- Oh,
how the mighty leader of Albuquerque crystal meth underworld has fallen. Bryan
Cranston, who will forever be known first and foremost as Walter White of “Breaking
Bad” fame, has signed up to appear in the new Power Rangers film as the
superheroes’ leader Zordon. The role won't require all of Cranston, as Zordon
is a disembodied head floating in a tube who leads and trains the Power
Rangers. It’s an odd choice for a leader, but the casting was confirmed by a
post from - and yes this really exists - the official Power Rangers account,
stating “The mighty Zordon has officially been cast. Please welcome Bryan
Cranston to the Power Rangers Movie.” Elizabeth Banks is also part of the cast
and will play arch-villain Rita Repulsa. The Power Rangers will be played by “Life
Bites” actress Naomi Scott, teen rapper Becky G, Dacre Montgomery, Ludi Lyn and
RJ Cyler, none of who are well-known and probably won't be based on this
project, to be directed by Dean Israelite, who also directed “Project Almanac.”
After being replaced as the director of “Doctor Strange” by Scott Derrickson,
Israelite had an opening in his schedule and he now gets to helm a reboot of
the Power Rangers franchise, which will be the series’ first film since a pair
of movies were released in the mid 1990s, “Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The
Movie” and “Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie.” If you don’t remember them, don’t worry
because the rest of us either don’t recall them or made a conscious choice to
forget that they ever existed. But in Hollywood, remakes, reboots and
unnecessary sequels are definitely still a thing we have to deal with………
- When
the United States needs someone to stand in the way of progress, Congress is
always there to come through. Stand an applaud Iowa Republican Rep. Steve King
for being the latest to stand in the gap and stop change from happening after
the Treasury Department announced in
April that it would switch out President Andrew Jackson for prominent abolitionist
Harriet Tubman on the $20 bill. It seemed like a wise move to put a) the first
woman and b) a minority on a piece of currency, but King was having none of it
and after a few weeks to stew over it, he has introduced an amendment to bar
the Treasury Department from spending any funds to redesign paper money or coin
currency. His plan would nullify the Treasury Department's plans to replace the
current image of Jackson on the $20 bill with a portrait of Tubman, who bravely
worked on the Underground Railroad during the Civil War. There seemed to be no
sensible reason to prevent her from becoming he first black woman ever to
appear on a U.S. banknote, but leave it to a member of Congress to step up and
pig-headedly lay their body across the railroad tracks of social progress,
stopping that train in its tracks. Sure, it was overshadowed by a week in which
Congress failed to pass any one of four bills that would have enacted stricter
gun control laws in the wake of the Orlando mass shooting incident, but don’t let
King’s anti-heroics go unheralded. Word on the street is that the Iowa
Republican is hoping to attach his legislation to another bill that will
authorize the Treasury Department's funding, but he’s remain suspicious mum on
the rationale behind his bill or what he hopes to accomplish with it………
- Can’t
stop, won't stop, won't be a free man any time soon. Former Dallas Cowboys
running back Joseph Randle has been a busy felon since long before his unwanted
exodus from the league and now that he’s out of football and in the cafeteria
line at a local jail in Kansas, he’s not slowing his pace one bit. Randle, who
has been charged in Kansas with a casino disturbance and with backing his car
into three people, among his indiscretions, has now been charged with
threatening a deputy while jailed on other charges in Kansas. According to sheriff's
spokesman Lt. Lin Dehning, Randle is accused of threatening a deputy who was
"enforcing the rules" last month at the Sedgwick County Jail. Yes,
this guy has gone from threatening to go the distance every time he took a
handoff to threatening a deputy who demands that he play nice with his cellmate
and not have any contraband hidden under his mattress. While police didn’t
immediately provide any other details of Randle’s infractions, he was charged
with a felony count of criminal threat. Randle then made the always memorable
first court appearance in the case via a video link from the jail, which is
always a distinguished route to go. For a dude who had a string of run-ins with
the law when he was a free man with high-paying job, it’s not really surprising
that Randle had major issues with cops when he was behind bars and surrounded
by them on a daily basis, but at this rate he’s going to rack up three strikes
on his felony scoreboard sooner rather than later……….
- Dear
Russia…umm, can you kind of stop poaching our citizens to enlist in your army? Sincerely,
your pal, Moldova. That request may not carry a lot of weight, but Moldova's
foreign ministry has nonetheless called on Russia to stop recruiting Moldovan
citizens to the Russian Army. In what was undoubtedly a forcefully written,
boldly crafted letter sent to the Russian embassy in Chisinau, the ministry
accused Russia of recruiting soldiers in Ternovca, a village located in the
pro-Russian breakaway region of Trans-Dniester, which borders Ukraine. Accusing
Russia of doing unethical things anywhere in the immediate vicinity of Ukraine
is a pretty safe play and Moldova believes that the alleged recruitments
violate bilateral agreements. However, this mini-manifesto was a bit vague in
that it did not say when the alleged recruitments took place or how many people
had been recruited. Those sorts of nondescript threats are harder to rally
around for most and it’s not surprising that the Russian embassy did not
immediately respond. The letter also included a demand that Russia withdraw some 1,000 Russian troops
stationed in Trans-Dniester. Trans-Dniester, which broke away from Moldova in
1990 fearing Moldova intended to reunite with Romania, is a place Moldova feels
is in need of an international civil peacekeeping operation. Despite its
efforts to the contrary, Trans-Dniester is not internationally recognized as an
independent state. Many who live there would like to become the world’s 194th
nation, but the region is having a hard time gaining much traction to make that
happen. For now, it will have to settle for being the piece of property over
which the latest World v. Russia showdown is taking place……..
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