- Ladies of Cleveland, today is truly a dark day for you. Well, most every day is a dark day by virtue of the fact that you live in Cleveland. No area of the country has more cloudy, overcast days than Northeast Ohio and Cleveland isn't exactly a pick-me-up place to live. But Oct. 31 will forever be remembered by the women of C-Town as the end of an era - an era of left-handed handsomeness in center field for their beloved Indians. Today is the day the Cleveland Indians have declined outfielder Grady Sizemore's $9 million contract option for 2012, making the former All-Star eligible for free agency. Sizemore has never fulfilled his immense on-field potential mainly because he hasn’t been able to stay on the field consistently. A rash of injuries has led to five surgeries, two on his knees, in three years. The Indians have been relatively patient with the oft-injured Sizemore, who hit 33 homers and stole 38 bases in 2008. He has played just 210 games the past three seasons, including a career-low 33 games in 2010 and just 71 games in 2011. His home run total (28) and stolen base total (17) for the past three seasons have not come close to matching his All-Star seasons and with the unpalatable option of paying him $9 million or setting him free and replacing him with a cheaper alternative, the Indians made the wise choice. They did couple that with the stupid choice of exercising overweight, underperforming pitcher Fausto Carmona's $7 million for next season, but batting .500 isn't bad. It's possible the Indians may try to re-sign Sizemore, but he may be able to get a better offer elsewhere. As for Carmona, he was the Indians' opening-day starter last season but went just 7-15 with a 5.25 ERA in 32 starts. Sizemore must be fired up to know that someone with those impressive credentials was wanted in Cleveland but he wasn’t…………
- Oh, this should be fun. Two groups accustomed to getting their way and known as experts in their respective fields are set to do battle and the stakes are extremely high. On one side if the Zetas cartel, a ruthless Mexican drug gang known for killing anyone who stands in its way and lately for taking the fight to bloggers who have criticized the cartel and expressed any negative thoughts on its operations. On the other side is a group that has both fans and detractors galore and is likely playing on an entirely different level than a Mexican drug cartel: the hacker group known simply as Anonymous. Anonymous is known for online attacks against banks and government institutions and appears to be angry over the cartel’s attacks on those who criticize it online. A video purportedly from the international hacker ring threatens the Zetas, warning that the names, photographs and addresses of cartel supporters can be published "if necessary." To Anonymous’ credit, the group realizes where its strengths lie and where they are deficient. "We cannot defend ourselves with a weapon," a masked man says in the footage. "But we can do this with their cars, homes, bars and whatever else they possess. It will not be difficult. All of us know who they are and where they are located." The figure, clothed in g a suit and tie and speaking with a Spanish accent, claims the cartel has kidnapped an Anonymous member in the Mexican state of Veracruz. "We demand his release," the man says. So far there has been no official confirmation that Anonymous is responsible for the video, which does not mention a victim name or provide specific details about the alleged kidnapping. However, its existence underscores how prominent a part social media have come to play in Mexico’s increasingly deadly drug war. A debate erupted on Twitter shortly after the video surfaced and security experts warned that lives will be lost if Anonymous releases the identities of individuals cooperating with cartels. These experts believe rival cartels will use the information to attack and fear that could exacerbate the level of violence exponentially. Hash tags of #OpCartel were a frequent sight Monday, with many questioning the legitimacy of the video and others claiming Anonymous had called off its plans to target the Zetas. Taking on a cartel would be a bold and brave move for Anonymous, whose typical mode of battle is launching distributed denial-of-service attacks, in which multiple people use scripts to repeatedly access a website, slowing it badly or shutting it down if its servers can't handle the traffic. Taking on PayPal, Master Card, Visa and the Church of Scientology are much different endeavors than fighting a drug cartel that basically controls an entire country. The idea of the group draining the bank accounts of Zetas leaders and members or removing their security measures to allow others to steal from them is amusing, but does Anonymous really have the means and kahones to pull any of this off………..
- Jon Huntsman isn't doing well right now in the Republican presidential race. The former Utah governor is lagging behind the likes of Mitt Romney, Herman Cain and Rick Perry in every poll that matters and at this point his major contribution to the process is stimulating widespread discussion on whether he is still in the race and if so, why. Life somehow got even worse for Huntsman while stumping in New Hampshire this weekend. While trying to wow Granite State voters and show them what they could expect from a Huntsman presidency, he ran afoul of some local livestock and could not escape unscathed. A goat named Izak attempted to take a major bite out of Huntsman’s leg at an event in Dover and although Huntsman (and his pants) were not seriously harmed, this would seem to indicate that Huntsman will not be picking up a significant portion of the furry quadruped vote in the Republican primary. Izak’s owner, Bill Higgins, did his best to defend his animal by telling assembled media the goat was just “taste-testing” Huntsman’s trousers, calling it a “friendly nibble.” To Huntsman’s credit, he shook off the vicious attack and laughed it off before shaking Higgins’ hand and patting Izak on the head when he left. Huntsman later joked about the incident at a campaign stop at the McConnell Community Center. “He took a bite out of my kneecap,” Huntsman said “Is there a better indicator in the state of New Hampshire than how well you do with the goat? Actually, there is. It’s called running for the Republican nomination for president and having less than five percent of voters choose you in every single state where you’re on the ballot until you join luminaries like Rich Santorum and Tim Pawlenty in dropping out of the race…………
- Riot Watch! Riot Watch! This is a different brand of uprising, but the sentiment is the same. Instead of pipe bombs, rocks and angry fists, Spanish shepherds are fighting back against The Man the best way they know how: with sheep. Dozens of angry shepherds led flocks of sheep through the streets of downtown Madrid on Sunday in defense of ancient grazing, migration and droving rights threatened by urban sprawl and man-made barriers. A shepherds council established in 1273 led the revolt and council president Jesus Garzon said some 5,000 sheep and 60 cattle crossed the city to exercise the right to droving routes that existed before Madrid grew from a rural, backwater town to the capital city it is today. The effort was awesome because it hailed back to an ages-old tradition of a chief herdsman paying 25 maravedis — coins first minted in the 11th century — to use the crossing. Under Spanish law, shepherds have a right to use 78,000 miles of paths for seasonal livestock migrations from cool highland pastures in summer to warmer grazing in winter. The process is called transhumance and in Spain it involves around a million animals, mostly sheep and cattle. Many of the paths have been used annually for more than 800 years and modern-day Madrid is in the way of two north-south routes, one of which dates back to 1372. Madrid is an extremely modern city by European standards, becoming Spain’s capital city and administrative center when King Philip II moved his court to the city in 1561. Since that time, the city has grown up all around the migration routes and the Puerta del Sol - a large plaza that is the site for regular demonstrations, tourist-seeking kooks in superhero outfits looking to rip people off by convincing them to pose for pictures and plenty of pedestrian traffic - now straddles one of the routes. In response to the city’s continued trespassing on one of their routes, shepherds have halted traffic in the fall for the last 18 years to assert their rights to cross the city. In actuality, many Spaniards have great respect for ancient shepherding customs and do not object to the annual march through the city. The herds that made the trek Sunday had spent the summer grazing in Brieva de Cameros, 185 miles north of Madrid, Garzon said..........
- Scarlett Johansson, you have company. The buzz might not be as intense as when nude pictures of the voluptuous Johansson were leaked online by various gossip sites after a hacker pilfered them from Johansson’s phone, but topless pictures of country/pop star Taylor Swift are a headline-grabber too - whether they’re authentic or not. Swift, who has had her share of personal attacks and difficult moments in the public eye, is on the offensive after a gossip site called Celebrity Jihad posted a photo of a curly-haired blonde girl lying topless across a bed, claiming that it was a leaked photo of Swift. Swift, who once wrote a song and filmed a video in response to a bad review reacted swiftly and her representatives sent a cease-and-desist letter to the site demanding that the photo be taken down because it was not in fact Swift. The site acknowledge receiving the letter, but the picture remains up. If the site doesn’t change its mind and take the image down, a formal lawsuit could be the next step. What’s funny about the entire “controversy” is that the picture obviously isn't of Swift. One look at the face (the face, guys, the face and nothing else) confirms that the country/pop starlet is not the one topless on that bed and in theory, the drama should end quickly. However, the situation affirms several evident truths any remarkably hot or interesting female star under the age of 45 or so must deal with: 1) If a gossip site can find a topless image of you, they will use it and if they can’t locate such an image they will happily fake it to drive up page views and 2) No one can hack a nude photo of you if no such image exists. In other words, if you don’t snap it, they cannot steal it. The same goes for sex tapes, in case anyone was wondering……………
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