Dow Jones Take A 416 Point Tumble

The Dow Jones took a 416 point tumble, the biggest one day loss since 9/11. The cause seems to be related to various inconsistent economic reports such as a drop in housing prices, but increase in consumer confidence. This despite a recent report that more then 16 million Americans are living below the poverty line. The highest number in US history. Oil is going up, but gold is going down. Then there is a possible recession coming towards end of 2007 according to former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan.

Another factor, for reasons I don't understand, is the failed attack on Dick Cheney by a suicide bomber during a visit in Afghanistan. Why this would have an impact isn't explained. Best guess is because Cheney has instrumental in the military spending and funds that are going to multiple military contractors he is friendly with. His death would more then likely hit their bottom lines hard.

Frankly I am surprised it took this long for the Dow to take a hit as the US market is in some odd bubble where the rich and large corporations are benefiting but pretty much everyone else isn't. Considering its the lower and middle class that do the spending that keep the economy engine going, the growth of the Dow Jones hasn't made much sense. The stock market is saying the economy is strong while every other indication is saying there is a problem. Something had to give and it looks like it was the stock market first.

Reading First Program Under Scrutiny

The Reading First program, apart of Bush's No Child Left Behind Act, is under scrutiny for cronyism that benefited the Oregon professors that initially helped Bush create the law and the program. Its been discovered that the consultants used to help in various programs approved for funding were headed by top Bush administration donors. In other words, the consultants where pushing their own products while preventing any other competitors from entering the market.

This shouldn't be a surprise as there is literally no law, no action, that the Bush administration has taken that doesn't benefit his friends in some form or fashion. The Bush admin is the very definition of cronyism. Knowing he and his friends are willing to corrupt the education of our next generation is just further proof that there is nothing he isn't willing to do.

The Education Inspector General report on the Reading First program and also an AJC article regarding this corrupted program.

Quickie Movie Reviews

I have been on a small movie spree these last few weeks so figured will write quick reviews of the movies, on the assumption people know what they are about, just don't know if worth seeing.

Amazing Grace - Typical historical film, not that is a bad thing as the film is very entertaining and well done. Recommend sooner rather then later.

Breach - Another typical historical film, also very well done. Great acting all around and also worth seeing.

Bridge To Terabithia - The movie sadly didn't get good until towards the end when a tragic turn finally added the drama the otherwise boring movie desperately needed.

Ghost Rider - Typical popcorn movie. If you go in with the right mindset, don't try to hard to pick it apart, it does the job of entertaining you for two hours.

Music and Lyrics - Boring film, not very funny. The memorable part is the introduction of Haley Bennett, who is going to be a hell of a star if she picks the right roles. Her beauty just popped off the screen and was quite breathtaking. Sadly the film does little to indicate if she has any singing or acting skill (but didn't hurt either), hopefully her skills beyond looks will be highlighted in future work.

Reno 911!: Miami - Silly but amusing as hell. In no way shape or form try to take anything about it seriously and you will have a good time.

RIAA Wants To Ban Wi-Fi

The RIAA, the recording industries mafia enforces, have filed a motion that basically says that Internet Service Providers should be held responsible for all activity of its customers including possible violations of copyright. If such a ruling occurred in their favor, it would in effect eliminate the possibility of any open wi-fi wireless networks such as those being considered by San Francisco and Atlanta and those that already exist in many restaurants and locations throughout the US. Considering that such a ruling would make anyone from companies to major corporations liable for whatever floats the boat of the RIAA, the MPAA and really anyone that wants a quick infusion of cash, the net result is it make it very expensive for any company to provide Internet connectivity. It never ceases to amaze me how a company claiming to protect the rights of its artists (bullshit, its really their corporations) seems to have no problem running roughshod over everyone and anything in that effort. This is just another example of why citizens need to flat out boycott any and all corporations that are apart of the RIAA and refuse to by any music if any artists that support them and their behavior.

Oscar Predictions?

The Oscars should be starting right about now and everyone is throwing around predictions. Usually I don't mind trying the same thing except for that most of the nomoniees I haven't see. Actually this is one of those years where I could care less who wins as most of the movies that I have seen just don't resonate with me in any way.

Part of my indifference may be due to the fact that the Oscars don't so much as cover the year 2006 in movies as more covers the months of November and Decemeber in movies. Its hard to care when knowing 10 months of the year don't really count. Then there is the huge advertising campaign that pretty much desolves the Oscars from "who deserves it" to "who spent the most money". Anyway just for giggles, based mostly on chance and lots of guessing, here are my wins for the main categories of the Oscars.

Best Picture: Babel
Best Actor: Forest Whitaker
Best Actress: Helen Mirren
Best Supporting Actor: Eddie Murphy
Best Supporting Actress: Cat Blanchett
Best Dirctor: Martin Scorsese
Foreign Film: Pan's Laybrinth
Adapted Screensplay: The Departed
Orginial Screenplay: Babel
Animated Feature Film: Cars
Art Direction: Pan's Labyrinth
Cinematography: Pan's Labyrinth
Sound Mixing: Pirates of the Caribbean
Sound Editing: Flags of Our Fathers
Originial Score: Babel
Originial Song: Love You I Do
Visual Effects: Pirates of the Caribbean

Support The Troops...Unless Its Too Much Trouble

With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan — to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations
- Abraham Lincoln; March 4th, 1865 Second Inaugural Address

Support The Troops. Its the catch phrase of the moment. Used as an excuse for war. Its used as a defense. Its used for offense. Its used to increase a financial cost the country can scarcely afford. Its used to funnel more money to the corporate entities that waste it. Yet that phrase doesn't seem to apply when its the troops, our soldiers, that need the support.

The Bush Administration and his republican cronies whip out this phrase on a constant basis when it comes to the Iraq War. The try to use it to fan the flames of patriotism and quash any dissent. Yet time and time again, when supporting the troops will cost money that will not go into the coffers of the Haliburtons and other Bush corporate cronies, suddenly the cost is simply too high. If it goes to a corporation, the money is always there. No expense is spared. If the money is going to the soldiers, the injured or the families of the dead, lets pause and reconsider. Apparently the money can be spent better elsewhere.

The Bush administration on camera cries out that we must support the war so that we can support the troops. Yet privately, he screws over the veterans, those no longer able to help with his legacy agenda. In the line of fire, he likes you. After you have made your sacrifice and your family is left to pick up the pieces, he simply has no use for you. This is evidenced by his repeated health care budget cuts and other cuts to reduce the support the veterans and their families receive. This attitude is no more evidenced by the recently exposed conditions for out-patient care at Walter Reed Hospital.

The Washington Post recently reported on the abysmal conditions at Building 18 used to house out-patients of the hospital. The care is top notch while coming from the field of battle but during recovery, the soldiers are basically treated as refuge. A burden, a cost that isn't worth paying. As if a stitch, some surgery and maybe a prosthetic limb (or two) with a few weeks of bed rest and the soldier should be ready to return back to civilian life as good as new.

Of course we know that's not the case. Recovery is a long, arduous, and expensive process. A process that Bush claims he supports whenever he goes for the photo-op in the Ward 57, the amputee unit. Instead though there is disintegrating buildings, complicated paperwork, confused staffers, un-trained supervisors, in-capable databases and pretty much any error you can name, the soldiers have to deal with on a constant and regular basis.

They sacrificed elsewhere just to start a new fight here at home. A battle against the bureaucratic machine. A battle they cannot hope to win without help from a leadership that simply doesn't care. They got what they wanted out of the troops, the rest is just a burden they are not interested in carrying. For a fraction of the funds handed to the Haliburtons for Iraq this new frontline at home could be over before it began.

The reality of Walter Reed is simply inexcusable. The politicians claim they support the troops yet their inaction's and voting records often show the opposite. The voters slap on yellow ribbons on their SUVs yet continue to vote for the person whose actions do not support their words. You claim to support the troops? Prove it. Write and tell your congressmen to get his shit together and make sure the troops get the support and care they deserve. Remind them that families sent their family over their to "protect our freedoms" and whether they come home injured or in a body bag, they and their families will be taken care of.

As President Lincoln said "to care for him who shall have borne the battle". The troops have already borne one battle, they shouldn't have to fight another and nor should their families.

(image source)

Joe Rogan vs Carlos Mencia

According to Joe Rogan ("Fear Factor"), Carlos Mencia's ("Mind of Mencia") entire career is based upon the stealing of other comics material. Apparently a norm of the industry that everyone knows is happening but does nothing about. Well Joe had enough and decided to confront Carlos directly about it. Oh and he recorded it.

You can see the video here or here or here.

In the edited confrontation, notice that Carlos doesn't really so much as defend against the accusation as basically just call Joe an ass for confronting him on stage. In and of itself, not exactly damning but Joe did do a comparison of Carlos jokes to other acts jokes to prove his point. Wish he had done more of that during the video but it does help to make a convincing case.

You would think the story would end there, but nope. Carlos Mencia is clearly pissed at the online embarrassment has returned a few volleys back by getting Joe banned from the comedy club and costing him his agent.

On top of that, Carlos has decided that the video of the confrontation is infringing his copyright. In what can only be the move of a moron, he forced YouTube to take down the video and probably will have emails sent to other sites therefore guaranteeing this video pops up anywhere and everywhere since preventing the online community from seeing something is a sure fire way to make sure they will see it. Its also is the behavior of a guilty person.

In addition, I don't even know what makes him think he has copyright ownership of anything in the video. To my knowledge jokes can't be copyrighted. The footage used came from other sources not under the ownership of Carlos (did he buy Comedy Central recently?). Maybe he thinks his name or his face is copyrighted. He would be wrong, but its the only explanation I have for attempting to enforce his non-existent copyright.

At this point I am not sure who is winning the war. Carlos is still getting paydays from Comedy Central for his shows and probably will continue to do so but has gotten a major online embarrassment. Joe remains more or less unemployed with no hangout and no agent. In the end, I am going to call it a wash as I doubt this will effect either career's since the Carlos will continue to do what he wants due to other comedians he has stolen material from are doing nothing about it.

Anna Nicole Smith Will and Legal Mess

The story that will not die continues to onward with more legal wrangling as everyone tries to figure out where the $88 million will go. At first everyone thought that whoever is the father (from 5 candidates now) is will get the 8 month old daughter. Whoever gets the baby becomes the custodian of the fortune. By becoming custodian of the fortune they in effect get to live the life of luxery and wealth. Hire a couple nannies and enjoy the lifestyles of the rich and famous.

A new wrinkle has come up though with the will. Probably to the suprise of no one, Anna Nicole Smith neglected to update her will to keep up with the recent developments of her life, in this case the death of her son and birth of the daughter. The result is will gives her fortune to her dead son, so as of now, no one knows where the money will go. California law would have given the fortune to the daughter by default but Anna had recently moved, bought, or borrowed a house in Bermuda. Even that is unknown and undetermined. So depending on where her official place of residence is could decide to who the money goes. Long story short, its a gigantic FUBAR of a legal mess.

Ironic considering her lover, maybe husband, possible father of the little girl, was the lawyer that drew up the orginial will and its current executor. In theory you think he would know better. Of course this whole thing stinks to high hell and I still have to wonder what involvement Howard Stern has in the death of the Smith family. Its seems like a lot of the actions in the last year have helped create a legal mess that will give him sole custody of the girl and therefore full control over the Smith fortune. Being a lawyer, you think he would have figured out a better way to work this out as something like this could be fought in court for years.

Easy Solution To Avoid Tangled Headphones

Found this video through Gizmodo that demonstrates an easy way to track your headphone cards with your MP3 player and not have to worry about the wadded knot that occurs when shoving the cords into pockets.

Lego Star Wars Millennium Falcon

In the "if money wasn't an object" department comes this 5,000 plus piece of Lego-tastic fun that probably will cost in the neighborhood of $300 or more to get when it comes out. More pics here.

Dixie Chicks Win Five Grammys

Maybe it "revenge" against Bush and the republican establishment, maybe it was the lack of competition, or maybe it was because the album was that good, but the Dixie Chicks reigned supreme at the 07 Grammy Awards with wins in the biggest Grammy categories of Album of the Year, Song of the Year, Record of the Year, Country Album of the Year, and Country Performance of the Year for "Not Ready to Make Nice" single and album Taking the Long Way.

These wins came despite the abandonment of the country genre they once ruled over due to comments by Natalie Maines that criticized Bush on the eve of the Iraq War claiming she was ashamed that Bush was from Texas. This kicked off a campaign in country music to basically destroy the careers of the Dixie Chicks with fans and country music radio stations refusing to play their music. An apology days later did little to stop the backlash.

The wins yesterday, especially the two country wins are probably not going over well for the fans of country music as the boycott by fans and radio against the Chicks continue despite and 70%+ of the country not satisfied with the Iraq War and about the same not please with Bush. In effect, the comments Maines had made in 2003 have become the common sentiment for most of the country. As the Chicks pointed out during one of their award wins, they don't really have a genre as country has rejected them and pop/top 10 hasn't made up its mind. The awards will probably help many stations get off the fence on playing their music. So congrats to the Dixie Chicks for standing tall and getting the chance to give a collective finger to all those that tried to destroy them three years ago.

Autopsy Results on Anna Nicole Smith Inconclusive

The autopsy of Anna Nicole Smith has so far not explained the cause of death for the former Playmate. The results indicate she had not taken drugs, no evidence of long term drug use and no evidence of a crime. Basically the whole thing has that same mysterious what happened vibe that the odd death of her son last year had. One person dying is strange, but both, in the same family is very suspicious to me.

I am starting to wonder what is up. A possible suspect if a crime has been committed is Smith's sorta husband and lawyer who is probably very familiar with the terms of her will and with the oldest son and Anna herself gone, is probably set to inherit all the money she herself got as a result of her previous marriage.

It makes me think of all the Black Widows that get caught now and then using poison and they like to murder their husbands. They don't get caught the first or second time, but by the third the chance of coincidence goes away and you really have to wonder what's up. When things go wrong, its often smart to go to the common denominator be it a computer, car or in this case mysterious deaths. Hopefully there is no crime, its just a tragic event and her little girl will be taken care of but I am thinking this is just the beginning of a long and bizarre story.

Anna Nicole Smith Found Dead

Anna Nicole Smith, 39, collapsed at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Hollywood, Florida and died probably at the hotel was brought to a hospital and declared dead there. Cause of death is unknown. She recently had remarried shortly after the birth of her second child and death of her first. She is probably most famous for her multiple Playboy appearances and her long fight for the estate of her rather old husband several years ago. Earlier this week she was also named in a class action lawsuit against TrimSpa X32 that she was spokesperson for.

She was basically the Paris Hilton of the 90s. To be blunt, Anna Nicole existed for two reasons - to get attention for looking good and to find a rich man to take care of her. She succeed at both but for some reason still didn't seem to find happiness. At most you could use her as an example that money can't buy happiness but as her life showed, it can buy many good times. My best guess of cause of death is going to be accidental overdose on drugs. I find it hard to believe it was suicide. If she was going to do that, it would have been after the death of her son, not after being involved in another lawsuit, something she already has much experience in.

Anna Nicole Smith 1967-2007

Viacom Forces YouTube to Remove Clips

Viacom, in response to failed negotiations with YouTube, ordered the removal of 100,000 video clips from the website. Viacom is the owner of MTV, VH1, Nickelodeon, Comedy Central, Paramount Pictures and lots of other things. All of which could only benefit from the free advertising that YouTube provides.

In a time where an attempt at viral marketing resulted in un-intentional bomb scare in Boston, you would think companies would be trying to make better use of the safe and free advertising sites such as YouTube provides especially to bloggers, commentators and other means used to disseminate the interesting bits of info that occur still on television and movies. In others words, the ultimate in viral marketing, and even better its free.

Now Viacom just gets to spend millions of dollars to do the exact same thing only because its a pain to get and use clicks on their websites, most will simply pass on talking about whatever content their properties produce. As a negotiation tactic, Viacom did nothing to hurt YouTube and did everything to shoot itself in the foot. As decisions go, this is one of the stupidest committed in a while.

Harry Potter 7 Released 12:01pm 7/21/07

Author J.K. Rowling has announced that the last of the Harry Potter books, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, will be released on July 7th, 2007 at midnight. The book is rumored to kill at least one if not more of the main characters of the series, including possibly the boy wizard himself. Already many sites are offering pre-orders as will be retail sites if they are not already. In fact, my library has already allowed me to reserve the book so if interested in the reading but not the buying check out your library as soon as possible to be low in the book queue.

The release of the book messes nicely with the movie release of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix out July 13th.

Super Bowl XLI Predicted by Tecmo Super Bowl

Orginial NES game Tecmo Super Bowl has predicted that the Bears defeat the Colts 28-24. Now that is known, what will you be doing Sunday instead of watching the game?

Teen Accuses RIAA of Collusion

A 16 year old boy, whose family has been under constant legal siege by the RIAA who has filed cases against his mother and sister, has apparently had enough and decided to fight back by accusing the RIAA of collusion and defrauding the courts of the United States. In short, he is accusing the recording industry of being a cartel. Which actually is pretty much accurate. The industry may compete for talent but they don't compete for consumer dollars where the price of pretty much everything is agreed upon by all the companies making up the RIAA. Afterall when was the last time you saw Sony Music try to out price say Virgin? I just hope his lawyers have kept up and also attempt to get the RIAA to reveal the values and numbers they use to prove how much copyright violations are costing them as those numbers are clearly exaggerated for their own benefit. I wish him the best of luck because I am simply disgusted with the RIAA's bullying tactics.