Posted 1:03 PM by Gene

How many of today's "flaming bomb throwers" become tomorrow's wet firecrackers?

Posted 10:15 AM by Gene

9:53 AM The cost of insuring Irish debt against default rises to a record high, up 46 basis points from yesterday, and government bond yields also jump. The weakness was sparked by a Barclays research note warning that Ireland may need to seek financial help from the IMF or EU if conditions get any worse.

DOW 10,000,000,000!!!!!

Posted 9:20 AM by Gene

So SUMNER's holding a rock concert (or is that two rock concerts?) on the Mall but to get free advertising He's calling them rallies. This is why BIGMEDIA can pound us with the iron fist in the titanium glove -- and this is why we must learn to pound them back.

Posted 9:11 AM by Gene

Five held over 'terror threat' to pope

All...Buddhists!

Pfffffffffffffffffft!

Posted 8:57 AM by Gene

I don't know who Brian is, but I think he's got a BRILLIANT idea in getting LEGENDARY WELCH to run UMASS. I can see it now: applying SIX SIGMA to teaching! Weeding out the bottom ten percent of students -- and faculty! Charging so much for tuition He can start a BANK for student loans! Outsourcing the cafeterias to India! Who knows -- maybe He could do an IPO! This has so much to recommend to I don't know where to begin!

Next time, Brian, just write a résumé.

...a risible puff piece incorporating wildly implausible yet flattering suggestions involving a powerful figure in exchange for face/telephone time.

The less stupid NEWS HACKS think their readers the more money they might make.

Posted 9:13 PM by Gene

We said several years ago someday this megalomaniac would play Shylock on Branson East. This is but the first step there.

Posted 9:01 PM by Gene

While the Yahoo!ligans offer up another crass ad -- really, we wish Jerry were still there, so he could engage in moral turpitude proudly -- we console ourselves with this hed:

Album Sales Hit Low Mark For Third Time This Year

We further console ourselves to note the top album this past week sold 90,000 copies, which twenty years ago wouldn't have made the top 50.

Posted 5:27 PM by Gene

GOING DOWN!!!!!

Posted 5:18 PM by Gene

OH, THE PEOPLE YOU'LL MEET: Two dopes -- dope DEALERS sat behind me on the El. One dope -- dealer was out of breath dropping his stash and evading the cops (he said). The other dope -- dealer was headed to a hospital to pick up drugs (legal) no doubt paid for by us. His Omnipotence would have hugged himself. The runner was 30ish but looked older, skinny (as well he would be evading cops) with a moustache and goatee and a light brown casual shirt and beige droopy drawers, and a white baseball cap (backwards); the other was about 30 and 200 pounds with a navy blue sport shirt and light gray droopy drawers. I have long questioned the utility of cell phones but a discreet one would have come in handy then.

Posted 2:57 PM by Gene

Remember when DAN BLATHER's defenders repeated the mantra "fake, but accurate"?



This time, with irony.

Posted 2:44 PM by Gene

The occasion of Stewart’s appearance this time, like it was in 2004, is so he can hawk a book -- in this case, "Earth (The Book)."

In return, O’Reilly will return the favor – agreeing to appear on the “Daily Show” on September 27. Perhaps O’Reilly will promote his “Bold & Fresh Tour” Tour of the country with Glenn Beck.

A PLAGUE O' BOTH YOUR -- pardon -- THE FAULT, DEAR BRUTUS....

Posted 2:43 PM by Gene

Getting rid of all that obsolete technological gobbledygook will only mean you can get your junk to market faster, plus you can use the money saved for MARKETING that won't work.

Posted 10:46 AM by Gene

We are not surprised PILLHEAD believed WIKIPEDIA. After all, 500 TRILLION listeners believe HIM.

(Via WOLFFMAN!!!!!)

Posted 10:45 AM by Gene

Tina Brown Interviews Tony Blair

What a...natural.

Read it at The Harvard Crimson

But not in the BEAST?

Posted 10:41 AM by Gene

If the issue of federal pay does take off, surely somebody, somewhere, sooner or later, will make the obvious point. Republican politicians were in charge of the entire federal workforce when compensation went into the stratosphere and federal employees began living a life beyond the reach of the average citizens who pay their salaries. Eric Cantor will want to explain that to all those “fed-up Americans.”

Andrew Ferguson in The Weekly Standard?!?!?

Posted 10:19 AM by Gene

GM CEO: repayment of bailout could take years

You hint-hinting something, Dan?

Posted 3:14 PM by Gene

Do You Know Where Your Commercials Are?

Despite Advanced Tech, Marketers Seem to Have Little Idea Where Their Ads Actually Appear

The CRAINIACS seem to want to top themselves with self-serving outrages. The advertiser's willful ignorance is the handmaiden of the 10-minute commercial pod. The whole industry is predicated on willful ignorance. Willful ignorance allows advertisers to build fiefdoms that stick it to their customers while giving them plausible deniability when their moolah finances vilest sleaze or winds up in a 10-minute pod -- or ideally both. This story and the last prove incontrovertibly that advertising agencies and their clients are parasitic liars, yet we'll never be able to deprive them of their livelihoods.

Posted 2:49 PM by Gene

I couldn't stand THE NO-SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN ZONE long before Tunku decided it would be fashionable to be TINA!!!!!'s token conservative.

Posted 2:01 PM by Gene

TRANSLATION: MICKEYMOUSE NIXON tries MODESTY.

(Via the usual Romy, who obviously doesn't watch the Big C. Don't blame you!)

Posted 1:39 PM by Gene

And since we mentioned that Pew Foundation survey, we must say anyone who relies heavily on certain sources for "information" is misinformed, but in different ways. The geezers who watch the decaying nightly-news triumvirate get a highly diluted version of The Paper of Re-CORD's front page and an unhealthy dose of condescension. Those who rely on the PILLHEADS are misinformed because they get only what they want to hear. Those who rely on the COMEDY CENTRAL NEWS NETWORK are misinformed because not only do they get what they want to hear, when something from the evil forces happens ED and ERIC tend to be very behind the curve, and making up for it with frantic investigative joke telling aimed at ADAM!!!!! may not help the viewers. Of course those who rely on The Paper of Re-CORD know everything. Given who runs PEOPLE WARNER those relying on CNN know nothing.

Happily those relying on the Web are misinformed too because they have to engage in a wild-goose chase skimming surfaces.

Posted 12:10 PM by Gene

There MUST be a directive from GanNETt corporate HQ, because USAOKAY!!!!! has started its perennially irritating SUPER BOWL ADS campaign NOW!

The only thing more irritating is realizing how many thousands of meetings and hundreds of thousands of hours the lunkhead INDRA and PepsiCo have spent on this.

Posted 8:52 AM by Gene

It's not likely that Netflix will ever be able to offer a satisfying alternative to live programming. Still with most monthly cable fees running north of $70, digital alternatives such as those run by Netlfix and other video-on-demand companies are becoming increasingly palatable.

And not a moment too soon.

Posted 8:38 AM by Gene

The public affairs office of the Democratic Party (aka our fearless First Amendment defending state press) has a strategy: If we call the Tea Party candidates WACKO often enough...

...we can call you BIASED STOOGES even more often!

As we said last night, some of them are a little off the deep end -- and as we also said last night, the state press is off the other deep end.

Posted 8:33 AM by Gene

How AudioAnimatronic is BRANSON EAST becoming? Our favorite Branson East columnist Mike says the theme park operators are using TelePrompTers and earpieces!

Posted 8:19 AM by Gene

EXCELSIOR! with THE LORD GOD STEVE:

Apple is selling some 17 million apps per day, and they may begin to outsell music downloads by the end of this year. Android too is catching up to iTunes' 250,000 apps, boasting about 70,000, and BlackBerry isn't far behind. The app market is huge, right?

Not according to a new study by Nielsen and the Pew Research Center. Only around 35% of adult cell phone owners have apps on their phone (including preloaded apps), and only 24% actually use them. Although apps have generated huge profits for developers, they still rank very low on cell phone users' mobile activities. Texting and taking pictures are now common among adults--more than 70% use these features--but downloading apps still has a long way to go: Just 29% of adult cell-phone owners have downloaded apps, a percentage lower than recording video and playing music.

What's more, adults rarely pay for apps. Of the thousands of adults surveyed, a mere 13% have paid for an app. The majority opt for free apps, if anything, and even of those who are willing to pay, 60% have dropped less than $2.99. Apps also have a low shelf life: more than half of users have deleted apps, and the majority of those who have do so within two weeks.

CAVEAT at 9:20 a. m.: This is from the same Pew Foundation report that says practically ALL 18-to-34-year-olds watch the COMEDY CENTRAL NEWS NETWORK!!!!!

(First link via WOLFFMAN!!!!!; second link via MediaBistro)

Posted 9:36 PM by Gene

And speaking of BIGMEDIA STOOGES:

Last year, Christopher Hayes gave $250 to the congressional campaign of a good friend, Alabama Democrat Josh Segall.

That’s hardly noteworthy, but for one factor: Hayes is the Washington, D.C., editor of The Nation, a left-leaning news magazine that covers U.S. politics. And his political donation is not an anomaly in journalism, where donating to or otherwise advocating for politicians is often taboo – if not prohibited outright by some news companies.

Hayes is one of 235 people who identified themselves on government documents as journalists, or as working for news organizations, who together have donated more than $469,900 to federal political candidates, committees and parties during the 2010 election cycle, a Center for Responsive Politics analysis indicates.

People identifying themselves as working for hard news outlets such as the Washington Post, the New York Times, the New York Post, News Corp., Vanity Fair and Reuters are among the listed donors. Also listed are employees from outlets offering lighter fare -- ESPN, Vogue -- or community news. Some have donated thousands of dollars.

The average contribution per person identified is eight times Hayes’ amount, and because of some big-spending media professionals, that number is slightly skewed upwards -- with the median amount donated coming in at $500. Sixty-five percent of all identified donations went to Democrats, the Center’s research indicates.

Also not surprising:

Of the 22 political contribution-making media professionals OpenSecrets Blog attempted to contact, nine returned voice and e-mail messages. Of them, three declined to comment....

(Via the usual Romy)

Posted 9:27 PM by Gene

We are somewhat saddened to learn Rep. Castle has lost to a flailing Palinist, especially as he seems such a gentleman; but what bothers us isn't the notion of ideological purity -- and we can understand the party faithful throwing this longtime stalwart out because so many of the RINOs are BIGMEDIA stooges -- but that we have another BECK OLBERMANN of whatever stripe with an ALWAYS-ON!!!!! style who shuts down when the red light does, and who may not have a brain to turn on (as witness RAND!!!!! PAUL!!!!!). The voters are entitled to screaming meemies if that's what they want. They should not be surprised if they themselves start to scream.

Posted 10:36 AM by Gene

Howie Hairshirt MUST tell us that Jack -- uh, I think his name was Amberson, one of the great JERNALISTIC HEROES of all time, was a NIXON TOO.

Anderson [THAT'S his name?], who died in 2005, may seem a remote figure today....

But only yesterday he SAVED THE WORLD!!!!!

Posted 9:31 AM by Gene

Well we weren't that far off: Cuba's about to lay off ten percent of its government work force. Since government is the only work people have what will Cubans do for a living?

Posted 9:22 AM by Gene

As bad as their raw naked ADVERTISING is, when the hacks go into their thinker mode it's far worse. Hacks don't have a hundredth of the firepower needed to be public intellectuals but that doesn't stop them from indecent exposures. This USAOKAY!!!!! piece will stand as a classic of its kind; it's what gets Prof. Shafer to fume over fake trends. Not everyone is peeking at others' cell phones, and I don't give two hoots for my neighbor's private life -- when we're all a slightly different shade of dull who but the hopelessly bored is inclined to care? -- but SOB AL's first-person plural never entirely disappeared from OKAY!!!!!, and at OKAY!!!!! we have to make a big thing of every showy mirage.

Posted 8:50 AM by Gene

TRANSLATION: For news hacks ED MURROW has become IMUS without the liquor.

And natch, this blazing hero-worship mentions the word "ratings" ONCE. The advantage of digital media is that its traces may disappear faster than print's, meaning its embarrassments disappear too.

Posted 2:16 PM by Gene

New Medicare chief speaks out against rationing

Well somebody's running for...never mind.

Posted 1:58 PM by Gene

Th[e] diversification of HBO's business is essential given the strong possibility that the network's core business has peaked. There may be no simpler explanation for the absence of subscriber growth. "Thirty million might be where the ceiling is," said Myers.

Maybe because only so many people want to watch THE GREATEST TELEVISION IN ALL RECORDED HISTORY -- and fewer still want to pay a not-so-small fortune for it.

Posted 1:55 PM by Gene

The latest fad in academe is textbook rentals.

That's easy -- just charge the rental agencies more.

Posted 1:48 PM by Gene

LITTLE MALCOLM SEZ THE IPAD WILL CHANGE THE WORLD FOREVER!!!!!!!!!!

I think we have a new name for our "Please Fold As Soon As Possible" list.

Posted 1:34 PM by Gene

MICKEYMOUSE NIXON'S RUNNING FOR CHAIRMAN!!!!!

In hindsight, former Disney CEO Michael Eisner calls his decision in 1995 to buy CapCities/ABC, and with it, its crown jewel ESPN, "ONE OF THE BEST ACQUISITIONS MAYBE OF THE WHOLE CENTURY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" (Best overemphasis added)

ESPNCORP on July 28, 1995: $19.10 a share. ESPNCORP TODAY: $34.22 A SHARE. UP 5.87 PERCENT A YEAR IN FIFTEEN YEARS -- BEFORE INFLATION! SMASHING, MR. TRIBUNE CHAIRMAN!



A GREATLY APPRECIAT...ING NEUHARTHISM OF THE MONTH AWARD TO RYAN!

(Via I Want Media)

Posted 10:56 AM by Gene

Since we will NOT take care of Iran the best we can do is sell arms to our "friends" the Saudis -- and hope THEY don't get swept up in a fit of religious fervor.

(Via TINA!!!!!)

Posted 9:35 AM by Gene

Hey, if I were a Democrat I wouldn't boast too loud either!

Posted 11:12 PM by Gene

TRANSLATION: HONORARY MAYOR MIKE thinks he can be president without being president.

His last time before the voters in 2009—which came after a controversial move to extend term limits—resulted in a surprisingly narrow five-percentage point win, even after spending a staggering $109 million.

Well, he does have the money....

Posted 10:04 PM by Gene

If it's Sunday it must be Big Double-A-Scribble Time:

1. 10-minute commercial pods are WHAT ADVERTISERS WANT. Oh, they won't admit to it, but in buying air time incontinently advertisers consent to any and all ways of buying it, including 10-minute pods. They don't care so long as they get their time. And why should corporate America care about anything, its aim being to make its rep from top to bottom worse than the oil biz' or airlines?

To build a 10-minute ad break Aug. 27, Spike started off with a promo for its UFC programming, then ran spots for DirecTV; Unilever's Axe shampoo; B.F. Goodrich; Schering-Plough's Zegerid OTC; Jack Link's beef jerky; VF Corp.'s Lee Jeans; Screen Gems' latest "Resident Evil" movie; AT&T; Miller Lite beer; and Progressive Insurance.

But wait, there's more: Ads also ran during the break for PepsiCo's Mtn Dew soda; Pep Boys; Trojan condoms; Outback Steakhouse; Mobil motor oil; Sony Corp.'s Vaio laptop; Diageo's Captain Morgan Lime Bite rum; Kraft Foods' Dentyne gum; a DVD for the FX program "Sons of Anarchy"; and UFC action figures. The break was then garnished with what appeared to be two ads from local cable operators. Other popular marketers with ads in the extended "Entourage" breaks included Allstate, Domino's, Yum Brands' Taco Bell, Colgate-Palmolive's Colgate Wisp, Mars' Snickers and Esurance.

In the words of the NRA, WE DO OUR PART!

"Viewers don't like clutter," said Debbie Solomon, managing director-business planning, at WPP's MindShare.

WHY DO VIEWERS COUNT? ALL YOU WANT ARE NUMBERS!

One ad-buying executive frowned. "We know every network at times shoehorns in additional commercials to boost revenue, especially in programs with higher unit costs," said [THE ALL-TOO-FREQUENTLY QUOTED] Andrew Donchin, director of investment at Aegis Group's Carat. "But this situation is especially egregious and very troubling. It not only devalues the commercial messages but, unfortunately, also raises the suspicion that other networks may be playing the same games."

WHY SHOULD YOU CARE SO LONG AS IT'S OUR MONEY AND YOU SPEND IT? YOU'RE WORSE THAN GOVERNMENT!

And government can burn money "in the public interest".

"This is not the direction that television is going in. Television is going the other way, to have shorter breaks so that people can't just skip our advertising," said Ed Gold, advertising director at State Farm Insurance. The company had its ads appear in two different ad breaks each about nine minutes in length during Spike telecasts of "Entourage" episodes Friday, Aug. 27. "I will tell you right now, we at State Farm find an eight-minute-to-10-minute commercial break unacceptable," he added.

AND THE NEXT TIME I SEE MY BOSS I'M GONNA MAKE SURE THAT FIFTEEN-MINUTE POD'S UNSKIPPABLE!

And one very good self-serving excuse:

To be sure, Spike has some challenges when trying to run "Entourage." The episodes of the bawdy HBO show about a movie star and his pals often have to be cut to meet basic-cable standards of decency, leaving Spike to fill extra time (The length of "Entourage" episodes can vary, but are typically delivered to Spike between 21 and 24 minutes in length). Ratings for the program have not been stellar since Spike started running it in January; the network paid a hefty fee of around $600,000 per episode, according to several press reports.

"We don't want to put our customers in an environment that is not appropriate for their commercial messages," said Jeff Lucas, exec VP-sales, at MTV Networks' Entertainment Group. "If there's a problem, we'll fix it."

YOU'VE FIXED IT VERY WELL, SUMNER. Without a doubt this is by far the most exasperating thing ADVERTISERS and the CRAINIACS have EVER done.

2. Killing Off 30-second Spot Is Bad Medicine for OTC Drug Industry

Not to worry: with SUMNER's help we can run TWENTY-MINUTE ADS, complete with FIVE MINUTES OF DISCLAIMERS to shut the feds up.

Posted 1:36 PM by Gene

If you're a ROCK mu-SICK cri-TICK of course smaller venues would mean "a better show". It might also mean not as many are willing to pay for the genius of mu-SICK -- or worse, that the genius of mu-SICK might NOT be worth paying for. But isn't POLLYANNA every ROCK mu-SICK cri-TICK's middle name?

Posted 1:23 PM by Gene

In more news of TOLERANCE:

From 3- and 4-year-olds used as human shields or to gather spent cartridges, to teenagers offered motorcycles for planting roadside bombs, children are being used more and more to fight Americans here, U.S. Marines say.

"We've seen children actually dropping mortar rounds in the (firing) tubes against us," says Lt. Col. Michael Manning, commander of the 1st Battalion, 2nd Marine Regiment that is rotating home after seven months in this hilly northern district of Helmand Province.

"I've never seen a culture that cares so little for human life. They (the Taliban) truly don't care unless it impacts their own personal family," says Manning, who has lost 13 Marines and seen 127 wounded since March.

And would someone PLEASE call off the rioters? Your fellow idiot canceled!

Posted 9:34 AM by Gene

I guess it will be, sighhhhhhhhhh.