The Alligator was promptly killed because, well I guess he bit off a guys arm but in the defense of the Alligator, I’m sure it was pretty hungry. Even though the Alligator lived on the premises of the Upscale Golf Course he never got invited to the Club House for lunch. Small birds while tasty are nothing more than a snack to a 10 ft Alligator.
Kind of brings to mind the ever retracting wilderness as a result of man’s encroachment on it. Alligators migrate to Golf Courses and are then either killed for misbehaving or actually taken away to a preserve.
Overall, it was a bad day for both the Alligator and the man who shanked a ball into the drink. And my friends wonder why I don’t play golf.
Man you really can’t get away from these people. You got Kate on TV all day and you have Jon banging tons of chicks. I can’t go a day without seeing a Jon and Kate update on my newsfeeds and I can’t figure out why. I don’t know why the media and the general population are so enamored with this couple and their kids, I don’t get it. And they are getting divorced and the kids are on TV and Jon thinks this and Kate says that.
I just don’t get it. I don’t watch the show but besides having 8 kids what qualifies this broken up couple as national news? Every news outlet is waiting on the next big Jon and Kate headline and frankly I really don’t give a shit. They have a TV show where I guess the kids run around, ok big fucking deal. Flava Flav had a TV show too but he’s not splashed up on my news sites or doing interviews on Good Morning America.
What does it solve either the fact that you’re airing all this family laundry on interviews? Is it to extend the 15 minutes of fame? Is it to make the show more appealing? I just don’t get it. Then again I don’t get a lot of things.
I’m just hoping these people go away because there’s way more important shit to be focusing on than the world of Jon and Kate. The kids really shouldn’t be subjected to a being on reality show either but that’s just my opinion. Which of the kids is the first one to grow up and do something completely outrageous or get hooked on drugs? At least they have an excuse when they do it… fucked up childhood with cameras around all the time.
It’s also interesting to note that Kate seemed to be the one who took the brunt of the media’s criticism shortly after they announced the divorce but now Jon is the one who is getting roughed up. Not much has changed I’m sure in terms of Jon and Kate but the media decided to take a particularly different tone after a couple of weeks.
Anyway, I think the show just got canceled which is great for America. These people can fall back into whatever semblance of normal like after the show stops taping and we the people won’t have to be bombarded by it on TV and the Internet. Of course we’ll probably see another incarnation of participants in this show on another show but hopefully it will take some time for Hollywood to get that together. I would be fine with a couple of guest spots on Hollywood Squares and some low key news reports about how the kids are adjusting just fine to life not in front of a camera crew. That’s not going to happen though.
Just because I rip into left wing ego case Keith Olbermann doesn’t mean I can’t flip the script and call it like i see it on a so-called conservative talk show host. Glenn Beck of Fox News is also part of the partisan, Jerry Springeresque impasse we seem to be stuck at in terms of the sensationalism, manufactured outrage and just plain bullshit that has clogged up the airwaves of late.
I’m not sure where Glenn Beck came from or why he’s a credible but whomever is signing his paychecks should take a good hard look in the mirror. I have been flipping through the channels lately and found him to be most annoying, abrasive and not really making much sense. Using props of various kinds to prove his points, spouting about historical/political facts that do and do not have relevance to the situations of today. I think he’s cried on air 4 or 5 times so far and while that may have been to garner more attention and make himself seemingly more of a patriot because he cares for his country it’s been as believable as the Terrel Owens “That’s My Quarterback” interview.
I remember the first time I saw him on TV he was interviewing a lady and he was talking about how much he hates compact fluorescent light bulbs because he didn’t like how they made him look in the mirror. He brought up a great point that at the time NBC was running a “Green” campaign and doing Public Service Announcement’s for CFL’s and cutting back on energy consumption while NBC’s parent company General Electric makes those lightbulbs. However, marginalizing energy consumption on the part of how you look in the mirror is the exact opposite of how American’s should be thinking.
This week I saw him stand by a red phone begging the White House to call him, erratically prancing around and acting like a school kid who just got multiple wedgies (queue crying). I don’t get it, every once in a couple months he comes up with a somewhat credible news story or uncovers some far-left tie to a White House appointed position and plays off of that for another 3 months while giving everyone his whacked ass view of his “America” during the mean time.
While I genuinely believe that Glenn Beck is trying to do good for his country in his head, the way he is going about doing it is not only misguided and ineffective but also extremely dangerous in it’s subjective and one-sided nature. Yes there are problems in America, there have always been problems in America and there will always be problems in America. We don’t live in a Utopia and you cannot please everyone all the time. I can appreciate some of his views on Healthcare, government takeover of the Auto industry and have grown weary of bigger and bigger government as it acquires more and more of America. Notwithstanding, just because you are talking louder and throwing a temper tantrum doesn’t make you right and actually serves to diminish the message you are trying to send.
It’s hilarious that the people that say the most outrageous things are given the bigger pulpits to shout from when real journalists are relegated to page 18 of the newspaper and don’t have a TV show because the objective truth isn’t good for ratings. It’s partly the fault of the American public for consuming this crap but more so the fault of the media conglomerates and advertisers who effectively put these wind bags on the air. Yes it’s a capitalistic society and I understand making sensible news profitable is hard if not impossible but there has to be another way right?
Terrence Copper is open but should I throw it to him?
Bob McFlurry with Sports
I love Drew Brees and I mean that in the gayest way possible. I’ve loved this guy since his sophomore season in 1998 at Purdue when he led the team on an 80 yard drive with 1:25 left on the clock and threw a 25 yard strike to Ike Jones (of a rival high school of mine) for the game winner against #4 Kansas State in the Alamo Bowl. I remember this distinctly because not only was that night the first time I had ever taken a flaming shot of Bacardi 151 and a neighbor had hit my car parked outside my friends house, but also the amazing statistic that Brees’ Boilermakers were only the second unranked team to beat a top 5 team in bowl game in history. It is still easily a top 10 College Football game I have ever watched.
Brees continued a storied College career earning Academic All-America Player of the Year as a Senior and garnering the Maxwell Award for the nation’s most Outstanding Player. Drew also holds the record for the longest pass in NCAA history at 99 yards.
Brees was drafted by San Diego with the first pick in the second round of the 2001 NFL draft (San Diego drafted Ladanian Tomlinson in the first round). Initially I was somewhat weary of Brees taking it to the next level given his 6 foot 190+ frame. The trend of high round QB’s drafted into the NFL was that of size and athleticism more so than cognitive function in the early 2000’s and to some extent continues today (See Jamarcus Russell).
However, Brees put my doubts to rest starting in 2004 in his 3rd year as the starting QB for the Chargers posting an insane TD to Int ratio (27-7), passer rating (104.8) and with Tomlinson led San Diego to a 12-4 record and their first playoff birth in 9 years.
Before that 2004 season though, the Chargers drafted Eli Manning, eventually trading him to the NY Giants in exchange for the rights to Phillip Rivers and several draft picks. A protracted contract dispute between the Chargers and Rivers allowed Brees to be named started and enjoy a breakout year in 2004. Brees was a free agent at the end of 2004 and eventually would be lassoed with the Franchise Tag for the 2005 season. Brees did go down late in the 2005 season with a torn labrum in his throwing shoulder.
In 2006 the New Orleans saints took a chance on the once comeback player of the year and gave him a 6 year 60 million dollar contract. In 2006 he was named runner up to Tomlinson for the AP NFL MVP. The same year he took the Saints past the Eagles and into the NFC Championship game against the Bears. The next two seasons were not as good as the Saints fell back to mediocrity going 7-9 and 8-8 mostly due to defensive deficiencies. By this time though Brees had established himself as an upper echelon QB starting a Pro Bowl game. He fell 15 yards short of the single season passing yardage mark owned by Dan Marino.
All in all, Brees is, in my opinion, the second best QB in the NFL at this point behind Peyton Manning (yes above Tom Brady). I think Brees will continue a torrid pace this year and win the AP MVP if another running back, Adrian Peterson, does not block him from it. It’s good to see that a QB of a smaller stature can thrive in the NFL given that most teams draft 6’4” athletic specimens to play QB but seem to forget that the QB needs to make decisions with the ball, not just throw or run with it.
Look for the Saints to beat the Giants this week and be a force to be reckoned with the rest of the season.
I just read an article by N.Y. Times writerWILLIAM C. RHODEN on why he thinks a Yankees Vs. Dodgers World Series would be great for baseball. No doubt that would be appealing in the sense of America’s two largest markets and an East/West Coast dynamic to it but Rhoden seems to give odd reasoning why the matchup would be good for baseball.
“what Major League Baseball needs is a great World Series, a Series for the ages. And with all due respect to those two other potential matchups, it’s a Yankees-Dodgers World Series that could take the game back to its roots at a time when baseball desperately needs to recover a portion of the trust, if not the innocence, that it has lost in the steroid era.”
Mr. Rhoden, if you want to recover a “portion of trust” for baseball then why would you match up teams with marquee players that have been anything but truthful in their dealings with performance enhancing drugs. While Manny Ramirez, Alex Rodriguez and Andy Pettie are hardly the only players in the last 20 years to have taken and gotten caught taking performance drugs how do you figure that those guys being in and winning a World Series is going to recover some innocence it lost in the steroid era? How would a Dodgers/Yankees matchup, “reinforces its roots and, yes, its relative purity”?
Trust, innocence, relative purity? What are you smoking Rhoden? I’m not going to argue a Dodgers/Yankees matchup would be good for ratings, but good for the game?
I think the Phillies beating the Yankees would be poetic in a year when A-Rod had to come out of the closet with his use of PED’s. A Phillies Vs. Angels series (while not having one of the big 2 markets involved) could have the makings to be one of the greatest series of all time given the way the teams play and the absence of a tainted marquee player.
Overall, don’t give me your purity, innocence and trust logic while debating on which teams should be in the series because the two teams you suggested, Rhoden, debunk your whole theory. I don’t know how you run your household but when a dog pisses the carpet, you don’t give him a treat.
Maybe you’re a little young to remember Lou Albano the wrestler but you may remember him managing such wrestlers as former Intercontinental Champion Greg ‘The Hammer’ Valentine but Albano made more of a mark on managing tag teams. Mr. Fuji and Mr. Saito, The Valiant Brothers, Wild Samoans, The Moondogs, and The British Bulldogs were a few of the teams he managed over the years. Overall he guided two dozen wrestlers to the Championships.
You may also remember Albano in a number of Cyndi Lauper videos including Girls just Want to Have Fun. Moreover, I remember Lou Albano best for his role as the real life Mario in The Super Mario Bros. Super Show! as well as lending his voice to the animated character. I can remember many a days coming home from school and watching this program.
He was inducted into the WWF/WWE Hall of Fame in 1996.
Some of the more notable names he managed were André the Giant, Hulk Hogan, “Superfly” Jimmy Snuka, The Iron Sheik, Nikolai Volkoff and George ‘The Animal’ Steele.
Originally a drink for lactating mothers, oatmeal stout was described as nutritional on early labels. Oats are in the same family as barley, and a small addition yields great flavor. Popular in the late 1800’s, the last oatmeal stout was brewed before the First World War until Samuel Smith reintroduced this style in 1980.
Easily one of my favorite stouts but a little higher on the alcohol at 5% ABV. Not sure it’s worth the price around my parts though. Got a case last week for $58. Though I have no problem having a couple at the bar.
Overall goes on to prove the point to myself that the English know how to brew great ale’s and stouts.
Try pairing one with:
Pizza and salad, Italian foods, steamed clams, grilled ahi tuna, lobster with drawn butter, steak, eggs Florentine.
I get really weary of these media conglomerates the bigger and bigger they get.
Clear Channel.
900+ Radio Stations
Formerly owned 40+ TV stations
Owns numerous outdoor advertising billboards and Taxi Cab displays.
Analysis: You can’t turn a radio station dial without every other station being owned by Clear Channel. You can’t miss billboards they own if you travel on major highways. If you live in a metropolitan area you have seen news and sports scores on top of taxi cabs.
Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp
HarperCollins book publishing
Elektra Records catalog
More than 150 Newspapers in Australia, Fiji, Papua New Guinea, UK and Ireland and the United States.
Around 30 Magazines including GQ and Vouge.
20th Century Fox (Film) and various other motion picture related entites
FOX Broadcasting Networks including FOX, Fox Business, News, Sports etc.
Fox International owns 120 channels around the world.
Social Network MySpace
Other online interests include RottenTomatoes.com (film review site), Photobucket.com, Hulu.com(45%)
Analysis: Murdoch has his hands in pretty much everything. You’re not going to read an upper echelon newspaper in print or online that Murdoch doesn’t own. Many argue his Fox News network caters to a Republican agenda. It’s nice to own the biggest film rating website when your company makes movies. Rupert’s MySpace status says “Mogul”.
Walt Disney: Here’swhat’s in the Mouses’ house.
ABC Television Network has 226 affiliated stations reaching 99 percent of all U.S. television households.
ESPN and their channels.
Disney Channel, SOAPnet, A&E, the History Channel, the Biography Channel
Disney owns 277 radio stations in the United States through it’s stake in Citadel Broadcasting Corp.
6 Magazines including ESPN the magazine. Marvel Comics and their catalog of charaters.
Hyperion Books (publishing)
Touchstone Pictures, Miramax Films, Pixar and a host of Buena Vista companies.
The Disney internet group includes NFL.com, NBA.com, NASCAR.com ESPN.com ABC.com among others.
Analysis: Mickey and ESPN are pretty big. ABC reaches just about everyone in the U.S. They will keep making movies with moneymaker Pixar and new acquisition Marvel Comics to just about corner the Comic Superhero market. Why does Disney control NFL.com and NBA.com? I was always a bigger fan of Donald Duck.
Viacom / CBS Corp.
TV Stations include: MTV, MTV2, Nickelodeon,VH1, Spike TV, CMT, Comedy Central, Palladia, BET, Showtime.
Paramount Pictures including: Dreamworks, MTV Films, Nickelodeon Movies.
Publishing includes Kaplan, Pocket Books, Simon & Schuster, The Free Press, The Touchstone, Fireside Group.
CBS Network consists of 29 stations. CW Network (50%).
Video Game Developer Harmonix of Guitar Hero and Rock Band.
Analysis: I linked Viacom and CBS Corp together because even though they split up in 2005 after merging in 1999, Sumner Redstone still controls 71% of the voting stock in both companies. The influence MTV has on the youth of America turning them into mindless consumers is amazing. Shows on MTV end now and they roll a Beatles Rock Band clip during the credits (Subliminal Commercial). Palladia is actually pretty awesome and should be called Music Television. I’m not sure who has more power at any given time: Sumner Redstone or Rupert Murdoch?
TimeWarner
HBO, Cinemax, CNN, TBS, Warner Bros. Television Group, Cartoon Network, Turner Classic Movies
Warner Bros. Pictures, New Line Cinema, Castle Rock, Village Roadshow Pictures.
DC Comics (Batman + Superman)
People, Time, Sports Illustrated, Fortune among a host of other magazines.
AOL, AOL.com, AOL Instant Messenger
Warner Music Group – one of the big 4 labels.
Analysis: After betting the farm on AOL and it not working out they have fallen off a bit. Time Warner posted a $16.03 billion loss for the final quarter of 2008 which may lead it to sell of portions of it’s assets.
General Electric:
NBC, CNBC, MSNBC, Bravo, Sci Fi Channel, Telemundo, USA, Oxygen
NBC Universal Television Distribution, Universal Media Studios
NBC Universal (80% ownership): Universal Pictures, Focus Features, Rogue Pictures. Universal has production agreements with Imagine Entertainment, Jersey Films, Tribeca Films, the Kennedy/Marshall Company, Playtone Company, Strike Entertainment, Type A Films and Working Title Films among others.
With such a small amount of companies controlling such a vast amount of media it’s a wonder everything we see, read and hear on radio, newspapers and TV is so homogeneous. When someone like Sumner Redstone or Rupert Murdoch controls a vast empire of media, if a person, organization/corporation or member of government could persuade them to report the news a certain way or handle specific stories in a particular light or influence them whatsoever from a journalism standpoint this country is seriously fucked. Knowledge is power and if you are controlling the knowledge or twisting the knowledge a certain way for hundreds of millions of people you can influence elections, shape public opinion and government policy. We as Americans are guaranteed free speech and press but I don’t think that’s what we’re getting from our media conglomerates. When so much money relies on advertising these companies are effectively at the will of the advertisers and in some ways, the government which has found ways to censor news without effectively taking a newscast off the air.
Democracy is only as good as the level of credible journalism in that Democracy. I found a worthy cause for this issue calling for more diversity in media. Find out ways you can get involved at http://www.stopbigmedia.com/.
I never really had a problem with Keith Olbermann on Sportscenter when he teamed with Dan Patrick to put a soundtrack of zingers and one-liners to sports highlights. He smiled, cracked jokes and seemed generally likable though still slightly smug.
I don’t really have a problem with Keith having his left wing show on MSNBC either. He can have his “Worst Person In The World” and try to pick apart Bill O’Reilly or his Republican/Conservative opponent du jour every night and I’m fine with that, he’s got his right to do that within reason and I won’t be above saying he’s right from time to time. He seems to have a general care about the country and it’s citizens which is a very respectable trait and one I happen to share with him.
What I cannot stand is Olbermann being on the Sunday Night Football panel. I realize his background in sports broadcasting but if there’s one thing i don’t like mixed in with my sports it’s bullshit politics. Not that he brings up politics on Sunday Night Football, but just knowing his priggish, self-righteous ass is a mouthpiece for a left sided network pains me to no end. For the record I would hate to see Glenn Beck or Bill O’Reilly or Rush Limbaugh as an anchor on a sportscast as well. You do remember how long Limbaugh lasted as an ESPN commentator in 2003?
You don’t see Chris Berman have a show and plug a Republican agenda or Bob Costas stray from sports leaning stories on his show. You have to pick what you are, sportscaster or political pundit; there’s no gray zone here. I don’t care if a sportscaster comes out in support of an issue or political candidate but don’t make a whole show about it and further, don’t be a condescending asshole about it.
Olbermann sits himself behind a desk on weeknights and pretends to be a modern day Edward R. Murrow (he won the Murrow award in 2003). However he does it with a sharp tongue and an “i’m smarter than you”, egotistic tone that makes me want to throw my laptop off my desk. I won’t pretend to write as eloquent as Keith or tear into an issue with the same smarts and vigor but give me a staff of capable people and a full time salary and I have no problem devoting 10+ hours a day into pumping out content that’s informative and stimulating.
What makes Olbermann so smart anyway? He claims to have gone to an Ivy League school (Cornell), however, he graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in Communications arts from the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, not the School of Arts and Sciences which is the Ivy league one.
In an interview with Playboy Magazine Olbermann was quotes to say:
“My Ivy League education taught me how to cut corners, skim books and take an idea and write 15 pages on it, and also how to work all day at the Cornell radio station and never actually go to class.”
Obviously lying about going to theIvy LeagueCornell isn’t a big deal to folks like you and I, but for a guy who wastes valuable airtime to nit pick at Rep. Charlie Rangel for saying ‘inferred” instead of “implied” it seems relavent to nit pick at him. Oh, wowzers Keith, got him on that one.
Seriously though, tone and inflection are big parts of broadcasting and no doubt were covered during his matriculation at non-Ivy league Cornell studying Communication Arts. You would think he would have taken from that education that if you come off as a pompous arse and a know it all that you would actually have to back it up with a little more than a Communications degree and several stints as a sportscaster spouting lines like “Booya”! Where is the credibility with this guy? Half the time he’s making inane grammar corrections or subjective comments on subjective comments from Senators, Representatives or right wing personalities. 30% of the time he’s dealing in absolute bullshit and the other 20% is reserved for stuff that actually does matter whether it’s biased or not.
I’m not saying that Olbermann is a bad person because he’s better than most of the talking heads out there but I wonder sometimes if he’s at least subconsciously trying to be the smartest guy in the room nation to show up the kids who repeatedly stole his lunch money in grade school. That’s been my experience at least, either the overzealous person is overcompensating because they are constantly dealing with their own insecurities which can include a host of things including height, weight, perception of beauty or lack of breast or penis size.
Basically he’s the guy sitting at the end of the bar drinking alone because of his lack of people skills. He’s pissed off all his friends and most of his acquaintances who aren’t blinded by his B-list stardom.
Hasn’t this movie been done a couple of times before? Independence Day, The Day After Tomorrow ring a bell to anyone? End of the world by: Aliens, Global Warming and now The Mayan Calendar? It’s a shocker that all three of these movies were directed, written and produced by Roland Emmerich. The man seems to have a lock on “End Of The World” scripts in Hollywood. I’m wondering if he has a wheel that goes around like The Price is Right and whatever doomsday scenario he lands on, that’s his newest movie.
The film will probably get panned because this isn’t 1996 and blowing shit up in CGI just doesn’t have the same effect on people as it did back when Bill Clinton was banging chicks in the White House. And Amanda Peet has bangs? What the fuck is up with that?
Anyway, I’ll probably get roped into watching this movie at some point and I think I’ll rather enjoy watching a fake California fall into the ocean. That’s definitely going to happen in real life at some point too only John Cusack isn’t going to be able to drive a car and fly a plane through falling buildings to get out alive.
I’d like to give you more info on the Mayan Calendar but the Phillies are about to play the Rockies and this broad already gives a synopsis on a Youtube video. She actually won an Emmy for it which is unbelievable because I didn’t know they gave out Emmy’s to Youtube videos. I’ve had a crush on her for a couple of months and her mammoth breasts. She (they really because I doubt she actually writes most of the shit) actually come out with some pretty cool content from time to time as well. Kind of like BeerSlugger.com only better looking and with bigger tits.
By: Billy BeerSlugger
Bob McFlurry With Sports
By: Billy BeerSlugger