- Pacman Jones or the police, who do I believe? On the one hand, you have a rain-making, bouncer-assaulting, pro-wrestling-wannabe thug, a guy who spits on women and is suspended from the NFL for a year. Pac is maintaining that he has only been arrested twice in his life, not the six-pack of arrests that is being commonly reported. The police have a somewhat different take, basing their claim on Pacman’s police records. Now I know the cops can and do lie, fabricate evidence, abuse citizens, etc., but in this case I’m going to take their word, sorry Pac. The police tend to be good about documenting things like when people get arrested. While I’m on a Pacman tangent, how’s about a second gem he dropped in the same interview that gave us that first bit? Addressing his decision to go to a New York City strip club the night before his meeting with NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell to address Pacman’s involvement in and legal troubles resulting from a February strip-club brawl in Las Vegas, Jones dropped the following grammatical gem: “If I could do anything different, I wouldn’t have went and gotten nothing to eat then. There wasn’t even no girls there.” Wow…..um….wow. Stepping past the repeated, gross and egregious abuse of the English language, let me ask one obvious question: You’re telling me that while in New York City, you had to go to a strip club to get your chow on? You’re in NYC, a place I recall as having no less than a dozen restaurants on every block covering every type and ethnicity of grub, and yet you’re going to a strip club to eat? Forget for a minute that those places are the dirtiest, slimiest, most disgusting and gross places around, why would you want to go to place to eat whose primary purpose has nothing to do with food and where you have to pay a cover charge just to get in the door? Either Pacman is really dumb or a terrible liar (or based on the evidence at hand, both). But if you’re involved in a strip club melee that leaves a bouncer paralyzed and results in you being charged with two felonies, don’t you think you could mix in a run to Sbarro or a visit to one of the hundreds of hot dog vendors on the streets of Manhattan instead of eating at a strip club? Personally, I have to admit that I’m torn on the issue of Jones’ potential return to the NFL next year. Part of me knows he’s a moron and a bad guy, but part of me loves the nonstop entertainment he brings through sheer stupidity as well as the nuclear implosion that’s bound to happen whenever he finally screws up his football career for good.
- Hey Army, offer me whatever you want, I’m still not enlisting to join your merry band of crew-cut-sporting, camouflage-wearing yes men (and women). Because of lagging enlistment numbers and the need for more soldiers to wage unnecessary, expensive, bloody and indefensible wars against other countries, the U.S. Army is considering once again upping enlistment perks for new recruits. The new plan would allow enlistees to choose from a “buffet” of incentives, including up to $45,000 tax-free money that could be used to buy a home or start a business upon re-entry into civilian life. What, you mean the chance to be berated by an angry drill sergeant, shipped all over the world, never see your family on a regular basis and possibly die fighting a pointless, idiotic war created by your own president aren’t incentive enough to sign up? The opportunity to surrender your individuality, do as you’re told without questioning it and do so for a paltry salary don’t have ‘em flocking to the local recruiting office? Look Army (and all other branches of the military), you can offer me $500,000 tax free, give me ten extra pairs of cool camouflage pants and throw in a set of steak knives strong enough to cut a tree trunk and I’m still not signing up. Maybe you should take a hint and realize that people aren’t signing up because shock of all shocks, they don’t want to.
- Kate Hudson is a wildly underrated actress. I base this opinion not on any roles she’s had recently on TV or in movies, but rather on comments she made for an upcoming issue of Harper’s Bazaar. “As primal beings, men are not supposed to be monogamous….Part of what I love about men is it’s hard for them to be monogamous. Women, I think, need to spend more time understanding men than trying to change men.” Also on the agenda was another issue which further underscores how great and talented an actress Hudson is: her love of lingerie. “I am totally obsessed with lingerie,” she explained. “However often I wear it is not often enough.” Can’t you just see my point here? This hot, hot blonde is both rich and famous, loves lingerie and loves the fact that men have a hard time being monogamous! Get her an Oscar and a hefty pay raise for her next movie, pronto!
- The epedmic of preists sexually abusing children here in the U.S. is terrible enough, but just as disgusting is the tale of one Mexican priest who murdered his illegitimate son because he feared discovery of the boy’s existence might cost him his job. The Rev. Dagoberto Valle Arriaga confessed to killing his son, Oscar Emmanuel Valle Hernandez two years ago, according to the attorney general’s office for the central state of Mexico. Arriaga feared that church officials would learn of the child’s existence and remove him from the priesthood, so he killed the boy. Right, because that’s the logical step if you have an illegitimate child and don’t want him discovered. Just snuff Junior out so you can keep your job as a man of God. Something tells me that murdering a person to cover up an illegitimate child runs contrary to the teachings of any church that doesn’t double as an insane cult. Arriaga has been sentenced to 55 years in prison for his crime, a sentence that isn’t nearly long enough.
- I’m predicting an unsuccessful political career for Cindy Sheehan, the grieving mother of a U.S. soldier killed in Iraq who on Thursday made good on a promise to run for the U.S. House against Rep. Nancy Pelosi. Sheehan had vowed to run against Pelosi in 2008 if Pelosi didn’t impeach W. by July 23. Pelosi failed to reach this most noble of goals, so on Thursday, Sheehan formally announced her candidacy for Congress. The reason I think she’s doomed as a politician is because she’s already done the one thing that no true politician ever does – make good on a promise. By announcing at a rally in San Francisco that she was following through on what she said she would do, Sheehan has proved she does not have what it takes to be a bona fide member of Congress. If you can't learn to check your ethics and morals at the door, C., you’ll never be elected to any political office in this country.
- I’ve gotten some criticism for not including Rush Hour 3 in my list of third installments in major movie franchises that have hit theaters this summer, so allow me to explain why. The Rush Hour franchise isn’t in the same class as movies like Ocean’s Eleven/Twelve, Spiderman 1-2, Pirates of the Caribbean or the Bourne movies. Rush Hour movies follow a more predictable script than your average episode of Saved by the Bell. Chris Tucker is LAPD officer Carter, in trouble with his superiors for his maverick ways, and Jackie Chan is Lee, the great Hong Kong cop called in to pair with Carter on a major international crisis. Isn’t it great how director Brett Ratner and the writers don’t even bother to concoct a plausible story line explaining why a cop from L.A. and one from Hong Kong end up backstage at the Folies Bergere in Paris? When you pair a predictable, formulaic plot with equally predictable dialogue, paint-by-numbers humor and action sequences, you arrive at the unmistakable conclusion that this return from a six-year hiatus in the series is nothing more than a cash grab via an unoriginal movie only appealing to the small number of people who are already (unexplainably) fans of the franchise.
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