Posted 11:18 PM by Gene

Shucks, William Jefferson's going to have to -- freeze it.

Republicans two-for-two since the election. Whoopee!

Posted 12:08 PM by Gene

We wonder if this portends the future? Probably not: Republic Windows and Doors was caught in the housing biz and the credit mess. But the CEOs have had their day. Problem is, we know from experience union bosses can be bad guys too.

Posted 12:03 PM by Gene

TRANSLATION: Oprah! Plug MY book!

Posted 11:35 AM by Gene

The latest fad in the publishing biz is to hope for zillionaires to run "quality" boutique imprints. This is but another showy false front for what it really wants: All The Lord Goddess Oprah All the Time, pulling her daily malevolent stunts, selling out of every last piece of garbage she can tout in the name of some vague PC notion of self-improvement. The book biz has become the magazine biz in hard cover, churning out the fad of the day when not producing books for no audience, and the people running it are but slightly more reserved versions of the thumb-in-the-eye jackasses who've ruined show-biz. Sorry, MAX PERKINS DIED 61 YEARS AGO.

Posted 7:02 PM by Gene

Is Bad Jobs News Good News for the Stock Market?
Investors reacted to the distressing jobs report with feverish buying, with the thought that layoffs signal a preparation for higher profits and recovery



Con-SER-va-tive investing!

Posted 6:46 PM by Gene

One of Der Homeland's factotums hired illegals.

Our new president would perform a vast public service by breaking up Dubya's fantasy and letting it be incompetent under many roofs as before, and not ONE.

Posted 6:05 PM by Gene

Charles Strouse, the exceptionally talented songwriter who will be known to posterity as the unintentional co-author of an extremely annoying [C]RAP "ANTHEM" (I do not blame HIM), is about to open his long-awaited stage adaptation of The Night They Raided Minsky's. You remember that one -- it was a late-sixties sitcom in which an Amish girl becomes a burlesque star or something, the sort of fantasy that led Norman Lear (its author) into raging with beet-red face for decades at the evil of religion (until he found it pays to get it), and it bombed despite the editing -- anyway, we look at this ad, and we see the producers have thus far cast four men and two women. We do not wonder why. Having heard Mogul's Friend bemoan the lack of bankable actresses (or rather female ac-TORS) we venture theater producers feel like Sisyphus trying to find young women who aren't the second coming of Sarah Jessica Horseyface. We further suspect the poor Minsky brothers must be rolling in their graves knowing what BRANSON EAST may be about to do to its theme park customers. Of course the ratio might be four-to-two because of the comedians. Few people went to Minsky's for the comedians.

But then few of BRANSON EAST's tour groups go for the entertainment, there being none.

Posted 6:02 PM by Gene

You can't blame the Bugmeisters of Redmond for not doing their part -- they've just issued Vista SP2 in beta!

Posted 5:58 PM by Gene

Which raises the question that if we are in a depression it will have the salutary act of keeping people from buying things they shouldn't. Hummers, super-high-tech kitchen countertops, all-body tattoos, breast and buttock implants by the millions, bondage sessions -- our nation has been too long overdue for a chastening, and now we might have to get it.

Posted 5:45 PM by Gene

You may remember Connie and Clyde. They've been joined in our local lore by this -- lady. I don't know which is worse -- burglary or "whelps." And despite her sweet boyfriend, given the nature of the object of their affection we suggest the two deceased legs in this ménage à trois barely had enough brain cells for one.

Posted 3:55 PM by Gene

INBEV is showing off its subsid's Clydesdales at the NFL'S CEO FEST.

Wouldn't the Royal Lipizzaner Stallions be more apt?

Posted 3:38 PM by Gene

Happily dense hyperpartisans of the side opposite NRO can daydream too -- like E. J.:

The Upside Of Catastrophe: How The Recession Advances Obama's Legislative Agenda

Posted 1:39 PM by Gene

15 YEARS for MUR...burglary.

BYE, OJ!

His voice shaking....

I guess this time he wasn't ACTING.

Posted 10:32 AM by Gene

TRANSLATION: Liza is 62, and she's been through a tough life, and with anyone else when someone says that "[w]hen she belted, her wide vibrato wobbled to the breaking point. Most of her s’s were slurred sh’s. Frequently short of breath, she swallowed phrases. Many of her highest notes were dry, piercing caws", we might understand if the recipient were to crawl under a chair and stay there, but with Liza, and for reasons beyond understanding, all can be forgiven.

Posted 10:18 AM by Gene

The only thing more annoying than MS. TRAVERS absolving HER CROWD from ANY responsibility for our economic disaster is the ANAL RETENTIVES DEBATING THE OS-CAR®S.

Posted 10:16 AM by Gene

Somebody at BUTTMAN sez:

Recessions (which almost always are caused by bad government policy)....

So remember! All those CDOs and SIVs and liar loans and no-down-payment mortgages and credit cards coming out the wazoo were caused by GOVERNMENT!!!!!

P. S. at 2:37 p. m. Somebody at NRO disagrees. HERESY!

Posted 7:18 PM by Gene

Now that the proverbial horse has left the non-existent barn:

Dodd, Frank Say Treasury May Not Get More TARP Funds

Posted 6:59 PM by Gene

What do INBEV (aka Anheuser-Busch), "CareerBuilder, Cars.com, Coca-Cola, Hyundai, Mars (Pedigree dog food), Monster.com...PepsiCo (Frito-Lay)," GoDaddy.com -- and GE BANCORP have in common?

These companies STILL have the money to send their CEOs to...oh, never mind.

Posted 4:57 PM by Gene

Jennifer should know: The first rule of celebritydom is "Anything you say in public can be used against you."

Posted 3:12 PM by Gene

MEDIA SHOULD NOT CALL TERRORISTS 'ISLAMIC,' GROUP SAYS

That's okay; they don't call them "terrorists."

Posted 1:31 PM by Gene

At lunch at a YUM! restaurant (a KFC if you must know) I noticed strange noises coming from the speakers. At first I thought I was hearing commercials. Then I realized it was Dish Network's customer-information channel. I knew that because I'd heard it before -- at the MICKEY D's next door. As it happens the folks in JIM BAKKER'S OLD HOMETOWN have a joint TV venture with the Dish for business establishments. Strangely hardly anyone noticed; it was all noise to them. How many millions would business save ditching MUZAK?

Speaking of stupid media, two CONCAST vans were parked nearly next to each other in the YUM's lot. The left-hand door of the right-hand van read:

CAUTION! VEHICLE MAKES

Nothing on the right-hand door. The right-hand door of the left-hand van read

FREQUENT STOPS

Nothing on the left-hand door. If the two had been parked the other way around it would have made a perfect commentary on CONCAST's service.

And this time someone else noticed.

Posted 11:24 AM by Gene

No! HANK can bail out the CLUNKER BROTHERS!! PFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFT!!!!!

Posted 11:17 AM by Gene

Maybe shutting Saturn's not such a hot idea either.

Posted 10:57 AM by Gene

I think ol' SLIME's decided the winner of His publicity stunt!

No. 399, by the way. SLIME, you're safe.

Posted 10:50 AM by Gene

Mr. Potato Head is running for a vast salary increase.

We think Littler Jeffy should call his bluff. More likely to happen: He gets the vast increase -- and stays on the air while campaigning. A great twofer!

And Goodthings Entertainment's laying off 500, and this news should make them even HAPPIER.

Posted 9:26 AM by Gene

And the winner of Cheapie MarketWatch's coveted (PFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFT!) CEO of the Year Award is -- Brian Goldner...for turning HASBRO into a MOVIE STUDIO!!!!!

I was about to say that beats suing but suing's a bit more honest.

Posted 9:22 AM by Gene

It would certainly be bad news if several cities had to do without daily papers -- but who hypnotized Col. Zell and Tom Sawyer into being king of the hill?

Now this is better news: radio advertising is declining. We'd say the same thing here but with 200,000 stations playing the same thing the biz could use a diet.

(Both links via MediaBistro)

Posted 9:02 AM by Gene

I do believe this ritual sacrifice of money for the auto oafs will be close. No one wants to be blamed for shutting down the Big 3. No one wants to see our dollars go straight into the incinerator either.

Well, no one except CONGRESSPOOPS.

Posted 8:58 AM by Gene

Let us hope the central bankers are right when they believe THIS economy is amenable to interest-rate cuts; to me it still looks like Paul's panicking.

Posted 8:56 AM by Gene

The Tightening Humanities Job Market

They were hiring?!?

Posted 8:51 AM by Gene

IS MS. TRAVERS campaigning for JEB?

NO MORE BUSHES!!!!!

Posted 8:48 AM by Gene

The hacks did such a typically superb job covering the Bratz contretemps that we didn't know a Federal judge could still take the manufacturer's rights away. We continue to think Mattel is mad because someone outdesigned it. We would further say that when plastic dolls are better looking than most ac-TRESSES that is further reason to be depressed.

Posted 8:45 AM by Gene

The Mogul's Friend continues his ruminating over whether Nicole is a "star", the fans having decided long before he could:

Kidman doesn't fit the bill. In fact, there are shockingly few female stars of any stature that fulfill that equation. I called a couple of movie marketers to ask if I was being unfair to Kidman. Their answer: No. As one marketer cannily noted, "If someone moves a Will Smith film onto one of your [release] dates, you panic. If someone moves a Nicole Kidman movie onto your date, you shrug. She's just not a real commercial force." Or as another marketer put it: "She's an actress, not a movie star. There's a big difference."...

What's really depressing is that when you ask marketing execs to name the actresses that do earn their keep, you're usually met with silence.

MOVIES ARE BETTER THAN EVER!

Posted 5:57 PM by Gene

Some "celebrities" just came out with a Prop 8 video tantrum, and while we don't usually quote from one of the Web's most overrated sites (up there with WALTER WINCHELL!!!!!!!!! in our book), these folks said it:

This reminds us how smart Obama was to keep celebrities from too-vocally supporting him. (They stuck to simple "Do as you're told by famous people: Vote" web ad campaign videos). Because usually they seem really obnoxious and do more to aggravate than they do to inure.

Oh, plus the music sucks.

That's "a multiple-award-winning American composer" you're talking there!

Posted 3:27 PM by Gene

GOSH, does this mean no more trillion-dollar eyesores in Dubai?

Posted 3:16 PM by Gene

At $4.2 million it's still less than you could pay for a decaying shark carcass!

Posted 2:57 PM by Gene

Okay Dave, if SLIME is Scrooge, and increasingly hangs around people who are enlightened (like, say, your typical NEWS HACK), does that mean in the end He becomes a touchy-feely liberal? And if so, what does that say (or do) for all the SCROOGENESS beforehand?

Who'd want to read a long story about such a dreary character, no matter how powerful, rich or famous he is?

You got it right early, Dave.

No. 326 on Amazon.com; no. 706 at Barnes and Noble. Not that many.

(Via TV Week)

Posted 1:38 PM by Gene

TRANSLATION: With energy prices presently drying up exploration activities non-speculating speculators and energy companies could yet earn the last laugh on us -- but that laugh may be a long time coming.

Posted 1:28 PM by Gene

Oh my oh my, the BERT (for probably the seventieth time) has "reorganized" its U. S. book biz, meaning more zillion-dollar advances for celebs and boring politicians, more deadly literary fic-TION, more turning of money into recyclables, in several ways.

Posted 1:25 PM by Gene

You don't suppose The One may have chosen his first wrong guy for the cabinet, do you?

Posted 1:03 PM by Gene

THE TWXSTERS are building a FLINTSTONES THEME PARK in BRANSON EAST!

Pennette's script will rely on contemporary issues: Wilma, for example, mulls leaving Fred because he still acts too much like a caveman and hasn't adapted to more modern ways. Barney and Betty tackle fertility issues before deciding to adopt. Musical will also tackle global warming -- but in this case, as "The Flintstones" takes place before the ice age, the characters will confront "global cooling."

Just so long as the multitudes add to global warming our way!

(Via Vulture)

Posted 11:03 AM by Gene

Mario! Take the Warhol.

On the other hand I can see why he won't sit for his portrait.

Posted 9:07 AM by Gene

So -- advertisers can ADVERTISEADVERTISEADVERTISE during tough times and gain market share.

Okay then -- explain what GM should do.

We note in this regard that America's Most PC CEO has unleashed an ad campaign. It wasn't that long ago that these same clods chewed over the wording in one of their Ray Charles Diet Pepsi ads for fear of leaving the wrong impression. We repeat: ADVERTISING IS FOR FINANCING JUNK TELEVISION; ADVERTISING IS FOR CREATING CORPORATE FIEFDOMS; ADVERTISING IS FOR CEO SCHMOOZING.

We might note it also wasn't that long ago when PepsiCo backed Hezbollah TV -- something we fear America's Most PC CEO might have appreciated.

Posted 8:15 AM by Gene

Shhhhhhhh, don't say anything, but...

APPLE QUIETLY RECOMMENDS USING ANTIVIRUS SOFTWARE [sic]

P. S. at 3:10 p.m.

Apple's Antivirus Suggestions Are No Longer Available

Did a GOD just throw a tantrum?

Unfortunately, malware today isn't just about taking advantage of the operating system’s weaknesses, as the majority of such threats now comes from the developed code targeting weaknesses in browsers and other such applications which aren't platform specific.

If I can penetrate this gibberish I think he means "Hmmmm...."

Posted 7:05 AM by Gene

Awwww SHUCKS, our side doesn't get total control.

A few more adjectives, a few more weasel words....

Posted 6:16 PM by Gene

This is...RICH:

In a story in its January issue, Vanity Fair delves deep into the saga of El-Ad Properties, the Israeli company responsible for buying the Plaza Hotel and converting its well-loved, if aging, rooms into super fancy condos. The building's high-profile buyers (who signed on for the apartments sight unseen), have been complaining about "small windows, low ceilings, obstructed views, buckling floors, trashed carpets, glacially slow elevators, and frequent interruptions of running water," among many, many other things. And that's just the obvious stuff. A Vanity Fair source "with knowledge of the materials used in the hotel rooms" uncovered a host of cut corners:

"Instead of Italian marble for the bathroom floors and walls, El-Ad used low-density marble from China (about 50 cents a square foot). The crown moldings in the rooms aren’t actually wood or plaster; they’re fiberglass and run from $2 to $7 a foot. (High-end crown molding can cost $70 a foot, and real plaster molding many multiples of that.) The so-called mahogany closet is in fact just a thin layer of mahogany veneer over industrial particleboard...The carpet in the hallway on the penthouse level was cut and cobbled together—a practice known as “patch-n-match.” (The interior designer of the renovation and hotel representatives stand by the materials used in the project.)"

The rich, they are different from you and me. They are stupider.

Posted 5:59 PM by Gene

Ohhhhh, now Plaxico -- PLEXICO has an "alibi": his teammate was robbed at gunpoint.



Which of course justified Plaxplex twirling a pistol.

Posted 5:40 PM by Gene

NFL suspends six players 4 games for steroids violation

Talk about baseball...no, let's not talk about baseball.

Posted 5:30 PM by Gene

NEWS HACKS DAYDREAMING: If a certain half-witted New York governor chooses the Slickster to replace you-know-who in the Senate I would guess not only does that make a certain president-elect's job harder, but permanent re-election for the half-wit may not be a fait accompli anymore.

Posted 5:22 PM by Gene

The same PR types who oohed and aahed when some retail publicity group said Black Friday sales were up double-digits (or the number of mall visitors, or whatever) are now huffington and puffington over a particular Web site's worth. We will not mention the dot.com boom as that's too easy. We would mention Salon.com, however. And when companies like PAPERROFRE-CORDCO and the media operations of Kaplan Inc. go for so little it may not say much anyway. And they have Web sites too.

Of course this pile of crock comes from RANCECORP, which is best known for leaving stuff on sidewalks.

Posted 5:18 PM by Gene

I think I know the type who would let little kids smoke pot. I think I would not like to know them.

Posted 5:07 PM by Gene

If SLIMES think they can bring back the TV biz with 3-D they should remember what that forgotten autocrat "Gen." David "Titanic" Sarnoff once said in a fit of megalomania, when he likened his biz to "a plumber laying a pipe." This is a new super-high-tech version of the same old plumbing, delivering the same centuries-old sewage. People may be tired of the sewage.

“For 3-D to become impactful in the homes of the world, the people that make money are going to have to subsidize it,” Hill said, referring to the TV set makers, who would benefit from selling another round of TV upgrades to consumers.

I've got a BETTER idea, Dave: LET -- oh, you know the punchline.

Posted 2:16 PM by Gene

Now now you hunk! Not TOO close! UNCLE may be watching.

Posted 1:51 PM by Gene

GM, Ford Will Sell Corporate Jet Fleet

Only about a billion clunkers too late.

Posted 1:49 PM by Gene

Bart Simpson voices every Apple user's worst nightmare: that he or she is a trend-chasing loser whose pricey gadget-collecting hobby is somehow making Bill Gates rich. The below clip also references Apple's "1984" spot, which is usually dubbed the best ad of all time, but is rarely remembered by anyone other than ad-industry people or hardcore Apple users.

NUF SAID.

Posted 11:26 AM by Gene

Mel Martinez, the Latino George "Mooooo" Voinovich, is retiring from the Senate.

We doubt even Republicans care.

Posted 8:46 AM by Gene

Buzz may be helping -- but so are sweeteners the network is using to attract and retain customers. Showtime has boosted its subscribers during the last year in part by offering promotional discounts, said Deana Myers, a senior analyst with SNL Kagan. In addition, some of Showtime's recent distribution deals provide a financial incentive for cable companies to market the channel. [SEVENTH GRAF]

TRANSLATION: This is another thoroughly spinny plug through which unwitting readers can be had. A NEUHARTHISM OF THE WEEK AWARD to MEG!

(Via MediaBistro)

Posted 10:59 PM by Gene

“Every time I walk through the doors of the academy building, I experience what I would imagine a pious Catholic could feel as he walks through the portal of St. Peter’s Cathedral in Rome,” Mr. von Donnersmarck wrote in a blurb for the academy’s recent annual report.

Uh, Henckel -- you think we could have chosen a different church?

(Via Mogul's Friend, in whom this column brought on an advanced case of the willies -- such as he can bring on)

Posted 7:14 PM by Gene

Well, here's one way of putting it:

Siege at Bangkok Airports Worries Thailand's Horde of Tourism Students

Posted 7:03 PM by Gene

MORE EXCITEMENT AT SLASHDOT!

Idle: World's Oldest Marijuana Stash Found 2008-12-01 18:19

Posted 6:43 PM by Gene

West tries to prevent Pakistan-India breakdown

TRANSLATION: The sleazy, skanky, slimy, scummy world of REALPOLITIK is starting to enter into the Indian outrage, meaning that after we've talked it out for a couple of weeks all parties can completely forget about it -- until the next attack.

Posted 6:18 PM by Gene

Stop him! Stop RON ROSENBAUM before he probingly high-IQingly intellectually deep-thinkingly farts again!

Posted 6:05 PM by Gene

We weren't going to comment on this story which we found last night, first as it's from a notorious British broadsheet and second because the old saw about "any publicity" may apply here, but you must wonder if there's a severe disconnect between the subservient hacks who dearly want to help this GENIUS on the road to a complete and infernally lasting recovery and the proles who may not stand her, and who have good reason not to.

Which further reminds us that the same typing ciphers slobbering over this genius had the devil's -- pardon me, the dickens of a time (there being no devils in the news hack's world, except perhaps bean counters) deciding whether the scum of Bombay (and we're using that name now on Chris's most excellent suggestion) were GUNMEN or MILITANTS. One look at this awful story should disabuse all but the coldest news hack of evading the truth -- but many hacks have no hearts to break, or long work in the business has merely turned them into blood-pumping devices. (Indeed we first found a variation by accident while hunting down the doofus Plex -- PLAXICO, and even that couldn't wipe out the ache.)

Posted 5:20 PM by Gene

We do not feel sorry for this "lost generation" of anchorpoops. We are told that to deprive a MARKET -- I mean, the viewers of second- and third-string faces is a calamity: “Basically, you replace someone who knows City Hall with someone who can’t find it.” Most of these news noses have not been near City Hall since they got their jobs. We've said it before: the purpose of a PROFIT CENTER is to make big bucks and lure the unsuspecting into the Wheel of Fortune/JEOPARDY!!!!! block and into prime time. It is NOT to inform people. To that end half your typical PROFIT CENTER is prepackaged stuff; the rest is weather and sports, and a few minutes for the police blotter. Where's the public service in that? Yet even in the stiff pungent wind of the public disservice they perform these faces maintain their Ted Baxter fantasies of DOING something. A veterinary technician does more of a public service tending to sick pets than even the most overpaid anchorpoop performs by nightly intoning, "Good evening and here's what's happening: A shooting spree on the West Side has left two dead and...." As SUMNERS are discovering too late for their investments, ANYONE can be an ANCHORPOOP -- and future vets' helpers putting on the brave...face appear to be discovering it a bit late too.

Posted 3:55 PM by Gene

Did Dubya turn the other way at the mortgage mess before it really started -- or was the office of President vacant at the time?

Posted 3:40 PM by Gene

BULLETIN!!!!!

Dow industrials down 500 points, erasing half of last week's gain

Second half tomorrow! Pfffffffffffffffffffffffffft!

Posted 3:30 PM by Gene

The Plaxico -- PLEXICO story is getting to be the biggest barrel of laughs since O. J. tried to reclaim his merchandise. We can see this guy, a gun concealed in his pocket and his stupidity not so readily concealed, showing off the AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAATTITUDE for which he's evidently become quite richly remunerated, boasting of his omnipotence and his immortality, and doing a quick Quick Draw (McGraw, that is). Whether it happened that way or not (we gather not) the idea of big rich folk getting a comeuppance like this is always vastly gratifying.

Although most of the time it isn't so darn painful.

P. S. at 7:21 p. m. Or maybe it did.

Posted 3:28 PM by Gene

The current de...RECESSION started a month after GEKKO "GRASSO" KUDLOW saw Goldilocks.

Posted 12:07 PM by Gene

LET'S STOP WORRYING ABOUT RECESSIONS AND START GROWING AGAIN!!!!!!!!!! (RealClear overemphasis added)

Okay John (or should that be Tammy?), how do we start growing again? "By letting our citizens produce as freely as possible!!!!!" All right Tammy -- John, but what if no one can afford all the goods we produce because people don't have the money and credit's dried up -- and maybe because they already have too many goods anyway?

(Via Contentions, which calls John's RealClear thinking "a good idea")

Correction on 1/5/2009 at 7:03 p. m.: Our bad -- it's Tamny. Sorry about that. But it doesn't entirely let him off the hook; how about...Tamny Hall?

Well I thought it was funny.

Posted 11:58 AM by Gene

Five Ways to Get Tickets for Obama's Inauguration

Oprah, Beyoncé and Anne Hathaway are said to be going, so why not you?

Well, maybe because I'm not a friend of the late King Richard!

TWXSTERS! Your rags CAN and MUST get skinnier!

Posted 11:55 AM by Gene

Rush Limbaugh endorses Clinton for Obama's cabinet

Hmmm, maybe we were wrong -- can anything be worse than ASSPress?

Posted 10:51 AM by Gene

What could be WORSE than ASSPress? A CNN WIRE!!!!!

Posted 10:46 AM by Gene

Rice on terror: All victims are in this together

We don't know what Colinette means, but given the source it puts us in mind to paraphrase Ben Franklin, and especially given how GUVMENTS handle terror catastrophes: either we shall all be hanged together or we shall all be hanged separately.

Posted 10:40 AM by Gene

And yet another intern (this for SUPERADAM!!!!!!!!!!) hints at something that won't quite come out because of this typing's geeky, heavily ironic tone: TV shows aren't watched so much as they're lauded, which forces people into tuning them in not for the enjoyment but for some sort of self-improvement, which may leave a lot of cranky viewers behind wondering what the fuss was about -- and we suspect none of the programs this intern mentions will last, in no small measure because of the mass advocacy.

Posted 10:30 AM by Gene

Kaplan Inc. is down almost 20. I note this hopeful news because Ahts Journal HAD to link to THIS piece of dog droppings, the sort of verbiage we can expect more and more of now that news orgs left and right (pardon -- left) are laying off staff and letting interns fill the space. With such space filling who needs newspapers?

A NEUHARTISM OF THE MONTH AWARD TO ZAK! Any relation to SHREK?

Posted 9:57 AM by Gene

The next time con-SER-va-tives gloat how FREE EN-TER-PRISE will save the economy, remember how THE THREE-HEADED-DOG AND CO. DESTROYED MERVYNS.

Looks like it's gonna be a FREE EN-TER-PRISE DAY in the Wall Street Casino -- EVERY MAN FOR HIMSELF!

Posted 9:39 PM by Gene

"I think that Muslims should raise their voice against such actions. They should forge a coalition to fight such phenomena, because it harms them and damages their image," said Ali Abdel Muhsen, 22, a Muslim engineering student in the West Bank city of Nablus.

When?

Muslims and Arabs must confront the violence "that is taking place in our name and in the name of our (Islamic) tenets," wrote Khaled al-Jenfawi, a columnist for Kuwait's Al-Seyassah daily.

"Unfortunately, we have yet to see a distinguished popular condemnation in the traditional Arab or Muslim communities that strongly rejects what is happening in the name of Islam or Arab nationalism," wrote al-Jenfawi.

Once more: When?

Posted 9:00 PM by Gene

Deccan Mujahideen email threatens Delhi

Anybody for hiding under the desk this time?

Posted 7:36 PM by Gene

The GRAWF further wastes our time with this scribble about England's alleged promiscuity. That our gorge rises to new heights with each such typing indicates that newsrooms and societies move ever farther apart; that newsrooms cannot report on society nor offer helpful cures; that the news hack has become so insistent in creating crises for Jack Shafer to fume over that we stop caring about anything. Even stories that should anger us like the Mumbai gunman craze can't stir us out of our torpor, being over-reported and under-reported at once. News has become such a ubiquitous drone and its acquisition among Web surfers such a compulsion that it's fast approaching uselessness.

Posted 7:16 PM by Gene

And speaking of advertising, if it's Sunday it must be Big Double-A-Scribble Time:

Ad Nauseam: Repetition of TV Spots Risks Driving Consumers Away

Consumers Bugged by Many Ads

How many times have Rance's boys pulled this gag, blasting the biz' awful product though his readers never make anything else? Too many generations of adpersons have heeded the advice of George Washington Hill -- ANNOY 'EM AND YOU SELL 'EM!!!!! -- for anyone to do ads different. Yet last night I contemplated what was arguably the perfect commercial for the Polaroid Swinger. And thinking now I can see why perfect commercials have become as impossible as good pop tunes. The exact same cultural rot acts on both.

And when today's George Washington Hills talk of social networks it only means they'll engage in more repetition, and more screaming, and more flailing.

And in other typical full-of-it, Rance's legions try to convince us PEOPLE INC.'s putative flagship is popular among the young. So is anorexia, if we're to judge from its skinniness.

Posted 7:07 PM by Gene

Two pontifications on show-biz from The Paper of Re-CORD; First we learn (I learn) the NFL and the makers of a Spider-Man tentpole have used Irving Berlin tunes, which I suppose makes him "relevant"; but all it does is to highlight how irrelevant modern pop music is as Berlin and his contemporaries seemed to have mined all the good musical ideas, making them forever, and all today's geniuses have are chords, and beats, and dross. (No accident that even in this economy the musical based on his film musical based on his film musical got walloped by the critics; but the tunes may be good enough to save a show that isn't worth saving.)

Meantime another writer works himself into a frenzy at yet another autumn of GENIUS from the movee biz. And if there's anyone who can't see posterity it's your fillum writer. Heck he doesn't know where the tip of his nose is. That won't prevent him from advertising.

Posted 6:45 PM by Gene

The Dwarf Stalin of North Korea supposedly made a public appearance yesterday, but no pictures were disseminated, nor do we have any idea where he appeared, so reading this story is the kind of complete waste of time that makes surfing for news ever less pleasant than a dentist's drill.

Posted 10:52 AM by Gene

And why pray tell should we listen to ShopperTrak except that it has an in with newsmen every year after Black Friday, thus getting its fees in the news outlets?

ShopperTrak measures foot traffic in shopping centers and malls using more than 50,000 video devices.

And from this they know how much people spent? These guys should be working for The (RET.) Gang. Who knows? Maybe they do.

Posted 10:38 AM by Gene

Speaking of cheating, MB2 insists a new New Deal won't work. So who does he bring in as his first witness? AMITY -- who believes a new New Deal won't work not because it would be wasteful, or incompetent, but because it would be GOVERNMENT, and further because in FREE EN-TER-PRISE lies the source of all wisdom, as the wise men of Citi and AIG would tell us, if only they were unshackled.

Posted 10:24 AM by Gene

Gosh! Cheating -- in WEB GAMBLING?!? Knock me over with a sparrow feather.

P. S.

Steve Kroft, Ira Rosen and Sumi Aggarwal of "60 Minutes" and special correspondent Gary Wise contributed to this report.

Maybe if ST. WARREN cut us in on His BRIDGE proceeds we might not have to outsource our reporting, hmmm?

P. P. S. This story was first plugged four days ago on CBS GEEKS...er, CNET. Fresh news!

Posted 10:17 AM by Gene

And if our new president wants to create a jobs program we suggest he start an agency that would burrow through all the paperwork needed to clear government appointees of conflicts of interest. It would employ in the thousands.

And once it started investigating its employees' conflicts it could hire thousands more.

Posted 10:11 AM by Gene

India's government has "a Harvard-educated MBA and an eminent lawyer" as its new home minister -- you know, its Color-Code Man, the guy who's supposed to prevent against people being bombed en masse, and who's replacing a guy who eminently deserved to resign -- but this, we fear, is a little like our UNCLE SUCKER asking The (RET.) Gang for advice, albeit without the consulting fees.

Posted 10:06 AM by Gene

The (RET.) Gang -- you know, all those former generals who gas on cable "news" what we should do in hot spots, who endlessly swami about what's next, and are wrong 90 percent of the time -- have a nifty deal: they use their TV incompetence to sell consulting jobs to UNCLE SUCKER, who of course wouldn't know better anyway.

Here is an overwhelming argument against watching cable "news", even as a source of comedy. And here is an overwhelming argument against The (RET.) Gang, who really ought to SHUT UP.