Wednesday, January 07, 2015

Paraguayan cross protests, new White Stripes releases and disgraced former governors


- Where is Larry Sanders and does he want to continue? No, this isn't a debate about whether the comedic star of “The larry Sanders Show” wants to hang it up and retire from acting. The Sanders in question here is Milwaukee Bucks center Larry Sanders, who is currently AWOL while playing on a four-year, $44 million contract that was signed prior to last season. He has been away from the team since Dec. 23, originally because of the flu, but there aren't many flus that last for two-plus weeks, the team needs a different reason to explain why its best shot blocker isn't around. Jason Kidd cited "personal reasons" for the absence but the team hasn’t given any more details about what’s going on. In such situations, a public with lots of questions and few answers starts to invent wild theories about what’s going on and here, the word on the street is that Sanders has lost his motivation to play and wants to quit basketball. Multiple reports this week have suggested that Sanders is ready to walk away from the game because his commitment to it simply sint there any longer. Snaders’ agent, Happy Walters (ironically named given the circumstances surrounding his client), didn’t exactly deny the report, but merely called it unsubstantiated. For now, the Bucks seem content to allow Sanders to stay away and work out whatever issues he’s facing. He has missed the team’s last seven games and while the team does have the power to suspend him however long they deem fit for "intentional failure or refusal to render the services required under the player's contract or the CBA,” there seems to be no intention of doing so at present………

- This is truly a shocker, America. A rich guy who once convinced a lot of people to vote for him committed a crime and he’s actually going to spend time in jail because of it. That rich guy would be former Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell may have been handed a two-year prison sentence on federal bribery charges, but isn't giving up the belief that rich people can do whatever the hell they way and get away with it. McDonnell vowed to keep fighting the bribery accusations that led to his conviction at the federal courthouse in Richmond, yet said he was "deeply, deeply sorry" for the actions that led to his conviction on 11 felony public corruption charges. In his twisted world view, he "never, ever betrayed my sacred oath of office." Maybe McDonnell needs to look at the situation differently, given that he received much less than the 10 to 12 years that prosecutors had started the day asking for. Still, hearing that dear old dad/husband/pal was going to prison was enough to send an audible gasp up from McDonnell's children, family and friends. His wife, Maureen McDonnell, remained in the courtroom bawling her eyes out, but that could have simply been because she could face a similar sentence herself and saw that train of justice rolling down the tracks toward her. It was a dramatic culmination prolonged downfall of a Republican governor once heralded as a rising star and a man tabbed to give the party's 2010 rebuttal to President Barack Obama's State of the Union. Now, he’s the first Virginia governor ever sent to prison for corruption despite a steady parade of well-dressed character witnesses who touted what an awesome dude McDonnell is. Hell, his attorneys even read excerpts of more than 400 letters they'd submitted making the same case. U.S. District Court Judge James Spencer was not swayed and smacked the disgraced governor with  24 months in prison, two more years of supervised release, as well as $1,100 in fines. It wasn’t the justice many were hoping for, but it’s more than they should’ve expected………..


- And so it continues for another recording artist whose career is no more. The White Stripes ceased to be several years agp, but like so many other acts who either retired or passed away, the music just keeps coming. Albums that were recorded but mysteriously never saw the light of day suddenly pop up when there is money to be made from their late release. For The White Stripes, it’s a live album and DVD detailing part of the band's 2005 tour of South America. The release will be made available as part of frontman Jack White’s Third Man Records subscriber-only service, The Vault. The release will include the double-album “Under Amazonian Lights,” which was recorded live in Manaus, Brazil on June 1, 2005, as well as a DVD featuring footage recorded at the gig at Teatro Amazonas Opera House. Among the tracks fans will receive is a cover of Bob Dylan’s “Lovesick Blues.” "Words do not ably describe the beauty of the Teatro Amazonas nor the furor riled up by the White Stripes appearance,” a promotional release for the album reads. “Not only was there fear that the amplification of the band would cause the plaster in the building to crack and possible fall and injure attendees, but out of custom/fear/lord-knows-what the crowd remained seated until being explicitly asked to stand from the stage by Jack White himself.” Dear God, the mayhem. The DVD will also show Jack and Meg White venturing outside the venue to play an entirely unamplified version of “We Are Going to Be Friends” for a group of fans who couldn’t get tickets and watched the performance via closed-circuit feed…….


- The question has finally been answered in Paraguay. What do you have to do to convince an indifferent government that is happy to ignore problems for as long as it takes to make them go away to meet with you? Creidt a group of disgruntled workers who nailed themselves to wooden crosses to protest what they say are unpaid wages with helping to provide the answer to this particular riddle. It’s a very graphic form of protest that is becoming increasingly common in Paraguay and perhaps its effectiveness derives from the fact that it has been condemned by the Roman Catholic Church and the forbidden always tends to have more of an impact. Four men and one woman have been nailed to crosses for several weeks in front of the Brazilian Embassy in Paraguay's capital, Asuncion, and a sixth person planned to join them Tuesday before the Work Ministry caved and agreed to meet with the protesters on Jan. 26. That might seem like a government agency totally lying and setting an unnecessarily distant date some three weeks in the future in an effort to placate the angry masses….and it probably is. According to the protestors, they represent about 9,000 workers who claim they are owed thousands of dollars in back pay and other benefits for work on the Itaipu Dam. Wait….a big, bureaucratic entity abusing the little guy and refusing to give the working man what’s rightfully his? That never happens. Maybe if all 9,000 disenfranchised workers were nailed to crosses in front of the embassy, that meeting would be today instead of Jan. 26……….

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