Random Thoughts 7.29.08

• I was watching the Eddie Murphy movie The Distinguished Gentleman over the weekend, and was amazed how similar his campaign speeches in the beginning sounded to some of the things Barack Obama is saying now. In 1992, these were supposed to be the inane ramblings of a con artist, and it was supposed to be funny to think that people would buy into it and vote for him.
  
• Bennigan's is filing for bankruptcy. They haven't been the same since they discontinued the burger topped with the giant wheel of fried mozzarella, but I'm sure going to miss the deep-fried turkey-and-ham-and-cheese sandwiches.
• With NFL training camp opening, and Jeremy Shockey living the Mardi Gras life this season, I need to take what may be one of the last opportunities to gloat over my Giants' Super Bowl win by posting this pic:
  
  That's right, it's a Nicaraguan peasant wearing one of the unsellable Patriots 2007 world champs T-shirts.
• Richie Sexson sucks.

No I Don't Have Feelings

'Cuz feelings are gay!

Weekend misogyny, beeyotches!

That About Sums It Up

This is an actual bumper sticker. You can get it here, and the proceeds go to a good cause. First seen on Vodkapundit.

This is about where I'm at as far as the '08 election goes (though you have no idea how happy I am to see that bloodsucker Edwards caught up in a scandal that's going to cost him a shot at VP). What the hell, I live in Delaware--my state's whopping three electoral votes are going to Obama no matter what I do. Maybe I'll throw my vote away on Bob Barr. I'm really more of a Libertarian in Republican's clothing anyway.

Stray-Rod

The last-ever MLB All-Star Game at Yankee Stadium is right around the corner, and all the buzz this week is about....A-Rod and Madonna. Of course, all this comes as a surprise to no one who's been paying any kind of attention to baseball and/or the gossip pages (which seem to be pretty interchangeable right now)--strippers are crawling out of the woodwork to get their 15 seconds (you don't get minutes in this case; he's a ballplayer, not a governor) of fame by telling the world they banged A-Rod (seen at left popping out with the game on the line in the 9th--AGAIN), and he was even caught going to a Toronto hotel last year with a stripper who bore a body type resemblance to She-Hulk. No, the only question here is what on earth would possess the soon-to-be-ex-Mrs. Rodriguez to conceive a second child with a world-class philanderer like her soon-to-be-ex-husband. It all becomes clearer if you accept the rumors that she ditched them in Miami while she ran around Paris with Lenny Kravitz: more kid$=more child $upport. There's gold in them thar balls!

Of course, I do have to stick up for the guy a little bit--he plays for my team, after all. My pal and Red Sox fan Pat sent me this little gem, making sure to point out the part about A-Rod drinking sex-on-the-beach cocktails. Yeah, drinking fruit drinks and then nailing a hot stripper--that's really gay, there, buddy! If only he could be more hetero--you know, like Papi and Man-Ram.

Use(less)net

By now everyone who reads this blog knows what a huge fan I am of the New York Football Giants. What you may not know is where I go for my daily dose of breaking Giants news. Of course I check BBI on a daily basis, but that site is only updated daily, so for breaking news and discussion, I head for the Giants newsgroup on Usenet (for the truly geeky, it's alt.sports.football.pro.ny-giants). There, I can find out what other Giants fans are reading, watching, and thinking, and occasionally I even participate in the discussion.

But all that just got a lot harder. In an egregious example of overstepping the authority of one's office, New York State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo has strongarmed several major internet service providers into dropping most or all access to Usenet newsgroups. The reason? 88 out of over 100,000 of them--that's around .08%--contained some form of child porn. Does this sound like overkill to you? Why not ban digital cameras? Or analog cameras and scanners? That would ensure that no one ever trades child porn again ever. Or extend it into other areas of life. Want to reduce highway fatalities? Ban automobiles--everyone takes the train! But wait, once in a while, people get hit by trains (either accidentally or as a means of suicide). So it looks like we're back to the ol' Foot 'n' Leather Express.

The Founding Fathers thought that the right to free and open speech and expression was so important that they made it the very first piece of the Bill of Rights. But Cuomo doesn't seem to care, extorting ISPs with the threat of bad publicity, since, as the CNet article stresses, using the law to accomplish this has already been ruled unconstitutional. Hopefully, the ACLU (who, in their defense, was involved in overturning Pennsylvania's attempt to legislate Internet censorship) will take a break from defending terrorists and rapists and put the pressure on New York and the ISPs to bring back our newsgroups. My Giants offseason depends on it.

Tech Tip: Clean Your System

One of our staff introduced me to a great little utility last week to clean up (and speed up) Windows-based systems. It's called CrapCleaner, or CCleaner for short. There's not much to it--just download it (it's freeware), install it, and run it until it says there's nothing left to clean. It doesn't take too long to run, and most of the default settings work just fine. My only caveat is to think twice before letting it clean up your Internet Explorer/Firefox stuff. Chances are if you've got saved passwords/browser histories/recently typed URLs, you've got them for a reason, and deleting them won't give you much of a speed boost. Other than that, this is a great little utility for computers that haven't been formatted in a while.

In Memoriam: Tim Russert 1950-2008

I was asked over the weekend if I would be taking down the farting video that I posted a couple of weeks ago in light of Tim Russert's passing on Friday. The answer is no, I won't, but I will take a moment to pay respect to a good newsman. Russert did a better job than most at attempting to put his personal views aside and present a balanced viewpoint, always asking the tough questions regardless of the subject's political affiliations. Russert's voice will be missed among the mainstream media elite.

Strahan

With the start of the NFL's training camp season right around the corner, one of my all-time favorite Giants, Michael Strahan, announced his retirement yesterday. I'm a little surprised that he'd walk away from a guaranteed $4 million (with bonuses rumored to kick in at the almost-surely-reachable level of 6 sacks), especially to rebuild his war chest after his shrew of an ex-wife cleaned him out, but I can respect his desire to go out with his health more or less intact and as a Super Bowl champion. He has the single season sack record, and he's still nearly 60 sacks behind the career record, so that one is likely forever out of his reach. It would have been nice of him to have let his team, his coach, or at least his front office staff know of his decision before announcing it to the press, but for the most part, his departure was fittingly dignified. Let's just hope he's learned a thing or two from Tiki Barber and leaves behind any petty grudges he may have had in the locker room as he searches for a job in the broadcast booth. Thanks for fifteen great years, captain.

Friday Videos 5.23.08

In honor of Yankee skipper Joey G. getting the boot during last night's win over the O's, here's the best manager tirade ever:



And here's Meet the Press host Tim Russert on MSNBC. He loses his train of thought right after he says "No one has appeared on that program..." at about 14 seconds in. See if you can hear why:

Teddy and McCain

Ted Kennedy has a malignant brain tumor. John McCain is releasing his medical records. With timing like that, it can't be coincidence. I won't be at all surprised to see whichever candidate the Democrats end up nominating try to make some political hay out of this--after all, McCain is only a few years younger than Uncle Teddy, and is himself a cancer survivor (albeit "only" melanoma--a skin cancer). The Dems, especially Obama, love to portray themselves as young and hip and paint conservatives as old fuddy-duddies. It worked pretty well against Bob Dull Dole, but wasn't quite so hot against Reagan in the '80s. Hopefully McCain's medical history won't have any red flags, because while I'm not his biggest supporter, I respect his service record and find him far less abhorrent than Obama/Clinton and will be voting for him in November.

Fists of Fury

Goose Gossage is crying "fowl" over Joba Chamberlain's fist-pumps after inning-ending strikeouts. He does bear a striking resemblance to Howard Dean in 2004, but Joba's just an emotional guy who really loves the game and reacts just as visibly to a bad outing as a good one. Papelbon up there in Boston has been known to do almost the same thing after he closes out a game, but he almost always gets a free pass. (He did catch a little bit of heat for dancing around in his underwear, but hey, the Sox had just won the Series, so even I'll give him a pass for that one.) And how many home runs has Man-Ram stood there and watched? Joba's not trying to show guys up--he's just showing a little heart and emotion. That is acting like a Yankee, no matter what Goose says. And it's nothing but good for the game.

Man Movies I Missed

I was watching TV earlier and saw the commercial for the new Indiana Jones flick. I know there's a lot of buzz about it, but I'm just not catching the fever and couldn't understand why, until it hit me that I've never actually seen any of the first three all the way through. Sure, I've flipped past the boulder scene, or Mola Ram tearing out the dude's heart, but I've never sat down with a glass of scotch or a Chicory Stout and watched Raiders of the Lost Ark, or Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. That got me to thinking....there are a lot of classic "guy staples" that I've never taken the time to watch. Maybe it's something I should work on the next time I get a rainy Saturday. Here's a list of what I consider the top 10 that I've never seen (at least not all the way through):

10. War Games
9. Platoon
8. Dirty Rotten Scoundrels
7. Heat
6. Scarface
5. Any of the existing Indiana Jones trilogy
4. The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly
3. Rocky I or II (though I've seen III and IV so many times I can probably recite them from memory
2. Casino
1. Raging Bull

And that's just a small sampling. I ought to be ashamed of myself.