- Why so serious, people of Warsaw, why so serious? Just
because a despotic madman who may be the worst person ever to live attempted to
exterminate an entire race of people and used your country in his quest, why
should you have a problem with a statue of Adolph Hitler kneeling in prayer in a
courtyard in the former Warsaw Ghetto? On the surface, such a statue in the
very area where hundreds of thousands of Jews were forced by Nazis to live in
inhumane conditions during World War II could be construed as upsetting.
Predictably, the over-reactors at the Simon Wiesenthal Center, a Jewish
Advocacy group, have deemed the statue to be “a senseless provocation which
insults the memory of the Nazi’s Jewish victims.” These bleeding hearts are
upset because prior to World War II, Warsaw had the largest Jewish community in
Poland and Europe and during the war, about 300,000 Jews in the ghetto died –
most of hunger and disease and after being sent to concentration camps where
they were killed. Those responsible for the statue contend it is intended to be
thought-provoking and the exhibition’s catalogue says art “can force us to face
the evil of the world.” The fact that virtually no one has ever forgotten how
evil Hitler was does not seem to factor in to their argument. Italian artist
Maurizio Cattelan created the statue in 2001 and it was installed in Warsaw
last month. Titled “HIM,” the display has drawn thousands of viewers since it
was placed. The statue depicts a schoolboy kneeling in prayer and the head is
made to resemble that of the fundamentally evil German dictator who wasn’t even
German. It is visible only through a hole in a wooden gate and is the work of
an artist known for being deliberately provocative. Cattelan has also made an
effigy of Pope John Paul II being crushed by a meteorite and that work was also
displayed in Poland, a deeply Catholic country. He may just dislike Poland,
although Poland’s chief rabbi, Michael Schudrich, was consulted about the
installation and said he believes it has educational value……….
- Welcome back, Charlie Sheen. His world-class charade of
general insanity and vitriol toward anyone in his path (and his own body with
the yearlong cocaine bender he mixed in along the way) had seemingly faded as
his new basic cable series “Anger Management” got off the ground and achieved a
modest amount of success, but ugly and hateful Charlie Sheen resurfaced over the weekend in a favorite vacation
getaway of rich people who want the cachet of traveling internationally while
not giving up the actual experience of being in the United States, also known
as Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. That’s where Sheen recently opened a new lounge, the
Epic Bar in the swanky El Ganzo Hotel. Unimaginatively named (calling it the
Winning Bar may have been the only lamer option), the nightspot was graced with
Sheen’s presence and a heartwarming scene in which he berated the audience with
an anti-gay epithet. “How we doing . . . Lying bunch of f----t a--holes. How we
doing? You guys suck!” That warm greeting certainly grabbed the attention of
the capacity crowd, which included Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and
former Guns N’ Roses guitarist Slash, who performed later in the night. With
those dignitaries on hand, maybe Sheen was simply inspired to give them a memorable
night. Sadly, someone must have pulled him aside after he pulled his face out
of the pile of coke he was snorting and off the hooker he was sexing up later
in the night because Sheen eventually issued a sort-of apology, saying, I meant
no ill will and intended to hurt no one, and I apologize if I offended anyone. I
meant to say maggot, but I have a lisp.” Good one, Chuck. Let us know when
you’re going to start being funny again………
- Good news, all 30 teams in Major League Baseball. A former
flame-throwing reliever who also enjoys throwing flames at workers on his
family’s ranch in an attempt to murder them is now free and clear…..of the
Venezuelan penal system. Former
major league pitcher Ugueth Urbina was freed on Sunday after serving 7½ years
in prison for the attempted murder of five workers on his family's ranch and he
is already excited about a return to the game he loves. Newly freed, Urbina
took the field in his native country to play for the Caracas Lions and described
himself as "more mature" and said he was "very excited to play
baseball again." "I'm excited to be here," Urbina said prior to
a game against the Zulia Eagles. Now 38 years old, he was released from prison after
serving roughly half of his 14-year sentence for attempted murder during a
dispute over a gun on Oct. 16, 2005. That dispute saw him attack and injure
workers on the ranch with the help of a machete and several co-conspirators. Urbina
was convicted of attempting to murder the workers by dousing them in gasoline
and setting them on fire at the ranch, located about 25 miles from Caracas,
although he has repeatedly denied involvement with the incident and claimed he
was sleeping at the time of the attack. There is no guarnatee that Urbina, who
pitched for the Montreal Expos, Boston Red Sox, Texas Rangers, Florida Marlins,
Detroit Tigers and Philadelphia Phillies and saved 237 big league games from
1995-2005, will ever have as much as a tryout with a major league team, but
least he can still play Venezuelan winter-league baseball and recall those fond
memories in the 2003 World Series to help the Marlins beat the New York Yankees.
For now, he is holding out hope that he will play professional baseball in the United States again. "The first
order of business is pitching in Venezuela," he said. No, the first order
is actually staying out of prison…….
- Stick it to the Man, Lund family of Gurnee, Ill., stick it
to The Man….with your small-scale outdoor hockey rink in your suburban yard. Everyone
fights their own battle with a different totalitarian regime and for the Lund
family, that regime is the local government that is ordering them, much like
Ronald Reagan did do the Russians in 1990, to tear down this wall……or haphazard
home hockey rink. For the second straight winter, the Lunds decided to
construct a hockey rink for the neighborhood children to enjoy. The rink, with
plywood wall boundaries, covers their side yard and it has drawn the ire of at
least one neighbor who has courageously chosen……to remain anonymous while
b*tching to county official. “It became a nuisance,” said Lake County
administrator Barry Burton. “And again, they’ll be asked to remove it.”
According to this bureaucratic despot of doom, the county’s property laws
include a very specific provision of “no ice rinks in your yard.” It seems like an obscure
ordinance and it is, but if it does exist, then the Lunds are now repeat
offenders and Burton will not allow their ridiculous rink to stand. “We don’t
want to be a Scrooge,” he added. “This is in fact too large for that type of
area.” One neighbor complained that kids playing late in the evening are
disturbing him with their über-loud slap shots and likened the sound to that of
a hammer pounding on his door. Kim Lund has no intention of backing down from
the city in this fight and sounds ready to freeze herself to the ice to protect
it should anyone come to tear it down. “It has been red-flagged,” she said. “To me, it’s the principle. We are not violating any ordinances. We have
consulted with an attorney. It’s a neighbor issue more than anything to me.”
Should her family choose to keep the ring up in an act of hockey-based
defiance, they could be fined………
- Samsung needs an edge. It doesn’t have the tech arsenal to
compete with the iPhone or Droid, so finding a competing operating system to
capture the hearts, minds and wallets of consumers is the company’s new
mission. In this quest, Samsung will soon become the first to sell a smartphone running
on the Tizen operating system through Japanese carrier NTT Docomo and other
partners. Beginning early next year, Samsung will offer the Tizen-based phone,
which runs the Linux-based operating system that emerged from the death of
Nokia's MeeGo. Samsung took over the development of the operating system from
Intel, which originally worked with Nokia on MeeGo, and the Linux Foundation is
also involved. One advantage for Tizen is that it is generally viewed as more
open than Google's Android, which has developed a reputation among some
developers of being overly legalistic and byzantine with its numerous
restrictions for apps. These policies have hampered the company’s ability to
make massive changes to the underlying platform for the operating system and
the companies working on Tizen see it as a viable alternative to the Droid and
the closed iOS operating system Apple’s iPhone uses. A cynic could argue that
Samsung is simply desperate as it watches its market share dwindle and the
Droid and iPhone seize a stranglehold on the market, but the company is
somewhat hedging its bets by also carrying devices running on Microsoft's
Windows Phone operating system. Predictably, as with anything running a Windows
OS, these phones have failed miserably and left Samsung in need of better
options. Tizen is also being developed with an idea to use it for other devices
as well, including televisions and tablets………..
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