By ROBERT RECTOR
I got my real first taste of political dirty deeds some years back when, as a young editor, I was directing the coverage of a Los Angeles city council campaign.
One candidate, for reasons that weren't entirely clear, decided that her opponent had planted a spy in her camp.
So she fired off a letter to the city attorney's office accusing her opponent of stealing campaign secrets.
Then she demanded the media write a story that her opponent was "under investigation" by the city attorney's office for ethical misconduct.
Since asking for an investigation doesn't constitute the existence of one, we declined. It was clear she was trying to use the media to smear her opponent by portraying him as some morally compromised KGB agent.
It was minor stuff at a minor level. But it's a game played with varying degrees of success at the highest levels.
Consider: It didn't take long for the smear-mongers to take dead aim at prospective presidential candidate Barack Obama, the senator from Illinois.
Just this past week, Insight, a magazine owned by the conservative Washington Times, raised the specter that Obama is actually a Muslim. Maybe even a radical one.
Playing a skewed game of connect the dots, the article said that the young Barack attanded a mandrassah, or Muslim religious school, in Indonesia where he lived with his stepfather and mother. He was 6 at the time and had attended Catholic school for two years.
The implication is that Barack was schooled in Islamic radicalism while attending that school even though there is no evidence that terrorism or anything like it was part of the curriculum some 40 years ago.
I guess what we're suppose to read between the lines is that Obama, if elected president, will deliver the country lock, stock and oil barrel over to Islamic jihadists who will convert our churches to mosques, veil our women, toss our liquor into the Pacific Ocean and pack the halls of Congress with radical clerics.
But if that kind of political mud isn't bad enough, some members of the media had a large hand in slinging it. The boys over at Fox News picked up this nonsense on several of their programs and played up an angle in the magazine story that unnamed researchers "connected" to Hillary Clinton were spreading this information about her potential rival.
By doing so, Fox performed the difficult double smear move almost flawlessly: First cover Obama with mud, then blame it on Clinton.
As Howard Kurtz reported in the Washington Post, "in the first media controversy of the 2008 campaign, two of the leading candidates find themselves forced to respond to allegations lacking a single named source.
For their part, Obama's office said that "the idea that Senator Barack Obama attended some radical Islamic school is completely ludicrous. Senator Obama is a committed Christian and attends the United Church of Christ in Chicago."
Clinton's people called it "an obvious right-wing hit job by a Moonie publication that was designed to attack Senator Clinton and Senator Obama at the same time." Insight, like the Washington Times, is owned by a company controlled by the Rev. Sun Myung Moon.
In the meantime, the newly declared Clinton has other media matters on her mind. The New York Times, a paper that can only be described as friendly toward her, has already declared that she "has to combat her image...of being radically liberal, ruthlessly ambitious, or ethically compromised."
And to think election day is still almost two years away.
Monday, January 29, 2007
Spank a Child, Go to Jail
By ROBERT RECTOR
In a state beset with myriad knotty problems ranging from immigration to the governor's broken leg, Assemblywoman Sally Lieber has hit on an issue that many of us will get behind. So to speak.
The Mountain View Democrat has proposed banning the spanking of young children.
That's right, folks. Spank a child, go to jail.
Lieber's proposal would make spanking, hitting and slapping a child under 4-years-old a misdemeanor. Adults could face up to a year in jail and a $1,000 fine.
Presumembly, doctors who give a child a whack at birth would be exempted.
No less a father figure than Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said he thinks the proposal was well intentioned but had doubts about how a ban would be enforced.
Having the police respond to spanking calls seems like a bad use of public safety personnel. Maybe they could create a swat team.
But the governor said he "got smacked about everything" as a child in Austria but has never hit his own kids.
As for me, I got a couple of slaps on the ear from Dad when I was out of line as a child. Mom never raised a hand against us, although I do remember her chasing my brother with a broom once. And she once threatened to stick my head in the oven if I didn't behave. She was kidding. I think.
Not everyone thinks a ban on spanking is something we need on the books.
One critic called it ``nanny-politics.'' Another said. ``Fine, then a bill should be passed to allow other parents to smack the parents of undisciplined children.''
``Where do you stop?'' asked Assemblyman Chuck DeVore, R-Irvine, who said he personally agrees children under 3 shouldn't be spanked but has no desire to make it the law. ``At what point are we going to say we should pass a bill that every parent has to read a minimum of 30 minutes every night to their child? This is right along those same lines.''
Still, spanking of children within families is illegal in some countries (for example, Sweden, Switzerland, Iceland, Finland, Denmark, Norway, Austria, Germany, Italy, Malta, Cyprus, Croatia, Israel and Latvia). New Zealand is currently debating whether or not to outlaw parental spanking, having outlawed corporal punishment within its educational institutions in 1989. Similar initiatives in the U.S. have repeatedly failed.
Indeed, one parent-teacher group called Operation No Spank puts it this way:
"Children should no longer be excluded from the legal protections against assault and battery that apply to adults. Moreover, the defense of children should be more vigorous because they are more vulnerable; because the consequences of their early mistreatment are difficult to reverse; because damaged children tend to grow into damaged adults who are likely to avenge themselves in one way or another.
"If they will not harm others, then they will likely harm themselves, and they may passively support the mistreatment of children perpetrated by others. Current research in the field of child development overwhelmingly confirms the theory that the earlier and the worse the mistreatment of children, the worse the outcome."
Nobody wants to see young children get slapped around. And most parents don't abuse their children.
But even fewer people want to see the government tell them how to raise their family.
As one reader wrote to the San Jose Mercury News:
"The day that the [government] gives birth to my children, then they have a right to raise them. Till then they are mine to do with as I please. I will raise them the way I see fit. If I think that those little butts need a swat … I will be the one to give it to them."
In a state beset with myriad knotty problems ranging from immigration to the governor's broken leg, Assemblywoman Sally Lieber has hit on an issue that many of us will get behind. So to speak.
The Mountain View Democrat has proposed banning the spanking of young children.
That's right, folks. Spank a child, go to jail.
Lieber's proposal would make spanking, hitting and slapping a child under 4-years-old a misdemeanor. Adults could face up to a year in jail and a $1,000 fine.
Presumembly, doctors who give a child a whack at birth would be exempted.
No less a father figure than Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said he thinks the proposal was well intentioned but had doubts about how a ban would be enforced.
Having the police respond to spanking calls seems like a bad use of public safety personnel. Maybe they could create a swat team.
But the governor said he "got smacked about everything" as a child in Austria but has never hit his own kids.
As for me, I got a couple of slaps on the ear from Dad when I was out of line as a child. Mom never raised a hand against us, although I do remember her chasing my brother with a broom once. And she once threatened to stick my head in the oven if I didn't behave. She was kidding. I think.
Not everyone thinks a ban on spanking is something we need on the books.
One critic called it ``nanny-politics.'' Another said. ``Fine, then a bill should be passed to allow other parents to smack the parents of undisciplined children.''
``Where do you stop?'' asked Assemblyman Chuck DeVore, R-Irvine, who said he personally agrees children under 3 shouldn't be spanked but has no desire to make it the law. ``At what point are we going to say we should pass a bill that every parent has to read a minimum of 30 minutes every night to their child? This is right along those same lines.''
Still, spanking of children within families is illegal in some countries (for example, Sweden, Switzerland, Iceland, Finland, Denmark, Norway, Austria, Germany, Italy, Malta, Cyprus, Croatia, Israel and Latvia). New Zealand is currently debating whether or not to outlaw parental spanking, having outlawed corporal punishment within its educational institutions in 1989. Similar initiatives in the U.S. have repeatedly failed.
Indeed, one parent-teacher group called Operation No Spank puts it this way:
"Children should no longer be excluded from the legal protections against assault and battery that apply to adults. Moreover, the defense of children should be more vigorous because they are more vulnerable; because the consequences of their early mistreatment are difficult to reverse; because damaged children tend to grow into damaged adults who are likely to avenge themselves in one way or another.
"If they will not harm others, then they will likely harm themselves, and they may passively support the mistreatment of children perpetrated by others. Current research in the field of child development overwhelmingly confirms the theory that the earlier and the worse the mistreatment of children, the worse the outcome."
Nobody wants to see young children get slapped around. And most parents don't abuse their children.
But even fewer people want to see the government tell them how to raise their family.
As one reader wrote to the San Jose Mercury News:
"The day that the [government] gives birth to my children, then they have a right to raise them. Till then they are mine to do with as I please. I will raise them the way I see fit. If I think that those little butts need a swat … I will be the one to give it to them."
Frank, as in Frankfurter
By ROBERT RECTOR
An open letter to: Frank McCourt President, Los Angeles Dodgers Los Angeles, Calif.
Dear Mr. McCourt: IT warms my heart when a prominent citizen, such as yourself, reaches out to enrich the lives of the common man, such as myself.
I mean, you own the Dodgers and you don't have to lift a finger to get 3 million people flocking to Chavez Ravine to see your team, win or lose.
But you're a giver, Frank. And you'll be giving fans what could be a a life-altering experience when they come to the ballpark this year.
Starting this season, the right field pavilion at Dodger Stadium will be converted into a special section, giving around 3,000 fans as many hot dogs, peanuts, popcorn, nachos and sodas as they want.
Of course, you're nobody's fool, Frank. Tickets that are usually 10 bucks will sell for $35 in advance and $40 on gameday, and some items at the concession stand aren't in play - beer, ice cream and candy will be sold separately at regular prices.
That means Joe Fan will have to eat like a lumberjack to break even on the deal.
But I realize, Frank, there will be some additional expenses involved that you'll need to cover.
You're going to need to brace up the right field pavilion because I suspect the fan base out there will resemble nothing short of a gathering of sumo wrestlers and nose tackles.
Sitting there will give new meaning to the term " squeeze play."
And I'm betting that on a hot summer day, you'll be able to smell the crowd from San Diego.
Then you'll need additional paramedic support for those fans who try to pound down 12 Dodger dogs in three innings. Of course, if you're really enterprising, you could hawk cholesterol-lowering pills to those junk food zealots who are sucking up a thousand fat grams per game.
Then's there's the additional security you'll need to prevent fans from showering the opposing team's fielder with nachos when a fly ball is in play. That is, if they're able to get out of there seats to throw anything.
I'm betting the first home run ball that lands in the right field pavilion won't be caught. It will be eaten.
It's a brilliant plan, Frank, because gluttony and baseball go together like hot dogs and heart attacks.
No less than the immortal Babe Ruth, arguably the greatest player of all time, would love your idea. Legend has it that the Babe, one day in Coney Island, ate four porterhouse steaks and eight hot dogs, and drank eight sodas. That, of course, was just a pre-game snack.
Now, with your plan, Frank, anyone can be the Babe.
And who can't work up an appetite watching players like Catfish Hunter, Chili Davis, Candy Maldonaldo, Goose Gossage, Cookie Lavagetto and Pie Traynor?
I have just one suggestion, Frank. If you really want to get this promotion off the ground, name the right field pavilion after Tommy Lasorda.
That will give those hungry fans a real role model.
Sincerely,
Robert (I'd Rather Have Sushi) Rector.
An open letter to: Frank McCourt President, Los Angeles Dodgers Los Angeles, Calif.
Dear Mr. McCourt: IT warms my heart when a prominent citizen, such as yourself, reaches out to enrich the lives of the common man, such as myself.
I mean, you own the Dodgers and you don't have to lift a finger to get 3 million people flocking to Chavez Ravine to see your team, win or lose.
But you're a giver, Frank. And you'll be giving fans what could be a a life-altering experience when they come to the ballpark this year.
Starting this season, the right field pavilion at Dodger Stadium will be converted into a special section, giving around 3,000 fans as many hot dogs, peanuts, popcorn, nachos and sodas as they want.
Of course, you're nobody's fool, Frank. Tickets that are usually 10 bucks will sell for $35 in advance and $40 on gameday, and some items at the concession stand aren't in play - beer, ice cream and candy will be sold separately at regular prices.
That means Joe Fan will have to eat like a lumberjack to break even on the deal.
But I realize, Frank, there will be some additional expenses involved that you'll need to cover.
You're going to need to brace up the right field pavilion because I suspect the fan base out there will resemble nothing short of a gathering of sumo wrestlers and nose tackles.
Sitting there will give new meaning to the term " squeeze play."
And I'm betting that on a hot summer day, you'll be able to smell the crowd from San Diego.
Then you'll need additional paramedic support for those fans who try to pound down 12 Dodger dogs in three innings. Of course, if you're really enterprising, you could hawk cholesterol-lowering pills to those junk food zealots who are sucking up a thousand fat grams per game.
Then's there's the additional security you'll need to prevent fans from showering the opposing team's fielder with nachos when a fly ball is in play. That is, if they're able to get out of there seats to throw anything.
I'm betting the first home run ball that lands in the right field pavilion won't be caught. It will be eaten.
It's a brilliant plan, Frank, because gluttony and baseball go together like hot dogs and heart attacks.
No less than the immortal Babe Ruth, arguably the greatest player of all time, would love your idea. Legend has it that the Babe, one day in Coney Island, ate four porterhouse steaks and eight hot dogs, and drank eight sodas. That, of course, was just a pre-game snack.
Now, with your plan, Frank, anyone can be the Babe.
And who can't work up an appetite watching players like Catfish Hunter, Chili Davis, Candy Maldonaldo, Goose Gossage, Cookie Lavagetto and Pie Traynor?
I have just one suggestion, Frank. If you really want to get this promotion off the ground, name the right field pavilion after Tommy Lasorda.
That will give those hungry fans a real role model.
Sincerely,
Robert (I'd Rather Have Sushi) Rector.
Thursday, January 11, 2007
Smog Over Hollywood
By ROBERT RECTOR
The next time your eyes run like a faucet, the air tastes like diesel fumes and your chest feels like you inhaled oven cleaner, blame Hollywood.
According to a recent report out of UCLA, 140,000 tons of year of ozone and diesel particulate pollutant emissions from trucks, generators, special effects explosions and fires are being produced by the sames folks who brought you "Gone With the Wind."
Show biz tops hotels, aerospace, apparel and semiconductor manufacturing in traditional air pollutant emissions in Southern California, the study says, and is probably second only to petroleum refineries. Enterntainment ranks third in greenhouse gas emissions.
This is particularly noteworthy in an industry that produces more environmental activists than a Greenpeace convention.
That crashing sound you hear is George Clooney, Ed Begley Jr., Ted Danson, Robert Redford, Tom Hanks, Leonardo DiCaprio, Rob Reiner, et al bouncing off their solar panels.
According to the study, researchers considered the emissions created directly and indirectly by the film and television industry. For example, they factored in both the pollution caused by a diesel generator used to power a movie set, as well as the emissions created by a power plant that provides electricity to a studio lot.
Call me simple minded but that's like saying I'm to blame for using my toaster which is connected by wall plug to a massive emissions-generating power plant that was once constucted by fume-spewing heavy equipment.
But I digress. Researchers also interviewed 43 people who worked in a variety of areas within the industry, and reviewed major trade publications to see the level of attention paid to environmental issues. In doing so, researchers found that some studios have recycling programs and green building practices.
"Nevertheless, our overall impression is that these practices are the exception and not the rule, and that more could be done within the industry to foster environmentally friendly approaches," the study said.
I guess we can be thankful that so many films are being produced in Canada or the skies above Hollywood would resemble turn-of-the-century Pittsburgh.
The enterntainment industry, to nobody's surprise, wasn't quick to embrace the study.
Lisa Day, spokeswoman for Participant Productions which worked on offsetting carbon emissions from the making of "Syriana" and "An Inconvenient Truth," said she was a little surprised by the study's findings, according to an article in the Los Angeles Times.
"I think the industry as a whole does look at itself," she said. "The studios have done a lot in terms of waste reduction. I think that energy is the new thing the industry is looking at and what impact they have."
The industry might also look at the fact that a good film doesn't need a dozen 20-megaton explosions to hold our attention.
Since Hollywood usually finds itself on the cutting edge of social activism, I suspect this will cause more than a few ripples through the industry.
It will be interesting to see how quickly Hollywood's social activism turns inward.
But since that same industry generates a combined $29 billion in revenue and employs 252,000 in greater Los Angeles, don't look for a lot of new regulations to emerge from the study.
Now, if we can just convince the industry to stop polluting the screens, we may have accomplished something.
All ready this year we have been subjected to such noxious offerings such as "Snakes on a Plane," "Beerfest," "She's the Man" and "Larry the Cable Guy: Health Inspector."
Cough, cough.
The next time your eyes run like a faucet, the air tastes like diesel fumes and your chest feels like you inhaled oven cleaner, blame Hollywood.
According to a recent report out of UCLA, 140,000 tons of year of ozone and diesel particulate pollutant emissions from trucks, generators, special effects explosions and fires are being produced by the sames folks who brought you "Gone With the Wind."
Show biz tops hotels, aerospace, apparel and semiconductor manufacturing in traditional air pollutant emissions in Southern California, the study says, and is probably second only to petroleum refineries. Enterntainment ranks third in greenhouse gas emissions.
This is particularly noteworthy in an industry that produces more environmental activists than a Greenpeace convention.
That crashing sound you hear is George Clooney, Ed Begley Jr., Ted Danson, Robert Redford, Tom Hanks, Leonardo DiCaprio, Rob Reiner, et al bouncing off their solar panels.
According to the study, researchers considered the emissions created directly and indirectly by the film and television industry. For example, they factored in both the pollution caused by a diesel generator used to power a movie set, as well as the emissions created by a power plant that provides electricity to a studio lot.
Call me simple minded but that's like saying I'm to blame for using my toaster which is connected by wall plug to a massive emissions-generating power plant that was once constucted by fume-spewing heavy equipment.
But I digress. Researchers also interviewed 43 people who worked in a variety of areas within the industry, and reviewed major trade publications to see the level of attention paid to environmental issues. In doing so, researchers found that some studios have recycling programs and green building practices.
"Nevertheless, our overall impression is that these practices are the exception and not the rule, and that more could be done within the industry to foster environmentally friendly approaches," the study said.
I guess we can be thankful that so many films are being produced in Canada or the skies above Hollywood would resemble turn-of-the-century Pittsburgh.
The enterntainment industry, to nobody's surprise, wasn't quick to embrace the study.
Lisa Day, spokeswoman for Participant Productions which worked on offsetting carbon emissions from the making of "Syriana" and "An Inconvenient Truth," said she was a little surprised by the study's findings, according to an article in the Los Angeles Times.
"I think the industry as a whole does look at itself," she said. "The studios have done a lot in terms of waste reduction. I think that energy is the new thing the industry is looking at and what impact they have."
The industry might also look at the fact that a good film doesn't need a dozen 20-megaton explosions to hold our attention.
Since Hollywood usually finds itself on the cutting edge of social activism, I suspect this will cause more than a few ripples through the industry.
It will be interesting to see how quickly Hollywood's social activism turns inward.
But since that same industry generates a combined $29 billion in revenue and employs 252,000 in greater Los Angeles, don't look for a lot of new regulations to emerge from the study.
Now, if we can just convince the industry to stop polluting the screens, we may have accomplished something.
All ready this year we have been subjected to such noxious offerings such as "Snakes on a Plane," "Beerfest," "She's the Man" and "Larry the Cable Guy: Health Inspector."
Cough, cough.
Anals of the Absurd
By ROBERT RECTOR
Many men were probably heartened recently by a study that concluded women who exercise by doing housework can reduce their risk of breast cancer.
That's right, guys. The research on more than 200,000 women from nine European countries found that doing household chores was far more cancer protective than playing sport. Dusting, mopping and vacuuming was also better than having a physical job.
So, all along, we weren't really being slobs. We were merely advancing the cause of women's health.
Of course, men get breast cancer too. So does that mean they should man the mop?
Good question. But an even better one is: who concocts this kind of weird research anyway? And what, if anything, does it prove?
Turns out we're not the only ones intrigued by that question.
No less than Harvard University is the site each year of the Ig Noble prizes, given for achievements that "first make people laugh, and then make them think."
According to the a scientific humor journal called the Anals of Improbable Research, examples range from the discovery that the presence of humans tends to sexually arouse ostriches, to the statement that black holes fulfill all the technical requirements to be the location of Hell.
This year's Ig Nobel winners include:
-Ivan R. Schwab, of the University of California Davis, and the late Philip R.A. May of the University of California Los Angeles, for exploring and explaining why woodpeckers don't get headaches. -Wasmia Al-Houty of Kuwait University and Faten Al-Mussalam of the Kuwait Environment Public Authority, for showing that dung beetles are finicky eaters. -Howard Stapleton of Merthyr Tydfil, Wales, for inventing an electromechanical teenager repellant -- a device that makes annoying high-pitched noise designed to be audible to teenagers but not to adults; and for later using that same technology to make telephone ringtones that are audible to teenagers but probably not to their teachers.
-D. Lynn Halpern (of Harvard Vanguard Medical Associates, and Brandeis University, and Northwestern University), Randolph Blake (of Vanderbilt University and Northwestern University) and James Hillenbrand (of Western Michigan University and Northwestern University) for conducting experiments to learn why people dislike the sound of fingernails scraping on a blackboard. -Nic Svenson and Piers Barnes of the Australian Commonwealth Scientific and Research Organization, for calculating the number of photographs you must take to (almost) ensure that nobody in a group photo will have their eyes closed. -And last but not least: Daniel Oppenheimer of Princeton University for his report "Consequences of Erudite Vernacular Utilized Irrespective of Necessity: Problems with Using Long Words Needlessly." Fine efforts, every one. Personally, I am attracted to an award from 2005 that went to Gauri Nanda of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, for inventing an alarm clock that runs away and hides, repeatedly, thus ensuring that people DO get out of bed, and thus theoretically adding many productive hours to the workday.
Or the 2004 award nabbed by Steven Stack of Wayne State University, Detroit, Michigan, and James Gundlach of Auburn University, Auburn, Alabama, for their published report "The Effect of Country Music on Suicide."
Compared to these studies, the breast cancer/housework research ranks alongside Sir Isaac Newton's three laws of motion.
Many men were probably heartened recently by a study that concluded women who exercise by doing housework can reduce their risk of breast cancer.
That's right, guys. The research on more than 200,000 women from nine European countries found that doing household chores was far more cancer protective than playing sport. Dusting, mopping and vacuuming was also better than having a physical job.
So, all along, we weren't really being slobs. We were merely advancing the cause of women's health.
Of course, men get breast cancer too. So does that mean they should man the mop?
Good question. But an even better one is: who concocts this kind of weird research anyway? And what, if anything, does it prove?
Turns out we're not the only ones intrigued by that question.
No less than Harvard University is the site each year of the Ig Noble prizes, given for achievements that "first make people laugh, and then make them think."
According to the a scientific humor journal called the Anals of Improbable Research, examples range from the discovery that the presence of humans tends to sexually arouse ostriches, to the statement that black holes fulfill all the technical requirements to be the location of Hell.
This year's Ig Nobel winners include:
-Ivan R. Schwab, of the University of California Davis, and the late Philip R.A. May of the University of California Los Angeles, for exploring and explaining why woodpeckers don't get headaches. -Wasmia Al-Houty of Kuwait University and Faten Al-Mussalam of the Kuwait Environment Public Authority, for showing that dung beetles are finicky eaters. -Howard Stapleton of Merthyr Tydfil, Wales, for inventing an electromechanical teenager repellant -- a device that makes annoying high-pitched noise designed to be audible to teenagers but not to adults; and for later using that same technology to make telephone ringtones that are audible to teenagers but probably not to their teachers.
-D. Lynn Halpern (of Harvard Vanguard Medical Associates, and Brandeis University, and Northwestern University), Randolph Blake (of Vanderbilt University and Northwestern University) and James Hillenbrand (of Western Michigan University and Northwestern University) for conducting experiments to learn why people dislike the sound of fingernails scraping on a blackboard. -Nic Svenson and Piers Barnes of the Australian Commonwealth Scientific and Research Organization, for calculating the number of photographs you must take to (almost) ensure that nobody in a group photo will have their eyes closed. -And last but not least: Daniel Oppenheimer of Princeton University for his report "Consequences of Erudite Vernacular Utilized Irrespective of Necessity: Problems with Using Long Words Needlessly." Fine efforts, every one. Personally, I am attracted to an award from 2005 that went to Gauri Nanda of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, for inventing an alarm clock that runs away and hides, repeatedly, thus ensuring that people DO get out of bed, and thus theoretically adding many productive hours to the workday.
Or the 2004 award nabbed by Steven Stack of Wayne State University, Detroit, Michigan, and James Gundlach of Auburn University, Auburn, Alabama, for their published report "The Effect of Country Music on Suicide."
Compared to these studies, the breast cancer/housework research ranks alongside Sir Isaac Newton's three laws of motion.
Party On
By ROBERT RECTOR
I am a freelancer. I am unencumbered, unattached, unleashed.
And one of the best things about my status is that I am longer required to attend an office Christmas party.
I'v seem enough lampshade-on-the-head, photocopy-your-butt merriment to last me a lifetime.
Or as Corey Ford wrote way back in 1951:
"The annual office party starts along about noon on December 24 and ends two or three months later, depending on how long it takes the boss to find out who set fire to his waste basket, threw the water cooler out the window, and betrayed Miss O'Malley in the men's washroom."
It hasn't changed a lot since then.
Among other oddities, I've seen a couple of careers blindsided over the years.
There was the time when an ambitious new employee decided to take the opportunity to show off his sophisitication and smarts with every boss in the room. After an evening of working the room like a politician running for office, he discovered his fly was unzipped the entire time.
Then there was the occasion when a young married couple decided to bring their 2 year-old for reasons I can't begin to fathom. The kid headed straight to the nut dish, consumed its contents then proceeded to get sick all over the bosses new carpet.
I've seen drunk and disorderly. I've seen employees boo Santa Claus. I've seen boozy romantic liaisons that disolved in the cold light of dawn.
I've also seen deadly dull. There's nothing like compulsory attendance to sap the holiday spirit right out of a party. One such affair I attended resembled a wax museum.
Want a receipe for potential disaster? Try this: Mix superiors and subordinates, cronies and rivals, the ambitious and the apathetic, stir in weird secret Santa gifts and social anxiety, add a generous dose of alcohol and see what happens.
A recent survey by a professional women's group found that drinking too much was the number one regret of women at their office parties. Sixty percent of the women surveyed changed their opinion of a co-worker after experiencing chardonay-fueled hijinks, according to one report.
But if you really need a reason to avoid, or to party lite, at the annual holiday bash, consider this: Drunken antics at office Christmas parties are increasingly being filmed and posted on the Internet, a report from ViralVideoChart.com says. The web chart firm says footage from office bashes posted on video share websites tripled in 2006 to 150,000.
Clips included a woman complaining about her boss, who, unknown to her, was standing behind her.
It would smart to avoid seeing your Yuletide on YouTube.
One historian traces the office party to the feast of Saturn, the god of agriculture, a Roman favorite. Citizens would untie the bound feet of the god's statue on Dec. 17, and a week of carrying on would begin.
"Loose reins are given to public dissipation," the philosopher Seneca reported.
Gifts were exchanged. Masters and slaves swapped roles. Drinking, gambling, feasting and "singing naked" would take place, according to one writer of the time.
Sounds just like the party over at Acme Widgets.
But even if you behave yourself, the holiday party can contain hidden pitfalls, according to authors Noel Boivin and Christopher Lombardo:
"While you may want to skip home in sheer delight at not having offended anyone during your company's holiday hootenanny, remember to step lively and keep a keen eye out for open manhole covers. If you don't you might end up like a Korean man did following his company's year-end blowout: the man fell 18 feet into an open sewer, where he spent the next 8 days sleeping on a foam mat and sipping from a puddle of clean water before his screams for help caught the attention of a passerby."
I am a freelancer. I am unencumbered, unattached, unleashed.
And one of the best things about my status is that I am longer required to attend an office Christmas party.
I'v seem enough lampshade-on-the-head, photocopy-your-butt merriment to last me a lifetime.
Or as Corey Ford wrote way back in 1951:
"The annual office party starts along about noon on December 24 and ends two or three months later, depending on how long it takes the boss to find out who set fire to his waste basket, threw the water cooler out the window, and betrayed Miss O'Malley in the men's washroom."
It hasn't changed a lot since then.
Among other oddities, I've seen a couple of careers blindsided over the years.
There was the time when an ambitious new employee decided to take the opportunity to show off his sophisitication and smarts with every boss in the room. After an evening of working the room like a politician running for office, he discovered his fly was unzipped the entire time.
Then there was the occasion when a young married couple decided to bring their 2 year-old for reasons I can't begin to fathom. The kid headed straight to the nut dish, consumed its contents then proceeded to get sick all over the bosses new carpet.
I've seen drunk and disorderly. I've seen employees boo Santa Claus. I've seen boozy romantic liaisons that disolved in the cold light of dawn.
I've also seen deadly dull. There's nothing like compulsory attendance to sap the holiday spirit right out of a party. One such affair I attended resembled a wax museum.
Want a receipe for potential disaster? Try this: Mix superiors and subordinates, cronies and rivals, the ambitious and the apathetic, stir in weird secret Santa gifts and social anxiety, add a generous dose of alcohol and see what happens.
A recent survey by a professional women's group found that drinking too much was the number one regret of women at their office parties. Sixty percent of the women surveyed changed their opinion of a co-worker after experiencing chardonay-fueled hijinks, according to one report.
But if you really need a reason to avoid, or to party lite, at the annual holiday bash, consider this: Drunken antics at office Christmas parties are increasingly being filmed and posted on the Internet, a report from ViralVideoChart.com says. The web chart firm says footage from office bashes posted on video share websites tripled in 2006 to 150,000.
Clips included a woman complaining about her boss, who, unknown to her, was standing behind her.
It would smart to avoid seeing your Yuletide on YouTube.
One historian traces the office party to the feast of Saturn, the god of agriculture, a Roman favorite. Citizens would untie the bound feet of the god's statue on Dec. 17, and a week of carrying on would begin.
"Loose reins are given to public dissipation," the philosopher Seneca reported.
Gifts were exchanged. Masters and slaves swapped roles. Drinking, gambling, feasting and "singing naked" would take place, according to one writer of the time.
Sounds just like the party over at Acme Widgets.
But even if you behave yourself, the holiday party can contain hidden pitfalls, according to authors Noel Boivin and Christopher Lombardo:
"While you may want to skip home in sheer delight at not having offended anyone during your company's holiday hootenanny, remember to step lively and keep a keen eye out for open manhole covers. If you don't you might end up like a Korean man did following his company's year-end blowout: the man fell 18 feet into an open sewer, where he spent the next 8 days sleeping on a foam mat and sipping from a puddle of clean water before his screams for help caught the attention of a passerby."
I Hereby Resolve
By ROBERT RECTOR
According to some historical sources, the tradition of the New Year's resolutions goes back to 153 B.C. It was then that Janus, a mythical king of early Rome, was placed at the head of the calendar.
With two faces, Janus could look back on past events and forward to the future. Janus became the ancient symbol for resolutions and many Romans looked for forgiveness from their enemies and also exchanged gifts before the beginning of each year.
Historians don't tell us, however, when the first resolution was broken. I peg it at one minute after midnight, 153 B.C. thereby starting an entirely new tradition, one that continues unabated to this day.
For example, I resolved not to write any more columns on lightweight topics like new year's resolutions. And, well, here I am.
No less an authority than the U.S. government says the most popular resolutions are to lose weight, pay off debt, save money, get a better job, get fit, eat right, get a better education, drink less alcohol, quit smoking, reduce stress, take a trip, help others.
A poll taken by Marist College has losing weight at the top of the list. In a tie for second is "be a better person" and "stop smoking."
Pollsters from the college's Institute of Public Opinion surveyed nearly 1,300 people. And the survey found 71 percent of men and 57 percent of women say they stuck to their resolutions of last year.
Apparently, "telling the truth" doesn't rank high on the resolution scale.
All of this data reveals a kind of schizophrenic quality to our lives. We eat like there's no tomorrow over the holidays, then vow to lose weight in a cycle that repeats itself every year.
We go head over heels in debt, then promise not only to pay off debt but save money at the same time, a road Bill Gates would have trouble traveling.
We try to stop drinking and smoking at the same time we try to reduce stress, which led us to drinking and smoking in the first place.
And how can you be a better person or help others if you're overweight, unfit, under educated, in debt, drinking, smoking and stressed out? Mother Theresa couldn't do it.
So I resolve to eliminate all resolutions.
Instead, I suggest we adopt "new rules" for the new year. I offer these examples as formulated by comedian/ social commentator George Carlin:
"Stop giving me that pop-up ad for classmates.com! There's a reason you don't talk to people for 25 years. Because you don't particularly like them! Besides, I already know what the captain of the football team is doing these days: mowing my lawn. "Don't eat anything that's served to you out a window unless you're a seagull. People are acting all shocked that a human finger was found in a bowl of Wendy's chili. Hey, it cost less than a dollar. What did you expect it to contain? Trout? "Ladies, leave your eyebrows alone. Here's how much men care about your eyebrows: do you have two of them? OK, we're done. "I'm not the cashier! By the time I look up from sliding my card, entering my PIN number, pressing "Enter," verifying the amount, deciding, "No, I don't want cash back", and pressing "Enter" again, the kid who is supposed to be ringing me up is standing there eating my Almond Joy. "If you're going to insist on making movies based on... old television shows, then you have to give everyone in the Cineplex a remote so we can see what's playing on the other screens. Let's remember the reason something was a television show in the first place is that the idea wasn't good enough to be a movie. "No more gift registries. You know, it used to be just for weddings. Now it's for babies and new homes and graduations from rehab. Picking out the stuff you want and having other people buy it for you isn't gift giving, it's the Caucasian version of looting. "
According to some historical sources, the tradition of the New Year's resolutions goes back to 153 B.C. It was then that Janus, a mythical king of early Rome, was placed at the head of the calendar.
With two faces, Janus could look back on past events and forward to the future. Janus became the ancient symbol for resolutions and many Romans looked for forgiveness from their enemies and also exchanged gifts before the beginning of each year.
Historians don't tell us, however, when the first resolution was broken. I peg it at one minute after midnight, 153 B.C. thereby starting an entirely new tradition, one that continues unabated to this day.
For example, I resolved not to write any more columns on lightweight topics like new year's resolutions. And, well, here I am.
No less an authority than the U.S. government says the most popular resolutions are to lose weight, pay off debt, save money, get a better job, get fit, eat right, get a better education, drink less alcohol, quit smoking, reduce stress, take a trip, help others.
A poll taken by Marist College has losing weight at the top of the list. In a tie for second is "be a better person" and "stop smoking."
Pollsters from the college's Institute of Public Opinion surveyed nearly 1,300 people. And the survey found 71 percent of men and 57 percent of women say they stuck to their resolutions of last year.
Apparently, "telling the truth" doesn't rank high on the resolution scale.
All of this data reveals a kind of schizophrenic quality to our lives. We eat like there's no tomorrow over the holidays, then vow to lose weight in a cycle that repeats itself every year.
We go head over heels in debt, then promise not only to pay off debt but save money at the same time, a road Bill Gates would have trouble traveling.
We try to stop drinking and smoking at the same time we try to reduce stress, which led us to drinking and smoking in the first place.
And how can you be a better person or help others if you're overweight, unfit, under educated, in debt, drinking, smoking and stressed out? Mother Theresa couldn't do it.
So I resolve to eliminate all resolutions.
Instead, I suggest we adopt "new rules" for the new year. I offer these examples as formulated by comedian/ social commentator George Carlin:
"Stop giving me that pop-up ad for classmates.com! There's a reason you don't talk to people for 25 years. Because you don't particularly like them! Besides, I already know what the captain of the football team is doing these days: mowing my lawn. "Don't eat anything that's served to you out a window unless you're a seagull. People are acting all shocked that a human finger was found in a bowl of Wendy's chili. Hey, it cost less than a dollar. What did you expect it to contain? Trout? "Ladies, leave your eyebrows alone. Here's how much men care about your eyebrows: do you have two of them? OK, we're done. "I'm not the cashier! By the time I look up from sliding my card, entering my PIN number, pressing "Enter," verifying the amount, deciding, "No, I don't want cash back", and pressing "Enter" again, the kid who is supposed to be ringing me up is standing there eating my Almond Joy. "If you're going to insist on making movies based on... old television shows, then you have to give everyone in the Cineplex a remote so we can see what's playing on the other screens. Let's remember the reason something was a television show in the first place is that the idea wasn't good enough to be a movie. "No more gift registries. You know, it used to be just for weddings. Now it's for babies and new homes and graduations from rehab. Picking out the stuff you want and having other people buy it for you isn't gift giving, it's the Caucasian version of looting. "
A New Bloom
By ROBERT RECTOR
I've been hanging around the Rose Bowl for some 50 years or so.
When I was very young, my older brother took me to my first football game, a New Year's Day headbanger featuring USC and Wisconsin in 1953. Even though we sat in the rain all day, I loved every minute of it.
Later, my father and I had an annual tradition. We'd go to something called the Junior Rose Bowl game every year, which pitted the two best community college teams in the country. We usually didn't know much about who was playing but even then, my dad figured I had community college written all over me. He was right.
When I was in high school in Glendale, the annual Glendale-Hoover titanic was played at the Rose Bowl annually, a real adrenalin rush.
Then, when UCLA took up residence in 1982, we bought season tickets which we own to this day.
To the casual fan, not much as changed at the Rose Bowl since the 1950s. The scoreboards are new, there are a few more restrooms, a few more concession stands.
And the seats. In the old days, you sat on benches, no seatbacks, no arms. When someone at the other end sat down, 50 people had to slide to one side to make room. It didn't do much for the game experience but it was a great cardio-vascular workout.
Now, most of the stadium has theater-style seats. An improvement? Not necesarily. The leg room is so bad that you almost need to assume the prenatal position when you sit down. Remember when you sat at your kid's desk at back-to-school night? It's kinda like that.
So I was glad to receive an e-mail recently, soliciting my opinions about a potential renovation of the 84-year-old stadium.
Nobody questions the need for renovation. But financing it is another thing. The city of Pasadena and the Rose Bowl Operation Committee had a great plan: stick the National Football League with the bill.
But since that dog won't hunt, it's time for Plan B.
The Rose Bowl is already an international attraction. So is Stonhenge but that doesn't make it a comfortable place to hang out.
Plan B would change all that, providing first-class comfort and luxury.
We're talking luxury boxes, preferred seating, plentiful rest rooms, actual leg room, easy access and egress, a real showplace.
The cost: $100 million to $200 million.
That's not outrageous. The Univsrsity of Michigan is coughing up $200 million for a redo of its stadium. Not to be outdone, Ohio State has a $194 million plan.
So who around here has that kind of money? The city of Pasadena? No. The University of California system? Nope. UCLA? They have their share of high-roller alums and a good sized fan base, but guess what? They're about to get touched for a major re-do of Pauley Pavillion, the on-campus basketball venue. Estimated cost: $70 million. And at UCLA, basketball is king.
And you can bet those same high rollers and fans will be in the marketing cross hairs if an NFL team comes to town soon.
The competition for the sports dollar in this town is getting fierce.
Nonetheless, if you read the survey, it seems clear that luxury suites, premium seats, better parking and other amenities along with various naming rights are the cornerstone of a plan that would raise revenue to pay for a renovation bond.
And the city of Pasadena along with UCLA and the Tournament of Roses are putting up $250,000 to spend on a strategic plan to make it work.
Here's how this Rose Bowl user comes out in the survey.
Would I buy a luxury box? Nope, the high cost pretty much limits those to big corporations.
Would I pay for preferred seating? Probably, provided I could get it in a location I wanted.
Would I spend extra to preserve the Rose Bowl for future genetations?
Absolutely. And I hope there are many more like me.
I've been hanging around the Rose Bowl for some 50 years or so.
When I was very young, my older brother took me to my first football game, a New Year's Day headbanger featuring USC and Wisconsin in 1953. Even though we sat in the rain all day, I loved every minute of it.
Later, my father and I had an annual tradition. We'd go to something called the Junior Rose Bowl game every year, which pitted the two best community college teams in the country. We usually didn't know much about who was playing but even then, my dad figured I had community college written all over me. He was right.
When I was in high school in Glendale, the annual Glendale-Hoover titanic was played at the Rose Bowl annually, a real adrenalin rush.
Then, when UCLA took up residence in 1982, we bought season tickets which we own to this day.
To the casual fan, not much as changed at the Rose Bowl since the 1950s. The scoreboards are new, there are a few more restrooms, a few more concession stands.
And the seats. In the old days, you sat on benches, no seatbacks, no arms. When someone at the other end sat down, 50 people had to slide to one side to make room. It didn't do much for the game experience but it was a great cardio-vascular workout.
Now, most of the stadium has theater-style seats. An improvement? Not necesarily. The leg room is so bad that you almost need to assume the prenatal position when you sit down. Remember when you sat at your kid's desk at back-to-school night? It's kinda like that.
So I was glad to receive an e-mail recently, soliciting my opinions about a potential renovation of the 84-year-old stadium.
Nobody questions the need for renovation. But financing it is another thing. The city of Pasadena and the Rose Bowl Operation Committee had a great plan: stick the National Football League with the bill.
But since that dog won't hunt, it's time for Plan B.
The Rose Bowl is already an international attraction. So is Stonhenge but that doesn't make it a comfortable place to hang out.
Plan B would change all that, providing first-class comfort and luxury.
We're talking luxury boxes, preferred seating, plentiful rest rooms, actual leg room, easy access and egress, a real showplace.
The cost: $100 million to $200 million.
That's not outrageous. The Univsrsity of Michigan is coughing up $200 million for a redo of its stadium. Not to be outdone, Ohio State has a $194 million plan.
So who around here has that kind of money? The city of Pasadena? No. The University of California system? Nope. UCLA? They have their share of high-roller alums and a good sized fan base, but guess what? They're about to get touched for a major re-do of Pauley Pavillion, the on-campus basketball venue. Estimated cost: $70 million. And at UCLA, basketball is king.
And you can bet those same high rollers and fans will be in the marketing cross hairs if an NFL team comes to town soon.
The competition for the sports dollar in this town is getting fierce.
Nonetheless, if you read the survey, it seems clear that luxury suites, premium seats, better parking and other amenities along with various naming rights are the cornerstone of a plan that would raise revenue to pay for a renovation bond.
And the city of Pasadena along with UCLA and the Tournament of Roses are putting up $250,000 to spend on a strategic plan to make it work.
Here's how this Rose Bowl user comes out in the survey.
Would I buy a luxury box? Nope, the high cost pretty much limits those to big corporations.
Would I pay for preferred seating? Probably, provided I could get it in a location I wanted.
Would I spend extra to preserve the Rose Bowl for future genetations?
Absolutely. And I hope there are many more like me.
Friday, December 15, 2006
In the Spirit of the Season
By ROBERT RECTOR
I had a colleague once upon a time who had a unique approach to the holidays.
She was Jewish, her husband was Protestant, and they had two kids.
But instead of going through the anguish of whose religious preference prevailed, they simply celebrated everything.
Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa - you name it, they did it. It was a clever way to solve a knotty problem.
If only all of us would be so creative.
I thought of her recently when I read that the folks up at Sea-Tac Airport in the state of Washington removed all the terminal's Christmas trees in response to a complaint by a rabbi.
The rabbi wanted to install an 8-foot menorah and have a public lighting ceremony and threatened to sue if it wasn't done.
So airport officials, using the meat-cleaver approach to problem solving, decided they didn't have time to "add a fair representation of all cultures," so they took down all the decorations.
I don't quite understand why it would take more time to erect a menorah than it would to take down 15 Christmas trees, but people think differently in the Pacific Northwest. I think it's the dampness.
Eventually, the trees, called "holiday trees" by airport officials in a burst of political correctness, were restored when the rabbi insisted it was not his intent to "hold Christmas hostage."
But there's still no menorah. Stay tuned.
The entire silly episode is an example of the battle to sanitize our culture that is being waged by the armies of political correctness and fueled by a population in which everyone believes he or she is a victim.
Don't get me wrong. I don't believe anyone should shove their beliefs down another person's throat. I also believe we should be sensitive to our cultural differences and learn to celebrate them.
And I don't buy into the goofball theory of Fox commentator Bill O'Reilly who claims that "it's all part of the secular progressive agenda ... to get Christianity and spirituality and Judaism out of the public square." He also says that this larger agenda includes "legalization of narcotics, euthanasia, abortion at will, gay marriage."
Sorry, Bill, it's not a conspiracy. In fact, it may be worse than that. It's a bunch of well-intentioned people run amok.
Why do we walk on eggshells for fear of offending non-Christians, when, at the same time, surveys show most non-Christians in the U.S. celebrate Christmas in one form or another?
Which underscores the point that, like it or not, Christmas is not the religious holiday it once was. We have Charles Dickens to thank for that.
According to historian Ronald Hutton, the current state of observance of Christmas is largely the result of a mid-Victorian revival of the holiday spearheaded by Dickens. In "A Christmas Carol," Hutton argues, Dickens sought to construct Christmas as a family-centered festival of generosity, in contrast to the community-based and church-centered observations, the observance of which had dwindled during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.
Oddly, the Brits themselves are in an uproar about what their Mr. Dickens hath wrought. A recent article in the Daily Mail decried the fact that "only one in 100 Christmas cards sold in Britain contains religious imagery or message.
"One offensive card ... suggested that shepherds only saw the angel appear on the hillside because they were hallucinating after smoking drugs.
"Another card ignores Christmas altogether - wishing the recipient a `Happy December."'
Meanwhile, back in the United States, there are some signs that sanity may be making a return appearance.
Many retailers and corporations are reversing their decisions to avoid use of the term "Christmas" in their advertising and promotions, a really bad decision made last year. Among those who have decided to re-embrace Christmas are Wal-Mart, Target, Kohl's, Sears Holdings Corp. (Sears and K-Mart) and Macy's. Maybe we should boycott them anyway for stupidity.
In the meantime, go ahead and shout it from the rooftops: "Merry Christmas!" It's making a comeback. Celebrate it however you please. Call it what you want. But just enjoy it.
I had a colleague once upon a time who had a unique approach to the holidays.
She was Jewish, her husband was Protestant, and they had two kids.
But instead of going through the anguish of whose religious preference prevailed, they simply celebrated everything.
Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa - you name it, they did it. It was a clever way to solve a knotty problem.
If only all of us would be so creative.
I thought of her recently when I read that the folks up at Sea-Tac Airport in the state of Washington removed all the terminal's Christmas trees in response to a complaint by a rabbi.
The rabbi wanted to install an 8-foot menorah and have a public lighting ceremony and threatened to sue if it wasn't done.
So airport officials, using the meat-cleaver approach to problem solving, decided they didn't have time to "add a fair representation of all cultures," so they took down all the decorations.
I don't quite understand why it would take more time to erect a menorah than it would to take down 15 Christmas trees, but people think differently in the Pacific Northwest. I think it's the dampness.
Eventually, the trees, called "holiday trees" by airport officials in a burst of political correctness, were restored when the rabbi insisted it was not his intent to "hold Christmas hostage."
But there's still no menorah. Stay tuned.
The entire silly episode is an example of the battle to sanitize our culture that is being waged by the armies of political correctness and fueled by a population in which everyone believes he or she is a victim.
Don't get me wrong. I don't believe anyone should shove their beliefs down another person's throat. I also believe we should be sensitive to our cultural differences and learn to celebrate them.
And I don't buy into the goofball theory of Fox commentator Bill O'Reilly who claims that "it's all part of the secular progressive agenda ... to get Christianity and spirituality and Judaism out of the public square." He also says that this larger agenda includes "legalization of narcotics, euthanasia, abortion at will, gay marriage."
Sorry, Bill, it's not a conspiracy. In fact, it may be worse than that. It's a bunch of well-intentioned people run amok.
Why do we walk on eggshells for fear of offending non-Christians, when, at the same time, surveys show most non-Christians in the U.S. celebrate Christmas in one form or another?
Which underscores the point that, like it or not, Christmas is not the religious holiday it once was. We have Charles Dickens to thank for that.
According to historian Ronald Hutton, the current state of observance of Christmas is largely the result of a mid-Victorian revival of the holiday spearheaded by Dickens. In "A Christmas Carol," Hutton argues, Dickens sought to construct Christmas as a family-centered festival of generosity, in contrast to the community-based and church-centered observations, the observance of which had dwindled during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.
Oddly, the Brits themselves are in an uproar about what their Mr. Dickens hath wrought. A recent article in the Daily Mail decried the fact that "only one in 100 Christmas cards sold in Britain contains religious imagery or message.
"One offensive card ... suggested that shepherds only saw the angel appear on the hillside because they were hallucinating after smoking drugs.
"Another card ignores Christmas altogether - wishing the recipient a `Happy December."'
Meanwhile, back in the United States, there are some signs that sanity may be making a return appearance.
Many retailers and corporations are reversing their decisions to avoid use of the term "Christmas" in their advertising and promotions, a really bad decision made last year. Among those who have decided to re-embrace Christmas are Wal-Mart, Target, Kohl's, Sears Holdings Corp. (Sears and K-Mart) and Macy's. Maybe we should boycott them anyway for stupidity.
In the meantime, go ahead and shout it from the rooftops: "Merry Christmas!" It's making a comeback. Celebrate it however you please. Call it what you want. But just enjoy it.
Tuesday, December 12, 2006
Talk Is Cheap
By ROBERT RECTOR
YOU could say that there is a mathematical property of statistically independent events bunching together.
Or you can say that bad things happen in threes.
Anyway you slice it, we were subjected this week to yet another member of the acting profession popping off, following the well-worn path recently tread by Mel Gibson and Michael Richards.
This week's winner of the "put-a-sock-in-it" award goes to Oscar-winning actress Gwyneth Paltrow who reportedly feels dinner talk is far more interesting in her adopted homeland Britain than back in her native country, the good old USA.
"I love the English lifestyle, it's not as capitalistic as America. People don't talk about work and money, they talk about interesting things at dinner," she told NS, the weekend magazine supplement of daily Portuguese newspaper Diario de Noticias on Saturday.
She later backtracked, verbally waving the American flag while explaining that her remarks were misconstrued because of language differences.
But whatever the explanation, Gwen hasn't exactly been quiet on the issue.
According to published reports, she told London's Guardian in January: "I love the English way, which is not as capitalistic as it is in America. People don't talk about work and money; they talk about interesting things at dinner parties. I like living here, because I don't tap into the bad side of American psychology, which is `I'm not achieving enough, I'm not making enough, I'm not at the top of the pile.' It's just kind of like, `I am."'
And she told Harper's Bazaar she preferred her British friends to her American friends: `They're intelligent, and they're not looking over my shoulder at dinner to see if there's anyone better walking in."
Given the state of British cuisine, they're probably looking at their plates in horror wondering what the hell they've been served.
But onward.
OK, maybe this doesn't match Michael and Mel for sheer dehumanizing bigotry. But there's something nutty about someone who, while living a life of wealth and privilege, spends her professional life hanging with actors, directors and producers, then extrapolating their sometime egomaniacal and/or eccentric behavior onto the entire American populace.
So she doesn't like to talk about capitalism? How does she think she got rich while mouthing words that other people wrote?
Besides, rich people don't have to talk about money. Or work. They talk about things that matter. Like beating the tax code.
Those Brits. The last time I was in a London pub, all I wanted to talk about Arsenal versus Manchester United. All they wanted to talk about was Beowulf.
In the same interview, Gwen says that having pop star Madonna, 48, who married British film director Guy Ritchie six years ago, nearby was another advantage to living in London.
Now, there's someone I'd like to chat with over dinner. By the way, didn't she use to call herself the Material Girl? Sounds capitalistic to me. And wasn't she the one who once said, "When I get down on my knees, it's not to pray"?
I guess it never comes up in dinner conversation.
YOU could say that there is a mathematical property of statistically independent events bunching together.
Or you can say that bad things happen in threes.
Anyway you slice it, we were subjected this week to yet another member of the acting profession popping off, following the well-worn path recently tread by Mel Gibson and Michael Richards.
This week's winner of the "put-a-sock-in-it" award goes to Oscar-winning actress Gwyneth Paltrow who reportedly feels dinner talk is far more interesting in her adopted homeland Britain than back in her native country, the good old USA.
"I love the English lifestyle, it's not as capitalistic as America. People don't talk about work and money, they talk about interesting things at dinner," she told NS, the weekend magazine supplement of daily Portuguese newspaper Diario de Noticias on Saturday.
She later backtracked, verbally waving the American flag while explaining that her remarks were misconstrued because of language differences.
But whatever the explanation, Gwen hasn't exactly been quiet on the issue.
According to published reports, she told London's Guardian in January: "I love the English way, which is not as capitalistic as it is in America. People don't talk about work and money; they talk about interesting things at dinner parties. I like living here, because I don't tap into the bad side of American psychology, which is `I'm not achieving enough, I'm not making enough, I'm not at the top of the pile.' It's just kind of like, `I am."'
And she told Harper's Bazaar she preferred her British friends to her American friends: `They're intelligent, and they're not looking over my shoulder at dinner to see if there's anyone better walking in."
Given the state of British cuisine, they're probably looking at their plates in horror wondering what the hell they've been served.
But onward.
OK, maybe this doesn't match Michael and Mel for sheer dehumanizing bigotry. But there's something nutty about someone who, while living a life of wealth and privilege, spends her professional life hanging with actors, directors and producers, then extrapolating their sometime egomaniacal and/or eccentric behavior onto the entire American populace.
So she doesn't like to talk about capitalism? How does she think she got rich while mouthing words that other people wrote?
Besides, rich people don't have to talk about money. Or work. They talk about things that matter. Like beating the tax code.
Those Brits. The last time I was in a London pub, all I wanted to talk about Arsenal versus Manchester United. All they wanted to talk about was Beowulf.
In the same interview, Gwen says that having pop star Madonna, 48, who married British film director Guy Ritchie six years ago, nearby was another advantage to living in London.
Now, there's someone I'd like to chat with over dinner. By the way, didn't she use to call herself the Material Girl? Sounds capitalistic to me. And wasn't she the one who once said, "When I get down on my knees, it's not to pray"?
I guess it never comes up in dinner conversation.
A Game for the Ages
By ROBERT RECTOR
THERE are days when there's nothing finer than to live in Southern California.
0ne of those days was Saturday in Pasadena.
On a sparkling clear day with the San Gabriel Mountains awash in sunlight, on an afternoon of high definition hues and images, UCLA and USC engaged in a football game for the ages.
UCLA won but that's only part of the story.
If you were lucky enough to be there, you participated in one of the great traditions our area has to offer.
The Bruins and Trojans have been engaged in unique combat for more than 75 years. No other city in the U.S. features two major universities a scant 10 miles apart who compete at a championship level.
The fans, athletes, coaches and alums rub elbows throughout the year, ratcheting up the intensity level. Families, friends and neighbors are united. And divided. Bets are made. Barbs are exchanged.
Thousands have participated, millions have lived and died with the result.
For awhile, I feared it might fade away.
USC had assembled a football juggernaut at the same time UCLA was going through a down period.
Last year, USC won by 47 points, their seventh win in a row. So dominating were the Trojans that it appeared their game with the Bruins had become an afterthought. Indeed, many at USC consider Notre Dame their biggest rival.
Over at UCLA, the basketball team has been the dominate force in that sport for years, which tended to cool the rivalry. Football fans in Westwood had become downright fatalistic about their prospects, tired of being a lightweight in a heavyweight fight even though it wasn't too long ago the Bruins had won eight times in a row.
Would success breed failure? Would dominance doom the rivalry?
Those issues were put to rest Saturday with a UCLA win that restored some of the luster to the Bruin program while knocking the Trojans out of the national championship game.
People laughed, people cried. It was theater on a grand scale, played out on the grand stage of the Rose Bowl.
But more importantly, it gave the rivalry a needed shot in the arm. Revenge will do that.
And it's a good thing. Because this is Americana at its best. And because no matter what side you're on, for one afternoon a year, it brings us all together.
Meanwhile, somewhere on Monday, a USC alum found his office filled with blue and gold balloons. Somewhere, an SC alum had to pick up the dinner tab. Somewhere, an SC backer was forced to wear a UCLA shirt after losing a bet. And somewhere, a UCLA fan is ordering Christmas cards inscribed, "UCLA 13, USC 9. Happy Holidays."
Long live the Bruins. Long live the Trojans. And the games they play.
THERE are days when there's nothing finer than to live in Southern California.
0ne of those days was Saturday in Pasadena.
On a sparkling clear day with the San Gabriel Mountains awash in sunlight, on an afternoon of high definition hues and images, UCLA and USC engaged in a football game for the ages.
UCLA won but that's only part of the story.
If you were lucky enough to be there, you participated in one of the great traditions our area has to offer.
The Bruins and Trojans have been engaged in unique combat for more than 75 years. No other city in the U.S. features two major universities a scant 10 miles apart who compete at a championship level.
The fans, athletes, coaches and alums rub elbows throughout the year, ratcheting up the intensity level. Families, friends and neighbors are united. And divided. Bets are made. Barbs are exchanged.
Thousands have participated, millions have lived and died with the result.
For awhile, I feared it might fade away.
USC had assembled a football juggernaut at the same time UCLA was going through a down period.
Last year, USC won by 47 points, their seventh win in a row. So dominating were the Trojans that it appeared their game with the Bruins had become an afterthought. Indeed, many at USC consider Notre Dame their biggest rival.
Over at UCLA, the basketball team has been the dominate force in that sport for years, which tended to cool the rivalry. Football fans in Westwood had become downright fatalistic about their prospects, tired of being a lightweight in a heavyweight fight even though it wasn't too long ago the Bruins had won eight times in a row.
Would success breed failure? Would dominance doom the rivalry?
Those issues were put to rest Saturday with a UCLA win that restored some of the luster to the Bruin program while knocking the Trojans out of the national championship game.
People laughed, people cried. It was theater on a grand scale, played out on the grand stage of the Rose Bowl.
But more importantly, it gave the rivalry a needed shot in the arm. Revenge will do that.
And it's a good thing. Because this is Americana at its best. And because no matter what side you're on, for one afternoon a year, it brings us all together.
Meanwhile, somewhere on Monday, a USC alum found his office filled with blue and gold balloons. Somewhere, an SC alum had to pick up the dinner tab. Somewhere, an SC backer was forced to wear a UCLA shirt after losing a bet. And somewhere, a UCLA fan is ordering Christmas cards inscribed, "UCLA 13, USC 9. Happy Holidays."
Long live the Bruins. Long live the Trojans. And the games they play.
Put a Sock In It
By ROBERT RECTOR
JUST in time for Christmas, I bring you the results of my highly unscientific, maybe even unreliable, but curiously on-point survey of gift giving in the U.S. and assorted other foreign lands.
And the winner for the most detested present received during the holidays by all races, creeds and colors: socks.
That's right, folks, if you want to alienate your spouse, kids, in-laws and friends, bundle up an arrangement of socks in myriad colors and styles for them to discover underneath the tree.
Socks triumph over underwear, fruit cakes and nose hair trimmers as gifts that say, "Hey, I was in a hurry, and it was cheap."
The feelings that wash over those who receive the gift of socks could last a lifetime.
Other memorable gifts culled from a sampling of people who apparently have been dealing with the ensuing issues for many years:
"The Man Catcher Voodoo Kit: Nothing says `I think you are reaching the point of desperation' more than a gift of voodoo charms meant to attract a mate."
"Hankies. I was nine years old, and very unimpressed. It didn't help that the hankies were printed with festive Santas carrying bulging sacks of presents that were obviously not hankies."
"My father got me the complete works of William Shakespeare. I was 7 at the time. Another Christmas, Dad gave me a diet book, an etiquette book and a book on how to attract men with a card that said `with the hope you'll grow into a proper young lady.' I was 24."
"Our family of two small girls plus mom and dad received a family gift from my mother-in-law. The package was carefully wrapped. ...Who should get to open the gift for all of us? Finally, one of the girls began the ripping and tearing process with all of us cheering and expectant. Boy, surprise, the letdown, how odd and inappropriate, a home electrolysis kit!"
"One walkie-talkie. Ordinarily this might be a cute idea except the gift-giver definitely did not have the other one nor know the whereabouts of it."
But it could be worse. A cursory cruise though the Internet offers oddities like Twinkie-flavored lip gloss and guitar pick earrings, not to mention the pregnant trailer trash doll and a doormat that reads, "nice underwear."
Then there's the disappearing civil liberties mug, which is covered with the complete text of the Bill of Rights. But when you pour in hot liquids, the rights that are infringed by the Patriot Act vanish before your very eyes.
Too liberal for you? Try the talking Ann Coulter action doll. Just press her belly, and listen to Ann spout her own special brand of anti-liberal opinions. You'll hear Ann's own voice attack everyone from swing voters to the Hollywood elite. All in all, Ann mouths 14 different conservative comments.
Tacky? Sure. But what are the holidays without tacky? And while we're on the subject, nobody does tacky like the entertainment industry.
Consider this example from writer John Scalzi who recounts it in a piece called "The 10 Least Successful Holiday Specials of All Time," a tales which may or may not be true:
Listeners of radio's Columbia Broadcasting System who tuned in to hear a Christmas Eve rendition of Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" in 1939 were shocked when they heard what appeared to be a newscast from the North Pole, reporting that Santa's workshop had been overrun in a blitzkrieg by Finnish proxies of the Nazi German government.
The newscast, a hoax created by 20-something wunderkind Orson Wells as a seasonal allegory about the spread of fascism in Europe, was so successful that few listeners stayed to listen until the end, when St. Nick emerged from the smoking ruins of his workshop to deliver a rousing call to action against the authoritarian tide and to urge peace on Earth, good will toward men and expound on the joys of a hot cup of Mercury Theater of Air's sponsor, Campbell's soup.
Instead, tens of thousands of New York City children mobbed the Macy's Department Store on 34th, long presumed to be Santa's New York embassy, and sang Christmas carols in wee, sobbing tones. Only a midnight appearance of New York mayor Fiorello LaGuardia in full Santa getup quelled the agitated tykes.
Welles, now a hunted man on the Eastern seaboard, decamped for Hollywood shortly thereafter.
JUST in time for Christmas, I bring you the results of my highly unscientific, maybe even unreliable, but curiously on-point survey of gift giving in the U.S. and assorted other foreign lands.
And the winner for the most detested present received during the holidays by all races, creeds and colors: socks.
That's right, folks, if you want to alienate your spouse, kids, in-laws and friends, bundle up an arrangement of socks in myriad colors and styles for them to discover underneath the tree.
Socks triumph over underwear, fruit cakes and nose hair trimmers as gifts that say, "Hey, I was in a hurry, and it was cheap."
The feelings that wash over those who receive the gift of socks could last a lifetime.
Other memorable gifts culled from a sampling of people who apparently have been dealing with the ensuing issues for many years:
"The Man Catcher Voodoo Kit: Nothing says `I think you are reaching the point of desperation' more than a gift of voodoo charms meant to attract a mate."
"Hankies. I was nine years old, and very unimpressed. It didn't help that the hankies were printed with festive Santas carrying bulging sacks of presents that were obviously not hankies."
"My father got me the complete works of William Shakespeare. I was 7 at the time. Another Christmas, Dad gave me a diet book, an etiquette book and a book on how to attract men with a card that said `with the hope you'll grow into a proper young lady.' I was 24."
"Our family of two small girls plus mom and dad received a family gift from my mother-in-law. The package was carefully wrapped. ...Who should get to open the gift for all of us? Finally, one of the girls began the ripping and tearing process with all of us cheering and expectant. Boy, surprise, the letdown, how odd and inappropriate, a home electrolysis kit!"
"One walkie-talkie. Ordinarily this might be a cute idea except the gift-giver definitely did not have the other one nor know the whereabouts of it."
But it could be worse. A cursory cruise though the Internet offers oddities like Twinkie-flavored lip gloss and guitar pick earrings, not to mention the pregnant trailer trash doll and a doormat that reads, "nice underwear."
Then there's the disappearing civil liberties mug, which is covered with the complete text of the Bill of Rights. But when you pour in hot liquids, the rights that are infringed by the Patriot Act vanish before your very eyes.
Too liberal for you? Try the talking Ann Coulter action doll. Just press her belly, and listen to Ann spout her own special brand of anti-liberal opinions. You'll hear Ann's own voice attack everyone from swing voters to the Hollywood elite. All in all, Ann mouths 14 different conservative comments.
Tacky? Sure. But what are the holidays without tacky? And while we're on the subject, nobody does tacky like the entertainment industry.
Consider this example from writer John Scalzi who recounts it in a piece called "The 10 Least Successful Holiday Specials of All Time," a tales which may or may not be true:
Listeners of radio's Columbia Broadcasting System who tuned in to hear a Christmas Eve rendition of Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" in 1939 were shocked when they heard what appeared to be a newscast from the North Pole, reporting that Santa's workshop had been overrun in a blitzkrieg by Finnish proxies of the Nazi German government.
The newscast, a hoax created by 20-something wunderkind Orson Wells as a seasonal allegory about the spread of fascism in Europe, was so successful that few listeners stayed to listen until the end, when St. Nick emerged from the smoking ruins of his workshop to deliver a rousing call to action against the authoritarian tide and to urge peace on Earth, good will toward men and expound on the joys of a hot cup of Mercury Theater of Air's sponsor, Campbell's soup.
Instead, tens of thousands of New York City children mobbed the Macy's Department Store on 34th, long presumed to be Santa's New York embassy, and sang Christmas carols in wee, sobbing tones. Only a midnight appearance of New York mayor Fiorello LaGuardia in full Santa getup quelled the agitated tykes.
Welles, now a hunted man on the Eastern seaboard, decamped for Hollywood shortly thereafter.
Wednesday, November 29, 2006
When Race Is a Four-Letter Word
By ROBERT RECTOR
I was in a restaurant the other night with a friend, who happens to be African-American, when a stranger, who was white, came up and said,"Terrible about that Michael Richards thing."
He apparently felt compelled to apologize to every black person he saw for the former "Seinfeld" comic's infamous racist comments that were front page news recently.
It was an odd encounter but I had to give the stranger marks for his sincerely.Which is more than I can say for Richards, and his partner incrime, Mel Gibson.
I can't look into a person's heart to determine the goodness or evil that resides therein. But when actors Richards and Gibson apologized for their unrelated but equally virulent racist tirades, I didn't believe a word of it.
Oh, I believe they're sorry. Sorry they attempted career suicide.
But I have never heard anyone engage in the kind of rants these two mouthed who deep down inside didn't believe that race is a four-letter word.
Kramer blamed a black heckler for his tirade, saying he lost his temper. I've been mad at people who just so happen to be black. I've been mad at Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton. I've been mad at Ward Connerly. I've been mad at Harry Bellafonte and Bill Cosby. I've been mad at Koby and Shaq.
But unlike Richards, I've never resorted to using cheap racial slurs or to yearn for the good old days when lynch mobs roamed the American countryside.
Hatred, pain and degradation aren't valid debating techniques. And if that's all you can resort to, you've already lost the battle.
Some of this boorish behavior is attributable to the anything-goes atmosphere at comedy clubs where you get can soar past the boundaries of taste, as long as the audience thinks you're funny. But Richards wasn't funny. In fact, he was scary.
``It's a first time for me to talk to an African American like that - that's a first time for me,'' Richards said earlier this week. But reports have surfaced that Richard also engaged in an anti-Semitic rant this year at a comedy club. That makes him at least a two-time loser and one whose excuses ring shallow.
Gibson was full of tequila when he laid blame for the world's problems at the feet of the Jews. But even that has become a crutch.
Gibson said that he has "battled the disease of alcoholism for all of my adult life and profoundly regret my horrific relapse." He added, "Please know from my heart that I am not an anti-Semite. I am not a bigot."
But, as Pliny the Elder wrote in AD77, "In vino, veritas", or "Inwine, there is truth". Meaning that Gibson's views weren't formed by Jose Cuervo.
His is what they call a non-apology apology. Bruce McCall, in a 2001 New York Times piece, defined the term as referring to "sufficiently artful double talk" to enable you to "get what you want by seeming to express regret while actually accepting no blame."
Besides, Gibson can be frightening when he's sober. After Frank Rich of the New York Times wrote that Gibson's "Passion of the Christ" would inflame anti-Semitism, Gibson told The New Yorker, "I want to kill him. I want his intestines on a stick. I want to kill his dog."
It is apparent that while Gibson may suffer from the disease of alcoholism, he suffers from the disease of prejudice as well.
I do not long for world in which we all wear the heavy coat ofpolitical correctness. But I do long for a world where Michael Richards and Mel Gibson and all those like them will look inward and resolve the issues that have left them bitter and hateful.
When they do, it will be a better world.
I was in a restaurant the other night with a friend, who happens to be African-American, when a stranger, who was white, came up and said,"Terrible about that Michael Richards thing."
He apparently felt compelled to apologize to every black person he saw for the former "Seinfeld" comic's infamous racist comments that were front page news recently.
It was an odd encounter but I had to give the stranger marks for his sincerely.Which is more than I can say for Richards, and his partner incrime, Mel Gibson.
I can't look into a person's heart to determine the goodness or evil that resides therein. But when actors Richards and Gibson apologized for their unrelated but equally virulent racist tirades, I didn't believe a word of it.
Oh, I believe they're sorry. Sorry they attempted career suicide.
But I have never heard anyone engage in the kind of rants these two mouthed who deep down inside didn't believe that race is a four-letter word.
Kramer blamed a black heckler for his tirade, saying he lost his temper. I've been mad at people who just so happen to be black. I've been mad at Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton. I've been mad at Ward Connerly. I've been mad at Harry Bellafonte and Bill Cosby. I've been mad at Koby and Shaq.
But unlike Richards, I've never resorted to using cheap racial slurs or to yearn for the good old days when lynch mobs roamed the American countryside.
Hatred, pain and degradation aren't valid debating techniques. And if that's all you can resort to, you've already lost the battle.
Some of this boorish behavior is attributable to the anything-goes atmosphere at comedy clubs where you get can soar past the boundaries of taste, as long as the audience thinks you're funny. But Richards wasn't funny. In fact, he was scary.
``It's a first time for me to talk to an African American like that - that's a first time for me,'' Richards said earlier this week. But reports have surfaced that Richard also engaged in an anti-Semitic rant this year at a comedy club. That makes him at least a two-time loser and one whose excuses ring shallow.
Gibson was full of tequila when he laid blame for the world's problems at the feet of the Jews. But even that has become a crutch.
Gibson said that he has "battled the disease of alcoholism for all of my adult life and profoundly regret my horrific relapse." He added, "Please know from my heart that I am not an anti-Semite. I am not a bigot."
But, as Pliny the Elder wrote in AD77, "In vino, veritas", or "Inwine, there is truth". Meaning that Gibson's views weren't formed by Jose Cuervo.
His is what they call a non-apology apology. Bruce McCall, in a 2001 New York Times piece, defined the term as referring to "sufficiently artful double talk" to enable you to "get what you want by seeming to express regret while actually accepting no blame."
Besides, Gibson can be frightening when he's sober. After Frank Rich of the New York Times wrote that Gibson's "Passion of the Christ" would inflame anti-Semitism, Gibson told The New Yorker, "I want to kill him. I want his intestines on a stick. I want to kill his dog."
It is apparent that while Gibson may suffer from the disease of alcoholism, he suffers from the disease of prejudice as well.
I do not long for world in which we all wear the heavy coat ofpolitical correctness. But I do long for a world where Michael Richards and Mel Gibson and all those like them will look inward and resolve the issues that have left them bitter and hateful.
When they do, it will be a better world.
Monday, November 27, 2006
Hard to Digest
By ROBERT RECTOR
In a week devoted to eating, there were a few morsels left overfor a news hungry public to digest.
The first was the unholy alliance between Rupert Murdoch and O.J. Simpson who had teamed up in an attempt to bomb American culture back to theStone Age with ``If I Did It,'' an "imaginary confession" in which Simpson was to have described how he would have killed his ex-wife in a combinationbook/TV interview package.
The project caused such widespread revulsion that even Murdoch, no stranger to bad taste, had to pull the plug on it.
``I and senior management agree with the American public that this was an ill-considered project,'' explained Murdoch, whose News Corp. ownsboth Fox Broadcasting and the book's publisher. Of course, a dozen Fox network affiliates said they would not air the two-part sweeps month special, and numerous stores had either declined to sell the book or had promised to donate any profits to charity.
The bottom line is that no self-respecting advertiser would have participated in this travesty. And with no advertising, there are noprofits.
Just in case you thought Murdoch had suddenly grown some moral backbone.
After all, he oversees a network that has brought us such reality offerings as "Playing It Straight," in which a female college student was asked to sort through 14 men, most of them gay, to find the straight one who would be the love of her prime-time life, not to mention "My Big Fat Obnoixous Boss" and "When Animals Attack."
As for Simpson, he'd perform as a trained seal if the money was right. We all know he needs the cash so he can continue the hunt for his wife's killer, a search that appears to take place mostly on golf courses.
And finally, never underestimate the entrepeneurial instincts ofthe our fellow Americans. Even though Simpson's book was pulled off the market, a copy showed up this week for sale on eBay for $4000.
Meanwhile, back in Chicago, the Cubs, with much flourish, proudly announced they had signed free-agent outfielder Alfonse Soriano for$136 million over eight years. The team has spent $200 million on player salaries in the last week or so.
The thing to remember here is that the Cubs are owned by theTribune Co., the same folks who own and have been slowly strangling the life out of the Los Angeles Times, threatening to turn a once-proud paper into the Penny Saver.
Apparently, the boys back in Chicago favor runs over reporters and pitching over Pulitzers.
Despite an alarming decline in circulation at the Times, theTribune folks plan to cut back the staff even more, apparently deciding that the answer to an increasingly dissastified readership is to give them even less. Meanwhile, the employees at Times, which has achieved more success in the last five years than the Cubs have in the last 100, must wish they would have spent more time learning to hit a curve ball.
And let's hear it for Michael Richards, the comic who did the impossible this week. In one profanity-laced, racist rant, Richards made Mel Gibson look like Mahatma Gandhi.
Richards, who gaind fame as Kramer on the "Seinfeld" TV series, apparently didn't take kindly to a couple of hecklers during his stand-up routine at the Laugh Factory. He unleashed a tirade directed at the hecklers, whowere black, that was so vitriolic it would have made George Wallace blush.
His career in shambles, he apologized the next day. Next we can expect Richards to enroll in an anger management program, blame alcohol and claim he was molested by a priest.
In a week devoted to eating, there were a few morsels left overfor a news hungry public to digest.
The first was the unholy alliance between Rupert Murdoch and O.J. Simpson who had teamed up in an attempt to bomb American culture back to theStone Age with ``If I Did It,'' an "imaginary confession" in which Simpson was to have described how he would have killed his ex-wife in a combinationbook/TV interview package.
The project caused such widespread revulsion that even Murdoch, no stranger to bad taste, had to pull the plug on it.
``I and senior management agree with the American public that this was an ill-considered project,'' explained Murdoch, whose News Corp. ownsboth Fox Broadcasting and the book's publisher. Of course, a dozen Fox network affiliates said they would not air the two-part sweeps month special, and numerous stores had either declined to sell the book or had promised to donate any profits to charity.
The bottom line is that no self-respecting advertiser would have participated in this travesty. And with no advertising, there are noprofits.
Just in case you thought Murdoch had suddenly grown some moral backbone.
After all, he oversees a network that has brought us such reality offerings as "Playing It Straight," in which a female college student was asked to sort through 14 men, most of them gay, to find the straight one who would be the love of her prime-time life, not to mention "My Big Fat Obnoixous Boss" and "When Animals Attack."
As for Simpson, he'd perform as a trained seal if the money was right. We all know he needs the cash so he can continue the hunt for his wife's killer, a search that appears to take place mostly on golf courses.
And finally, never underestimate the entrepeneurial instincts ofthe our fellow Americans. Even though Simpson's book was pulled off the market, a copy showed up this week for sale on eBay for $4000.
Meanwhile, back in Chicago, the Cubs, with much flourish, proudly announced they had signed free-agent outfielder Alfonse Soriano for$136 million over eight years. The team has spent $200 million on player salaries in the last week or so.
The thing to remember here is that the Cubs are owned by theTribune Co., the same folks who own and have been slowly strangling the life out of the Los Angeles Times, threatening to turn a once-proud paper into the Penny Saver.
Apparently, the boys back in Chicago favor runs over reporters and pitching over Pulitzers.
Despite an alarming decline in circulation at the Times, theTribune folks plan to cut back the staff even more, apparently deciding that the answer to an increasingly dissastified readership is to give them even less. Meanwhile, the employees at Times, which has achieved more success in the last five years than the Cubs have in the last 100, must wish they would have spent more time learning to hit a curve ball.
And let's hear it for Michael Richards, the comic who did the impossible this week. In one profanity-laced, racist rant, Richards made Mel Gibson look like Mahatma Gandhi.
Richards, who gaind fame as Kramer on the "Seinfeld" TV series, apparently didn't take kindly to a couple of hecklers during his stand-up routine at the Laugh Factory. He unleashed a tirade directed at the hecklers, whowere black, that was so vitriolic it would have made George Wallace blush.
His career in shambles, he apologized the next day. Next we can expect Richards to enroll in an anger management program, blame alcohol and claim he was molested by a priest.
Monday, November 13, 2006
Hard Times
By ROBERT RECTOR
I spent Wednesday commiserating.
I commiserated with Republican friends distressed by Democratic victories on election night.
I commiserated with friends at the Los Angeles Times whose immediate futures may be bleaker than the Republican Party.
The Republicans lost the battle because of the war. I guess that "shock and awe" strategy works both ways. But two years from now, the issues that shape the election could be completely different. And so could the outcome.
That is not to understate the enormity of what happened Tuesday night. The Republicans have been in charge of the House since 1994 and ruled the Senate for most of that period. And it ended with an alarming suddenness. Good-bye evangelicals. Welcome back Dixie Chicks.
The people have spoken. But the people's political memory is short. After all, the voters spoke just two years ago, sweeping Bush back into the White House.
And truth be told, the Democratic strategy at this point, especially concerning the war, is just as unclear as the President's. Stay tuned.
Meanwhile, over at the Times, uncertainty also reigns. All you need to know about the Tribune Co.'s stewardship of the paper is that they chose tofire Dean Baquet, the LA Times editor, during election week, usually the most chaotic and stressful time of the year in the news business. This is tantamount to ejecting the pilot on final approach to LAX.
In the meantime, the Tribune folks, who also canned the publisher last month because he objected to further staff reductions, threaten more cuts at the paper at the same time its circulation is plunging. You don't save the Titanic by slicing another hole in the hull. But that seems to be the Tribune business model.
It takes a lot of people to cover an area the size of Southern California and maintain bureaus throughout the U.S. and the world. It also takes a big commitment and a lot of money. The last two are in short supply these days at the Times.
Perhaps it is inevitable. I worked for more than 30 years at the Times, a golden era when, under the leadership of Otis Chandler, the organization made money by the truckload and spent it just as fast.
That is not reality in this business. At another paper I worked for, we taped pencils back to back so we could continue to use them even as they became stubs, thereby delaying replacement costs.
Tribune executives complained that the Times was slow to realize the economic realities facing the business today. There may be some truth to that, a hangover from the free-spending Chandler days.
Even at the storied New York Times, a dissident investor is escalating a showdown, seeking steps that would lessen the Sulzberger family's control over the newspaper company.
Morgan Stanley Investment Management, which owns 7.6 percent of the company's stock and is unhappy with a long slide in its share price, submitted a proposal aimed at giving other shareholders more say in the company's operation and future.
But money is not the only issue in Los Angeles. When the Tribune bought the Times several years back, the consensus among the troops was that the Rancho Cucamonga Quakes had just bought the Dodgers. We both played ball but at considerably different levels.
There was jealousy in Chicago, home base for the Tribune, especially when the Times won a slew of Pulitzer Prizes.
Now, the Trib has replaced a respected editor and publisher with a couple of guys from Chicago who probably needed a map to find the building.
There is a flicker of hope. Billionaire philanthropist Eli Broad and prominent investor Ron Burkle have submitted a bid to buy Tribune Co. But if that doesn't work, the Times will become a shadow of its former self.
And that's a shame, even if you think it is edited by a bunch of old lefties who worship Michael Moore and Ed Asner. That's because the Times lifted the level of coverage of other papers in its circulation area. We'll all be the poorer for its decline.
I spent Wednesday commiserating.
I commiserated with Republican friends distressed by Democratic victories on election night.
I commiserated with friends at the Los Angeles Times whose immediate futures may be bleaker than the Republican Party.
The Republicans lost the battle because of the war. I guess that "shock and awe" strategy works both ways. But two years from now, the issues that shape the election could be completely different. And so could the outcome.
That is not to understate the enormity of what happened Tuesday night. The Republicans have been in charge of the House since 1994 and ruled the Senate for most of that period. And it ended with an alarming suddenness. Good-bye evangelicals. Welcome back Dixie Chicks.
The people have spoken. But the people's political memory is short. After all, the voters spoke just two years ago, sweeping Bush back into the White House.
And truth be told, the Democratic strategy at this point, especially concerning the war, is just as unclear as the President's. Stay tuned.
Meanwhile, over at the Times, uncertainty also reigns. All you need to know about the Tribune Co.'s stewardship of the paper is that they chose tofire Dean Baquet, the LA Times editor, during election week, usually the most chaotic and stressful time of the year in the news business. This is tantamount to ejecting the pilot on final approach to LAX.
In the meantime, the Tribune folks, who also canned the publisher last month because he objected to further staff reductions, threaten more cuts at the paper at the same time its circulation is plunging. You don't save the Titanic by slicing another hole in the hull. But that seems to be the Tribune business model.
It takes a lot of people to cover an area the size of Southern California and maintain bureaus throughout the U.S. and the world. It also takes a big commitment and a lot of money. The last two are in short supply these days at the Times.
Perhaps it is inevitable. I worked for more than 30 years at the Times, a golden era when, under the leadership of Otis Chandler, the organization made money by the truckload and spent it just as fast.
That is not reality in this business. At another paper I worked for, we taped pencils back to back so we could continue to use them even as they became stubs, thereby delaying replacement costs.
Tribune executives complained that the Times was slow to realize the economic realities facing the business today. There may be some truth to that, a hangover from the free-spending Chandler days.
Even at the storied New York Times, a dissident investor is escalating a showdown, seeking steps that would lessen the Sulzberger family's control over the newspaper company.
Morgan Stanley Investment Management, which owns 7.6 percent of the company's stock and is unhappy with a long slide in its share price, submitted a proposal aimed at giving other shareholders more say in the company's operation and future.
But money is not the only issue in Los Angeles. When the Tribune bought the Times several years back, the consensus among the troops was that the Rancho Cucamonga Quakes had just bought the Dodgers. We both played ball but at considerably different levels.
There was jealousy in Chicago, home base for the Tribune, especially when the Times won a slew of Pulitzer Prizes.
Now, the Trib has replaced a respected editor and publisher with a couple of guys from Chicago who probably needed a map to find the building.
There is a flicker of hope. Billionaire philanthropist Eli Broad and prominent investor Ron Burkle have submitted a bid to buy Tribune Co. But if that doesn't work, the Times will become a shadow of its former self.
And that's a shame, even if you think it is edited by a bunch of old lefties who worship Michael Moore and Ed Asner. That's because the Times lifted the level of coverage of other papers in its circulation area. We'll all be the poorer for its decline.
Wednesday, November 08, 2006
The Race That Isn't
By ROBERT RECTOR
IF you live in Pasadena or Burbank, Glendale, Temple City or Monterey Park, you might not discover there's a Congressional election taking place in your neighborhood until you step into the voting booth next Tuesday.
You won't see much in the way of billboards, lawn signs, mailers or bumper stickers. There are no cable TV ads or campaign rallies. There's not a lot of media attention.
Yet Adam Schiff, the Democratic incumbent, is indeed running for re-election. And he's already won.
That's because Schiff is running in a "safe" district, one whose boundary lines have been drawn to protect the interests of the incumbent.
Schiff's 29th Congressional District is heavily Democratic. Much of that is due to demographic changes. In a nutshell, the Republicans have been leaving and the Democrats are moving in.
But thanks to redistricting, the 29th is so solidly Democratic now that Schiff's re-election is all but assured, short of a national-level scandal. Talk about job security.
Fortunately, the people of the 29th seem well served by Schiff, a centrist Democrat who spends a great deal of time pressing the flesh in the district and, when in Washington, avoiding extreme positions.
I know Republicans who are still smarting over FDR but will vote for Schiff.
As you can imagine, this tends to discourage highly visible, well-financed opponents. In this election, Schiff faces Jim Keller, a Libertarian; Lynda Llamas of the Peace and Freedom Party, William Paparian, a former Pasadena mayor who is running as a Green Party candidate, and William Bodell, a Republican.
Hardly the kind of competition that would have Schiff looking for a job in the private sector.
In the meantime, Schiff has raised more than $1 million for this election. Only Paparian with $23,135 has reported raising any money for his run. Bottom line: In the last election, Schiff won 65 percent of the vote. His closest opponent had 30 percent.
It seems odd that a country which embraces competition in business, in education, in sports - because it results in a better product - should ignore this mantra when it comes to choosing political representatives.
One result of that thinking is that in 2004, 85 percent of House incumbents won by landslide majorities of more than 60 percent. Only seven incumbents, out of 399 running, lost their seats.
And while I'm sure than many of these incumbents were re-elected based on their good deeds, a lot were returned because voters had no real choice.
According to Common Cause, advances in information and mapping technology have enabled a level of precision in district drawing that in effect, enables legislators to choose the voters they wish to represent and makes it difficult for voters to hold their representatives accountable. It also ratchets up the cynicism level of many voters.
For the record, this is a bipartisan bloodsport. I only mention Schiff because he is right here in our own backyard.
Republicans have had their own share of shenanigans. In Georgia, in the wake of taking control of state government in 2004, Republicans in 2005 redrew the Democratic gerrymander of 2005. They piously defend the proposed lines as more compact, but their primary motivation is clear: two more Republican House seats in 2006.
The bad news is that attempts at reform have failed.
Voters rejected Proposition 77 in last year's special election. The measure would have put redistricting in the hands of retired judges, who would have had to follow specific guidelines.
Much of the blame for that defeat can be placed at the feet of state legislators who promised a better plan when they campaigned against Prop. 77. Instead, their plan collapsed at the end of the session in a circus of finger pointing.
The state Legislature needs to try again. And if they don't, we need to encourage another try at the initiative level. Perhaps even a plan that confronts the problem from a national perspective.
It's as simple as this: If competition is a cornerstone of our society, it certainly ought to bring us better service from our elected representatives.
IF you live in Pasadena or Burbank, Glendale, Temple City or Monterey Park, you might not discover there's a Congressional election taking place in your neighborhood until you step into the voting booth next Tuesday.
You won't see much in the way of billboards, lawn signs, mailers or bumper stickers. There are no cable TV ads or campaign rallies. There's not a lot of media attention.
Yet Adam Schiff, the Democratic incumbent, is indeed running for re-election. And he's already won.
That's because Schiff is running in a "safe" district, one whose boundary lines have been drawn to protect the interests of the incumbent.
Schiff's 29th Congressional District is heavily Democratic. Much of that is due to demographic changes. In a nutshell, the Republicans have been leaving and the Democrats are moving in.
But thanks to redistricting, the 29th is so solidly Democratic now that Schiff's re-election is all but assured, short of a national-level scandal. Talk about job security.
Fortunately, the people of the 29th seem well served by Schiff, a centrist Democrat who spends a great deal of time pressing the flesh in the district and, when in Washington, avoiding extreme positions.
I know Republicans who are still smarting over FDR but will vote for Schiff.
As you can imagine, this tends to discourage highly visible, well-financed opponents. In this election, Schiff faces Jim Keller, a Libertarian; Lynda Llamas of the Peace and Freedom Party, William Paparian, a former Pasadena mayor who is running as a Green Party candidate, and William Bodell, a Republican.
Hardly the kind of competition that would have Schiff looking for a job in the private sector.
In the meantime, Schiff has raised more than $1 million for this election. Only Paparian with $23,135 has reported raising any money for his run. Bottom line: In the last election, Schiff won 65 percent of the vote. His closest opponent had 30 percent.
It seems odd that a country which embraces competition in business, in education, in sports - because it results in a better product - should ignore this mantra when it comes to choosing political representatives.
One result of that thinking is that in 2004, 85 percent of House incumbents won by landslide majorities of more than 60 percent. Only seven incumbents, out of 399 running, lost their seats.
And while I'm sure than many of these incumbents were re-elected based on their good deeds, a lot were returned because voters had no real choice.
According to Common Cause, advances in information and mapping technology have enabled a level of precision in district drawing that in effect, enables legislators to choose the voters they wish to represent and makes it difficult for voters to hold their representatives accountable. It also ratchets up the cynicism level of many voters.
For the record, this is a bipartisan bloodsport. I only mention Schiff because he is right here in our own backyard.
Republicans have had their own share of shenanigans. In Georgia, in the wake of taking control of state government in 2004, Republicans in 2005 redrew the Democratic gerrymander of 2005. They piously defend the proposed lines as more compact, but their primary motivation is clear: two more Republican House seats in 2006.
The bad news is that attempts at reform have failed.
Voters rejected Proposition 77 in last year's special election. The measure would have put redistricting in the hands of retired judges, who would have had to follow specific guidelines.
Much of the blame for that defeat can be placed at the feet of state legislators who promised a better plan when they campaigned against Prop. 77. Instead, their plan collapsed at the end of the session in a circus of finger pointing.
The state Legislature needs to try again. And if they don't, we need to encourage another try at the initiative level. Perhaps even a plan that confronts the problem from a national perspective.
It's as simple as this: If competition is a cornerstone of our society, it certainly ought to bring us better service from our elected representatives.
Tuesday, October 31, 2006
Child's Play
By ROBERT RECTOR
CHILDREN have to be tough these days to survive the often ham-fisted efforts of their parents to raise them.
I offer as proof the following evidence.
Down in Orange County, home to Goofy, among others, fears of childhood obesity have led schools to discourage and sometimes even ban birthday cupcakes, according to published reports.
"They can bring carrots," said Laura Ott, assistant to the superintendent of Orange County's Saddleback Valley Unified School District. "A birthday doesn't have to be associated with food."
Meanwhile, officials at schools across the county have banned kids from playing tag, touch football and any other unsupervised chase game during recess for fear they'll get hurt and hold the school liable.
Recess is "a time when accidents can happen," said one principal, who approved the ban.
Many school administrators have also taken aim at dodgeball, saying it is exclusionary and dangerous.
So if I read this right, at a time when teachers and parents have declared a holy war against junk food in the name of combating childhood obesity, we are our telling our kids to take a seat because they might scrape a knee.
Talk about a mixed message.
In a world gone mad, banning birthday cupcakes is low on my list of things to do. Mankind has celebrated life's little milestones with special food since the dawn of time. And while I believe we should steer kids away from a diet of Krispy Kremes, I also favor teaching moderation over culinary fascism.
My hat's off to the Texas Legislature which passed the so-called Safe Cupcake amendment, according to the Los Angeles Times, which guarantees parents' right to deliver unhealthful treats to the classroom - such as sweetheart candies on Valentine's Day and candy corn on Halloween.
Rep. Jim Dunnam sponsored the legislation after a school in his district booted out a father bringing birthday pizzas to his child's class.
"There's a lot of reasons our kids are getting fat," said Dunnam, a Democrat from Waco. "Cupcakes aren't one of them."
Besides, wouldn't a kid burn off the calories in a cupcake during a typical recess? Sure, if he or she was allowed to play.
Right here in Santa Monica, Franklin Elementary school banned tag because, as principal Pat Samarge says, "Little kids were coming in and saying, `I don't like it.' Children weren't feeling good about it."
Well, when I was a kid, I wasn't always "feeling good" about tests, cafeteria food and dancing with girls (a stigma I learned to overcome). I don't recall anyone suggesting we ban those activities to soothe my self-esteem. Dealing with it was part of growing up.
Of course, somebody could get hurt. But how badly hurt can you get by being "it"?
And dodgeball? Apparently, we're told it promotes bullying, victimizing and isolation for those who drop out of the game. Which sounds like a pretty good primer for adulthood to me.
The National Association for Sport and Physical Education, which represents more than 18,000 teachers and professors, has consigned dodge ball to its "physical education hall of shame" where it joins musical chairs, red rover, and duck, duck, goose because they require children to chase each other.
Soon, we will be dressing our kids in haz-mat suits and they will spend their recesses playing video games. Oh, yeah, carpel tunnel syndrome. Bad idea.
For me, learning about winning and losing as a kid was a lot easier than experiencing it for the first time as an adult.
Even worse, as Jay Leno said of the tag ban, the last kid who was tagged at a school would be "it" for the rest of his life.
CHILDREN have to be tough these days to survive the often ham-fisted efforts of their parents to raise them.
I offer as proof the following evidence.
Down in Orange County, home to Goofy, among others, fears of childhood obesity have led schools to discourage and sometimes even ban birthday cupcakes, according to published reports.
"They can bring carrots," said Laura Ott, assistant to the superintendent of Orange County's Saddleback Valley Unified School District. "A birthday doesn't have to be associated with food."
Meanwhile, officials at schools across the county have banned kids from playing tag, touch football and any other unsupervised chase game during recess for fear they'll get hurt and hold the school liable.
Recess is "a time when accidents can happen," said one principal, who approved the ban.
Many school administrators have also taken aim at dodgeball, saying it is exclusionary and dangerous.
So if I read this right, at a time when teachers and parents have declared a holy war against junk food in the name of combating childhood obesity, we are our telling our kids to take a seat because they might scrape a knee.
Talk about a mixed message.
In a world gone mad, banning birthday cupcakes is low on my list of things to do. Mankind has celebrated life's little milestones with special food since the dawn of time. And while I believe we should steer kids away from a diet of Krispy Kremes, I also favor teaching moderation over culinary fascism.
My hat's off to the Texas Legislature which passed the so-called Safe Cupcake amendment, according to the Los Angeles Times, which guarantees parents' right to deliver unhealthful treats to the classroom - such as sweetheart candies on Valentine's Day and candy corn on Halloween.
Rep. Jim Dunnam sponsored the legislation after a school in his district booted out a father bringing birthday pizzas to his child's class.
"There's a lot of reasons our kids are getting fat," said Dunnam, a Democrat from Waco. "Cupcakes aren't one of them."
Besides, wouldn't a kid burn off the calories in a cupcake during a typical recess? Sure, if he or she was allowed to play.
Right here in Santa Monica, Franklin Elementary school banned tag because, as principal Pat Samarge says, "Little kids were coming in and saying, `I don't like it.' Children weren't feeling good about it."
Well, when I was a kid, I wasn't always "feeling good" about tests, cafeteria food and dancing with girls (a stigma I learned to overcome). I don't recall anyone suggesting we ban those activities to soothe my self-esteem. Dealing with it was part of growing up.
Of course, somebody could get hurt. But how badly hurt can you get by being "it"?
And dodgeball? Apparently, we're told it promotes bullying, victimizing and isolation for those who drop out of the game. Which sounds like a pretty good primer for adulthood to me.
The National Association for Sport and Physical Education, which represents more than 18,000 teachers and professors, has consigned dodge ball to its "physical education hall of shame" where it joins musical chairs, red rover, and duck, duck, goose because they require children to chase each other.
Soon, we will be dressing our kids in haz-mat suits and they will spend their recesses playing video games. Oh, yeah, carpel tunnel syndrome. Bad idea.
For me, learning about winning and losing as a kid was a lot easier than experiencing it for the first time as an adult.
Even worse, as Jay Leno said of the tag ban, the last kid who was tagged at a school would be "it" for the rest of his life.
Tuesday, October 24, 2006
Herd Instinct
By ROBERT RECTOR
THEY gather at dusk, when the last traces of sunlight paint the horizon in hues of pink and blue, just before night extinguishes all color.
They can be found under a nearby oak, usually in groups of five or six. They seemingly exchange furtive glances, lest they be disturbed.
Before they are done, they will wreak havoc on the particular piece of land they have chosen to occupy.
Yet, their presence usually draws expressions of affection and awe.
"They" are deer. And "they" are overrunning my neighborhood.
I consider myself an animal lover. Not a vegan, mind you, but a person who enjoys animals in all their infinite varieties. I mean, I can't bring myself to pick a live lobster out of a tank for dinner. And I saw "March of the Penguins" three times.
But let me tell you something, folks, Bambi is getting brazen.
I've lived in the foothills for three decades and never have I seen anything like the herds that nonchalantly parade through our streets and yards. While some folks have neighborhood cats, we have neighborhood bucks.
Some display an air of detached entitlement. A family group in my driveway one evening wouldn't move even after I blinked my lights and honked.
I've gone eyeball-to-eyeball with a deer while retrieving my morning paper more than once. Over at the local golf course, they graze or lay about oblivious to flying golf balls and the anguished cries of the wounded duffer.
Most of my neighbors have long ago given up on growing roses in front of their houses. Roses, it seems, are a favorite hors d'oeuvre.
My wife has bravely fought back by spraying deer repellent on a row of roses in front of our house, but it works only sporadically and seems to repel humans as well as animals.
None of this should come as a great surprise. Deer populations are exploding and our neighborhoods have become vast urban salad bars for an increasingly hungry herd.
As far as I can tell, there have been no measures taken to mitigate the deer population binge, at least in our neck of the woods. Deer reproduce quickly. A doe matures at 2 or 3 years, and then typically gives birth to twins each year for 10 or more years.
According to scientists, deer birth control is a bit of a problem. First, every female deer must be captured for the first dose then given booster shots after that. Any volunteers?
Hunting seems out of the question. The prospect of orange-jacketed, rifle-toting hunters moving through our neighborhoods like Germans through France seems like a really bad idea.
Yet scientists also point out that the deer population expands exponentially, that is the herd does not increase the same amount each year but grows in ever-greater amounts as babies have babies.
And we thought immigration was an issue.
So do we learn to live with it? That presents its own set of problems.
One family member has already hit a deer while driving her car. A spooked doe kicked in a window in front of our house one day.
That's not the worst of it. As recounted in USA Today:
Ron Dudek, 73, of Rancho Santa Fe died of complications from antler wounds inflicted to his face by a male deer that Dudek encountered when he went to pick tomatoes in his backyard garden.
Karen Morris, 56, of Clearlake was hospitalized for 12 days with head injuries after an attack by a buck outside her home. The horns bruised Clifford Morris, 68, when he came to his wife's aid.
In Covelo, Arnold and Jeannine Bloom returned to their pickup after watering a friend's vegetable garden. A small buck ran up to the truck and knocked the man on his back. When Jeannine Bloom swung at the animal with a piece of firewood, it turned to her and ripped a hole in her arm.
Game wardens shot five bucks on the streets of Helena, Mont., after the deer threatened staffers at a day care center and a teenager delivering newspapers.
Welcome to Bambi and the Beast.
A biologist at the National Wildlife Research Center blames most of the trouble on the edginess of male deer during the fall mating season. Great, another thing to think about just before I drift off to sleep.
Bottom line: I'll do a little deer proofing around the house. Because given the choice of living with nature or living without it, I'll take the former.
THEY gather at dusk, when the last traces of sunlight paint the horizon in hues of pink and blue, just before night extinguishes all color.
They can be found under a nearby oak, usually in groups of five or six. They seemingly exchange furtive glances, lest they be disturbed.
Before they are done, they will wreak havoc on the particular piece of land they have chosen to occupy.
Yet, their presence usually draws expressions of affection and awe.
"They" are deer. And "they" are overrunning my neighborhood.
I consider myself an animal lover. Not a vegan, mind you, but a person who enjoys animals in all their infinite varieties. I mean, I can't bring myself to pick a live lobster out of a tank for dinner. And I saw "March of the Penguins" three times.
But let me tell you something, folks, Bambi is getting brazen.
I've lived in the foothills for three decades and never have I seen anything like the herds that nonchalantly parade through our streets and yards. While some folks have neighborhood cats, we have neighborhood bucks.
Some display an air of detached entitlement. A family group in my driveway one evening wouldn't move even after I blinked my lights and honked.
I've gone eyeball-to-eyeball with a deer while retrieving my morning paper more than once. Over at the local golf course, they graze or lay about oblivious to flying golf balls and the anguished cries of the wounded duffer.
Most of my neighbors have long ago given up on growing roses in front of their houses. Roses, it seems, are a favorite hors d'oeuvre.
My wife has bravely fought back by spraying deer repellent on a row of roses in front of our house, but it works only sporadically and seems to repel humans as well as animals.
None of this should come as a great surprise. Deer populations are exploding and our neighborhoods have become vast urban salad bars for an increasingly hungry herd.
As far as I can tell, there have been no measures taken to mitigate the deer population binge, at least in our neck of the woods. Deer reproduce quickly. A doe matures at 2 or 3 years, and then typically gives birth to twins each year for 10 or more years.
According to scientists, deer birth control is a bit of a problem. First, every female deer must be captured for the first dose then given booster shots after that. Any volunteers?
Hunting seems out of the question. The prospect of orange-jacketed, rifle-toting hunters moving through our neighborhoods like Germans through France seems like a really bad idea.
Yet scientists also point out that the deer population expands exponentially, that is the herd does not increase the same amount each year but grows in ever-greater amounts as babies have babies.
And we thought immigration was an issue.
So do we learn to live with it? That presents its own set of problems.
One family member has already hit a deer while driving her car. A spooked doe kicked in a window in front of our house one day.
That's not the worst of it. As recounted in USA Today:
Ron Dudek, 73, of Rancho Santa Fe died of complications from antler wounds inflicted to his face by a male deer that Dudek encountered when he went to pick tomatoes in his backyard garden.
Karen Morris, 56, of Clearlake was hospitalized for 12 days with head injuries after an attack by a buck outside her home. The horns bruised Clifford Morris, 68, when he came to his wife's aid.
In Covelo, Arnold and Jeannine Bloom returned to their pickup after watering a friend's vegetable garden. A small buck ran up to the truck and knocked the man on his back. When Jeannine Bloom swung at the animal with a piece of firewood, it turned to her and ripped a hole in her arm.
Game wardens shot five bucks on the streets of Helena, Mont., after the deer threatened staffers at a day care center and a teenager delivering newspapers.
Welcome to Bambi and the Beast.
A biologist at the National Wildlife Research Center blames most of the trouble on the edginess of male deer during the fall mating season. Great, another thing to think about just before I drift off to sleep.
Bottom line: I'll do a little deer proofing around the house. Because given the choice of living with nature or living without it, I'll take the former.
Tuesday, October 17, 2006
Cable Guys
By ROBERT RECTOR
I had to call my cable television company the other day, an exercise that strikes fear in the hearts of all who attempt it.
That's because a call to the cable guy requires you to negotiate an automated call-in system so complicated it could serve as the entrance exam for Caltech.
I don't want to mention which system it is but it starts with a C, ends with an R and has the letters HARTE in between. And I suspect they are typical.
First, you get a sales pitch. Want high speed Internet access? A telephone system? Super whiz bang digital hi def DVR jumbotron with a picture so sharp you can see Jerry Springer's nose hairs? No waiting. Immediate service is available.
If not, it's on to tier two. There, you are greeted by an apologetic voice that suggests they are very busy and this call might take more time that you thought. Since I had blocked half a day to wade through this bleak and humanless landscape, it was indeed daunting news. But onward.
Next, indicate your native tongue. It was odd that they had delivered five minutes worth of information to someone who may not have understood a word of it before they asked for a language preference. And they asked for it in English.
But I digress. Next, enter your phone number. Then, press 2 for options. That directs you to a menu with five more options. If you're lucky, you go to yet another option menu, this requiring you to verbally describe your problem in two words or less into the phone. Yelling "the damn thing doesn't work" isn't an option.
If you're unlucky, you get a message saying they're too busy and call back later.
At this point, if you haven't hurled the phone across the room in disgust, a live person finally comes on the line. And guess what? Before you can discuss your problem, they try to sell you a movie channel that offers a nonstop diet of bad airline-grade films, interspersed with specials like "The Making of 'Deuce Bigalow, European Giggilo.'" Beyond that, you receive assurances that a repair person will be at your residence sometime on a day that ends in Y between the hours of midnight and 11 p.m.
And these guys want me to buy a phone system from them?
At a time with the big telecom boys such as AT&T and Verizon are getting involved in the cable TV game and satellite dishes are becoming more popular, you would think that companies like Charter would be on their best behavior. Indeed, a recent survey they apparently never saw showed that 85 percent of respondents said that even a single bad experience with a customer service representative would provoke them to consider taking their business elsewhere.
On the other hand, do I want my TV delivered by the folks who bring me a cell phone system that sometime works like two tin cans and a string?
In the meantime, I think all Charter executives should be tied to chairs for an entire day and forced to listen to all their phone options until they beg for mercy. In two words or less.
I had to call my cable television company the other day, an exercise that strikes fear in the hearts of all who attempt it.
That's because a call to the cable guy requires you to negotiate an automated call-in system so complicated it could serve as the entrance exam for Caltech.
I don't want to mention which system it is but it starts with a C, ends with an R and has the letters HARTE in between. And I suspect they are typical.
First, you get a sales pitch. Want high speed Internet access? A telephone system? Super whiz bang digital hi def DVR jumbotron with a picture so sharp you can see Jerry Springer's nose hairs? No waiting. Immediate service is available.
If not, it's on to tier two. There, you are greeted by an apologetic voice that suggests they are very busy and this call might take more time that you thought. Since I had blocked half a day to wade through this bleak and humanless landscape, it was indeed daunting news. But onward.
Next, indicate your native tongue. It was odd that they had delivered five minutes worth of information to someone who may not have understood a word of it before they asked for a language preference. And they asked for it in English.
But I digress. Next, enter your phone number. Then, press 2 for options. That directs you to a menu with five more options. If you're lucky, you go to yet another option menu, this requiring you to verbally describe your problem in two words or less into the phone. Yelling "the damn thing doesn't work" isn't an option.
If you're unlucky, you get a message saying they're too busy and call back later.
At this point, if you haven't hurled the phone across the room in disgust, a live person finally comes on the line. And guess what? Before you can discuss your problem, they try to sell you a movie channel that offers a nonstop diet of bad airline-grade films, interspersed with specials like "The Making of 'Deuce Bigalow, European Giggilo.'" Beyond that, you receive assurances that a repair person will be at your residence sometime on a day that ends in Y between the hours of midnight and 11 p.m.
And these guys want me to buy a phone system from them?
At a time with the big telecom boys such as AT&T and Verizon are getting involved in the cable TV game and satellite dishes are becoming more popular, you would think that companies like Charter would be on their best behavior. Indeed, a recent survey they apparently never saw showed that 85 percent of respondents said that even a single bad experience with a customer service representative would provoke them to consider taking their business elsewhere.
On the other hand, do I want my TV delivered by the folks who bring me a cell phone system that sometime works like two tin cans and a string?
In the meantime, I think all Charter executives should be tied to chairs for an entire day and forced to listen to all their phone options until they beg for mercy. In two words or less.
Monday, October 09, 2006
The Future Is Now
By ROBERT RECTOR
Since childhood, I've spent a great deal of time in outer space. I read every science fiction book I could get my hands on at a young age and watched every movie from "Destination Moon" to "Star Wars" in hopes that someday the world they portrayed would be a reality in my lifetime.
And now, here it is. Sort of.
It seems Sir Richard Branson of Virgin Airlines fame plans to offer suborbital spaceflights and later orbital spaceflights to the paying public starting as early as 2008 through his Virgin Galactic enterprise.
The craft, with six passengers and two pilots, will make suborbital flights lasting three hours overall, with about seven minutes of weightlessness. If all goes according to plan, passengers will be able to release themselves from their seats and float around the cabin to truly experience weightlessness.
The future is arriving right on schedule.
Of course, there are a few galactic potholes to consider before we buckle up.
For one thing, the tickets will cost a cool $200,000 a pop. While I've been busy filling my change jars and hoarding aluminum cans, at that rate it may take me 100 years to save up enough cash. I could mortgage the house and let the cash ride on a hedge fund, but that has some serious downside such as divorce. Stowing away may be an option.
Then there is the passenger list. Paris Hilton has reportedly signed up, giving new meaning to the term space cadet.
There seems to be some debate over whether William Shatner, who has long pretended to boldly go where no man has gone before, will be along for the ride. One report said he has. Another quotes him saying that he has turned down a free trip into space because "I'm interested in man's march into the unknown but to vomit in space is not my idea of a good time." Why do I get the feeling that Shatner has spent most of his adult life trying to live down "Star Trek"?
The spaceport concept appears to need some fine tuning. Last year, Branson announced that Virgin Galactic would undertake a joint venture with the New Mexico state government to construct Spaceport America, a $225 million facility.
The first rocket launched from the New Mexico site recently wobbled off course at an elevation of 40,000 feet and crashed. The wreckage wasn't found for nearly a week.
Perhaps anticipating this, Virgin Galactic is in negotiations with Lloyd's of London for flight insurance. This will cover risks to people and structures on the ground near the launch site. However, passengers on suborbital flights are expected to travel at their own risk, at least initially.
None of this deters Sir Richard. Even before the first launch, Branson has plans for orbital space tourism and proposes putting a hotel in space.
Not to be outdone, Space Adventures Ltd. an Arlington, Va., based space tourism company best known for sending paying tourists to the International Space Station, has announced a project named Deep Space Expeditions Alpha to send people around the moon. A five-and-a-half day lunar flight could happen in 2008 or 2009 and cost about $100 million per person.
The company also announced that they would begin offering a 90 minute space walk for about $15 million, in addition to the $20 million required for the visit to the ISS. The space walk would be completed in the Russian designed Orlan space suit. The training for the space walk would require an extra month of training on top of the six months already required.
All of this points to one thing about space travel that never seemed to be an issue in early science fiction. Until the Greyhound Bus people launch, travel to space will be the purview of the same folks who watch their sports from luxury boxes, take their vacations on yachts and live behind gates.
At that rate, the first colony on the moon may be a country club.
Since childhood, I've spent a great deal of time in outer space. I read every science fiction book I could get my hands on at a young age and watched every movie from "Destination Moon" to "Star Wars" in hopes that someday the world they portrayed would be a reality in my lifetime.
And now, here it is. Sort of.
It seems Sir Richard Branson of Virgin Airlines fame plans to offer suborbital spaceflights and later orbital spaceflights to the paying public starting as early as 2008 through his Virgin Galactic enterprise.
The craft, with six passengers and two pilots, will make suborbital flights lasting three hours overall, with about seven minutes of weightlessness. If all goes according to plan, passengers will be able to release themselves from their seats and float around the cabin to truly experience weightlessness.
The future is arriving right on schedule.
Of course, there are a few galactic potholes to consider before we buckle up.
For one thing, the tickets will cost a cool $200,000 a pop. While I've been busy filling my change jars and hoarding aluminum cans, at that rate it may take me 100 years to save up enough cash. I could mortgage the house and let the cash ride on a hedge fund, but that has some serious downside such as divorce. Stowing away may be an option.
Then there is the passenger list. Paris Hilton has reportedly signed up, giving new meaning to the term space cadet.
There seems to be some debate over whether William Shatner, who has long pretended to boldly go where no man has gone before, will be along for the ride. One report said he has. Another quotes him saying that he has turned down a free trip into space because "I'm interested in man's march into the unknown but to vomit in space is not my idea of a good time." Why do I get the feeling that Shatner has spent most of his adult life trying to live down "Star Trek"?
The spaceport concept appears to need some fine tuning. Last year, Branson announced that Virgin Galactic would undertake a joint venture with the New Mexico state government to construct Spaceport America, a $225 million facility.
The first rocket launched from the New Mexico site recently wobbled off course at an elevation of 40,000 feet and crashed. The wreckage wasn't found for nearly a week.
Perhaps anticipating this, Virgin Galactic is in negotiations with Lloyd's of London for flight insurance. This will cover risks to people and structures on the ground near the launch site. However, passengers on suborbital flights are expected to travel at their own risk, at least initially.
None of this deters Sir Richard. Even before the first launch, Branson has plans for orbital space tourism and proposes putting a hotel in space.
Not to be outdone, Space Adventures Ltd. an Arlington, Va., based space tourism company best known for sending paying tourists to the International Space Station, has announced a project named Deep Space Expeditions Alpha to send people around the moon. A five-and-a-half day lunar flight could happen in 2008 or 2009 and cost about $100 million per person.
The company also announced that they would begin offering a 90 minute space walk for about $15 million, in addition to the $20 million required for the visit to the ISS. The space walk would be completed in the Russian designed Orlan space suit. The training for the space walk would require an extra month of training on top of the six months already required.
All of this points to one thing about space travel that never seemed to be an issue in early science fiction. Until the Greyhound Bus people launch, travel to space will be the purview of the same folks who watch their sports from luxury boxes, take their vacations on yachts and live behind gates.
At that rate, the first colony on the moon may be a country club.
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