Posted 9:56 PM by Gene

And speaking of NRO -- and tantrums:

THE WAR ON DRUGS HAS WEAKENED LIBERTY, STRENGTHENED BIG GOVERNMENT, ENRICHED CRIMINALS AND DAMAGED AMERICA'S SECURITY!! IT HAS TURNED WHAT SHOULD BE A MATTER FOR INDIVIDUAL ADULT DECISION INTO A NATIONAL DISASTER!!! AND IT HAS BEEN DOING SO FOR DECADES!!!! IT'S LONG PAST TIME IT CAME TO AN END!!!!! [Less-than-adult overemphasis added]

Like in the Netherlands!

By the way, was our favorite crook Connie Black persecuted for...dealing in drugs? We didn't think so. How do you explain his enrichment?

Posted 9:42 PM by Gene

“IT'S CLASS WARFARE, AND IT'S THE KIND OF LANGUAGE YOU WOULD EXPECT FROM THE LEADER OF A THIRD-WORLD COUNTRY, NOT THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES!!!!!!!!!!” said Rubio. [Warlike overemphasis added]

Okay Rube, we'll grant this was another of His Incompetence's cheap, insincere, thoroughly tacky stunts. But what is with this undying love affair between you Republicans and the HYPERRICH?

And what sort of a knee-jerk hard-core third-world leftist is MITCH PEARLSTEIN?

Posted 8:20 PM by Gene

What's the point in trying to sell women's sports as something they aren't? We're not against the fairer sex competing athletically but they'll never be popular; most women don't like sports and most men want beauties. Every women's professional sports league has played to indifference, or worse. It behooves those who tout women's sports as societal breakthroughs to hold the hype.

Posted 8:09 PM by Gene

Earlier this week The Econowiz made a small noise by saying the era of manned space flight was over. It was a contest launched with Sputnik between two nations, and once America won the contest in several ways so ended the need for showing off in orbit. The only rationale for manned space flight is to colonize other planets; despite her manifold flaws (too little land mass for one) our terra firma should do us fine for a while. With no need for us to colonize planets there is no need to spend zillions on what have become high-tech hi-mom moments. That His Incompetence pretty well announced the end in his inimitable downer way gives it a sour note as we know all too well he deems such things as space flight unworthy of us, and besides it's more money for His toys. That said we should continue to explore space with unmanned missions. They illumine the path for the future, though that future will most likely be for synthetic and worthless creatures tied to homo sapiens in name only. The desire to send ourselves to other planets can wait; so can the eventual need to turn the human race into something else.

Posted 12:22 PM by Gene

This is exasperating. Is this Hahvahd Mutual Fund's way of mocking Republicans for being patriotic -- or is this another excuse for Democrats to be less than patriotic?

Keeping THE MASTER's line in mind we must ask, how did something like Independence Day become political?

Posted 12:07 PM by Gene

Murguia, a University of Kansas law school graduate, was appointed to the federal bench in 1999 by President Bill Clinton, an abortion rights Democrat. [Conveniently last graf]

Again, let's cut the comedy; "justice" is about politics. Let's elect ALL our judges -- PERIOD.

Posted 10:02 AM by Gene

He hasn't been cleared yet.

Posted 9:56 AM by Gene

Surprise: Vegas is swarming with Vegrants -- er, "street performers". If Kitty Bean had been on call USAOKAY!!!!! wouldn't have run this; isn't the Veg HIP and HOT now? It's also in a depression. Given the clientele as documented here they're a perfect fit.

Posted 9:43 PM by Gene

Chavez's cancer revelation rattles Venezuela

Rattles? If I were a thoughtful Venezuelan I'd be rubbing my hands with glee -- remembering, of course, that Fidel still lives.

Posted 1:50 PM by Gene

Speaking of speculative, from a likely CON-SER-VA-TIVE:

New York soon will no longer be the financial capital of the world thanks to a hostile government that has served up a menu of punitive regulations aimed at driving big banks out of the country, says analyst Dick Bove [SIC].

In his latest broadside against the post-crisis regulatory environment, Bove asserts that a recent spate of layoffs, particularly by Goldman Sachs, is just the latest sign that large financial institutions will have to take their operations overseas.

The result, he says, will not be good both for New York and the nation.

The SECOND LINK when Googling his name:

Dick Bové Not “Full Of Hot Air,” Not Paid Off By Goldman Sachs, Says Dick Bové

Posted 1:41 PM by Gene

WHY THE DOW WILL PLUNGE TO 7,000!!!!!!!!!! [Plunging overemphasis added]

I HATE such speculative buncombe; Doug has no more idea where stocks will go than anyone else. He can only base it on a gut feeling, the feeling that BEN and His cronies have rigged the markets for the benefit of the extremely select few, and that stocks are going higher on fairy tales. But a gut feeling is not empirical evidence, and the only empirical evidence we have is that the markets are now moving sharply higher -- albeit for no known reasons other than the perpetrators' net worth. This is as bad as any sales pitch on the BIG C, from the other side.

And the markets are not going down until (or unless) such bubbles are deflated. My speculative prediction based on LinkedIn: $40 BILLION MARKET CAP THE FIRST DAY. MORONS!

Posted 1:34 PM by Gene

Alas we must face the galling realization the conspiracy to make our culture into Fukushima is a global one. Though poor domestic B.O. performance often dictates world receipts (but not always) we should not ignore HUGE!!!! foreign grosses, though our product is practically the only one available to locals, and it exists in a movee biz a fraction of its former self. Oh for that renaissance of the fifties when Europe exported its best to the U.S., which was too often better than ours! We suspect petty kings like PHEEEELEEEEEPE DOUGHMAHHHHHHN would gladly boast, "VEEE arrre an eenternationalll cohmpannie!" To which we say, if he wants to commit treason overseas, that's fine with us -- but why does treason have to be nominally headquartered here?

Why couldn't PHEEEELEEEEEPE have traded places with DSK? There's a man we'd love to see put through the wringer of a criminal charge.

Posted 11:14 AM by Gene

Greece’s austerity plan looks doomed to fail. It does too little to prevent the epic folly of Greece’s railways and other ruinous schemes. It will screw down too hard on ordinary Greeks, with new taxes, spending cuts and a rushed privatisation scheme. And it will almost certainly condemn Greece to recession, strife and an eventual debt default.

DOW 900 GIGAMEGAHEXA...oh, never mind.

Posted 10:25 AM by Gene

The world is apparently coming to the revolting conclusion that DSK may have been framed. He is not a nice guy, but neither perhaps were his accusers, and those of us who railed against him will have to eat crow.

Posted 6:11 PM by Gene

THE ATTITUDE LEAGUE deserves a season-destroying lockout even more than the NFL -- and at least we can harbor the hope it will get it.

Posted 6:09 PM by Gene

Conservatives may overstate the potential for Jews voting Republican; they think perhaps more alike than any other racial or ethnic group, and their first concern is Pat Robertsons, never mind their "synagogues" combat his ilk with ever-diluted traditions and moral piffle. Because so many lead in self-important professions the likelihood of political conversions is that much smaller. We would hope, however, they'd realize that by constantly voting party line they're as much Babbitts as any rock-ribbed Christian -- no, worse.

Posted 5:30 PM by Gene

This latest ennui-provoking publicity stunt is why news can be more trouble following than it's worth. We don't know why some people think they're more honest uttering curse words; you'd think they'd have a little more dignity and self-respect than to utter them of our president; you'd think an Ivy Leaguer with a zillion connections who earns half-a-million as a TWXSTER and perhaps an equal amount from CONCAST (or whatever they overpay him) would cherish his job as an entitlement. Moreover with all those self-appointed brains and all that moolah you'd think he'd come up with a better zinger than a crude word meaning PENIS. Perhaps he wallows in the self-pity of his relative "obscurity" and thus OLBERMANNING or BECKING were his answer. Certainly they're the answer if you wish to emulate a horse's behind.

Posted 1:54 PM by Gene

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEVIL:

Memo from 1970: ‘A PLAN FOR PUTTING THE GOP IN TV NEWS!!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA!!!!!’
(EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEVIL overemphasis added)

Golly gee, if only they'd been like the Dems -- and it didn't cost them a dime!

Posted 12:10 PM by Gene

There'll always be a PAPER OF RE-CORD:

Posted 11:38 AM by Gene

Speaking of Antonin Costello, this friend of Big Tobacco's got repudiated by His fellow Nine-Fingers!



You can stop SMOKING, Tony C!

Posted 11:24 AM by Gene

SHOULD AULD ACQUAINTANCE BE FORGOT....

Fed's QE2 program ends with final $4.91 billion Treasury bond purchase

Don't worry, we'll be reacquainted!

Posted 11:22 AM by Gene

Older Interns Signal Gloomy US Labor Market

Older interns signal DOW 800 GIGAHYPERMEGAQUINTAZILLION!

Posted 10:06 AM by Gene

Greece clears final hurdle to get bailout funds

ALL RIGHT, WALL STREET CASINO, YOU JUST GOT PAID AGAIN!

Oh, the Greek unemployment rate is 16.2 percent and climbing? NOT OUR PROBLEM!

With debt equal to more than 150% of GDP and a rapidly contracting economy, Greece must choose between declining the EU/IMF bailout and defaulting now, or imposing more austerity, getting more loans, and defaulting a few months from now. So, why would the Greek government choose to go through all of this agony just to buy a few months? And why would it want to pile on more austerity when what is needed is a program for economic growth?

It could be because Greek elites have not yet moved all of their capital out of the country.

Sounds like what our elites might do someday.

Posted 10:01 AM by Gene

No sensible person can deny family breakdown is behind so much of our social disorder. The question is, short of an Islamic Republic (PFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFT!), how can any earthly power fix it?

And when a writer in a conservative rag can state, "It’s easy to imagine, for instance, millions becoming less accepting than in the past of top CEOs’ making hundreds of times more money than they do. Conservatives’ attempts to debunk, say, tax increases on the rich as reflecting 'class envy' and 'class warfare' may be less effective than they have been till now", who can bet something is profoundly wrong -- except the Antonin Costellos?

Posted 9:28 AM by Gene

CLODS: As we've noted before hack pols have this obsession with playing rock anthems in their campaigns. It's no accident some of the rockers are getting back at Republicans for using their genius without their permission as they're Democrats, which makes them look extremely small-minded. But why must the oafish pols use the same six songs anyway? And why must it always be rock? What's wrong with "The Stars and Stripes Forever" or "Seventy-Six Trombones" on occasion? And these jerks don't even listen to the lyrics.

Of course someone would scoff at the latter; that was from a show about a con man with a musical scam. But he did come through for River City -- more than we can say for most pols.

Posted 9:23 PM by Gene

This very-well-done piece by Winston Groom on Truman Capote must serve as Exhibit A to the notion that his unfathomable celebrity will survive his writing. And who hears of Truman Capote anymore?

On the other hand there are all those stories.

Posted 8:41 PM by Gene

IDIOT:

[C]ontrary to Colbert’s claim that Viacom has “no approval over what I say” — corporate lawyers do in fact review his scripts, proposals and even subject matter “to identify legal and commercial issues and to ensure compliance with … ‘standards and practices’ for cable shows.” [Emphasis added]

We have long known ED MURROW AND ERIC SEVAREID were essentially stooges for SUMNER. Why has it taken the world so long to find out?

Posted 8:24 PM by Gene

If this wasn't inevitable:

Riyadh will build nuclear weapons if Iran gets them, Saudi prince warns

Now who uses them on Israel first?

Posted 7:00 PM by Gene

Taking a $545 million bath (more accounting for inflation) is what in too many quarters is called vision.

Posted 1:28 PM by Gene

A hard-core tech site admits that while Justice Antonin Costello had fairy tales on his side, the antis had studies.

And we have noted our strong skepticism of the social sciences before, but we suspect even they can stumble onto truth occasionally.

Much as we hate to bother with commenters we must here as this got lots of "I play violent videogames but" and "Why has crime gone down?" As to the former they've already taken out their aggressions on the movee biz; as to the latter that may have to do with octupling our police presence in big cities and to people giving birth to fewer hoodlums. One did note a connection to all those friends of the court. And then came this zinger:

I'm betting it was beneath the dignity of any of the Supreme Court Justices to actually PLAY any of the games they passed judgement on. Still, for most people to make such a decision, I think the first requirement would be to become really involved in the games. In any case I''m [sic] sure the Justices spent at least several weeks "studying" the questions about the games, just as medieval philosophers debated for several hundred years about the number of teeth in a horse's mouth....

Posted 1:04 PM by Gene

Homebuilders led the stock parade this week with a fantastic 11 percent gain. This is a group that hedge funds and bubbleheads love to hate. All the bond bears have been dead wrong in predicting sky-high mortgage rates. So have all the bubbleheads who expect housing-price crashes in Las Vegas or Naples, Florida, to bring down the consumer, the rest of the economy, and the entire stock market. None of this has happened...[T]he homebuilders index has increased 76 percent over the past year, with particularly well-run companies like Toll Brothers up about twice as much. The bubbleheads missed all this because they haven’t done their homework....

Dirk van Dijk has discovered that, in 2005 or whenever, GEKKO KUDLOW has ALWAYS been an idiot.

Posted 12:17 PM by Gene

Not mocking the woman at all, but:

Little named Newspaper Association of America president

Whatever her name we hope, especially after last Saturday, the biz gets littler.

Posted 11:47 AM by Gene

What IS with con-SER-va-tives and "con-SER-va-tive" pop culture?

Posted 11:44 AM by Gene

NOMOTOWN, "city of 100,719 vacant parcels and three Starbucks" and a destroyed auto biz and nonfunctional schools and a government that couldn't dig its way from a hole in the ground, has found its SOLUTION: RENDELLISM! Make the city HIP, and HOT, and YOUNG, and MILLIONS will SWARM back and REBUILD THE AUTO BIZ?!?!?

Look, who doesn't want Detroit to come back? But we in Philthydelphia have tried that gag, and we have a HIP! HOT! DOWNTOWN -- and we're STILL SIXTY PERCENT GHETTO.

The idea of Detroit as a raw, creative space is getting plenty of help from outside media and art circles.

Earlier this month, BBC Radio ran a half-hour special called "Unbuilding Detroit." International photographer Andrew Moore explored the beauty of the city's abundant empty buildings for his critically acclaimed book "Detroit Disassembled."

But if the HIP! and HOT! flood NOMOTOWN doesn't that mean all these buildings get occupied, which means it loses its HIPNESS and HOTNESS, which means it's not so BEAUTIFUL anymore?

Posted 5:44 PM by Gene

So long as there are Republicans, and Democrats, and lobbyists, and big business, the tax system will never be fair.

Posted 5:16 PM by Gene

What do HUGE UP DAYS!!!!! tell us except the Wall Street Casino expects to be paid?

Posted 4:57 PM by Gene

After his stellar stump speech in print yesterday we regard Antonin as the EDDIE!!!!! of con-SER-va-tive Republican jurisprudence: The Italian John Marshall (as He no doubt thinks) who's a bit closer to Lou Costello (whom He vaguely resembles), stalwart defender of First Amendment Rights! even as He SCREAMS to have cameras removed from the venues where he's sucking up to the rich, terror to clerks (no doubt) while dictating His opinions to a mirror, to much giggling from behind His back....

We must ask, why do we need judges? We've said it before but we call them the Nine Fingers for a reason, and they're appointed for political reasons, and their decisions are political when they don't result from lobbying. We believe more than ever these legalists should be elected, and held to the same theoretically tough ethics standards as anyone else. And upon reflection we cringe at how the late Chief Finger Hole-in-the-Throat always whined that the Fingers and their thousands of clerks were COLLAPSING under the weight of all their CASES, to which we say, why not arbitration? Why not non-judicial panels with the power of law? Why must everything be decided by pygmies in black robes?

P. S.

Sen. Ken Levine said he expects game designers to "move forward empowered, but also with a sense of responsibility." [First two words added]

Why do our superiors think they grant us a favor when they utter empty platitudes like CONGRESSPOOPS?

With luck there'll be more piracy among the hardcore.

Posted 1:37 PM by Gene

Pols don't listen to the lyrics of the eternal rock masterpieces they use on the trail?



GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWSH!!!!!

P. S. at 3:33 p. m.

[T]he Corner is probably not the place for a music theory class.

Nor anything else musical.

ROLL OVER, BEETHOVEN!!!!!

Posted 1:29 PM by Gene

As the industry complains about all those SUPERHERO TENTPOLES it's inflicted on people it supposes are all fanboys, and thus retarded, USAOKAY!!!!! bows to the latest mechanical wonder:

[M]odel Rosie Huntington-Whiteley (Megan Fox's replacement) is stunning, but no actress. With her perfectly sculpted long legs and beyond bee-stung lips, she seems part of the dazzling special effects, on hand for male fans to ogle, just as they do the super-cool machinery.

TRANSLATION: Now the biz is casting toys!

Posted 3:36 PM by Gene

Robert Blake was guilty after all.

Posted 3:16 PM by Gene

"We can't do what we want to do all the time. If you don't have boundaries, what then?"

Hey guys! That fellow who used to spell his name with a whatisit is a CON-SER-VA-TIVE!!!!!

"It's FUN!!!!! being in Islamic countries, to know there's only one religion! There's order! You wear a burqa! There's no choice! People are HAPPY!!!!! with that!" [Fun overemphasis added]

Oh wait....

"I'm supposed to go to the White House to talk about copyright protection. It's like the gold rush out there. Or a carjacking. There's no boundaries." Because of the problem with piracy, he said, he has no plans to record another album.

YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!!!!!

(Via WeeklyStandard.com)

Posted 1:57 PM by Gene

Once again socc -- fuuuuuuuuutballllllllll proves it is the WORLD'S SPORT...with lots of violence and injuries.

Fortunately some people had sense:

Fearing this kind of violence, Argentine authorities deployed about 2,200 police -- reported to be the largest security operation for a soccer match -- to control the crowd.

But not the Interior Ministry:

Suggestions to play the match in an empty stadium were turned down by interior ministry officials after consulting with the Argentine Football Association and its president, Julio Grondona.

RENDELLISM in...South America! Take it away!

Posted 10:47 AM by Gene

OooooOOOOOoooooh, the WORRRRRRRRLD COMMUNITY wants to arrest Muammar!

Will that be anything like THE WORRRRRRRRRLD COMMUNITY stopping NUKEMAN?

Pffffffffffffffffffffffft!!!!!

Posted 10:29 AM by Gene

As I'm guessing was pretty well expected, the Nine Fingers struck down Ah-NULT's videogame law -- and one big reason (cursorily skimming through the legalese) is he relied on the self-appointed expert Craig Anderson, who is to videogame nuts what John C. Dvorak is to computer phreaks. Yet the Fingers have knotted themselves into yet another ideological pretzel as they've agreed to rule on broadcast indecency, which, though less disgusting than some videogames, is federally regulated, because the...

My head hurts.

P. S. at 12:38 p. m. We should note there were lots of friends of the court for corporate interests, and we know who Chief Finger Roberts loves.

In fairness this sort of thing will prove moot for these reasons: First, videogame sales are increasingly moving away from consoles and onto the Web and iPads, which means no restrictions on purchases (and in some cases no purchases); second, the blood-and-guts games have been in decline for some time, largely due to geeks and BUGS; and third, what happened to recorded...SOUND is happening to videogames, regardless of what Deutsche Bank sells -- SAYS.

Although annoyingly SOUND sales have been up of late, perhaps due to better PR stunts.

P. S. at 2:08 p. m. Bugmeisters are up four percent and nine hacks out of ten say it's because WE WIN!!!!! WE WIN!!!!! (will news hacks EVER stop celebrating?) -- and the tenth more credibly says it's because the bugs are moving up Windows 8 (just what I need).

Posted 9:57 AM by Gene

Taking one for the team:

Terrell Owens, who has placed himself among the NFL's all-time leading receivers with plans to play a 16th season, has undergone surgery to repair a torn anterior cruciate ligament in one of his knees following a previously undisclosed injury this offseason, according to sources familiar with the injury.

Owens, 37, was unavailable for comment but sources said the surgery by noted orthopedist Dr. James Andrews occurred within the past month.

One source said Owens was hurt while on site taping a television show for VH1.

Posted 9:37 AM by Gene

Frank McCourt takes Dodgers into bankruptcy court

Now you know this won't last -- zillionaires are salivating all over -- but if ever a sport deserved bankruptcy it's SELIGISM, being bankrupt in other ways.

Posted 9:28 AM by Gene

Several States Forbid Abortion After 20 Weeks

By ERIK ECKHOLM

On the theory that fetuses can feel pain after 20 weeks (AN IDEA DISPUTED BY MAINSTREAM MEDICINE!!!!!), several states have banned abortions later than this. [Home-page blurb; painful overemphasis added]

Yep, I think PINCH wants to turn His rag into unpaid advertising.

Posted 9:25 AM by Gene

An irritant:

Perhaps the strongest evidence for the new labels comes from the International Tobacco Control Evaluation Project, which has examined tobacco-control policies around the world.

After Thailand switched to graphic labels in 2005, for example, the project found that the percentage of smokers who reported thinking about health risks because of the warnings went up from about 35 percent to 55 percent. The percentage of smokers who said that the warnings made them more likely to quit rose from 31 percent to 46 percent.

Happily Discover.com doesn't mention whether the number of Thais still smoking has gone down. This is like a hamburger recipe without the hamburger.

News hacks find so many different ways of being bad.

(Via AHTSJournal, which must find the new warning labels artistic)

Posted 5:56 PM by Gene

The critics were WRONG!!!!! Audiences are MISSING OUT!!!!!!!!!! And a sequel is GONNA ROCK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (Rockin' overemphasis added)

Does this drool belong in DVFORBESLISTBLOG?

Posted 4:39 PM by Gene

The further THUMBS® is from his rave movee reviews, the better he is. ROMY (who is still hung over) says the guy's won some sort of best blog competition, and though we dismiss such awards -- they judge the same six professional writers, who already have enough unearned honors -- this guy deserves it. We'd written some time ago about his electric portrayal of his early days in newspapering. A few months back he wrote on a TNR piece (why must it put so much behind its stupid wall?) about all the once-famous authors in oblivion. Ah, Saul Bellow -- a Nobel-winning egghead from the University of Chicago. We haven't read a novel in ages but we like to read plays: they save all the trouble of slogging through exposition and get right to the point. But even the best writing doesn't have the visceral impact of music. The opening of Roses from the South stirs more yearning than ten novels. Especially in this hectic age reading fiction involves what must prosaically be called time management, a calculation of effort versus gain, and most of the time it isn't worth it.

Posted 10:43 AM by Gene

"Whitey" Bulger's story is strangely tinged with laughter and even admiration -- we suspect LEGENDARY SCORSESE admires him -- but when we realize he possibly killed 19, including two innocent bystanders and two women, it isn't quite so funny or admirable anymore.

Those who laugh at or admire his saga should have their heads examined, assuming something's there.