Today marks the second annual Blog Action Day.  While last year was about how to live a bit greener, this year’s theme is “poverty”.

When I first heard what the theme was, I struggled with it.  While I have lived at a lower income (think coupon clipping), I certainly have never been at the poverty level.  How could I possibly wrap my brain around something this complex and come up with a post that would do such a weighty subject the justice it deserves?  I went to my mother and asked her advice, and she said four words to me that turned on the light bulb for me: “Think about your grandfather.”

Dr. Lloyd Antonel, D.O. was one of your old time doctors.  Sure he could have made a lot of money over his career, but he was a doctor for the sake of being a doctor.  Long before I was born he was doing things that may sound insane now, but they proved how he was really there to help people.  One of the stories about him that is from my mother’s childhood is when someone in their neighborhood got injured and they immediately rushed the person to my grandfather not knowing what else to do.  He threw everything off the kitchen table and performed surgery right there in front of his children.  Today he would probably be hit with malpractice for not operating in a sterile environment, but back then he did what he had to do.

My grandfather’s legacy of helping those who were less fortunate than himself goes way back, and he was the type of doctor that if you couldn’t pay him, you couldn’t pay him, or he would take payment in whatever you felt like you could afford.  He was once paid in chickens.  Another time he was paid in the form of a spider monkey… no, I am not kidding.  (The monkey hated my grandfather and would climb the fig tree in front of his office and throw figs at him… no one ever knew why as my grandfather had never hurt the monkey in any way)

As a child he had lived through hard times and he knew what it was like to go without food.  As he made his way through his career, and had made some money… and not more animals, he would donate food to shelters.  If he needed 10 pounds of onions he would buy 100 and donate the extra 90 to a soup kitchen.  One of his favorite places to donate to was the Society of St. Vincent de Paul in Phoenix.  When he decided to “retire” from private practice he was out of work a full hour before St. Vincents snapped him to get their clinic into shape.

While this was a paid position he worked tirelessly and far more than they paid him for to help those he could.  He did get the clinic in shape, and as he had been a pharamicist before he was a doctor, he figured out how to build them a full pharmacy with donations of sample medications from other doctors around the city.  He worked on this for approximately 8 years before he simply couldn’t do it any more.

What does this have to do with poverty?  Well, it shows you that it isn’t always about money, but offering the talents and services you have in your personal arsenal.  Are you a doctor?  Volunteer at a clinic.  A lawyer?  There are numerous centers for free legal aid.  Plumber?  Help out a soup kitchen with their plumbing needs or those of the people who come in.  There is an endless amount of things any help center could use, and don’t think you won’t get something out of it.  My grandfather thrived in doing this, and sometimes he brought home as much food as he took to them due to them getting more food than they could handle.  (I swear that man’s fridge was always stocked to the top with convenience store sandwiches.)

There is no doubt that finances are tight for many Americans, but have you ever thought about just how much your time and talents are worth to those with less than you?

Would someone mind telling me why in the world how much someone weighs should matter to anyone but the person who is carrying it?

Case in point is professional dancer Cheryl Burke, one of the fan favorites from Dancing With The Stars, apparently put on five pounds over the summer.  She opted to take this summer off, her first time off in several years, and was not dancing her usual 7 hours a day.  Even with the “weight gain” (which was said to be mainly in her shoulder blade area) she still fit into her size 4 costumes.

In a recent article on the Chicago Sun-Times website, they went into great detail about how many nasty comments and blog posts have been made about Cheryl’s change in weight.  Apparently she finally went on Good Morning America (video link) and addressed the issue, saying that the comments had been very hurtful and she had some emotional moments over what had been said.  While I would say Ms. Burke needs to grow a slightly thicker skin, I do think any comments about her gain are just ludicrous.

Now you would think in an article about how she was hurt by the comments, and explaining her weight and size, people might take a hint not to say more, but, alas, this is the Internet.  (spelling and grammar mistakes are all of the commentor from the)

Cheryl needs to look at herself in the mirror and pictures. Her butt and thighs are huge. She needs to compare with other coworkers or people who are the top of the game that not the right look for professional dancers. It does not matter how good she dances because your appearance does not appealing to watch it. People who turned to be huge and fat are all said that same things like she said. Honestly, she is fat with humounous butt and thighs. I like her but if she is keeping her fat weights right now or getting fatter, I probably my mind would gradually not going to be her fan anymore. She needs to be realistic that she is fat. Like one of the trainer, the blonde hair, not tall and chubby, she has exercised hard and makes a living out of it why she does not have nice body but because she keeps on exercising hard for her carrer that why she does not turn to be big butt and thigh like she was born to be which is the same like Cheryl. Cheryl is in public eyes. She needs to want to look good or the best herself, nobody could make her do it. She is fat if not like a pig but she would if she keeps on denial it and gets people to cheer her that it is okay and good to look like now. They do not tell the truth or in the eyes of the beholder. Well! be honest she is getting fat and fatter. If she or anyone who was born with big butt and thighs then they should live with it, right! WRONG!!! Look at the trainer who has the same generic problems like Cheryl but she beats it by working out A LOT and diet. No pain, no gain! It is her choice! It would be sad that she would choose to let go and be natural (FAT). Britney Spears at least she has 2 kids. Cheryl, if you let yourself go and keeps denying the truth and feel hurt and does not listen to any criticism then you have a chance to be like STAR JONES before her diet and plastic surgery with a lot of scars everywhere. People does not want you to be better than them.
Good Luck!

Okay, first… wow.  How about some people worry about actually talking like they’ve gotten an edumakation before commenting on someone elses “carrer”.  All that aside, I go back to my original comment about why should anyone’s weight matter to anyone beyond the person carrying the weight?  Obviously it shouldn’t, but this has become a real problem in the United States where young girls are constantly bombarded with “be thin, be thin” imagery and comments. Is it any wonder that anorexia is a problem here?

And there was this portion of a comment by another user.

I really think most of the people who thinks it’s okay for a PROFESSIONAL DANCER to look like this is overweight themselves and defending her so as not to look so bad themselves. She’s not just a woman, she’s not a mom who just recently had children, she’s in a profession where her body is her one tool.

Well, guess what, I am overweight (something I am very up front about), and I will defend her because I think it is just pure insanity to call a size 4 woman “fat”.  Yes, I am trying to lose weight, but I am doing this strictly for myself, and no one else and I think everyone, no matter what their size or profession, should just be allowed to be themselves.  If they are comfortable, if they can work with the weight they are at, then it is simply no one elses business.

Honestly, the only thing I can figure is that these people’s lives are so sad, they have to find an excuse to tear down someone else, and if that is the case, I would much rather be fat than so petty.

Welcome to the fourth annual posting of this entry!  Long time readers can skip it, but as I keep adding more readers, it’ll keep getting posted!

Ah, Columbus Day, the day we set aside each year to celebrate a lie. It always warms my heart.

People tend to forget that Christopher Columbus wasn’t looking for North America when he landed here, he was looking for the West Indies. Quite the navigator there. He also believed, until his death, that the entire time he was in this area that he was exploring the Eastern coast of Asia.

Never mind the fact that he also took the indigenous people as slaves and shipped them back to Spain, against the Crowns wishes. Never mind that colonists he brought over here rebelled against him when the New World didn’t come close to what he described. No, no, all those things are just a-ok for a man we should honor with a governmental and banking holiday.

The biggest offense to me is that he was far from the first person to “discover” the Americas. (how does one “discover” a place that is already inhabited?) The Siberians crossed the land bridge with Alaska as early as 70,000 BC, and it was those crossings that gave us the Native Americans. There were numerous other occurrences of people coming to the Americas, but one of the most well documented was Leifur Eircksson in 1005 when he sailed from Iceland to North America and traveled down the coast. Gee… does that come before 1492?

Yet, history textbooks still hail him as the man who “discovered” America. Why is beyond me, but a friend pointed me to a wonderful book called “Lies My Teacher Told Me : Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong“that spends an entire chapter delving into this very matter. Fascinating stuff.

If you want to credit Columbus with something, just say that he brought the America’s to the attention of Europe, but leave it at that.

Remember when I wrote aboutall sexual predators are over the age of 36?  It seems someone got an early start!

A 15-year-old girl that attends Licking Valley High School in Newark, Ohio is facing charges of possessing criminal tools and the illegal use of a minor in nudity-oriented material.  Her crime was that she used her camera phone to take nude photos of herself, and she then in turn sent them to some of her classmates.  The students he received the images are also facing possible criminal charges.

The unnamed girl is facing could be sentenced to everything from probation to several years in a juvenile detention center. It is also up to the judges discretion, but she could be forced to register as a sex offender.

This is shockingly similar to an incident I wrote about in April of 2004 about another 15-year-old girl doing something similar.  That girl was taking cam photos of herself doing sexual things and sending them to men she met in chat rooms.  She was labeled as a sex offender, and under the law, she was forced to inform people in her neighborhood of how she may be a danger.  I always wanted to know how that discussion went, “Hi, I’m a sexual danger to myself… please be careful”?

While I certainly do not feel any teenage girl should be doing these sort of activities, I definitely feel that the punishments are not befitting of the “crime”.  This is childhood stupidity, why possibly destroy their lives over what amounts to stupid indiscretion?  Registering them as sex offenders?  Putting the camera phone girl in juvenile detention center for years would certainly not be helpful to this girl’s future.  Why not get her counseling?  Community service?  Probation I have no problem with, but the other parts just seem entirely over the top to me.

My other question would be why valuable court time and law resources are being taken up with such a case?  Perhaps it is time for lawmakers to put some new caveats into the sexual predator laws about if it is a child doing it to themselves?  The above linked news story mentions that prosecutors are seeing more and more instances of this, which means even more time is being taken away from other matters to go after kids who do what kids do… they do something stupid.

This reminds me of all the shoplift teenagers I caught over the years in the comic book store.  We would call the police, but we never pressed charges, we just made sure the cops gave them a good, hard scaring, and the cops would thank us for not forcing them to file out reports and more.  It worked for both sides, and we were both happy.  What about teenagers who get stopped for drunk driving?  They get some education classes, sometimes taken to a morgue to see what could have happened, but rarely do you go to detention or get registered.

I take sexual offenders extremely seriously, don’t get me wrong, but I feel the punishment should fit the crime, and I think this time they are wildly out of proportion to one another. Put her on probation, and if she does it during again during that time, then throw the book at her, but a one time offense? It just makes no sense to me.

It would seem Paramount is none too happy with the fall premiere of South Park that aired earlier this week.

-looks outside- Yep, the sky is blue.

Nikki Finke at Deadline Hollywood Daily is saying that executives at Paramount or more than just a bit displeased about the content of the episode entitled “The China Probrem”.  It wasn’t the “A” story that had to deal with Cartman trying to stave off an impending Chinese invasion of the USA, but the “B” story that dealt with the other boys trying to cope with imagery of George Lucas and Steven Spielberg raping Indiana Jones.

Yeah… you read that right.

The kids saw Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull over the summer, and having been dealing with the guilt of having watched their favorite adventurer getting “raped”, and not doing anything about it.  Of course the rape was metaphorical for the disaster the script was, but at three separate points in the episode, we were shown Lucas and Spielberg actually raping Indiana in scenes that were homages to rape scenes from A Clockwork Orange, The Accused and Deliverance, as well as sending up all the scenes in rape movies where people will finally agree to helping the victims.  At the very end of the episode we were also treated to Spielberg and Lucas raping a Stormtrooper from Star Wars… it was a very uplifting episode.

There are others who are saying the rape metaphor shouldn’t have been used at all.  While I certainly do not find the traditional definition of rape amusing at all, how many times have people and writers said, “They raped my childhood…”, “They raped that character…”, “The government is raping us…” etc?  The word has taken on so many meanings in our lexicon, but did anyone stop to think that was what the show was trying to portray?  I heard many people say Indiana got raped by the fourth movie, so the show just took it literally, and people get worked up over it.  You have to selective sensitivity.

According to Ms. Finke, Paramount execs are not happy with parent company Viacom as they also own Comedy Central, and allowed this episode to go forward.  I would image a lot of their anger is because the DVD for the movie is coming out on October 14th, so having the movie picked on so publicly this close to release probably doesn’t thrill them.  Also according to Ms. Finke, Paramount is planning to keep quiet on the subject in public venues as they want the issue to go away, but since when have bloggers allowed an issue to die?

This isn’t the first time Paramount has been angry at Matt Stone and Trey Parker, the creators of the series.  Back in 2006 they were also displeased with them over the Tom Cruise/Scientology episode, “Trapped In A Closet”, as Cruise was one of their biggest box office draws at the time.  At that time they did complain, and the episode was pulled from the usual rotation after only one repeat airing.  I think it is rather obvious that the suits at Paramount need to get a much thicker skin about things.

South Park works because all subjects are equal fodder for them, and it is just about guaranteed that there will eventually be an episode that offends you/insults something you believe in. If the show was to consider Paramount properties off limits, how would that be fair? It wouldn’t.

It concerns me that comedy writing seems to be taking so many hits from various sides as of late. Earlier this week we had the Saturday Night Live video pulled from the web over two jokes at the expense of a couple involved in the sub-prime loan disaster.  Now we have South Park under fire again for making fun of another company in the Viacom family.  Are we suddenly seeing the rise again of the political correctness boom from the 1980’s and comedy writers are going to have what they can write about being dictated to them by committee and lawyers?

Comedy, and all of its derivatives such as satire, should enjoy the utmost freedom under the 1st amendment, but yet it seems there are many out there who feel it should have more and more restraints put on it.  Is it outright censorship?  No, but suggesting things shouldn’t be written about sure is a close second.

It’s episode 13… EEEK! Unlucky #13!

- Is the stock market an indicator of what will happen on Main Street, USA? Some very vague ideas of what you can do to quickly trim some expenses for yourself.

- A very brief review of a new coffee from Joffreys (I was drinking it as I recorded), called Coffee 2.0.

- Why are border agents detaining people for a sketch of a car? This story is just mindboggling.

- Not mentioned on the podcast, but thank you to David Kelsey for the shiny new logo!

Here’s a link to the MP3 for those who wish to download it.

Mark your calendar boys and girls, but it appears Guns N’ Roses may finally be releasing the eleven-years-in-the-making album, “Chinese Democracy”… only at Best Buy.

Er… okay… that’s… well, odd.

Wouldn’t you think if you had been working on an album for 11 years, you would want it available everywhere possible?  Take me for instance, I’m not sure I even want the stupid album at this point, but the closest Best Buy to me is 90 miles away.  True, I can always order it from their online store, but that isn’t even the point, you are limiting your potential customer base and sales to one outlet.  The winner in this instance is Best Buy, certainly not Guns N’ Roses in the long run.

Now, here comes an even more interesting aspect to this entire thing in that Dr. Pepper, the soda company, may be giing away a whole lot of free soda.  Back in March they issued a challange to Axl Rose, the only remaining member of the original band, to issue the album by the end of the year, and if they did, they would give every person in the United States a free can of Dr. Pepper. Tony Jacobs, VP of marketing Dr. Pepper, told Billboard, “We’re waiting to hear about ‘Chinese Democracy’ just like all the other GNR fans, but if the rumors are true, we’re putting the Dr Pepper on ice.”

Hate to say it, but I’m betting on Dr. Pepper not having to give any soda away.  And as for the actual album… eh, I need to hear some tracks before I plunk down any money with Best Buy for the album.  Good luck Axl, I think you and your ego are going to need it.

It has once again become apparent that Hollywood has run out of ideas.  According to Variety, the Fox network is planning to remake one of the most successful British comedies of all time, Absolutely Fabulous.

For those of you unfamiliar with the original show, AbFab (as it is known to its fans) is the story of two school friends, Edina (Jennifer Saunders) and Patsy (Joanna Lumley), who have aged less than gracefully.  No matter how out of touch they are with their own age, and what is truly cool, they have more money than brains, and cling desperately to trying to be “in” with people far younger than themselves.  All of this is done with the disapproving eye of Edina’s very prudish daughter, Saffron (Julia Sawalha).

The series was born out of a single sketch on the French & Saunders show, and ended up running for five seasons in England for a total of 37 episodes spread over 13 years.  When it was imported to America, it had an instant cult following for its crass and crude humor, and became a gigantic hit with the gay community.  (there were several hints over the five seasons that Patsy may not have always been a woman, but it was always kept very vague)

At the height of its popularity, Roseanne Barr put the wheels into motion to do an American version, and even went so far as to have Edina and Patsy appear in one episode of her hit series.  This import of the series was eventually killed off as Roseanne finally realized the humor was not going to import to a broader American audience all that easily.

Flash forward to 2008, and now Fox thinks they can pull it off.  Normally I would immediately write this off as a sure fire disaster, but sadly it is being spearheaded by Mitch Hurwitz, the creator of Arrested Development.  Anyone who has read this blog for any length of time knows that I think AD is one of the most brilliant American sitcoms ever crafted, and if anyone can do dysfunctional characters, it is Mr. Hurwitz.  Then there is the second caveat keeping this from complete disaster, and that is the involvement of Edina herself, Jennifer Saunders, as one of the producers.

Even with those great talents behind the scenes, I have a hard time believing they will be able to bring this show to the USA and keep it’s charms intact.  Take the characters chain smoking for instance.  In the English version, several episodes revolved around the fact Patsy fell asleep in the kitchen with a lit cigarette, and the room was burned to a cinder, causing major renovations.  There was another episode that focused heavily on the fact that Patsy tried quitting smoking and it seemed nicotine had seemed to seep out of her into the multiple patches she was wearing.  Certainly this will be dropped for the USA version, but that is unfortunate because their smoking is very much a part of who they are.  These characters WOULD smoke, no matter what the atmosphere in society is towards it.

Their binge drinking may survive as Karen (Megan Mullally) on Will & Grace was a heavy drinker (and fairly obvious she was an amalgamation of the two women from AbFab).  Their drug use will probably need to be toned down, as will some of Patsy’s sexual escapades.

In short, I think Roseanne had it right when she dropped the project all those years ago.  This, like so much British humor, will be difficult to import to America.  While Edina & Patsy are broadly drawn archetypes, they are played with loving subtlety by the actresses who inhabited them. No matter how vile they were, you couldn’t help but love them because you knew they did what they did out of stupidity.  American actors have a tendency to not be able to convey this sort of situation without slamming through it in a ham fisted manner. Also, our writers don’t usually grasp such things like that either.

With Mr. Hurwitz and Ms. Saunders involved, I hold out some hope this won’t be as large a disaster as some other British imports have been, but I won’t hold my breath for it being good either. Once again I am left to wonder why we must import so many of our ideas and concepts for television and movies. The mind truly boggles.

Saturday Night Live has another predicament on their hands.

On The October 4th episode they ran a sketch about the federal bailout of the banks.  I felt the skit was rather even handed, poking fun at both President Bush and the Democratic controlled congress, especially Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi.  After the episode aired, five skits from the episode were posted to the web, including the bailout sketch, but on Monday the bailout one mysteriously disappeared.  If you go to any blog that posted it, you will see the following screen (please note this is a screen shot and not an actual embed, so no controls work in it)

What happened?  Conspiracy theories are running rampant, and I would usually ignore such things, but now there are reports that NBC is deleting any comments from their site that question where the video went.  This says to me that there is indeed something amiss here.

Michelle Malkin has posted a transcript of the missing SNL skit, and has also pointed out what could possibly be the reason behind NBC taking it down… it smells of legal threats.

I have a theory.

One of the rapacious couples featured in the skit was Herbert and Marion Sandler (portrayed by Darrell Hammond and Casey Wilson). Unlike the other composite figures, the Sandlers are a real-life couple.

Also lampooned: Left-wing billionaire George Soros.

As Todd Thurman at Heritage notes, the Sandlers are left-wing moguls who built “a mortgage company whose major product was subprime mortgages and they sold it to Wachovia for $24.2 billion in 2006. And what do the Sandlers do when they are not peddling subprime garbage? They are busy writing checks to leftist groups like the Center for American Progress, the American Civil Liberties Union, and Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN). Yes that ACORN.”

The Sandlers are seething over the skit. And George Soros must be livid as well. Anyone else smell a legal threat behind the disappearance of the vid?

It is true that the Sandlers are seething as mentioned in this article from USA Today, no clue if there is any truth to the statement about Mr. Soros.

Whatever the reason is for the removal, this stinks.  SNL has a long tradition of satire aimed at both sides of the aisle, and to show favoritism to one or the other is just not right, and it is certainly not keeping with the tradition of the show.  True, the skit did air, but it sets a deadly precedent for the show going forward.  Are they no longer going to be allowed to make fun of real life people for fear of future incidents such as this?  Perhaps the tag line under the image of the Sandlers that said “People who should be shot” was a bit much, but who cares?  It’s satire!

I defended SNL two weeks ago over the New York Times skit, and while I felt the skit was more about the media than the Republicans, I did say in the comments I was worried about the lack of material pointed at the Democrats thus far this season.  We did see some humor at the expense of Senator Joe Biden in the opening vice presidential debate sketch, which is still online, but with this one being yanked, the message is unclear.

Ali Gharib of the HuffingtonPost.com has a theory about how the sketch even came about.

But where did SNL get the idea? It’s hard to say exactly, but one possibility lies in the insidious web of neocon connections — a web that actually runs through the backstage halls of SNL.

Ayala Cohen, an SNL associate producer, is the wife of soon-to-be editor of the neocon journal Commentary, John Podhoretz (according to this site, and though I couldn’t confirm her title, I did confirm by phone that Cohen is still with SNL). Podhoretz, of course, is the son of longtime Commentary editor and neocon sage Norman Podhoretz.

Uh… yeah.  I’m sorry to inform Mr. Gharib, SNL has always poked fun at both sides, this is not something cooked up by “neocon connections”.  If this was remotely true, would we have had three Palin sketches already out of four episodes?  No.

So, why was the sketch removed from the Web?  Was it yanked for the Democrat portion?  Was it because of the Sandlers?  Was it because of Soros?  No matter which answer it is, it is a disturbing one.  Can political or financial pressure now dictate at whom the writers of SNL can point their wit at?  If there was something else about the sketch it would have been stopped before airing by standards and practices, and I do believe all SNL skits are run through the legal department before airing.

As of this writing, NBC and SNL have both not responded to inquiries made by various press outlets as to what happened.  With each passing moment this is becoming a more sinister situation, and the silence from the NBC camp is deafening.  If it is a situation where they can’t discuss it due to legal proceedings, than they need to say that.  If it was due to some form of other pressure, well, at least say something!

UPDATED AT 4:45 PM CST: Nikki Finke is reporting that the video is coming back online, but with the Sandlers section edited to take out the “shot in the head” comment and removal of the charge of corruption… way to go, NBC… you idiots.

The stock market fell another 369.88 points today.  So what?

While I am sure people will greatly disagree with me, I believe that the stock market has become nothing more than a giant gambling scheme where everyone has forgotten the most basic principle.  The stock market is a long term investment, and short term hiccups should be ignored.

While I understand there are those out there that need to move mass volumes of shares for funds and so on, for individual investors, you should always take the view that any stock is a long term situation.  Occasional bumps in the road, no matter how long they may last, need to be viewed in the overall long term projections you set for yourself when you purchased the stock.

Am I some sort of economic and financial whiz?  Heck no, but this is one mantra I have lived by for eons.  Admittedly I have been out of the stock market for quite some time personally (I owned Wal-Mart for years until it seemed to go into an almost 2 year stall), and my parents got out some time back after some success, but the one rule we all lived by was, “Oh well, the market dipped, we aren’t in this for short term gains.”

This also brings up a point about the major indices that has always driven me mad: they are not the final say to the economic health of the nation.  If it was, why did it not start falling long before the failures began to happen?  Wouldn’t all these great “analysts” have seen it coming and inested more conservatively?  No, they showed once again that the market is more controlled by emotions than by actual facts and analysis.  The market is in freefall, but that does not mean the every day consumer is.

If anything, I would be more prone to buy right now than anything.  I’m not, but if I had money to be gambling with (come on folks, it IS gambling, it’s just very fancy gambling), I would be eying a lot of different stocks right now.  Yes, things are bad NOW, but this is mostly shake out of people that are just plain nervous.  Give it a few weeks and every one will begin regaining their senses, and while the market won’t boom, it will stabilize and people will start focusing on the things in the country that need the real fixing.

In the meanwhile, please don’t go investing in comic books.

I watch listen to a lot of TV as I do my writing, and the new onslaught of pitchmen and annoying products is just amazing.

Over there, to the right… do you see him?  Don’t look directly at Vince!  His crazy eyes have the power to hypnotize you into buying a ShamWOW! (”It’s made in Germany, and you know the Germans make the best stuff.”)  To call Vince annoying would be an understatement, but of course he doesn’t replace my least favorite TV huckster, Billy Mays.  Oh Billy, you’ve come so far, what with you now advertising Mighty Mendit.

So today I saw an ad for the latest in the never ending stream of junk that gets thrown at us via TV ads: The Snuggie.  What grabbed my attention that, besides this looking like the robe for some unknown cult, it came with a folding book light.

Huh?

What does a folding booklight have to do with a flannel cult robe?  So, being a curious sort, I headed over to their website, and no real clues as to the connection between the two items, but I decided to explore the site some, and discovered the horrifying truth… the same company is behind the ShamWOW!, Mighty Mendit, Mighty Putty (also hawked by Billy Mays), a few others, and my absolute favorite… the Pancake Puff.

What is wrong with normal flat pancakes?  Essentially you are making donought holes, call them donought holes!  And stuffing a “pancake” with pizza filling?!?  You really have to wonder who comes up with these things.

I think I am most shocked to discover they didn’t make the Handy Switch, I wonder how that one got away from them!  As I asked in my post about the remote light switch wonder, I really do wonder how orders these things.  If you read this, and you have bought any one of these items I’ve mentioned, or even one I haven’t, please explain to me and my readers why you bought it, and did it live up to your expectations?  That is the one thing I have always heard that they don’t so that is what causes a lot of my confusion.

Here is your chance folks, go down to the comments and let loose with your thoughts on anything you have ever bought from a TV ad!  I really am curious to hear from real people that have bought any of these items or the like.

It seems that the 1990’s have returned, and this is not a good thing for the comic book industry.

As I’ve mentioned before, I’ve worked in the comic book industry, and I can tell you first hand about possibly the darkest times in comic book history: the speculator boom of the 90’s.  During the early to mid part of that decade, the comic industry was under siege by a wave of collector speculation as we received an influx of new customers from the bad stock market.  This then set off the already existing collectors into a buying frenzy where they would purchase multiple copies of the newest and “hottest” books, sure they had an upper hand due to their understanding the market.

People went nuts, to be blunt, thinking they could buy a copy of a comic that had a million-plus print run and it would be as valuable as any Silver Age comic (books published between 1956 to the late 1960s/early 1970s).  The thing they didn’t understand was that Silver Age books were valuable due to the low number of copies that existed from the day they were printed.  No comic had ever seen print runs anything close to what we were seeing during this time period.

The worst example of the entire speculative boom was Superman #75, published in 1992.  This comic finished up a storyline entitled The Death of Superman, and due to a culmination of the speculation boom, a slow news period and good marketing on the part of DC Comics, this single issue sold numbers unlike anything seen in the industry before.  To give you an example, in my town of 17,000 people (23,000 counting college students), we sold 1500 copies in 8 hours.  People came in to buy copies on release day that had never bought a comic book before in their lives, but they had heard “this will be a good investment”. Copies were going for as much as $25 on the first day it was released.

I actually spent a lot of time trying to tell people that a) there are too many copies being printed for this to be an “investment” and b) do you really think they are going to kill off the most well-known comic book character ever?  I just went on eBay and took a look and see copies in mint condition that their auction is over and they had no bids at $.99.  Color me not surprised.

So, why do I bring this up?  Will, with the economy the way it currently is, it seems people are looking to jump back into the industry again.  In an article from the Wall Street Journal, the following section appeared on October 3rd.

Mark Craddock, manager of Comic Book World, in Florence, Ky., says stock-market investors also are turning to superheroes. “There’s kind of a buying frenzy” in vintage comic books, he says.

The “Silver Age Comic Book Pricing Index” of 32 frequently traded ’60s comics, was up 14.2% in the 18 months ending in July, while the Standard & Poor’s 500 stock index was down 11% in the same period. Mark Haspel, president of Certified Guaranty Co. in Sarasota, Fla., which grades comic books, often for investors, says it’s on track to handle 200,000 books this year, up from 150,000 in 2007.

“Spiderman is going to be here in 20 years — he’s not going away,” Mr. Haspel says.

The comic book industry saw an explosion of new stores during the a fore mentioned speculative boom, and when it was all done, all those stores closed… and so did many old stores.  The industry was crippled by that influx of collectors, and I fear the same thing could happen with another wave of speculators coming into the industry.

The other thing that concerns me is that they are buying books, at least for now, that they have no understanding of how to properly care for them, their historical significance to the art form or do they understand that they are actually creating a false market.  They may drive up prices for now, but how will they ever find people that are able to afford these new prices?  Golden Age and Silver Age comics have very small markets due to their already prohibitive costs, and with the prices being driven up by an influx of “investors”, that market will shrink even more.  This will leave these people with the option of selling their books to retailers, whom of course are not going to be able to pay them their going price guide value, but a percentage thereof so that they can in turn make a profit.  This is if they can even find a store willing to purchase them because not all stores are equipped to deal with such specialized books.

In short, I hope this is just a minor blip, and no one is considering this seriously.  If you are, I beg of you to rethink your investment strategy.  If you insist on going forward with it, try to learn from the past, and please, I beg of you, make sure you learn to properly care for these pieces of history you’re putting into your portfolio.

Cover of Prez: First Teen President #1 from Gorilla Daze.  And, yes, it was a real series.

It’s episode 12… I’ve been doing this for three months already?!?

- The economy, how messed up are we?

- Will the economy take down your favorite sites? This is in relation to a post Mark and I did on Mashable this week.

- Will the economy make Hollywood’s output even worse? Probably.

Here’s a link to the MP3 for those who wish to download it.

On July 20th, 1989, the very first thing I did when I got up, I went to register to vote.

It was my 18th birthday, and my first act as a legal adult was to go down to my local County Clerk’s office and fill out my voter registration card.  This was the single most important thing to me that day, everything else was secondary.

My mother had spent several years involved with the League of Women Voters, and a few years as the president of the local chapter.  One of her duties was at each major election, she would go down to an office on the Truman State University (then Northeast Missouri State University) campus, sit outside the office where the votes were counted, and as tallies were given to her, she would call them into the national ABC News office.  I was in my early teens and I would go and sit with her, but a few times, due to my excitement over the process, she would let me make the phone calls into the national office.  (She always stood next to me and would double check the numbers I gave to make sure I reported them correctly)

I learned very early on about the importance of being a voter.  I learned that no matter how much you thought only one vote didn’t matter, it really did.  Unfortunately, there is one thing I hate a lot in life, and that is standing in lines.  It never stopped me from doing my patriotic duty, I just grumbled about it a lot.  Luckily we can now vote up to six weeks before the election in my area, so today after lunch, I went down to the same County Clerk’s office I went to in 1989, walked in, got my ballot, voted, and walked out.  Yep, I have already cast my vote in the 2008 presidential election.  Even if my candidate doesn’t win, I will know I at least had my say.  If the opponent wins, I know I will at be able to say for the next four years, “Don’t look at me, I didn’t vote for him.”

If you aren’t registered to vote, why not? It just so happens that I did a list over at Mashable today called 10 Resources for Voter Registration.  It couldn’t be easier to register to vote nowadays, and if you need some motivation, watch the video below.

Come on folks, it’s time to make sure you take full advantage of your freedoms.

Back on September 7th I made a post about Save The Superman House.

News was circulating that the house that an 11-year-old Jerry Siegel, along with his friend Joe Shuster, came up with what would become Supermanwas falling into complete disrepair.  An author named Brad Meltzer decided to set up a fund, Ordinary People Change The World, to raise funds to save the house where an American icon was born.

I am beyond thrilled to announce that their efforts raised $111,047 to date, and work is beginning on the house tomorrow, October 2nd, to make the necessary repairs.  The original goal was $50,000, but the extra funds will allow them to fix both the exterior and interior of the household.  The house currently is occupied by an elderly couple, but there is no word on what will happen to the house after they move or pass on.

While I have no clue if any of my readers contributed, I still must send a thank you out to the entire Internet.  This was, and is, a part of American history that should not have been neglected.  Kudos to each and every person out there that donated even a penny to this cause.  I know times are tough for most, there is no denying that, and to donate to cause such as this, something that could have easily been laughed off, means the world.

Thank you to each and every one of you for saving this landmark of American pop culture.

The Copyright Royalty Board (CRB) in Washington, D.C. is set to rule on Thursday over a request from the National Music Publishers’ Association (NMPA) to raise the royalty rate paid on digital downloads.

It seems the NMPA has decided it is time for royalties to go up, and seeing as CD sales are on the decline, the record companies have pawned off the request to the digital download market.  The current royalty rate is $.09 a song and they are requesting an increase to $.15, a hike of more than 60%.

Seeing as Apple’s iTunes store currently controls 80% of the digital music market, it is fairly obvious this move is squarely directed at them.

Under the current system, on a $.99 song sale, it is believed Apple already gives away $.70 in royalties and rights.  Of the remaining $.29, very little is actually profit as the majority goes to maintaining the store, paperwork and so on.  This new rate would lower Apple’s share to $.23, and they are saying at that price they would actually be losing money.

As Apple is like any other business, and wishes to make money, iTunes vice president Eddy Cue has made a rather ominous threat via an article on CNN Money.

If the [iTunes music store] was forced to absorb any increase in the … royalty rate, the result would be to significantly increase the likelihood of the store operating at a financial loss - which is no alternative at all,” Cue wrote. “Apple has repeatedly made it clear that it is in this business to make money, and most likely would not continue to operate [the iTunes music store] if it were no longer possible to do so profitably.

I personally find it highly unlikely that Apple would actually go that far, but it does seem when one company controls 80% of a market, and is projected to go as high as 85%, that this does seem a rather unfair targeting of them. It does also put them in a position where their threat should be taken very seriously.  Apple does have a counter-proposal on the table of a percentage of wholesale that would work out to an actual reduction of royalties, but somehow I don’t see that flying either.

David Israelite, president of the National Music Publishers Association, is saying that everyone should embrace the royalty increase because ultimately everyone involved will prosper. Um… yeah… sure, I see that. -scratches head- There was a more telling quote in the CNN Money story from Mr. Israelite that I think sums up the core of this whole issue.

“Apple may want to sell songs cheaply to sell iPods. We don’t make a penny on the sale of an iPod.”

Ah, yeah, there we go again.  Remember back in 2005 when Edgar Bronfman, CEO of the Warner Music Group, thought record companies should earn a percentage from the sale of each iPod sold as Apple wouldn’t be able to sell their products without music to put on it.  Luckily that idea was quickly squashed, but here it is rearing it’s ugly head again, just in a different form.

So Apple is once again being targeted for basically being profitable.  Well, let me ask the music industry a very simple set of questions: Did you collect payments for sales of record players?  8 Track players?  Tape decks?  CD Players?  On and on and on, why is it now okay to target one hardware manufacturer because they have the most popular version of it?

Once again, here we are with the music industry again trying to get more blood out of a turnip, never mind their greed may end up harming things.  Say this passes and Apple finally gives in to raising their prices, this will inevitably leads to lower sales, and in turn, lower royalties.  Say Apple would shut down iTunes, then there would be no royalties at all.  Gee, are either of these desirable for any party involved.  How would everyone “prosper” again?

Stupid, stupid music companies.

According to IO9, there is talk of someone doing a sequel to Blade Runner.

Okay, first off, the original film came out in 1982, based on a novel by Philip K. Dick named Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep, and while it has cult status, I doubt many people younger than myself even know of this film.  Considering this project isn’t locked, and lead times for effects heavy films are 2 - 3 years, you’re looking at 2010 or 2011 for this to come out.  That would put this project close to the 30 year mark since the original, making progressively less sense.

Secondly… IT ISN’T NEEDED!  Blade Runner is one of those works that, no matter which cut of it you watch, it is a complete and perfect work.  Fantastic story, great acting and with so many years gone by, the visuals still pack a heck of a wallop.  I watched it on HD-DVD when the deluxe boxed set came out, and there were even more astonishing details lurking in the shadows, and with a bit of effects cleaning, it was just… wow.  Capturing the vibe of this film a second time would be next to impossible and, quite simply, should just not be done.

This is where Hollywood is just depressing me more and more.  We just hear about bad idea after bad idea, and there seems to be no stopping them.  Remember MTV is remaking The Rocky Horror Picture Show?  There are talks that the remake of Ed Wood’s schlock classic, Plan 9 From Outer Space, is moving ahead.  Possibly a Men In Black 3, which is so not needed (and the cartoon series actually was better than the second film).

It just seems like bad idea afte rbad idea is coming out of Hollywood lately, and no one is saying “wait a minute…”.  I think the time has come for exectutives to come out of their ivory towers and hear what people actually have to say about these projects.  They need to be stopped before they even get started, and save all of us the inevitable pain.

Just say no to Blade Runner 2… please.

A 478-carat diamond was found in the Kingdom of Lesotho recently.

The diamond has been rated as a D color, the highest color grade possible in a white diamond, and it is said to have a flawless center.  After going through the cutting process they expect to yield a 100-carat round diamond.

Who cares?

I am sorry, but this is one of the aspects of the world I have never grasped.  Sure, there are some things diamonds can do such as drill bits and so on, but for their usual purpose as jewelry, I just don’t get it.  And it’s not just diamonds, but gems in general… you do all realize you’re getting excited but shiny rocks, right?

Now, I know I get excited about technology, but at least it does something for me.  Gold?  Well, gold is too soft to be usable as pretty much anything.  Silver?  Well, it makes a nice tea set.  It’s gem stones where I really do shake my head the most.  Shiny, shiny rocks, and there’s whole stores devoted to them!  Jewelry stores are about the equivialent of “rock stores” to me.

I understand it all goes back to peceived value, demand, rarity, etc, and if you think about just about anything in these terms, you’ll come up with a similar conclusion for any given item.  However… shiny, shiny rocks is just totally lost on me.

What could any person say about Paul Newman that hasn’t been said a thousand times by millions of others?

While Mr. Newman could have traded on his famous good looks for his entire career, he didn’t.  Instead he became a master of his craft and provided us with more memorable roles than some armies of actors could ever hope to do.  While you can certainly point to his well-known roles in films such as The Hustler,  Hud, Cool Hand Luke,  Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, The Color of Money and on and on and on, one of my personal favorites is one that never got much coverage, and that was Nobody’s Fool.

I’m not sure why Nobody’s Fool never got much mention, it may have been because it was a story that centered heavily on people facing their own mortality, but it is one of my most recommended films to friends and family.  A great performance by Newman (of course), Jessica Tandy in her last role and Bruce Willis (who took scale pay so he could have the opportunity to work with Newman), make for a wonderful little gem of a film.  Seriously, rent it, buy it (you can usually find it pretty cheap), but do yourself the favor of checking it out.

Beyond his acting, though, it was his immense generosity that always amazed me.  Most people have seen the Newmans Own brand of food items in the grocery store, but it always amazes me how many people don’t know the story behind it.  Every penny of profit made from the line of salad dressings, lemonade, popcorn and more goes to charity.  In the 25 years the brand has been around, it has donated over $250 million dollars to various charities around the world.  This also included the Hole in the Wall Camps (named for the Hole in the Wall Gang from the story of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid) which were summer camps set up for kids with serious health problems that allowed them to attend totally free of charge.

I will certainly miss Mr. Newman not only for his contributions to the cinema, but also for all of the charity work he did over the years.  Rest in peace, Mr. Newman.

It’s episode 11… and it’s mostly for all the new people…

- Lots of new readers this week, and possibly some new listeners, so a bit of a catch up on who I am and what this blog is about. All of this brought about due to that James Bond post.

- Comments, comments, comments… I need feedback folks!

Here’s a link to the MP3 for those who wish to download it.