Indecent Exposure

You gotta love Larry Flynt and Joe Francis for one thing: exposing for the nation just how ridiculously indecent the bailout-mania has become.


Seriously, from my perspective, they have just as much claim, maybe even a more righteous claim, to a government handout as any other legal business venture.
The bankers and the Big Three have only themselves to blame for loaning money to people who couldn't afford to pay it back, or paying a work force too much to produce cars that would not sell.

So those guys screw the pooch, and now they want the rest of us to keep their business a float?

Maybe we should bailout the porn industry first.
I'm pretty sure Joe Francis and Larry Flynt haven't sabotaged their businesses with bad decisions, such as photographing ugly women nobody wanted to see anyway.
Move them to the front of the line.

Issues

If anybody is having trouble commenting on this page, send me an email (addy is in the profile.)

Or, just leave a comment on the previous page's last posting.

Added info, like operating system/browser you're using would also be helpful.

Define "Success"

I'm hearing a different tone than what I've heard in the past. All over, the chattering classes on the right are approaching the soon-to-come administration without the deranged hatred we've see from the left for the past eight years.

"I hope he succeeds" is the over riding sentiment.

Thing is, nobody is saying what 'success' is.
Example:While FDR is seen widely, and wildly, as a success, by all stupid people the nation over (that would be most of them), the facts show that the long term results of his policies ranged from failure to abject failure. But, he was so successful at hoodwinking the people, we now have a monument in Washinton celebrating it.

As someone who holds political views far different than Barack Obama, how can I wish him 'success' as he goes about his way of implementing policies that I believe will be harmful and further erode the nation's welfare?
Does anybody think government run health care, given it's unblemished track record of sucking every where it's tried, will somehow be an improvement because Obama does it?

Can anybody who believes in the sanctity of human life, as I do, think Obama will somehow be an improvement when it comes to protecting the innocent? Especially after he voted to deny the 14th Amendment protections of citizenship and due process to a whole class of the citizenry? (In other words, the first black president supports the re-creation of a 'nigger' class. Didn't our nation already fight a long struggle against such a notion).

Will more intrusive government, expansion of wealth transfers and increasing encroachment on economic liberties suddenly be successful after history has repeatedly shown otherwise?

I don't wish the new president success any more than I wished the last guy success.
Instead, I wish,hope and pray for the success of the nation to somehow rise above it's self-inflicted troubles and continue to be the one place that continues to offer the most promise for our descendants, just as it did for our ancestors.

Missing Links

Not done yet. Soon, I will have a completed link list. If yours is missing,and a few of you are, it won't be much longer.

Thanks for hanging in there.

No Reservations

I first became aware of Anthony Bourdain over a year ago, maybe almost two years ago, through online buddy and know-it-all RW. This was back in his food blogging days.

Brian, also a fan, just came back from Vietnam after doing a little Bourdaining of his own.

As I said, I became 'aware'. Meaning, I knew he was there, and little else. Never watched his show on The Travel Channel. And never gave him another thought.

All that changed a few weeks ago. Being stuck in recovery, unable to do too much, I spend much time killing boredom through channel surfing, and ended up surfing my way right into Bourdain's show.
Now I'm hooked.

For those who don't know:
In "No Reservations" (Bourdain's show), he travels the world to exotic lands and eats the food. Some of this stuff is truly bizarre, but he eats it anyway.
He's funny,wry, and self-deprecating. A professional chef with a punk attitude who doesn't take himself too seriously but puts out one hell of a good show, while taking the occassional no-so-subtle shot at some of those other chef hosts on Food Network (Rachel Ray seems to be a favorite target).

Been watching all reruns, as I'm a very recent fan, but the new season starts tonight.
If you haven't yet, check him out. You'll be glad you did.

What Were We Eating Before?

Pizza Hut is now promoting a new All Natural Pizza, with natural crust,natural cheese, natural peperoni, etc.

For years, Pizza Hut has bombarded us with advertising that testified to the superior quality of their fare, and now they take it all back?

Transplanting Slumliness

On the docket for today is a story from the Frisco Bay region :Influx of black renters raises tension in Bay Area

In summary, the residents of Antioch,CA are pissed off with the influx of poor Negroes moving into town with Section 8 housing vouchers bringing with them "loud parties, mean pit bulls, blaring car radios, prostitution, drug dealing and muggings of schoolchildren."
In other words, the same old stuff that comes with all neighborhoods where the vast majority of the population resembles the cast of a Snoop Dogg video.

To be expected, the aggrieved have called for, and received, a greater measure of police patrolling aimed toward keeping a damper on the Annoying and Federally Subsidized Community.

Now, the subsidized nuisances are striking back with a lawsuit for police harassment,intimidation, or whatever... but I'm pretty sure racism will be charged as well.

What this all comes down to is the one thing it is not politically correct to proclaim, although the evidence for it is overwhelming: Bad neighbors live in bad neighborhoods for a self-evident reason. No amount of subsidy to help poor people escape poverty slums will change the behaviors and social mores that brought them to the slums in the first place.

Giving them free money to 'escape' just spreads their crap around into other neighborhoods where the citizens have already earned a certain level of lifestyle through their own merits.

You got to love this quote from the article:

Karen Coleman, a mother of three who came here five years ago from a blighted neighborhood in nearby Pittsburg. "We are trying to raise our kids like everyone else. But they don't want us here."

No, Mrs. Coleman. With the loud parties,pit bulls, blaring car stereos,and a government check, you are not trying to raise your kids 'like everyone else'.

But at least you're right about one thing: They don't want you there. And justifiably so.