- Brazilian diplomats, time to channel your inner Zig
Ziggler. Your nation is hurting financially, possibly because its leaders
stupidly chose to host not one, but two massive international sporting events
in the past decade and spent billions upon billions of dollars on facilities and
lodging for the 2014 World Cup and 2016 Summer Olympics with no hope of ever
recouping most of that money. Those and many, many other factors have Brazil
battling through one of the country's worst economic crises in decades and in
the brainstorming sessions about how to get their finances back on track,
leaders have apparently decided that one viable strategy is to ask their
diplomats to help increase exports of weapons made in the South American
country. Yes, asking diplomats to pimp weapons for a nation that’s among the
world's largest light arms dealers is what it’s come to and as proof, Brazil's
foreign ministry sent a letter to its embassies recently directing them to
promote events and seminars with an eye to increasing the export of products
manufactured by the defense ministry. The eight-page latter has become public
due to Brazil's Information Access Law and now, the government looks even more
pathetic for begging its diplomatic representatives to help increase sales to
Europe, Asia, the Middle East and Africa, though not quite as embarrassing as
if all of this had taken place through an ad oh, so subtly placed by the
government on Craigslist or posted on Facebook……..
- Typically, a college football coach is one of the best
promoters for one of his players who has decided to declare for the NFL draft. Barring
some seriously bad blood between player and coach, that college coach is
rallying behind his guy, telling NFL teams that he’s talented, coachable and a
great person they’d be fortunate to add to their roster….which brings us to
Notre Dame coach Brian Kelly. One of his former players, quarterback DeShone
Kizer, declared for the draft in December after starting just 23 games for the
Fighting Irish, going 12-11 while throwing for 5,809 yards with 47 touchdowns
and 19 interceptions, adding 992 rushing yards and 18 scores on the ground. Many
draft analsyts wondered why Kizer decided to turn pro when he wasn’t ready for
the NFL, but it wasn’t until now that his own college coach joined that chorus
os dissent. "He should still be in
college. ... he needs more time to grow in so many areas, not just on the field
but off the field," Kelly said. So his own college coach believes that he
jumped the gun by leaving school after his redshirt sophomore season - but the
good news is that after undercutting Kizer’s draft status, Kelly wants everyone
to know that he still supported the quarterback's choice. "Once a decision
was made, we were united and we went to work to put him in the best
situation," Kelly said. Ultimately, the coach claims that Kizer as having
the best skill set among NFL quarterback prospects and will still be a good pro
if a team can draft him and give him time to develop………
- Whatever draws eyeballs, eh Spicer Greene Jewelers? Credit
the store’s co-owner, Eva-Michelle Spicer, with doing exactly what a business
owner is supposed to do: promote her business by doing whatever it takes to
draw in eyeballs, even if that means pissing off a few people in the process.
Somewhere along the line, this marketing genius and her team of brilliant
strategists decided that in order to sell more rings, earrings and necklaces,
the best move was to make a tongue-in-cheek allusion to domestic violence, only
with what they thought was an über-clever twist of words. The store began
receiving heat late last month for a billboard that read, "Sometimes, it's
OK to throw rocks at girls,” a message it displayed on a white backdrop
displayed various gemstones and with the tagline, "Asheville rocks,"
with a photo of a diamond replacing the "o." Ah, joking that hurling
rocks at females is acceptable as long as those rocks can be measured in cut,
carats and clarity, sooooo funny. Spicer, who may not have realized how much
blowback there would be but is probably fine with it if it helps her bottom
line, says she was deeply saddened that the billboard offended anyone because
that was not its intent. The billboard has since been replaced, but the amount
of exposure it garnered for the store clearly made its message a productive
one, even if it was a lame and tasteless attempt at humor……….
- James Cameron would seem to be very busy with his
multi-film Avatar work right now, but that isn't stopping one of his past
collaborators from suggesting that the two of them may ride together once more.
Arnold Schwarzenegger has hinted that he may work with Cameron again on a new
Terminator film, reviving a partnership the two established when they worked
together on the first two films in the franchise, which were released in 1984
and 1991. Somehow, Hollywood’s affinity for all things unoriginal has kept the
franchise alive long enough for the latest film in the series, “Genisys,” to be
released in 2015. The ‘chise lives on even though Paramount Pictures have ended
their involvement with it, at least in the mind of the Governator. “I’m looking
forward to doing another Terminator movie, yes,” Schwarzenegger said in explaining
why he’s still hopeful that not only will there be another film, but that
Cameron will also be involved in a direct role in production. “I don’t want to
call it, like, fake news, like the president calls it, but I think people just
write things, I have no idea why. Just because Paramount doesn’t want to pick
up the Terminator franchise, you have 15 other studios willing to do it, that
doesn’t mean the Terminator franchise is finished, right? It just means they
are on their way to negotiate with another studio, but I can’t give you the
details of that. They’ll announce that. But, yes, the Terminator franchise is
never finished.” In a lot of other areas of the economic world, a statement
like that might be far-fetched, but in Hollywood, it’s not only plausible, but even
extremely probable………
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