This is serious folks…as we speak – Israel is unleashing holy hell on the Gaza strip

December 31, 2008 · Posted in Featured, Government, Social Issues, The World, Things to think about, Topic Blogs · Comment 

This is one of those new topics that is so steeped in history and the subject of so many diplomatic shortfalls and small victorys, I don’t know where to begin.  The region and this conflict has become saturated into our very being over the last 30 years.  If there is one lasting reminder of the ongoing struggle to co-exist peacefully in the world, it’s the Israeli and Palestinian struggle.  A struggle that seems to be ever resilient to peace dealings, treaties, ceasefires, and international law.

The modern day Israeli- Palestinian conflict that we know has been active since right after WWI.  To keep this short and sweet, essentially the area known as Gaza was ruled by the Ottomans, or the present day Turks for centuries.   The British defeated the Ottoman army and freed up this entire region.  In a nutshell again, land was promised to the Jews and to the Arabs in a series of agreements, treaties, orders, declarations, all of which obviously don’t hold merit.  So we have two rival factions of Arabs and Jews staking their claim to an area of land seen sacred in both of their people’s history.  Trust me, this is an entire semester of history wrapped into like three sentences.

No matter the history, I think it’s safe to say that Israel has reached a point of no return.   I really have no desire to dig deeper into this issue as it gets way to complicated.  We are dealing with militants, rival factions within the Palestinian people themselves, international peace accords that have no bearing on the region, agreements reached between PLO and Israeli leaders over 15 years ago that have not held strong, basically it’s a horrible situation that no one or two super power governments can remedy. 

The US is just a part of this conflict as those directly involved, we provide billions of dollars in military and civilian aid to Israel, and we have taken very strong stances against those countries who seek out the anniliation of Israel.  All in all, I hate to see the year end with the tension building momemtum as it has in the last week or so.  Israel is a very powerful nation who is loathed by most Arab Middle Eastern countries…this is a scary situation that Americans need to pay some mind too.   The region has been at war for years but we have never seen such a barrage of non-stop devastion by the Israelis like this in recent years.  This is a planned, strategic based offensive which needs to be taken seriously.  The Israeli goverment means business this time and we need to be well aware of the outcome.  At least keep yourself abreast of the daily situation.

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Changing the Pro Bowl is a waste of time…leave it in Hawaii

December 31, 2008 · Posted in Featured, Funny and Odd, Junk Mail, Rant, Sports, Things to think about, Topic Blogs · Comment 
Only dude that watches the game
Only dude that watches the game

The news of the NFL Pro Bowl changing venues does not surprise me.   Why?  Knuckleheads thinking that moving a meaningless game to the mainland states will make the game more viable?  No.   It’s a waste of the players time right now and it will continue to be. 

First of all, moving out of Hawaii does suck since it’s a nice trip for these players…but why the hell has it always been played after the Super Bowl?  The hype of the Super Bowl is like no other and once it’s over, it’s over.  The players are nursing injuries, talking to agents, and making plans for the spring and summer.  None of them care about a game in Hawaii!  It’s a free vacation, a chance to act dumb on camera wearing a lei, and play in a worthless glorified high school all star game.  I’ve always thought the Pro Bowl was boring, never got excited about it, and usually changed the channel by halftime. 

The only reason they don’t have the game mid-season is that players could get hurt, or whatever.  Honestly, nobody really get’s all pumped about a game that means nothing and the players half ass it.  You know they do, each running back gets the ball like two times and sits down… never to be seen again.

So…the plan is to have it moved to Miami in 2010 and be played the week before the Super Bowl.  Brilliant idea, I’m sure if one of the starting QB’s happens to be playing in the big game the following week, we can expect a stellar effort.   You bet that starting running backs and receivers will be playing in this game like it’s a backyard flag game, come on!  This isn’t baseball where they have a sweet home run derby and an old timers game to liven up the weekend leading up to the game.    What I find ironic is that the baseball season drags on for 162 games – however the all star activities are very popular and the all-star game gets a huge audience.  Football has a short 16 week season, but nobody gives a crap about the Pro Bowl because of when it’s played, after the season.  Well, either way, it won’t be a popular game to watch. 

…And now a PSA from Plaxico Burress:


 

 

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The team formerly known as the Kansas City Chiefs

December 29, 2008 · Posted in Featured, Funny and Odd, Rant, Sports, Things to think about · Comment 

The season is done.  A record of 2-14 leaves the fans in KC wondering where in the hell this football team went.  What happened to my team?  I don’t want football at Arrowhead stadium to become nothing more than a ritual of drinking beer, eating tasty BBQ, and then watch a football team get embarrassed week after week.  That doesn’t cut it with me and it doesn’t cut it with any fan of the game.

Carl is out as GM, what now?  I have little faith in the ability of Clark Hunt to lead this team in the direction with the spirit and leadership his father showed decades ago.  The Hunt legacy continues in KC with a team and coaching staff who are lost. 

The Chiefs lost their last 9 games of the 2007 season, only to lose 14 more this year.  How can this city survive another rebuilding year or another youth movement?  It’s getting old, the players don’t want it and the fans are sick of it.   You can’t blame everything on draft picks, yeah Ryan Sims was a terd, but we move on ok?  As a unit, nothing clicks with this team anymore.  Internally, the pot has been boiling over all season.  Clark Hunt specifically made mention that the 2008 season needed to be a playoff berth season and that he expected to see visible progress.  Well, Carl’s head didn’t exactly roll, it was escorted out of the building on a platter at the end of the season.   We still get to watch Herm Edwards act like a condescending jerk during press conferences while spewing out his narrow minded perception of why the team fails. 

The quarterback situation was (is) a friggin merry go round, however, Thigpen looked promising as a late season scrambler and adjusting to a more spread offense.  All in all, the offensive line is made of pillows and the loss of Jared Allen on defense was felt all year.  Thank you Carl for taking a big smelly dump on the NFL’s leading sacker and forcing him to do what no other has done- stand up to you and leave town!  The Chiefs paid big time, 10 sacks recorded on the season, a new NFL low.

I guess mediocre performance is accepted in the Chiefs organization…but not elsewhere.  Crennel is fired as Brown’s coach after a 4-12 season, they have sucked and lost 10 games in five of the last six seasons, and he was a first time head coach, he had it coming.  Mangini fired as Jets coach, they start the year 8-3 and it looked like Favre will take this team to the big game, but fail to make playoffs.  A couples of years back they called him “Mangenius” for pulling the team back together again.  They were 23-26 under him which is not great, but not horrible, he still gets the axe.   As we speak, Wade Phillips is probably updating his resume in Dallas from yesterday’s performance.  These are much better teams who have much higher expectations of their coaching staffs!  

But not in KC!   Yippey kai yeee haw no way.   Herm is probably on a much needed vacation, or he’s quietly reviewing films in his office easy chair while thoughts of 2009 sugar plums dance in his head.  Humbug!  The Chiefs are 6-26 under Herm Edwards the last two seasons and he still has the audacity to say he’s upset and this is still his team?  No it’s not.  Where are the owners?  Where’s the organization stepping in saying enough is enough?  Poor job performance typically means grounds for improvement or dismissal.  The team has gone from 9-7 to flat out suck.  Other organizations make moves to improve their team, while the Chiefs front office keeps the good ole’ boy network fully intact at the same time producing a horrible football team.  The time of hiding behind the hope of young players is gone, no more rebuilding, no more 5 year plans.  Stop this downward slide NOW !!!!!!!

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Poetry in the NFL

December 28, 2008 · Posted in Entertainment, Funny and Odd, Sports · Comment 

Owens_Cries_For_RomoAs a life long Dallas Cowboys fan I want the Cowboys to win. But I must say, one quarter into today’s awful game I started getting a little excited about how ugly it was getting for the ‘Boys. I know tomorrow the talk shows here in dallas will be howling and I must say I am happy to see the contrast of the Miami Dolphins making one of the great turnarounds in NFL history and making the playoffs while the Cowboys complete one of the great collapses in NFL history. Coming into the season they were ordained in the press. The hype provided by the HBO series, 12 pro bowl players, the apparent genius of Jason Garrett.

It all proved to be just that: hype. I do not think the Cowboys were ever as good as billed.

On top of that I think the combination of Garrett and Romo caught the NFL off guard in their first full season, but after the league got a taste of what they had they adjusted. And the not-so-dynamic duo did not have anything in reserve.

Romo is not capable of being a great NFL quarterback. I switched over to the Miami game after half time and saw Chad Pennington make precision, deep passes that I just do not think Romo can make. Ever.

Someone needs to pull the stats and look at Romo’s distribution of passes. I think if you exclude all the easy dump off passes to Jason Witten and to the running backs you will not see the kind of consistency to the receivers that you want in an NFL quarterback.

Romo seems like a nice guy and I think he makes an excellent back up quarterback, but enough is enough.

So today was a day of poetic justice:

Pennington beat the Jets.

Parcells and Tony Sporano proved what a manager / coach working with a plan in mind could do if empowered by the owner.

I think Jerry Jones is a good owner, he needs to prove that now by making the changes needed to fix the Dallas Cowboys.  Dare I suggest that at some point the chronic mediocrity of the Cowboys will fade the star and the “America’s Team” status that has gone with it for so long.

A lot of people like to compare the Cowboy’s franchise to the New York Yankees.  Jerry needs to prove that he is an owner comparable to Steinbrener by making ruthless moves to get this team back on top.

This Cinderella story did not have a happy ending.

Go Miami!!!!

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Your wife says you are not a failure – Yep that is a win

December 28, 2008 · Posted in Funny and Odd, Government, Political Figures, Politics · Comment 

Waving bye-bye

Mrs. Bush, Rice: Bush presidency not a failure – Yahoo! News.

WASHINGTON – First Lady Laura Bush disagrees with critics who call the presidency of George W. Bush a failure.

“I know it’s not, and so I don’t really feel like I need to respond to people that view it that way,” Mrs. Bush said in an interview that aired Sunday. “I think history will judge and we’ll see later.”

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice took a similar view in a separate interview.

“I think generations pretty soon are going to start to thank this president for what he’s done. This generation will,” she said.

“Because I think the fact that we have really made foreign assistance not just an issue of giving humanitarian aid or giving money to poor people, but really insisting on good governance and fighting corruption.” she said. “I think the fact that this President has laid the groundwork for a Palestinian state, being the first president, as a matter of policy, to say that there should be one, and now, I think, laying the foundation that’s going to lead to that Palestinian state – I can go on and on.”

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New York Giant’s receiver Burress heading towards not so jolly holiday season

December 24, 2008 · Posted in Featured, People in the news, Sports, Topic Blogs · Comment 

The saga with Plaxico Burress is spiraling downward quickly.  As you recall, he was recently caught in the middle of a nightclub shooting.  Well, he actually shot himself which is humorous, but the fact that an NFL player is walking through clubs with a gun (anyone for that matter) is repulsive. 

Once again, we have another NFL player in the middle of a nasty off the field dilema and again involves law enforcement.  As you also recall, I talked about my old pal Micheal Vick in an earlier article, well folks, are we starting to see an odd pattern here?  I don’t like to hear that this is an “isolated incident” or he was “in the wrong place”…bullcrap.

The NFL is getting soaked to the bone with teams ridden with thugs and losers.  They live a phony celebrity life with their only attribute being “soft hands, speed, and hard to tackle”.  There are a lot of reputable players in the league too and I am not classifying them all as tarnished.  This is not a case of the media being too hard on these guys, or sports writers making these incidents and accidents seem worse than what they are – bologna, it’s becoming a fact of the league.  These are guys who don’t take their professional status seriously.  They have a god given gift that apparently isn’t enough to keep them satisfied.  They have millions of little boys that watch them on Sunday mornings in living rooms across the country- emulating them- dreaming and pretending that they too were NFL football players.  You have millions of people who wear their jerseys in admiration, draft them for fantasy teams, purchase thousand of dollars worth of season tickets, and stand in lines to meet them at public appearances.  WHY?  Because they have a recognizable name?  Jeffrey Dahmer was a public figure but I wouldn’t wear his line of cologne (if he had one, ode de severed head?) 

The list of NFL players getting in trouble is just absurd.   Remember- I typically take the stance of giving these guys second chances, but my positive outlook on “giving everyone a break” is beginning to run very thin.  Look at the other knuckleheads who have been in trouble this year, Chiefs running back Larry Johnson, Larry Johnson again, Broncos receiver Brandon Marshall, Steelers receiver Santonio Holmes, and the list goes on and on, there are reports of DUI arrests, drug offenses, weapons charges, money laundering, and god knows what else.

Hey owners!  Strap on a set of chestnuts and do some housecleaning!  Put a quality product on the field and I don’t mean wins and ticket sales.  Sadly, that’s all you care about.  I’m sure if the NFL doesn’t pan out for these guys they can always get hired by one of the big three automakers.  They both have unions which serve no other purpose than to drag the name down.

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Unbalanced yet fair – Why some should pay more for freedom

December 23, 2008 · Posted in Finance, Financial Crisis, Government, Political Issues, Politics, Social Issues, Society, Thoughts on the economy · 1 Comment 
Too Big for the Average Joe

Too Big for the Average Joe

A week or so ago a friend of mine, in fact a great friend, told me in no uncertain terms that he could not understand why people who are successful in business, and therefore get rewarded well for their efforts should have to pay a higher percentage of those earnings than people who make less. I did not have a perfect answer for him at that time, and I do not claim to have a perfect answer now, but I do think I have a valid point, and I hope he will listen.

Is freedom free? Do some citizens have more rights than others? Does everyone benefit equally from being a citizen? Do some citizens have certain genetic advantages that assist them in performing their work? Does the world need ditch diggers too?

You see America is a living-breathing organism. All the things that happen everyday, happen for a reason, and they happen because someone made them happen. The lights come on when they are supposed to, the streets are paved, our armed forces protect us, our local police protect us and our firefighters keep our neighborhoods from going up in flames. Now none of these events are paid directly by a consumer (except your electricity bill, but those are not the lights I am talking about), instead they are paid for in large part by taxes and fees. City, State and Federal taxes provide many services on a daily basis that allow us to go perform whatever job it is we do to earn a living, if these services were not provided we would more than likely only be able to take care of our own dwellings and our own family’s needs, because everyone else’s problems would simply just be too big a drain on our individual resources.

Therefore, my answer to why some people have to pay more than others, and why that is fair is as follows.

There is a picture associated with this post that I will reference a few times, so glance up to the top left and look at the National Debt Clock now, tick tock tick tock, ok now back to the story. After looking at the clock you will see the National Debt equates to roughly $86,000 per family or $34,000 per person. To the average American citizen this is a death nail. I know plenty of people who could never pay off this debt with their current salaries, and to add insult to injury, even if they could they would simply add to the number, because they would have to go on welfare to feed their families.

You see in America we make money individually, but we spend money universally. The rich are no more protected by the armed forces than the poor. In fact, the poor are far more likely to serve and protect than the rich, whether you are speaking of the armed forces or the police or the fire department, so one could say the poor protect the rich.

Therefore, the poor people who do the leg work to provide the basic security and services we require to live our lives are the same people who could never afford to pay the $86,000 debt we earned together. It is this imbalance that requires the wealthy in this country to help pay for more of the shared debt. You see, the rich person travels to work on the same roads, calls the same police and is protected by the same armed forces, but when they reach their employment destination they happen to earn a great deal more money than many of the people they pass on these roads. Often the poor are given notice of this fact, because the rich are driving cars that cost more than most people earn in a year.

This imbalance brings to mind a simple thought, which is why if the same roads provide the path to earning more, and the police protect more stuff for you, and your freedom is worth more financially to you, shouldn’t you pay more? The rich live a nice life in America. They are free to travel, purchase and enjoy many more things than the poor. If America’s freedoms were compromised there is a better than average chance that the super rich would be targeted first, and one could argue would be affected to the greatest extent. Once you are poor and have very little, it is less plausible to imagine a world where things could get much more difficult, so there is less to defend, from a financial and a lifestyle perspective.

I am breaking the rules and writing a blog that is longer than it should be, but I want to add one last thought in closing. The economy is a fragile thing, as we have had demonstrated in great detail recently, and if the poor are required to help bailout the masses there will be a great deal more pain and suffering in our future. The poor in this country are a real class of people. They do not lobby and they are all too often overlooked, but their children still laugh and cry, get sick and hungry and their education is not a luxury we can afford to overlook. In this day and age, we should not be asking why am I being asked to pay more than everyone else, we should be asking what more can I do to make sure others will someday get to experience the brighter, lighter and more financially rewarding side of freedom.

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Honey this was such a good idea…the snow just disappears!

December 23, 2008 · Posted in Featured, Funny and Odd, Junk Mail, People in the news · 1 Comment 

I sure hope this gets added to the list of the greatest bonehead achievements of all time.  After reading this story from Massachusetts, you might think twice about engaging the use of propane in the snow removal process.  If you do like to burn your snow, do it somewhere else besides your back patio.   Here’s what was running through his mind when rationalizing the use of a flame thrower:
1.  The act of shoveling is so last year, especially when fire is right here at my finger tips
2.  Hey, snow is basically ice – and ice melts with heat? (maybe he forgot wood on that list too)
3.  Think of the time I’ll save melting this snow…time that could be better spent working on the Camero in the driveway
4.  Since I quit smoking – I haven’t used it as much
5.  I’ll have the cleanest patio in the neighorhood (and now think how nicely ventilated the house is)

The human species is a complicated animal.  We eat, we sleep, we procreate, we drink beer, and we never ever learn from the mistakes of others.  I bet even as the back of his house sizzled like a hamburger on the Foreman, he stared at it and said “whoa!”

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Maybe celebs are right…lack of privacy would bug me to death

December 22, 2008 · Posted in Asides, Entertainment, Featured, People in the news, Things to think about, Topic Blogs · Comment 

I look at the front page of Yahoo and the first headline that hits me is that Courtney Cox is declaring her preference against divorce.  What I don’t understand is why our media outlets really think that this interests me.  Who garners this information out of her and has to spew it all over the web?

I just don’t hold much credible stake in the thoughts of one actress on the fate of her marriage.  This isn’t going to make me sit back and say to myself “Wow, if Courtney thinks that way- by golly I need to do it that way.” 

Did Hollywood couples suddenly become the benchmark for quality relationships? 

The bigger issue has got to be the outright lack of fundamental privacy.  Money, power, fame, and a life that is not their own if you think about it.  This goes for anyone in the public eye and does fame really work itself out to be something good for you?  You have a lot of money- but others control it.  You have your picture everywhere- and people use it however they want.  Your personal life is not your own- rather a constant topic of conversation for others to exploit and hurl back in your face.  

It bores me when I see this kind of news, which is probably exactly what she wishes the paparazzi would be…bored and uninterested.

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Older kitty cat needs new home in Chicago area, can you help?

December 19, 2008 · Posted in Big Business Ripoffs, Entertainment, Funny and Odd · 2 Comments 

Found this on Fark.com and may be the biggest WTF of the week.

This kitty wants to be a domestic cat and live in a condo in Chicago. If you can help, let her know. Help may or may not include Zoloft, Abilify, or Valium.

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