not real time Olympics

It’s Winter Olympics time. All the thrills, spills, and chills. A chance to cheer on the winners and make fun of the losers. So far we’ve seen history made, expectations met, and hope fulfilled.

Too bad it’s not live in most places. If you live on the West Coast like me, you are treated to the utter professionalism of NBC Sports by seeing everything up to three hours later. Thank goodness for Twitter, otherwise it would be damn near midnight PST before you saw Evan Lysecek spin his way to a gold medal. Try to complain to the brass, and all you get is, “You can’t please everybody.” The thing is, nobody’s pleased. Even the people who get to see stuff live have to suffer through commentator prattle, seemingly endless human interest montages, and a billion commercials. Let’s no forget webcast blackouts, and a homepage that leaves much to be desired. All in all, NBC and Dick Ebersol get a big thumbs down.

We now know why the network projected a 400 million dollar loss by broadcasting the games. They’re salty and they are making the viewers pay for it. I say that NBC sports deserve a big “FU” back from us. It’s bad enough they screw up their tennis coverage every year, but now to turn the Winter Olympics into one giant clusterfuck is ridiculous.

Alert to CBS and ABC, if you get a chance to cover the Olympics in the future, look to NBC as a guide for what NOT to do. Now I’m off to twitter to catch the latest Olympic news..LIVE.

Bastids.

cooning guido style

The Italian Community in New Jersey is up in arms because MTV has a brand new show called, “Jersey Shore” which showcases a cultural subset who call themselves ”Guidos”. Guidos are dark-skinned (due to excessive tanning),  have wild hair, have their own vernacular, and spend their time partying, drinking, gelling their hair, and wasting time. Something about this sounds familiar but I can’t put my finger on it just yet… But Italians from the Eastern seaboard and beyond are decrying the show for exploiting ethnic Italian stereotypes. They call the show racist. Again, this sounds so friggin’ familiar. Hmmmm. Due to pressure, two advertisers have pulled out. Undaunted MTV decided to run the show anyway.

That isn’t surprising in the least. Who cares about stereotypes when you’re making tons of money? You know that familiar feeling I kept mentioning? It’s the sense of deja vu. MTV and its demonic sister, Vh-1 have been a showcase for black folks to make fools out of themselves. Now I guess it’s time for them to dig up some more old stereotypes in order to offend a whole new audience. It’s not like I’m placing the blame entirely on the networks, they wouldn’t be able to have these shows if there weren’t idiots out there willing to sell themselves out for a little bit of fame and a $5,000.00 honoriarium.

The Guidos in question say that they are just expressing family and ethnic pride. I could go with that to a certain extent. Say like, if there were was some redeeming knowledge in learning how to gel your hair perfectly and say, “Yo”! Let’s just call all this for what it is: Cooning. Cooning always pays. It’s that simple. Even if there was enough outrage to get “Jersey Shore” taken off, what’s to say that the very next week  MTV wouldn’t come up with, “Chinatown Nights” or some other bullshit?

It’s so easy to sell out now it’s not even funny, nor is it entertaining. Flip any channel and you’ll be confronted with the very worst parts of our individual cultures. As long as there are people willing to buck and shine (in Jersey Shore’s case: Oil and Gel), there’s always going to be someone who’s willing to film it. Of course there’s always those willing to watch.

polls and purges

It’s been awhile but I had to deal with some things in the real world.  They haven’t been completely dealt with but, here I am. Writing supposedly heals the soul. I’m about to do some healing right now. 

Well last night was election night.  A year and almost a day before, one of the most historic elections in our country’s history took place. Barack Obama was elected as the 44th President and the world rejoiced. This year after tirelessly campaigning against Obama, the opposition sought to wrest seats and the conscience of the electorate from him. After the results came in late last night, The Right were celebrating gubernatorial victories in Virginia and New Jersey. They were well within their rights to. Chris Christie and Bob McDonnell ran smart campaigns that focused on the issues of their respective states. Moderates and Independents flocked to the polls while the Democrats stayed away. The massive Obama ground game was non-existent and even an appearance by the man himself didn’t help. So, these wins were a referendum on Obama and the Democratic controlled Senate right?

Not so fast. State elections in an off-presidential year have had little effect historically. Meaning, gains in one election cycle don’t necessarily mean the same gains in the next one. Also, let’s be real. John Corzine and Craig Deeds weren’t the best candidates. Corzine’s popularity numbers were in the low 30′s. Deeds-Crikey! This dolt actually thought he could win being an anti-Obama Democrat. He was trounced and rightly so. That just goes to show that a campaign is only as good as the campaigner. You can’t make a rose out of a weed. These guys did not appeal to young voters, minorities, and left leaning Independents-the core coalitions of the Democratic Party. They did very little to inspire the base so no wonder why the stayed away in droves. If anything, Obama upped the bar significantly for modern politics. You have to be an outstanding candidate with command of the issues, you have to rally the base, you have to appeal to those outside your party, and you must have a top notch campaign staff. Neither Democratic had any of these things and as a result, the Republicans won.

But those races weren’t the most significant ones of the night. The race that everyone’s attention was focused on was a special election Congressional race in the 23rd District in New York State. Republican DeeDee Scozzafava was hand-picked by the GOP bigwigs in the district to run for the seat. Initially, they saw no problems. NY-23 was solidly Republican and Scozzafava was a fiscally conservative/socially moderate candidate who fight right in with the East Coast Republican establishment. That is until The Right of the right set their sights on the seat. Soon, the nationwide Republican Purge hit and Scozzafava was labeled a liberal and a radical and was displaced in favor of a handpicked Conservative by the name of Doug Hoffman. Armed with a cache of out of district money, the blessings of Dick Amrey, Sarah Palin, Rush Limbaugh, and Tea Party talking points, Hoffman positioned himself as the main contender to battle Democrat Bill Owens. Scozzafava saw the writing on the wall and bowed out of the race.

Funny how things just seem to right themselves (don’t pardon the pun, it was bad). Hoffman seemed to have everything in hand. He was the right wing’s blessed child running in a solid red district. Forget the fact that he didn’t actually LIVE in the district. Forget the fact that he was completely disinterested in local issues. Forget the fact that he pissed off the local press by skirting questions and bringing everyone’s favorite Astro-turfer Dick Armrey to a sit down interview. Forget the fact that Scozzafava had one more card up her sleeve. Two days before the election, she endorsed OWENS. She even made a round of robo calls stating that Owens would be the best choice. Hell hath no fury and all that. Fox News, Michael Steele, and the others who had endorsed Hoffman over her were left with egg all on their mugs. Credit to them for recovering quickly and predicting a Hoffman victory. Too bad they underestimated the voters of NY-23 like they underestimated Scozzafava.

They just never seem to get things right, those folks. By Wednesday morning,  Bill Owens was declared the winner of a house seat that hadn’t had a Democratic butt sit in it in about a century. The folks of NY-23 weren’t fooled by the fly by night Conservative. They weren’t swayed by Sarah Palin’s Facebook encouragement. They weren’t turned on by Rush’s invective. Good for them. Good for the rest of us. The purge didn’t work this time, and if they keep making the same mistakes, it will never work. This was the race that was supposed to be the real test of the resurgent Republican Party. It was supposed to be a statement against President Obama.

See how well that turned out….

Rushed and Rammed

It seems that Big Rush Limbaugh isn’t satisfied with spreading his bile over the airwaves on a daily basis. Now he wants to become a NFL owner. It’s been reported that Limbaugh is interested in purchasing the woeful St. Louis Rams franchise and my goodness has the poo been flying. There are some that say he should be able to buy a team. I mean, it’s capitalism as it is at work; those that have money should buy what they want. There are others who say that Limbaugh has no business getting involved with professional sports, specifically a sport were 70% of the athletes are black based on his past statements.

I am on the side of those who are like, ” No way, no how”.  There’s something about Limbaugh being in a position to buy and trade black flesh that makes me sick to my stomach. He may see it as a purely money making venture, but I can’t help but think he could use his position to create some sick social experiment. Besides, I don’t know any African American player with even a smidgen of pride who would play for him, regardless of what Stephen A. Smith says.

And let’s talk about Mr. Smith for a minute. Oh, this dude is so making  HBCUs look bad right now. Mr. Smith is convinced that those black athletes who are vowing not to play under a Limbaugh regime are on some bullshit because he feels anyone with a lot of melanin and who plays pro football can be bought. Great, just what people need: A fresh dose of cynicism to muddle the debate over what’s truly right and what’s truly wrong. Hacks like Smith are the reason why I can barely tolerate sports journalism now. It’s nothing more than an exercise in projection. These so called commentators foolishly wax poetic about the glory days of the sport all the while barely disgusting their contempt for the athletes who play it. Their smugness and the obsession for getting the “controversy behind the story”, makes for interesting by lines and not much else.  So, Smith hoeing himself out to anyone who will listen because he’s guaranteed to say something controversial provides little insight into this issue.

This issue simply is this: Limbaugh is an asshole. There are NFL owners who are assholes. However, Limbaugh’s assholery isn’t limited to the world of sports. He’s has managed to offend nearly every living person representing nearly every group on this planet. The question is does the dominant sports franchise in the United States need Limbaugh in the mix? With all the problems within the NFL? Do they DESERVE Limbaugh? My answer is no. Didn’t we learn anything from Marge Schott?

The Laureates of WTF?

Harvard Law Graduate, best selling author, United States Senator, President, Nobel Laureate for Peace. Barack Obama has accomplished more in his 48 years than many. Why is it so damn hard for some folks to acknowledge those accomplishments? The amount of hate is sickening. He is the 3rd African American and the first American sitting President since Woodrow Wilson to win the Nobel Prize. Where’s the pride? Seriously.

The Republican’s response included trotting out Chairman Michael Steele who declared that Obama didn’t deserve the award. The Right’s reaction sank to even lower levels with various pundits and internet warriors stating that they agreed with the Taliban and that Obama should give the award back. The most egregious statement was that Obama’s win was the result of an affirmative action quota. This, from the people who claim to love America so much?

My God, what is wrong with these people? Once again, folks from other countries are showing more love towards our President than people living right here. Even those on The Left were sniping. I’m just so done. If it matters, I’m proud and happy. Even though I have disagreed with some of PBO’s policies, I think his winning the Nobel Prize is freakin’ awesome. I’m encouraged to follow the President’s call for action for peace. Lord knows we need it–especially right here in the good ol’ U.S.A.

uh serena…

When you finally earn the number #1 rank back, you’re supposed to WIN!

Do better in Doha girlfriend, the haters are already salivating.

Speaking of which ESPN’s Abigail Lorge can kick rocks. The U.S Open is old news, she needs to move the hell on. It’s disgusting to see how some in the media and the blogosphere want to see people suffer.

Ugh!