The fate of "Smallville" decided, a town willing to whore itself out for free stuff and reasons you should watch women's college basketball

- The fate of Smallville is especially interesting to me because at this point, it is the one and only show on the CW network that doesn’t absolutely and totally suck. In the four or so years since emerging as the bastard offspring of the marriage of the WB and UPN networks, the CW has jettisoned its good shows one by one in favor of shallow, crap-tacular offerings that all center on the same theme: rich, beautiful people living in either New York or southern California, going to posh parties, hooking up with one another and looking to climb the social ladder. Literally, this network of fools has churned out more series based on this theme than I ever thought possible. Through it all, Smallville has managed to stave off the ax of CW head idiot Dawn Ostroff and amazingly, the story of Clark Kent’s humble beginnings in rural Kansas has been renewed for a 10th season. The CW announced the decision Thursday, making Smallville one of the last CW series to be renewed for next season. Although the network will only confirm that lead man Tom Welling is set to return next season, Erica Durance has already said that her contract runs through Season 10, Cassidy Freeman said that her contract runs three years, meaning she could be included in next season and Justin Hartley also said he would return if the show wants him back. That’s four key cast members and although I still miss the über-hot Kristin Kreuk as a member of the cast (but love seeing her on NBC’s Chuck), that’s a good start. It’s also good to see that in spite of a move to Friday nights for this season – often a graveyard for TV shows because Friday is a night when far fewer people are at home watching television – ratings for Smallville have actually increased, , bringing in an average of 3.12 million viewers. Also, making it ten seasons is something that even legendary shows like Seinfeld didn’t achieve, so that’s definitely a milestone for Smallville and most importantly, it doesn’t feel like the show has hung on too long and outstayed its welcome. Hopefully that feeling will continue through the tenth season of action…………

- Why not change town name to “Will Whore Selves out for Free Stuff”? Sure, the official city name is Topeka, Kansas, but Mayor Bill Bunten and Co. are willing to temporarily pimp themselves and their city out if it means getting free stuff from Internet giant Google. Bunten believes that Topeka should change its name for a month as part of a campaign to earn a spot new "Fiber for Communities" program. Google is going to install new Internet connections in unannounced locations, giving those communities Internet speeds 100 times faster than those elsewhere, with data transfer rates faster than 1 gigabit per second. It’s actually a pretty cool deal and cities wishing to be chosen have until March 26 to tell Google why they should be selected. The company says it will pick one or more cities for the pilot project. "We'll offer service at a competitive price to at least 50,000 and potentially up to 500,000 people," Google says in an online post. To up his city’s chances, Bunten announced Monday that his city will be known as "Google" -- Google, Kansas. "It's just fun. We're having a good time of it," he said of the unofficial name change, which will last through the end of March. "There's a lot of good things that are going on in our city." Umm, if it’s unofficial and it’s only for a month, what exactly does that do for anyone? You’re not really changing the name, not even for a day, and it’s not official, so why bother? I want to make it clear that the ones who need mocking here are Bunten and his citizens, not Google. Fact is, the company’s contention that U.S. Internet speeds are falling behind the global standard is on point. So if Google wants to fix things itself by installing new broadband cable, go for it. I just don’t think that the good folks at Google are going to see this hollow gesture and say, “Gee, some Podunk city in Kansas unofficially changed its name to Google for a month, we’d better pick them.” Topeka isn’t exactly a major national city, boasting a population of only 123,400. And as much as Bunten would like for his proclamation – which renames Topeka as "Google, Kansas -- the capital city of fiber optics" – would like to believe it’s so, the fact is, to put it simply, if terrorists look to attack a major U.S. city of significance, Topeka isn’t cracking the top 50 list. In closing, I would like to soften my verbal salvos directed at Mayor Bunten by pointing out that his lame attempt to woo Google is far from the lamest or dumbest name-change effort by a mayor of Topeka. Back in 1998, former mayor Joan Wagnon temporarily changed the name of the city to "ToPikachu, Kansas," in reference to the Pikachu anime character, from the show and game called "Pokemon," which was popular at the time. Why the hell the mayor of a town in Kansas felt that Pokemon had any special link to her city is beyond me, but it should make Bunten feel like less of an idiot for his own waste of time, if nothing else. All in all, I could not be prouder to NOT live in Topeka…………

- There are many reasons I don’t watch or follow women’s basketball. The actions of Baylor freshman Brittney Griner in Wednesday night’s game against Texas Tech in Lubbock, Tex., well, let’s just say that they are not among those reasons. Griner, a 6’8 giant and one of the prized recruits in the nation this past season, was tangling in the low post with Texas Tech's Jordan Barncastle. Barncastle fouled Griner with No. 14 Baylor up 55-39 with 9:01 remaining in the game and as the two untangled and Griner stumbled away the recipient of some rough play, she was clearly agitated. That’s nothing new; players get bumped around and pissed off in every sport, every single game. Basketball is very much this way and at most, players typically jaw with one another, maybe get up in their opponent’s face and bump chests. But not Brittney Griner, no sir. She was not going to take any crap from Barncastle and she came charging at Barncastle ready to throw hands. Griner wound up and threw a freaking haymaker, landing her fist squarely on Barncastle’s face. The blow broke Barncastle’s nose and the game was stopped for about 10 minutes as officials reviewed tape. Officials clearly saw that Barncastle was moving away from Griner at the time of the punch and a technical foul was called on Griner. She was ejected for a flagrant foul and another technical was called on another Baylor player, Morgan Medlock. The Texas Tech bench also got a technical for going out onto the court after the punch was thrown, but their tech was defensible because if someone is looking to cave in your teammate’s face, you had best get out on the court to protect her. Like I said, this sort of shenanigan is something that would lead me to watch a lot more women’s college basketball. If I could be guaranteed that a couple of chicks would start brawling every game and that one would unleash a Mike Tyson-like jab to her opponent’s grill, I’d watch women’s basketball every night of the week. Nothing says classy, sportsmanlike competitor quite like busting someone’s beak with your bare hands. Oh, and big ups to Baylor coach Kim Mulkey and athletic department officials for manning up to suspend Griner for all of two games – the team’s regular-season finale and first conference tournament game. Way to show that you’re serious about discipline and representing your team and university well, guys……………

- The self-importance and pomposity of awards shows like the Oscars are key reasons why I don’t want these self-congratulatory schmooze-fests. Seeing the status quo incestuously give awards to one another on a rotating basis and refusing to actually open their doors to non-mainstream shows, movies, artists and voices who actually deserve recognition is not my thing. These attributes were on display in finest form this week when the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced Tuesday that "Hurt Locker" producer Nicolas Chartier will not be allowed to attend the March 7 awards show because of an e-mail he sent that has been deemed in violation of the Academy's campaigning standards. "Chartier had recently disseminated an e-mail to certain Academy voters and other film industry figures in which he solicited votes for his own picture and disparaged one of the other contending films," the Academy said in a statement Tuesday evening. Basiscally, Chartier sent out an email looking to drum up votes for his movie and made veiled, negative remarks clearly directed at one of its chief competitors, James Cameron's "Avatar." According to recipients of the email, Chartier's message asked the message recipients to help promote the Iraq war movie so that the it would win, "and not a $500M film," which is a not-so-cloaked shot at “Avatar” (which is vastly overrated, by the way). In the Academy snooty opinion, Chartier's appeal to voters and industry insiders crossed the line by "casting a negative or derogatory light on a competing film." That sort of action is against the organization's arrogant, self-important rules. In response, Chartier’s invitation to the show was pulled, which ironically should be considered a blessing because now he doesn’t have to sit through four hours of arrogant Hollywood types pumping up one another’s egos by handing out tacky trophies and making self-aggrandizing speeches sprinkled with fake humility. The Academy also made the magnanimous decision not to remove "The Hurt Locker" out of the competition completely. If the film wins, co-producers Kathryn Bigelow, Mark Boal and Greg Shapiro will accept the award and Chartier would receive his ugly Oscar statuette later. Way to show that you don’t take yourselves too seriously, H-Wood…………

- Is it a problem when your country’s national police chief and top anti-narcotics official are arrested for being in league with the country’s drug cartels? I feel like there might be a slight conflict of interest there, but I never can quite tell with these situations. Let’s ask the good folks of Guatemala their thought because Guatemalan Attorney General Amilcar Velasquez announced Wednesday that Police Chief Baltazar Gonzalez and anti-drug czar Nelly Bonilla were arrested Tuesday and charged in connection with a shooting last year over some stolen cocaine that left five police officers dead. With U.S. Secretary of State Hank Clinton set to arrive in Guatemala in a few short days for talks with the Guatemalan government, the arrests should provide an interesting backdrop for the visit and a nice conversation starter for all involved. Seriously, who can’t have a good chat about top law enforcement and government officials allegedly having key roles on the wrong side of a drug-related shooting that left five cops dead? Coincidentally, Hank Clinton’s visit is expected to include a discussion of Guatemala's current anti-drug efforts. I’m sure Hank will be fascinated to hear about the 11-month investigation by the International Commission Against Impunity that led to the arrests of the two high-ranking officials and also police officer Fernando Carrillo. Together, the three men are accused of heading a criminal network that infiltrated and systematically corrupted the police force with a commitment to robbery and drug trafficking. Their burgeoning criminal enterprise was brought to the forefront following the shootout between police and drug traffickers last year. Allegedly corrupt officers attempted to steal 750 kilos of cocaine from the traffickers, a practice that was apparently common under Gonzalez and Bonilla’s leadership. Gonzalez, Bonilla and Carrillo are accused of trying to cover up the shooting incident, which is smart business for anyone running a drug cartel but problematic if you are caught. As one might expect, the arrests did not do anything good for the government of President Alvaro Colom "Guatemala is at the epicenter of the drug threat," according to a U.S. State Department report on narcotics released this week. "Corruption and intimidation of law enforcement continue to be major challenges. Combined with multiple changes in senior positions ... there was no perceptible improvement to institutionally strengthen law enforcement or give law enforcement agencies the capacity to more effectively address the grave narcotics situation in Guatemala." That definitely doesn’t sound like a positive assessment, but perhaps the militant, angry femi-Nazi ways of Hank Clinton can solve all of Guatemala’s problems. Then again, based on our own experiences with Hank here in the U.S., probably not…………