Some news gets a Farrah mount of coverage

There's really not an opportune time to die. On the way to an IRS Audit, your heart could stop in a Gran Mal seizure seconds before your car is struck by an Eastbound, government subsidized light rail train carrying three or four passengers sparing you the pain of blunt force trauma and Uncle Sam's anal probe but...you'd still be dead. Your family would, most likely, mourn but they'd still be on the hook for whatever the new, more customer friendly government collections agency claims it is due plus the death tax. OK, perhaps there is an opportune time to die.

Poor Farrah Fawcett and Billy Mays. The former celebrity babe and the quasi famous pitchman had the misfortune to die during the month of mourning for a single gloved, suspected child molester weirdo who happened to dance and sing better than your average American Idol winner. Regarding Mr. Jackson's passing, I suppose it should come as no surprise that after a farcical circus life there's a neon pyre burning amidst klegal floodlights and a parade of race baiting clowns grabbing every available microphone and clamoring to be heard above the din of boom box wielding moon walking "mourners".

Major and lesser news outlets from coast to coast are wall to wall and cover to cover with the death of the dermatological challenged King of Pop. While the ticker tape parade for the one with the stopped ticker is planned, the world is still turning and decisions that should be stories of note go with about as much notice as the other Jackson brothers have received in the past twenty years. Jakie, Tito, Jermaine, Randy and Marlon haven't seen this many cameras in years outside of the Best Buy where they meet once a week to see if anyone has found their own solo albums in the discount rack.

While people were killing themselves because a pop singer died, our government is preparing to potentially kill our economy with the single largest tax increase in history in the name of the environment. And the USA Today didn't print a word about it. The fact nobody who is voting on this and other bills reads them shouldn't matter. Not all the facts are provided anyway. What should matter is that the American people are oblivious to this money, power and rights grab.

We remain like the frog in a pot of water on a stove top. The temperature is rising slowly enough that we don't notice it. If we don't notice it, eventually we will be cooked alive. As usual, I've no suggestion for a cure. But I will say, I've finally found some doctor's advice I can heed.

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When it comes to bad taste, this one is a Whopper

Anyone who has the misfortune to actually know me understands I am, by no measure of the word, a prude. In fact, in decisions of decorum and propriety, I usually err to the side of inappropriate. Or so says Mrs. Bald Man.

I've watched the recent slew of Burger King commercials with the plastic headed crowned mascot playing frat boy type pranks on people whom I assume are, or at least were until the public embarrassment, Burger King customers. I won't speak for any of you but, if patronage of an establishment provides tacit approval for a nocturnal visit from their poster child, I will be choosing my luncheon locations with a great deal of care from now on. However, if it means a midnight romp with their pigtailed namesake, I might have to try the lunch specials at Wendy's a bit more often.

Carl's Junior is the chain most likely to associate their take out menu with the list of services tattooed on the butt of your local street corner solicitor but other chains, bowing to the publicity generated by these type of ads, are joining the fray faster than french fries are consumed at Tubby Goldstiens ninth birthday party. Burger King is now making a play for the most absurd linkage of eating with other orally related activities with a new display ad.



Am I being a knee-jerk conservative when I say I really don't care for this type of advertising? Of course, falling on the heels of this video, what should we expect next, packets of K-Y thrown in our takeout bags next to the catsup?



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Another way to look at it...

I am not, repeat not, excusing the behavior of the South Carolina Governor. I do question calls for his impeachment based on his having an affair. If indiscretion was evidence of an inability to perform one's job, I know several higher ups in major corporations who should be dusting off their resumes as they should soon be out of a job.

The inevitable comparison between this affair and GOP calls for the impeachment of Bill Clinton will be all over the papers soon. The difference here is, granted once he was caught, Sanford admitted his dalliance rather than try to cover it up.

In a stolen Twitter comment from Neal Boortz's page:

If Mark Sanford had cheated on his taxes instead of his wife, he would have been a cabinet member by now.

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You Tube report, we decide.

Conspiracy theories are a lot of fun. From the second shooter in Dallas to reports that The ONE was born in Kenya and is not a United States citizen and therefore is ineligible to be the First African American President of the United States, they run the spectrum of political views. Most such theories are crap but they serve a purpose. For while sometimes a New Mexican weather balloon is just a weather balloon, there are occasions when what is reported as truth is nowhere near reality. Conspiracy theorists keep us on our toes and help remind us to question everything.

In these days when the main stream media has surrendered its mantle of investigative journalism to become the town crier for the current administration, we all need to seek alternative sources for conflicting and often truthful reporting. With reports indicating that a large percentage of young adults are getting their national news from John Stewart and Stephen Colbert it is no surprise Press Secretary Gibbs feels the need to try his hand at stand up on a regular basis. He must be pretty good at it. He has seasoned journalists rolling in the aisles to a point where they are incapable of asking a probing question regarding the unprecedented rate at which the government is putting its grimy fingers in to every aspect of our lives. That guy from Harold and Kumar must be doing a bang up job behind the scenes slipping Gibbs little throw off lines.

I’ve long been concerned over the rumored revival of the so called fairness doctrine; also known as the Hush Rush bill. This piece of unconstitutional legislation would demand equal time for both sides of an issue on talk radio shows. Forget the fact the most Sunday news shows tend to be stacked three and four to one, Liberal versus Conservative. In the case of This Week with little George that ratio is only fair considering the resident right thinker there is the sage George Will. I think they might want to get a few more minds on the left to even the playing field.

About this time some of you will be shouting, “what about Fox News”. Ok, I will give you that one. To paraphrase the aforementioned Mr. Will, Fox News seems to be singled out because it is like a discordant chord in an otherwise harmonious symphony. When every other news outlet speaks in terms so sycophantic that their teleprompters have the seal of the White House on them, Fox sticks out like a straight guy at one of Sanjaya’s house parties. With odds like that, you’d think the fairness doctrine would ease some of the conservative laryngitis by providing a cough drop of balance. Unfortunately, the control of this fairness will not lie in the opinions of a free market but in the biased prism of a government official. This won’t be good.

Where hope springs eternal, evidence that no matter what our government decides, the will of the people will win out. Case in point: Iran. News reporters were asked to leave the country when protests started in the wake of the recent election of the Players club jacket guy who hates Jews. As the Maxwell Smart cone of silence of the leaders in Iran descended on its citizenry and television station and newspapers closed, every day people began to Twitter and Facebook and YouTube their way to publicizing an country wide uprising. Evidence of violence by the government against the protestors shows a ruling party willing to do anything to remain in power. This repression would have gone on in seclusion were it not for Al Gore’s greatest achievement of the internet.

I don’t know enough to comment on how well or how poorly our President is handling the situation as the United States relates to the happenings in Iran. I do know enough to comment that, those of you who wish to remain free need to take every opportunity to make yourselves heard and do our best to lift our own cone of silence being lowered, not yet by government fiat but, by a willing media who might do better to do their research on Facebook.

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Stranger than fiction

If NBC is the channel of No Bad Coverage for the first African American President of the United States then ABC must be Another Barack Channel. The unbiased news division of the channel is basically turning its cameras over to The ONE to tout his plan for pretty much taking over our health care.

Understandably the RNC has questioned the fairness of this and expressed its concerns that only one side of the issue will be discussed. The reply from ABC gives me a warm feeling and I anticipate a discussion as fair as an Iranian national election.

Reading about this "stab-proof" knife, I can't help but wonder if the TSA will allow me to carry this on a plane. This seems about as well thought out an invention as any security plan launched by the agency. Sure, you can't stab someone (well easily anyway)but it's my guess as soon as people figure out slashing someone works almost as well, the prices for this crab will be slashed too.

The Guantanamo Four's life in the paradise of the Bahamas took a nasty turn when Khelil held Ablakim's head under water a little too long while rough housing in the surf and Ablakim has a flashback to his waterboarding torture. The two quickly made up over ice cream and talk of some day blowing up the ice cream parlor.

I had to listen to this three times. The first time I thought it had been edited. The second time I thought I was drunk and the third time I decided I best get drunk. Ultra liberal comedian Bill Maher talks bad about The ONE?



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Umm...I think you missed one

Every few days I take a few minutes to read the roll calls of the House and Senate's votes. Even though I would prefer government inaction, I feel compelled to keep an eye on our government in action.

Several very public incidents were recognized by the House in resolutions passed, mostly overwhelmingly. H.RES.505 condemned the senseless murder of late term abortion Doctor George Tiller and H.RES.529 condemned the attack and murder at the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC. While I personally don't understand wasting the public's time and money having our politicians write, debate and pass such resolutions, I suppose in a civilized society outrage and condolence have a place in public discourse. I am sure I am in the minority as one who questions the need for such acknowledgments.

My questioning becomes more anger as I note the absence of a resolution condemning the shooting of a Marine recruiter in Alabama by a self-professed member of the "religion of peace" in what the shooter claimed was a justified killing.

Understandably the House is busy with its take over of everything from Auto Manufacturers to Cigarette companies so they may have just run out of time to make such a resolution. Although they did have time to congratulate the University of Tennessee women's basketball team and Head Coach Pat Summitt on her 1000th victory, express condolences to the citizens of Italy and support for the Government of Italy in the aftermath of the devastating earthquake that struck the Abruzzo region of central Italy and express condolences to the families, friends, and loved ones of the victims of the catastrophic explosion at the ConAgra Foods plant in Garner, North Carolina. I guess the time to condemn a terrorist act on US soil just wasn't there.

Oh well, perhaps I shouldn't be too hard on the government, the media mostly ignored this story too.

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Even in HD it is still mostly crap

Mrs. Bald Man and I finally joined the HDTV crowd. About a month ago we purchased a LCD Flat screen, lugged it home, screwed it to the wall and let it fry our minds with mindless entertainment (sic) options at 1080 lines of resolution. I was more than pleasantly surprised to learn our cable provider (Comcast) sends out a high definition signal for our local broadcast channels without our having to sign up for their HD service.

As a cable subscriber, I've paid little attention to the public service ads announcing the broadcaster's switch to HD. These ads appeared only slightly less frequently than the calls I get trying to sell me an extended auto warranty. It is good to see those guys getting their just come uppance. I guess I am only slightly surprised to learn eight hundred thousand of our brightest citizens failed to heed the static filled warnings of the publicly funded notices and had to call the FCC's hotline for help. I wonder how many of these geniuses know the QVC order number from memory.

The switch to digital had been delayed from it's original date because Democrats didn't feel the public was well enough informed. Even with the delay nearly a million people still weren't informed. Some people, it seems, are beyond help.

In their continuing effort to control everything in our daily lives, Congress will soon debate a bill to limit the volume of commercials. The same group responsible for the fast talking litany of potential side effects and too small to read paragraphs of fine print in ads now, thinks they can outsmart those whose job it is to outsmart us consumers out of our money. Billy Mays and Vince the Sham Wow guy will need verbal governors to keep from violating the law. Somehow I think they will still be annoying even at half the volume. I've a suggestion, how about our government buts out of this and every other area of my daily life. I am thinking perhaps the volume on the commercials about the coming switch to digital should have been even louder. If they were, there might have been a few less panicked callers screaming "I want my MTV"!!

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I remember you.

Yes, I know I haven't been posting as regularly as I have been or should be.

Sorry.

Sometimes life gets in the way of this avocation. My company is getting ready to release a new version of our software and the muse that guides the scatterbrained spewing that makes up this blog is busy trying to come up with cogent sentences designed to get people to use the aforementioned updated software. I am not complaining, it is my job. I just hope the government doesn't swoop in and tell my bosses how much I should be paid for it.

I will see you all as soon as I have a spare moment or two to gather some thoughts.

Until, I guess I will just "man up" and do my work; kind of like Chastity Bono.

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Obama in the highest

I am having a hard time figuring out why they pulled the Chia Obama off the shelves. Fortunately, it is still available online. I mean, we have Obama everything else. Just days after the coronation of The ONE, Obama plates, coins, stamps and just about everything else was being offered from outlets as diverse as QVC to the local street corner. I am pretty sure those street corner guys weren't spreading their wealth as Obama requested we do.

It was ridiculous enough having the President's mug plastered over everything in site; including mugs. The Rock Star in Chief did little to dissuade crowds from behaving like teenagers at a Jonas Brothers concert. From New York to Minnesota , New Jersey and even an attempt in Colorado, schools are already being named for the First African American President of the United States. You can eat at the Obama restaurant and provided the country's women leave him alone long enough to pose for it, most likely Mount Rushmore is soon to be updated.

The homages to The ONE extend beyond the porous borders of our own country. In Israel he is "honored" with Obama Huts and Britain's Prime Minister Gordon Brown has renamed a nearly sacred stretch of beach in France after him!

Now lest you think this is just a bit of right wing nut job hyperbole aimed at dissing the Savior In Chief, the media has now taken to calling him God-like.



I would have thought by now the allure of image over substance would have begun to wear thin. As we continue our march to the left side of the political and economic spectrum, as Europe retrenches to the right, the mindless followers of a modern day messiah are not those listeners to a formerly chubby, cigar smoking AM talk radio behemoth, they are those on the left gazing with glossed over eyes at the second coming.

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Tanks for the Memories

In China the old saying "no news is good news" seems to take on a more ominous tenor. Today is the twenty year anniversary of a widely (back then) covered demonstration in Tiananmen Square in the country's capital city of Beijing. In an under reported statistic, outdone only by the under reporting of Al Gore's interests in green related interests for financial gain, the Chinese Communists stated 241 people died when tanks produced by the people began running down those same people as the government tried to breakup the peaceful assembly. The Red Cross of China reports the number of dead to be more in the 2,600 range. Funny, I've never known a communist to misreport anything. It makes me wonder how accurate CNN/Asia is in their reporting of 150,000 attending a candlelight vigil when the Hong Kong police say it was closer to 63,000.

The vigil, held in the more tolerant and more profitable province of Hong Kong, was the only commemoration of this bloody event on Chinese soil. It wouldn't really have mattered had any been held on the mainland itself. In the days leading up to this anniversary, the Chinese government blocked access to many web sites, search engines and other news outlets. Even Twitter was blocked just in case any pesky free thinking malcontent decided to use his 140 or so characters to speak ill of the Party.

The Huffington Post has a story about the Chinese government pressuring a U.S. news organization and this group of Obama loving (well, odds are they are)reporters canceled an interview with a leader of the Chinese Uighur dissidents, under pressure from Chinese authorities. The left leaning site doesn't say which news outlet it was but, since they didn't name it, you can bet it wasn't Fox News. My money is on CNN or MSNBC. Tiananmen Square itself was placed on lockdown days before this anniversary and film crews were prevented from taking any pictures.

It is about this time in a post where I should begin comparing the freedom sucking proposals and policies of the current administration and bemoaning the fact that we are fast becoming a country that would be unrecognizable to our founding fathers. You can draw those comparisons and conclusions yourself.

My only thought, as I sit here and wonder why I've not seen a single photo or film clip of the brave student who stood his ground and stared down a tank in the middle of the square as the world watched and placed bets as to whether or not the Party faithful driver would back up for a second run after squashing him like a squirrel under the over-sized BF Goodrich's on a government motors Silverado truck is this:

Who among us, in this age of enlightened self-esteem improving education, will be willing to do the same?

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Maybe it isn't suppossed to look like what it is.

I am sorry for those who lost family, friends and even casual acquaintences in the recent Air France tragedy.

Now that wreckage has been found we can lay to rest the Bermuda Triangle style theories of alien abduction. Thankfully, I didn't read that one too many places. I did read in quite a few places where terrorism had been ruled out rather quickly. I wonder why? Those saying so profess that this doesn't resemble a terrorist bombing. Well, Sotomayor doesn't look like a racist but she is. Looks can be deceiving.

I may be tinkling the ivories on the piano of this conspiracy song purposely but consider this:

France recently defended itself by killing a group of pirates in Somalia. These pirates happen to belong to the "religion of peace" known for retaliatory and terrorist acts worldwide.

The flight was delayed after the airlines and airport security received a bomb threat. The plane was searched but nothing was found. If the search was as thorough and logical as that I receive going through our own TSA screening on a weekly basis, I am not surprised nothing was found.

With wreckage strewn across a two mile deep ocean, we may never know what really happened to this flight and those innocents aboard. If it was a terrorist act, it isn't like the cowards who would purport to do such a thing are going to come forward to risk the world's wrath.

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He is still not in his right mind.

Nancy Reagan may not have meant what she said to be a political assessment but, truer words have not recently been spoken. Of course, Katie makes sure to correct us all. Just in case.


Watch CBS Videos Online

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Ice, ice baby

While The ONE and Mrs The ONE were enjoying a taxpayer funded tryst in the Big Apple, GM lawyers were preparing for the mother of all bankruptcy filings and nut job provided abortion foes with fodder for continuing on their death march through a heinous act of violence that, rightfully, is being condemned by Pro-Life groups everywhere.

Rhetoric everywhere is heating up. North Korea is doing sales demonstrations of its nuclear capacity and the whack job in Iran is only outspoken, in quantity, by Hugo Chavez in Venezuela. It is getting so hot is it any wonder the Arctic Sea ice is melting? Well, I've bad news for global climate change devotees everywhere. A video on You Tube seems to refute the "the poor Polar Bear is losing its home" argument.



Check out the creator's (film maker just didn't seem appropriate) comments here.

I still fail to see how the climate change debate is over. I suppose it is only over because the cowards on the warming side of the argument continue to avoid debate. I guess showing up in front of people with disagreeing viewpoints doesn't seem safe.

In a separate train of thought, my sympathies go out to the family of late term abortion doctor Tiller. However I find it interesting the government is now guarding other abortion doctors (on our dime) but the Marines are left to take care of their own. Fortunately, the Marines are more than capable of that.

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