You are looking at posts that were written in the month of October in the year 2007.
Posted on October 23rd, 2007 by Mark.
Categories: News.
What is there to be said. The Chinese are building an empire on the backs of the american people. They hold our debt and in many ways our fate in their hands. We buy from them voraciously consuming for the sake of “having”. We manufacture nothing, they manufacture everything. We share a symbiotic relationship, we provide the market and they provide the goods. Corporations started the sellout of this country a long time ago and merrily the government and the consumer joined along. Remember the days when it was “buy American made” everywhere? I remember those days. Remember when we feared the expansion of Japan into this country? I remember those days. Oh the threat they posed!Â
Now all of the money we’ve been funneling to China through our pursuit of “the cheap” has funded their military to a point where they actually pose a very real and viable threat. Take for instance this story about China’s weaponizing of space and their desire to be able to knock out our satellites.Â
Once the satellite-maneuvering technology matures, the group said, China would have the know-how to destroy other satellites in space in wartime. China could launch cheaply-made weapon-carrying objects into space and change their courses to destroy or damage satellites of other countries by sending signals from submarines, the center said.
China shocked the world in January by firing a missile at an old weather satellite without notifying anyone in advance, showing off its anti-satellite weaponry and its ability to shoot down satellites without being immediately noticed.
How many Osama Bin Ladens and Al-Qaedas would it take to match the threat of one China? We are asleep at the wheel. We are marching along into the abyss while China rises to meet its golden age. What madness is this? How much of ourselves will we allow to be given away? When will we finally understand that we make monsters of those that have a limited means to harm us while ignoring those with the truest potential to threaten us?
Posted on October 22nd, 2007 by Mark.
Categories: Entertainment, Uncategorized.
Talk about weird. Who knew this guy was so worldly. I’m not a big fan of ‘Inside the Actors Studio’ because I find it pretentious. “What’s your favorite word?” Who cares? “What’s your least favorite word?”  Ditto. No seriously, ditto is my least favorite word. What a bore… but then when you consider that this Lipton is following up a previous career as a pimp… well it makes sense. He manages to pimp actors as artists with every question. I guess old habits die hard?!
Posted on October 22nd, 2007 by Mark.
Categories: News.
Hurray! The Turks are sending troops to the Iraqi border after Kurdish rebels murdered several Turkish soldiers. Of course the Turks insist that they will attempt diplomacy before retalliating, but the people of that country are demanding retribution. I wonder what Bush would do? It seems that the philosophy of this president is do as I say and not as I do, as he pleads with Turkey to stay its hand. My, how noble a thing is that?Â
Isn’t Northern Iraq supposed to be the shining example? Aren’t the Kurds the supposed cooperative lot in that insane asylum of a region? Seems to me that we were sold a bill of goods as it relates to them as well. First they meet with Iranian operatives and now they are unable or unwilling to stop guerilla groups from lashing out at their age old enemy the Turks. It’s obscene how absolutely ridiculous our policy where it concerns Iraq has become. We are rudderless and blind.Â
Don’t worry though… all of this will be a vague memory when we find ourselved embroiled in World War III. Ah, our president… Mr. Positive!
Posted on October 20th, 2007 by Mark.
Categories: Entertainment.
So I went to see this flick because I was promised bloodsucking undead, without an “emo” slant. There are no selfloathing vampires in this film, there are no rockstar types ala Lestat; there is only a bunch of inbred looking nasties that have managed to devise a great way to gourge on some normal folks like you and me. After reading the reviews and realizing that Josh Hartnett starred in it, I wasn’t expecting much. To be honest, I’ve soured on horror given the cheese that is ‘Saw’ and all of its wannabe spinoffs. Color me shocked when I found myself still giving a damn half way into the movie.
The story takes place in Barrow Alaska, a day before the sun is due to set and not rise again for thirty days.  It is a hectic time with many people looking to get the hell out of town before perpetual night. I don’t know if I could handle it or not myself, but I think I would like to experience something like that once in this life. Anyway, the town’s sheriff, (Hartnett) and his deputy are seeing a rise in vandalism with the theft and destruction of satellite/cellular phones and the murder of every sled dog in town. Hmmm… I wonder how we’re going to contact the real world if the phones go down? Unfortunately for the town the cops never bother to consider that… and it was one moment where I thought, “COME ON!”
Needless to say, as night falls on Barrow and the town begins its plunge into thirty days of endless night, matters go from bad to worse. The phones go out, the internet goes out, the power goes out and then people start getting mauled and ending up with their heads on stakes. Whoopsie! It seems that these pranksters are actually cold blooded killers! Whoopsie! No… they’re actually super strong and voraciously hungry vampires!
I have seen a lot of vampire flicks in my time but I have to say that this bunch for me seemed the most realistic. They did not speak english. They looked like a singular line of inbred that had existed together unmolested for a few hundred years and it was all fairly believable. Better yet, they had even managed to devise this bit of genius in attacking a town enveloped in perpetual night that had a manageable population that they could pick off over time. Wow, fiction that was well thought out even if the subject matter was overplayed and cliched. BRAVO!
I did have a few issues with the movie and I’ll just rattle them off here for the sake of being thorough. First Hartnett, this guy maintains his streak with me… I have yet to see him play a part well. He’s the most unbelievable thing in the whole film and when you consider this is a vampire flick that’s saying something. Because Hartnett was bad, I never bought off on the strained relationship between he and his wife (played by Melissa George) and that’s huge. Why? Because that’s one of the reasons you’re supposed to want to see these two people survive. You know that eventhough they’ve been apart, they’re supposed to be together. If one of them dies, that dream dies… *yawn*. That was my reaction, I found that bit of “drama” tedious because it just wasn’t believable. Neither Hartnett, nor George made that part of the film work, and that’s sad.
Something that also rubbed me wrong was the way things changed so quickly. I don’t think the wife or the boy took issue with it, so maybe I’m just a picky schmuck? The issue I had with the pacing was that in the beginning we are treated to these suspensful moments where the sled dogs a guy at the phone company and a pair of workers at the pipeline are killed off. These are awesome little scenes in which we are shown just how fast and unstoppable the vampires truly are. There will be no going toe to toe with them, they’re just too tough. Well when we finally get a good look at the vampires all of that goes away. There are no more well worked “snatch and grabs” of victims. No more organized teamwork, it’s just jump on someone and tear their bloody throats out. I really thought it diminished what was a well worked suspense… and that was a shame. I spoke to the wife about this and she said that it worked for her because she felt that the vamps had become frenzied by the blood and so they were no longer worried about methods.
All in all the film was good. Acting of the leads aside, you have to love the premise in and of itself. The movie offers a great way to kill a couple of hours on a rainy day and will leave the horror lover well satiated. Go ahead and catch a matinee and save yourself a couple of bucks if you’re not sure about the subject matter.Â
Posted on October 20th, 2007 by Mark.
Categories: Not so artistic renderings.
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I laughed.
I cried.
I pee’d my pants.
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Posted on October 19th, 2007 by Mark.
Categories: News.
I listened to Randi yesterday. I even posted a few times to her message board, before being banned for reasons not yet known to me. I surely didn’t break any rules there… so perhaps somebody read what I posted here? It would be pretty lame if my comments here got me banned… I thought this was America and we were entitled to an opinion. Oh that’s right… it’s a personal message board and the Constitution doesn’t apply to a privately owned website. Well, whatever… thankfully I have this forum to say whatever I like as long as it’s not slanderous or libelous. So I’m going to offer my opinion on the nebulous explanation that Randi offered the audience yesterday as to what happened to her Sunday night.
To recap, Randi was involved in a mishap Sunday night that ended up with her face down on the ground. According to her, she isn’t quite sure what happened. She went outside an “Irish pub” to have a smoke and boom… she blacked out or something. Seriously, that’s as much information as she was able to offer. She did say that she wasn’t sure if somebody had hit her/knocked her down or not… but that’s as far as that went. She did add that she hadn’t eaten. What did she mean by that? Did she mean she’d been drinking on an empty stomach (she was at a pub) or was she saying that she got dizzy because she hadn’t had any food? Your guess is as good as mine.
Now here’s the part that makes you wonder what the hell is up with the story. She says that she went home, she was disoriented and in pain and knew that she could not do her show Monday. After all she is a talk show host and according to her, talk show hosts need their teeth. Alrighty then, I believe her, I’m sure the show would be a lisping mess if you were to have no teeth. She sat down at her computer and typed a “two sentence email” to the people at Air America saying that she had been injured and that she would follow up with them after she saw doctors on Monday. Here is where I was like, “what”, when it came to her explanation. She seemed to indicate that in that email she had used the term “mugged”. That was at least what I gathered from what she said. Then she went into this whole deal about being disoriented and not knowing what had happened and being confused. She was confused? She comes back four days later, lays this story on her audience and now I’m confused.
Honestly, I don’t know what happened to Randi. I can make a couple of assumptions based in part on what she said yesterday. I think that she likely blacked out. That’s my opinion after hearing what she had to say. Whether it was caused by too much drink or not is anybody’s guess. I also think that she wrote an email to Air America in which she used the term “mugged” or something that indicated that to the folks there at the company. I think that this caused the confusion as to what had actually happened and ended up making a colleague at Air America look like an imbecile. Randi seemed surprised that this would make the news. Hello, Randi… you fancy yourself a celebrity of sorts. You refer to yourself as “the goddess”. I suppose it all became suddenly inconvenient when an embarrassing little incident like this occured? Of course people were going to talk about this, especially when it was indicated to someone that this was a mugging of some sort. Whether it was you that started that ball rolling or not is still unclear, but from your show yesterday that seemed to be what you were saying. All of the excuses about being confused or not knowing exactly what happened, set aside, that’s what I personally gathered.
So where did the story about the dog walking come in? Wasn’t that another account of the happenings Sunday night; that she tripped over her dog? Who started that one? Why? That’s another one we’ll just have to speculate about. You can add that one to Randi having her attorney field media inquiries. That was another, “Huh?” moment for me.
What really pissed Randi off? According to her she was angry that nobody (media related) bothered to ask how she was doing. I’m sure that would have come Randi, after they’d managed to set aside the huge elephant that was, “What exactly did or did not happen to you Sunday night?” It seems after listening to your show Thursday Oct. 18th that you owe a good deal of the blame for that to yourself.Â
Banned or not from your message board, I sincerely hope that you are feeling better soon Randi, and that whatever it is that happened on Sunday night is not more serious than you having tipped a few back on an empty stomach. When compared with a mugging or a medical condition that could have caused you to pass out, it seems the least of all the evils.Â
Posted on October 18th, 2007 by Mark.
Categories: Sports.
News that Joe Torre and the Yankees could not strike a deal did not come as a shock. “The Boss” had made it pretty clear that he was intending on getting rid of Torre if the Yanks did not advance beyond the series with the Indians. Nothing that Steinbrenner does, ever makes much sense so painting Torre as a loser after a stellar run as manager of the greatest franchise in baseball history seemed the status quo. The only way this could have ended well for Torre was if he’d managed to win the series and then told George to take the gig and choke on it anyway. I was really rooting for the team to go all the way just so that Joe would have had a chance to do that very thing. Sure the Yanks offered him a contract but it was a slap in the face and really all they wanted to do was put Joe in the position of having to pull the trigger. They knew an out and out firing would not sit well with the fans.
I for one would like to thank Joe Torre for the part he played in providing a lot of years of excitement for we fans of the Yanks. They can say that he was too laid back, that he’d lost his desire or whatever else it is that can be offered up as proof that it was time that this happened… I don’t care. For twelve years you could bank on one thing… extra games at the end of the season. People think that a huge payroll means you should be there every year. People think that it should be easy to win with a team like that… I say bull. If anything it seems that it might take more to motivate a clubhouse full of celebrity millionaires to give a damn. They’re getting paid regardless… they’re in NY… they’ve made it. How hungry can they still be? So Joe, I offer a heartfelt thanks… God help the next bastard that has to come in and compete with your record!
Posted on October 16th, 2007 by Mark.
Categories: Entertainment, News.
Who the hell knows what happened to Randi Rhodes on a Manhattan street Sunday evening. I can’t make heads or tails of any of the reports that have been released so far. One guy from Air America (Jon Elliot) seemed to indicate that he had some information that Rhodes had been attacked, saying on air:
“Is this an attempt by the right-wing, hate machine to silence one of our own?” he asked on the air, according to Talking Radio, a blog. “Are we threatening them? Are they afraid that we’re winning? Are they trying to silence intimidate us?”
This of course is just the kind of thing that Randi Rhodes’s audience lives for… I should know, I used to be a moderator on her site’s messageboard. I can only imagine the hornets nest of conspiracy that this stirred up over there. Undoubtedly Karl Rove is intimately involved in the orchestration of this nefarious deed. It doesn’t even matter what’s true or untrue, like the Kennedy assassination, Princess Diana and the Dan Rather “What’s the frequency Kenneth?” incidents of the past this shall live on in their minds as a wake-up call from the right wing attack machine.
For my part, I am just interested to hear what happened from Randi herself, and perhaps that’s what’s truly at play here… people are being given a reason to be curious about her show. Sadly it’s not been much more than a bunch of shrill angst with a Brooklyn accent for years, and likely won’t be any different with this new set of choppers their putting into her head.
Lest anyone think I never moderated her forum, I offer this quote… “Being a moderator at the Randi Rhodes messageboard is like being a doorman at a crackhouse.” As I said, I should know… I was one of the first mods.Â
Hope you’re feeling better Randi, even if I think that you’ve lost a lot of credibility over the years and haven’t bothered to tune in for some time. Why do I have a feeling this incident has less to do with “Busch” and more to do with Michelob as in Amber Bock? Hmmmmmm…… *snickers*
Posted on October 16th, 2007 by Mark.
Categories: Editorials, News.
Could the Goldman’s have asked for better PR for their book ‘If I Did It’? Yesterday I saw Fred Goldman and Kim Goldman on ‘Dr. Phil’; the appearance was of interest because the ghost writer (who ironically enough was also a witness at the murder trial) was also there. After seeing this interview it is apparent that “hypothetical” is a term that should not be applied to this written confession. OJ Simpson gave up too much information and lacked the intellect to maintain his distance from the subject matter. He was there and he did murder Ron and Nicole, of this there is no longer any credible doubt.Â
I was also surprised to hear Kim Goldman’s account of Johnnie Cochran’s comment after the verdict was read. According to Kim Goldman, that zoot suit wearing shyster turned to her, smirked and said, “Gotcha.” Wow, what a quality human being. I never had a doubt that Johnnie Cochran was a cockroach but this surely confirms my impression of the man. Thankfully, I believe that Johnnie’s biggest case, the one before his creator… likely didn’t end favorably for the counselor. Karma is a bitch Johnnie.
Now this morning I see that two of the imbeciles that were involved in OJ’s strong arm robbery of “his” memorabilia are rolling over on the former football great. Hallelujah! It just doesn’t get any better than that. It’s bad enough that OJ is a pariah and loathed by decent people the world over, but to then be betrayed by the bottom feeders and celebrity wannabes that will be seen with you… well that’s priceless.
OJ is likely going to do some time. Will it be justice for the poor Goldmans or the Browns… no. It will however wipe that smug look off of OJ’s face and deny him a few rounds of golf and that’s worth something!
Posted on October 12th, 2007 by Mark.
Categories: Just Dumb, News.
So Ann Coulter says on Donnie Deutsche’s show on CNBC that she would like to see jews “perfected” or something of the sort and there is suddenly this outcry; “How dare she!” What? Donnie Deutsche upon hearing the words uttered becomes immediately offended and makes a big deal about it. Is THIS what’s going to sink Ann Coulter? I have to tell you, I saw the footage this morning and I didn’t think that what Ann said was especially offensive, especially when weighed against prior statements.
In Christianity there is a belief that jews that accept Christ are “perfected”. The term comes from the fact that jews are the “chosen” of God’s children and yet they deny Jesus Christ, the one thing that can grant them salvation (per Christianity). Christians want everybody to be “saved” and that comes only through acceptance that Christ died for our sins. All Coulter was saying was that she/Christians wanted jews to be saved and therefor perfected.
All of this angst is just absurd. She advocates for all kinds of nonsense and spews hate ad nauseum and it’s a little blurb on some unwatchable show that matters? Why, because it involves jews? Is that what makes it over the line? I just want clarification.
Just for the record, the jewish people should thank God (you know the one that both Christians and they believe in) that Christians run this country. If not for all of the Christians I don’t know that there would be such ready and willing support for Israel. Just because Coulter is a charlatan and hardly exhibits a shred of decency that would indicate that she is indeed a Christian doesn’t change the fact that she’s right about those in the faith wanting jews to become perfected. The term has existed for a long, long, time… and this is the first time that somebody bothers to get bent out of shape about it?Â
I hate Ann Coulter with every fiber of my being… but this is a stretch. Just my opinion on the matter.