Posted 11:33 AM by Gene

TRANSLATION: Republicans will use bloggers as lobbyists. Democrats use bloggers as lobbyists. What's the point of blogging when it becomes a full-blown parrot factory?

Posted 11:24 AM by Gene

So "The Street" has decided (or been told) Saddam was a martyr.

If we got The Street's favorites together they'd make up a third of the ruling class of Hell.

Posted 8:35 AM by Gene

What if they gave an inauguration -- and everyone was bored?

Does anyone still want Ah-NULT for prez?

Posted 8:30 AM by Gene

We are permanently stuck between two lunkheaded philosophies of government: the Republican kind, which gives everything away to the hyperrich, and the Democratic kind, which taxes us to death. Where do these louts get their philosophies? We know hardly anyone in Congress reads, or thinks. Do they learn these things by osmosis? How do they become such intransigent enemies of the people?

(Via Jo-NAH, who is merely Bob's opposite number)

Posted 8:23 AM by Gene

Branson East finally lets its theme-park customers eat at the attractions. You wonder why it took so long. They've had food stands at Coney Island for decades.

Posted 8:12 AM by Gene

Complete this sentence:

Confoundingly, the quality of network television seems to be going in two directions at once: The best shows, at least the weekly dramas, get better, while the worst shows keep drooping deeper.

Happily, there are more of the best shows and fewer of the worst ones. At least that's what certain TV ad-blurbists believe -- which is why we've stopped believing them.

Posted 5:41 PM by Gene

This smells of trouble. GPS's for Mexican migrants? What's to prevent them from using them to lead gaggles of illegals across the border?

Posted 1:41 PM by Gene

Somebody doesn't like Sen. Hein-TZZZ -- and that somebody is a FOB'N'H!

Plus he's selling a book. Terry, does anyone really care who you were?

Posted 1:27 PM by Gene

USAOKAY!!!!! interviews THE WORLD'S GREATEST COMEDIAN out of character after his battery of publicists assures him it's the paper's policy never to ask entertainers a tough question.

Posted 1:22 PM by Gene

So the next time you want to pass something get HIS approval FIRST!

Posted 1:20 PM by Gene

Sen. Whine and NANCY! want us to redeploy outoutOUT!!!!!

(Via CNN.com, where this news has been "developing" for almost twenty minutes)

Posted 1:09 PM by Gene

HERR DOKTOR SONDHEIM'S DOING KING LEAR!

Well, sort of.

Posted 11:36 AM by Gene

Aside from shifting the print date (because millions of readers wanted it, possibly including those who had their subscriptions canceled) how is the man who shares a last name with the manager of the '62 Mets changing PEOPLE NEWSRAG? WELL, he's starting a "regular history section", perhaps to monetize his archives, plus an environmental section (I guess that means a global warming lecture every week), plus a "law section" written by one Reynolds Holding (does that sound like a company name?), plus he's launching something that sounds suspiciously like Peter Jennings's "Person of the Week" stories -- plus he's going to uglify the Web site! (But why on Monday?)

The only question left is, when do enough readers quit that JonBoy overtakes him in circulation?

Posted 9:22 AM by Gene

So Ohio State's ATHUHLETIC program has a SYNCHRONIZED SWIMMING TEAM -- and it's throwing off $1 million to the library. Well WHOOPEE.

At what point does an INSTEETOOSHUN UV HYER EHDYUKAYSHUN grow so big and bloated that it serves no purpose except self-preservation?

And what are 52,000 "students" learning there?

Posted 9:01 AM by Gene

Is GM threatening to build more cars people don't need so Toyota can't be number one?

Posted 8:59 AM by Gene

The black Ralph Kramden (and no, we're not talking Congressman Rangel) makes another "comedy":

The whole plot could easily fit into a 45-minute TV show, and there are far too few laughs for a movie being marketed as roly-poly slapstick. And by the way, marketing departments: I love Tag Heuer, Armani and BMW's Z Series.

Posted 8:32 AM by Gene

I have all but stopped reading the brand-name pundits because they best personify the hacks' feet-on-the-desk attitude. Just write a column -- or better still, have an intern write it; no one will know the difference. For the first time in memory I decided to read Eleanor Clift® because she was writing about NANCY!, and I figure they must be close friends; I can see them yakety-yakking together about old boyfriends or rumors or skin care or whatever two yakety-yakkers will yak about. Of COURSE her column was nothing but the standard propaganda boilerplate. If the biz fired its brand-name pundits that alone would guarantee a better product -- or at least one that temporarily couldn't get any worse.

Posted 8:29 AM by Gene

Clever statistics: total "music" unit sales are up -- but total album sales are down, and the only up part of the biz is singles downloads -- and the good news is their rate of growth is slowing.

Could it be? Even the "music" S&M phreaks can't stand the garbage?

Posted 8:15 AM by Gene

Every day on the way in to work I pass two CHEAP CHANNEL billboards. Currently they carry ads for a social-service agency and a "criminal defense attorney." As you may guess it's not a nice neighborhood. But then you might guess it's not a nice neighborhood because CHEAP CHANNEL put the ads there. I can imagine what ol' LOWSY MAYS thought of the inner city -- the same he thought about classical and jazz, which enabled him to buy and merge and chase people away from the radio.

Of course LOWSY's empire's new owners have a trick up their nasty sleeves: LED billboards. I can see them at night in residential neighborhoods. Oh well, this neighborhood doesn't have to worry, so long as the CHEAP sells it social-service agencies and "criminal defense attorneys."

P. S. CHEAP and GOODTHINGS ENTERTAINMENT are putting ads in New York taxis. That should pay for the LBO!

Posted 8:59 PM by Gene

Dubya's naming a new League of Nations ambassador -- and Foggy Bottom is not amused:

"This building's not too happy," the source said. "No one here likes Zal. He is known as being a pain in the ass to work for and doesn't get on well with the Foreign Service."

Another -- er, qualification?

(Via NYSun.com)

Posted 6:37 PM by Gene

A poignant blog entry about the StinkyInky staffers who've lost their jobs has degenerated in comments into a fight over two zillionaire PROFIT CENTERS who'll be keeping theirs.

Yes, I feel sorry for the people who've lost work. But dammit the biz puts out too much junk -- especially from the PROFIT CENTERS. The pettiness of some of the comments further points to the widespread denial that THEY, the HACKS, for extruding an INFERIOR PRODUCT, are to blame. And that DEFINITELY includes some of the AWARD WINNERS.

And don't doubt it -- all the financial pruning will make a bad biz WORSE.

(Via the usual Romy)

Posted 6:18 PM by Gene

When the Alexander Throttlebottom of the cabinet fires a nuclear boss for not fixing lax security, you know THAT'S a PROBLEM.



T-H-R-O-T-T-L-E-B-O-T-T-O-M.

Posted 6:08 PM by Gene

Just what we need, MR. DILBERT: BUGMEISTER for PRESIDENT. Whether he'd consent is another matter; it would be a demotion from running 27 universes. But think of it this way: with you as VICE-PRESIDENT we'd NEVER be FUNCTIONAL AGAIN.

(Via InfoWorld)

Posted 5:51 PM by Gene

You've heard the old saw about how electricity and water follow the path of least resistance? The same is true with MONEY -- and pieces of -- LEGISLATION. Some unscrupulous CONGRESSPOOPS and LOBBYISTS will find ways around the alleged reforms being approved in this first PR burst of the NEW! IMPROVED!! CONGRESS!!!, and here's betting their unreforms prove intractable.

Especially with "The McDONALD'S CLAUSE."

Posted 5:36 PM by Gene

TRANSLATION: We could be in for the first recession caused by a housing glut.

Remember the Great Depression? The proximate causes were too much speculation -- and dozens and dozens of auto manufacturers making too many cars. Here we have a comfy-cosy combination of both -- too many McMansions and condos going up and too much flipping. But the RealTOR® idiots will go to their dying day insisting THE MEDIA DID IT!!!!!

Posted 5:32 PM by Gene

The TWXSTERS are trying to force a shotgun wedding of the two incompatible HD DVD formats. The ultimate outcome of such improvisations if unchecked is bloatware of a different kind.

Remember -- only the PUBLIC pays.

Posted 5:26 PM by Gene

That The Paper of Re-CORD devotes three pages to an obituary of the owner of two incarnations of Sardi's and his "fine Italian hand" is its own eulogy to New York's entertainment industry, however many $10,000 seats it sells. He was there in the middle of it, when it counted. Today it only counts grosses. RIP.

Posted 3:17 PM by Gene

We've been trying to view the NEW! IMPROVED!! HOUSE!!! on C-SPAN.com, but for us it's become a willies-provoking experience, and we think we know why: even when The Members are addressing other Members, they're still talking to THEMSELVES.

Posted 3:15 PM by Gene

We agree drivertv.com is one slick Web site, and it's probably even slicker on cable. Just one question: why do we still need auto dealers?

Posted 11:33 AM by Gene

One Second of Superbowl [sic] Advertising = $87,000? (CNN/Money) [MediaBistro link]

When it buys you a luxury box and gives you permission to spend weeks telling off your underlings -- WHY NOT?

Posted 11:03 AM by Gene

This year is set to be the hottest on record worldwide due to global warming and the El Nino weather phenomenon, Britain's Meteorological Office said on Thursday.

Tick...tick...tick....

Posted 10:48 AM by Gene

Billionaire pleads for help in space race

You don't suppose -- nah. NAH. The founder of Amazon.com? TAXPAYERS? IXNAY.

Posted 9:58 AM by Gene

Hey! Look who's running for president! ME!

Posted 9:50 AM by Gene

The greatest money making machine in world history is having trouble making money for its advertisers!

In many cases, the cost of an eBags.com ad placed on either Google's own Web site or one of its affiliates now equals 45% of the price of the product it promotes. That's crimping the company's own profit margins and forcing it to look elsewhere to market its bags.

"We're testing print ads right now," said Cobb, whose company will spend up to $8 million on ads in 2007.

Old media's coming BACK?!?!?

The investors read Cheapie Marketwatch -- the stock's going up!

Posted 9:47 AM by Gene

Mr. My Business is My Business, who would spend our entire gross domestic product on political campaigns, thinks the minimum wage should be ZERO!

And what kind of minimum wage would YOU like to make, BIZ?

Posted 6:49 AM by Gene

Now ya done it, Bob -- you got Congress to thinking it should mandate lower executive pay!

Which will be worse -- the posturing of Democrats or the greed of Republicans?

Lowe's shares have tripled during Nardelli's tenure at Home Depot.

Who says he didn't do his job?

P. S. The subordinates mourn a disciple of the "LEGENDARY" LEGENDARY WELCH (did YOU put that word in, JOHN?):

As the news of his resignation on Jan. 3 shot through Home Depot's white-walled Atlanta headquarters and reached stores, some employees text-messaged each other with happy faces and exclamation points.

:) !

Posted 6:23 PM by Gene

Survey: Net expands musical tastes

TRANSLATION: "Music" S&M phreaks are spending more money and more time on the Web to hear more of a slightly newer version of the same old same old.

Posted 6:09 PM by Gene

This is what THE WORLD'S OLDEST ADOLESCENT lives for:

Tower of London gets first female Beefeater after 500 years

Posted 5:55 PM by Gene

"Kim was in many ways dealt a weaker hand than his father, but he has played it better," says Brian Myers, a North Korea specialist at Dongseo University in Busan, South Korea.

Have wimps as your opponents and I say that deals you a few pretty good cards too.

Posted 5:45 PM by Gene

US 'would have handled hanging differently'

NOW they tell us.

It appears the investigation into the execution will last a lot longer than the execution.

Posted 5:42 PM by Gene

Honorary Mayor Mike thinks he can ban cell phones in schools. He'd be just as successful introducing learning.

Posted 5:27 PM by Gene

Here is Exhibit A in why we need FEWER sports columnists. Okay, so coaches may lie when they express their undying fealty to a given team. Plainly coaches should use sense -- something, we will admit, in short supply in football factories and the NFL. But is it treason to change your mind? And really, isn't it a stretch to think anyone in the ESPNCORP world of SPORT has character? That changing your mind is treason among men who lack character indicates again that the FRED FLINTSTONES of SPORTS MEDIA threw away their locks and keys a long time ago for the sake of always spouting off.

Posted 5:23 PM by Gene

When a con-SER-va-tive or glibertarian justifies our long-term working- and middle-class wage stagnation by writing how many DVDs and iPods today's money can buy, he's up to something -- and that something is the usual worship of the superrich, who can buy a lot more DVDs and iPods.

Posted 3:40 PM by Gene

Bush Wants Balanced Budget by 2012

Pffh-hh-hh hh hh hh hh hh hh ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!!!

Posted 3:37 PM by Gene

The lacrosse team at DICKIE V's favorite school has invited two of the "accused" players back, which leads one to suspect it may be sued as well.

Posted 10:30 AM by Gene

Gentlemen, start your engines! HOLLYWOOD STENOGRAPHER! PAUL DRECK! USAOKAY!!!!! Some guesser is predicting THE CONSPIRACY will gross $10 BILLION THIS YEAR!!!!!

Of course these idiots also said last summer would be (to use a favorite expression at OKAY!!!!!!) BOFFO too.

Posted 10:13 AM by Gene

Jonny Hairshirt proposes moving Lucy Van Pelt back to EARLY MORNING!

This man is a FOUNT of WISDOM!

Posted 9:37 AM by Gene

We knew Iran was meddling in Iraq -- but who knew it was so diligent it's supporting both sides?

Posted 9:18 AM by Gene

The Home Depot's chairman agrees to resign thanks to his high pay and lousy performance -- and gets a $210 million severance package!

So he makes big money coming and going!

Posted 8:44 AM by Gene

A lobbyist does the illegal legally.

Posted 8:15 AM by Gene

How do you like that? Everyone and his DOG is writing a think piece about how movies stink! They must REALLY be good! This time it's a couple of scribblers from The Cute Little Pink Paper -- and theirs is WAY better than David Denby's platinum-plated excuse, despite the prefab "snarky" tone. It's so quotable we don't know where to begin -- but at least it doesn't pin the blame on the popcorn restaurants, nor does it quote four movie executives. "[T]hat Big Serious Oscar-Grubbing Dump you took on us all fall and winter" indeed! How about this one?

• We’re not stupid: No one in Hollywood actually loves Jesus. Things have gotten niche-ean now that the FoxFaith brand has launched. (Good job lifting the phrase “faith-based” from the Bush camp, News Corp.!) We suppose the Christians won’t realize it was News Corp.’s Fox Searchlight that released Notes on a Scandal, with Cate Blanchett fornicating with a teen.

No we're not!

Posted 6:57 AM by Gene

Well WHOOPEE! Branson East sets a new box-office "record" by fleecing the tourists. I am so PROUD!

LOBBYIST PLATITUDE OF THE WEEK:

Charlotte St. Martin, executive director of The League of American Theatres and Producers, Inc., said in a statement, "We are delighted to announce this record breaking week on Broadway. It is important, HOWEVER [Boneheaded maybe-we're-making-too-much-money-producing-junk disclaimer], to highlight that although grosses and attendance numbers continue to rise steadily, so have the costs of mounting and running shows, enabling only a few productions shows [Lobbyists'-interns-typing-too-fast SIC] to recognize profits. We continue to focus our efforts on controlling those costs we can control, to create a healthy producing environment and to allow even more productions to thrive."

Knock it off! Branson East's theme parks are in business for THEMSELVES.

Posted 6:42 AM by Gene

SKNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNX (with a co-author) mourns for the loss of the old Republican Party, a party that cooperated with Democrats (to get the Democrats' job done, but S. doesn't say that), and with Gerry we say total goodbye to the "sweet bipartisanship" which NEWT killed (so says Kenneth Duberstein, former wunderkind, now a high-powered -- LOBBYIST), the bipartisanship of "Cheney, Rumsfeld, Baker, Greenspan and Scowcroft"....

Gerry is buried today. May we please let him rest in peace?

Posted 8:09 PM by Gene

Okay, nobody got shot, or raped, or assaulted, but that this story of cheerleaders on a rampage and the "adults" who enabled them became such a big thing in Dallas says, as I've said before, something has snapped in the national psyche, and soothing bromides about Gerry and bipartisanship or responsibility won't change that.

(Via AMERICA'S LEADING...oh, you know)

Posted 5:45 PM by Gene

And further on country music, somebody tried to sell a record during something called the PetroSun Bowl, and all they left was a picture.



We'll take it.

(Image link fixed 8/9/2008; dead link to original)

Posted 5:43 PM by Gene

Empire Zone: How Would You Advise Spitzer?

Be very careful with subpoenas.

Posted 5:39 PM by Gene

The new League of Nations boss starts off on the wrong foot:

"Unfortunately, the United Nations, though we have been playing pretty [SIC] instrumental [SIC] role for peace and prosperity and development, we have been underappreciated, sometimes unfairly criticized," he said.

Darfur? Rwanda? The Durban Conference? Oil for Food? Zionism as Racism?

Can't understand why.

Posted 5:34 PM by Gene

MORE LATE-BREAKING NEED-TO-KNOW NEWS FROM THE ASSPRESS:

Carly Simon to Promote Her New CD on QVC

Posted 5:07 PM by Gene

News Corp., Time Warner Sign Carriage Deal for Business Channel

A HITLER-STALIN PACT!

Posted 4:51 PM by Gene

I'm sorry now I linked to this story, but one can almost understand the attitude. Yes, America's royalty showed up to honor the football hero, and Henry the K let people know that he's still far more powerful than he ought to be. But since Harry Truman, and with only several fitful breaks -- Kennedy, who was killed before he could show his full potential; and Reagan, whom history helped -- we've been ruled by chowderheads, first a football hero, then a paranoiac, than another paranoiac, then another football hero, then a PC preacher, then a wimp, then SLICK, then WIMP the II -- a procession of noble leadership that flat out blew it. Our morass reflects their incompetence. I think that's why I resent that the feds took the day off, another day off with pay, and no mail, all so we'd be forced to remember a less-than-mediocre president who didn't help the southeast Asians while doing a friend a favor. I could understand thus honoring Ike, who at least served nobly in the War, but looking at the pictures of the highly self-regarding Washington elite (like the one above) I felt my gorge rising. On top of this Sen. Whine and Sen. Campaign Finance made bipartisan noises. "Both understand the need to change the way D.C. operates," Sen. Whine's spokesman said, meaning two more years of Beltway contempt. I am not, as our late president no doubt said many times, a happy camper. Did he invent the line?

Posted 2:18 PM by Gene

And in news that may be related to GRIM MILESTONES, among other things, StinkyInky Publishing Co. is laying off people.

Keep rubbing your hands at GRIM MILESTONES, keep laying off people.

Posted 2:07 PM by Gene

AP Asks: Why So Many Upset by Iraq Death Toll?????????? (GREGIAN overemphasis added)

I'm not "upset." No one can be happy about it, but I'm not upset. Now why do the ASSPress and America's news hacks pull the "upset" gag? Every time they reach an arbitrary number in Iraq they can pull the GRIM MILESTONE gag -- a way of trying to influence an outcome that, if the hacks had their way, might not be all that friendly to us. And why do the hacks use words like GRIM MILESTONE when they approach such numbers with smiling anticipation? No, I'm not "upset" -- AND NEITHER ARE YOU.

Posted 9:53 AM by Gene

Where's the outrage over black-on-black killings?

Of the country's 14,860 homicide victims in 2005, 7,125 were black, according to the FBI's Uniform Crime Report. And of the 3,289 cases that year in which a single black was killed by a single assailant, the FBI says, 91% of the killers were black.

Let me put this another way: The number of blacks killed in 2005 in this one homicide category alone approaches the total of all the blacks lynched in this country from 1882 to 1968, according to records maintained by Tuskegee University.

NO SNITCHIN'!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

(Via, oh well, The Corner)

Posted 8:56 AM by Gene

Hmmm....

[H]ere's a look forward to that which we could really do without going forward, in the hopes of a happier 2007...

-- Quotes from Robert Thompson, the Syracuse U. professor who doubles as director of the important-sounding Center for the Study of Popular Television and is available for sound bites on, well, just about anything.

I'm not the only one annoyed by him?!?!?

Posted 8:38 AM by Gene

To think of the zillions these two sclerotic properties have earned is to think of how thoroughly the greedmeisters of America's Electronic Mints have abused the public trust.

29 years for the one, 28 for the other. 57 years of catalepsy. And sorry, I don't care how popular they are with middle-aged women and DWEEBS.

...Post-Newsweek, Hearst-Argyle....

And how many of the idiot news companies who keep thumpheting about THE PUBLIC INTEREST are among the worst offenders in ignoring it?

Posted 8:10 AM by Gene

Kurtz: Ford liked reporters, wasn't paranoid about the press

If only all Re -- oh never mind.

Posted 6:52 AM by Gene

I really hate to link to this op-ed piece again, but the Web forces my hand: here is another commercial stratagem, and here is another form of junk mail. The Web gets less and less trustworthy every day.

Posted 6:38 AM by Gene

TRANSLATION: The Democrats will do to Republicans what Republicans did to Democrats. Ho-hum.

Posted 7:05 PM by Gene

Speaking of the ASSPress I wish it were possible to calculate how much of our national computing horsepower goes out the exhaust pipe following the "stories" on these no-talents. We might understand if they did something, like record one of their tuneless overproduced albums, but this wonder of the ages seems to have done nothing in the last several years except provide time-wasting filler for news organizations.

Posted 7:00 PM by Gene

The ASSPress says the Democrats are going to "curtail" junkets, but who says they can't do their business some other way?

Perhaps these last two posts show me a bit too suspicious of people, but when one thing happens another thing is sure to happen down the pike -- thus with the genius of science, thus with House "reform."

Posted 6:56 PM by Gene

Scientists have genetically engineered a dozen cows to be free from the proteins that cause mad cow disease, a breakthrough that may make the animals immune to the brain-wasting disease.

So what else can they be engineered to have?

Posted 1:37 PM by Gene

One must apply a clothes pin to one's nose when Bugmeister's favorite rag ponders something like country music, because it does so with the anthropologist's attitude, and a definite air of superiority. Regardless, whatever country music's current flaws -- it can't make a memorable tune to save its life, but neither can the rest of what passes for music nowadays -- at least its heart is in the right place.

Posted 1:07 PM by Gene

I think we ought to banish these annual stories about annual lists of overused words and other instant clichés because the hacks still use them 365 DAYS A YEAR -- as witness THE NEWS HACKS' DICTIONARY.

Posted 1:00 PM by Gene

Good news for TV executives: reduced-sugar cereals are flopping, meaning their manufacturers have a greater excuse to whap us on the head with their old cotton-candy brands -- and with MORE TV ADVERTISING.

Posted 11:02 AM by Gene

The ne plus ultra of ad-blurbists, Mr. David Denby, who has surely seen as many masterworks these last few years as any man above the title, makes a startling admission, one which may seem strange from someone who, like most ad-blurbists, is more than content about the biz:

If we want to see something badly enough, we go, of course, and once everyone settles down we can still enjoy ourselves. But we go amid murmurs of discontent, and the discontent will only get louder as the theatre complexes age. Many of them were randomly and cheaply built in response to what George Lucas conclusively demonstrated with “Star Wars,” in 1977: that a pop movie heavily advertised on national television could open simultaneously in theatres across the country and attract enormous opening-weekend audiences. As these theatres age, the gold leaf doesn’t slowly peel off fluted columns. They rot, like disused industrial spaces. They have become the detritus of what seems, on a bad day, like a dying culture.... [And on good days too, we guess, except the ad-blurbists seldom know those.]

The executives complain about the theatres, but the second-rate, dispirited atmosphere of so many multiplexes is part of the world they have made, complete with its tiresome, meaningless annual cycle of pictures that storm the media beachhead and wash out with the tide, and the overloaded fall seasons with doleful dramas about depression, suicide, addiction, and random death. Theatre attendance is holding up, but if the audience gets weary and chooses to watch movies at home we have to understand what we are doing not only to an art form but to ourselves.

Which will not prevent him or his comrade in adjectives Mr. Lane from overrating many, many, many, MANY more pop movies and doleful dramas in the decades to come, greasing the movie-industrial complex's skids with their liberal application of BS.

BUT...there IS hope: Visionary directors like MR. SODERBERGH have devised a NEW ECONOMIC TEMPLATE for their masterworks (as he did with CASABLANCA II -- a BOX-OFFICE BOMB), and maybe they won't need the studios to distribute them (which does sound like a twenties mogul saying pictures won't need sound). And the best news comes in the popcorn restaurants:

The idea of user-friendly theatres may be catching on. Sumner Redstone’s daughter Shari, the president of National Amusements, the family-owned theatre business, has vowed to convert half the lobbies of the chain’s hundred and nineteen theatres to social spaces with comfortable lounges, and to build more. [It is also the parent to a certain member of THE CONSPIRACY, and we suspect SUMNER doesn't have the foggiest idea what kind of movies He excretes or where He excretes them or how, and doesn't care, so long as HE has His POWER. Were the LEGENDARY fact checkers asleep? Or was Mr. Remnick merely being the World's Greatest Editor?]

Have we been taking notes from our colleague Mr. Felatta?

We seem to have:

I spoke to Barry Meyer, the chairman and C.E.O. of Warner Bros. Entertainment, in a wood-panelled conference room adjacent to his office, in Warner’s venerable Burbank headquarters....

I was just joking when I said to Michael Lynton, the chairman and C.E.O. of Sony Pictures Entertainment, in the studio’s creamy executive offices in Culver City....

Peter Bart, the editor-in-chief of Variety, who was an executive at Paramount in the seventies, put it to me this way:

As Tom Roth-man [SIC!], the chairman of Fox Filmed En-tertainment [SIC!!], said to me....

A NEUHARTHISM OF THE MONTH AWARD TO MISTUH DENBEH!

P. S. A good start for New Year's Day -- biz is the worst in five years! Oh well, one day does not a year make, but we can hope.

P. P. S. on 1/2 at 11:10 a.m.: I see JPOD applauds Mr. Denby's wuhk. In a way it proves my point: a silly ad-blurbist praises a silly ad-blurbist. I don't take this opus seriously because how many "think pieces" have the blurbists written about how movies are getting worse -- and how many rave reviews have they written after? The presence of all those industry bigwigs sounds the tocsin too. JPOD also seems to believe the Web will "change" the biz. Thus far its principal accomplishments are The Blair Witch Project, those @#$%&* SNAKES and AIN'T IT COOL NEWS. I am NOT impressed.

Posted 10:44 AM by Gene

Fully-automated news stories WORK:

Hundreds of people filed into the Capitol Rotunda late Saturday to view Ford (nyse: F - news - people )'s closed, flag-draped casket.

We knew the auto industry was in trouble but...?

Posted 10:28 AM by Gene

Lenny campaigns his folks for the White House:

Clinton-Obama Differences Clear In Senate Votes!!!!! [Hed, with overemphasis added]

The Senate has held 645 roll-call votes during their shared tenure, and more than 90 percent of the time the two senators stood with other Democrats. [SIC] (Inconvenient detail in third graf)

But we insist there's a difference -- mainly over ETHANOL. Yep, we're running somebody for President! A Neuharthism of the Week Award (politicial division) to Lenny and Shailagh!

Posted 6:54 PM by Gene

And speaking of professional college football, here is the definition of humiliating: a team squanders a 31-point lead and loses in something called the INSIGHT BOWL (formerly the INSIGHT.COM BOWL), and the losers (Minnesota's Golden Gophers) vamoose their coach -- a year after signing him to a wealthy contract extension.

Professional college football sometimes gets what it deserves.

The firing came on New Year's Eve to avoid having Mason's contract roll over to another season. Mason earns his base salary of $1,987,344 and a 90-day notice's worth of supplemental income ($229,500), plus $1.4 million in already-earned deferred compensation.

On Nov. 30, men's basketball coach Dan Monson was fired, costing the University $1.3 million in a buyout.

I would say the Gophers should learn from their experience, but this being HYER EHDYUKAYSHUN it is highly unlikely anyone will learn anything.

The YOUNUHVERSEHTEE's president's name, by the way, is Bruininks -- if it matters.

(Via ASSPress)

Posted 5:27 PM by Gene

Here's why the networks cut away from the marching bands during football games and fill in halftimes with their gassing heads: the bands play too much of Led Zeppelin and "Snakes on a Plane" and "more [and more and more and more] rock music." At best the arrangements are kitsch, and that assumes a best. (Though this is hardly a golden age of band music; college bands exist because professional college football and John Philip Sousa arrived together.) Maybe the old fight songs are hokey, but hell, Louis Elbel wrote "The Victors" in 1898, and the Wolverines still play it, because it's still pretty good, and they'll still play even when snakes are extinct.

Posted 5:25 PM by Gene

Poll: Americans See Gloom, Doom in 2007

Sounds like good news to me!

Was ever there any proof news hacks do too much polling?

Posted 3:24 PM by Gene

NEWS HACKS BREAK OUT IN A BROAD GRIN:



3,000!!!!!!!!!!

YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!!!!! DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING WHIRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!!

ANOTHER "GRIM" "MILESTONE" HA HA HA HA HA!!!!! BE SURE TO LAUGH WHEN YOU SAY IT!

Posted 3:01 PM by Gene

Elsewhere re the movement to cause mass mental retardation, the Big V, which used to be a newspaper and had a reason for using "words" like "competish", gives us reason for hope:

In addition to adding more low-cost unscripted fare, nets may start slashing entire genres. Original movies continue to struggle, while concert specials may become extinct -- especially following a year in which even big names like Madonna couldn't attract eyeballs.

Plus there may be a "writers'" strike, which may seem an oddity as the last TV show to be written may have been forty years ago.

Posted 2:53 PM by Gene

If BoxOfficeMojo is to be believed, THE CONSPIRACY enjoyed a slightly up year (and after inflation two percent is slightly, however THE NEW! IMPROVED!! PAUL DRECK!!! and the press agents at USAOKAY!!!!! spin it; on that basis it's still down from three of the past four years). No doubt next year the movie S&M phreaks will be back, ready to engage again and again in the intellectual equivalent of head-butting without a helmet, but we forlornly hope for the time that even they can see something is amiss in the popcorn restaurants where they worship, even if the ad-blurbists never will.

Posted 2:50 PM by Gene

David "300" Bauder (that's a joke, son) drones and drones about the "succession" at 60 Minutes as though he spoke of the succession of kings, which, in a certain unflattering way, he is.

Posted 11:42 AM by Gene

Hmmm...you don't suppose this says something:

President Bush sent his regrets; he was cutting cedar and riding his bike on his ranch in Texas. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and his deputy, Richard Durbin, couldn't make it, either; they were on a trip to visit Incan ruins. Incoming House Speaker Nancy Pelosi took a pass, too -- as did nearly 500 of the 535 members of Congress.

A 6-to-3 majority of the Supreme Court, including Ford's appointee, John Paul Stevens, ruled against attending. All the nation's governors were invited; few, if any, came. Apparently only two Cabinet members -- Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez -- accepted the invite....

The American people quickly outdid their representatives in respect for the departed president, as several hundred citizens lined up for a late-night public viewing of the casket. But the populace, too, was slow to rally. Capitol police erected barriers to contain thousands, but by mid-afternoon yesterday, only 20 people were in line -- providing a luxurious person-to-portable-toilet ratio of 1:1.

Well, it is the New Year's, and Gerry was a modest man.

Posted 11:15 AM by Gene

And speaking of FOR SALE, a SUPERDUPERMEGAGIGABLOGGER carefully likened MITT to Ronny Reagan, and earns the undying admiration of the governor -- and maybe a chance for said SUPERDUPERMEGAGIGABLOGGER to claim he's a CLOSE FRIEND OF THE PRESIDENT'S!

We quote again:

The Internet is a new world of media, fertile and endlessly receptive to communication needs of all kinds. It could very well become so overwhelmed by commercial and political stratagems, so cluttered and so untrustworthy that it winds up utterly useless for honest communication.

That possibility is not, as Herbert Hoover put it, ''inconceivable.'' It has already happened with local radio -- and it has happened with the postal service, which has become primarily a conduit for junk mail.

The Internet can still be saved. But it won't save itself.

Yep, we're getting there.

Posted 11:09 AM by Gene

We try not to link to SUPERDUPERMEGAGIGABLOGGERS as they have become flag-waving Johnny-One-Notes, but Jo-NAH is all aflutter because the PROFESSOR (or rather a LINK from a LINK from the PROFESSOR) thinks G000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000GLE can no longer be trusted.

We stopped trusting G000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000GLE not long after it took over PYRA LABS.

And unlike the PROFESSOR (or Jo-NAH), we've attempted to read BOTH LINKS. The first writer (the creator of Firefox) is annoyed with G000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000GLE's promotional "tips", which only seem to show up with certain searches; the second writer likens them to the disasters surrounding "Don't be evil"; the PROFESSOR takes that second story seriously, and Jo-NAH reads the PROFESSOR and takes him very seriously. Sometimes the Web is nothing more than a glorified Yente the Matchmaker -- another reason I try to stay away from SUPERDUPERMEGAGIGABLOGGERS.

Posted 11:05 AM by Gene

One could make an argument that Saddam's execution was an excuse to justify the war -- which is why its haste seemed a little unseemly. One could further make the argument that at this stage of the game it's almost irrelevant, given how Iran and Syria seem to rule the proceedings.

Posted 10:31 AM by Gene

And before we forget it's time for our NEUHARTHISM OF THE YEAR AWARD, and this year it goes to two men whose rag not only publishes more spin and blurbs than any other weekly rag, but who plopped a cherry on their whipped-cream accomplishment by putting ANNIE LEIBOVITZ on a domestic cover when everywhere else we were LOSING AFGHANISTAN!!!!! -- in short, a NEUHARTHISM OF THE YEAR AWARD to the LATE MR. MARK and his successor JONBOY!

Hey Late Mr. Mark! How does it feel to be ignored?

Posted 10:07 AM by Gene

AMERICA'S LEA -- NEWSRAG plays another trick: it puts Gerry on our cover (the usual if-only-all-Republicans bit, conveniently ignoring The Palsy Pardon, no doubt) -- and Saddam on everyone else's. Incompetent presidents come every year. Saddams come every decade.

Indeed AMERICA'S L -- you get the gag, is richer and fuller than we'd have guessed: the hacks' favorite historian Mike got another posthumous interview (we may be getting these by the truckload over the next few days), saying If Only was "a larger figure than you might have thought", conveniently forgetting "Jack and the Beanstalk", and that "historians will treat Ford kindly" because he was "bipartisan" -- which after the hacks get through with it is another @#$%&* code word for HE AGREED WITH US.

And now we have to wait until Friday because that fool "No, My First Name Ain't Casey, But I Run the Publishing Equivalent of the '62 Mets" Stengel moved his rag's closing date. Don't these clowns realize how we crave for our weekly dose of CW?