Saturday, January 09, 2016

You can't kill "Deadwood," good news for sea cows and Baseball HOF Twitter pissing matches


- Just so everyone knows, trying to pretend that the attempted mass extinction of an entire race of people never happened is still illegal…at least in France. A French high court has upheld the law singling out Holocaust denial as a crime on the basis that the World War II genocide is of a "different nature" than other crimes against humanity. The decision stems from the case of a math teacher who was fired after being convicted of Holocaust denial challenged the law because it (allegedly) unfairly punished only those disputing or denying the Jewish Holocaust, but not other crimes against humanity. It was a bullsh*t argument that a 10-year-old younger brother might use when his parents ground him for lying about breaking a valuable vase in the living room and he throws his sister under the bus because she didn’t tell anyone about putting a scuff mark on the wood floors with her high heels. Nice try, a-hole math teacher. You’re no less of a scumbag because the law doesn’t punish others the same way if they pretend other, lesser crimes against humanity didn’t happen. Thankfully, the Constitutional Court ruled that the Nazi Holocaust "has in itself a racist and anti-Semitic significance" and, additionally, was committed in part on French territory. Back in 1915, France recognized the 1915 Armenian genocide and declared slavery a crime against humanity and the United Nations has also recognized the Tutsi genocide committed by the Hutus in Rwanda in 1994. Denying or disputing those other atrocities is not a crime, but then again, they didn’t take place partially in France so maybe this math teacher wants to stop grasping for straws and being a total piece of garbage……….


- Being a cheater who ruined his chances to get into the Baseball Hall of Fame with what he injected into his body stings, eh Roid-ger Clemens? The 354-game winner, who retired in 2007 but once again failed to gain HOF status in voting this week, will continue to sit on the outside looking in with his seven Cy Young Awards and at least one fellow pitching great seems all right with that. Two-time Cy Young Award winner Roy Halladay, who retired in 2013 with 203 wins, 2,117 strikeouts and a 3.38 ERA, barely waited for the ink in this year’s ballots to dry before he fired a shot against Clemens’ bow on Twitter. Halladay posted a tweet which said: “When you use PEDs you admit your not good enough to compete fairly! Our nations past time should have higher standards! No Clemens no Bonds!” He wrote what a hell of a lot of people think on the topic even though both Clemens and Bonds have never officially been linked to using PEDs, but Clemens continues to use that lack of official proof as a weak shield to defend himself. He fired back at Halladay, calling it  "disheartening" to hear about "an ill-informed player making an asinine statement." Clemens went so far as to release a statement in which he reminded a man who was his teammate for one year in Toronto that Halladay himself had faced what he deemed false PED accusations. "Just to enlighten him, he was accused of using amphetamines by the 'strength coach,'" Clemens said in the statement. "You should be very careful when putting tweets out while not having your facts on the matter at hand." Halladay slept on that, came back the next morning and replied, “I'll let my reputation speak for itself.” Clemens’ real fight shouldn’t be with Halladay, but rather with the remaining 31 percent of voters he needs to win over to rise from the 44 percent he received this year to the 75 percent needed for election……….


- Today is a big day for the cows of the sea. Yes, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has proposed to remove the West Indian manatee from the endangered species list and reclassify it as "threatened," which doesn’t seem like a huge positive unless you know what it feels like to have your species almost completely disappear from Earth. The agency made the proposal after "significant improvements" in the manatee’s population and habitat conditions, a noteworthy development because the portly creatures were among the first species added to the list in 1972. Back in 1991, the agency began conducting aerial surveys of the population and found a mere 1,267 manatees in Florida. That number has grown to more than 6,300 in the state, a 500-percent increase. "The manatee's recovery is incredibly encouraging and a great testament to the conservation actions of many," Cindy Dohner, the service's Southeast regional director, said in a release. “Today's proposal is not only about recognizing this progress, but it's also about recommitting ourselves to ensuring the manatee's long-term success and recovery." The sea cow-huggers with various conservation groups reacted to the announcement with much less enthusiasm than would be expected, with many questioning the wisdom of applying the status to the entire West Indian species, which includes manatees in the Caribbean and Central and South America. The Endangered Species Act defines an endangered species as one currently in danger of extinction throughout all or a significant portion of its range, while a threatened species is one that is likely to become endangered within the foreseeable future. Now there will be a 90-day comment period in which the public is invited to submit scientific or technical feedback to help the service reach its final decision on the proposal. Let the uninformed spewing of opinions begin……..


- You cannot kill “Deadwood,” at least not yet. The former cult favorite HBO drama aired for three seasons between 2004-06 and ever since, fans have been pining for its revival in some form. Now, the network has decided to give the people what they want. HBO programming president Michael Lombardo confirmed that series creator David Milch has initiated talks for a “Deadwood” TV movie and that project is now officially in the pipeline. "David has our commitment that we are going to do it,” Lombardo said. "He pitched what he thought generally the storyline would be — and knowing David, that could change. But it’s going to happen." The premium cable Western starred Ian McShane and featured a cast that included Timothy Olyphant, Molly Parker, W. Earl Brown, John Hawkes and Brad Dourif. There is no word on who would or wouldn’t be a part of the movie even though Lobardo expressed optimism that all of the key players would return and said that would be at Milch’s discretion, but getting the project done is going to take some time because as Lobardo explained. “Milch is currently working on another project. "The understanding is that when he is done with that, he will turn his attention to [writing the] script for the ‘Deadwood’ film,” Lobardo said. All of this has to come as a relief to fans who were tortured with rumors of two feature-length TV films that never materialized………

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