- Who isn't the gas crisis hitting hard? Food prices are going up, airline prices are skyrocketing and delivery services are charging more to transport your goods. But dammit, this time it has gone too far because those bloated fuel costs are hitting America where it hurts - the adult entertainment industry. The strip club is a valued institution in every American community worth its salt - and by “valued institution” I mean it’s a place where desperate losers go to see drug-addled skanks take off their clothes and rub on brass poles because those desperate losers can't get any girl to take off her clothes and have sex with them of her own free will and without being paid for it. But with gas prices soaring and Americans forced to more closely examine their spending, strip clubs are taking a hit. Men no longer have those extra $1 bills to shove down the G-string of Cinnamon, Ginger and Bambi. They can’t afford the two-drink minimum at their local strip joint and those high gas prices make it tough to drive two towns over to the strip club so their wife or girlfriend doesn’t see their car in the parking lot of the strip joint in their hometown. Nowhere is the problem more evident than Florida’s First Coast. In Jacksonville. the typical lunch crowd at Sinsations has dwindled to just two guys and a couple of sandwiches. That’s just disgusting - and I don’t just mean the sandwiches in a strip joint. The reality of the situation is spelled out by Joe Serafini, manager of the Emperor's Gentlemen's Club in Jacksonville. “People just don't have the money to go out, they don't have the money to buy a drink, they certainly don't have the money to spend on an entertainer,” said the manager of Joe Serafini. Nice use of the word “entertainer” as opposed to stripper or skank, by the way. Serafini also says he has been forced to lay off staff, reduce prices and limit hours to turn a profit and managers at Sinsations say their income has dropped by roughly 35 percent in recent months. “I have to go to other places to try to make the money,” said an exotic dancer known as Storm. Other places like the nearest corner in a leather miniskirt, I wonder…but cutting down on your coke usage might also help. “[I've gone from] about a grand a week, down to a couple hundred,” Storm added. Yeah, you really can’t sustain a good drug habit on that income. Oddly enough, although many strip club patrons are likely among those who have received an economic stimulus refund from the federal government, Serafini says that money is not being spent in his club. It’s a sad story and just another illustration of how the W. administration is choking out America’s economy.
- Did we or did we not abolish slavery about a century and a half ago in these here United States? I was under the impression that we did and most of your probably were as well. Someone forgot to send the memo to millionaire perfume maker Mahhender Sabhnani, 51, of Central Islip, N.Y. Mr. Sabhnani and his wife Varsha apparently kept two Indonesian housekeepers as virtual slaves. The couple exploited these two poor women just as so many rich people do with those who immigrate to the U.S. in search of a better life. Varsha Sabhnani was the mastermind of this exploitation scheme, so she received 11 years in prison. Her husband was only a small part of the operation, so he got off with 40 months in prison and a $12,500 fine. Ironically, that’s probably hundreds of times more money than the Sabhnanis ever paid to their two slave maids. Why is it that the richest, most prosperous people are so often the most despicable, classless a-holes when it comes to how they treat those under them? Hope saving a few bucks on paying your help was worth spending several years behind bars, idiots….
- God bless you, tree huggers. On the totem pole of rioters, protestors and social dissidents, you rank at or near the bottom. You choose non-violent, peaceful methods of dissent such as climbing up in trees and living there as opposed to setting cars and buildings on fire, throwing rocks and Molotov cocktails and clashing with police. Yet you have your purpose and place in the world of dissidents, so I still salute your efforts. The University of California, Berkeley has long been home to pot-smoking liberal activists, especially during the ‘70s. But that spirit lives on in the new millennium thanks to an intrepid group of tree huggers looking to save an oak tree grove that is being threatened by the university’s plans for a massive new athletic training center. In December 2006, dozens of protestors climbed into trees in the endangered grove and proceeded to live there in protest of the new construction. Since then, university administrators have won a court order allowing them to evict the protestors and put that order into action by cutting supply lines and yanking many of the activists out of their arboreal homes. The remaining half dozen protestors were driven into a single redwood tree and there they remain to this day, some 18 months later. These hearty souls refused the administration’s demands to move and also to ration water, so the aggravated administrators finally gave in and offered them sustenance. A court case challenging the construction of the training facility is nearing its end, so this matter could come to a head very soon. Still, the remaining tree huggers are in it for as long as it takes. One of their ground-based supporters, a woman identifying herself only as Citizyn (what is it with tree-dwellers and bizarre single names?), says those still in the tree are well-trained climbers who will not give up. Best of success to you, peaceful protestors, I hope you win your battle or at the minimum finally get to take a shower…..
- Driving his opponent out of the race with a campaign of violence, murder and terror just wasn’t enough for Zimbabwean President Bob Mugabe. As the nation’s runoff election approached, he and his forces of machete-wielding youth militia members continued to terrorize voters even though Mugabe was the only candidate that was still in the election. That fact didn’t stop the weapon-laden youths from running around, assaulting people and threatening them to go to the polls and vote Friday. Voters was threatened with violence and death if they didn’t have red ink on their fingers - the sign that a person had voted in the election. Mugabe went ahead with the election that the rest of the world recognized as a total sham and proudly declared his victory, pointing at the results like an excited toddler pointing to a turd in the toilet bowl when he’s being potty trained. Ironically, Mugabe’s win smells just as foully as a pile of crap and is equally as pleasant. So he’s “won” (i.e. forcefully ripped with guns, knives, beatings, murders and intimidation) another five-year term in office. Sorry about that, Zimbabwe, words can’t express how terribly you all must feel at this point.
- Soccer fan is one of those constants you can count on in life. When all else fails and nothing goes according to plan, there’s soccer fan, acting like a freaking hooligan and doing what soccer fan does - cause chaos. Whether it’s bagging up urine to make urine bombs to lob at opposing fans, throwing lit flares at the other team’s goalie, rioting in the streets because their team lost or starting brawls in the stands, soccer fan is guaranteed fun every day of the week. So of course soccer fan would be in all his glory at the 2008 Euro championships, which just wrapped up yesterday with the championship match between Germany and Spain. However, soccer fan’s finest moment came in a semifinal game between Croatia and Germany in which Croatian fans are alleged to have displayed signs with Nazi-themed messages on them and shouted Nazi-themed chants. Great move, soccer fan. Nothing says supporting your team and showing spirit like chanting and representing for a group responsible for the largest genocide in the history of the world. But hey, I’m sure no descendents of the 6 million-plus Jews who were killed by the Nazis would take offense to your act, not when it’s for a good cause like a freaking soccer game. It wasn’t even the title match, it was a quarterfinal game. Good thing Croatia was eliminated in the quarterfinal round, because I don’t want to imagine what their fans would have broken out if they had advanced. What’s next, some Darfur smack? Wanna fly the Zimbabwean flag and chant about Robert Mugabe brutalizing and killing his own people to win an election? Class it up, soccer fan. Even for you, running Nazi smack is low class.
Monday, June 30, 2008
Sunday, June 29, 2008
Justin Gimelstob's crush gone wrong, a contrite prison escapee and a college football drug dealer
- Justin Gimelstob sure does take a long time to get over a hot chick turning him down. Gimelstob, a tennis player on the men’s side of the ATP Tour, had some extremely harsh words recently for a player he used to coach when she was a teen - Anna Kournikova. Gimelstob, who now sits on the ATP’s executive board and isn't a major factor on the court as a player, lit up the über-hot Anna K. in a recent interview, calling her among other things a “bitch” and “douche bag.” He started off in direct fashion, saying, "She's a bitch. Hate's a very strong word. I just despise her to the maximum level, right below hate. I think she falls into the Marcelo Rios scumbag category. And this whole bluff about her retiring because of her back? She had the yips on her serve, she can't get her serve on the court." Also nice was Gimelstob lying about whether he had a crush on Kournikova. Asked if he had ever been attracted to Kournikova, Gimelstob declared: "Definitely not. I have no attraction to her, because she's such a douche.” Sure, Justin, whatever you say. His comments come as he is a month away from squaring off against Kournikova in a mixed doubles match at a World Team Tennis event. Regarding that match, Gimelstob says his prediction is simple: pain. He says that if Kournikova doesn’t leave the court crying, he hasn’t done his job. He also says he plans to nail her in the midsection with a shot. First off, I’ll admit that defending Kournikova on her merits as a tennis player won't work here. She was a colossal failure on the court, never winning any tournament of value and seeing her career end in short order. Her problem was being more focused on her career as a model and actress/vixen in that hack loser Enrique Iglesias’ music videos. To be fair, Kournikova never tried to mislead anyone into believing that she was a serious tennis player intent on being the world best. She was also notoriously arrogant, allegedly telling one young boy who asked for her autograph and had a crush on her that, “You cannot afford me.” All of that being said, Gimelstob’s beef with her sounds like a classic case of a dude having a crush on a hot girl and getting shut down. First, you can be sure that if he was her coach, even when she was a junior level player, he had the hots for her. If you are around a girl that hot day in, day out and you don’t have a thing for her, you’re either gay or you don’t have a pulse. So he had to have a crush on her and now, all these years later, he’s still bent. Few things make a man that bitter for that long and chief among them is being soundly rejected by a hot girl. Maybe she treated his advances with utter contempt and stomped all over his ego, but Justin, you need to let it go and move on. Before your little temper tantrum, no one outside yours and Anna K.’s close, personal circles knew about this. Now…..everyone knows and you look like a jerk on several levels. Making Anna K. cry by hitting her with a tennis ball won't help you reclaim your lost manhood, so just let it go and walk away…..
- The story of Eve Carson’s murder was already tragic, but with the release of six warrants used by police in her case this week, the depth of the tragedy has gone to new extremes. Carson is the former student body president at the University of North Carolina who was brutally murdered this spring, stunning the UNC campus and the Chapel Hill community. The warrants released this week allege that Laurence Lovette, 17, and Demario Atwater, 22, entered Carson’s home through an open window, kidnapped her at gunpoint, took her in her own vehicle to a nearby ATM to withdraw $1,400 from her account and then shot her multiple times. Both are charged with first-degree murder and although their respective attorneys are trying to pick away at the prosecution’s case, I’m not buying it. Lovette’s attorney told a judge that the prosecution’s case relies on hearsay from an unreliable confidential informant, which sounds very much like the desperate plea of a lawyer who knows that he or she is completely and irrevocably f****d. A conviction here would put these two up for the death penalty, which I dare say they’re deserving of. You break into the home of some random girl who is studying for her classes, you kidnap her in her own car so you can steal a measly $1,400 and then you kill her? How are you that desperate for money that you can cross so many lines in such a short span of time? Heck, break in and steal her computer, jewelry and credit cards if you have to. Take her ATM card and force her to give you her PIN number, but killing her….no way. This is just a sickening case all around.
- So what, now getting hit with felony drug charges gets you kicked off your college football team? In an elite program in its heyday, that kind of criminal activity gets you bumped to first string and cements your status as a prime-time player, but now it gets you booted? Go figure. This disturbing bit of news comes courtesy of now-former University of Alabama linebacker Jimmy Johns, who was was arrested on felony drug charges Tuesday and kicked off the team. Johns came to Alabama as a running back and receiver in 2007, then moved to defense for his what was supposed to be his senior year. That senior year isn't going to happen because according to Tuscaloosa police, Johns was “pretty wide open” selling cocaine to students on and around the University of Alabama campus. He also tried to hide the activity from his teammates, not the best move. If you’re the biggest crack dealer on campus, some of your teammates are probably going to find out about it. Hard to explain why strung-out junkies are coming to your apartment at all hours of the night with wads of cash in their hands and others are hitting you up on campus asking if you’ve got any good stuff because they need to get high tonight. “He didn't want them to know he was involved in it,” said Capt. Jeff Snyder of the West Alabama Narcotics Task Force. Johns may not have wanted his teammates to know he was a crack dealer, but as Alabama was conducting spring football practice, police began getting tips that Johns was involved in drug sales. In what I like to call slam-dunk, irrefutable evidence, undercover officers purchased cocaine from Johns five times in the last 11/2 weeks, Snyder said. Hard to argue you’re not selling drugs when an undercover officer buys off of you not one, not two, but five times in less than three months. Police arrested Johns at a gas station near his off-campus apartment, where he lived alone. They searched his apartment and found about 10 grams of cocaine and ecstasy pills. Ooh, let me handle this one for you, Jimmie. The drugs weren’t yours, you were just storing them for a friend. Maybe someone broke into your apartment to smoke crack and drop X and when you chased them out they left the drugs behind. As I’m sure you know, it’s NEVER an athlete or celebrity’s fault when they’re found to have drugs on their person. Someone else is always to blame and there’s always a grrrreat explanation. Johns had better start concocting such an excuse, because he has been charged with distributing cocaine and possessing the pills. Being the team’s second leading rusher your first two years and being projected as a starting linebacker won't get you off of drug charges. You’ll also be amazed to know that Johns missed part of spring practice for academic reasons. A guy dumb enough to deal drugs on campus and who spends a lot of time playing football isn't fulfilling his academic requirements? No way. Head coach and noted liar Nick Saban wasted no time in giving Johns the heave-ho, dismissing him from the team almost immediately after the charges were made. “This type of behavior obviously will not be tolerated and he is no longer a part of our program,” he said in a brief statement. “Not unless you are a first-team All-American and projected first-round draft pick.” Okay, so I made part of that up, but it isn't that far fetched….
- Sometimes life just works out. Circumstances unfold in a way that brings everything into place, with wrongs righted and fences mended. Inmate Luis Camacho-Mendoza had just such an experience this week when he broke out of prison. He is a prisoner at the Crawford County jail in Arkansas and Tuesday, he decided to make his own personal prison break. Using a tool he fashioned from two screwdrivers, Mendoza pried open a kitchen door and found a back way out of the prison. However, as excited as he was to escape, Mendoza also apparently felt guilty about breaking out. He left behind a toilet paper rose as a sign of his contrition for escaping, a noble gesture if you consider foliage made of something you use to wipe your butt as noble. Fortunately for Mendoza, he didn’t have to live with the guilt of his escape for long. Police discovered him in a home not far from the prison on Wednesday, attempting to hide in a closet under a pile of laundry. He even attempted to conceal himself by placing a pillowcase on his head, a tactic that failed to fool the cops. “He wasn’t hiding too good because you could see the outline of his head in the pillowcase,” said grammatically challenged investigator Ken Howard. So it’s back to jail for Mendoza to serve out the rest of his sentence on drug charges and the extra time he’ll receive for the escape. He could potentially be deported back to his native Mexico, so there is that to consider as well. But at least he doesn’t have to feel guilty about escaping because he’s now back where he belongs.
- The story of Eve Carson’s murder was already tragic, but with the release of six warrants used by police in her case this week, the depth of the tragedy has gone to new extremes. Carson is the former student body president at the University of North Carolina who was brutally murdered this spring, stunning the UNC campus and the Chapel Hill community. The warrants released this week allege that Laurence Lovette, 17, and Demario Atwater, 22, entered Carson’s home through an open window, kidnapped her at gunpoint, took her in her own vehicle to a nearby ATM to withdraw $1,400 from her account and then shot her multiple times. Both are charged with first-degree murder and although their respective attorneys are trying to pick away at the prosecution’s case, I’m not buying it. Lovette’s attorney told a judge that the prosecution’s case relies on hearsay from an unreliable confidential informant, which sounds very much like the desperate plea of a lawyer who knows that he or she is completely and irrevocably f****d. A conviction here would put these two up for the death penalty, which I dare say they’re deserving of. You break into the home of some random girl who is studying for her classes, you kidnap her in her own car so you can steal a measly $1,400 and then you kill her? How are you that desperate for money that you can cross so many lines in such a short span of time? Heck, break in and steal her computer, jewelry and credit cards if you have to. Take her ATM card and force her to give you her PIN number, but killing her….no way. This is just a sickening case all around.
- So what, now getting hit with felony drug charges gets you kicked off your college football team? In an elite program in its heyday, that kind of criminal activity gets you bumped to first string and cements your status as a prime-time player, but now it gets you booted? Go figure. This disturbing bit of news comes courtesy of now-former University of Alabama linebacker Jimmy Johns, who was was arrested on felony drug charges Tuesday and kicked off the team. Johns came to Alabama as a running back and receiver in 2007, then moved to defense for his what was supposed to be his senior year. That senior year isn't going to happen because according to Tuscaloosa police, Johns was “pretty wide open” selling cocaine to students on and around the University of Alabama campus. He also tried to hide the activity from his teammates, not the best move. If you’re the biggest crack dealer on campus, some of your teammates are probably going to find out about it. Hard to explain why strung-out junkies are coming to your apartment at all hours of the night with wads of cash in their hands and others are hitting you up on campus asking if you’ve got any good stuff because they need to get high tonight. “He didn't want them to know he was involved in it,” said Capt. Jeff Snyder of the West Alabama Narcotics Task Force. Johns may not have wanted his teammates to know he was a crack dealer, but as Alabama was conducting spring football practice, police began getting tips that Johns was involved in drug sales. In what I like to call slam-dunk, irrefutable evidence, undercover officers purchased cocaine from Johns five times in the last 11/2 weeks, Snyder said. Hard to argue you’re not selling drugs when an undercover officer buys off of you not one, not two, but five times in less than three months. Police arrested Johns at a gas station near his off-campus apartment, where he lived alone. They searched his apartment and found about 10 grams of cocaine and ecstasy pills. Ooh, let me handle this one for you, Jimmie. The drugs weren’t yours, you were just storing them for a friend. Maybe someone broke into your apartment to smoke crack and drop X and when you chased them out they left the drugs behind. As I’m sure you know, it’s NEVER an athlete or celebrity’s fault when they’re found to have drugs on their person. Someone else is always to blame and there’s always a grrrreat explanation. Johns had better start concocting such an excuse, because he has been charged with distributing cocaine and possessing the pills. Being the team’s second leading rusher your first two years and being projected as a starting linebacker won't get you off of drug charges. You’ll also be amazed to know that Johns missed part of spring practice for academic reasons. A guy dumb enough to deal drugs on campus and who spends a lot of time playing football isn't fulfilling his academic requirements? No way. Head coach and noted liar Nick Saban wasted no time in giving Johns the heave-ho, dismissing him from the team almost immediately after the charges were made. “This type of behavior obviously will not be tolerated and he is no longer a part of our program,” he said in a brief statement. “Not unless you are a first-team All-American and projected first-round draft pick.” Okay, so I made part of that up, but it isn't that far fetched….
- Sometimes life just works out. Circumstances unfold in a way that brings everything into place, with wrongs righted and fences mended. Inmate Luis Camacho-Mendoza had just such an experience this week when he broke out of prison. He is a prisoner at the Crawford County jail in Arkansas and Tuesday, he decided to make his own personal prison break. Using a tool he fashioned from two screwdrivers, Mendoza pried open a kitchen door and found a back way out of the prison. However, as excited as he was to escape, Mendoza also apparently felt guilty about breaking out. He left behind a toilet paper rose as a sign of his contrition for escaping, a noble gesture if you consider foliage made of something you use to wipe your butt as noble. Fortunately for Mendoza, he didn’t have to live with the guilt of his escape for long. Police discovered him in a home not far from the prison on Wednesday, attempting to hide in a closet under a pile of laundry. He even attempted to conceal himself by placing a pillowcase on his head, a tactic that failed to fool the cops. “He wasn’t hiding too good because you could see the outline of his head in the pillowcase,” said grammatically challenged investigator Ken Howard. So it’s back to jail for Mendoza to serve out the rest of his sentence on drug charges and the extra time he’ll receive for the escape. He could potentially be deported back to his native Mexico, so there is that to consider as well. But at least he doesn’t have to feel guilty about escaping because he’s now back where he belongs.
Saturday, June 28, 2008
My interest in Wimbledon '08 ends, ridiculously expensive desert apartments and child rapists catch an undeserved break
- Have you ever dreamt of paying ridiculous sums of money to live in an apartment in the middle of a desert-laden nation inside of a building that moves and changes shapes? I thought maybe you had, so that’s why I’m happy to let you in on the Dynamic Tower, a skyscraper to be built in Dubai by New York-based architect David Fisher of the Dynamic Group. Plans for the skyscraper were announced this week, with the 420-foot tower to be completed by 2010. It will be shape-shifting structure, 80 stories of prefabricated floors that will each be able to lift independently thanks to wind turbines under each floor. It’s the first skyscraper Fisher has designed, which is leading many in the architecture world to doubt his ability to make this happen. If he does, the building will rip would-be tenants off to the tune of $3,000 per square foot, equating to apartments costing between $4 million and $40 million. Why anyone would pay that much to live in a building that can change shape at any time and is located in the middle of a freaking desert, I don’t know. However, if you are both incredibly rich and incredibly stupid and might need a place to live in a couple of years, this is something you may want to look into….
- The Supreme Court has been busy handing down bad decisions and bad news for the past couple weeks, supporting gun enthusiasts, inept, mentally handicapped presidents and the like. That being said, their decision to spare convicted child rapists from the death penalty might be their worst one yet this week. The court determined in the case of Patrick Kennedy, a man convicted of raping his own stepdaughter, that the death penalty can only be applied in murder cases. By a 5-4 vote, the court overturned the death sentence Kennedy had received in 2003 from a lower court. Judge Anthony Kennedy (no relation, although judging by the idiocy of this decision by the court, you have to wonder) wrote in the majority opinion that “evolving standards of decency” in the United States forbid the death penalty being given to non-murderers. He also wrote that doing so would violate the Eighth Amendment, which forbids cruel and unusual punishment. Sorry Supreme Court justices, but I have to agree with the many irate state attorneys general around the country who are ripping your ruling and the various legislators who are vowing to continue passing legislation allowing for death sentences for convicted child rapists. Anyone who does anything that vile to a child deserves severe, severe punishment….
- College baseball isn't one of the premier college sports, so good stories like what the Fresno State baseball team accomplished this season often go unnoticed by all but the most hardcore seamheads. The Bulldogs barely made the NCAA Tournament, having to win their conference tournament to guarantee a bid. They were the fourth seed in their regional out of four teams, meaning that they should expect to be headed home after one weekend. Instead, they spent the next four weeks ripping through nationally ranked teams like San Diego, Arizona State, Rice, North Carolina and Georgia on their way to their first-ever national championship in a men’s sport. They lost 31 games this season, the most ever for an NCAA baseball champion. Six times, they played elimination games that would have ended their season if they had lost. Six times they won, always against “superior” competition. They had their star right fielder playing with torn tendons in his finger that were hampering him to the extent that his coach seriously considered benching him. Yet there was Steve Detweiler in the College World Series’ final game, belting a two-run home run to send his team on their way to the clinching victory. Their top pitcher was out with an arm injury as well and because they had to play so many big games both before and in the CWS, their pitching staff was supposed to be too jacked up to win the best-of-three championship series against the mighty Georgia Bulldogs, ranked eighth in the country. After Fresno State dropped the first game of the title series by surrendering a 6-3 eighth-inning lead, you thought that this might be the time when they had taken too big of a hit to recover from. When they fell behind 5-0 early in Game 2, that looked to be the case. Then they got off the mat, came back and crushed Georgia for a 19-10 win to force the decisive third game. They won that game 6-1, leaving no doubt by jumping out to an early lead and finishing in style. For a team that would be the equivalent of a 13-16 seed in the NCAA basketball tournament, it’s a freaking fairy tale story. Every team they played and beat for a month was ranked higher than they were and had more overall talent. Congrats to a team of scrappers, a roster full of players whose coach says they love adversity, love getting dirty, love running into walls and love people telling them they can’t. This is an awesome story and they are my favorite college sports champion in a long, long time in any sport.
- TLC needs to stop asking what I would do if Joey Fatone or the token black chick from the Spice Girls showed up at my office and asked me to sing. The network is premiering a new show this Sunday that combines the horrors of karaoke with the travesty that is a former man bander and a talentless bubble gum pop skank ambushing people to do karaoke, The Singing Office. The premise is getting groups of office workers to sing and dance against workers from another office, with Fatone coaching one office and the Spice Skank coaching the other one. Here’s my answer for you, TLC: If that tip-frosting, bib-overall wearing, dancing-in-unison-with-four-other-dudes poseur Fatone showed up at my office, I would summarily beat him down with my bare hands and possibly inject his face with every freaking staple I had handy, one for each painful instance when I was unwillingly subjected to the horr-a that he and his boys in N-Town Sync Degrees propagated when they lip-synced one of their crummy bubble-gum pop songs and it was played on the radio in a supermarket, dentist’s office, etc. that I was unfortunate enough to be in. I probably wouldn’t punch the Spice Skank like I would Fatone, but only because she’s a girl and not because the music her group of hacks put out was any better than Fatone’s. So I dare either of those two to show up any place I am and put a microphone in my face, because I guarantee I’ll find a new use for it - sticking it right up their a**………
- Well that was fast. My interested in watching Wimbledon came and went in a matter of a few days. Any desire I had to watch the tournament at tennis’ most historic venue vanished Thursday when my girl Maria Sharapova was eliminated in the tournament’s second round by unseeded Alla Kudryavtseva. Don’t get me wrong, tennis can be fun to watch and there are some other, um, physically gifted players in the women’s game, just none as smoking hot as Sharapova. Her never-ending legs, bitchin’ body and pretty smile can make even the most mundane match a must-see, but with her loss, I have no real reason to watch any more of Wimbledon this year. Maybe I tune in for the men’s final if it ends up being a Roger Federer-Rafael Nadal rematch just to see if Nadal can finally beat Federer on grass, but other than that no thanks. Is there any way we can institute a rule that Sharapova automatically wins at least three matches in every major tournament? That way we’re guaranteed to see her at least four times, which is always a positive. No offense to the Williams sisters, but those two are far too muscled, mannish and chiseled to be fun to watch. They scare the crap out of me and Serena Williams looks more like a linebacker than a tennis player. See you in 2009, Wimbledon, it was a short run this year….
- The Supreme Court has been busy handing down bad decisions and bad news for the past couple weeks, supporting gun enthusiasts, inept, mentally handicapped presidents and the like. That being said, their decision to spare convicted child rapists from the death penalty might be their worst one yet this week. The court determined in the case of Patrick Kennedy, a man convicted of raping his own stepdaughter, that the death penalty can only be applied in murder cases. By a 5-4 vote, the court overturned the death sentence Kennedy had received in 2003 from a lower court. Judge Anthony Kennedy (no relation, although judging by the idiocy of this decision by the court, you have to wonder) wrote in the majority opinion that “evolving standards of decency” in the United States forbid the death penalty being given to non-murderers. He also wrote that doing so would violate the Eighth Amendment, which forbids cruel and unusual punishment. Sorry Supreme Court justices, but I have to agree with the many irate state attorneys general around the country who are ripping your ruling and the various legislators who are vowing to continue passing legislation allowing for death sentences for convicted child rapists. Anyone who does anything that vile to a child deserves severe, severe punishment….
- College baseball isn't one of the premier college sports, so good stories like what the Fresno State baseball team accomplished this season often go unnoticed by all but the most hardcore seamheads. The Bulldogs barely made the NCAA Tournament, having to win their conference tournament to guarantee a bid. They were the fourth seed in their regional out of four teams, meaning that they should expect to be headed home after one weekend. Instead, they spent the next four weeks ripping through nationally ranked teams like San Diego, Arizona State, Rice, North Carolina and Georgia on their way to their first-ever national championship in a men’s sport. They lost 31 games this season, the most ever for an NCAA baseball champion. Six times, they played elimination games that would have ended their season if they had lost. Six times they won, always against “superior” competition. They had their star right fielder playing with torn tendons in his finger that were hampering him to the extent that his coach seriously considered benching him. Yet there was Steve Detweiler in the College World Series’ final game, belting a two-run home run to send his team on their way to the clinching victory. Their top pitcher was out with an arm injury as well and because they had to play so many big games both before and in the CWS, their pitching staff was supposed to be too jacked up to win the best-of-three championship series against the mighty Georgia Bulldogs, ranked eighth in the country. After Fresno State dropped the first game of the title series by surrendering a 6-3 eighth-inning lead, you thought that this might be the time when they had taken too big of a hit to recover from. When they fell behind 5-0 early in Game 2, that looked to be the case. Then they got off the mat, came back and crushed Georgia for a 19-10 win to force the decisive third game. They won that game 6-1, leaving no doubt by jumping out to an early lead and finishing in style. For a team that would be the equivalent of a 13-16 seed in the NCAA basketball tournament, it’s a freaking fairy tale story. Every team they played and beat for a month was ranked higher than they were and had more overall talent. Congrats to a team of scrappers, a roster full of players whose coach says they love adversity, love getting dirty, love running into walls and love people telling them they can’t. This is an awesome story and they are my favorite college sports champion in a long, long time in any sport.
- TLC needs to stop asking what I would do if Joey Fatone or the token black chick from the Spice Girls showed up at my office and asked me to sing. The network is premiering a new show this Sunday that combines the horrors of karaoke with the travesty that is a former man bander and a talentless bubble gum pop skank ambushing people to do karaoke, The Singing Office. The premise is getting groups of office workers to sing and dance against workers from another office, with Fatone coaching one office and the Spice Skank coaching the other one. Here’s my answer for you, TLC: If that tip-frosting, bib-overall wearing, dancing-in-unison-with-four-other-dudes poseur Fatone showed up at my office, I would summarily beat him down with my bare hands and possibly inject his face with every freaking staple I had handy, one for each painful instance when I was unwillingly subjected to the horr-a that he and his boys in N-Town Sync Degrees propagated when they lip-synced one of their crummy bubble-gum pop songs and it was played on the radio in a supermarket, dentist’s office, etc. that I was unfortunate enough to be in. I probably wouldn’t punch the Spice Skank like I would Fatone, but only because she’s a girl and not because the music her group of hacks put out was any better than Fatone’s. So I dare either of those two to show up any place I am and put a microphone in my face, because I guarantee I’ll find a new use for it - sticking it right up their a**………
- Well that was fast. My interested in watching Wimbledon came and went in a matter of a few days. Any desire I had to watch the tournament at tennis’ most historic venue vanished Thursday when my girl Maria Sharapova was eliminated in the tournament’s second round by unseeded Alla Kudryavtseva. Don’t get me wrong, tennis can be fun to watch and there are some other, um, physically gifted players in the women’s game, just none as smoking hot as Sharapova. Her never-ending legs, bitchin’ body and pretty smile can make even the most mundane match a must-see, but with her loss, I have no real reason to watch any more of Wimbledon this year. Maybe I tune in for the men’s final if it ends up being a Roger Federer-Rafael Nadal rematch just to see if Nadal can finally beat Federer on grass, but other than that no thanks. Is there any way we can institute a rule that Sharapova automatically wins at least three matches in every major tournament? That way we’re guaranteed to see her at least four times, which is always a positive. No offense to the Williams sisters, but those two are far too muscled, mannish and chiseled to be fun to watch. They scare the crap out of me and Serena Williams looks more like a linebacker than a tennis player. See you in 2009, Wimbledon, it was a short run this year….
Friday, June 27, 2008
Hopefully Spider-Man 4 doesn't suck, news on 24's return and Kanye West = arrogant a-hole
- This would be one of those stories that makes you incredibly nauseous whether you’re a parent or not. You don’t need to be a parent to be repulsed upon hearing that a series of raids by federal law enforcement authorities resulted in the removal of 21 juveniles from sex-selling rings. Those figures were announced by the FBI announced Wednesday, along with other tallies from sweeps conducted in 16 cities nationwide over the past five days. “Our top priority in these cases has always been to identify children victims and move swiftly to remove them from these dangerous environments,” FBI Director Robert Mueller said. Amen to that. You find a perv who has anything to do with child prostitution, go ahead and bust them. Arrest first, ask question after you’ve attached electrodes to the most sensitive parts of their body and cranked up the voltage. According to Mueller, this week’s sweeps bring to 433 the number of child victims recovered in the five years since the FBI began its “Innocence Lost” initiative. The program was designed to combat the epidemic underage prostitution. What is truly disgusting about in cases like this, boys as young as 11 and girls as young as 12 are often targeted by prostitution rings. Among the cities where raids were carried out this week are Los Angeles, Sacramento, Oakland, Las Vegas, Reno Phoenix, Houston, Dallas, Texas, Detroit, Boston, Atlanta, Miami and Tampa. My sympathies if you live in one of those cities and have been sharing it with these pervs, that sucks. Some crimes you can defend, some crimes are not a big deal….those statements don’t apply here. I sincerely hope that if the people arrested in these stings involving juveniles are in fact guilty that they are thrown into prison with the most vicious, sodomizing inmates we have in our prison system.
- New York Jets tight end Chris Baker recently parked in the designated parking spot of team president Mike Tannenbaum to show his unhappiness with his contract situation and how the team was handling it. On Seinfeld, George Costanza had sex on his desk with the cleaning lady at one of his many jobs and when fired for the indiscretion, asked “Was that wrong?” Never did I think that I would look at those two as model employees…not until I heard the story of Houston Astros pitcher Shawn Chacon. Chacon is a mediocre veteran pitcher for a bad team, a guy who is a No. 3 starter at best. He hasn’t had a great season, going 2-3 with a 5.04 ERA in 15 starts. In light of that performance, the team demoted him from the starting rotation to the bullpen. Chacon didn’t take kindly to the demotion and earlier this week, he got into an altercation with GM Ed Wade in the dining room at a team meal. According to Chacon, Wade was verbally attacking him and cursing him, the message being to “look in the mirror”. Chacon’s response? Grabbing Wade by the neck and throwing him to the floor, of course. For whatever reason, the team didn’t appreciate having the 19th or 20th best player on a 25-man roster assaulting its top executive and the team has suspended Chacon indefinitely. Wade says the suspension will last until the Astros make a final determination on Chacon’s status on the roster (see here outright release). If that’s me, I’m going to go ahead and accept the demotion to the bullpen. At worst, I’m going right back at the GM when he’s cussing me out and I’m firing verbal salvos back at him. That would get you into trouble, just not as much trouble as felony assault. Trust me, I’ve worked for some real a-holes and choking them would have been a very welcome alternative many times, but it was simply never on the table as I tend to reject criminal activity as means to satisfy that sort of dispute. Good thinking, Shawn, I’m sure other teams will be lining up to sign you and your 5.04 ERA once the Astros cut you loose….
- Kanye West, the most arrogant, egotistical man in music, is at it again. Fresh off a disastrous, über-late performance at the Bonnaroo Music Festival, West has been ripped for taking the stage nearly two hours late and inciting fans to pelt the stage with garbage and glow sticks and spray paint derogatory messages about him on the back of portable toilets at the festival site. He basically lived up to a line from his most recent hit “Stronger” which says in part, “you should be honored by my lateness.” In other words, be grateful that I ever bother to show up at all, mo-fo, that’s how great I am. Bonnaroo attendees didn’t agree, nor do the many critics who are ripping West for his act at the festival. For his part, K. West is acting like a spoiled brat, saying on his blog that the flak he's taken has left him “the most offended I've ever been.” Sorry K., but when your performance at a festival was scheduled for 2:45 a.m. and you didn't take the stage until 4:25 a.m. due to circumstances that can be mostly attributed to you, you deserve to be ripped. The delay was caused by problems setting up West's elaborate stage set, which included an interplanetary landscape of a wavy black platform and a video screen above. To be fair, part of the delay can be traced to rockers Pearl Jam, who had performed on the main stage earlier that evening, and went an hour over their scheduled time. Still, if West could just perform without a freaking circus of lights, video screen and props, he could have been on stage much earlier. When you walk into a place like the Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival, which traditionally has favored jam bands, you need to realize that you’re not exactly the kind of act people want to see. Thus, your pompous, self-aggrandizing stage act might lead to “Kanye sucks” chants and criticism from fellow musicians like pedal steel guitarist Robert Randolph, who played later the same day. West didn’t help matters by complaining that he was “dealing with ... idiots who didn't really have the capacity to really put on this show properly.” Good job, K., that’ll win people over. Call them idiots, see if that helps. If you had just performed when originally scheduled (8:15 p.m. the night of June 14), and not demanded that your set be moved later in the evening so it was sufficiently dark for your “glow-in-the-dark” performance. To be fair, I like some of Kanye’s music and he’s one of the few hip-hop artists in my iPod. That being said, I would have been pissed and looking for something to throw at him if I had to wait two hours for his set as well. Take your butt-ugly fly’s eyes sunglasses and get lost, K. West. See if you can’t take a trip to a place where you can acquire a little humility, jerk.
- Fear not, fans of 24 who have waited two years for a new season and were alarmed when cast member and Scotsman Robert Carlyle stated that the two hours covered by this November's 24 prequel movie will count toward Season 7's episode count. “This is two hours in real time,” he said, “and there'll then be 22 episodes.” Proving that you shouldn’t believe the statements of someone who doesn’t know what they’re talking about, Fox confirmed that Day 7 indeed will be the usual 24 episodes/hours and that the TV movie won't count toward that time. Something else Carlyle said was that the final moments of the prequel will feed right into the opening scenes of Season 7, but once again, he appears to be off base. The prequel itself picks up four years after the events of Day 6, which ended with Jack staring off a cliff outside of James and Audrey Heller’s house in Malibu, looking out to the Pacific below. This effectively places Jack Bauer in the year 2017, if you do the math. He’ll then advance another few on-screen months between the movie's sure-to-be-thrilling climax and Jack's appearance before Congress. At the start of Season 7. In other TV news, the rectangle has become a triangle on One Tree Hill. As last season ended, Lucas (Chad Michael Murray) was on the phone inviting an unidentified female companion to elope to Las Vegas with him. One of the potential leading ladies was supposed to be Lindsey, played by Michaela McManus. Since McManus is now joining the cast of NBC's Law & Order: Special Victims Unit as the new assistant district attorney, effective with this fall’s Season 10, let’s go ahead and assume she wasn’t the one on the other end of that phone call. Kinda takes a lot of suspense out of the OTH plot, but then again, can’t imagine that a lot of people were spending their summer debating that cliffhanger anyhow….
- I have to admit, I am excitedly looking forward to the reported May 2011 release date for Spider-Man 4. By “excitedly looking forward” I of course mean that I’m hoping it doesn’t totally blow as much as Spider-Man 3 did. Let’s face it, this is a franchise that has gotten steadily worse as it went from a fantastic first movie to a good second one to subpar third installment. Now the fourth incarnation of Spidey is a go and being eyed for that May 2011 release date, which should give Sam Raimi and Co. time to analyze the many, many things they did wrong in the last film. (Hint: Too many villains, too many storylines and too much going on that detracted from the main plot. One of the franchise’s staple characters, J.K. Simmons (aka J. Jonah Jameson), had this to say. “Nobody’s signed anything on any dotted lines and I don't think there's an actual script yet, but as we all know [that’s "just" a detail]," Simmons told tvguide.com. “In films, they work backwards. They announce that Spider-Man 4 will open on, say, Memorial Day 2011, they start the marketing campaign from there, and at some point they’ll write and cast the movie.” Aside from making sure that Tobey Maguire is on board and ensuring that Raimi signs on to direct one more time, the unresolved question everyone is buzzing about is who will be the villain in No. 4. Will it be Lizard (Dylan Baker has played Dr. Curt Connor twice, in Parts 2 and 3), could it be Vulture or might it be Kraven? Honestly, unless the script and plot improve dramatically from Spider-Man 3, it doesn’t freaking matter who the villain is, so let’s focus on that first, k?
- New York Jets tight end Chris Baker recently parked in the designated parking spot of team president Mike Tannenbaum to show his unhappiness with his contract situation and how the team was handling it. On Seinfeld, George Costanza had sex on his desk with the cleaning lady at one of his many jobs and when fired for the indiscretion, asked “Was that wrong?” Never did I think that I would look at those two as model employees…not until I heard the story of Houston Astros pitcher Shawn Chacon. Chacon is a mediocre veteran pitcher for a bad team, a guy who is a No. 3 starter at best. He hasn’t had a great season, going 2-3 with a 5.04 ERA in 15 starts. In light of that performance, the team demoted him from the starting rotation to the bullpen. Chacon didn’t take kindly to the demotion and earlier this week, he got into an altercation with GM Ed Wade in the dining room at a team meal. According to Chacon, Wade was verbally attacking him and cursing him, the message being to “look in the mirror”. Chacon’s response? Grabbing Wade by the neck and throwing him to the floor, of course. For whatever reason, the team didn’t appreciate having the 19th or 20th best player on a 25-man roster assaulting its top executive and the team has suspended Chacon indefinitely. Wade says the suspension will last until the Astros make a final determination on Chacon’s status on the roster (see here outright release). If that’s me, I’m going to go ahead and accept the demotion to the bullpen. At worst, I’m going right back at the GM when he’s cussing me out and I’m firing verbal salvos back at him. That would get you into trouble, just not as much trouble as felony assault. Trust me, I’ve worked for some real a-holes and choking them would have been a very welcome alternative many times, but it was simply never on the table as I tend to reject criminal activity as means to satisfy that sort of dispute. Good thinking, Shawn, I’m sure other teams will be lining up to sign you and your 5.04 ERA once the Astros cut you loose….
- Kanye West, the most arrogant, egotistical man in music, is at it again. Fresh off a disastrous, über-late performance at the Bonnaroo Music Festival, West has been ripped for taking the stage nearly two hours late and inciting fans to pelt the stage with garbage and glow sticks and spray paint derogatory messages about him on the back of portable toilets at the festival site. He basically lived up to a line from his most recent hit “Stronger” which says in part, “you should be honored by my lateness.” In other words, be grateful that I ever bother to show up at all, mo-fo, that’s how great I am. Bonnaroo attendees didn’t agree, nor do the many critics who are ripping West for his act at the festival. For his part, K. West is acting like a spoiled brat, saying on his blog that the flak he's taken has left him “the most offended I've ever been.” Sorry K., but when your performance at a festival was scheduled for 2:45 a.m. and you didn't take the stage until 4:25 a.m. due to circumstances that can be mostly attributed to you, you deserve to be ripped. The delay was caused by problems setting up West's elaborate stage set, which included an interplanetary landscape of a wavy black platform and a video screen above. To be fair, part of the delay can be traced to rockers Pearl Jam, who had performed on the main stage earlier that evening, and went an hour over their scheduled time. Still, if West could just perform without a freaking circus of lights, video screen and props, he could have been on stage much earlier. When you walk into a place like the Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival, which traditionally has favored jam bands, you need to realize that you’re not exactly the kind of act people want to see. Thus, your pompous, self-aggrandizing stage act might lead to “Kanye sucks” chants and criticism from fellow musicians like pedal steel guitarist Robert Randolph, who played later the same day. West didn’t help matters by complaining that he was “dealing with ... idiots who didn't really have the capacity to really put on this show properly.” Good job, K., that’ll win people over. Call them idiots, see if that helps. If you had just performed when originally scheduled (8:15 p.m. the night of June 14), and not demanded that your set be moved later in the evening so it was sufficiently dark for your “glow-in-the-dark” performance. To be fair, I like some of Kanye’s music and he’s one of the few hip-hop artists in my iPod. That being said, I would have been pissed and looking for something to throw at him if I had to wait two hours for his set as well. Take your butt-ugly fly’s eyes sunglasses and get lost, K. West. See if you can’t take a trip to a place where you can acquire a little humility, jerk.
- Fear not, fans of 24 who have waited two years for a new season and were alarmed when cast member and Scotsman Robert Carlyle stated that the two hours covered by this November's 24 prequel movie will count toward Season 7's episode count. “This is two hours in real time,” he said, “and there'll then be 22 episodes.” Proving that you shouldn’t believe the statements of someone who doesn’t know what they’re talking about, Fox confirmed that Day 7 indeed will be the usual 24 episodes/hours and that the TV movie won't count toward that time. Something else Carlyle said was that the final moments of the prequel will feed right into the opening scenes of Season 7, but once again, he appears to be off base. The prequel itself picks up four years after the events of Day 6, which ended with Jack staring off a cliff outside of James and Audrey Heller’s house in Malibu, looking out to the Pacific below. This effectively places Jack Bauer in the year 2017, if you do the math. He’ll then advance another few on-screen months between the movie's sure-to-be-thrilling climax and Jack's appearance before Congress. At the start of Season 7. In other TV news, the rectangle has become a triangle on One Tree Hill. As last season ended, Lucas (Chad Michael Murray) was on the phone inviting an unidentified female companion to elope to Las Vegas with him. One of the potential leading ladies was supposed to be Lindsey, played by Michaela McManus. Since McManus is now joining the cast of NBC's Law & Order: Special Victims Unit as the new assistant district attorney, effective with this fall’s Season 10, let’s go ahead and assume she wasn’t the one on the other end of that phone call. Kinda takes a lot of suspense out of the OTH plot, but then again, can’t imagine that a lot of people were spending their summer debating that cliffhanger anyhow….
- I have to admit, I am excitedly looking forward to the reported May 2011 release date for Spider-Man 4. By “excitedly looking forward” I of course mean that I’m hoping it doesn’t totally blow as much as Spider-Man 3 did. Let’s face it, this is a franchise that has gotten steadily worse as it went from a fantastic first movie to a good second one to subpar third installment. Now the fourth incarnation of Spidey is a go and being eyed for that May 2011 release date, which should give Sam Raimi and Co. time to analyze the many, many things they did wrong in the last film. (Hint: Too many villains, too many storylines and too much going on that detracted from the main plot. One of the franchise’s staple characters, J.K. Simmons (aka J. Jonah Jameson), had this to say. “Nobody’s signed anything on any dotted lines and I don't think there's an actual script yet, but as we all know [that’s "just" a detail]," Simmons told tvguide.com. “In films, they work backwards. They announce that Spider-Man 4 will open on, say, Memorial Day 2011, they start the marketing campaign from there, and at some point they’ll write and cast the movie.” Aside from making sure that Tobey Maguire is on board and ensuring that Raimi signs on to direct one more time, the unresolved question everyone is buzzing about is who will be the villain in No. 4. Will it be Lizard (Dylan Baker has played Dr. Curt Connor twice, in Parts 2 and 3), could it be Vulture or might it be Kraven? Honestly, unless the script and plot improve dramatically from Spider-Man 3, it doesn’t freaking matter who the villain is, so let’s focus on that first, k?
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Outrage over nothing, stealing the Hulk and the Great Wall of W. can continue
- Is China ready for the Summer Olympics? You better believe it! If elite athletes can jog around a city block in Beijing once and end up blowing black soot out of their noses onto Kleenex after they’re done, then you have to figure the Chinese are ready. When American Olympics personnel are designing special, top-secret surgical/hygiene masks for U.S. athletes to wear from the second they arrive in Beijing until they step onto the field or track to compete, go ahead and figure that everything is in place for the Games. Yes, welcome to the first-ever Olympics where we may actually see an athlete drop dead from respiratory failure during an event, good times! Although the Chinese lamely insist they’re doing everything possible to ensure clean air for the Games, data on air quality in and around Beijing suggests its toxicity is at a hazardous level. But hey, the Chinese are banning certain high-emission vehicles from the road for the next couple of months, so that should clear everything up. Nothing like attempting to erase decades of air pollution with a band-aid solution for a couple of months. When American athletes are asking questions of their team physicians such as, “Should I move to L.A. with all of its smog and pollution to prepare?”, odds are there’s a problem afoot. Nothing like the splendor of the Summer Olympics, higher…cough….hack…..farth-…cough…cough…..faster….gasp…..
- You may see a major international organized crime operation being shut down, but I prefer to see opportunity. The arrest and indictment of 21 members of one of the nation’s largest Hispanic gangs has created an opening in the world of drug trafficking, racketeering and murder for hire. A North Carolina grand jury has returned a 55-count indictment against members of the Mara Salvatrucha, or MS-13, gang for crimes they committed at the direction of their leader, a man currently imprisoned in El Salvador. Among the charges facing the 21 gang members are drug trafficking, racketeering, assault and murder. Members of Mara Salvatrucha allegedly committed four murders in Charlotte and Greensboro and sent drug profits out of the country to their leaders in El Salvador, one of who currently sits in a prison cell. While you could point to these activities and lament the criminal element of our society, if you prefer to be optimistic like me, you can find the positive here. There is now an opportunity for one of our own, an American gang, to step in and fill the role that Mara Salvatrucha had previously held in our nation’s economy. How often do you hear people lament that the jobs and opportunities are leaving the United States and getting away from deserving Americans? Well, here’s a chance for some Americans to step in and take up the slack from foreigners. Granted, they’ll go to prison if they’re caught and what they would be doing would be highly illegal and harmful to certain people, but in trying economic times, can we afford to be picky? I say no….
- Just when you thought the U.S. Supreme Court might have developed a set of kahones and reached a point where it could make the right call on very tough, dicey cases on a regular basis….something like this happens. After pissing off conservatives nationwide by giving (gasp) Guantanamo Bay detainees the rights they are actually allowed under the Geneva Convention, the nine old men and women in black robes who decide the nation’s biggest court cases whiffed big time when presented with the issue of the extension of the border fence along the boundary between the U.S. and Mexico. With a chance to stop construction on another of the W. administration’s idiotic, ill-fated wastes of time and money, the court refused to hear arguments to halt work on the wall on the grounds that it will harm the environment and animals living in the construction area. Predictably, the plea came from environmentalists who oppose the idea of erecting a wall stretching from the Pacific surf at Tijuana all the way to the Gulf of Mexico near the town of Brownsville, Tex. At issue in this case was a two-mile section of fence in the San Pedro Riparian National Conservation Area near Naco, Ariz. That particular portion of the fence has already been erected and those bringing the case to court argue that it has harmed several endangered species, including wild cats such as the ocelot and the jaguarundi. Sadly, the court refused to take this chance to strike at what is a bad idea overall for a number of reasons. I readily admit that this would be a cheap, back-door way to go about it, but with a project that is such a bad idea on so many fronts, I say take whatever chance you can get.
- What do you do with a footless, 8-foot-tall Incredible Hulk statue? That’s a question someone in the town of Lowell, Mass. has on their hands after thieving the oversized replica of the star of this summer’s biggest rip-off, copycat film trying to capitalize on a movie just made five years ago (it’s a surprisingly crowded genre, you’d be amazed). Police arrived at the theater to find the large green figure gone, ripped from the platform where it stood. Because the thieves lack the necessary means and equipment to take the whole statue, platform and all, they had to snap off the Hulk at the ankles and leave the lower portion. Police Capt. James McPadden brilliantly theorizes that more than one person and a getaway vehicle were used in the theft. Great work, Sherlock. You think it took more than one person to steal an 8-foot-tall statue? With ace police work like that, it should take the Lowell Police Department no time at all to recover the stolen Hulk.
- I’ve spent the past 2-3 days trying to muster up anger, bitterness, hostility or to be even remotely interested in the “controversies” over statements made by both Shaquille O’Neal and Don Imus earlier this week. O’Neal went on a profanity-laced rant as he took the mic at a New York City club Sunday night, rapping about how Kobe Bryant “couldn’t do without me,” a reference to Bryant’s failure to win the NBA title this year, a title that would have been his first since O’Neal left the Lakers to go to Miami several years ago. He also rapped a line asking Bryant how his (O’Neal’s) ass smells. Imus, on the other hand, was talking about the ongoing saga of Pacman Jones, rain maker extraordinaire and Dallas Cowboys defensive back. Imus and his radio show partner were discussing Jones’ quest for reinstatement to the NFL following his one-year suspension for his piece de resistance in his spree of crimes and run-ins with the law, the Las Vegas nightclub shooting that left a bouncer permanently paralyzed. Imus’ partner was detailing the highlights of Jones’ saga when Imus interrupted to ask what “color” Jones is. Informed he was black, Imus replied, “Well, there you go.” The intent of his comment is open for interpretation. Imus would have you believe he was sarcastically pointing out how police routinely racially profile criminals and treat blacks unfairly. Imus haters would like you to believe that he was implying that of course it was a black man who had been arrested six times and been in so much trouble. For the past two days, I’ve watched talking heads blow the comments of these two men out of proportion, trying to make them out to be big news when they are simply not. O’Neal’s rap lyrics are merely sniping between two guys who don’t like each other and couldn’t get along when they were both with the Lakers. Despite winning three NBA championships together, they couldn’t coexist and so O’Neal left the team. Quite frankly, I don’t give a rat’s ass what the state of his relationship with Bryant is. Either of them making comments about the other makes no difference to anyone but them. It has zero impact on any NBA season, not to mention this is the offseason now. Unless and until these two locks horns in the octagon, MMA-style, don’t bother me with their back and forth. As for Imus….I can see where there is at least some validitiy in his explanation, even if it seems unlikely to me that it’s true. He didn’t use any racist terms, he didn’t advocate acting in a biased way toward African-Americans and he didn’t directly put them down. He may have said something that is stereotyping and outdated in its thinking, but you can’t crucify someone for that. He is what he is - a crass, behind-the-times shock jock who is going to say stupid things from time to time. I’ve never listened to his shows anyhow, so I personally don’t feel much of an impact from the world through the eyes of Imus. So in conclusion…..a lot of people have spent the past 2-3 days blowing hot air about nothing at all….
- You may see a major international organized crime operation being shut down, but I prefer to see opportunity. The arrest and indictment of 21 members of one of the nation’s largest Hispanic gangs has created an opening in the world of drug trafficking, racketeering and murder for hire. A North Carolina grand jury has returned a 55-count indictment against members of the Mara Salvatrucha, or MS-13, gang for crimes they committed at the direction of their leader, a man currently imprisoned in El Salvador. Among the charges facing the 21 gang members are drug trafficking, racketeering, assault and murder. Members of Mara Salvatrucha allegedly committed four murders in Charlotte and Greensboro and sent drug profits out of the country to their leaders in El Salvador, one of who currently sits in a prison cell. While you could point to these activities and lament the criminal element of our society, if you prefer to be optimistic like me, you can find the positive here. There is now an opportunity for one of our own, an American gang, to step in and fill the role that Mara Salvatrucha had previously held in our nation’s economy. How often do you hear people lament that the jobs and opportunities are leaving the United States and getting away from deserving Americans? Well, here’s a chance for some Americans to step in and take up the slack from foreigners. Granted, they’ll go to prison if they’re caught and what they would be doing would be highly illegal and harmful to certain people, but in trying economic times, can we afford to be picky? I say no….
- Just when you thought the U.S. Supreme Court might have developed a set of kahones and reached a point where it could make the right call on very tough, dicey cases on a regular basis….something like this happens. After pissing off conservatives nationwide by giving (gasp) Guantanamo Bay detainees the rights they are actually allowed under the Geneva Convention, the nine old men and women in black robes who decide the nation’s biggest court cases whiffed big time when presented with the issue of the extension of the border fence along the boundary between the U.S. and Mexico. With a chance to stop construction on another of the W. administration’s idiotic, ill-fated wastes of time and money, the court refused to hear arguments to halt work on the wall on the grounds that it will harm the environment and animals living in the construction area. Predictably, the plea came from environmentalists who oppose the idea of erecting a wall stretching from the Pacific surf at Tijuana all the way to the Gulf of Mexico near the town of Brownsville, Tex. At issue in this case was a two-mile section of fence in the San Pedro Riparian National Conservation Area near Naco, Ariz. That particular portion of the fence has already been erected and those bringing the case to court argue that it has harmed several endangered species, including wild cats such as the ocelot and the jaguarundi. Sadly, the court refused to take this chance to strike at what is a bad idea overall for a number of reasons. I readily admit that this would be a cheap, back-door way to go about it, but with a project that is such a bad idea on so many fronts, I say take whatever chance you can get.
- What do you do with a footless, 8-foot-tall Incredible Hulk statue? That’s a question someone in the town of Lowell, Mass. has on their hands after thieving the oversized replica of the star of this summer’s biggest rip-off, copycat film trying to capitalize on a movie just made five years ago (it’s a surprisingly crowded genre, you’d be amazed). Police arrived at the theater to find the large green figure gone, ripped from the platform where it stood. Because the thieves lack the necessary means and equipment to take the whole statue, platform and all, they had to snap off the Hulk at the ankles and leave the lower portion. Police Capt. James McPadden brilliantly theorizes that more than one person and a getaway vehicle were used in the theft. Great work, Sherlock. You think it took more than one person to steal an 8-foot-tall statue? With ace police work like that, it should take the Lowell Police Department no time at all to recover the stolen Hulk.
- I’ve spent the past 2-3 days trying to muster up anger, bitterness, hostility or to be even remotely interested in the “controversies” over statements made by both Shaquille O’Neal and Don Imus earlier this week. O’Neal went on a profanity-laced rant as he took the mic at a New York City club Sunday night, rapping about how Kobe Bryant “couldn’t do without me,” a reference to Bryant’s failure to win the NBA title this year, a title that would have been his first since O’Neal left the Lakers to go to Miami several years ago. He also rapped a line asking Bryant how his (O’Neal’s) ass smells. Imus, on the other hand, was talking about the ongoing saga of Pacman Jones, rain maker extraordinaire and Dallas Cowboys defensive back. Imus and his radio show partner were discussing Jones’ quest for reinstatement to the NFL following his one-year suspension for his piece de resistance in his spree of crimes and run-ins with the law, the Las Vegas nightclub shooting that left a bouncer permanently paralyzed. Imus’ partner was detailing the highlights of Jones’ saga when Imus interrupted to ask what “color” Jones is. Informed he was black, Imus replied, “Well, there you go.” The intent of his comment is open for interpretation. Imus would have you believe he was sarcastically pointing out how police routinely racially profile criminals and treat blacks unfairly. Imus haters would like you to believe that he was implying that of course it was a black man who had been arrested six times and been in so much trouble. For the past two days, I’ve watched talking heads blow the comments of these two men out of proportion, trying to make them out to be big news when they are simply not. O’Neal’s rap lyrics are merely sniping between two guys who don’t like each other and couldn’t get along when they were both with the Lakers. Despite winning three NBA championships together, they couldn’t coexist and so O’Neal left the team. Quite frankly, I don’t give a rat’s ass what the state of his relationship with Bryant is. Either of them making comments about the other makes no difference to anyone but them. It has zero impact on any NBA season, not to mention this is the offseason now. Unless and until these two locks horns in the octagon, MMA-style, don’t bother me with their back and forth. As for Imus….I can see where there is at least some validitiy in his explanation, even if it seems unlikely to me that it’s true. He didn’t use any racist terms, he didn’t advocate acting in a biased way toward African-Americans and he didn’t directly put them down. He may have said something that is stereotyping and outdated in its thinking, but you can’t crucify someone for that. He is what he is - a crass, behind-the-times shock jock who is going to say stupid things from time to time. I’ve never listened to his shows anyhow, so I personally don’t feel much of an impact from the world through the eyes of Imus. So in conclusion…..a lot of people have spent the past 2-3 days blowing hot air about nothing at all….
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Alcohol + NFLers = trouble, a Sopranos ripoff and shocking Amy Winehouse news
- A big salute to health officials in the city of Dundee, Scotland for taking on one of the biggest plagues on the populace in any society: smoking. No one hates smoking more than me and no one does more to keep his distance from losers who smoke more than I do. We could jam all of these jerks onto a big freighter and ship them off to Siberia permanently for all I care. Choking down your cancer sticks around the rest of us and forcibly upping our chances of lung cancer because of secondhand smoke makes you a loser, no questions asked. So I tip my cap to officials in Dundee, who are undertaking a new program designed to help smokers in their city kick the habit. Participants will receive an electronic card each week worth $25 that they can redeem for fresh food and groceries. The cards cannot be used for drugs or alcohol, but you might be asking how this is going to help smokers stop smoking. After all, they could just use the cards for groceries and then with the extra cash that is freed up, buy their cigs. But that’s where the second part of the program kicks in. The pilot program will require participants to undergo weekly carbon monoxide breath tests to prove they haven’t started smoking again and they will also receive treatment for their addiction. If only American cities were making this kind of innovative, forward-thinking effort to stamp out smoking, maybe we’d be further ahead in stamping it out here in the United States.
- Suck it long and suck it hard, Chicago White Sox. While you all whine, b*tch and moan about how dirty and smelly the visitors’ clubhouse is at Wrigley Field and how ignorant the fans there are, you’re missing out on the real story. That story would be your cross-town rivals b*tch-slapping you in a three-game weekend sweep. Both the White Sox and Cubs may have entered and exited the series in first place in their respective divisions, it wad the Cubs winning all three games and outscoring their in-city rivals by a collective 22-11 margin. It was the Cubs pounding out nine home runs, including four from third baseman Aramis Ramirez, who might need to be pulled off White Sox pitching at this time. It was the Cubs getting strong starting and relief pitching from the likes of Ryan Dempster, Ted Lilly, Bob Howry and Kerry Wood. The first game of the series was the only close one, but even then it was decidedly in the favor of the Cubs as they rallied from a 3-1 deficit and ripped the game with a walk-off homer from Ramirez. From there, it was an 11-7 beatdown on Saturday and an even more thorough 7-1 butt-whipping Sunday night on ESPN Sunday Night Baseball. White Sox pitcher John Denks was among those with a lack of proper focus, complaining that the visitors’ clubhouse reeks of urine. Catcher A.J. Pierzynski basically called Cubs fans unemployed rejects, while manager Ozzie Guillen said his players hated getting dressed because the locker room is so small that you’re likely to find some teammate’s exposed rear end in your face at any given moment. Great perspective, guys. Keep that up and you’ll be on the receiving end of another sweep next weekend when the Windy City showdown resumes on Chicago’s south side at the White Sox’s home park, U.S. Cellular Field.
- Boy, I am just stunned. There are just some things in life you never see coming no matter how hard you try, no matter how closely you look. Life is rife with mysteries; things you cannot explain, predict or expect. Chief among those is how a good, clean-living, upstanding soul like Amy Winehouse is now allegedly battling emphysema and operating at 70 percent capacity in her lungs. Mitch Winehouse, the singer’s father and the man who has the unfortunate designation of being all but assured of ending up as a parent who outlives their child, told a British tabloid those facts over the weekend after his little girl was hospitalized (again) after a recent collapse. “With smoking the crack cocaine and the cigarettes, her lungs are all gunked up,” Mitch Winehouse explained. He also claimed that his daughter may end up having to use an oxygen mask full-time, which ironically might help her singing. It’s not like her singing could be any more indecipherable regardless of what she does, so it would have to help. Again, I find all of this totally flabbergasting. Who ever would have expected that someone like Amy Winehouse would end up with damaged lungs? Why didn’t someone tell her that snorting vodka and cocaine, jamming heroin into your veins, smoking weed and cigarettes and downing every kind of alcohol known to man is bad for your body? It’s not like people can be expected to know this stuff on their own. The bummer here is that at least with Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin and Jim Morrison, we got a few years of amazing music before drugs and hard living wrecked and ultimately killed them. With Winehouse, we get a couple of crappy albums full of mumbling, moaning and growling that I’m not sure even qualify as music. Best of success in finishing off your steep and severe decline in health and prosperity, Amy.
- Looking for a way to get totally ripped off and throw away $400 for something that is overpriced by a solid 100 percent? Search no more, because you’re looking for the 30-disc boxed set featuring all seven seasons of The Sopranos. Yes, this massive rip-off gives you 30 discs plus two bonus DVDs and it’s been slapped with a $399.99 price tag. What extras do I get for throwing away $200 more than I should, you ask? Well, you’ll also get an interview with series creator David Chase, conducted by Alec Baldwin; three soundtrack CDs; and a pair of featurettes in which cast members sit down for dinner to reflect on their favorite scenes and what not. I’m guessing the ending is still a lame fade to black, so don’t expect this 10-lb. monstrosity, available Nov. 11, to rectify that problem. Yes, a lot of people loved this show and I’m not discounting that. I have a lot of shows I’ve loved too, but there is no f’ing way I would ever pay $400 for a DVD set of any of them Compounding my anger here is that fact I never watched this show when it was on the air and have no interest in it. Consequently, this freaking $400 price tag is pissing me off so much and it’s such a blatant ripoff that I may track down a copy of this DVD set and illegally burn a copy of it just out of spite….
- There may be a new reason to be amazed when you turn on your favorite NFL team’s game this fall. Aside from marveling at the feats of strength, speed and agility from your favorite players, you should probably take a minute to stop and appreciate the amazing fact that enough of the players stayed sober and out of the drunk tank long enough to play that game. Okay, so that might be a bit of an exaggeration, but it is alarming to see the rate at which NFLers are picking up DUI (along with the occasional boating under the influence charge) this offseason. In the past week alone, Tennessee Titans defensive end Jevon Kearse was booked on suspicion of DUI charges and Carolina Panthers wide receiver Dwayne Jarrett plead guilty to drunken driving charges. To follow that up, a man who has posted both a driving while intoxicated and boating while intoxicated incident this offseason (take a bow, Cedric Benson!) was ordered by a Texas judge to place a ignition lock breath analyzer on his car to prevent him from getting behind the wheel molared up. Benson is currently a man without a team because the Chicago Bears cut him after his second alcohol-related offense of the offseason, but he may be a man without a way home from his local bar if he can’t learn to stay sober. I get that these guys want to enjoy themselves in the offseason, but there should not be this many idiots in any one professional sports league. Point blank, if you drive while under the influence, that’s what you are - an idiot. It’s not open to debate; it’s just a fact. So if you see your favorite NFL player at your local watering hole, keep an eye on him and maybe offer him a ride him at the end of the night. It might be the best way to prevent these idiots from driving drunk since they can’t seem to take responsibility for themselves.
- Suck it long and suck it hard, Chicago White Sox. While you all whine, b*tch and moan about how dirty and smelly the visitors’ clubhouse is at Wrigley Field and how ignorant the fans there are, you’re missing out on the real story. That story would be your cross-town rivals b*tch-slapping you in a three-game weekend sweep. Both the White Sox and Cubs may have entered and exited the series in first place in their respective divisions, it wad the Cubs winning all three games and outscoring their in-city rivals by a collective 22-11 margin. It was the Cubs pounding out nine home runs, including four from third baseman Aramis Ramirez, who might need to be pulled off White Sox pitching at this time. It was the Cubs getting strong starting and relief pitching from the likes of Ryan Dempster, Ted Lilly, Bob Howry and Kerry Wood. The first game of the series was the only close one, but even then it was decidedly in the favor of the Cubs as they rallied from a 3-1 deficit and ripped the game with a walk-off homer from Ramirez. From there, it was an 11-7 beatdown on Saturday and an even more thorough 7-1 butt-whipping Sunday night on ESPN Sunday Night Baseball. White Sox pitcher John Denks was among those with a lack of proper focus, complaining that the visitors’ clubhouse reeks of urine. Catcher A.J. Pierzynski basically called Cubs fans unemployed rejects, while manager Ozzie Guillen said his players hated getting dressed because the locker room is so small that you’re likely to find some teammate’s exposed rear end in your face at any given moment. Great perspective, guys. Keep that up and you’ll be on the receiving end of another sweep next weekend when the Windy City showdown resumes on Chicago’s south side at the White Sox’s home park, U.S. Cellular Field.
- Boy, I am just stunned. There are just some things in life you never see coming no matter how hard you try, no matter how closely you look. Life is rife with mysteries; things you cannot explain, predict or expect. Chief among those is how a good, clean-living, upstanding soul like Amy Winehouse is now allegedly battling emphysema and operating at 70 percent capacity in her lungs. Mitch Winehouse, the singer’s father and the man who has the unfortunate designation of being all but assured of ending up as a parent who outlives their child, told a British tabloid those facts over the weekend after his little girl was hospitalized (again) after a recent collapse. “With smoking the crack cocaine and the cigarettes, her lungs are all gunked up,” Mitch Winehouse explained. He also claimed that his daughter may end up having to use an oxygen mask full-time, which ironically might help her singing. It’s not like her singing could be any more indecipherable regardless of what she does, so it would have to help. Again, I find all of this totally flabbergasting. Who ever would have expected that someone like Amy Winehouse would end up with damaged lungs? Why didn’t someone tell her that snorting vodka and cocaine, jamming heroin into your veins, smoking weed and cigarettes and downing every kind of alcohol known to man is bad for your body? It’s not like people can be expected to know this stuff on their own. The bummer here is that at least with Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin and Jim Morrison, we got a few years of amazing music before drugs and hard living wrecked and ultimately killed them. With Winehouse, we get a couple of crappy albums full of mumbling, moaning and growling that I’m not sure even qualify as music. Best of success in finishing off your steep and severe decline in health and prosperity, Amy.
- Looking for a way to get totally ripped off and throw away $400 for something that is overpriced by a solid 100 percent? Search no more, because you’re looking for the 30-disc boxed set featuring all seven seasons of The Sopranos. Yes, this massive rip-off gives you 30 discs plus two bonus DVDs and it’s been slapped with a $399.99 price tag. What extras do I get for throwing away $200 more than I should, you ask? Well, you’ll also get an interview with series creator David Chase, conducted by Alec Baldwin; three soundtrack CDs; and a pair of featurettes in which cast members sit down for dinner to reflect on their favorite scenes and what not. I’m guessing the ending is still a lame fade to black, so don’t expect this 10-lb. monstrosity, available Nov. 11, to rectify that problem. Yes, a lot of people loved this show and I’m not discounting that. I have a lot of shows I’ve loved too, but there is no f’ing way I would ever pay $400 for a DVD set of any of them Compounding my anger here is that fact I never watched this show when it was on the air and have no interest in it. Consequently, this freaking $400 price tag is pissing me off so much and it’s such a blatant ripoff that I may track down a copy of this DVD set and illegally burn a copy of it just out of spite….
- There may be a new reason to be amazed when you turn on your favorite NFL team’s game this fall. Aside from marveling at the feats of strength, speed and agility from your favorite players, you should probably take a minute to stop and appreciate the amazing fact that enough of the players stayed sober and out of the drunk tank long enough to play that game. Okay, so that might be a bit of an exaggeration, but it is alarming to see the rate at which NFLers are picking up DUI (along with the occasional boating under the influence charge) this offseason. In the past week alone, Tennessee Titans defensive end Jevon Kearse was booked on suspicion of DUI charges and Carolina Panthers wide receiver Dwayne Jarrett plead guilty to drunken driving charges. To follow that up, a man who has posted both a driving while intoxicated and boating while intoxicated incident this offseason (take a bow, Cedric Benson!) was ordered by a Texas judge to place a ignition lock breath analyzer on his car to prevent him from getting behind the wheel molared up. Benson is currently a man without a team because the Chicago Bears cut him after his second alcohol-related offense of the offseason, but he may be a man without a way home from his local bar if he can’t learn to stay sober. I get that these guys want to enjoy themselves in the offseason, but there should not be this many idiots in any one professional sports league. Point blank, if you drive while under the influence, that’s what you are - an idiot. It’s not open to debate; it’s just a fact. So if you see your favorite NFL player at your local watering hole, keep an eye on him and maybe offer him a ride him at the end of the night. It might be the best way to prevent these idiots from driving drunk since they can’t seem to take responsibility for themselves.
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Human rights stilll being trampled in Nepal, I deny a request from Pacman Jones and Coldplay's new album...decent, not great
- Request denied, Pacman Jones. In attempting to shake the stigma of being who he is as he continues his step-by-step reinstatement to the National Football League, Dallas Cowboys defensive back Pacman Jones is now asking that he be referred to as Adam Jones, his given name. “I’m not saying my teammates won't call me ‘Pacman’ on the field. But for the most part, I want to be Adam or Mr. Jones.” Oh, that’s rich. You want us to show you the respect to call you Adam or Mr. Jones, yet you don’t show one freaking bit of respect for anyone? Mr. Jones? You could play for another 20 years, make the Pro Bowl every year, win five Super Bowl MVP awards and be the undisputed best player in the sport and you still would not be able to earn enough respect that I’ll call you Mr. Jones. The only way you’re going to be called Mr. Jones is when a judge says, “Mr. Jones, how do you plead to these charges?” You can sign autographs as Adam and you can tell everyone who will listen about wanting to make this change. I even appreciate your reasoning for it, that there is “really just a lot of negativity behind it (the Pacman name).” Still, it’s wishful thinking on your part and I have rejected your appeal. You remain Pacman until further notice….
- Democracy has failed and oppression has prevailed. Zimbabwean dictator Robert Mugabe has apparently retained his spot as leader of the African nation after his campaign of terror, harassment and killing against opponent Morgan Tsvangirai and his Movement for Democratic Change party caused Tsvangirai to withdraw from the race Sunday. “The courageous people of Zimbabwe, of this country, and the people of the MDC have done everything humanly and democratically possible to deliver a new Zimbabwe and a new government,” Tsvangirai said in announcing his decision. “We in the MDC have resolved that we will no longer participate in this violent, illegitimate sham of an election process.” Rightly so, Tsvangirai and his supporters feel that asking Zimbabweans to come out and vote for them in Friday’s runoff election would be putting their lives at risk. Does anyone doubt that Bob Mugabe would go as far as to stick one of his soldiers in the voting booth with a machine gun, ready to blow the head off of anyone who voted for Tsvangirai? Still, this is an incredibly sad day and it pisses me off to no end. That someone can so blatantly cheat, oppress, abuse and even kill and still walk to streets smiling, shaking hands and acting like he’s not doing what he’s doing….infuriating. That he can do it as the world watches and as the majority of his people want a change (and said so in the last election) makes it even worse. You suck, Bob Mugabe, you oppressive piece of crap….
- What the $#^$#%#$!! @ is &#%%^$%^@$ going on here? The Australian Senate is once again under pressure from critics to ban certain profanities on TV and the legislature is again refusing to censor. The latest inquiry came as a result of foul-mouthed, ill-tempered chef/reality TV host Gordon Ramsay, whose series Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares features a nonstop deluge of swear words from its host. The show is a top-rated program in Australia, where the highly rated Nine Network airs it regularly. For his part, Ramsay is telling those offended by his rampant profanity to f**k off. “Turn over [the TV channel]. Isn't it easier?” he said in an interview. Among the evidence presented during the hearings was an episode where Ramsay used one of his favorite profanities 80 times during a 40-minute episode. Personally I’ve never watched the show for more than 15 seconds because I don’t care about 99.9 percent of reality shows, especially ones where arrogant, blowhard hosts with a perpetual bad attitude insult and berate people. So keep spewing your curse words with impunity, G., Australia welcomes your act.
- Whoa there, partners! For those music critics hailing the new Coldplay album Viva La Vida or Death and All His Friends as a ginormous leap forward in the group’s evolution and something that could vault it into the musical elite the way The Unforgettable Fire thrust U2 into the stratosphere, you need to check yourselves. This is a good album to be sure and a step forward for that pretentious twit Chris Martin and his band mates, but it’s more of an average step forward in the evolution of a good (not great) band than it is a musical masterpiece. Coldplay may have gone so far as to bring in Brian Eno, the man who produced The Unforgettable Fire for Bono and the boys, but that didn’t get them as good of an album. One wise choice Coldplay did make was cutting down on the whiny, mellow piano ballads that Martin so loves to croon on. Songs like Cemeteries of London showcase a different vibe to be sure, and Lovers in Japan features a driving beat from drummer William Champion that add some punch to the music. The first single, Viva La Vida, has been out on radio for a while and was performed at the MTV Movie Awards. It is a musical hodgepodge of keyboards, percussion and textured sounds, but it still reeks of Martin’s signature prima donna attitude. He does do everyone a favor by abandoning his familiar falsetto for most of the album, which is a nice touch to be sure. Still, it’s nothing more than a good, solid album and certainly not enough to elevate Coldplay into the upper echelon of the rock world.
- You haven’t heard as much about it of late, but rest assured that in Nepal and China, people are still being beaten, harassed and jailed for speaking out against China and its abominable human rights record in Tibet. As the Olympics approach and millions of athletes and fans prepare to descend on a city whose air is so bad that running the 100 meters might be hazardous to your health, people are still being imprisoned just for speaking out against one of the world’s most egregious violators of human rights. Nepalese authorities have jailed three Tibetan activists for three months for leading protests against China’s crackdown in Tibet. Additionally, hundreds more Tibetan exiles were detained for taking part in a major protest in front of the Chinese Embassy’s visa office over the weekend. Nice work on that one, Tibetan exiles. A big salute to all of you for taking it to the streets, scuffling with the cops and getting yourselves detained in the process. Thanks for reminding us that several months may have passed but nothing has changed when it comes to oppression and abuse of authority in your corner of the world.
- Democracy has failed and oppression has prevailed. Zimbabwean dictator Robert Mugabe has apparently retained his spot as leader of the African nation after his campaign of terror, harassment and killing against opponent Morgan Tsvangirai and his Movement for Democratic Change party caused Tsvangirai to withdraw from the race Sunday. “The courageous people of Zimbabwe, of this country, and the people of the MDC have done everything humanly and democratically possible to deliver a new Zimbabwe and a new government,” Tsvangirai said in announcing his decision. “We in the MDC have resolved that we will no longer participate in this violent, illegitimate sham of an election process.” Rightly so, Tsvangirai and his supporters feel that asking Zimbabweans to come out and vote for them in Friday’s runoff election would be putting their lives at risk. Does anyone doubt that Bob Mugabe would go as far as to stick one of his soldiers in the voting booth with a machine gun, ready to blow the head off of anyone who voted for Tsvangirai? Still, this is an incredibly sad day and it pisses me off to no end. That someone can so blatantly cheat, oppress, abuse and even kill and still walk to streets smiling, shaking hands and acting like he’s not doing what he’s doing….infuriating. That he can do it as the world watches and as the majority of his people want a change (and said so in the last election) makes it even worse. You suck, Bob Mugabe, you oppressive piece of crap….
- What the $#^$#%#$!! @ is &#%%^$%^@$ going on here? The Australian Senate is once again under pressure from critics to ban certain profanities on TV and the legislature is again refusing to censor. The latest inquiry came as a result of foul-mouthed, ill-tempered chef/reality TV host Gordon Ramsay, whose series Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares features a nonstop deluge of swear words from its host. The show is a top-rated program in Australia, where the highly rated Nine Network airs it regularly. For his part, Ramsay is telling those offended by his rampant profanity to f**k off. “Turn over [the TV channel]. Isn't it easier?” he said in an interview. Among the evidence presented during the hearings was an episode where Ramsay used one of his favorite profanities 80 times during a 40-minute episode. Personally I’ve never watched the show for more than 15 seconds because I don’t care about 99.9 percent of reality shows, especially ones where arrogant, blowhard hosts with a perpetual bad attitude insult and berate people. So keep spewing your curse words with impunity, G., Australia welcomes your act.
- Whoa there, partners! For those music critics hailing the new Coldplay album Viva La Vida or Death and All His Friends as a ginormous leap forward in the group’s evolution and something that could vault it into the musical elite the way The Unforgettable Fire thrust U2 into the stratosphere, you need to check yourselves. This is a good album to be sure and a step forward for that pretentious twit Chris Martin and his band mates, but it’s more of an average step forward in the evolution of a good (not great) band than it is a musical masterpiece. Coldplay may have gone so far as to bring in Brian Eno, the man who produced The Unforgettable Fire for Bono and the boys, but that didn’t get them as good of an album. One wise choice Coldplay did make was cutting down on the whiny, mellow piano ballads that Martin so loves to croon on. Songs like Cemeteries of London showcase a different vibe to be sure, and Lovers in Japan features a driving beat from drummer William Champion that add some punch to the music. The first single, Viva La Vida, has been out on radio for a while and was performed at the MTV Movie Awards. It is a musical hodgepodge of keyboards, percussion and textured sounds, but it still reeks of Martin’s signature prima donna attitude. He does do everyone a favor by abandoning his familiar falsetto for most of the album, which is a nice touch to be sure. Still, it’s nothing more than a good, solid album and certainly not enough to elevate Coldplay into the upper echelon of the rock world.
- You haven’t heard as much about it of late, but rest assured that in Nepal and China, people are still being beaten, harassed and jailed for speaking out against China and its abominable human rights record in Tibet. As the Olympics approach and millions of athletes and fans prepare to descend on a city whose air is so bad that running the 100 meters might be hazardous to your health, people are still being imprisoned just for speaking out against one of the world’s most egregious violators of human rights. Nepalese authorities have jailed three Tibetan activists for three months for leading protests against China’s crackdown in Tibet. Additionally, hundreds more Tibetan exiles were detained for taking part in a major protest in front of the Chinese Embassy’s visa office over the weekend. Nice work on that one, Tibetan exiles. A big salute to all of you for taking it to the streets, scuffling with the cops and getting yourselves detained in the process. Thanks for reminding us that several months may have passed but nothing has changed when it comes to oppression and abuse of authority in your corner of the world.
Monday, June 23, 2008
Weekend box office news, reasons to be a Chris Baker fan and bad news for ravers
- I have to admit, I’m a huge Chris Baker fan. You may know Baker as a mediocre second-string tight end with the New York Jets, a decent player who is a solid pass catcher but has never amassed more than 500 receiving yards in a season. I, on the other hand, know (and love) him as the player currently embroiled in a bitter contract dispute with the Jets who decided to take things to the next level recently. He had already missed mandatory team workouts and treatment sessions for his injured ankle, but Baker clearly felt those actions weren’t sending the message loudly enough. In order to step it up a notch, Baker parked his red Bentley in the parking spot belonging to team president Mike Tannenbaum at the team’s practice facility. He parked in the spot and team officials had to confront him in the locker room and ask him to move his car. Personally I hope he keeps parking there and when they ask him to move it, he gives them the double middle finger. It’s so awesome to do what he’s doing because this is the kind of in-your-face, rebellious and juvenile crap that everyone talks about doing to their boss when that boss treats them poorly. Everyone talks about it, but next to no one does it. Not Chris Baker, no sir. He followed through and shoved it right in the team’s face. Heck, I think he deserves a new contract on that basis alone, even though his stats don’t warrant it. Good work, Chris, you should be very proud of yourself.
- Police often overstep their bounds, believe it or not. It’s hard to imagine (Rodney King beating) that police could (Amadou Diallo shooting in Brooklyn) ever become excessive in their use of force or their authority, but it’s true. Just such an instance happened recently in Lakeville, Minn., where two officers barged into Troy Molde’s home at 3 a.m. to inform him that his garage door was open, the keys to his truck were in the ignition and the door to his house was ajar. The officers were acting as part of a public service campaign to remind residents to secure their homes to prevent thefts, but the protocol is generally to leave notices on homeowners’ doors. On this occasion, they entered the home and proceeded to move through the living room, where four children under the age of 7 were having a sleepover, then proceeding upstairs to Molde’s bedroom. The police claim their actions were justified because their initial knocks on the door were not answered (at 3 a.m., no one answered? No way.) Molde says he feels “violated” by the incident and I’d have to agree. The cops have no right to enter your home under those circumstances and waking up to find the cops standing over your bed would definitely stick with a person. Keep your doughnut-fueled asses out of citizens homes, Lakeville police officers.
- Most schools don’t have a Get Knocked Up club. A drama club? Yes. Environmental club? Sure. But I quite frankly feel cheated because my school never had a secret club where large numbers of girls got together and made a pact to get knocked up and raise their children together. In fact, Gloucester High School in Gloucester, Mass. is the first school I’ve ever heard of with such a club. According to reports this week, a group of girls at the school actually got together and pledged to become pregnant and then raise their children together. Principal Joseph Sullivan confirmed the allegations, saying the school launched an investigation after 17 of its students, all under the age of 16, turned up pregnant. The school averages four girls a year having babies, but when that number reached 17 the school became curious and their investigation found that nearly half of the pregnant teens were part of this secret club. These girls went to the school nurse multiple times for pregnancy tests and suspiciously, several of them seemed more upset when the test showed they were not pregnant than they were when they learned that they were with child. Some of them actually reacted by dishing out high fives and making plans for baby showers when they got the big news. They were apparently so desperate to get knocked up that one girl got with a 24-year-old homeless man in order to conceive. That’s just pathetic, that you’re so desperate to have a kid that you’ll get after it with a homeless dude. Get ahold of yourself, girls. I get that you might not want to have a child with someone you know and who would feel obligated to help raise and support the child, but a homeless guy? I look forward to you looking back in a few years and realizing that you wrecked your life by deliberately getting pregnant in high school when you could have waited a few years and had a much better experience. Well done, ladies…..
- The inexplicable attack on the products needed to make the world’s most popular illegal drugs continues. After news that a U.S.-backed effort to stamp out coca production in Colombia in 2007 failed miserably, this week we learned that authorities working with Australian police destroyed a ginormous stockpile of 33 tons of safrole-rich oil this week, an oil instrumental in the production of the popular rave drug Ecstasy. According to the authorities, the oil could have been used to produce as many as 245 million tablets of X, with a street value of $7.3 billion. Now where are bounce-pit-loving, glow-stick-wearing, techno-music-dancing ravers going to get their X? How are they going to find tablets of this highly dangerous, often-deadly drug to ingest if your keep confiscating their supplies? Putting on a quality rave isn’t cheap, jerks. Finding the right abandoned warehouse, a DJ able to spin crappy techno dance music that all sounds the same, a giant bounce pit and a million glow sticks isn’t easy even when there is affordable X on hand. Now that a major blow has been struck to the supply line, no one is going to be able to throw a good rave. Thanks for nothing, Australian anti-drug authorities…..
- Promotion cannot save a bad movie, as it turns out. After a promotional onslaught rivaling any we’ve seen for a summer movie this year, Mike Myers’ new comedy “The Love Guru” flopped at the box office, bringing in a measly $14 million and finishing fourth for the weekend in the earnings race. From the aspect of it being a lame movie that isn’t nearly as funny as it aspires to be, I can totally get how this happened. However, bad movies often make a lot of money because of a variety of reasons – star power, name power of a movie franchise, etc. The weekend’s top-earning movie rode the name power of its predecessor, the franchise it was remaking, to the top spot. Steve Carrell, Anne Hathaway and The Rock gave “Get Smart” a great start with $39.2 million in earnings to lead the pack. Coming in second and still going strong was Jack Black’s animated “Kung Fu Panda” with $21.7 million, very narrowly edging out the shameless ripoff, copycat “The Incredible Hulk” with earnings of $21.6 million. Overall, the weekend’s top 12 movies brought in $136.9 million, a 10 percent increase from the same weekend last year. Not a stellar weekend at the movies, but at least “Wall-E” is coming out this next weekend, so that should be a good laugh for one and all and a fun movie.
- Police often overstep their bounds, believe it or not. It’s hard to imagine (Rodney King beating) that police could (Amadou Diallo shooting in Brooklyn) ever become excessive in their use of force or their authority, but it’s true. Just such an instance happened recently in Lakeville, Minn., where two officers barged into Troy Molde’s home at 3 a.m. to inform him that his garage door was open, the keys to his truck were in the ignition and the door to his house was ajar. The officers were acting as part of a public service campaign to remind residents to secure their homes to prevent thefts, but the protocol is generally to leave notices on homeowners’ doors. On this occasion, they entered the home and proceeded to move through the living room, where four children under the age of 7 were having a sleepover, then proceeding upstairs to Molde’s bedroom. The police claim their actions were justified because their initial knocks on the door were not answered (at 3 a.m., no one answered? No way.) Molde says he feels “violated” by the incident and I’d have to agree. The cops have no right to enter your home under those circumstances and waking up to find the cops standing over your bed would definitely stick with a person. Keep your doughnut-fueled asses out of citizens homes, Lakeville police officers.
- Most schools don’t have a Get Knocked Up club. A drama club? Yes. Environmental club? Sure. But I quite frankly feel cheated because my school never had a secret club where large numbers of girls got together and made a pact to get knocked up and raise their children together. In fact, Gloucester High School in Gloucester, Mass. is the first school I’ve ever heard of with such a club. According to reports this week, a group of girls at the school actually got together and pledged to become pregnant and then raise their children together. Principal Joseph Sullivan confirmed the allegations, saying the school launched an investigation after 17 of its students, all under the age of 16, turned up pregnant. The school averages four girls a year having babies, but when that number reached 17 the school became curious and their investigation found that nearly half of the pregnant teens were part of this secret club. These girls went to the school nurse multiple times for pregnancy tests and suspiciously, several of them seemed more upset when the test showed they were not pregnant than they were when they learned that they were with child. Some of them actually reacted by dishing out high fives and making plans for baby showers when they got the big news. They were apparently so desperate to get knocked up that one girl got with a 24-year-old homeless man in order to conceive. That’s just pathetic, that you’re so desperate to have a kid that you’ll get after it with a homeless dude. Get ahold of yourself, girls. I get that you might not want to have a child with someone you know and who would feel obligated to help raise and support the child, but a homeless guy? I look forward to you looking back in a few years and realizing that you wrecked your life by deliberately getting pregnant in high school when you could have waited a few years and had a much better experience. Well done, ladies…..
- The inexplicable attack on the products needed to make the world’s most popular illegal drugs continues. After news that a U.S.-backed effort to stamp out coca production in Colombia in 2007 failed miserably, this week we learned that authorities working with Australian police destroyed a ginormous stockpile of 33 tons of safrole-rich oil this week, an oil instrumental in the production of the popular rave drug Ecstasy. According to the authorities, the oil could have been used to produce as many as 245 million tablets of X, with a street value of $7.3 billion. Now where are bounce-pit-loving, glow-stick-wearing, techno-music-dancing ravers going to get their X? How are they going to find tablets of this highly dangerous, often-deadly drug to ingest if your keep confiscating their supplies? Putting on a quality rave isn’t cheap, jerks. Finding the right abandoned warehouse, a DJ able to spin crappy techno dance music that all sounds the same, a giant bounce pit and a million glow sticks isn’t easy even when there is affordable X on hand. Now that a major blow has been struck to the supply line, no one is going to be able to throw a good rave. Thanks for nothing, Australian anti-drug authorities…..
- Promotion cannot save a bad movie, as it turns out. After a promotional onslaught rivaling any we’ve seen for a summer movie this year, Mike Myers’ new comedy “The Love Guru” flopped at the box office, bringing in a measly $14 million and finishing fourth for the weekend in the earnings race. From the aspect of it being a lame movie that isn’t nearly as funny as it aspires to be, I can totally get how this happened. However, bad movies often make a lot of money because of a variety of reasons – star power, name power of a movie franchise, etc. The weekend’s top-earning movie rode the name power of its predecessor, the franchise it was remaking, to the top spot. Steve Carrell, Anne Hathaway and The Rock gave “Get Smart” a great start with $39.2 million in earnings to lead the pack. Coming in second and still going strong was Jack Black’s animated “Kung Fu Panda” with $21.7 million, very narrowly edging out the shameless ripoff, copycat “The Incredible Hulk” with earnings of $21.6 million. Overall, the weekend’s top 12 movies brought in $136.9 million, a 10 percent increase from the same weekend last year. Not a stellar weekend at the movies, but at least “Wall-E” is coming out this next weekend, so that should be a good laugh for one and all and a fun movie.
Sunday, June 22, 2008
Win/lose millions on the moon, carnage in Seattle and a baby with a tough future
- I’d love to have famed World Wrestling Entertainment announcer Jim Ross announcing a Seattle Mariners game this week, if for no other reason than to hear good ol’ J.R. scream, “My gawd! My gawd! The carnage! There are bodies everywhere! There is blood everywhere! My gawd!” It really has been a carnage-filled week for the Mariners, with general manager Bill Bavasi fired Monday for being the architect for one of the worst teams in baseball and manager John McLaren following him out the door three days later. The M’s were projected by many to contend for the AL West title and possibly make it to the World Series, but their lackluster start has basically rendered the entire second half of the season pointless. Back on June 4, their ineptitude inspired McLaren to go on one of the most overrated managerial rants of all time, spewing a monologue of clichés punctuated by f-bombs and other profanities that basically expressed his frustration at being the manager of a sucky team. Now that terrible team isn’t McLaren’s concern; he was fired Thursday and replaced by bench coach Jim Riggleman, who will preside as the team’s interim manager for the remainder of the season. Yes, quite a week in the Emerald City, unless of course you’re a fan of winning baseball…
- Here’s proof positive that you can’t keep a good cocaine-producing country down. Despite “record” U.S.-backed efforts to stamp out the production of the coca plant in Colombia and eliminate a vital ingredient in the process of bringing cocaine to the United States, Colombian peasants actually devoted 27 percent more land to growing coca plants in 2007. Furthermore, the overall production of cocaine from the country went up from 984 metric tons to 994 last year, pushing Colombia close to that elusive 1,000-metic-ton mark. The United Nations called the increase in land usage for the purpose of coca growing “a surprise and a shock,” but I choose to call it something different: the entrepreneurial spirit at work. You have hard-working Colombian peasants trying to grow their biggest cash crop and The Man is on their ass, hounding them and trying to put them out of business just because the product chiefly made from their crop happens to be an illegal narcotic. But these peasants don’t fold up shop and go home; they move their operations to smaller plots in more remote regions of the country. These plots produce less coca, but that only means more and harder work for these peasants. I don’t hear them complaining, nor would I understand them if I did because to be honest, I forgot 97 percent of the Spanish I learned in high school the instant class ended. Still, the entrepreneurial spirit of these peasants demands your respect, dammit, because you can't, no you can’t keep a good cocaine-producing nation down….
- I’ve never been a guy with big, long lists of goals and ambitions for his life. I choose to take life more as it comes and do my best with where I’m at. That being said, one of the specific goals I do have for my life is to never, ever have my name associated with the words “multimillion-dollar body parts scheme.” It’s a goal I am currently reaching with astonishing proficiency, but sadly Christopher Aldorasi, 36, isn’t quite as successful at this pursuit. Aldorasi was convicted in April for his role in a scheme to secretly cut up corpses and sell off the dismembered parts. He apparently did the cutting, which earned him a conviction on 20 counts, including enterprise corruption, grand larceny and reckless endangerment. For those crimes, Aldorasi will spend the next nine to 27 years in prison, which isn’t long enough. If you’re sick enough to bust out a saw and take apart corpses (including the corpse of former Masterpiece Theatre host Alistair Cooke) and be okay with it, you are not a person we need as a part of our society. Go to jail, stay far, far away from the rest of us and see if you can’t grow a conscience while you’re in the slam, C.
- You can go ahead and start the countdown to the first official therapy session for Jamie Lynn Spears’ new baby. The tot was born Thursday morning at a hospital in southern Mississippi to the 17-year-old Spears, who named her new daughter Maddie Briann. The father is Casey Aldridge, a 19-year-old pipe layer (actually, that’s what got him into this predicament in the first place) and I’m sure that being born to two teenagers and a member of the uber-insane Spears family won't hurt little Maddie Briann at all. After all, whose mother doesn’t announce her pregnancy in OK! Magazine and have that pregnancy derail their career as a child actress? And whose parents don’t earn hundreds of thousands of dollars selling their first baby pictures to some trashy publication? Not that you’re not off to a smashing start as a parent, Jamie Lynn, but just to be safe, don’t take any parenting tips from your big sister. In fact, ask her everything she’s done as a mom and then do the exact opposite at all times, that should be safe….
- Been considering that elusive trip to the moon but just can't find the time or motivation to go? May I suggest the Google Lunar X Prize, a competition by the Internet’s most popular search engine that will award $20 million to the first privately funded team to land a rover on the moon, have it travel the surface for 500 meters or more and send back pictures, data and video. The feat must be accomplished by December 31, 2012 to claim the $20 million prize. After that, the amount drops to $15 million and after 2014, it goes away altogether. The contest is the brainchild of Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page. “We believe that space should be open to anyone and everyone, especially those people who want to go,” said Becky Ramsey of the X Prize Foundation. It’s a nice concept, but I have to wonder who the hell actually has the time and resources for this? And wouldn’t it cost more than $20 million to win this competition? Who has a functional space shuttle handy, plus a lunar rover with video and photo capabilities? Plus, with the cost of fuel these days I would have to imagine that this would be cost-restrictive and that you’d spend more money to successfully complete the mission than you would win. I’m going to go ahead and stay Earth-based, but best of success to anyone out there who wants to chase this brass ring.
- Here’s proof positive that you can’t keep a good cocaine-producing country down. Despite “record” U.S.-backed efforts to stamp out the production of the coca plant in Colombia and eliminate a vital ingredient in the process of bringing cocaine to the United States, Colombian peasants actually devoted 27 percent more land to growing coca plants in 2007. Furthermore, the overall production of cocaine from the country went up from 984 metric tons to 994 last year, pushing Colombia close to that elusive 1,000-metic-ton mark. The United Nations called the increase in land usage for the purpose of coca growing “a surprise and a shock,” but I choose to call it something different: the entrepreneurial spirit at work. You have hard-working Colombian peasants trying to grow their biggest cash crop and The Man is on their ass, hounding them and trying to put them out of business just because the product chiefly made from their crop happens to be an illegal narcotic. But these peasants don’t fold up shop and go home; they move their operations to smaller plots in more remote regions of the country. These plots produce less coca, but that only means more and harder work for these peasants. I don’t hear them complaining, nor would I understand them if I did because to be honest, I forgot 97 percent of the Spanish I learned in high school the instant class ended. Still, the entrepreneurial spirit of these peasants demands your respect, dammit, because you can't, no you can’t keep a good cocaine-producing nation down….
- I’ve never been a guy with big, long lists of goals and ambitions for his life. I choose to take life more as it comes and do my best with where I’m at. That being said, one of the specific goals I do have for my life is to never, ever have my name associated with the words “multimillion-dollar body parts scheme.” It’s a goal I am currently reaching with astonishing proficiency, but sadly Christopher Aldorasi, 36, isn’t quite as successful at this pursuit. Aldorasi was convicted in April for his role in a scheme to secretly cut up corpses and sell off the dismembered parts. He apparently did the cutting, which earned him a conviction on 20 counts, including enterprise corruption, grand larceny and reckless endangerment. For those crimes, Aldorasi will spend the next nine to 27 years in prison, which isn’t long enough. If you’re sick enough to bust out a saw and take apart corpses (including the corpse of former Masterpiece Theatre host Alistair Cooke) and be okay with it, you are not a person we need as a part of our society. Go to jail, stay far, far away from the rest of us and see if you can’t grow a conscience while you’re in the slam, C.
- You can go ahead and start the countdown to the first official therapy session for Jamie Lynn Spears’ new baby. The tot was born Thursday morning at a hospital in southern Mississippi to the 17-year-old Spears, who named her new daughter Maddie Briann. The father is Casey Aldridge, a 19-year-old pipe layer (actually, that’s what got him into this predicament in the first place) and I’m sure that being born to two teenagers and a member of the uber-insane Spears family won't hurt little Maddie Briann at all. After all, whose mother doesn’t announce her pregnancy in OK! Magazine and have that pregnancy derail their career as a child actress? And whose parents don’t earn hundreds of thousands of dollars selling their first baby pictures to some trashy publication? Not that you’re not off to a smashing start as a parent, Jamie Lynn, but just to be safe, don’t take any parenting tips from your big sister. In fact, ask her everything she’s done as a mom and then do the exact opposite at all times, that should be safe….
- Been considering that elusive trip to the moon but just can't find the time or motivation to go? May I suggest the Google Lunar X Prize, a competition by the Internet’s most popular search engine that will award $20 million to the first privately funded team to land a rover on the moon, have it travel the surface for 500 meters or more and send back pictures, data and video. The feat must be accomplished by December 31, 2012 to claim the $20 million prize. After that, the amount drops to $15 million and after 2014, it goes away altogether. The contest is the brainchild of Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page. “We believe that space should be open to anyone and everyone, especially those people who want to go,” said Becky Ramsey of the X Prize Foundation. It’s a nice concept, but I have to wonder who the hell actually has the time and resources for this? And wouldn’t it cost more than $20 million to win this competition? Who has a functional space shuttle handy, plus a lunar rover with video and photo capabilities? Plus, with the cost of fuel these days I would have to imagine that this would be cost-restrictive and that you’d spend more money to successfully complete the mission than you would win. I’m going to go ahead and stay Earth-based, but best of success to anyone out there who wants to chase this brass ring.
Saturday, June 21, 2008
3-D rip-off, Lithuanians ban Nazi symbols and Ludacris branching out
- Now this is just getting scary. The political conflict in Zimbabwe has been going on for months now, the country’s opposition movement struggling to dislodge dictator Robert Mugabe from office the legal way, by beating him in an election. Mugabe refused to accept the results, drove his opposition from the country and has reigned by terror ever since. He’s beaten, robbed, jailed, killed and done anything else needed to prevent the opposition from winning the runoff election on June 27 between himself and opposition candidate Morgan Tsvangirai. Those efforts took another disturbing turn this week when four activists from Zimbabwe’s leading opposition group, the Movement for Democratic Change, and the wife of the mayor of Harare, another MDC member, were kidnapped and killed. The MDC has blamed Mugabe’s ZANU-PF party for the killings, which bring to 70 the number of MDC members killed since the initial election three months ago. Abigail Chiroto, wife of Harare’s mayor Emmanuel Chiroto, was found at a mortuary north of Harare, beaten with rocks and iron bars to the point that her face was barely recognizable. Emmanuel Chiroto is a prominent member of the MDC, which appears to be all the reason Bob Mugabe and his crew need to kidnap and kill someone. The four activists who were kidnapped were found in a different location than Abigail Chiroto, in a township 18 miles south of Harare. The method of killing was also different – stabbing with spears and shooting. So some nice versatility shown by Bob Mugabe and Co., killing and disposing of bodies in different locales and by different means. This election can’t come soon enough, if for no other reason than to stop these pre-election killings.
- Interesting show at the Baltimore Museum of Art on May 31. The museum had a very non-traditional show, which is typically a great thing for an art museum as it breaks up the stuffy, stiff, academic vibe those places tend to have. This show was all about tattooing and its place in art and society. The event featured a panel discussion with prominent tattoo artists and a runway show featuring the work of many local artists. There were discussions about the importance of body art among African tribes and Japanese laborers, but the runway show was the highlight of the evening. There was Jan Bishop, posing and showing off the 31 species of cats inked all over her skin. There were dozens of other men and women showing off their tats from head to toe, a very cool display. “There have never been this many tattooed people in one room in a museum that haven’t been asked to leave, said Bob Baxter, editor of Skin and Ink magazine. True enough, but it was a nice chance, at least for one night.
- What to do when you’ve conquered the world of rap and acted in a few mediocre action movies? For Christopher Bridges, a.k.a. Ludacris, the answer is launching a new website for aspiring musician and starring in a TV show on the Planet Green network. The site is WeMix.com and it’s a place where aspiring musicians can upload their material, collaborate with other artists and receive feedback on their work. “This is a site where you can get your music heard,” Ludacris said recently. He also hopes that music industry executives can use the site to scout for new talent and do so with a minimum of effort on their part. In getting the project up and running, he also claims to have found alternative and country artists he may sign to his Disturbing tha Peace label. It sounds a little bit like a different version of MySpace, minus the sexual predators and child molestors, but maybe that’s just me. Luda will also be starring in a new show on the Planet Green network with Tommy Lee, which should be an interesting mix.
- Call me crazy, but I have better ways to spend my money than on a 3-D television system that gets an incredibly limited slate of programming. Hyundai is the company making this great new concept possible, but only in Japan and only on a very limited basis. The only broadcasts available come out on Japanese cable systems four times a day and if you want to see them, you’ll need to by a 46-inch LCD television that costs $3,960 and comes with two pairs of 3-D glasses. That’s 25 percent more than a comparable standard LCD TV, plus you get the added bonus of looking like an ass, wearing 3-D glasses in your own home. On top of that, the only available programs at this time are short videos from Japan’s northern Island of Hokkaido showing shots from a local zoo, a motorcycle race and various other pointless endeavors. The TV uses technology called TriDef from DDD Group Pic of Santa Monica, Calif. In other words, there’s an American company in on this whole train wreck of an idea. Look, if I want to see objects flying off the screen into my face while I wear idiotic 3-D glasses, I’ll go to a freaking 3-D theater, thank you very much. I’ll stick to programs that don’t fly off the screen….
- Props to the Lithuanian government for finally getting around to dropping a ban on public displays of Nazi and Communist symbols in their country. Lawmakers in the country’s national legislature have passed a bill banning any and all public displays of symbols such as the swastika and the hammer and sickle. President Valas Adamus is expected to sign the bill into law later this month, so any Lithuanians with their swastika flags in the rear window of their pickup truck or in the front window of their home have a few days to take them down. Always good to ban people from repping the political party responsible for the biggest genocide in the history of the world, so good thinking there. If only there was a chance the United States could also ban the idiots who insist on flying the Confederate flag and perpetuating all of the hateful history it represents….
Friday, June 20, 2008
The limits of philanthropy, Roid-ger's financial problems and bilking the U.S. military health insurance program
- Apparently altruism and philanthropy have their limits. Robert Wyland, 51, is a California artist who agreed back in 1994 to help out the marine programs of his home state by creating an image to be used on what has become one of California’s most popular specialty license plates. Under the terms of a handshake deal with the state, Wyland painted a picture of a Pacific humpback whale with its tail rising from the misty ocean waters. The state made $40 million from sales of the plate and everything was going along just fine….until Wyland figured out how much money was being made and decided he wanted a piece of the action. He’s now demanding 20 percent of the revenues from sales of the humpback whale specialty plate for his art foundation, saying he never intended for the deal with the state to be permanent. I guess it was just valid until a lot of money started rolling in, eh Bob? If this thing had made $4 million instead of $40, I have a sneaking suspicion you wouldn’t feel the same way. Wyland and the state are now in negotiations on a new deal, but nothing has been decided at this point. “They’re saying, ‘We can get anyone to paint a Picasso.’ Well, you could, but it wouldn’t be a Picasso,” Wyland declared. Nice to know that you and your sizeable ego are alive and well, Mr. Wyland, it’s just too bad that your concept of giving without demanding something in return isn’t.
- This is just sad. By sad, I mean that it’s freaking hilarious and I’m incredibly amused by the fact that disgraced pitcher and alleged 15-year-old-girl dater Roid-ger “Pocket Rocket” Clemens is hurting for money to the point that he’s selling off cars to pathetic, lowlife ‘80s rockers to pay for his legal fees. As he inexplicably continues his defamation lawsuit against his former trainer Brian McNamee because McNamee confirmed/alleged that Clemens did indeed use steroids during his career, Roid-ger is racking up some major legal bills. To offset those expenses, he has pawned off one of his cars, a Bentley, to Poison front man Bret Michaels. Being the star of a sleazy, pathetic reality dating show on VH1 must pay well enough, because Michaels was able to buy Clemens’ whip and he loves it. “Bret is a big fan of Roger’s. The car is great,” one of Michaels’ reps was quoted as saying. Wonder how many Botox-ed, surgically enhanced Rock of Love skanks you can pile into that Bentley….
- What’s the problem here? So Thomas Lutz and his Philippines-based company stole nearly $100 million from the U.S. military’s health insurance program, what’s the big deal? Yes, they took money from a program designed to help the brave men and women who defend our country and put their lives on the line on a daily basis. Is that any reason to sentence Lutz to five years in jail and to order he and his company, Health Visions Corp., to pay back the $99.9 million they thieved? According to a federal judge in Madison, Wis., the answer to that last question is yes. The judge has ordered Lutz to jail and the money he helped steal paid back, a clear sign that this judge is a bit overzealous in applying the law. Well, either that or Lutz is a despicable scumbag who siphoned money from a program designed to benefit those most deserving of it, one or the other….
- Gotta love it when rich, spoiled people fight over pointless things. The clash between actor Robert De Niro and the Historic Districts Council of New York over alleged unapproved modifications to the penthouse of De Niro’s new 88-room luxury hotel in downtown Manhattan. Preservationists argue that the penthouse as it was ultimately constructed is 1,100 square feet larger than it was shown to be on the original design that the New York Landmarks Preservation Commission approved back in 2004. Those opposing De Niro want the commission to force him and scrap the entire penthouse and start over on it, an endeavor that would cost he and his partners an estimated $1.5 million. De Niro countered with a flimsy excuse of his own. “We did it so it would fit into the neighborhood….if there are any minor mistakes, my apologies for it because in any creation there are mistakes.” While I don’t think you should be forced to change the penthouse, Bobby D., you argument is pathetic. You’re not disproving what the other side is saying, you’re merely saying, “Whoops, my bad.” Problem is, adding an extra 1,100 square feet to a penthouse isn’t a small, accidental mistake, it’s a deliberate change. Now maybe you wanted to make the place bigger because the $625 and up you’re charging for rooms in your hotel isn’t quite enough. Either way, it’s always amusing when rich people with nothing better to do fight over trivial matters. Good times…..
- Never has a presidential administration failed so miserably on so many fronts. Aside from the debacle in Iraq, the failure to gain control in Afghanistan, the sagging U.S. economy, the decreased level of border security and the total failure of W.’s educational programs, it turns out that he and his crew have also been busy violating the law as it pertains to the rights of the detainees at Guantanamo Bay. The Supreme Court ruled this week that five White House, Pentagon and Justice Department lawyers followed orders from W. and Dick Cheney to reinterpret or disregard U.S. and international laws governing the treatment of prisoners during war time. The five lawyers, who arrogantly called themselves the “War Council,” held secret meetings in one another’s offices and concocted ways to prevent detainees from challenging their detention in federal court. David Addington, Alberto Gonzales (“I do not remember…..I do not recall….I do not remember that…”), William J. Haynes II, John Yoo and Timothy E. Flanigan comprised this deceitful, devious group and in addition to preventing detainees from their day in court, they also made it all but impossible to prosecute soldiers and officials for alleged crimes committed at Gitmo and other U.S. detention facilities. Thankfully the Supreme Court has stepped in and ensured that America will actually live up to the standard that every other freaking civilized country in the world is held to in dealing with prisoners, finally. All of the conservative, alarmist talking heads out there who are decrying this decision as the end of civilization as we know it…you all need to shut it and stop defending the worst administration and president in the history of our country.
- This is just sad. By sad, I mean that it’s freaking hilarious and I’m incredibly amused by the fact that disgraced pitcher and alleged 15-year-old-girl dater Roid-ger “Pocket Rocket” Clemens is hurting for money to the point that he’s selling off cars to pathetic, lowlife ‘80s rockers to pay for his legal fees. As he inexplicably continues his defamation lawsuit against his former trainer Brian McNamee because McNamee confirmed/alleged that Clemens did indeed use steroids during his career, Roid-ger is racking up some major legal bills. To offset those expenses, he has pawned off one of his cars, a Bentley, to Poison front man Bret Michaels. Being the star of a sleazy, pathetic reality dating show on VH1 must pay well enough, because Michaels was able to buy Clemens’ whip and he loves it. “Bret is a big fan of Roger’s. The car is great,” one of Michaels’ reps was quoted as saying. Wonder how many Botox-ed, surgically enhanced Rock of Love skanks you can pile into that Bentley….
- What’s the problem here? So Thomas Lutz and his Philippines-based company stole nearly $100 million from the U.S. military’s health insurance program, what’s the big deal? Yes, they took money from a program designed to help the brave men and women who defend our country and put their lives on the line on a daily basis. Is that any reason to sentence Lutz to five years in jail and to order he and his company, Health Visions Corp., to pay back the $99.9 million they thieved? According to a federal judge in Madison, Wis., the answer to that last question is yes. The judge has ordered Lutz to jail and the money he helped steal paid back, a clear sign that this judge is a bit overzealous in applying the law. Well, either that or Lutz is a despicable scumbag who siphoned money from a program designed to benefit those most deserving of it, one or the other….
- Gotta love it when rich, spoiled people fight over pointless things. The clash between actor Robert De Niro and the Historic Districts Council of New York over alleged unapproved modifications to the penthouse of De Niro’s new 88-room luxury hotel in downtown Manhattan. Preservationists argue that the penthouse as it was ultimately constructed is 1,100 square feet larger than it was shown to be on the original design that the New York Landmarks Preservation Commission approved back in 2004. Those opposing De Niro want the commission to force him and scrap the entire penthouse and start over on it, an endeavor that would cost he and his partners an estimated $1.5 million. De Niro countered with a flimsy excuse of his own. “We did it so it would fit into the neighborhood….if there are any minor mistakes, my apologies for it because in any creation there are mistakes.” While I don’t think you should be forced to change the penthouse, Bobby D., you argument is pathetic. You’re not disproving what the other side is saying, you’re merely saying, “Whoops, my bad.” Problem is, adding an extra 1,100 square feet to a penthouse isn’t a small, accidental mistake, it’s a deliberate change. Now maybe you wanted to make the place bigger because the $625 and up you’re charging for rooms in your hotel isn’t quite enough. Either way, it’s always amusing when rich people with nothing better to do fight over trivial matters. Good times…..
- Never has a presidential administration failed so miserably on so many fronts. Aside from the debacle in Iraq, the failure to gain control in Afghanistan, the sagging U.S. economy, the decreased level of border security and the total failure of W.’s educational programs, it turns out that he and his crew have also been busy violating the law as it pertains to the rights of the detainees at Guantanamo Bay. The Supreme Court ruled this week that five White House, Pentagon and Justice Department lawyers followed orders from W. and Dick Cheney to reinterpret or disregard U.S. and international laws governing the treatment of prisoners during war time. The five lawyers, who arrogantly called themselves the “War Council,” held secret meetings in one another’s offices and concocted ways to prevent detainees from challenging their detention in federal court. David Addington, Alberto Gonzales (“I do not remember…..I do not recall….I do not remember that…”), William J. Haynes II, John Yoo and Timothy E. Flanigan comprised this deceitful, devious group and in addition to preventing detainees from their day in court, they also made it all but impossible to prosecute soldiers and officials for alleged crimes committed at Gitmo and other U.S. detention facilities. Thankfully the Supreme Court has stepped in and ensured that America will actually live up to the standard that every other freaking civilized country in the world is held to in dealing with prisoners, finally. All of the conservative, alarmist talking heads out there who are decrying this decision as the end of civilization as we know it…you all need to shut it and stop defending the worst administration and president in the history of our country.
Thursday, June 19, 2008
The ignorant Hank Steinbrenner, a need for the Zohan in Tehran and someone looking out for the beautiful people
- Thank God someone is finally looking out for the beautiful people. While immigration reform regarding border security and other larger issues may have proven to be well beyond the capabilities of the 110th Congress, House Democrats are still trying to zero in on what really matters: bringing more foreign models to the U.S. Under current immigration policy, models coming to the United States for a photo shoot or an event for any length of time must compete with high-tech workers for precious H-1B visas. Now if I’m making the choice and it’s between a hot, foreign (preferable female) model, it’s a no-contest. Visa granted for the model, tech worker get back in line. However, in a ruthless, distant bureaucracy like our government, decisions unfortunately aren't made that way. But that could all change under a bill that cleared the Judiciary Committee last week, which would have models would be moved into a separate immigration category, freeing up more H-1B slots for tech dorks. For some idiotic reason, these two groups have been lumped together since 1991, when an immigration package set this ill-advised precedent. At the time, it seemed like a moot point because the number of available H-1B visas was greater than the number of qualified applicants seeking them. Things have swung the other direction in recent years, with as many as 165,000 applicants annually for the category’s 85,000 possible spots. Wanna guess who’s been getting the short end of this immigration stick? The hot, foreign models, that’s right. The numbers are just appalling: according to the committee report accompanying the bill, the government issued between 614 and 790 visas to models in each year between 2000 and 2005. Yes, less than a thousand of these hotties were allowed access to our country in those years. From there, things only worsened. The number of model visas issued was all the way down to 349 in fiscal year 2007. Enter the hero of our story, Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.). By the way, who wouldn’t be proud to have Rep. Wiener representing them in Congress? I know I would. Rep. Wiener (Wiener, Wiener, Wiener, Wiener, Wiener, Wiener, Wiener, Wiener, Wiener) has introduced a bill that would create 1,000 new visa slots for these deserving models, and his reasoning (as if he needs any, it’s Congress after all) is that the visa shortage is a problem in Manhattan but also in his Brooklyn district, which feels the impact in terms of the loss of “ancillary benefits” such as jobs in the industry or increased business. His bill would move models into a new P-4 visa category, one associated with entertainers and athletes and its language requires that the visiting model be “of distinguished merit and ability” and that the event or photo shoot have a “distinguished reputation.” If by “distinguished merit or ability” you mean that they should be really, really hot, then I agree. We don’t want ugly or marginally attractive models crashing our borders. I’m just happy that we won't be limited to bland, boring, American models in overwhelming quantities while high-quality foreign talent goes elsewhere. So thanks to Rep. Wiener (Wiener, Wiener, Wiener, Wiener, Wiener, Wiener) for sponsoring this valuable bill to Senate Judiciary Committee members Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah) and Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) for saying this week that they could get behind Weiner’s model bill. You all are true patriots and our country will be a better place because of your efforts.
- The New York Mets are lacking a lot of commodities right now - wins, defense, hitting, solid relief pitching - but perhaps the most glaring deficiency in their organization is class on the part of the front office and ownership. There’s really no other way to characterize a team waiting until 3:15 in the morning during a west-coast trip to fire its manager via press release, as the Mets did with Willie Randolph. That he was fired was no surprise; rumors of Randolph’s demise have been circulating ever since the Mets finished off one of the biggest collapses in the history of professional sports last fall in coming from ahead to lose the National League East to the Philadelphia Phillies after holding a double-digit lead late into the summer. The team continued its uninspired, erratic play this season despite adding the biggest acquisition of the offseason in ace starting pitcher Johan Santana and came out of the gate with a 34-35 record, seven games back of first-place Philly. There have been meetings between Randolph and Mets GM Omar Minaya, meetings between Minaya and ownership and meetings between just about anyone involved with this whole debacle. Numerous times, the word has been that the team needed to have a good week or it would cost Willie his job. In other words, he was going to be fired this season, one way or another. That’s fine, because if he’s not doing a good enough job and you think someone else can do better, go for it. But do it with some class and show Randolph some respect, respect you didn’t show him by canning him in the wee hours of the morning after his team flew across the country and beat the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim in Orange County North of San Diego Monday night. Executing your plan under those circumstances is a chicken sh*t move, one designed to shield those responsible for the decision from having to face anyone and explain it. Instead, you send out your press release and head off to bed, leaving the crap storm to rage outside while you rest comfortably. I’m sure Randolph appreciated being treated with such callous disdain as well. Who doesn’t enjoy having their employer fire them via press release and do so in the middle of the night? The Baltimore Colts packing up and leaving town in the middle of the night to move to Indianapolis welcome you to the club of gutless wonders, Mets. Your franchise had better hope that karma isn't real, because if it is, the total lack of decency and professionalism you’ve just shown will boomerang back and further ruin what has already been a terrible season for you.
- Same-sex marriages are a source of intense debate in the United States thanks to the new law in California permitting such unions, but I don’t think we’re going to see a case quite like the one now going on in Paraguay. As someone with a moral opposition to legalizing same-sex marriages, the images coming from California are definitely unsettling and not cool, but they’re not nearly as bizarre as the idea of two people being thrown into prison for taking part in a same-sex marriage ceremony and being released from jail because it’s revealed that the groom isn't actually a woman, but rather a hermaphrodite. Prosecutor Jose Planas order the couple jailed on Friday after their civil union took place on the basis that they were both women and thus violating the country’s law against same-sex marriages. Planas reversed field Monday when it came to light that the groom, Alejandro Martinez, was not a woman but rather a hermaphrodite. I’m not sure how that improves the situation, but for the happy couple, getting out of jail has to be nice. It’s not so nice for the rest of us who now have that bad mental image stuck in our heads, though. The story has actually become a hot topic in Paraguay, where people clearly have a much better stomach for this kind of story than I do. Moving on….
- Where is the Zohan when you really need him? Oh, that’s right, he’s starring in abysmal, clichéd comedy flops at your local multiplex. Truth is, the Middle East could use an infusion of the Zohan’s skills right now, what with him being both a world-class hair stylist and a badass soldier/anti-terror fighter. Police launched a major crackdown in neighborhoods around Tehran Saturday against men and women whose appearance and wardrobe don’t conform to strict Islamic standards. Hair salons and clothing stores where more modern, non-B.C. looks can be crafted were shut down and both motorists and pedestrians were stopped as the cops looked to stamp out any vestiges of Western culture or individuality. Women who were not wearing long, loose robes and covering their hair in public and men who did not look as if they were living in 400 B.C. were detained by police in an attempt to enforce the overzealous, backwards notion that everyone must follow the type of religion that the government wants and can’t in any way seek to be modern or free-thinking. If only the Zohan could go to Tehran, he could give fabulous, modern hairstyles to the people there AND fight against the police who would oppress them…..
- At the risk of having New York baseball overload, I’m going to rip a second Big Apple baseball team in a single day. Actually, I’m only ripping New York Yankees owner Hank “Ass Hat” Steinbrenner, but I have enough vitriol and venom for him to cover the entire freaking island of Manhattan, the Bronx, Brooklyn, Long Island, Staten Island and Coney Island. Hank has been at the helm of the team for less than a year, but already dude has proven that he is an utter and total moron. He’s loud, he’s unintelligent, he’s crass, he’s classless, he’s a thick-headed bore and he clearly is missing that part of the brain which filters out the truly idiotic things many people think but manage not to say. He rips opposing players, he rips his own team, he gives his opinions loudly and regularly on subjects he is completely unqualified to even have an opinion on and he needs to shut up. Hank’s latest rant came after the Yankees’ top starting pitcher, Chien Mien Wang, injured ligaments in his foot running the bases in an interleague game in Houston on Sunday. Wang is apparently going to be out until September, leading Hank to fume about how National League rules mandating that pitchers bat are arcane and need to be changed to conform with American League rules which provide for a designated hitter to take the pitcher’s spot in the lineup. “My only message is simple,” Steinbrenner said in Tampa, Fla. “The National League needs to join the 21st century. They need to grow up and join the 21st century.” Steinbrenner said he was angry and added: “I’ve got my pitchers running the bases, and one of them gets hurt. He’s going to be out. I don’t like that, and it’s about time they address it. That was a rule from the 1800s.” Good take, Hank. Any time you don’t like something a break goes against your team, just advocate changing the rules so your beloved Yankees don’t get hurt. If an opposing player slides into second bases, clips Derek Jeter with his spikes and knocks DJ out for three weeks with a hand injury, just ban sliding and wearing spikes. If the other team brings up a pinch hitter who gets a game-winning hit against you, change the rules to ban pinch hitters. Or, and this is a radical thought for you Hank, shut your freaking cake hole, stop crying like a little b*tch and accept that in sports, bad things happen. Players get injured, balls don’t bounce your way and sometimes, your freaking team loses and there is nothingyou can do about it. You can’t go changing rules just so your team gets its way, you clown. If your pitcher isn't athletic enough to run the bases in a non-pressure situation and not get hurt, then get a new freaking pitcher or don’t pitch the guy in games where he might have to run the bases. Now shut your mouth, make yourself comfortable in third place behind Boston and Tampa Bay and hope that by the time Wang returns, you’re not looking up at Toronto and Baltimore as well, you ignorant slug.
- The New York Mets are lacking a lot of commodities right now - wins, defense, hitting, solid relief pitching - but perhaps the most glaring deficiency in their organization is class on the part of the front office and ownership. There’s really no other way to characterize a team waiting until 3:15 in the morning during a west-coast trip to fire its manager via press release, as the Mets did with Willie Randolph. That he was fired was no surprise; rumors of Randolph’s demise have been circulating ever since the Mets finished off one of the biggest collapses in the history of professional sports last fall in coming from ahead to lose the National League East to the Philadelphia Phillies after holding a double-digit lead late into the summer. The team continued its uninspired, erratic play this season despite adding the biggest acquisition of the offseason in ace starting pitcher Johan Santana and came out of the gate with a 34-35 record, seven games back of first-place Philly. There have been meetings between Randolph and Mets GM Omar Minaya, meetings between Minaya and ownership and meetings between just about anyone involved with this whole debacle. Numerous times, the word has been that the team needed to have a good week or it would cost Willie his job. In other words, he was going to be fired this season, one way or another. That’s fine, because if he’s not doing a good enough job and you think someone else can do better, go for it. But do it with some class and show Randolph some respect, respect you didn’t show him by canning him in the wee hours of the morning after his team flew across the country and beat the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim in Orange County North of San Diego Monday night. Executing your plan under those circumstances is a chicken sh*t move, one designed to shield those responsible for the decision from having to face anyone and explain it. Instead, you send out your press release and head off to bed, leaving the crap storm to rage outside while you rest comfortably. I’m sure Randolph appreciated being treated with such callous disdain as well. Who doesn’t enjoy having their employer fire them via press release and do so in the middle of the night? The Baltimore Colts packing up and leaving town in the middle of the night to move to Indianapolis welcome you to the club of gutless wonders, Mets. Your franchise had better hope that karma isn't real, because if it is, the total lack of decency and professionalism you’ve just shown will boomerang back and further ruin what has already been a terrible season for you.
- Same-sex marriages are a source of intense debate in the United States thanks to the new law in California permitting such unions, but I don’t think we’re going to see a case quite like the one now going on in Paraguay. As someone with a moral opposition to legalizing same-sex marriages, the images coming from California are definitely unsettling and not cool, but they’re not nearly as bizarre as the idea of two people being thrown into prison for taking part in a same-sex marriage ceremony and being released from jail because it’s revealed that the groom isn't actually a woman, but rather a hermaphrodite. Prosecutor Jose Planas order the couple jailed on Friday after their civil union took place on the basis that they were both women and thus violating the country’s law against same-sex marriages. Planas reversed field Monday when it came to light that the groom, Alejandro Martinez, was not a woman but rather a hermaphrodite. I’m not sure how that improves the situation, but for the happy couple, getting out of jail has to be nice. It’s not so nice for the rest of us who now have that bad mental image stuck in our heads, though. The story has actually become a hot topic in Paraguay, where people clearly have a much better stomach for this kind of story than I do. Moving on….
- Where is the Zohan when you really need him? Oh, that’s right, he’s starring in abysmal, clichéd comedy flops at your local multiplex. Truth is, the Middle East could use an infusion of the Zohan’s skills right now, what with him being both a world-class hair stylist and a badass soldier/anti-terror fighter. Police launched a major crackdown in neighborhoods around Tehran Saturday against men and women whose appearance and wardrobe don’t conform to strict Islamic standards. Hair salons and clothing stores where more modern, non-B.C. looks can be crafted were shut down and both motorists and pedestrians were stopped as the cops looked to stamp out any vestiges of Western culture or individuality. Women who were not wearing long, loose robes and covering their hair in public and men who did not look as if they were living in 400 B.C. were detained by police in an attempt to enforce the overzealous, backwards notion that everyone must follow the type of religion that the government wants and can’t in any way seek to be modern or free-thinking. If only the Zohan could go to Tehran, he could give fabulous, modern hairstyles to the people there AND fight against the police who would oppress them…..
- At the risk of having New York baseball overload, I’m going to rip a second Big Apple baseball team in a single day. Actually, I’m only ripping New York Yankees owner Hank “Ass Hat” Steinbrenner, but I have enough vitriol and venom for him to cover the entire freaking island of Manhattan, the Bronx, Brooklyn, Long Island, Staten Island and Coney Island. Hank has been at the helm of the team for less than a year, but already dude has proven that he is an utter and total moron. He’s loud, he’s unintelligent, he’s crass, he’s classless, he’s a thick-headed bore and he clearly is missing that part of the brain which filters out the truly idiotic things many people think but manage not to say. He rips opposing players, he rips his own team, he gives his opinions loudly and regularly on subjects he is completely unqualified to even have an opinion on and he needs to shut up. Hank’s latest rant came after the Yankees’ top starting pitcher, Chien Mien Wang, injured ligaments in his foot running the bases in an interleague game in Houston on Sunday. Wang is apparently going to be out until September, leading Hank to fume about how National League rules mandating that pitchers bat are arcane and need to be changed to conform with American League rules which provide for a designated hitter to take the pitcher’s spot in the lineup. “My only message is simple,” Steinbrenner said in Tampa, Fla. “The National League needs to join the 21st century. They need to grow up and join the 21st century.” Steinbrenner said he was angry and added: “I’ve got my pitchers running the bases, and one of them gets hurt. He’s going to be out. I don’t like that, and it’s about time they address it. That was a rule from the 1800s.” Good take, Hank. Any time you don’t like something a break goes against your team, just advocate changing the rules so your beloved Yankees don’t get hurt. If an opposing player slides into second bases, clips Derek Jeter with his spikes and knocks DJ out for three weeks with a hand injury, just ban sliding and wearing spikes. If the other team brings up a pinch hitter who gets a game-winning hit against you, change the rules to ban pinch hitters. Or, and this is a radical thought for you Hank, shut your freaking cake hole, stop crying like a little b*tch and accept that in sports, bad things happen. Players get injured, balls don’t bounce your way and sometimes, your freaking team loses and there is nothingyou can do about it. You can’t go changing rules just so your team gets its way, you clown. If your pitcher isn't athletic enough to run the bases in a non-pressure situation and not get hurt, then get a new freaking pitcher or don’t pitch the guy in games where he might have to run the bases. Now shut your mouth, make yourself comfortable in third place behind Boston and Tampa Bay and hope that by the time Wang returns, you’re not looking up at Toronto and Baltimore as well, you ignorant slug.
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
We dominate Barbados in soccer, Elian turns his back on America and when caddies attack
- Polar bears and Pacific walruses, beware. The environment-wrecking, senseless and malicious machine that is the W. administration is heading your way and as usual, it’s doing so with a lack of intelligence, responsibility and a working grasp of the English language. I give this warning because I genuinely like both polar bears and Pacific walruses, but rest assured that the W. administration hates these critters just like it f’ing despises everything else in the environment that it can exploit in its endless quest to destroy the entire freaking ecosystem of the world in just two terms in office. Most presidents would have to serve two terms, take the mandatory four years off and then come back for two more terms to even inflict one-tenth the damage that this current administration has brought to bear on the environment. This latest strike at our furry friends to the north comes less than a month after W. and his posse of ass hats declared polar bears an endangered species. That declaration, like anything else with more than two syllables in it or requiring anything over the intelligence level of a 4-year-old, has gone right over W.’s head and his administration has given the green light to not one, not two, but seven major oil companies to search for oil in the Chukchi Sea off the northwestern coast of Alaska as long as the amount of polar bears and walruses they harm or kill in the process is limited to “small numbers.” No word on what “small numbers” means, which is kinda what I think W. and his crew want. If they keep things vague and ambiguous, they can’t actually be held accountable….or so they think. About 8 percent of the polar bears in the Arctic like in the Chukchi Sea, so there is a substantial risk here. But no risk to the environment isn't worth taking for W. and his boys, not after they raked in a cool $2.6 billion back in February from Phillips Co., Shell Oil Co. and five other companies for oil leases. Know what, I’m not even going to hold back this time, I’m coming right out and saying it. F**k you, W. You are a moron, you continue to dick over our country on every possible front, from lying about intelligence that you used to wrongly thrust us into a war that you now won't end, to crashing our economy like you probably crashed the expensive luxury car your dad was dumb enough to give you when you turned 16, to screwing up the environment, to making the rest of the world hate us a thousand times more than it already did. You’re a certified piece of crap, the worst president in the history of this or any other country and it’s going to take our nation years to recover from the damage you’ve done, asshole…..
- I had a lot of fun watching the U.S. Open at Torrey Pines over the weekend. It was a great tournament that actually stretched into Monday with an 18-hole playoff to decide the winner. The tournament featured plenty of great golf, some amazing shots and intense moments, but it also featured some of the biggest morons you’ll ever encounter at a sporting event. No, I’m not just talking about the ignorant a-holes who scream “Get in the hole!” every time a player hits the ball, even if the player is 600+ yards from the hole and will be fortunate to make it there in three shots, let alone one. I’m not ever talking about the idiots who scream that line when a player has yet to hit a shot and distract the player to the point that the player has to step back from his shot and refocus. More so, I’m referring to the father-son tandem of Thomas Campbell, 62, and Thomas Campbell Jr., both of whom were at the Open Friday and following around a threesome that featured the top three players in the world - Tiger, Phil Mickelson and Adam Scott. The Campbells decided that a good way to enjoy the tournament, rather than watching the world’s three best golfers, who be to get rip-roaring drunk and heckle Torry Navarro, Scott’s caddy. This clearly wasn’t run-of-the-mill heckling, either; if it was, Navarro would not have left the course, gone under the rope and into the gallery to deliver an (alleged) head butt to Campbell Jr. Whether the head butt took place is not certain, but what is certain is that San Diego police cuffed both Campbell men and hauled them off to jail. The kicker here is that with them at the tournament was Campbell Jr.’s 7-year-old son, who was forced to wait with an officer at the tournament while a family member came to pick him up. In other words, the two elder Campbells did all of this - getting smashed, heckling a caddy with what was almost certainly a run of obscenity-laced blasts, getting head-butted by the caddy they were taunting, getting arrested and taken off to jail - with their son/grandson watching. Good move, fellas. Way to show that kid how to conduct himself like a man. I’m sure he’ll shake that whole thing right off and be just fine. How could having your father and grandfather act like drunken idiots, get head-butted by a stranger, get arrested and leave you alone at the golf course until your mom could come pick you up be at all emotionally scarring? As he was being led away, Campbell Jr. yelled at police to, “Take it easy on my dad. We’re just trying to watch some golf.” No, Tom, you weren’t just trying to watch golf. People who tried to just watch golf are the ones who didn’t get into any altercations at the course, didn’t get arrested and left Torrey Pines in their own vehicle as opposed to the back of a cop car. Well done, Campbells, a very proud weekend for your family….
- Not the best way to send a message to Hollywood, moviegoers out there. When studios and producers green light a remake of a movie that was just made five freaking years ago, the right thing to do would be refusing to go see that movie on the grounds that it’s unoriginal, unimaginative and is a blatant cash grab by recycling a stale, played-out concept and adding new stars to the mix. The wrong thing to do is to go see that movie in such massive numbers that it ends up being the top-grossing movie of the weekend at $54.5 million. Yes, The Incredible Hulk is your big earner of this weekend at the movies, easily outdistancing Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and Desperate, Homely Middle Aged Women in the City with Sarah Jessica Parker. Just because a movie gets a lot of publicity and spends big promotional dollars to get its foot in the door on also-ran summer shows like American Gladiators doesn’t mean you automatically treat it like a legit summer blockbuster. Ed Norton or no Ed Norton, Hulk is one movie I’m not going to see in the theater, nor will I see it on TV or DVD when it ends up in those places months down the road. Maybe I’m a loner on this one, but I just can’t get with a movie this is such a complete rip-off of a movie that is less than a decade old. No soup for you, producers, execs, cast and crew of The Incredible Hulk, no soup for you….
- So close, yet so far away in the end. Yes, it was just eight years ago that little Elian Gonzalez was the flashpoint for a bitter international custody battle that pitted his relatives in Miami against his family back in Cuba after a raft he was on in an attempted border crashing capsized and he was rescued and brought into the United States while his fate was decided. Ultimately his relatives in Cuba won out and Elian, then age 6, was sent back to the Communist nation and forgotten about by most Americans, even those who fought and protested so vigorously to keep him in this country. Apparently that taste of freedom and democracy was not enough to convince Elian that Communism is not the way to go, because as of last week 14-year-old Elian is a member of Cuba’s Young Communist Organization. Reports out of Cuba have him joining the organization and promising never to let down puppet ruler Raul Castro, pretending to be president while his brother and the country’s former president retired, and Fidel Castro, the former president in question. So that’s the thanks we get for rescuing you from the dangerous ocean waters, feed, clothing and lodging you for weeks, Elian? Nice gratitude, you little brat. You’d better hope you are never stranded in the middle of international waters again, because next time we just might leave your Commie ass floating….
- Suck it, Barbados! You can take your sad, sorry soccer team ad ship it right back to your tiny tropical island in the Caribbean after the United Freaking States of America (U.F.S.A.! U.F.S.A.!) administered an 8-0 ass-kicking in the first game of qualifying for the 2010 World Cup on Sunday. Yes, that’s right, the U.S. is absolutely dominating the field against nations with less than X percent of our population and only a fraction of our land mass. Never mind that Barbados is smaller and has fewer people than some states here in the U.F.S.A., just focus on the fact that we beat them down in a sport that 94.6 percent of America doesn’t care about and that 99.56 percent of us stopped playing (if we ever played at all) when we turned 12. No, soccer isn't a major sport here in the United States and yes, those who play it are totally irrelevant on the sports landscape, but dammit, we routed freaking Barbados, baby! An 8-0 win in soccer is the equivalent of a 25-0 win in baseball or a 77-0 rout in real, American football. Yes, the entire country was focused on the U.S. Open, the NBA Finals, Major League Baseball’s regular season, their local Little League team, the NCAA Track and Field championships, their weekly bowling league and the pickup basketball game at their local park more than they were focused on this match, but does that mean it’s not a huge triumph? Umm, yeah, actually that is what it means. Sorry soccer, but here in the U.F.S.A., you still don’t matter and I don’t believe that you ever will.
- I had a lot of fun watching the U.S. Open at Torrey Pines over the weekend. It was a great tournament that actually stretched into Monday with an 18-hole playoff to decide the winner. The tournament featured plenty of great golf, some amazing shots and intense moments, but it also featured some of the biggest morons you’ll ever encounter at a sporting event. No, I’m not just talking about the ignorant a-holes who scream “Get in the hole!” every time a player hits the ball, even if the player is 600+ yards from the hole and will be fortunate to make it there in three shots, let alone one. I’m not ever talking about the idiots who scream that line when a player has yet to hit a shot and distract the player to the point that the player has to step back from his shot and refocus. More so, I’m referring to the father-son tandem of Thomas Campbell, 62, and Thomas Campbell Jr., both of whom were at the Open Friday and following around a threesome that featured the top three players in the world - Tiger, Phil Mickelson and Adam Scott. The Campbells decided that a good way to enjoy the tournament, rather than watching the world’s three best golfers, who be to get rip-roaring drunk and heckle Torry Navarro, Scott’s caddy. This clearly wasn’t run-of-the-mill heckling, either; if it was, Navarro would not have left the course, gone under the rope and into the gallery to deliver an (alleged) head butt to Campbell Jr. Whether the head butt took place is not certain, but what is certain is that San Diego police cuffed both Campbell men and hauled them off to jail. The kicker here is that with them at the tournament was Campbell Jr.’s 7-year-old son, who was forced to wait with an officer at the tournament while a family member came to pick him up. In other words, the two elder Campbells did all of this - getting smashed, heckling a caddy with what was almost certainly a run of obscenity-laced blasts, getting head-butted by the caddy they were taunting, getting arrested and taken off to jail - with their son/grandson watching. Good move, fellas. Way to show that kid how to conduct himself like a man. I’m sure he’ll shake that whole thing right off and be just fine. How could having your father and grandfather act like drunken idiots, get head-butted by a stranger, get arrested and leave you alone at the golf course until your mom could come pick you up be at all emotionally scarring? As he was being led away, Campbell Jr. yelled at police to, “Take it easy on my dad. We’re just trying to watch some golf.” No, Tom, you weren’t just trying to watch golf. People who tried to just watch golf are the ones who didn’t get into any altercations at the course, didn’t get arrested and left Torrey Pines in their own vehicle as opposed to the back of a cop car. Well done, Campbells, a very proud weekend for your family….
- Not the best way to send a message to Hollywood, moviegoers out there. When studios and producers green light a remake of a movie that was just made five freaking years ago, the right thing to do would be refusing to go see that movie on the grounds that it’s unoriginal, unimaginative and is a blatant cash grab by recycling a stale, played-out concept and adding new stars to the mix. The wrong thing to do is to go see that movie in such massive numbers that it ends up being the top-grossing movie of the weekend at $54.5 million. Yes, The Incredible Hulk is your big earner of this weekend at the movies, easily outdistancing Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and Desperate, Homely Middle Aged Women in the City with Sarah Jessica Parker. Just because a movie gets a lot of publicity and spends big promotional dollars to get its foot in the door on also-ran summer shows like American Gladiators doesn’t mean you automatically treat it like a legit summer blockbuster. Ed Norton or no Ed Norton, Hulk is one movie I’m not going to see in the theater, nor will I see it on TV or DVD when it ends up in those places months down the road. Maybe I’m a loner on this one, but I just can’t get with a movie this is such a complete rip-off of a movie that is less than a decade old. No soup for you, producers, execs, cast and crew of The Incredible Hulk, no soup for you….
- So close, yet so far away in the end. Yes, it was just eight years ago that little Elian Gonzalez was the flashpoint for a bitter international custody battle that pitted his relatives in Miami against his family back in Cuba after a raft he was on in an attempted border crashing capsized and he was rescued and brought into the United States while his fate was decided. Ultimately his relatives in Cuba won out and Elian, then age 6, was sent back to the Communist nation and forgotten about by most Americans, even those who fought and protested so vigorously to keep him in this country. Apparently that taste of freedom and democracy was not enough to convince Elian that Communism is not the way to go, because as of last week 14-year-old Elian is a member of Cuba’s Young Communist Organization. Reports out of Cuba have him joining the organization and promising never to let down puppet ruler Raul Castro, pretending to be president while his brother and the country’s former president retired, and Fidel Castro, the former president in question. So that’s the thanks we get for rescuing you from the dangerous ocean waters, feed, clothing and lodging you for weeks, Elian? Nice gratitude, you little brat. You’d better hope you are never stranded in the middle of international waters again, because next time we just might leave your Commie ass floating….
- Suck it, Barbados! You can take your sad, sorry soccer team ad ship it right back to your tiny tropical island in the Caribbean after the United Freaking States of America (U.F.S.A.! U.F.S.A.!) administered an 8-0 ass-kicking in the first game of qualifying for the 2010 World Cup on Sunday. Yes, that’s right, the U.S. is absolutely dominating the field against nations with less than X percent of our population and only a fraction of our land mass. Never mind that Barbados is smaller and has fewer people than some states here in the U.F.S.A., just focus on the fact that we beat them down in a sport that 94.6 percent of America doesn’t care about and that 99.56 percent of us stopped playing (if we ever played at all) when we turned 12. No, soccer isn't a major sport here in the United States and yes, those who play it are totally irrelevant on the sports landscape, but dammit, we routed freaking Barbados, baby! An 8-0 win in soccer is the equivalent of a 25-0 win in baseball or a 77-0 rout in real, American football. Yes, the entire country was focused on the U.S. Open, the NBA Finals, Major League Baseball’s regular season, their local Little League team, the NCAA Track and Field championships, their weekly bowling league and the pickup basketball game at their local park more than they were focused on this match, but does that mean it’s not a huge triumph? Umm, yeah, actually that is what it means. Sorry soccer, but here in the U.F.S.A., you still don’t matter and I don’t believe that you ever will.
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