are really behind the criminal activity, or so Smith theorizes. Emmitt then went on to say that it’s no big deal even if Vick has attended one, five, ten or even twenty dog fights and bet on the events. How magnanimous of you, E., to absolve Mike Vick of blame for some of the most heinous, reprehensible and disgusting acts that most of us have ever heard of. I didn’t even know that was within your power to grant that kind of pardon, so thanks. Then you have Deion, who tried to make an excuse that maybe it’s ok for Vick to be involved in this mess because he wanted to prove he had the biggest, baddest dog on the block, so to speak, and that perhaps Vick, being a pro athlete, identified with those tough dogs and being the top dog. The delicious irony is that both of these guys are paid football analysyts for major TV networks, although I have to second the thoughts of Sports Illustrated writer Peter King when he says that the suits at ESPN must be seriously wondering if they made a terrible mistake in hiring Smith. He’ll have to do better than these moronic comments, otherwise he’ll end up being just as bad and just as unwatchable an analyst as his former Cowboys’ teammate and ex-ESPN analyst Michael “Terrell Owens’ Stool Pigeon” Irvin.
Saturday, July 28, 2007
ABC president Stephen McPherson is a moron, a lowlife steals money from a church and NASA can't pull itself together
- Does anyone remember why Lindsay Lohan got famous in the first place? Seriously, as best I can remember, nearly all of her movies have been as unequivocally bad as her newest stink bomb, I Know Who Killed Me. Already reeling from a week filled with legal troubles, a drug-and-booze relapse and criticism coming from every angle, Lohan’s newest movie, which falls into the “torture porn” category that has produced nothing but unwatchable crap in recent months, is receiving the lowest possible rating from nearly every possible source. The plot is absurd and half-baked, the acting is awful and the dialogue is as bad as either of those two things. I know L. Lohan is good for some crazy, scantily clad images in pictures every few weeks, but that alone can't be enough to keep her in the spotlight, can it? There are thousands of skanks out there aspiring to be famous who will pose in little or no clothing and look as good or better than Lohan. Plus, they would give us the added bonus of not putting out movies centering on an amnesiac, one-legged attempted-murder survivor who claims she’s a stripper named Dakota Moss. Think about it people, we can do better………
- Bad news, TV fans….it turns out that the finale of Traveler on July 18 was indeed the series finale, which is not what I had initially posted. The decision to put the show on what producer David DiGilio terms “permanent hiatus” (see his TV Guide blog, http://community.tvguide.com/blog/Celebrity-Blogs/Davids-Traveler-Blog/800048619) is a regrettable one and many fans have spoken out vocally against ABC’s choice, including me. ABC president Stephen McPherson sounded incredibly dumb at the ABC upfront when he addressed the cancellation of the show, saying, “We were disappointed with the way the show was creatively developed.” Disappointed? What, you mean exciting, action-packed hours of drama with a great plot and interesting characters disappoint you? I’m so sorry to hear that, Steve-O, and even sorrier that it will mean the demise of a series I’d really come to like this summer. Again, there’s always a miniscule chance the series could be rescued, but if that’s going to happen fans have to speak out loudly, repeatedly and vocally. I hope you’ll do just that, because with hidden camera crap-fests, lame reality shows featuring hack inventors and other reality shows with D-list celebs ballroom dancing, ABC doesn’t have many good shows to offer, besides Lost and Greek.
- A while back, the WWE claimed that it was instituting its own internal drug-testing program for the company’s wrasslers. At the time everyone cracked jokes about the announcement, figuring it was as phony and scripted as the action in WWE wrestling. After all, with a roster full of jacked-up, chiseled performers that would seem to undoubtedly contain at least a few guys using ‘roids, WWE wouldn’t really test wrestlers and take action against them for using steroids, would it? For WWE’s sake, I hope that they were telling the truth, because in the wake of the Chris Benoit double murder/suicide tragedy, two congressmen who opened steroid hearings into Major League Baseball have requested that World Wrestling Entertainment provide records pertaining to the WWE's testing policies and practices. In a three-page letter dated Friday, Rep. Henry Waxman, the chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, and Tom Davis, the committee’s ranking minority member, asked WWE to provide several documents that should give the committee an in-depth look at WWE's drug-testing policy, including information about the results of performance-enhancing drug tests on wrestlers. The letter from Waxman and Davis cited the influence WWE performers have on young people as a reason for increased scrutiny of the message they would send by using ‘roids. The WWE has until Aug. 24 to respond, and a company spokesman has offered up a perfunctory response that says simply that WWE is “reviewing this letter and will respond accordingly.” As much as I enjoy watching WWE and as impressive as some of the physiques the wrestlers display are, it’s in no way worth it if it means these guys using performance-enhancing drugs that will continue leading to a slew of early deaths for former pro wrestlers.
- Tom Cruise may be weird, he may be insane, he may be creepy, kooky, bizarre and mildly frightening, but that doesn’t mean you get to extort money out of the little man. Two men have been arrested and charged with attempting to extort money from the diminutive, mentally unstable star by demanding a ransom for stolen photographs from his brain washing/wedding in Italy last year to Katie Holmes (come to your senses, Katie, it’s not too late!). David Hans Schmidt, a man known for brokering deals involving compromising photos and videos of celebrities, and Marc Lewis Gittleman, the co-conspirator who helped pull the photos from a discarded computer disk, have been hit with charges including conspiracy to commit extortion and sending communications for purposes of extortion. Schmidt allegedly approached Cruise’s reps six weeks ago with a $1 million ransom demand in exchange for the photos. Cruise’s crew then called the FBI, which in turn had little trouble unraveling the poorly constructed, meteorically stupid plan of Schmidt and Gittleman. It’s reassuring to know that sometimes in this world of oft-miscarried justice, stupid people get what they deserve.
- Of all the companies in Houston to emulate the business plan of, can I ask why NASA seems to have chosen Enron as a role model? No, NASA isn't guilty of egregiously dishonest, illegal financial practices, but they seem to be doing just about everything else wrong and ruining their reputation faster than you can say “Astronaut wearing adult diapers.” NASA’s recent run of black eyes began when Lisa Marie Nowak drove from Houston to Orlando to confront another woman in an astronaut love triangle, then the problems continued earlier this week when an unidentified NASA employee sabotaged a computer that was to have been transported by the space shuttle Endeavor to the international space station in a couple weeks. Now comes news that NASA may have ignored evidence of astronaut drinking and as a result put missions in danger, according to a panel of outside experts. The panel claims that after drinking heavily, one astronaut flew on a Russian spacecraft and another was cleared for flight on a space shuttle. Based on interviews it conducted, the panel says that NASA officials ignored the advice of flight surgeons and other astronauts who warned of safety risks because the astronauts in questions had too much to drink. The chairman of the panel, Col. Richard Bachmann Jr., did not expound much on the allegations but said the panel was informed about multiple infractions involving alcohol. The news was another punch to the junk for NASA, which still has not fully cleared up many of the issues that arose with the demise of the space shuttle Columbia. But hey, look at it this way, it’s not as if we’re trusting these people with billions of dollars, allowing them control over potentially deadly and dangerous situations and giving them clearance to send people out into space…..oh wait, we are…………
- It takes a complete and total lowlife to hatch a 10-year plan to steal thousands of dollars from the collection plate at their local church. William Biunno, 71, of Mountainside, N.J. has been charged with stealing nearly $28,000 over 11 years from the collection plate during Sunday Mass at Our Lady of Lourdes Roman Catholic Church. Church officials caught Biunno on tape with his hand in the collection plate, removing money instead of putting it in. Other than robbing little old ladies, scamming seniors out of their Social Security checks and pyramid schemes, this is just about the lowest, most despicable way to make money that I’ve heard in a long time. People come to church and try to give money to God and to the work the church is doing and there you are, ripping off God, church and fellow parishioners all in one fell swoop. Maybe next time there’s a sermon on the Eighth Commandment, you should pay special attention Mr. Biunno, remember, “Thou shalt not steal………..”
- Bad news, TV fans….it turns out that the finale of Traveler on July 18 was indeed the series finale, which is not what I had initially posted. The decision to put the show on what producer David DiGilio terms “permanent hiatus” (see his TV Guide blog, http://community.tvguide.com/blog/Celebrity-Blogs/Davids-Traveler-Blog/800048619) is a regrettable one and many fans have spoken out vocally against ABC’s choice, including me. ABC president Stephen McPherson sounded incredibly dumb at the ABC upfront when he addressed the cancellation of the show, saying, “We were disappointed with the way the show was creatively developed.” Disappointed? What, you mean exciting, action-packed hours of drama with a great plot and interesting characters disappoint you? I’m so sorry to hear that, Steve-O, and even sorrier that it will mean the demise of a series I’d really come to like this summer. Again, there’s always a miniscule chance the series could be rescued, but if that’s going to happen fans have to speak out loudly, repeatedly and vocally. I hope you’ll do just that, because with hidden camera crap-fests, lame reality shows featuring hack inventors and other reality shows with D-list celebs ballroom dancing, ABC doesn’t have many good shows to offer, besides Lost and Greek.
- A while back, the WWE claimed that it was instituting its own internal drug-testing program for the company’s wrasslers. At the time everyone cracked jokes about the announcement, figuring it was as phony and scripted as the action in WWE wrestling. After all, with a roster full of jacked-up, chiseled performers that would seem to undoubtedly contain at least a few guys using ‘roids, WWE wouldn’t really test wrestlers and take action against them for using steroids, would it? For WWE’s sake, I hope that they were telling the truth, because in the wake of the Chris Benoit double murder/suicide tragedy, two congressmen who opened steroid hearings into Major League Baseball have requested that World Wrestling Entertainment provide records pertaining to the WWE's testing policies and practices. In a three-page letter dated Friday, Rep. Henry Waxman, the chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, and Tom Davis, the committee’s ranking minority member, asked WWE to provide several documents that should give the committee an in-depth look at WWE's drug-testing policy, including information about the results of performance-enhancing drug tests on wrestlers. The letter from Waxman and Davis cited the influence WWE performers have on young people as a reason for increased scrutiny of the message they would send by using ‘roids. The WWE has until Aug. 24 to respond, and a company spokesman has offered up a perfunctory response that says simply that WWE is “reviewing this letter and will respond accordingly.” As much as I enjoy watching WWE and as impressive as some of the physiques the wrestlers display are, it’s in no way worth it if it means these guys using performance-enhancing drugs that will continue leading to a slew of early deaths for former pro wrestlers.
- Tom Cruise may be weird, he may be insane, he may be creepy, kooky, bizarre and mildly frightening, but that doesn’t mean you get to extort money out of the little man. Two men have been arrested and charged with attempting to extort money from the diminutive, mentally unstable star by demanding a ransom for stolen photographs from his brain washing/wedding in Italy last year to Katie Holmes (come to your senses, Katie, it’s not too late!). David Hans Schmidt, a man known for brokering deals involving compromising photos and videos of celebrities, and Marc Lewis Gittleman, the co-conspirator who helped pull the photos from a discarded computer disk, have been hit with charges including conspiracy to commit extortion and sending communications for purposes of extortion. Schmidt allegedly approached Cruise’s reps six weeks ago with a $1 million ransom demand in exchange for the photos. Cruise’s crew then called the FBI, which in turn had little trouble unraveling the poorly constructed, meteorically stupid plan of Schmidt and Gittleman. It’s reassuring to know that sometimes in this world of oft-miscarried justice, stupid people get what they deserve.
- Of all the companies in Houston to emulate the business plan of, can I ask why NASA seems to have chosen Enron as a role model? No, NASA isn't guilty of egregiously dishonest, illegal financial practices, but they seem to be doing just about everything else wrong and ruining their reputation faster than you can say “Astronaut wearing adult diapers.” NASA’s recent run of black eyes began when Lisa Marie Nowak drove from Houston to Orlando to confront another woman in an astronaut love triangle, then the problems continued earlier this week when an unidentified NASA employee sabotaged a computer that was to have been transported by the space shuttle Endeavor to the international space station in a couple weeks. Now comes news that NASA may have ignored evidence of astronaut drinking and as a result put missions in danger, according to a panel of outside experts. The panel claims that after drinking heavily, one astronaut flew on a Russian spacecraft and another was cleared for flight on a space shuttle. Based on interviews it conducted, the panel says that NASA officials ignored the advice of flight surgeons and other astronauts who warned of safety risks because the astronauts in questions had too much to drink. The chairman of the panel, Col. Richard Bachmann Jr., did not expound much on the allegations but said the panel was informed about multiple infractions involving alcohol. The news was another punch to the junk for NASA, which still has not fully cleared up many of the issues that arose with the demise of the space shuttle Columbia. But hey, look at it this way, it’s not as if we’re trusting these people with billions of dollars, allowing them control over potentially deadly and dangerous situations and giving them clearance to send people out into space…..oh wait, we are…………
- It takes a complete and total lowlife to hatch a 10-year plan to steal thousands of dollars from the collection plate at their local church. William Biunno, 71, of Mountainside, N.J. has been charged with stealing nearly $28,000 over 11 years from the collection plate during Sunday Mass at Our Lady of Lourdes Roman Catholic Church. Church officials caught Biunno on tape with his hand in the collection plate, removing money instead of putting it in. Other than robbing little old ladies, scamming seniors out of their Social Security checks and pyramid schemes, this is just about the lowest, most despicable way to make money that I’ve heard in a long time. People come to church and try to give money to God and to the work the church is doing and there you are, ripping off God, church and fellow parishioners all in one fell swoop. Maybe next time there’s a sermon on the Eighth Commandment, you should pay special attention Mr. Biunno, remember, “Thou shalt not steal………..”
Friday, July 27, 2007
More NFL knuckleheads, more NASA nut cases and I'm behind North Dakotans looking to legalize hemp
- I’ve found a good cause to throw my weight behind: the legalization of hemp in North Dakota. Your response is probably that advocating the legalization of hemp is akin to legalizing marijuana (which I favor for medicinal purposes), but that’s where you’d be wrong. Although hemp contains small, small traces of tetrahydrocannabinol, the psychoactive substance better known as THC in marijuana, and the two are from the same genus and species, hemp is in no way the same as marijuana in terms of usage. No one smokes hemp to get high; they use hemp to make clothes, lotions, car door panels, insulation, jewelry and more. The leading advocate for the legalization of hemp in North Dakota is David C. Monson, a farmer, high school principal and Republican state legislator in the state who sees his idea as “practical agriculture.” Six states across the country considered similar measures to the one that Monson is proposing over the past year, and Representative Ron Paul, R-Tex., introduced a bill in Washington, D.C. that would let states allow such crops. Still, North Dakotans have been the most outspoken on the issue, going so far as to have the state legislature has pass a bill allowing farmers to grow industrial hemp and creating an official licensing process to fingerprint such farmers and a global positioning system to track their fields. Of course, our stiff, rigid and bullsh*t-filled federal government is against the idea, citing the Controlled Substances Act. “Basically hemp is considered the same as marijuana,” said Steve Robertson, a special agent for the D.E.A. at its Washington headquarters. “We’re an enforcement agency. We’re sworn to uphold the law.” Right, Mr. Robertson, because we wouldn’t want to take a closer look at the law and see if it can be adapted and redefined to better address the issues it was actually designed to address. Good thinking on that one, D.E.A. Keep up the fight, North Dakota, hemp ought to be legalized and it looks like you’re the right ones to lead the fight.
- Amidst all of the uproar over the gambling scandal involving former NBA referee Tim Donaghy is the fact that a player who in many ways is the face of the league is building a new, 40,000-square-foot home that has its own freakin’ casino. You may remember hearing a few months back that LeBron James was constructing a mansion in the Akron, Ohio suburb of Bath Township. The house will be ginormous and boast things like a barber shop, basketball court, movie theater, two-story walk-in closet and the aforementioned casino. I know that the NBA can't control things like this, but how ironic is it that James is building this monstrosity at the very time the league is in the throes of a huge gambling scandal that has the potential to do major, possibly irreversible damage to its rep? Yes, there won't be any sports book action and money being bet on games at the in-house casino. Presumably it’ll be a place where James and his friends go to play poker, shoot some craps and have a good time, with James running the place himself. Still, if you listen to former mob boss and now anti-gambling advocate Michael Franzese (which I highly recommend you do), he vociferously states to anyone who asks that any involvement with gambling or gaming by athletes is a bad idea and can lead to nothing but negative ramiprecussions. Hopefully nothing comes out of James and his home casino, but it does go to show you how ingrained gambling and gaming are with these pro athletes; it’s something they feel the need to do regularly, even when it results in them losing tens of thousands of dollars and puts them in compromising situations.
- For the second time in his career, Michael Vick is having an apparel ban of some sort dropped on him by the NFL. Acouple years ago, the league had to prohibit fans from ordering Vick’s #7 jersey with the name “Mexico” printed on the back after Vick gave an unsuspecting woman herpes after sleeping with her and she came back to sue him. At that time, the NFL decided that fans would no longer be able to personalize Vick jerseys with the Mexico name, but right now that ban isn't looking so severe. As of today, NFLShop.com will not be selling any Michael Vick-related items and Reebok has stopped all sales of Vick jerseys, to which the company has the rights. A few weeks ago, it would have been hard to fathom an NFL without Vick in it, as he’s been one of the faces of the league for the past six years. More and more, though, the developments in the federal dogfighting case against him are making it plausible that not only could Vick miss the 2007 season, he could be done in the NFL altogether. A conviction on the charges he’s facing would definitely mean prison time under strict, inflexible federal sentencing guidelines, and from everything being said about the case, no one would be surprised if the Falcons released Vick no matter what the outcome of this case, barring a swift and improbable dismissal of all charges against him.
- Following the new NFL personal conduct policy that Commissioner Roger Goodell has set forth shouldn’t be this difficult for players. If you can avoid getting arrested, stay off drugs and behave like a somewhat normal citizen, you’ll have no trouble with Goodell. Yet players continue to get arrested for driving drunk, get into brawls at clubs, test positive for steroids and end up behind bars at an alarming rate. A large chunk of the trouble seems to be happening at clubs, especially strip clubs, so you’d think players would wise up and avoid this type of establishment. Carolina Panthers offensive lineman Jeremy Bridges clearly is not one of the smarter members of the league, because he now stands accused of misdemeanor assault for allegedly pulling a gun on a female employee during an altercation at a strip club in Charlotte. With no prior run-ins with the law (none of note, anyhow), and being a first-time offender of the NFL’s player conduct policy, Bridges might escape without a suspension, but then again, Goodell is suspending guys for just about everything this side of parking tickets, so maybe not. But good thinking by Bridges here, I mean who’s more dangerous than a chick working at a strip club? Plus, what solves an incident better than pulling a gun on a woman you weigh twice as much as? Players should just abide by the simple rule that if you feel like you need to take a gun to a place you’re going, maybe it’s a place you should be going to begin with. Start using your brain, Bridges, or Goodell will have you on the suspended list along with Mike Vick, Tank Johnson, Pacman Jones, Odell Thurman………and the list just keeps going.
* A brief addendum: The Panthers have gone ahead and suspended Bridges for the first two games of the regular season, clearly trying to beat the commish to the punch.
- Does NASA make a point of hiring psychopathic nut jobs? I only ask because after astro-nut Lisa Marie Nowak’s cross-country caper several months ago to kidnap/murder another woman involved in an astronaut love triangle, it became clear that NASA doesn’t do the best job of monitoring the mental stability of its employees. Now comes news that an unidentified NASA employee tried to sabotage the space shuttle Endeavor less than two weeks before the ship was to take flight. This loose cannon purposely damaged a computer inside the shuttle by cutting wires inside the machine, which is supposed to be delivered to the international space station by the Endeavor. The computer is supposed to monitor the strain on a space station beam and relay the information to flight controllers on Earth. The saboteur also damaged a second computer that wasn’t intended to be on the flight. No motive was given, but speaking of motives, this should be ample motivation for NASA to step up its security and mental health evaluations for anyone on its payroll that gets anywhere near a shuttle. Tighten things up, NASA, we can't have a government agency running so inefficiently, ineffectively and out of control, can we? Take a look around, see if you have any other agencies and departments running amok like that…….besides Alberto Gonzales and the Justice Department, and besides the war in Iraq and besides Vice Lord Cheney and his direct defiance of the National Archives requesting information he’s bound to turn over….aww, screw it. The entire administration is one ginormous joke, so why should NASA be any different?
- Amidst all of the uproar over the gambling scandal involving former NBA referee Tim Donaghy is the fact that a player who in many ways is the face of the league is building a new, 40,000-square-foot home that has its own freakin’ casino. You may remember hearing a few months back that LeBron James was constructing a mansion in the Akron, Ohio suburb of Bath Township. The house will be ginormous and boast things like a barber shop, basketball court, movie theater, two-story walk-in closet and the aforementioned casino. I know that the NBA can't control things like this, but how ironic is it that James is building this monstrosity at the very time the league is in the throes of a huge gambling scandal that has the potential to do major, possibly irreversible damage to its rep? Yes, there won't be any sports book action and money being bet on games at the in-house casino. Presumably it’ll be a place where James and his friends go to play poker, shoot some craps and have a good time, with James running the place himself. Still, if you listen to former mob boss and now anti-gambling advocate Michael Franzese (which I highly recommend you do), he vociferously states to anyone who asks that any involvement with gambling or gaming by athletes is a bad idea and can lead to nothing but negative ramiprecussions. Hopefully nothing comes out of James and his home casino, but it does go to show you how ingrained gambling and gaming are with these pro athletes; it’s something they feel the need to do regularly, even when it results in them losing tens of thousands of dollars and puts them in compromising situations.
- For the second time in his career, Michael Vick is having an apparel ban of some sort dropped on him by the NFL. Acouple years ago, the league had to prohibit fans from ordering Vick’s #7 jersey with the name “Mexico” printed on the back after Vick gave an unsuspecting woman herpes after sleeping with her and she came back to sue him. At that time, the NFL decided that fans would no longer be able to personalize Vick jerseys with the Mexico name, but right now that ban isn't looking so severe. As of today, NFLShop.com will not be selling any Michael Vick-related items and Reebok has stopped all sales of Vick jerseys, to which the company has the rights. A few weeks ago, it would have been hard to fathom an NFL without Vick in it, as he’s been one of the faces of the league for the past six years. More and more, though, the developments in the federal dogfighting case against him are making it plausible that not only could Vick miss the 2007 season, he could be done in the NFL altogether. A conviction on the charges he’s facing would definitely mean prison time under strict, inflexible federal sentencing guidelines, and from everything being said about the case, no one would be surprised if the Falcons released Vick no matter what the outcome of this case, barring a swift and improbable dismissal of all charges against him.
- Following the new NFL personal conduct policy that Commissioner Roger Goodell has set forth shouldn’t be this difficult for players. If you can avoid getting arrested, stay off drugs and behave like a somewhat normal citizen, you’ll have no trouble with Goodell. Yet players continue to get arrested for driving drunk, get into brawls at clubs, test positive for steroids and end up behind bars at an alarming rate. A large chunk of the trouble seems to be happening at clubs, especially strip clubs, so you’d think players would wise up and avoid this type of establishment. Carolina Panthers offensive lineman Jeremy Bridges clearly is not one of the smarter members of the league, because he now stands accused of misdemeanor assault for allegedly pulling a gun on a female employee during an altercation at a strip club in Charlotte. With no prior run-ins with the law (none of note, anyhow), and being a first-time offender of the NFL’s player conduct policy, Bridges might escape without a suspension, but then again, Goodell is suspending guys for just about everything this side of parking tickets, so maybe not. But good thinking by Bridges here, I mean who’s more dangerous than a chick working at a strip club? Plus, what solves an incident better than pulling a gun on a woman you weigh twice as much as? Players should just abide by the simple rule that if you feel like you need to take a gun to a place you’re going, maybe it’s a place you should be going to begin with. Start using your brain, Bridges, or Goodell will have you on the suspended list along with Mike Vick, Tank Johnson, Pacman Jones, Odell Thurman………and the list just keeps going.
* A brief addendum: The Panthers have gone ahead and suspended Bridges for the first two games of the regular season, clearly trying to beat the commish to the punch.
- Does NASA make a point of hiring psychopathic nut jobs? I only ask because after astro-nut Lisa Marie Nowak’s cross-country caper several months ago to kidnap/murder another woman involved in an astronaut love triangle, it became clear that NASA doesn’t do the best job of monitoring the mental stability of its employees. Now comes news that an unidentified NASA employee tried to sabotage the space shuttle Endeavor less than two weeks before the ship was to take flight. This loose cannon purposely damaged a computer inside the shuttle by cutting wires inside the machine, which is supposed to be delivered to the international space station by the Endeavor. The computer is supposed to monitor the strain on a space station beam and relay the information to flight controllers on Earth. The saboteur also damaged a second computer that wasn’t intended to be on the flight. No motive was given, but speaking of motives, this should be ample motivation for NASA to step up its security and mental health evaluations for anyone on its payroll that gets anywhere near a shuttle. Tighten things up, NASA, we can't have a government agency running so inefficiently, ineffectively and out of control, can we? Take a look around, see if you have any other agencies and departments running amok like that…….besides Alberto Gonzales and the Justice Department, and besides the war in Iraq and besides Vice Lord Cheney and his direct defiance of the National Archives requesting information he’s bound to turn over….aww, screw it. The entire administration is one ginormous joke, so why should NASA be any different?
Thursday, July 26, 2007
A classic drug excuse, a cyber-tool gets what he deserves and an angry passenger concocts a terrible plot
- It never ceases to amaze me how many people are carrying around their friends’ or family members’ drugs in their pockets or vehicles. Seriously, when was the last time someone was pulled over or arrested by police, found to have drugs on them and openly admitted to being the owner of said drugs? Every time, especially when the person in question is a celebrity or pro athlete, the individual goes to the, “They’re not mine, they belong to (friend/family member),” card. Lindsay Lohan is merely the latest to read from this tired script, trying to spin her arrest on misdemeanor driving under the influences, driving without a license and felony cocaine possession charges. She maintains her innocence on the drug charges, but I haven't heard her deny the driving-related offenses, which is good. After all, it is hard to deny driving without a license when you currently have your license suspended and were pulled over while driving your vehicle. But I’ll be fascinated to hear how someone else’s drugs magically appeared in your pocket, L. After all, drug users aren't known for being the most trustworthy, lasseiz-faire people when it comes to their drugs. They generally don’t hand their coke, weed or X over to someone else - they tend to want it in their possession so they can use it and don’t have to worry about someone else having it and ripping them off. But no worries, because someone who is clearly a stable, mature and responsible individual, as Lohan clearly is, should have no trouble beating a rum rap like this. That is, of course, assuming she can find time in between her continual trips to and from rehab to appear in court and defend herself.
- Internet squatters are one of the lower life forms on this planet, mostly because they look to buy up domain names they know companies and organizations will want in the future and then try to extort massive payments out of those companies and organizations in exchange for the rights to those domain names. In other words, they’re trying to earn a lot of money for doing nothing other than being a greedy weasel. That level of low-lifeness was taken even lower by Keith Malley, a man from New York who pirated the www.thesimpsonsmovie.com IP address, used it to divert people to a porn site and his own personal perverted site and then tried to bilk Twentieth Century Fox out of $50,000 for rights to the name. The World Intellectual Property Organization, a U.N. agency dealing in these types of matters, ruled that Malley must turn over the domain name to Fox and cannot force the company to pay him for it. Too bad for you, Malley, but you got exactly what you deserved: nothing. Just because Fox is a massive international company with deep pockets doesn’t mean you get to rip them off. Next time, come up wit a better scam, one that doesn’t involve you funneling unsuspecting Internet users to sites promoting sexual freakery.
- You’re going to be floored by this next piece of news, so brace yourself. Documents acquired by senators investigating Alberto Gonzales litany of lies, misdeeds and misconduct as attorney general directly contradict statements ol’ Alberto made in a hearing just a few days ago. Where have I seen this before…..oh right, last time Gonzales testified before Congress. He doesn’t seem to be able to tell the truth much in these kinds of settings or in any other settings for that matter. Actually, Congress might want to hit Alberto with a heavy dose of sodium pentathal before he testifies again, otherwise the lying is likely to keep on going. The new documents given to senators show that eight congressional leaders were briefed about the W. administration’s terrorist surveillance program on the eve of its expiration in 2004, directly contradicting statements Gonzales made before Senate committee earlier this week. At that hearing, Gonzales repeatedly insisted that the meeting in question had nothing to do with the surveillance program, but rather focused on an ambiguous, undefined intelligence program that he refused to discuss or elaborate on. Right, because that sounds soooo convincing. “No guys, that meeting was about a double-secret, top-level classified intelligence program that I really can't talk about.” How convenient for you, Mr. Gonzales, and by convenient I mean it was a blatant and obvious lie designed to disguise more of your own illegal and unethical actions. This isn't going very well for you, A., so maybe you should stop lying for a while and just shoot straight with the senators and the American public. I know it’s a new concept and it’s scary, but it’s your best option.
- I’m thankful to see that Cleveland Browns draft pick Brady Quinn has his priorities in order. While holding out from training camp and demanding that the Browns pay him like a top-five pick even though he was picked 22nd because he believes he was a top-five talent and the team had him rated as such, Quinn is busy appearing at area malls, signing autographs for $75 and also appearing on local sports talk radio shows. Instead of signing a rookie contract in line with the spot where he was picked, Quinn and his representatives continue to demand that he be paid for how talented they think he is and where they think he should have been picked. Sorry guys, but that’s not how this works. The NFL isn't a league where you can tell people how much you think you deserve and they blindly follow along even when there’s direct, contradictory evidence right at hand. Furthermore, Quinn looks like an idiot for holding out when he could very well have had a shot at winning a starting job if he had been in camp on time and performed to the high level that he thinks he should be paid at. Browns fans are tired of having a crappy team and they’re not going to have a lot of sympathy for a guy who could help their team but elects to put his own bank account ahead of getting on the field and being part of that team. The reality is that if Quinn is as good as he and his stool pigeons say he is and his performance on the field reflects that, then he’ll get the money he’s after - he just needs to prove it.
- Missing your flight sucks, period. For a traveler, there’s no worse feeling than rushing to get to the gate in time, only to realize that you’ve missed the plane and now you’re not going to get where you need to go on time. Sometimes you miss a flight and it’s your fault, sometimes it’s circumstances beyond your control, but either way, throwing out a bomb threat for the plane you were supposed to be on and missed is an unacceptable way to deal with the situation. This incredibly intelligent, thoughtful plot was hatched by an unidentified man at the Seattle-Tacoma Airport who missed a departing Northwest Airlines flight on Wednesday. What exactly are you hoping to accomplish by doing that? Like you’re going to force the plane to turn around and come back, then admit you were kidding and say, “Hey, since the plane is back, just go ahead a let me on board?” Bad news, you ginormous tool, when you make a bomb threat, whether it’s legit or fake, there’s one place you’re going and it’s not aboard a plane - it’s jail, moron. Perhaps this dude was looking to exact some revenge on the airline for having its flight take off on time when he was running late. If so, he sure showed them, eh? They brought the plane back and then sent it on its way, while this guy gets to face criminal charges for his brilliant bomb-threat plan. Sounds like an even exchange to me………..
- For those pointing to NASCAR driver Greg Biffle as the first “pro athlete” to speak out in condemnation of Michael Vick and his alleged involvement in a dog fighting ring, I have to say that you are all dead wrong. To make that statement is to make one critical assumption that is in fact very, very inaccurate: that race car drivers are in fact athletes. For the one millionth time, sitting in the driver’s seat of a car, pressing the gas pedal, turning the steering wheel and going around in circles with a bunch of other losers does not make you an athlete. A glorified motorist with a colorful jumpsuit, yes; a legitimate, well-conditioned professional athlete with actual athletic skills, no. Biffle is certainly free to say what he wants, so long as he realizes that his opinion doesn’t matter - at least no more than any person you’d talk to on the street. I value the views of the neighborhood butcher, the crossing guard outside the local elementary school or the guy who fixes my lawnmower as much as I do Biffle’s thoughts on the Vick case. Now if G. Biffle wants to weigh in on what the best kind of spark plugs are or how often I should rotate the tires on my car, I’m all ears. Otherwise, Biffle, know your role……AND SHUT YOUR MOUTH!
- Internet squatters are one of the lower life forms on this planet, mostly because they look to buy up domain names they know companies and organizations will want in the future and then try to extort massive payments out of those companies and organizations in exchange for the rights to those domain names. In other words, they’re trying to earn a lot of money for doing nothing other than being a greedy weasel. That level of low-lifeness was taken even lower by Keith Malley, a man from New York who pirated the www.thesimpsonsmovie.com IP address, used it to divert people to a porn site and his own personal perverted site and then tried to bilk Twentieth Century Fox out of $50,000 for rights to the name. The World Intellectual Property Organization, a U.N. agency dealing in these types of matters, ruled that Malley must turn over the domain name to Fox and cannot force the company to pay him for it. Too bad for you, Malley, but you got exactly what you deserved: nothing. Just because Fox is a massive international company with deep pockets doesn’t mean you get to rip them off. Next time, come up wit a better scam, one that doesn’t involve you funneling unsuspecting Internet users to sites promoting sexual freakery.
- You’re going to be floored by this next piece of news, so brace yourself. Documents acquired by senators investigating Alberto Gonzales litany of lies, misdeeds and misconduct as attorney general directly contradict statements ol’ Alberto made in a hearing just a few days ago. Where have I seen this before…..oh right, last time Gonzales testified before Congress. He doesn’t seem to be able to tell the truth much in these kinds of settings or in any other settings for that matter. Actually, Congress might want to hit Alberto with a heavy dose of sodium pentathal before he testifies again, otherwise the lying is likely to keep on going. The new documents given to senators show that eight congressional leaders were briefed about the W. administration’s terrorist surveillance program on the eve of its expiration in 2004, directly contradicting statements Gonzales made before Senate committee earlier this week. At that hearing, Gonzales repeatedly insisted that the meeting in question had nothing to do with the surveillance program, but rather focused on an ambiguous, undefined intelligence program that he refused to discuss or elaborate on. Right, because that sounds soooo convincing. “No guys, that meeting was about a double-secret, top-level classified intelligence program that I really can't talk about.” How convenient for you, Mr. Gonzales, and by convenient I mean it was a blatant and obvious lie designed to disguise more of your own illegal and unethical actions. This isn't going very well for you, A., so maybe you should stop lying for a while and just shoot straight with the senators and the American public. I know it’s a new concept and it’s scary, but it’s your best option.
- I’m thankful to see that Cleveland Browns draft pick Brady Quinn has his priorities in order. While holding out from training camp and demanding that the Browns pay him like a top-five pick even though he was picked 22nd because he believes he was a top-five talent and the team had him rated as such, Quinn is busy appearing at area malls, signing autographs for $75 and also appearing on local sports talk radio shows. Instead of signing a rookie contract in line with the spot where he was picked, Quinn and his representatives continue to demand that he be paid for how talented they think he is and where they think he should have been picked. Sorry guys, but that’s not how this works. The NFL isn't a league where you can tell people how much you think you deserve and they blindly follow along even when there’s direct, contradictory evidence right at hand. Furthermore, Quinn looks like an idiot for holding out when he could very well have had a shot at winning a starting job if he had been in camp on time and performed to the high level that he thinks he should be paid at. Browns fans are tired of having a crappy team and they’re not going to have a lot of sympathy for a guy who could help their team but elects to put his own bank account ahead of getting on the field and being part of that team. The reality is that if Quinn is as good as he and his stool pigeons say he is and his performance on the field reflects that, then he’ll get the money he’s after - he just needs to prove it.
- Missing your flight sucks, period. For a traveler, there’s no worse feeling than rushing to get to the gate in time, only to realize that you’ve missed the plane and now you’re not going to get where you need to go on time. Sometimes you miss a flight and it’s your fault, sometimes it’s circumstances beyond your control, but either way, throwing out a bomb threat for the plane you were supposed to be on and missed is an unacceptable way to deal with the situation. This incredibly intelligent, thoughtful plot was hatched by an unidentified man at the Seattle-Tacoma Airport who missed a departing Northwest Airlines flight on Wednesday. What exactly are you hoping to accomplish by doing that? Like you’re going to force the plane to turn around and come back, then admit you were kidding and say, “Hey, since the plane is back, just go ahead a let me on board?” Bad news, you ginormous tool, when you make a bomb threat, whether it’s legit or fake, there’s one place you’re going and it’s not aboard a plane - it’s jail, moron. Perhaps this dude was looking to exact some revenge on the airline for having its flight take off on time when he was running late. If so, he sure showed them, eh? They brought the plane back and then sent it on its way, while this guy gets to face criminal charges for his brilliant bomb-threat plan. Sounds like an even exchange to me………..
- For those pointing to NASCAR driver Greg Biffle as the first “pro athlete” to speak out in condemnation of Michael Vick and his alleged involvement in a dog fighting ring, I have to say that you are all dead wrong. To make that statement is to make one critical assumption that is in fact very, very inaccurate: that race car drivers are in fact athletes. For the one millionth time, sitting in the driver’s seat of a car, pressing the gas pedal, turning the steering wheel and going around in circles with a bunch of other losers does not make you an athlete. A glorified motorist with a colorful jumpsuit, yes; a legitimate, well-conditioned professional athlete with actual athletic skills, no. Biffle is certainly free to say what he wants, so long as he realizes that his opinion doesn’t matter - at least no more than any person you’d talk to on the street. I value the views of the neighborhood butcher, the crossing guard outside the local elementary school or the guy who fixes my lawnmower as much as I do Biffle’s thoughts on the Vick case. Now if G. Biffle wants to weigh in on what the best kind of spark plugs are or how often I should rotate the tires on my car, I’m all ears. Otherwise, Biffle, know your role……AND SHUT YOUR MOUTH!
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
Bigots still exist, the iPhone disappoints and Alberto Gonzales lies...again....and again....and again
- Six months ago, Ian Johnson was part of the best college football game I’ve seen in years and one of the best underdog stories in sports, period, when he scored the winning two-point conversion in Boise State’s Fiesta Bowl win over national power Oklahoma. After scoring the winning conversion, Johnson immediately made his way through the end zone, over to the sideline where he dropped down on one knee and proposed to girlfriend Chrissy Popadics, a Boise State cheerleader. It was a cool capper for an amazing night of football and a genuine feel-good story all around. It’s continued to be a feel-good story…..right up to the point where Johnson and Popadics were forced to hire security guards for their wedding this weekend because they have received death threats based on the fact that Johnson, a black guy, is marrying a white girl. That’s right, some backwoods, backwater, backwards, socially retarded thinkers out there have been so incredibly classless, socially stunted and small-minded as to send death threats to two college kids because they’re getting married and are of different racial backgrounds. It wouldn’t surprise me if some of those threats came from people who regularly wear hoods and giant white sheets, if you catch my drift, but there’s never, ever any excuse for anything like this. Even if you want to hold an outdated, bigoted and just plain wrong belief such as the belief that interracial marriages are wrong, you have no right at all to threaten, harass or even belittle those who enter into such a relationship. The biggest issue you should have with a wedding is what music to play at the reception, what color to make the bridesmaid dresses, etc. - not how many security guards to hire. As much of a long shot as it is, I hope that the police are able to find out who is making these death threats and prosecutes them to the fullest extent, because that type of backwards-thinking, racist person is hurting society a lot more than they are contributing to it.
- So maybe the new iPhone from Apple isn't the be all, end all of technological marvels that it was supposed to be. Numbers released yesterday by AT&T show that in the first two days after the iPhone’s release last month, a significantly lower number of the new phones were sold and activated than had been predicted. Analysts had theorized that as many as 500,000 iPhones would be sold the first few days, but the actual total ended up being 146,000. In related news, shares of Apple stock closed down $8.81 a share Tuesday, a 6.1 percent drop that put the value of an individual share at $134.89. Of all the possible results for the release of the iPhone, selling less than a third of the number of new phones than was predicted wasn’t one of the more expected outcomes. Glitches and bugs in the phone, maybe. Problems with service and reception on the phone, also plausible. But that hundreds of thousands of people would look at the iPhone, see what it has to offer and say, “Nah, I’ll pass,” wasn’t what most people expected.
- As a regular user of Facebook, I was surprised to hear that a rival site is suing Facebook creator Mark Zuckerberg for allegedly stealing their idea. The three founders of ConnectU, a social networking site similar
to Facebook, have sued Zuckerberg on the basis that they originally came up with the concept he used for the site and asked Zuckerberg to finish the computer code for their project while all of them were students at Harvard. Instead, the plaintiffs contend that he repeatedly stalled and put them off, only to pirate their idea and pass it off as his own. The lawsuit they filed will be heard at the U.S. District Court in Boston and the suit asks the court to shutter Facebook and give control of the company and its assets to the three founders of ConnectU. Part of me wants to ask if these three just finished watching The Italian Job on DVD and were inspired by Seth Green’s character’s continual claims that he was the real Napster and that Shawn Fanning stole the idea while both were students at…..Harvard. Either way, these three had better hope they have documented proof that they had the idea first, because unless they can provide more than a case of their word versus Zuckerberg’s, their lawsuit is going to be bounced quickly and with prejudice.
- The tenure of Alberto Gonzales as U.S. Attorney General was summed up nicely by a group of senators questioning him at hearings on Capitol Hill, with that summation coming in the form of two words: unqualified and deceitful. Gonzales’ part in the firing of eight federal prosecutors and his role in W.’s federal eavesdropping program have been under intense scrutiny mostly because he’s clearly done illegal things and lied about them repeatedly. For four hours on Tuesday, senators grilled Gonzales about a number of things, including allegations that he pressured a hospitalized attorney general into approving a counterterror program that the Justice Department considered illegal. As is his custom, Gonzales evaded, double-talked or outright refused to answer many questions. “It’s hard to see anything but a pattern of intentionally misleading Congress again and again,” criticized Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis. Nobody knows lying and deceit better than Congress, so if Sen. Feingold says something like that, I’m going to go ahead and believe it to be true. Well, to be fair, I’ve seen enough of the testimony ol’ Alberto has given to see his pattern of hemming, hawing and double-talking to know that he’s a lying sack of s**t. Hopefully this hearing will restart the pressure on Gonzales and his crew for all they’ve done, especially the illegal and politically motivated firings of those eight attorneys general. Ah, the W. administration……….it’s FAN-tastic!
- It’s not a good day for social networking sites, because not only is Facebook facing a federal lawsuit, MySpace is in the spotlight because it now appears that the site, best described as an adolescent version of Facebook, is an even bigger haven for pedophiles than originally thought. An internal investigation by MySpace found more then 29,000 registered sex offenders with profiles on the site, more than four times the number the company had initially estimated. North Carolina State Attorney General Roy Cooper and his colleagues had recently demanded that the News Corp.-owned site provide detailed information about how many sex offenders were registered on MySpace and where they live, but I doubt that either Cooper or MySpace execs were expecting such a disturbingly high number of sexual deviants and freaks. Anyone who has ever had an account on MySpace, well that’s a different story. I think anyone who has used the site even a bit would think that 29,000 might be seriously underselling things.
- What’s the big fuss? Who doesn’t have $207 million in spare change laying around their house? For some reason, when police discovered that amount of money at the Mexico City home of Maryland businessman Zhenli Ye Gon, they got suspicious and that suspicion culminated in Gon’s arrest on Monday on charges of operating one of the biggest drug trafficking rings ever discovered in the Western Hemisphere. Gon allegedly was in charge of an operation that supplied the main chemical ingredient in making meth. He was arrested in a restaurant in Silver Springs, Md. and something tells me he’s going to have a hard time making a case for his innocence. There aren't a lot of ways to legally accumulate $207 million and those who do earn that kind of cash legally don’t tend to keep it in physical form at their home. Those people - the Paul Allens, Warren Buffetts and Bill Gates of the world - they usually keep their hundreds of millions of dollars in banks and investments. And of course, this is definitely going to drive up the price of meth, so all my druggie readers will want to make sure they’re stocked up before prices start soaring…...kidding. I don’t have that many druggie readers, I don’t think…………
- So maybe the new iPhone from Apple isn't the be all, end all of technological marvels that it was supposed to be. Numbers released yesterday by AT&T show that in the first two days after the iPhone’s release last month, a significantly lower number of the new phones were sold and activated than had been predicted. Analysts had theorized that as many as 500,000 iPhones would be sold the first few days, but the actual total ended up being 146,000. In related news, shares of Apple stock closed down $8.81 a share Tuesday, a 6.1 percent drop that put the value of an individual share at $134.89. Of all the possible results for the release of the iPhone, selling less than a third of the number of new phones than was predicted wasn’t one of the more expected outcomes. Glitches and bugs in the phone, maybe. Problems with service and reception on the phone, also plausible. But that hundreds of thousands of people would look at the iPhone, see what it has to offer and say, “Nah, I’ll pass,” wasn’t what most people expected.
- As a regular user of Facebook, I was surprised to hear that a rival site is suing Facebook creator Mark Zuckerberg for allegedly stealing their idea. The three founders of ConnectU, a social networking site similar
to Facebook, have sued Zuckerberg on the basis that they originally came up with the concept he used for the site and asked Zuckerberg to finish the computer code for their project while all of them were students at Harvard. Instead, the plaintiffs contend that he repeatedly stalled and put them off, only to pirate their idea and pass it off as his own. The lawsuit they filed will be heard at the U.S. District Court in Boston and the suit asks the court to shutter Facebook and give control of the company and its assets to the three founders of ConnectU. Part of me wants to ask if these three just finished watching The Italian Job on DVD and were inspired by Seth Green’s character’s continual claims that he was the real Napster and that Shawn Fanning stole the idea while both were students at…..Harvard. Either way, these three had better hope they have documented proof that they had the idea first, because unless they can provide more than a case of their word versus Zuckerberg’s, their lawsuit is going to be bounced quickly and with prejudice.
- The tenure of Alberto Gonzales as U.S. Attorney General was summed up nicely by a group of senators questioning him at hearings on Capitol Hill, with that summation coming in the form of two words: unqualified and deceitful. Gonzales’ part in the firing of eight federal prosecutors and his role in W.’s federal eavesdropping program have been under intense scrutiny mostly because he’s clearly done illegal things and lied about them repeatedly. For four hours on Tuesday, senators grilled Gonzales about a number of things, including allegations that he pressured a hospitalized attorney general into approving a counterterror program that the Justice Department considered illegal. As is his custom, Gonzales evaded, double-talked or outright refused to answer many questions. “It’s hard to see anything but a pattern of intentionally misleading Congress again and again,” criticized Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis. Nobody knows lying and deceit better than Congress, so if Sen. Feingold says something like that, I’m going to go ahead and believe it to be true. Well, to be fair, I’ve seen enough of the testimony ol’ Alberto has given to see his pattern of hemming, hawing and double-talking to know that he’s a lying sack of s**t. Hopefully this hearing will restart the pressure on Gonzales and his crew for all they’ve done, especially the illegal and politically motivated firings of those eight attorneys general. Ah, the W. administration……….it’s FAN-tastic!
- It’s not a good day for social networking sites, because not only is Facebook facing a federal lawsuit, MySpace is in the spotlight because it now appears that the site, best described as an adolescent version of Facebook, is an even bigger haven for pedophiles than originally thought. An internal investigation by MySpace found more then 29,000 registered sex offenders with profiles on the site, more than four times the number the company had initially estimated. North Carolina State Attorney General Roy Cooper and his colleagues had recently demanded that the News Corp.-owned site provide detailed information about how many sex offenders were registered on MySpace and where they live, but I doubt that either Cooper or MySpace execs were expecting such a disturbingly high number of sexual deviants and freaks. Anyone who has ever had an account on MySpace, well that’s a different story. I think anyone who has used the site even a bit would think that 29,000 might be seriously underselling things.
- What’s the big fuss? Who doesn’t have $207 million in spare change laying around their house? For some reason, when police discovered that amount of money at the Mexico City home of Maryland businessman Zhenli Ye Gon, they got suspicious and that suspicion culminated in Gon’s arrest on Monday on charges of operating one of the biggest drug trafficking rings ever discovered in the Western Hemisphere. Gon allegedly was in charge of an operation that supplied the main chemical ingredient in making meth. He was arrested in a restaurant in Silver Springs, Md. and something tells me he’s going to have a hard time making a case for his innocence. There aren't a lot of ways to legally accumulate $207 million and those who do earn that kind of cash legally don’t tend to keep it in physical form at their home. Those people - the Paul Allens, Warren Buffetts and Bill Gates of the world - they usually keep their hundreds of millions of dollars in banks and investments. And of course, this is definitely going to drive up the price of meth, so all my druggie readers will want to make sure they’re stocked up before prices start soaring…...kidding. I don’t have that many druggie readers, I don’t think…………
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
Thoughts on last night's Greek, today's NBA news and 2008's presidential election
- Last night was another good episode for the new ABC Family series Greek, which makes the show three for three so far. Maybe this is a cynical way to view it, but if I’ve watched three episodes of a show and not once said to myself, “Hey, this kinda sucks right now,” then I’d qualify that series as successful. Aside from the continued hint, hint and wink, wink suggestions that Calvin, a friend of main character Rusty and a pledge for a rival fraternity, is gay and the fact that the show keeps going out of its way to drop heavy-handed hints and clues about it without any of the characters actually picking up on it, which is getting old quickly, I don’t have any gripes. Actor Jacob Zachar, cast in the role of Rusty, an uber-geek if there ever was one, is a perfect fit…….right down to the most pipe cleaner-ish, pasty white arms and legs I’ve ever seen. Seriously, the scene in this week’s episode with Rusty in the gym, trying to lift weights and hit on girls, was hilarious on several levels, not the least of which is the fact that his arms appear to be about two centimeters in diameter at most. The show is also aspiring to levels higher than the usual college show about sex, partying and slackers, attempting (successfully for the most part) to mix in interesting dramatic elements like the relationship between Rusty’s sister, Casey and her boyfriend Evan after he cheated on her. Also, the writers and producers are doing a good job of giving some depth to Rusty, keeping his geeky core while also making him funny, likeable and believable. His decision not to have sex with a girl his fraternity brother Cappie set him up with for the expressed purpose of having sex was somewhat predictable, but it still made him a more sympathetic character overall. With Traveler done for the summer, Greek is the lone show left that I recommend watching for the duration of the summer, so if you missed this week’s episode you can watch, tape or TiVo it on Friday at 9 p.m. on ABC.
- NBA Commissioner David Stern has spent years building as reputation as a smart, polished, smooth and slightly arrogant man, a man very much in charge of his empire. As such, it was jarring to see Stern at the podium today as he addressed the scandal involving former NBA referee Tim Donaghy and Donaghy’s alleged gambling indiscretions that may involve him shaving points and/or affecting the outcome of games he refereed. Stern tried to lay out the league’s policies in relation to gambling and their investigation into a series of misdeeds and misconduct by Donaghy over the past year, but clearly he was rattled and on edge as he spoke. The confident, poised expression was gone and he looked thoroughly overwhelmed as he attempted to pin all of the blame on Donaghy as one rogue, out-of-line ref who in no way an indication of a larger problem in the NBA. This stance does beg the question of how Stern can say this for sure when the league clearly had no idea that Donaghy was altering the outcomes of games prior to a few months ago. If they didn’t know he was doing it, why should we believe the league would know if other officials were as well? By Stern’s own admission, Donaghy was considered one of the NBA’s better referees, so if that’s the case, they thought he was doing a good job even as he was messing with point spreads, making intentionally bad calls and generally kowtowing to the orders of bookies he owed money to. The NBA needs to be honest and face up to the seriousness of the dilemma it’s smack dab in the middle of, because this isn't something they can just pin totally on Donaghy and wash their hands of. It’s bigger than that, so Stern and Co. need to deal with that reality.
- Memo to all candidates in the 2008 presidential election: If you want to win, one guaranteed in with millions of voters will be making sure that the new two-year plan formulated by American military commanders for Iraq doesn’t play out fully. In about 18 months, our new president will take office (thank God!) and if that new president can assure the American public that this buffoonish two-year plan is shortened and that American troops will be coming home prior to that two-year mark, that will win him major points with many, many voters (definitely with me). I realize that with the tool we currently have in office, our military needs to plan out for a future that includes their presence in Iraq, but just because they formulate a strategy for the next two years doesn’t mean we need to follow it out to its bitter end. W. is probably slightly pissed that it’s only a two-year plan; that idiot was probably hoping for a seven or eight-year plan at minimum. You suck, W., and the 2008 election can't come soon enough.
- File this under the heading of great cause, bad execution. Music legends Quincy Jones and Russell Simmons, along with fashion icon Tommy Hilfiger, are organizing a concert to raise funds for a Martin Luther King Jr. monument on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. It’s a terrific idea, one that’s long overdue…..but when the headliners for your concert are the beefy, makeup-hawking Queen Latifah, Garth Brooks and Kenny “Babyface” Edmonds, exactly who are you honoring? MLK was a great man, a civil rights pioneer and someone we would all do well to emulate, so why get a portly, waaaay-past-her-prime female rapper, a country musician who’s even further past his prime and a guy who hasn’t had even a minor hit in the past five years? What, was Wilson Phillips not available? Could Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch or Vanilla Ice or O-Town not be secured for a performance? I sincerely hope this monument is financed and built very soon, but I can’t help but feel bad that such an amazing and powerful leader is being “honored” by such a crappy slate of performers.
- A big, heart yawn goes out for the announcement of Drew Carey as the new host of The Price is Right. I didn’t care about the show when Bob Barker hosted it, so I certainly don’t care about it now that a B-list, overweight actor whose main claim to fame is hosting an improv comedy show that’s a copycat of a British show from about a decade and a half ago. Seeing Drew and his trademark horn-rimmed glasses explain Plink-O and the giant wheel to contestants and challenge them to guess the price of laundry detergent and baked beans just doesn’t float my boat. I just wonder if like B. Barker, Drew has free reign to grope, flirt with and hit on all of the showcase models, or if that was a privilege reserved for the old man only. Congrats on the big break, I guess, just know that it’s pretty much a concession that you’re giving up on your acting career and admitting that hosting crappy game and comedy shows that require little or no actual talent is the best you can hope for.
- NBA Commissioner David Stern has spent years building as reputation as a smart, polished, smooth and slightly arrogant man, a man very much in charge of his empire. As such, it was jarring to see Stern at the podium today as he addressed the scandal involving former NBA referee Tim Donaghy and Donaghy’s alleged gambling indiscretions that may involve him shaving points and/or affecting the outcome of games he refereed. Stern tried to lay out the league’s policies in relation to gambling and their investigation into a series of misdeeds and misconduct by Donaghy over the past year, but clearly he was rattled and on edge as he spoke. The confident, poised expression was gone and he looked thoroughly overwhelmed as he attempted to pin all of the blame on Donaghy as one rogue, out-of-line ref who in no way an indication of a larger problem in the NBA. This stance does beg the question of how Stern can say this for sure when the league clearly had no idea that Donaghy was altering the outcomes of games prior to a few months ago. If they didn’t know he was doing it, why should we believe the league would know if other officials were as well? By Stern’s own admission, Donaghy was considered one of the NBA’s better referees, so if that’s the case, they thought he was doing a good job even as he was messing with point spreads, making intentionally bad calls and generally kowtowing to the orders of bookies he owed money to. The NBA needs to be honest and face up to the seriousness of the dilemma it’s smack dab in the middle of, because this isn't something they can just pin totally on Donaghy and wash their hands of. It’s bigger than that, so Stern and Co. need to deal with that reality.
- Memo to all candidates in the 2008 presidential election: If you want to win, one guaranteed in with millions of voters will be making sure that the new two-year plan formulated by American military commanders for Iraq doesn’t play out fully. In about 18 months, our new president will take office (thank God!) and if that new president can assure the American public that this buffoonish two-year plan is shortened and that American troops will be coming home prior to that two-year mark, that will win him major points with many, many voters (definitely with me). I realize that with the tool we currently have in office, our military needs to plan out for a future that includes their presence in Iraq, but just because they formulate a strategy for the next two years doesn’t mean we need to follow it out to its bitter end. W. is probably slightly pissed that it’s only a two-year plan; that idiot was probably hoping for a seven or eight-year plan at minimum. You suck, W., and the 2008 election can't come soon enough.
- File this under the heading of great cause, bad execution. Music legends Quincy Jones and Russell Simmons, along with fashion icon Tommy Hilfiger, are organizing a concert to raise funds for a Martin Luther King Jr. monument on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. It’s a terrific idea, one that’s long overdue…..but when the headliners for your concert are the beefy, makeup-hawking Queen Latifah, Garth Brooks and Kenny “Babyface” Edmonds, exactly who are you honoring? MLK was a great man, a civil rights pioneer and someone we would all do well to emulate, so why get a portly, waaaay-past-her-prime female rapper, a country musician who’s even further past his prime and a guy who hasn’t had even a minor hit in the past five years? What, was Wilson Phillips not available? Could Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch or Vanilla Ice or O-Town not be secured for a performance? I sincerely hope this monument is financed and built very soon, but I can’t help but feel bad that such an amazing and powerful leader is being “honored” by such a crappy slate of performers.
- A big, heart yawn goes out for the announcement of Drew Carey as the new host of The Price is Right. I didn’t care about the show when Bob Barker hosted it, so I certainly don’t care about it now that a B-list, overweight actor whose main claim to fame is hosting an improv comedy show that’s a copycat of a British show from about a decade and a half ago. Seeing Drew and his trademark horn-rimmed glasses explain Plink-O and the giant wheel to contestants and challenge them to guess the price of laundry detergent and baked beans just doesn’t float my boat. I just wonder if like B. Barker, Drew has free reign to grope, flirt with and hit on all of the showcase models, or if that was a privilege reserved for the old man only. Congrats on the big break, I guess, just know that it’s pretty much a concession that you’re giving up on your acting career and admitting that hosting crappy game and comedy shows that require little or no actual talent is the best you can hope for.
Monday, July 23, 2007
Canned meat recalled, a horrible movie is box officer leader and Hugo Chavez fires back at those calling him a dictator....by being a dictator
- Curt Schilling has an opinion on everything, baseball and non-baseball, so most of the time I read a comment of his on a particular topic and go on my way, nonplussed. However, his recent comments about the idea that he could sign with the New York Yankees caught my attention because they highlight something that’s been bothering me recently. Schilling said he could never play for the Yankees because doing so would be “phony and disingenuous” and would invalidate his years playing with the Yankees’ archrival Boston Red Sox. Left unsaid by Schill but clearly seen in the subtext of his comments is a scathing condemnation of former teammate Johnny Damon, who did the very thing that Schilling says would make him phony and disingenuous. Damon bolted the Red Sox for the Yankees following Boston’s 2004 World Series title, choosing a 4-year, $60 million contract over staying with a team where he was a cult hero. Seeing Damon with the Yankees now is one of the most disheartening, pathetic things I’ve experienced as a baseball fan lately. He went from being one of the self-proclaimed “Idiots” with the 2004 Red Sox to a cleaned-up corporate sellout with the Yankees. Gone are the Idiot trademarks of long, flowing hair, a scraggly beard and a general goofy demeanor; in their place are a neat, tight, heavily-producted ‘do, no beard and a buttoned-up, boardroom persona that are just detestable. Damon is a shell of his former self on the field as well, mostly reduced to being a designated hitter and almost never playing center field where he made a name for himself with a reckless, all-out style in Boston and Oakland. For once I agree with Schilling, because no matter how much money Big Stein gives you, signing with the Yankees will always be selling out and selling a piece of your baseball soul in the process.
- Welcome to Venezuela, where you can keep your freakin’ mouth shut or you can leave. That alluring, inviting new slogan for tourism that I am so generously bequeathing to the Venezuelan board of tourism comes courtesy of inspiration provided by President Hugo Chavez, who says that any foreigners who publicly criticize him or the country’s government while in Venezuela will be expelled from its borders. Chavez, ever the overbearing dictator and oppressor, ordered Venezuelan officials to closely monitor international figures on visits to the South American nation and boot them out if they speak out against Chavez and his administration. “How long are we going to allow a person - from any country in the world - to come to our own house and say there’s a dictatorship here, that the president is a tyrant and nobody does anything about it?” Chavez whined. Points for going to the “Protect this house!” card, Hugo, I can see someone has been brushing up on his Under Armour commercials. But you’re right, what better way to show that you’re not an oppressive, fascist dictator than to take away the rights of visitors to your country to speak out against your oppressive, fascist, dictatorial ways? Nothing says free and easy, relaxed and friendly ruler of a nation quite like putting a gag order on anyone who dares dissent with your political views. Should I go ahead and assume that I am not welcome in Venezuela? This is quite frankly a very disappointing development because a while ago, I had thought Mr. Chavez and I were on the same page. He went to the U.N. and openly denounced W. for a variety of political reasons and I said to myself, “Now there is a smart, thoughtful guy!” But now H. Chavez goes and does something like this and he and I are once again at odds. Thanks for ruining what could have been a truly beautiful friendship, Hugo.
- So there weren't any good movie released over this past weekend…….and how do I know this, you ask? Did I go and see all of the new releases in theaters and use that firsthand knowledge to formulate an informed opinion? No, I simply looked at the top of the box office earnings list for the weekend, saw that I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry was the top-grossing movie and correctly deduced that if such an abysmal, clichéd, canned hack job of a movie was the one that the most people went to see, then there must not have been any good flicks hitting theaters the past few days. This movie has accurately been described as what you’d get if you rounded up all of the worst, lamest gay jokes you and your friends have ever told and threw them all into one script, mixed with a pathetic plot and not much else. Sorry to the producers of this movie, but as hot as Jessica Biel is, she’s not hot enough for me to pay ten bucks to go and watch your crappy movie for two hours just to see her. I knew that the lull between Ocean’s Thirteen, Transformers and the rest of the early-summer blockbusters and The Bourne Ultimatum on August 3 was going to be a down time for movies, I just didn’t know it was going to be this bad…………
- Would you have guessed that there would be a major recall of canned meat products in America and Spam wouldn’t be involved? It’s true, the long-running butt of canned meat-related jokes is clear of this story, which involves Georgia-based meat processing company Castleberry Food Co. recalling more than 80 brands of stew, chili, corned beef hash and other meat products in connection with a botulism outbreak. This is in addition to ten other brands of meat products the company had already recalled after consumers reported illnesses coming after consuming them. This would be yet another illustration of the truth in the old saying, “Never eat any meat that comes out of a can.”
- Wow…..I may openly and continually ridicule the dorky, loser-ish actions of Harry Potter fans as they dress up in costumes despite being middle-aged adults, but it’s still amazing to note that the last installment of the popular children’s book series sold 8.3 million copies in its first day on store shelves. Even great books by well-known and accomplished authors like Tom Clancy, John Feinstein and John Grisham don’t reach that type of lofty number in their entire run in stores and online, yet J.K. Rowling has sold that many books in one day. Thankfully, from pictures I have seen, many of the buyers are children or at least adults dressed normally, so it could be worse. Also worth noting is the fact that at $290 million in sales, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows brought in more than three times as much as the last Harry Potter movie did in theaters. Still, I am proud to say that I am one of the select few, someone who has never read a single word of any of these books or seen even a second of one of the movies in the series. For those of you who have, I do wonder what will fill the empty void in your lives now that no new Harry Potter books are on the horizon………..
- Welcome to Venezuela, where you can keep your freakin’ mouth shut or you can leave. That alluring, inviting new slogan for tourism that I am so generously bequeathing to the Venezuelan board of tourism comes courtesy of inspiration provided by President Hugo Chavez, who says that any foreigners who publicly criticize him or the country’s government while in Venezuela will be expelled from its borders. Chavez, ever the overbearing dictator and oppressor, ordered Venezuelan officials to closely monitor international figures on visits to the South American nation and boot them out if they speak out against Chavez and his administration. “How long are we going to allow a person - from any country in the world - to come to our own house and say there’s a dictatorship here, that the president is a tyrant and nobody does anything about it?” Chavez whined. Points for going to the “Protect this house!” card, Hugo, I can see someone has been brushing up on his Under Armour commercials. But you’re right, what better way to show that you’re not an oppressive, fascist dictator than to take away the rights of visitors to your country to speak out against your oppressive, fascist, dictatorial ways? Nothing says free and easy, relaxed and friendly ruler of a nation quite like putting a gag order on anyone who dares dissent with your political views. Should I go ahead and assume that I am not welcome in Venezuela? This is quite frankly a very disappointing development because a while ago, I had thought Mr. Chavez and I were on the same page. He went to the U.N. and openly denounced W. for a variety of political reasons and I said to myself, “Now there is a smart, thoughtful guy!” But now H. Chavez goes and does something like this and he and I are once again at odds. Thanks for ruining what could have been a truly beautiful friendship, Hugo.
- So there weren't any good movie released over this past weekend…….and how do I know this, you ask? Did I go and see all of the new releases in theaters and use that firsthand knowledge to formulate an informed opinion? No, I simply looked at the top of the box office earnings list for the weekend, saw that I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry was the top-grossing movie and correctly deduced that if such an abysmal, clichéd, canned hack job of a movie was the one that the most people went to see, then there must not have been any good flicks hitting theaters the past few days. This movie has accurately been described as what you’d get if you rounded up all of the worst, lamest gay jokes you and your friends have ever told and threw them all into one script, mixed with a pathetic plot and not much else. Sorry to the producers of this movie, but as hot as Jessica Biel is, she’s not hot enough for me to pay ten bucks to go and watch your crappy movie for two hours just to see her. I knew that the lull between Ocean’s Thirteen, Transformers and the rest of the early-summer blockbusters and The Bourne Ultimatum on August 3 was going to be a down time for movies, I just didn’t know it was going to be this bad…………
- Would you have guessed that there would be a major recall of canned meat products in America and Spam wouldn’t be involved? It’s true, the long-running butt of canned meat-related jokes is clear of this story, which involves Georgia-based meat processing company Castleberry Food Co. recalling more than 80 brands of stew, chili, corned beef hash and other meat products in connection with a botulism outbreak. This is in addition to ten other brands of meat products the company had already recalled after consumers reported illnesses coming after consuming them. This would be yet another illustration of the truth in the old saying, “Never eat any meat that comes out of a can.”
- Wow…..I may openly and continually ridicule the dorky, loser-ish actions of Harry Potter fans as they dress up in costumes despite being middle-aged adults, but it’s still amazing to note that the last installment of the popular children’s book series sold 8.3 million copies in its first day on store shelves. Even great books by well-known and accomplished authors like Tom Clancy, John Feinstein and John Grisham don’t reach that type of lofty number in their entire run in stores and online, yet J.K. Rowling has sold that many books in one day. Thankfully, from pictures I have seen, many of the buyers are children or at least adults dressed normally, so it could be worse. Also worth noting is the fact that at $290 million in sales, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows brought in more than three times as much as the last Harry Potter movie did in theaters. Still, I am proud to say that I am one of the select few, someone who has never read a single word of any of these books or seen even a second of one of the movies in the series. For those of you who have, I do wonder what will fill the empty void in your lives now that no new Harry Potter books are on the horizon………..
Sunday, July 22, 2007
Smashing Pumpkins return, Esai Morales joins a dubious club and soccer falls flat on its face in L.A.
- Bill Corgan is not one of the more beloved figures in the music world. That’ll happen when you date a loud, belligerent lightning rod of a woman like Courtney Love, as Corgan did before Love married Kurt Cobain. The perception of arrogance and over-the-top showmanship that Corgan is tagged with doesn’t help either, so when Billy reforms Smashing Pumpkins for a new album after several years doing solo projects and albums with other project bands, some people are going to rip the album no matter what simply because they dislike Corgan. I’m not one of those people and even though I’m not the world’s biggest Pumpkins fan, Zeitgeist is a good (not great) album that I’d rank somewhere between 7 and 8 on a scale of 1 to 10. The first single off the album, “Tarantula”, showcases the arena rock, hard-charging style that has been visible on most of the Pumpkins’ popular songs over the past decade-plus, but the album overall suffers from Corgan’s superficial, no-thought-involved lyrical style that shows little to no creativity on most songs. Longtime Pumpkins fans will find enough on the disc to enjoy it and not completely regret buying it, but it’s not an album that’s going to win over any new converts. It will probably accomplish its goal; namely making Corgan and mates a lot more money in album sales and touring revenue, but beyond that it will go down as just another rock album that was good, not great.
- Actor Esai Morales, welcome to the Ron Mexico Club. Ron Mexico, you may remember, was the fake name used by Atlanta Falcons quarterback and accused dogfighter and dog murderer Michael Vick when he was traveling out of the country and had sex with a woman, infecting her with herpes (allegedly). Morales stands accused of doing the same - well, sans the fake name part of the equation - by former girlfriend Elizabeth Mazzocchi. She is suing Morales for $25,000 based on charges that he assaulted her and intentionally infected her with herpes, a charge that Morales disputes. Well, that would be the ultimate “screw you” to an ex-girlfriend who treated you like crap……..but here’s hoping that those charges aren't true. A question for Mazzocchi, though: How is it that if Morales had herpes you never got it while the two of your were dating and presumably sleeping together? Are you trying to tell me that he went out and got herpes after you two broke up (either intentionally or otherwise) and then came back to have sex with you so he could infect you? I’m going to go ahead and say that I highly doubt this claim, it sounds a lot more like a cash grab than a legitimate lawsuit.
- So a female president has finally been elected……in India. Pratibha Patil, a congresswoman, lawyer and former governor of the northern state of Rajasthan, was elected as the country’s first female president on Saturday. One caveat is that in India, president is a mostly ceremonial position, with the country’s prime minister shouldering more of the executive responsibility and wielding more power (oh, that president was such a hollow, powerless post in the United States right about now…….). I have to say, I hope America follows this trend…….just not in the upcoming election. That would be because the only female candidate in this election will be Sen. Hank Clinton, D-N.Y. and I don’t think any of us want to be subjected to the true horror that we would experience if that vitriolic, abrasive, venomous shrew were elected as our next president. But if Patil’s election leads to advances for women in India, then two thumbs up for it.
- Soccer, feel the excitement! Wait…..you don’t feel it? Damn, neither do I. However, according to ESPN and the cadre of celebrities who filed into the Home Depot Center last night, we should all be verrrry excited about soccer and more specifically about the alleged savior of the sport in America, David Beckham. One quick aside: In order to save something, doesn’t it have to have been alive and breathing at some point? But Becks arrived amid much self-serving, unwarranted hype from ESPN and the broadcast kicked off with a half-hour special on Beckham coming to America, with announcers Rob Stone and Julie Foud-a-stain or whatever her name is trying to draw parallels between Becks and other great athletes who have “saved” their respective sports…..with the only difference being those athletes weren't ten years past their prime and the sports they were saving were sports Americans actually gave a crap about. Even so, with notable celebs like Katie Holmes, Kevin Garnett and Wayne Gretzky on hand, this had to be a great evening, right? Umm, sure if you love lots of Euros running around on a big patch of grass, kicking a black and white ball in arbitrary directions and showing exactly zero proficiency for putting said ball into the goal. Becks played an uninspiring ten minutes, just enough to claim he actually made the effort to play but not enough to keep the new “fans” who had tuned in interested enough to come back for more next time Beckham and the L.A. Galaxy are on TV. Go back to your obscure, ignored spot in the corner of the sports world, soccer, and we’ll call you if we have any interest in hearing from you again.
- What does it take to work the World Anti-Doping Agency into a frenzy? Apparently a vague, unproven and hearsay allegation made by a former pro golfer about the prevalence of steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs in professional golf will do the trick. After golf legend Gary Player claimed that some golfers take drugs, WADA President Dick Pound (save your jokes about his having a promising future in the adult film industry) says he supports Player’s allegations and criticized the PGA Tour for refusing to acknowledge there may be a problem. "That is certainly my suspicion, and Gary Player says he knows, so that's fairly powerful medicine from somebody who has only the integrity of the game at heart," Pound told BBC radio Sunday. Look, I’m not doubting that some golfers do ‘roid up, but Pound is clearly grasping at straws here. WADA and other anti-doping governing bodies are always one step behind the cheaters and they’re looking for any angle they can get to gain ground. Player saying he knows golfers are using because he was told so by a current golfer and then another one confirmed that allegation doesn’t definitively prove anything. Should the PGA Tour implement a testing program just as other sports are doing? Absolutely. But to insinuate that there is a major problem in golf without any substantiated proof is just wrong, and guys like Player and Pound should keep their opinions to themselves until they have names and data to back up their claims.
- Actor Esai Morales, welcome to the Ron Mexico Club. Ron Mexico, you may remember, was the fake name used by Atlanta Falcons quarterback and accused dogfighter and dog murderer Michael Vick when he was traveling out of the country and had sex with a woman, infecting her with herpes (allegedly). Morales stands accused of doing the same - well, sans the fake name part of the equation - by former girlfriend Elizabeth Mazzocchi. She is suing Morales for $25,000 based on charges that he assaulted her and intentionally infected her with herpes, a charge that Morales disputes. Well, that would be the ultimate “screw you” to an ex-girlfriend who treated you like crap……..but here’s hoping that those charges aren't true. A question for Mazzocchi, though: How is it that if Morales had herpes you never got it while the two of your were dating and presumably sleeping together? Are you trying to tell me that he went out and got herpes after you two broke up (either intentionally or otherwise) and then came back to have sex with you so he could infect you? I’m going to go ahead and say that I highly doubt this claim, it sounds a lot more like a cash grab than a legitimate lawsuit.
- So a female president has finally been elected……in India. Pratibha Patil, a congresswoman, lawyer and former governor of the northern state of Rajasthan, was elected as the country’s first female president on Saturday. One caveat is that in India, president is a mostly ceremonial position, with the country’s prime minister shouldering more of the executive responsibility and wielding more power (oh, that president was such a hollow, powerless post in the United States right about now…….). I have to say, I hope America follows this trend…….just not in the upcoming election. That would be because the only female candidate in this election will be Sen. Hank Clinton, D-N.Y. and I don’t think any of us want to be subjected to the true horror that we would experience if that vitriolic, abrasive, venomous shrew were elected as our next president. But if Patil’s election leads to advances for women in India, then two thumbs up for it.
- Soccer, feel the excitement! Wait…..you don’t feel it? Damn, neither do I. However, according to ESPN and the cadre of celebrities who filed into the Home Depot Center last night, we should all be verrrry excited about soccer and more specifically about the alleged savior of the sport in America, David Beckham. One quick aside: In order to save something, doesn’t it have to have been alive and breathing at some point? But Becks arrived amid much self-serving, unwarranted hype from ESPN and the broadcast kicked off with a half-hour special on Beckham coming to America, with announcers Rob Stone and Julie Foud-a-stain or whatever her name is trying to draw parallels between Becks and other great athletes who have “saved” their respective sports…..with the only difference being those athletes weren't ten years past their prime and the sports they were saving were sports Americans actually gave a crap about. Even so, with notable celebs like Katie Holmes, Kevin Garnett and Wayne Gretzky on hand, this had to be a great evening, right? Umm, sure if you love lots of Euros running around on a big patch of grass, kicking a black and white ball in arbitrary directions and showing exactly zero proficiency for putting said ball into the goal. Becks played an uninspiring ten minutes, just enough to claim he actually made the effort to play but not enough to keep the new “fans” who had tuned in interested enough to come back for more next time Beckham and the L.A. Galaxy are on TV. Go back to your obscure, ignored spot in the corner of the sports world, soccer, and we’ll call you if we have any interest in hearing from you again.
- What does it take to work the World Anti-Doping Agency into a frenzy? Apparently a vague, unproven and hearsay allegation made by a former pro golfer about the prevalence of steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs in professional golf will do the trick. After golf legend Gary Player claimed that some golfers take drugs, WADA President Dick Pound (save your jokes about his having a promising future in the adult film industry) says he supports Player’s allegations and criticized the PGA Tour for refusing to acknowledge there may be a problem. "That is certainly my suspicion, and Gary Player says he knows, so that's fairly powerful medicine from somebody who has only the integrity of the game at heart," Pound told BBC radio Sunday. Look, I’m not doubting that some golfers do ‘roid up, but Pound is clearly grasping at straws here. WADA and other anti-doping governing bodies are always one step behind the cheaters and they’re looking for any angle they can get to gain ground. Player saying he knows golfers are using because he was told so by a current golfer and then another one confirmed that allegation doesn’t definitively prove anything. Should the PGA Tour implement a testing program just as other sports are doing? Absolutely. But to insinuate that there is a major problem in golf without any substantiated proof is just wrong, and guys like Player and Pound should keep their opinions to themselves until they have names and data to back up their claims.
Saturday, July 21, 2007
Fun with Tasers, riots in Bolivia and a corrupt NBA ref
- Not to be outdone by the NFL in controversy, the NBA finds itself in the middle of its own major scandal this week. But as difficult as this may be to believe, the scandal now facing the NBA may be more damaging to the sport as a whole than the dogfighting allegations surrounding Atlanta Falcons quarterback Michael Vick. The indictment against Vick could completely destroy his career if he’s convicted, but the allegations of fixing games leveled at former NBA referee Tim Donaghy could land a devastating blow to the NBA at large. The FBI is investigating reports that Donaghy, a 13-year-veteran who recently resigned from the league, helped shave points and fix games in order to pay off gambling debts he owed to bookies. The findings came in the midst of a New Jersey-based investigation into organized crime. The reason this is such a big story is obvious: if you have a referee who is responsible for officiating games and whose judgments and actions regulate games and directly, powerfully impact the outcome of those games and that referee is corrupt and is acting under the influence of gamblers, the integrity of the game is greatly compromised. We watch games because the outcome is not predetermined and we want to see who wins based on skill. If you have a referee (or player) not doing their best or blowing calls or plays because they have to settle a gambling debt, then the legitimacy of your sport is called into question. Donaghy worked more than 60 games this year, including several playoff games, so he could definitely have impacted games in a big way. The NBA will surely face pressure to not only comply with the FBI investigation, but also to conduct an internal investigation of its own to make sure that this is an isolated incident and not a widespread epidemic. The league should accede to that pressure and do its own fact-finding, because if it ever comes out that three, four or five referees were in on this, the entire league will be in a crisis it may not ever fully recover from.
- In case you were wondering, yesterday was the easiest day in the history of mankind to identify the 40-year-old virgin losers in your town. They would have been the ones lined up outside the nearest bookstore, dressed full-out in Harry Potter costumes. Before you Potter-heads get all riled up, realize I’m not saying that reading and liking HP books and movies makes you a loser if you’re over the age of 12 (well I might think that, but……..). What I am saying is that if you waited outside a bookstore late at night, waiting for midnight, clad in the costume of one of the wizards, goblins, sorcerers, whatever there characters are, from the movie and you’re not a child, then you are a LOSER. It’s no different than the pasty, lifeless freak jobs who dress up in Star Wars gear and camp outside the theater any time a new Star Wars movie comes out. I can't blame kids too much because they’re kids and the book is targeted at them. Even adults who wanted to buy the book aren't that bad, it’s just the losers who are 45-year-old accountants by day, yet there they are with makeup, a mask and a wizard outfit outside the store, ready to stampede anyone in their way to get a copy of the new Harry Potter book. Still, a bigger loser exists than even these people - the tool who managed to get his or her hands on a copy of the book prior to its release and took the time to scan in copies of all 700-plus pages into their computer and post it online to spoil the ending for everyone else. That doesn’t make you cool, clever or a rebel; it makes you a ginormous tool who was deliberately mean to a group that includes millions of small children. Way to go, loser, hope that was worth it.
- Oh Iraqi government, you do so disappoint me. Well, not really. I don’t expect anything of you anyhow, and when you don’t have any expectations of someone, it’s impossible to be disappointed. When the Iraqi government announces that its military forces won't be able to take full control of the country by the end of the year, exactly zero people are surprised. When a governmental advisor gives no time table for when U.S. troops may be able to withdraw, even less people are surprised. Were America governed by an intelligent, capable, competent leader, our response (well, if that leader was in place we wouldn’t have been in Iraq in the first place, but play along nonetheless) would be a giant middle finger to Iraq as we pull each and every last one of our troops out and say, “Too bad, this is your mess to deal with, not ours.” Mouwaffak al-Rubaie, a national security advisor for the Iraqi government, refused to give any some of timeline for when Iraq might actually have the wherewithal to govern itself and run its own country, so clearly these guys have been influenced by W. far too much. They refuse to set any schedules, refuse to tell the truth and refuse to take responsibility for their own mess. Next thing you know, these guys will start continually butchering the names of foreign leaders and try to buy a Major League Baseball team……….
- St. Louisianans, you’re about to miss a golden opportunity thanks to your mayor. Mayor Francis Slay has rejected a proposal to make Sept. 2 “Ike Turner Day.” Turner will be performing at the Big Muddy Blues Festival in St. Louis on that day and it could’ve been a truly wonderful day for all citizens of the city. You could have passed out free wife beaters to everyone, lifted all laws against domestic violence and passed out a free dime bag to everyone attending the festival. All over St. Louis, boyfriends and husbands could have been beating and abusing their girlfriends and wives, using drugs and generally creating mayhem. Now to be fair, Ike Turner disputes that portrayal of his character, as shown in What’s Love Got to Do With It, a 1993 movie depicting the life of dancing, warbling, offensively bad singer Tina Turner. Ike would prefer that you remember him as a frequent performer at blues and jazz clubs in and around St. Louis. Sorry Ike, but I and millions of Americans will always think fondly of you when we hear the words domestic abuse and your name will continue to be the first on our tongues whenever we need to crack a quick, snappy domestic violence joke.
- Life is not going so well for Scott Olsen. The Florida Marlins pitcher had just come back from a team-imposed two-game suspension for insubordination and gotten a win by going seven innings and giving up only two runs, but his day was about to take a serious turn for the worse. Later in the night, Olsen was pulled over by the police because he was driving erratically. Instead of complying with the directions of the officer on the scene and taking his punishment, Olsen decided that he was going to resist. He got physical with the officers while they were attempting to arrest him and attempted to flee, with predictable results – charges of driving under the influence, resisting an officer with violence and fleeing and eluding a police officer. The only thing missing is a good Taser blast – oh wait, we did have a Taser blast? Sweet! A big salute to Scott Olsen for taking the smart route in this situation. When pulled over by the police for driving drunk, it’s always best to be as rude and belligerent as possible and to try to get away in your inebriated state. Because of course your chances for escape are so high and cops are always verrrry forgiving when you assault them and try to get away. That type of behavior never upsets them and it never leads to additional charges against you. Scotty, you need to realize very quickly that no matter how much talent you have on the baseball field, if you don’t stop acting like a complete ass clown off of it you’re going to quickly go the way of Denny McLain and Doc Gooden - amazing baseball talents who ended up spending more time behind bars than in the big leagues because they couldn’t get a hold on themselves.
- I’m ecstatic to have a protest/riot story to share, this one coming to us from the Bolivian capital of La Paz. Hundreds of thousands of Bolivians took to the city’s streets to protest a proposed move of the country’s capital from La Paz to Sucre. It is one of the largest demonstrations in the country’s history, which scores the protestors major points. However, there are no reports of any looting, rioting, burning or overturning of cars or smashing of storefront windows, so I have to deduct a few points there. If no hostages are taken and no major structural damage is done, how are the powers that be going to remember that you were there, protestors? Leave damage, destruction and the smoldering remains of buildings and automobiles and let them cry out as a testament to your rage and disdain.
- In case you were wondering, yesterday was the easiest day in the history of mankind to identify the 40-year-old virgin losers in your town. They would have been the ones lined up outside the nearest bookstore, dressed full-out in Harry Potter costumes. Before you Potter-heads get all riled up, realize I’m not saying that reading and liking HP books and movies makes you a loser if you’re over the age of 12 (well I might think that, but……..). What I am saying is that if you waited outside a bookstore late at night, waiting for midnight, clad in the costume of one of the wizards, goblins, sorcerers, whatever there characters are, from the movie and you’re not a child, then you are a LOSER. It’s no different than the pasty, lifeless freak jobs who dress up in Star Wars gear and camp outside the theater any time a new Star Wars movie comes out. I can't blame kids too much because they’re kids and the book is targeted at them. Even adults who wanted to buy the book aren't that bad, it’s just the losers who are 45-year-old accountants by day, yet there they are with makeup, a mask and a wizard outfit outside the store, ready to stampede anyone in their way to get a copy of the new Harry Potter book. Still, a bigger loser exists than even these people - the tool who managed to get his or her hands on a copy of the book prior to its release and took the time to scan in copies of all 700-plus pages into their computer and post it online to spoil the ending for everyone else. That doesn’t make you cool, clever or a rebel; it makes you a ginormous tool who was deliberately mean to a group that includes millions of small children. Way to go, loser, hope that was worth it.
- Oh Iraqi government, you do so disappoint me. Well, not really. I don’t expect anything of you anyhow, and when you don’t have any expectations of someone, it’s impossible to be disappointed. When the Iraqi government announces that its military forces won't be able to take full control of the country by the end of the year, exactly zero people are surprised. When a governmental advisor gives no time table for when U.S. troops may be able to withdraw, even less people are surprised. Were America governed by an intelligent, capable, competent leader, our response (well, if that leader was in place we wouldn’t have been in Iraq in the first place, but play along nonetheless) would be a giant middle finger to Iraq as we pull each and every last one of our troops out and say, “Too bad, this is your mess to deal with, not ours.” Mouwaffak al-Rubaie, a national security advisor for the Iraqi government, refused to give any some of timeline for when Iraq might actually have the wherewithal to govern itself and run its own country, so clearly these guys have been influenced by W. far too much. They refuse to set any schedules, refuse to tell the truth and refuse to take responsibility for their own mess. Next thing you know, these guys will start continually butchering the names of foreign leaders and try to buy a Major League Baseball team……….
- St. Louisianans, you’re about to miss a golden opportunity thanks to your mayor. Mayor Francis Slay has rejected a proposal to make Sept. 2 “Ike Turner Day.” Turner will be performing at the Big Muddy Blues Festival in St. Louis on that day and it could’ve been a truly wonderful day for all citizens of the city. You could have passed out free wife beaters to everyone, lifted all laws against domestic violence and passed out a free dime bag to everyone attending the festival. All over St. Louis, boyfriends and husbands could have been beating and abusing their girlfriends and wives, using drugs and generally creating mayhem. Now to be fair, Ike Turner disputes that portrayal of his character, as shown in What’s Love Got to Do With It, a 1993 movie depicting the life of dancing, warbling, offensively bad singer Tina Turner. Ike would prefer that you remember him as a frequent performer at blues and jazz clubs in and around St. Louis. Sorry Ike, but I and millions of Americans will always think fondly of you when we hear the words domestic abuse and your name will continue to be the first on our tongues whenever we need to crack a quick, snappy domestic violence joke.
- Life is not going so well for Scott Olsen. The Florida Marlins pitcher had just come back from a team-imposed two-game suspension for insubordination and gotten a win by going seven innings and giving up only two runs, but his day was about to take a serious turn for the worse. Later in the night, Olsen was pulled over by the police because he was driving erratically. Instead of complying with the directions of the officer on the scene and taking his punishment, Olsen decided that he was going to resist. He got physical with the officers while they were attempting to arrest him and attempted to flee, with predictable results – charges of driving under the influence, resisting an officer with violence and fleeing and eluding a police officer. The only thing missing is a good Taser blast – oh wait, we did have a Taser blast? Sweet! A big salute to Scott Olsen for taking the smart route in this situation. When pulled over by the police for driving drunk, it’s always best to be as rude and belligerent as possible and to try to get away in your inebriated state. Because of course your chances for escape are so high and cops are always verrrry forgiving when you assault them and try to get away. That type of behavior never upsets them and it never leads to additional charges against you. Scotty, you need to realize very quickly that no matter how much talent you have on the baseball field, if you don’t stop acting like a complete ass clown off of it you’re going to quickly go the way of Denny McLain and Doc Gooden - amazing baseball talents who ended up spending more time behind bars than in the big leagues because they couldn’t get a hold on themselves.
- I’m ecstatic to have a protest/riot story to share, this one coming to us from the Bolivian capital of La Paz. Hundreds of thousands of Bolivians took to the city’s streets to protest a proposed move of the country’s capital from La Paz to Sucre. It is one of the largest demonstrations in the country’s history, which scores the protestors major points. However, there are no reports of any looting, rioting, burning or overturning of cars or smashing of storefront windows, so I have to deduct a few points there. If no hostages are taken and no major structural damage is done, how are the powers that be going to remember that you were there, protestors? Leave damage, destruction and the smoldering remains of buildings and automobiles and let them cry out as a testament to your rage and disdain.
Friday, July 20, 2007
A bad hoax, a giant cheesy mess and FEMA f's over hurricane victims....again
- The good news just keeps flowin’ for Michael Vick. Not only is he facing a federal indictment on charges of building, financing and operating a dogfighting ring in which losing or non-compliant dogs were killed by beating, hanging and electrocution, Nike has decided to do the closest thing it can do to severing ties with Vick without actually severing ties with Vick - yet. Vick’s new signature shoe, the Air Zoom Vick 5, was scheduled to be released later this summer but has now been pulled by Nike. The company isn't going to pull other products with Vick’s name on them out of stores, but they aren't going to be producing any new products that would tie them to a dog-murdering, depraved freak job like M. Vick (allegedly). It looks suspiciously like Nike is doing the same thing the NFL and the Atlanta Falcons are doing, i.e. distancing themselves from Vick without totally abandoning, condemning or punishing him until the legal process plays out. Until he’s convicted of anything, none of these entities want to come out totally against him, lest he be exonerated (unlikely but possible) and it come back to bite them in the ass. However, the reality is that if Vick is convicted and ends up going to prison, all the issues with his team, the league and endorsers will be worked out. At that point, there’s no need for the Falcons or NFL to suspend him; he’s in prison, so clearly he can’t play. Also, companies whose products he endorses can than wash their hands of him and walk away without any fear of backlash. Bearing all of this information in mind, I’m stoked for the start of Falcons training camp on July 26, because I cannot wait to see the absolute circus this is going to be if Vick shows up.
- For all you Veronica Mars fans living in Denial-ville with me, our ride has come to an end. Up to this point in the summer, the CW has been rerunning episodes from this past season of Mars in the show’s normal 9 p.m. Tuesday time slot, but that has changed now that the network is bringing back another installment of the vapid, superficial, idiotic and uber-contrived “reality” series Beauty and the Geek. In other words, they want to take a bunch of nerdy guys, put them together with a bunch of “hot” girls who usually aren't all that hot and pretend that it’s a “social experiment” and that’s the kind of programming they want to hitch their fortunes to while running great shows like Veronica Mars off the air. For the first few weeks of the summer, the reruns of Mars were a nice diversion for fans like myself, a chance to pretend that the show hadn’t been canceled and that come fall, TV wouldn’t suck a little more because it was gone. Now I’ll have to wait for Season Three on DVD while sticking pins in my Dawn Ostroff voodoo doll. Actually, that doll is pretty much full of pins at this point and there’s nowhere left to stick new ones, so I’ll have to move on to a new one, which will be number………let’s see……95. What? It is Dawn Ostroff, after all, the most incompetent, stupid network executive in the history of television, she deserves it.
- Hey, Hurricane Katrina victims are already suffering, so why not inflict a little more pain and discomfort on them, eh FEMA? Word has come out that lawyers for the Federal Emergency Management Agency actually had the chutzpah to discourage officials from pursuing reports of dangerous levels of formaldehyde in trailers housing thousands of hurricane victims. That revelation comes courtesy of documents subpoenaed by members of the House of Representatives and released to the public Thursday. In a House hearing on the matter, three families who believe their illnesses were caused by the tainted trailers, Republicans and Democrats alike criticized the inexcusable and sleazy handling of the problem by FEMA. The orders from the organizations lawyers meant limited testing and inspecting of trailers whose occupants reported respiratory problems. But there was FEMA administrator R. David Paulison (never trust someone who begins their name with a single letter like that), trying to put a smiley face on a giant pile of rat feces by apologizing to the trailer occupants and saying, presumably with a straight face, “This agency made the best decisions it could with the information it had.” No, R. David Paulison, you purposefully limited to information you had on hand to make those decisions because you knew that if you had all the facts, you’d have to do something about the unhealthy, dangerous conditions those hurricane refugees were living in. But hey, if they’ve survived a massive hurricane, the destruction of their home, the loss of their personal belongings, prolonged flooding, slow or non-existent federal aid and other indignities, what’s a little formaldehyde poisoning? Good work, FEMA, you’re one more example of the absolute farce that this current administration is.
- Had you been driving down the freeway in Sacramento early Thursday morning with a carload of nachos, it would have been your lucky day. That’s because a tractor-trailer carrying blocks and blocks of cheese erupted in flames, turning its cargo of provolone, cheddar, mozzarella, American and other cheeses into the ultimate serving of hot liquid cheese. The melty, tasty river o’ cheese clogged the burning remains of the truck and the surrounding freeway, but no injuries or accidents were reported as a result of the spill. In a related story, Rosie O’Donnell was spotted in an airport on Thursday morning, demanding the earliest possible flight to Sacramento and clutching several family size bags of Tostitos as carry-on items.
- We feared it might happen and alas, it appears we’ve totally lost Katie Holmes to the dark side. The dark side, of course, is that of manically insane, couch-jumping-on, raving-mad Scientologist Tom Cruise, who somehow Jedi mind-tricked Holmes into marrying him, having his child and allowing him and his Scientology cronies to basically run every part of her life, including approving and movie script sent to the former Joey Potter of Dawson’s Creek fame. The new issue of People magazine promises on the cover to explain why Holmes is “happier than ever.” It’s their quote, not mine, but I’m guessing mind-altering drugs of some kind or a partial lobotomy were involved. Not that Holmes was the second coming of great actresses like Lauren Graham or Meryl Streep, but it’s still sad to see her life and career so thoroughly co-opted by a guy who would be much more at home in a padded room than in the general population of this nation. Then again, if having Cruise and his Scientology hacks look over potential movie scripts sent to Holmes keeps us from seeing another First Daughter, then maybe some good can come out of this.
- Hoaxes are funny, right? Who doesn’t love a good April Fool’s Day prank? Oh right, that would be me. Hoaxes could be really funny but usually aren't because the people perpetrating them are ginormous tools, but from time to time a funny hoax is cooked up and executed by a smart, savvy or sarcastic person who gets over on decidedly less intelligent, less savvy and much more clueless individuals. This would not be one of those times. A reporter for a Beijing TV station apparently decided that he needed something to jump start his career and figured that creating a fake news story about street vendors using chemical-soaked cardboard to fill meat buns was the way to do it. The report was presented as a hidden-camera expose on the illegal, unsanitary practice by food vendors on the streets of China’s capital city but turned out to be nothing more than the misguided ambitions of a struggling TV reporter who will now get to do a firsthand expose on life in a Chinese prison.
- For all you Veronica Mars fans living in Denial-ville with me, our ride has come to an end. Up to this point in the summer, the CW has been rerunning episodes from this past season of Mars in the show’s normal 9 p.m. Tuesday time slot, but that has changed now that the network is bringing back another installment of the vapid, superficial, idiotic and uber-contrived “reality” series Beauty and the Geek. In other words, they want to take a bunch of nerdy guys, put them together with a bunch of “hot” girls who usually aren't all that hot and pretend that it’s a “social experiment” and that’s the kind of programming they want to hitch their fortunes to while running great shows like Veronica Mars off the air. For the first few weeks of the summer, the reruns of Mars were a nice diversion for fans like myself, a chance to pretend that the show hadn’t been canceled and that come fall, TV wouldn’t suck a little more because it was gone. Now I’ll have to wait for Season Three on DVD while sticking pins in my Dawn Ostroff voodoo doll. Actually, that doll is pretty much full of pins at this point and there’s nowhere left to stick new ones, so I’ll have to move on to a new one, which will be number………let’s see……95. What? It is Dawn Ostroff, after all, the most incompetent, stupid network executive in the history of television, she deserves it.
- Hey, Hurricane Katrina victims are already suffering, so why not inflict a little more pain and discomfort on them, eh FEMA? Word has come out that lawyers for the Federal Emergency Management Agency actually had the chutzpah to discourage officials from pursuing reports of dangerous levels of formaldehyde in trailers housing thousands of hurricane victims. That revelation comes courtesy of documents subpoenaed by members of the House of Representatives and released to the public Thursday. In a House hearing on the matter, three families who believe their illnesses were caused by the tainted trailers, Republicans and Democrats alike criticized the inexcusable and sleazy handling of the problem by FEMA. The orders from the organizations lawyers meant limited testing and inspecting of trailers whose occupants reported respiratory problems. But there was FEMA administrator R. David Paulison (never trust someone who begins their name with a single letter like that), trying to put a smiley face on a giant pile of rat feces by apologizing to the trailer occupants and saying, presumably with a straight face, “This agency made the best decisions it could with the information it had.” No, R. David Paulison, you purposefully limited to information you had on hand to make those decisions because you knew that if you had all the facts, you’d have to do something about the unhealthy, dangerous conditions those hurricane refugees were living in. But hey, if they’ve survived a massive hurricane, the destruction of their home, the loss of their personal belongings, prolonged flooding, slow or non-existent federal aid and other indignities, what’s a little formaldehyde poisoning? Good work, FEMA, you’re one more example of the absolute farce that this current administration is.
- Had you been driving down the freeway in Sacramento early Thursday morning with a carload of nachos, it would have been your lucky day. That’s because a tractor-trailer carrying blocks and blocks of cheese erupted in flames, turning its cargo of provolone, cheddar, mozzarella, American and other cheeses into the ultimate serving of hot liquid cheese. The melty, tasty river o’ cheese clogged the burning remains of the truck and the surrounding freeway, but no injuries or accidents were reported as a result of the spill. In a related story, Rosie O’Donnell was spotted in an airport on Thursday morning, demanding the earliest possible flight to Sacramento and clutching several family size bags of Tostitos as carry-on items.
- We feared it might happen and alas, it appears we’ve totally lost Katie Holmes to the dark side. The dark side, of course, is that of manically insane, couch-jumping-on, raving-mad Scientologist Tom Cruise, who somehow Jedi mind-tricked Holmes into marrying him, having his child and allowing him and his Scientology cronies to basically run every part of her life, including approving and movie script sent to the former Joey Potter of Dawson’s Creek fame. The new issue of People magazine promises on the cover to explain why Holmes is “happier than ever.” It’s their quote, not mine, but I’m guessing mind-altering drugs of some kind or a partial lobotomy were involved. Not that Holmes was the second coming of great actresses like Lauren Graham or Meryl Streep, but it’s still sad to see her life and career so thoroughly co-opted by a guy who would be much more at home in a padded room than in the general population of this nation. Then again, if having Cruise and his Scientology hacks look over potential movie scripts sent to Holmes keeps us from seeing another First Daughter, then maybe some good can come out of this.
- Hoaxes are funny, right? Who doesn’t love a good April Fool’s Day prank? Oh right, that would be me. Hoaxes could be really funny but usually aren't because the people perpetrating them are ginormous tools, but from time to time a funny hoax is cooked up and executed by a smart, savvy or sarcastic person who gets over on decidedly less intelligent, less savvy and much more clueless individuals. This would not be one of those times. A reporter for a Beijing TV station apparently decided that he needed something to jump start his career and figured that creating a fake news story about street vendors using chemical-soaked cardboard to fill meat buns was the way to do it. The report was presented as a hidden-camera expose on the illegal, unsanitary practice by food vendors on the streets of China’s capital city but turned out to be nothing more than the misguided ambitions of a struggling TV reporter who will now get to do a firsthand expose on life in a Chinese prison.
Thursday, July 19, 2007
A great season finale for Traveler, a ball-less move by Senate Republicans and what could be the worst album in the history of music
- If any single action or opinion can make you a total and complete idiot, this would be the one: everyone is only angry at Michael Vick and condemning his alleged role in a dogfighting ring because he’s black. That is the single most asinine, ignorant statement you can make in reference to this or any other alleged crime. To say and believe that is to ignore the detailed, disgusting and thorough indictment handed down by the feds against Vick and his cohorts, an indictment accusing them of organizing and operating a dogfighting ring in which dogs were bought, bred and trained to fight to the death and if they refused to fight, the dogs were executed by electrocution, hanging or being slammed to the ground repeatedly until dead. People, especially black people (based on those I’ve heard defending Vick, I’m not being biased, just observing what I have seen and heard) who blindly defend a person of their own race by playing the race card first and repeatedly thereafter are just plain dumb. There are situations, such as this one, when race is not a factor or at least not a factor of any significance. The federal government didn’t indict Vick because he’s black; they indicted him because he’s a scumbag who ran a dogfighting ring and brutally murdered dogs when they refused to fight. If Drew Brees or Peyton Manning did what Vick is alleged to have done, people would be just as angry and just as thirsty for justice. Playing the race card in a situation such as this shows you are either not smart enough, too blinded by racial motivations are just too ignorant to realize the truth. By so doing, you’re invalidating other times when people are being persecuted and mistreated because of their race or ethnicity and when those times occur, your false claims of bias in cases like Vick’s will have weakened the cause of people who are being treated wrongly. Oh, and it’s also interesting to note that just a couple weeks ago, ESPN was diligently reporting that Vick was extremely unlikely to be indicted in the dogfighting ring. Something has obviously changed and changed dramatically in a short span of time. Realize that the feds have a 95 percent conviction rate when they issue an indictment. In other words, they don’t indict unless they’re certain they can and will get a conviction. They don’t want to waste time, money and reputations by indicting people if those people have any chance at all of being exonerated.
- Could someone tell me if this is 1993 or 2007? I’m admittedly disconcerted after learning that this summer, at some point, Hootie & the Blowfish are going to be touring the country. Right now the tour is on hold as lead singer Darius Rucker recovers from a staph infection in his left knee (what, has he been spending a lot of time in the Cleveland Browns locker room lately, a.k.a. Staph Infection Central?). He’s hard three operations trying to clean out the knee and is hoping that the third one will get the job done. Rucker’s health problems have forced H & TB to cancel four shows and postpone eight more, to the utter disappointment of tens and tens of fans. Also, the first 13 shows of the tour, which was scheduled to begin June 29, have also been pushed back. For the two or three of you who can't wait any longer to see the band, they will be performing three songs on CBS’ The Early Show tomorrow, live from their hometown of Charleston, S.C. So dust off your copy of Cracked Rear View and practice your vocals for Hold My Hand, because one of the biggest one-trick ponies of the ’90s music scene is back and just as mediocre as ever.
- God bless firefighters. They do so much for so many people, risking their lives in dangerous situations to save people and save buildings from burning to the ground. However, being a hero doesn’t absolve you from, say, destroying the wrong house in a training exercise when the actual house you were supposed to use is two blocks away. Firefighters in Braintree, Mass. were all set for a departmental training exercise and went at it with gusto, cutting holes in the roof of what they thought was a deserted home, cutting more holes in the walls and breaking windows. Somehow, they failed to realize that the actual house they were supposed to be using, one scheduled for demolition soon, was two streets away. Now, the town will be paying for the remodeling of the house, which ironically the owners were planning on doing anyway - just not to this extent. The fire department in Braintree would do well to remember an old carpentry maxim that has held up for centuries: Measure twice, cut once. Only in this situation it would be: Check twice to make sure you’re not destroying the wrong house for a training exercise, go ahead and wreck the house once. Hope that will help avoid any further disasters of this ilk, as always I’m here for any help you all need.
- Last night was the season finale of Traveler, my favorite new summer TV show. Yes, I said “season” finale, not “series” finale, which is good news. Although no official announcement has been made about the show’s future following its successful eight-week summer run, good ratings and good reviews should give it a shot at returning to ABC’s lineup at some point in the near future. As for the finale itself, it was definitely one of the top two episodes of the season, if not the best. It began with yet another face-to-face meeting between Jay, Tyler and law enforcement, only this time Will Traveler was there to intervene. The trio obviously escaped, and over the course of the episode went after Jack Freed (Neal McDonough), a man we learned is a former FBI exec who now works for Homeland Security but has his own agenda in some sort of domestic terrorism program with participants in several branches of the government and also the private sector. Having Will, Tyler and Jay together was a good chance to see how much their characters have grown and changed during the short season. There were plenty of twists and turns, as per the season finale playbook. Kim Doherty, Jay’s girlfriend, was arrested by the FBI and taken into custody at some remote location. The agent in charge of the investigation into the Drexler Museum bombing, Special Agent in Charge Fred Chambers (Steven Culp) was revealed to be a traitor and part of Freed’s organization when he pulled Agent Jan Marlow (Viola Davis) off the case and then shot Agent Guillermo Borjes (Anthony Ruivivar), her partner as he attempted to arrest one of Freed’s men. The season ended with Will, Jay and Tyler tricking Freed and driving him in a stolen limo to the offices of a local newspaper where they left him locked inside along with video evidence of showing him admitting to being responsible for the bombing. But in another twist, Freed or someone involved with him blew up the limo right after Jay placed a call to the paper from a nearby pay phone. Thus our trio of intrepid travelers are once again involved with an explosion, one that presumably will send them on the run again for the start of next season. All told, an exciting, fast paced finale that set up season two perfectly and answered a lot of questions at the same time. If I had to give a final grade for the series, it would definitely be an A, and I’ll be eagerly looking forward to the next season.
- Chalk one up for stupidity, courtesy of the Senate Republicans. Only four GOP senators had the testicular fortitude to join the Democrats in voting to end a filibuster and allow a vote on a measure to force the withdrawal of U.S. combat troops from Iraq. Instead, the stooges, er, senators on the wrong side of the 52-47 vote sided with the Ass Clown in Chief, W., and his demand that no strategic re-evaluations on Iraq be made until his artificial, stupid September evaluation date. Well of course we should follow that logic, I mean why go ahead and re-evaluate the situation now and make changes in July if things are clearly, terribly wrong? Why deal with problems now when you can keep your head up your ass a couple more months and then allegedly deal with those problems when they’ve had two more months to fester? Hey W., if four-plus years of one failure after another is the evidence we have, how is two more months with more of your faulty, moronic logic and strategy going to help? Are you suddenly going to stop being an idiot by September? That the Senate vote fell eight votes short of the 60 needed to end the filibuster is discouraging but not surprising. Too many of these guys are party stooges who don’t have the cahones to contradict their leader, even when he’s so obviously wrong. Thanks for nothing, Republican senators, so much for you serving in the best interests of your constituents and doing what’s best for our nation.
- How do you know a potential new album is going to be awful before you’ve heard any of it or know what songs will be on it? When the mere thought of that album makes you more nauseous than an American Karaoke artist like the effeminate Clay Aiken, then you know an album is going to be mind-numbingly terrible. Just what kind of album could inspire such a reaction? How’s about a collaboration between the man perm-wearing, elevator music-crooning Michael Bolton and Desperate House-skanks star Nicollette Sheridan? The pair are already married, so I guess they felt like they needed to stop inflicting pain and auditory discomfort on one another by singing around the house and start sharing that pain with the world. Bolton has already foisted some of the most crap-tacular whiny ballads ever recorded on the world, but teaming with his wife, whose musical abilities are subpar at best, could push him over the top and lead to one of the five worst records in the history of music, right behind whatever album Macarena appeared on and a greatest hits album by Cher.
- Could someone tell me if this is 1993 or 2007? I’m admittedly disconcerted after learning that this summer, at some point, Hootie & the Blowfish are going to be touring the country. Right now the tour is on hold as lead singer Darius Rucker recovers from a staph infection in his left knee (what, has he been spending a lot of time in the Cleveland Browns locker room lately, a.k.a. Staph Infection Central?). He’s hard three operations trying to clean out the knee and is hoping that the third one will get the job done. Rucker’s health problems have forced H & TB to cancel four shows and postpone eight more, to the utter disappointment of tens and tens of fans. Also, the first 13 shows of the tour, which was scheduled to begin June 29, have also been pushed back. For the two or three of you who can't wait any longer to see the band, they will be performing three songs on CBS’ The Early Show tomorrow, live from their hometown of Charleston, S.C. So dust off your copy of Cracked Rear View and practice your vocals for Hold My Hand, because one of the biggest one-trick ponies of the ’90s music scene is back and just as mediocre as ever.
- God bless firefighters. They do so much for so many people, risking their lives in dangerous situations to save people and save buildings from burning to the ground. However, being a hero doesn’t absolve you from, say, destroying the wrong house in a training exercise when the actual house you were supposed to use is two blocks away. Firefighters in Braintree, Mass. were all set for a departmental training exercise and went at it with gusto, cutting holes in the roof of what they thought was a deserted home, cutting more holes in the walls and breaking windows. Somehow, they failed to realize that the actual house they were supposed to be using, one scheduled for demolition soon, was two streets away. Now, the town will be paying for the remodeling of the house, which ironically the owners were planning on doing anyway - just not to this extent. The fire department in Braintree would do well to remember an old carpentry maxim that has held up for centuries: Measure twice, cut once. Only in this situation it would be: Check twice to make sure you’re not destroying the wrong house for a training exercise, go ahead and wreck the house once. Hope that will help avoid any further disasters of this ilk, as always I’m here for any help you all need.
- Last night was the season finale of Traveler, my favorite new summer TV show. Yes, I said “season” finale, not “series” finale, which is good news. Although no official announcement has been made about the show’s future following its successful eight-week summer run, good ratings and good reviews should give it a shot at returning to ABC’s lineup at some point in the near future. As for the finale itself, it was definitely one of the top two episodes of the season, if not the best. It began with yet another face-to-face meeting between Jay, Tyler and law enforcement, only this time Will Traveler was there to intervene. The trio obviously escaped, and over the course of the episode went after Jack Freed (Neal McDonough), a man we learned is a former FBI exec who now works for Homeland Security but has his own agenda in some sort of domestic terrorism program with participants in several branches of the government and also the private sector. Having Will, Tyler and Jay together was a good chance to see how much their characters have grown and changed during the short season. There were plenty of twists and turns, as per the season finale playbook. Kim Doherty, Jay’s girlfriend, was arrested by the FBI and taken into custody at some remote location. The agent in charge of the investigation into the Drexler Museum bombing, Special Agent in Charge Fred Chambers (Steven Culp) was revealed to be a traitor and part of Freed’s organization when he pulled Agent Jan Marlow (Viola Davis) off the case and then shot Agent Guillermo Borjes (Anthony Ruivivar), her partner as he attempted to arrest one of Freed’s men. The season ended with Will, Jay and Tyler tricking Freed and driving him in a stolen limo to the offices of a local newspaper where they left him locked inside along with video evidence of showing him admitting to being responsible for the bombing. But in another twist, Freed or someone involved with him blew up the limo right after Jay placed a call to the paper from a nearby pay phone. Thus our trio of intrepid travelers are once again involved with an explosion, one that presumably will send them on the run again for the start of next season. All told, an exciting, fast paced finale that set up season two perfectly and answered a lot of questions at the same time. If I had to give a final grade for the series, it would definitely be an A, and I’ll be eagerly looking forward to the next season.
- Chalk one up for stupidity, courtesy of the Senate Republicans. Only four GOP senators had the testicular fortitude to join the Democrats in voting to end a filibuster and allow a vote on a measure to force the withdrawal of U.S. combat troops from Iraq. Instead, the stooges, er, senators on the wrong side of the 52-47 vote sided with the Ass Clown in Chief, W., and his demand that no strategic re-evaluations on Iraq be made until his artificial, stupid September evaluation date. Well of course we should follow that logic, I mean why go ahead and re-evaluate the situation now and make changes in July if things are clearly, terribly wrong? Why deal with problems now when you can keep your head up your ass a couple more months and then allegedly deal with those problems when they’ve had two more months to fester? Hey W., if four-plus years of one failure after another is the evidence we have, how is two more months with more of your faulty, moronic logic and strategy going to help? Are you suddenly going to stop being an idiot by September? That the Senate vote fell eight votes short of the 60 needed to end the filibuster is discouraging but not surprising. Too many of these guys are party stooges who don’t have the cahones to contradict their leader, even when he’s so obviously wrong. Thanks for nothing, Republican senators, so much for you serving in the best interests of your constituents and doing what’s best for our nation.
- How do you know a potential new album is going to be awful before you’ve heard any of it or know what songs will be on it? When the mere thought of that album makes you more nauseous than an American Karaoke artist like the effeminate Clay Aiken, then you know an album is going to be mind-numbingly terrible. Just what kind of album could inspire such a reaction? How’s about a collaboration between the man perm-wearing, elevator music-crooning Michael Bolton and Desperate House-skanks star Nicollette Sheridan? The pair are already married, so I guess they felt like they needed to stop inflicting pain and auditory discomfort on one another by singing around the house and start sharing that pain with the world. Bolton has already foisted some of the most crap-tacular whiny ballads ever recorded on the world, but teaming with his wife, whose musical abilities are subpar at best, could push him over the top and lead to one of the five worst records in the history of music, right behind whatever album Macarena appeared on and a greatest hits album by Cher.
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