First, kill all the lawyers.

We've all seen them...every so often some moron with an over-inflated sense of entitlement files a lawsuit that makes us pause to shake our heads. Let me tell you about two of them.
In 2007 a Morgantown WV man sued McDonalds for putting cheese on his burger. He claims he asked for no cheese and had a severe allergic reaction after biting into said burger. While I guess it's possible, I've never heard of anyone that allergic to cheese. Come to think about it I've never heard of anyone allergic AT ALL to cheese. Anyway, this pinhead sued for 10 million dollars on a negligence claim. Are you kidding? For 10 million I'll cart my fat born-Jewish ass to a Klan meeting and bring a spare rope. Thankfully the claim was dismissed.
But recently it happened again. A VA man sued Burger King for "only" 100,000 dollars for failing to hold the onions, pickles, and tomatoes. Again playing the allergy card, he's suing on a negligence claim. But you know, people are assholes as I always say. I'm not upset at them...it's the lawyers who actually thought filing these cases was a good idea. They are the ones responsible in large part for the mess our legal system is in. Some judges can declare someone a "vexacious litigant" and restrict their ability to file suits in certain circumstances. This card should be played more often...especially against the lawyers who continue to add fuel to the legal fires that are consuming unecessary dollars and time from us all.
According to a post on hamptonroads.com, the attorney responsible for this suit is Constantine Spanoulis, whose office is in Virginia Beach. I wonder how many other of these ridiculous lawsuits came out of that office. How many layoffs could have been avoided were it not for the billions spent on frivolous suits like these?

Need food stamps? Call 800-IN-INDIA

Let's start with a statistic. Florida has a 9.7% unemployment rate. How to help, Florida style? Hire JP Morgan Chase (the recipient of federal bailout money) to run the food stamp program. Pay them 50 million dollars over three years. And the kicker: outsource the call center jobs to India. Yup. Someone is so brain dead at JP Morgan Chase as to think "Well, no one in Florida needs a job, we'll just take government money and spend it in a 3rd world country". They operate 4 call centers for the Florida Food Stamp Program, 2 of which are in India...none are in Florida. Lovely. After the newspaper "Palm Beach Post" broke the story, Florida officials now claim to have a promise from JP Morgan Chase to relocate those jobs back to the US. Better, but shouldn't Florida's money be spent IN FLORIDA?
To be fair, part of the blame goes to Florida for their lack of oversight. Indiana did it better...they also use JP Morgan Chase but their contract specified the call center jobs stay in Indiana. Only problem? They laid off 100 people when they hired JP Morgan Chase. Something tells me many of those 100 are now calling JPMC for food stamps. JPMC probably thinks of it as job security. I see it as the definition of short-sighted.

Something in the water in California

What is it about California that attracts the uber-liberals? A while ago I wrote about Anna Eshoo (D-where else but the Golden State) who called broadband internet service "a national asset". Now she's outdone herself. Let me present what may be THE most superfluous bill ever introduced...HR 6209. What does it want to regulate? Guess....I'll wait.
Give up? Ms. Eshoo (D-somewhere to the left of Bernie Sanders) wants to legislate........the volume of TV commercials.
She intends to give "broadcasters and whomever is involved the opportunity to explain to us if there are any sticky wickets, and I think we are confident we can close them, but I don't think we need to keep putting up with this."
Ms. Eshoo, please crawl back under whatever rock you came out from under and stay there. If you had talked to anyone in the audio business for 5 minutes you'd know audio levels vary. That's why TVs have volume controls. The more aggressively you process an audio signal the less fidelity you have. HDTV and surround sound require good sounding lightly processed audio. If TV stations cranked up the compression they'd be flooded with complaints about poor sound quality.
If you live in California and voted for this person who obviously has nothing better to do-shame on you. If you think she may be on to something...leave. Leave the country and go somewhere like Canada or the EU where people could talk about this with a straight face.

The arrogance is astonishing

Go here http://www.allaccess.com/assets/adFarm/_extra/AB_Letter.pdf
to read a letter that Anheuser Busch sent to the media recently.
They want to start paying invoices on Net 120 terms. The worst part? They'll get away with it. Agencies and stations will bend over a little further and grab their ankles a little tighter rather than band together and put a stop to this kind of abuse.
We need each other and antagonizing won't help. How long do you think it will be until Fred's used cars says "Hey, if Anheuser Busch can do it I can too"? What then?

Sirius/XM gets a last-minute lifeline

For those who didn't know, today was the deadline for Sirius/XM to make a $175 million dollar debt payment to the parent company of Dish Network. Their CEO Mel Karmazin didn't have it and planned a bankruptcy filing. But at the last minute, Dish competitor Liberty Media (parent of DirecTV) pumped in a 280 million dollar loan (at 15%!!!) with plans to sink another 250 million in exchange for about 40% of Sirius/XM's equity. Karmazin keeps his job which of course is far more important to him than the company he runs. This SOB was ready to wipe out millions of shareholders over a pissing match. Goniff. That's a Yiddish term...look it up. It fits.
I am heartbroken about the recent Sirius/XM merger and have written a previous post about it. Under the new regime choices have been slashed, the music dumbed down and the price has increased. In fact I no longer subscribe and I was one of the very earliest paying customers. OK, one bullet has been dodged but Mel has hundreds of millions more in debt coming due this year. What then? Shovel more of Liberty Media's cash into the moneypit?
Satellite radio was founded on choice. It now fails to deliver. Time to stick a fork in it-at least as long as Mel (fuck you I got mine) Karmazin is running it.

The cuts just keep on a-comin'

According to usually reliable government numbers, the last time the economy shrank for an entire year was 1982. I remember that recession...the job losses were due to automation and inefficient manufacturing and work rules than anything else. Service and McJobs were plentiful unlike now.
It looks like 2008's economic contraction is the greatest since the early 30's.
An NPR article detailed a breath-taking 75,000 job cuts announced on just ONE DAY...Friday the 23rd.
Caterpillar is slashing another 20,000 jobs. Even Microsoft will cut 5000, AT&T 12,000, Home Depot 7000, etc etc etc.
All the government stimulus in the world isn't going to dampen the fear. In the 1930's there was the Works Progress Administration which put people directly to work. As much as I detest new bureaucracy, this might just make sense.
Kinda gives new meaning to loving your job, huh?

Peace, lies, and free speech

Broward county, Florida is abuzz this week as the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) has placed ads on city buses.
The ads say "Islam-the way of life of Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and Mohammad".
Some are upset that the ads are religious in nature but Christian churches have also advertised there and Florida courts have decreed the buses are "public forums" hence free speech rights apply. Fine, but...
One tiny problem-Islam was most definitely not the religion of Abraham, Moses, and Jesus. Don't all monotheistic religions look upon lying as sinful? Oops.
Coral Springs FL resident and right-wing Jewish activist Joe Kaufman condemned the ads as offensive. Mr. Kaufman...bite me. You write for the webzine Front Page which has called for nuclear attacks on Syria, Afghanistan, and Iraq. You're also probably tied up (says the South Florida Sun-Sentinel) with the miltant Kahanist Jewish sect which wants to physically toss Muslims out of Israel.
And you dare call your umbrella group "Americans Against Hate". What you hate is truth, common sense and live and let live.
CAIR and AAH, according to media reports hate each other (see the irony?) and each has accused the other of advocating terrorism. Way to advocate peace guys!
Both groups, despite their public statements, are steeped in racism and intolerance. Neither of them, in my opinion, would know the truth if it flew down and bit them in the ass.
Why don't you both turn the other cheek and shut the fuck up? If there is a God, I doubt he'd look favorably on either group for fostering misinformation and divisiveness on already divided mistrusting public.
CAIR's ad has no more credibility than various products hawked on TV via 800 numbers and should be looked at as such.
Let me be clear hence the PC Nazis get peeved...CAIR has a perfect right to place those ads. I and hopefully millions of others have the right to call them on the carpet for speaking with forked tongue.

Needle in a haystack.

Eureka!
I've managed to find what literally millions of people have been unable to get their hands on for quite awhile: a job. A real full-time job. A job with a privately owned broadcasting company that offers health insurance and has never laid anyone off.

Many of you are asking "so what? Lots of jobs with privately owned companies provide health insurance, right?" If you're one of them you're not a broadcaster. A medium sized corporate-owned Radio/TV broadcast group has just eliminated health insurance for all employees. Clear Channel (the country's largest radio group) is poised to RIF as much as 20% of its' workforce after another huge layoff last year. Even powerhouse WBZ has eliminated its live overnight host and now closes the newsroom at 8pm after two rounds of layoffs in '08.

Thankful? You can't imagine. Thrilled? Damn tootin'.

And now for something completely different: Is it just me, or does anyone else think that pluralizing things with a Z is just stupid?
Example: Oreo Stackerz.