- Oh China, you crack me up. Because who doesn’t get a good laugh out of you foisting one toxic, potentially lethal product after another on the world? You put dangerous chemicals in toys, food, toothpaste, into milk power for infants and now into eggs. Your continual pursuit of making the world sick, literally, is hilarious. Who else but the wacky Chinese would even consider such an endeavor? So as you can imagine, I am laughing my butt off at news that health authorities in Hong Kong have found more eggs contaminated with the chemical melamine, and since Hong Kong is part of China, there’s the obvious connection . This particular chemical is at the center of a tainted milk scandal that has sickened more than 50,000 children across China, but you know the Chinese, they can’t be contained to any one product, they’re too big for that. So I guess eggs were the next logical move, with contaminated eggs found in a batch produced by Jingshan Pengchang Agriculture Product Company, located in Hubei province, about 430 miles (695 km) east of Shanghai. And no, I don’t want to hear about how these eggs were allegedly much lower in melamine content than contaminated eggs produced by Hanwei Eggs that were discovered last week in Hong Kong, because the bottom line is that the Jingshan eggs were still above the legal limit. In other words, doses of a
chemical used in making plastics and fertilizer should not be ending up in food that you intend for anyone to consume. So health officials in Hong Kong, quit spinning this by saying that there's little risk to human health and that a child would have to eat perhaps 20 eggs a day for the melamine to have an effect, no dice. Thankfully, at least one major retailer agrees with me on this - Wal-Mart. The company has pulled Hanwei eggs from the shelves of its supermarkets across China. But hey, nothing screams burgeoning global superpower quite like churning out toxic, chemical-laden products at the rate of one or two per month….
- Wonder how MTV feels about its choice of that knob Russell Brand to host its recent Video Music Awards show now? Not only did brand and his lame-ass humor bomb out on the show, this idiot is now at the center of a huge controversy that has the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) suspended one of its best-known stars while Brand resigned Wednesday for broadcasting a series of "gross" and abusive telephone calls. Brand and talk show host Jonathan Ross started this debacle earlier this month when they attempted to contact comedy actor Andrew Sachs for an interview on Brand's radio show. Showing that they are neither smart not armed with an Internet connection and rudimentary knowledge of a search engine, both of these tools failed to realize that Sachs -- who played a Spanish waiter in John Cleese's 1970s TV comedy "Fawlty Towers,” is not around to talk, so instead, they went brain dead and left a series of messages on the veteran actor's phone, joking about Brand's sexual relationship with Sach's granddaughter Georgina Baillie, 23. Nice of you to resign and issue a statement saying you take “complete responsibility” for the incident. “As I only do the radio show to make people laugh I've decided that, given the subsequent coverage, I will stop doing the show,” he said. Thanks for that, R., but you could have stopped doing it a long time ago and most of us wouldn’t have missed you. There’s a definite line between being funny and being an a-hole, and joking
that Sachs might kill himself on hearing the news you were “announcing” was over that line. Oh, and verrrry heartfelt apology the week after the incident, an “apology” in which you said the calls were "funny.” Know who didn’t think you were funny? The 15,000 people pissed enough to call and leave messages of complaint with the BBC. Know who else wasn’t down? Prime Minster Gordon Brown, who called the stunt “inappropriate and unacceptable.” Oh, and maybe stay on your side of the pond and don’t bother coming over to the U.S. anymore, R., we don’t know your brand of entertainment here….
- It’s about freaking time. Former Oakland Raiders coach Lane Kiffin has finally returned fire at that senile, semi-coherent, franchise-ruining corpse Al Davis, officially filing his complaint yesterday to claim his lost salary from the team following his firing. After that pathetic, rambling press conference Davis held where he hearkened back to the 1950s by using an overhead projector to display points of why he was firing Kiffin (didn’t want to draft Jamarcus Russell, whom Davis called “a great player.” Current averages for Russell? A verrrry studly 179.7 passing yards per game, less than one touchdown per game. Yup, that sure is great, Al). Kiffin has taken his sweet time, laying low since being fired on Sept. 30 after the Raiders' fourth game "for cause". It wasn’t until yesterday that Kiffin finally made good on his promise to seek payment for the remainder of his contract, filing the complaint through the NFL Coaches Association. It will now go straight to commissioner Roger Goodell, but there is no timetable set for hearings and the case may not even be heard before the end of the year. Here’s hoping that Kiffin gets what he’s seeking, namely the $2.6 million of salary he is owed under terms of his contract. Davis is a crabby, crotchety, senile old bastard who is choking the life out of his football team and needs to stop changing coaches on a whim. Making him pay the money he owes Kiffin might make him pause and think next time he goes to fire his head coach for the heck of it, in say, six months or so. Maybe no one told Al, but most NFL coaching contracts are guaranteed and none of the bogus claims he made against Kiffin in trying to support the firing should hold up in this case……
- For all the close calls Clark Kent has had during the seven-plus seasons of Smallville, last night was one of the most interesting ones as far as seeing how CK would weasel out of someone exposing his secret. His wave of good Samaritan deeds around Metropolis had provoked a warning from friend John Jones/Martian Manhunter last week that if he wasn’t careful, Clark’s identity and secret could be revealed. That nearly came true when Clark saved Lois Lane’s life after a mugger attacked she and Jimmy Olsen as they walked down a dark city street. The mugger turned out to be less than random by episode’s end, but at the time his identity wasn’t the issue. What was the issue was Jimmy snapping a pic of the scene as Clark super-sped through to save Lois. The picture turned out to be crystal clear except for one detail - the hero was a red-and-blue blur. That didn’t stop Jimmy from pushing the photo and miracle hero story to new Daily Planet/LuthorCorp boss Tess Mercer, who liked its sensationalism. Offered the chance to write the story, Clark declines because he thinks putting himself in the spotlight like that, even if no one knows it’s him who is the blur in the picture, is a terrible idea. But Jimmy continued digging into the story and uncovered miraculous heroic acts dating all the way back to Clark and Chloe’s time in Smallville, back to their days in the ninth grade. When Jimmy travels to the Kent farm to talk to Clark and see if anyone CK remembers from high school might have stood out as a superhero. Things take a turn for the worst when Jimmy spots an old Kent family photo with Clark in red and blue, just like in the picture from the mugging, and puts two and two together. He pegs Clark as the mystery hero and Clark denies it, then super speeds off to Metropolis and tracks down Chloe at the Isis foundation for her help. After initially telling Clark the day before that maybe the public believing that a hero like him does exist, Chloe is amazed Jimmy figured things out and as she and Clark discuss ways to fix the problem, Jimmy arrives after a harried drive from the farm. Seeing Clark beat him there, Jimmy accuses him of super-speeding to the city and points to it as more proof that Clark is a superhero. Then, Jimmy storms off after Chloe and Clark both insist that his theory is wrong, vowing to find tangible proof. That leaves Clark to scramble for a way to throw Jimmy off his trail, a quest that leads him to Oliver Queen’s private jet. Clark finds Oliver readying for takeoff for a vaction to the Bahamas, three uber-hot girls all over him and a drink in his hand. When Clark demands to talk to him in private, he is able to convince Oliver to help with a plan to divert Jimmy’s suspicions. That plan has Clark meeting Jimmy on the street and having Chloe drive a car that nearly runs him over before Oliver swoops in and saves him while wearing red and blue. The plan is thrown a curve when Clark gets a desperate call for help from Lois, who is in a pickle of her own. She has met a guy named Kane, who pretends to be a new reporter at the Daily Planet but is really a meteor freak whom LuthorCorp held at its Black Creek, Montana facility where Chloe was also held captive. Kane can scan people’s entire life history in his mind just from touching them, so Tess is using him to try and find out who stole her Kryptonian crystal she found in the Arctic near where Lex Luthor disappeared. Kane asks Lois out on a date, not knowing she has recognized him as a former Black Creek resident from a jump drive she stole from the Luthor Mansion, a drive containing files on many of the activities and prisoners at the facility. Lois says yes to the date so she can write a story and expose Kane, whose real name is Wilson. But the date goes sour when Kane/Wilson scans Lois, finds she doesn’t have the crystal and is contacted by Tess, who suggests he kill Lois. He tries, first by attempting to get himself invited up to her apartment for a nightcap. When Lois refuses, he follows her inside and attacks her with a gun. Lois is able to find him off long enough to call Clark for help, right in the middle of his plan to fool Jimmy. Clark is forced to abort and go save Lois, then super-speed back to where Jimmy is. As he gets there, Jimmy is being mugged by the same mugger who jumped Lois the previous night, a man working for Tess to abduct people who might know where the crystal is. Oliver, perched on a rooftop nearby, sees the mugging unfold, realizes something is amiss and springs into action. He saves Jimmy, knocks the mugger out and flies onto another rooftop using a zip line attached to one of his arrows he uses as Green Arrow. Clark comes on the scene just after that and when Jimmy accuses Clark of being the hero, CK point to the caped figure on the roof and says that’s the true hero. Jimmy buys it and apologizes to Clark for fingering him to begin with. However, the enthusiastic reaction to the hero and the resulting story makes Clark see that being a figure of hope like that might not be so bad. He has another talk with Oliver aboard his jet and when Oliver says he’s going back to fighting evil instead of jet setting around the world and partying, Clark sounds ready to join in. As Oliver heads off to Europe for a meeting of the Justice League, it seems like Clark is ready to be a part of their efforts. So another crisis of revealed identity averted, and that’s all until next time kids…..
- Remember that whole voting debacle eight years ago in Florida, the one that paved the way for eight years of the worst presidential performance in American history? How would you feel about some more election hijinks and shenanigans as one of the most faithful followers of the policies of that ass hat elected in 2000, W., is running for the nation’s highest office? See, I KNEW you would be excited. Yes, a mere eight years after Florida's hanging hijacked the election and led to voting changes in states around the country, many election observers remain concerned about the accuracy of the electronic voting systems most Americans will use November 4. Actually, those claims have merit already as early voting underway in 31 states, has borne out these problems. In recent weeks, voters in West Virginia, Colorado, Tennessee and Texas have reported that touch-screen machines registered their votes, at least initially, for the wrong candidate or party. Super news, everyone! Never a good sign when a problem with something as important as voting is lampooned in and episode of “The Simpsons,” the one set to air this Sunday which has already been leaked on the Internet and features a scene in which Homer's electronic vote for Barack Obama is recorded for John McCain by an evil voting machine that then devours him. So let’s all look forward to the possibility and near-certainty of touch-screen machines failing or registering votes for unintended candidates, optical-scan systems can having trouble reading paper ballots that are too long or marked with the wrong ink and electronic voting machines being hacked as our nation’s future hands in the balance, good times! And thanks to Democratic Sen. Rush Holt of New Jersey for being there to bolster our confidence in the electoral process by….well, I’ll let him tell you in his own words. Take it away, Senator! Tell us we’re wrong to fear impending disaster. “You can be almost certain that there will be irregularities in some places around the country,” said Rep. Rush Holt, D-New Jersey. Umm…..that’s not inspiring confidence. If anything, it adds fuel to the fire of negativity. But maybe I misunderstood you, so go ahead and clarify. “The problem now is that roughly a third of voters nationwide will use unverifiable electronic machines. So if there are uncertainties, there will be no way to resolve them,” Holt declared. Great, so disaster approaches and there’s nothing we can do about it. Election Day 2008, it’s Faaaaaaan-tastic…….
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