Thursday, March 20, 2008

How to make money if you're a disgraced skank, eavesdropping news and gun control advocates in trouble

- Score on for Big Brother. While Congress passed a bill late last week establishing rules and guidelines under which the government can invade the privacy of private citizens and intrude on their personal lives via its eavesdropping program, the bill is going to be vetoed by W. and based on the slim 213-197 margin the bill passed by in the House, there will be no override of that veto. Because the bill does not reach back and grant amnesty to telecommunications companies for acts of intrusion they already committed by monitoring private phone calls and emails without court permission, W. has already promised to veto it. In other words, if it doesn’t provide carte blanche for illegal actions already committed by order of him and his stooges, he’s not interested. Because of the impending veto and the small voting margin, “this bill has no impact at all” declared Republican Whip Rep. Roy Blunt of Missouri. I hate to admit it, this rich, old white dude is right. As nice as it would be to see the government be restricted from infringing upon our constitutional rights and horning in on our private communications, unless W. can get a bill that excuses his past crimes, er, mistakes, er executive decisions, he’s not going to sign it. Maybe in about 10 months when we swear in a real president, we can revisit this issue and reach a fair conclusion.

- What to do when you’re a disreputable skank and a known hooker involved with a sex scandal that brought down a former governor of the state of New York? Should you write a tell-all book, go on the talk show circuit or maybe go the unconventional route and use the sheer embarrassment from having people know you as a trampy slut who got after it with a middle-aged governor as motivation to turn your life around? Or, as Ashley Alexandra Dupree, a.k.a. “Kristen,” the petite blonde hooker that former Gov. Eliot Spitzer used on repeated occasions has chosen to do, you can release a couple of crappy pop songs on some lame music downloading site and try to capitalize on your notoriety as a whore that way. Dupree has put up two songs on a music site I won't name here mostly because I’m not about to facilitate this skank’s shameless attempt to further her music career through acts of prostitution, but the site uses a sliding pricing scale that ups the cost of a song as it becomes more popular. Her songs began as 68 cents apiece (no, sickos, not 69 cents) but are now up to 98 cents each because losers out there are somehow desperate for music from some talent-less hooker (well, talent-less musically, I assume she has talent in the bedroom based on the $1,000 a session E. Spitzer paid her for her services) even though it a) sucks and b) comes from someone they’ve never heard of as a musician. So far, Dupree has raked in more than $200,000 from the various pervy schmucks out there dumb enough to get suckered into buying her songs. Good luck explaining that one when someone asks you what you’re rocking on your iPod. What are you listening to there, buddy? Oh, it’s by this new artist, Ashley Alexandra Dupree, but you probably know her as Kristen. You mean that brunette hooker Eliot Spitzer hit it with? Yeah, that’s her. So why are you listening to her music anyhow? Stop trying to think of an answer for that final question because there isn’t one other than you being a perverted, sick freak. Next……..

- Gun control advocates, our nightmare may be coming true. Those of you out there who cling to an antiquated ideal that we should all be allowed to pack heat no matter where we go because the Constitiution allows us the right to bear arms (even though that refers to the ability of the country to raise a militia to defend itself against the British, not exactly a huge concern anymore) must be thrilled the Supreme Court currently has a case before it that could strike a serious blow for your right to strap your 9mm and take it with you to the mall, the grocery store, the dry cleaner, etc. For the first time in nearly 70 years, the court will consider whether the Second Amendment actually grants individual citizens the right to own a gun. The amendment reads, “A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” Yes, you read it right, to equip a MILITIA, the right to a gun should not be impeded. Aside from anti-government whack-a-doos looking to set up their own compounds and cults, how many gun owners ou there are looking to arm their own militia. How many knucklehead athletes who carry a gun into a club and end up shooting someone or getting shot are part of a militia? The specific case before the court centers on Washington, D.C.’s near total ban on gun ownership, a ban declared unconstitutional last year by a federal appeals court. Briefs supporting each side of the case have been coming in fast and furious to the Supreme Court, which heard arguments in the case Tuesday. Lord help us if the NRA and other gun honks get their way, because no matter how you try to spin the self-protection argument, it doesn’t fly. Putting more guns out there in the hands of anyone, trained or otherwise, licensed or not, makes the world a more dangerous place and ups the likelihood of someone getting shot and/or killed. Decide in favor of the Constitution the way it is written and intended, Supreme Court justices: just say no to lifting the gun-ownership ban in D.C. and don’t set a dangerous precedent that could cause a lot of problems.

- Some of you have been asking when I’d announce the next Album To Avoid. These are albums so atrociously bad that you may actually be in physical danger, especially that of hearing loss, if forced to listen to them. I’ve been holding off because I wanted to have this vital feature return with a bang, and boy do I have it. This was an easy one to spot because it contains the two most horrific, terrifying and terrible words in music today: American Karaoke. Yes, there is an album out now that has a direct link to the world’s biggest hack karaoke contest, having been produced by none other than the portly, cherubic, annoying Randy Jackson, dawg. Yo, dawg, this album is terrible, dawg. Jackson, having clearly been corrupted by years spent in close proximity to the many karaoke hacks on AK and having not been that capable musically before then, has put together a gawd-awful album of songs that might actually be able to make your ears bleed just by holding the disc in your hands. Let’s start with the fact that one of his fellow publicity hounds, er, judges on AK has a song on this album. Paula Abdul puts on a tragically, mind-bendingly bad performance on the poorly written, heavily synthesized, musical-talent-lacking Dance Like There’s No Tomorrow. Just imagine the worst pop song you’ve ever heard, times ten. It’s like putting Britney Spears, Mandy Moore, Jennifer Lopez, Fergie and Lionel Richie in a blender and mixing in a giant pile of monkey crap. Furthermore, Jackson reaches out the blend in another horrible music genre, country, with his crap-tacular pop music by bringing country singer John Rich in to duet with R&B singer Anthony Hamilton. Throw a tune from chubby, over-the-hill, mentally unstable Mariah Carey and you can begin to understand just how putrid this album is. I’d advise you to buy as many copies as possible….then burn them to keep them from inflicting any damage on the general public. However, advising you to do that would give Jackson and these artists money they don’t deserve. Instead, I’m advising you to either steal the album and burn it or just burn it right there in the store. Yes, you run the risk of going to jail for shoplifting, but it’s a small price to pay for destroying truly bad music.

- Finally….this season of MTV’s Real World/Road Rules Challenge: Gauntlet 3 has come to an end. Normally these shows are fun to watch, but this season was an absolute abortion from the start. The team comprised of Challenge veterans dominated from the start and only lost missions when they did so on purpose so they could send weaker members of their team home. Of course, with that kind of momentum going into the final challenge on this week’s episode, you just knew it was going to swing back the other way. Some way, some how there would be another momentum shift and the Rookie team would catch a break. That break came as the two teams raced through and über-obstacle course comprised of mini-challenges based on previous missions from this season. After a half-mile swim, the Veterans’ largest member, Eric, was already struggling. The big fella has to be pushing three bills and he couldn’t keep up with everyone else. Between the third and fourth parts of this mission, he collapsed and was taken to the hospital. In spite of that, the Rookies were so pathetic that they allowed the Veterans to make up what had to be 15-20 minutes lost because of Eric’s’ collapse and actually finish the mission first. Unfortunately for the Veterans, the rules for the final mission explicitly stated that ALL of a team’s members had to cross the finish line in order for them to win. Because Eric was in a hospital bed instead of with his team, the Veterans weren’t officially able to finish the race. The Rookies, who had quit when they thought they had lost, resumed digging for the chest buried in the sand and containing their team flag and hoisted it on the flagpole to win. The six members of the team split $300,000, so obviously each of them got $60,000. The truly sad part of all of this was that several members of the Veteran team, especially lesbian Evelyn and loudmouth Kenny, seemed more concerned with the fact that they lost their chance at the money than they were to see a friend and teammate collapse and have to be hospitalized. Good job, guys, way to keep perspective. All told, this was a truly forgettable season and next time, MTV needs to find a way to balance the teams better so we don’t end up with such a lopsided season of bad TV.

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