Oakland Mayor's Race: Ron Dellums running; Rebecca Kaplan should not run

Oakand Mayor Ron Dellums 

In the 2010 Oakland Mayor's Race, this news: Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums is running for reelection.

This blogger learned the news from a good friend who's been involved in Oakland political and nonprofit circles for over 3 decades. In the "funny who you see on the same plane flight" book, this person was on the same San Francisco to Chicago flight late Tuesday night. That's when the information that's been largely hidden from the public was shared.

"Dellums is going to give it a go and see what happens" the person said. Also Mayor Dellums had a fund-raiser over the weekend. The foundation for Ron Dellums' campaign for reelection as Mayor of Oakland has started.

While, as of this writing, I still don't think Dellums can win, the Mayor does have three things going for him. First, he's the incumbent and he's theoretically able to defend his record better than anyone else. Second, and perhaps this may be the first asset, he's the only African American candidate for Mayor of Oakland as of this writing. Third, reportedly some Oaklanders are looking at the other current choices for the Mayor's race - Councilmembers Jean Quan (District 4) and Rebecca Kaplan (At Large), Green Party candidate Don Macleay, and the legendary former State Senator Don Perata and are taking another look, a more positive one, at Mayor Dellums.

Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan

In that field, I don't think Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan should run for mayor at this time. The reason is that Rebecca, from this view, is not the elected official she can be. The basic problem is Councilmember Kaplan does not hold herself in such a way that one can look and say "That person can and should be mayor."

Insiders I've talked to observe that the only thing she's known for is passing "Oakland Mai Tai Day." Moreover, personally, Councilmember Kaplan has been prone to not see the side of those who disagree with her.

This is not something personally seen in the past by this blogger; but it did become starkly obvious at an event at Ozumo's Restaurant. We were talking about the Oakland Parking issue, when I observed that it seems Oakland's trying to balance its budget on the backs of its poor.

Rather than disagree in a way I was used to, which is calmly and intelligently, the Councilmember yelled at me at the top of her lungs that I was wrong, and fired off several choice words.

I maintained calm and listened to her massive, unexpected rant. Rebecca Kaplan's best asset is her Chief of Staff Andre Jones. He's a reasoned, intelligent, excellent representative of her office. The fear in this space is that if Kaplan runs for Mayor of Oakland and wins, she will act in a way that's not fitting for the office.  In my case, Rebecca did not apologize to me and still has not as of this writing.

I've held back on this for some time because I really have supported and do like Rebecca. But being in the office - achieving the objective for which she's long struggled to obtain - has changed her. When Rebecca Kaplan the candidate needed this blogger's support, she never acted that way. And while some may get a childish kick out of this, it's a sad day when such behavior is rewarded in an elected official.  I don't mind being disliked, but being disrespected is uncalled for.

While others have stories, I'll not repeat them. This is written with the objective of causing Councilmember Kaplan to be a better Oakland elected official. A person who can not only want to be mayor, but have everyone say she should be mayor. I get that she has a powerful base in the Oakland LGBT community and the time has come for a person from the LGBT community to be mayor, but that does not mean Rebecca is ready to be mayor.

A good mayoral candidate listens to people and wants to represent all of Oakland, not just a part of it. Rebecca can be that person, but 2010 is not the right time as she needs to grow.

Here's hoping she does.

Blockshopper enabling stalkers with home owner information website

Blockshopper.com, a place where one can go to obtain information on home sales, is enabling stalkers with its home owner information website.

A good friend  brought the site to this blogger's attention because when that person's name is searched on Google, their personal information on where they live comes up first.

The firm's service covers Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, Seattle, South Florida, St. Louis, Washingon D.C., and several other cities.

It's scary.

But what's even worse is Blockshopper.com has a legion of people complaining about its practice of posting what it claims is public information on its website. Consumeraffairs.com has several pages devoted to Blockshopper.com's practice, and where the company claims that they have the right to do it. But what's more shocking is the St. Louis-based Blockshopper is not addressing the requests of those who complain that they don't want their information on the site.

What's more, Blockshopper's using its Twitter account to communicate housing transactions on its website. It's here: @blockshopper.

Individuals of small means have no way to make Blockshopper stop. One has to be the size of a company like Jones Day, which successfully sued Blockshopper based on a technicality. This is the description of the firm on the case information webpage:

Founded in 2006, BlockShopper.com is a start-up local online real estate news service covering Chicago, South Florida, Las Vegas, and St. Louis. Its reporting staff is made up of ex-print journalists who collect public real estate sales data, then use information in the public domain (e.g. company web sites) to write news stories about recent transactions. BlockShopper currently produces upwards of 1,000 stories per month and has produced more than 8,000 since its founding, many of which appear in print newspapers as part of content-sharing partnerships with companies like Tribune. Three of those stories, all on BlockShopper's Chicago web site, reported the real estate transactions of partners and associates from Jones Day, the large international law firm.

Jones Day sued BlockShopper.com on Aug. 12, 2008 in federal court in Illinois. The complaint alleges that Blockshopper.com infringed and diluted the firm's service mark and violated state trademark and unfair competition laws by using the word "Jones Day" when referring to the real estate transactions of Jones Day attorneys, linking to its site and using lawyers’ photos from its site. The firm contends that these activities creates the false impression that Jones Day is affiliated with or sponsors BlockShopper.com.

Jones Day was granted a temporary restraining order.

The problem is that while BlockShopper.com claims the information used is "public" it's not easily available via search without the company's website posting. So BlockShopper.com is for all practical purposes making public but not easily obtainable information truly public and easy to get from the perspective of ease of access.

This is a matter for the California Attorney General to wade into.

UPDATE: I received this note below from Blockhopper:

Hi Zennie-- Read your post this morning.

It includes two errors I'd like to call to your attention.

1- We weren't "successfully sued" by Jones Day. To the contrary, they
frivolously sued us and then begged us to let them drop the case after
suffering through several months of terrible publicity.

A renowned First Amendment lawyer took our case pro bono, and the
Electronic Frontier Foundation and Public Citizen, among other
pro-free speech groups, organized on our behalf against them.

Jones Day tried to bully us into treating its lawyers differently,
hiding their real estate sales information from the public. They
failed because we stood up to them.

2- Real estate transactions and owner/buyer/seller names are not
"quasi private" information.

They are public, collected and published by county governments for
purposes of guaranteeing title and (fairly) assessing taxes.

To be sure, hiding names of owners/buyers/sellers makes life easier
for mortgage fraudsters and politicians doling out favors, like the
Chicago Congressman caught paying $270 a year in property taxes on his
multi-million dollar home.

You obviously disagree, but we believe this information should be even
more public, not less. We understand there are trade-offs, but we
believe they are worth it.

Thanks for reading, glad to discuss further if you have any interest.

brian

Stay tuned.

NY Times says Arthur Sulzberger Jr. took five percent pay cut in 2009

The New York Times' public relations office, taking issue with this blogger's post entitled "New York Times' Arthur Sulzberger Jr. takes huge raise; laid off staff", says Arthur Sulzberger Jr., Chairman and Publisher of The New York Times Company since 1997, and Janet Robinson, President and Chief Executive Officer of The New York Times Company, took a five percent pay cut in 2009 as did other staff members.

The NY Times PR department then kindly provided a copy of the NY Times 2010 Proxy Statement, which is linked to here so you can download a copy of it.

The NY Times Proxy Statement gives a bigger picture than what's reported, but it does not allow one, either Arthur Sulzberger Jr. or Janet Robinson, to paint a picture that they, like the rank-and-file non-executive staff, had their overall take home pay - salary and compensation - reduced. Indeed, the NY Times 2010 Proxy Statement paints an uglier picture.

A good, close read beyond this is recommended, but the basics are that in 2008 Arthur Sulzberger Jr.'s total compensation was $2,331,599 and in 2009 it was $5,986,738; that's an almost doubled increase in one year. In 2008, Janet Robinson took home $4,753,314; in 2009 (end of year) it was $6,262,755. That's over $2 million more to her in one year.

Much has been written about the compensation given for meeting performance targets such as increased revenues and profit. But the problem with the overall set of compensation targets is that not one of them gives a monetary bonus for creative ways of maintenance of staff levels. For example, compensation is given for hiring minorities, but it says nothing about firing them. Thus setting up the possible existence of a last hired (for the minority bonus), first fired (for the cost cut bonus) structure.

That's nothing to brag about.

Mr. Sulzberger and Ms. Robinson should make a bold statement and pour their compensation - or some of it - back into the New York Times Company and rehire some of the people who were let go. It would win new friends and make new fans of the New York Times Company and of the publication.

Stay tuned.

The Obama health care reform bill: pass it now

As the U.S. House of Representatives lines up on the "up or down" vote on Health Care Reform, it's important to remind everyone of where we are today, and why it's important to pass this bill. There are not only an estimated 31 million without health insurance, but the number may very well have grown when the current and seemingly never ending wave of job losses is considered.

It's not a static number.

To go over to a health care facility like Oakland's Highland Hospital's Emergency Room, or San Francisco General's or any similar place in many large American cities and see upwards of 200 people packed, standing-room only is heart-breaking. To see so many people turned away from badly needed health care is not a practice America should be known for, but it is.

Every time Health Care Reform is talked about, someone issues the words "government control" even when the public option's not in the bill. What that means is some people who want to be couch potato Conservatives don't want to pay attention to substance and are only comfortable with fluff. With anger. With maintenance of the status quo for reasons even they aren't sure of when pressed.

Some of the protesters against Health Care Reform are down right mean. Take this video of a crowd who jeered a man suffering from Parkinson's Disease on Tuesday:



When people say that America's educational system has declined, it's obvious from the behavior of the people in that video. They can't have a reasonable conversation because they don't study. Detail is lost on them.

For example, there's no evidence that the bill will be more costly for small business. In fact, if one reads the part of the information website that concerns small businesses, it provides tax credits to help small businesses afford health care, if they choose to provide it. Business taxes will not go up.

There are some Conservatives who don't want Health Care Reform to pass just because it's connected to President Obama and he's black. As pointed out by blogger Oliver Willis and Talking Points Memo, Rep David Scott (D-GA), received racist hate mail where President Obama was painted as The Joker and with a Swastika on his forehead:



Crazy behavior designed to scare people. But it's also a symbol of a time where America has two Worlds: educated and not. What's happening is those who aren't well-educated refuse to hear anyone else talk. There's an element of, yes, bitterness, here. But the end result is to only hurt themselves. Health Care Reform will help those who don't have health insurance, including many of those who protest against it.

The bottom line is the following Democratic House Members must fall in line and back Heath Care Reform: John Barrow (D- GA), John Adler (D - N.J.), Harry Teague (D-N.M.), John Tanner (D- TENN.), Brian Baird (D- WASH.) and Bart Gordon (D- TENN.). That would produce enough votes for passage of the bill.

Democrats must wake up an not side with those who refuse to educate themselves and represent hate and racism. That clouds the real issue, which is making our health care system better for all Americans.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Happy St. Patrick's Day from Georgia. This blogger celebrated St. Patrick, called the champion of Irish Christianity and the symbol of Irish culture, in a bit of a different way. My Mother's husband and my stepfather Chester Yerger passed away on March 17th, 2005 of complications generated from the spread of prostate cancer. So, every year my Mom's done something to remember him by, generally traveling to some place they used to go to.

But this year, she elected to stay home, so I joined her so she would not be alone. I've spent most of this day in the air to be here. As I get older, spending as much quality time with my Mother, who's my only remaining direct family person - and I'm the only child - means a lot. The same year, 2005, that January, she was diagnosed with breast cancer. But thanks to early detection, radiation, and a then-new drug called Femara, she beat it and was declared cancer-free April 17th of 2005.

That same year, I lost my biological father, Zenophon Abraham,Sr., to prostate cancer, October 16th. That was a hard, life changing year.

So, today, I did finally wear my green today and so did my Mom. I'm glad she's here and I'm able to do that with her.

Chris Dodd's financial reform package is not the right step

Retiring Senator Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) has presented what's called a "sweeping financial regulatory reform bill" by The Huffington Post, that's designed to prevent future Wall Street bailouts from occurring. But Senator Dodd's bill, while pointing to America's displeasure with Wall Street, is not the tonic that will help the country.

What's forgotten in all of this well-needed rush to reform the financial industry, is that the weak economy created this mess. Simple logic dictates that having good, well-paying jobs in many sectors, not just a few, will allow American workers to pay their loans. The popular idea is that sub-prime mortgages caused the economic problem the Obama Administration is working to get Americans out of. But that's not the problem, poor new job production has been the issue challenging America for most of the first decade of the 21st Century.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, in February there were 1.2 million "discouraged workers" or people who could not find a job, and that was up 476,000 from a year earlier (2009). And that's one of a number of measures that show jobs are still the number one problem.

The best solution is one that the Obama Administration seems loath to adopt but right for its time: Economic Nationalism. The idea that domestic policies should cause the development of American-controlled production with the objective of increasing the jobs base. Economic Nationalism has been the basis for the growth of economies in Japan, Taiwan, China, and The European Union. The United States economy has been picked apart by worldwide economic nationalist policies.

The only way America will have a fighting chance to revive its economy is by replicating the economic policies and corporate strategies used against it for so many decades. Maintaining a healthly jobs-producing economy must be the first priority.

Corey Haim - Corey Feldman skips Haim's funeral, issues new statement

Corey Feldman, the best friend and fellow 80s child star with the late Corey Haim did not attend Haim's funeral today, Tuesday, according to TMZ.com, but Corey Feldman did not attend. The funeral was held at Steeles Memorial Chapel in Thornhill, Toronto, Canada. Corey Feldman did issue this new statement on his blog:

A LETTER FOR THE GRAVE… (an open letter to Corey Haim)

Dear Corey.,

This is for you on the day of your funeral. First off I am so sorry I am not there with you today. By that I mean my physical body is not with your physical body. However you know that my heart is right at your side. You also know the only reason I am truly not there is out of respect for your mother and her wishes to minimize the media attention as much as possible. I want your family to have a calm peaceful day. Hopefully we will not see one shot of the funeral on the news. Just know I am at home today projecting positive energy for you and your passing.

I miss you so much already. When I think of something funny I don’t know who to tell it to. I find myself trying to call you but then remember your not there. I think about the new movies we will soon be doing together and then suddenly realise that the dream is over. I always feared this day would come, and often rehearsed how to face it. But once confronted with the reality of it, it’s so much more painful than I could have ever imagined. Nobody will ever understand the brotherhood we shared. Nobody will ever get the inside jokes we told. Nobody will understand the magic of 22/222 . Nobody will ever know how to do the secret Corey handshake. Nobody will ever make me laugh as hard as you did. Nobody will ever make me fight as hard as you did. Nobody will ever challenge me the way you did. Nobody will ever need me the way you did.

My mission in life became saving yours...more at Corey Feldman's blog.

It's a hard note to read. Losing friends is awful and it's compounded by the impact Corye Haim had on the World. As this blogger has been a palbearer too many times to think of, my sympathies go out to Corey Feldman and the family and friends of Corey Haim.

Earthquakes in Los Angeles, Oregon, and Alaska all 4 on Richter

Media attention has been on the Tuesday Los Angeles Earthquake that was 4.4 on the Richter scale, but there were earthquakes in Los Angeles and in Oregon and Alaska and all at or over 4 on the Richter Scale over the last two days.

According to the USGS, the Los Angeles Earthquake was located 18.9 miles below Pico Rivera, CA. But it wasn't the only quake over 4 to hit the West Coast over the past two days.

A larger earthquake, at 4.6, was located at Bandon, Oregon, a town of just over 2,800 people. While that quake hit on March 15th, it went largely unreported.

And Alaska has been the epicenter of eight earthquakes in the past two days and all over 3 on the Richter Scale - this too was largely unreported. The largest quake was today, Tuesday, and just after the LA quake. It was located in Rampart, AK and was 4 on the Richter Scale.

If your curious, check the information yourself here: http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/recenteqsus/Quakes/quakes_big.php. It's rather alarming.

The Alaska region has faced 245 earthquakes over the last week alone; see: http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/recenteqsus/Maps/special/Alaska.php. If I'm reading the data correctly, Alaska's the most active area in the World over the last week, as of this writing.

Stay tuned.

Erin Andrews peephole video searched for all over again

In the wake of the news that Michael David Barnett, Erin Andrews' stalker, was sentenced to 30 months in jail, Erin Andrews peephole video is searched for all over again. As of this writing, the term is number five on Google Trends. With that, we have two problems, for every Michael David Barnett who would stalk Erin Andrews to make the videos, it seems there are thousands of people would support the action via search.

Fame is a double-edged sword. As Days of Our Lives star David Leisure said at Ed Lozzi's Night of 100 Stars Party in Beverly Hills on Oscar Sunday, fame can draw some creepy people and episodes...



As David Leisure said, "It took some time for me to get used to that everyone thought they knew who I was, even though I didn't know who they were."

Erin Andrews has seen this first hand.

With all of the revealing photos and videos of women who want to be seen naked running around the Internet on Playboy.com, why search for the video of someone who doesn't want to be seen?

Wild.

Stay tuned.

David Beckham's injury blocks MLS LA Galaxy and World Cup in 2010

When it was announced in 2007, the deal that sent World Super Star Soccer Player David Beckham - The Tiger Woods of Soccer without the scandal - to the LA Galaxy of Major League Soccer seemed like a good one.

But since then, Milan's annual "borrowing" of David Beckham and his other flirtations have arguably reduced his value both as a player and a marketing draw in America.

This time, a injury to Becks left Achilles' tendon on Sunday, and while playing for AC Milan in its 1-0 victory over Chievo Verona was the culprit.

The Milan injury will keep Beckham out for six months, and will not return to action until September at best.

Why the LA Galaxy and the MLS allowed David Beckham, their biggest draw and 'six million dollar man', to be essentially a Worldwide soccer tool is beyond comprehension. But what's done is done; Becks is out for much of 2010.

That includes The World Cup, sort of. The Telegraph UK reports that Fabio Capello, manager of the English National Soccer Team, has made an offer for Beckham to be part of his World Cup backroom staff.

Erin Andrews - ESPN Reporter's stalker Barrett gets 30 months in jail

Michael David Barrett, who thought it was OK to stalk ESPN Reporter and Dancing With The Stars contestant Erin Andrews and secretly make videos of her as she changed clothes in her hotel room and then posted them on the Internet, was sentenced to 30 months in jail Monday, according to the LA Times.

Michael David Barrett pled guilty to having the intent to "harass or to cause substantial emotional distress" to Andrews. Barrett tried to sell his photos to the website TMZ.com and to other online publications. And when the Erin Andrews videos hit the Internet, CBS News and Bill O'Reilly had either actual or still frame photos from the videos as part of their telecasts!



Barrett shot video of Erin Andrews in hotel rooms in three states as she traveled for ESPN. Barrett would book a room next to Andrews and do his work from there. Why the hotels would give a room to a person who asked to be next to Erin Andrews is one for the books.

Andrews thinks her stalker's 30-month sentence is "not enough" and said she's at "the angry stage." I really don't blame her. Stalking of celebrities either online via email or in the way Erin Andrews was is just plain evil. The trouble is law enforcement doesn't do enough to make hard examples of the criminals who engage in such practices.

Even if a person doesn't like Erin Andrews or me, it doesn't give them the right to bother us. Frankly, this is where I do admire Rush Limbaugh (Did I say that?). Rush certainly gets a lot of the same kind of treatment (Well, OK. Except for the video camera thing) that celebrities get. But Limbaugh manages to roll on; Rush's $400 million Clear Channel contract buys him a lot of security and legal projection, too.

Stay tuned.

FBI should arrest cyberstalker with email address topprofster@gmail.com

The one thing that this blogger can't stand are cyberstalkers. There's one person in particular who's really not taking the fact that his actions are against the law seriously.

Whoever the person is and wherever they are, they reportedly have the time waste. They've informed me they're at some office. They think it's funny.

What I did was file a cyberstalking complaint with the FBI today. But even with my emails asking the person to stop, they persist. Simply because they think nothing's going to happen to them.

Really not a smart person, or a good person for that matter.

Hopefully the FBI sees this and takes action. The only information I have is the person's email:

topprofster@gmail.com

I just want the person to go away; preferably to jail.

Rielle Hunter hates GQ photos of Rielle Hunter

After agreeing to be interviewed by and pose for GQ Magazine, Rielle Hunter, John Edwards' mistress and mother to his new daughter, is letting the World know she hates her photos. According to Cristina Everett in the New York Daily News, Rielle Hunter "cried for two hours" when she saw what she says are repulsive photos in the GQ spread.

Wow, what's going on with Rielle Hunter? She agreed, obviously, to dress a certain way for the photo shoot. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that the photos are going to turn out in a way that's sexually suggestive. What Rielle Hunter's doing is playing the old publicists trick of doing something outlandish, or racist, or in this case just plain awful, then saying 'I didn't know,' or 'It was misunderstood.' It's a ploy borne of celebs reacting to rapid Internet exposure and public comment. If they don't like the action, they say what Rielle Hunter's saying.

Don't believe it.

While this may work for other celebrities in helping their image - Rielle Hunter's just that now, a celebrity - it's not going to help with her public image, which is already in the tank. Again, Rielle Hunter's known for taking up with a married John Edwards, while his wife is battling cancer, then having a kid with her.

That's not something to be proud of.

Rielle Hunter interview in GQ about John Edwards affair is smarmy

The title above, Rielle Hunter interviewed in GQ about John Edwards affair , plays the story straight, but the real non-Internet title should be "Rielle Hunter makes it to the top of public fame on John Edwards back". Which, if you think of Rielle Hunter as being with "Johnny", as she calls him in the GQ interview, while he's on his back, has some ring of possible truth to it.

It's impossible to clearly view Rielle Hunter as a sympathetic character. Rielle has damaged the lives of four people - John Edwards, Elizabeth Edwards, and Andrew Young and his wife - and not to mention high-roller political donors and Edwards campaign staffers, just by getting sexually involved with John Edwards, not refusing to do so with a married man who has a cancer-stricken wife, and then having his love-child.

Yikes!

Somewhere along the way, America forgot about that, it seems, that she took up with a a married man who has a cancer-stricken wife. For Rielle Hunter to even want to bear her soul to any publication, pay or not, is shameful. For Rielle Hunter to then take a photo that shows her with bare abs and untied sweatpants is also shameful, but it tells the story of what Rielle will use to achieve fame.

It does not matter that John Edwards, Elizabeth Edwards, and Andrew Young and his wife have had their say. She's the hub in the wheel of controversy that was created. No Rielle Hunter, and no John Edwards affair. Regardless of Edwards' character, Hunter just plain could have said "no, Johnny"; instead she followed that famous song and said "Opps, Johnny."

What's weird about all of this is John Edwards, Elizabeth Edwards, and Andrew Young and his wife have all suffered, while Rielle Hunter rises to a such a level that she's earned a "Q rating."

As Don King would say, only in America!

Variety Mag picked apart by online media's fragmentation process

In the story of trade magazine Variety's release of Film Critic Todd McCarthy and Theater Critic David Rooney, the real issue is that the mag is being picked apart by online media's fragmentation process. And within that is a terrible misunderstanding of how media works in the 21st Century.

As blogs like TMZ.com and Variety's real competitor Nikke Finke's Deadline.com become more popular and abundant in number, Variety loses, or has lost, its exclusivity. That has not been replaced by a good technical understanding of how to get its news seen online over its competitors.

Variety is dying as its downsizing. Variety's laid off eight staff members including McCarthy and Rooney, and is stuck within an old media model. It's using the new standard for any old media company that wants to make sure it's seen as "getting" new media: a Facebook and YouTube accounts, and a @Variety Twitter account. But it lacks the full, interconnected and monetized social network platform and its obvious the newspaper's managers don't spend time growing their online system.

Variety's YouTube channel does not help its website. And some of the videos have been blocked by studios like Fox because the videos featured Fox content. Moreover, the Variety YouTube channel lacks ads of its own, and its obvious that Variety has done nothing to take advantage of the revenue-generating possibilities of becoming a YouTube Partner. And that's just for starters.

If Variety understood the idea of making sure its brand was on every platform imaginable, it would have avoided sacking its key employees. But what's happening is Variety, to be frank, obviously does not know what it's doing in the New Media space. A pay space, or velvet rope, will not work because Variety's content is not unique enough to demand such a pay system. It will not work.

Stay tuned.

John Landgraf, President FX Network - Skyline High '80

John Landgraf, President FX Network - Skyline High '80, originally uploaded by zennie62.

Skyline High Class of 1980 grads may remember this face but with a beard. Remember John Landgraf from Skyline High, Oakland, California, class of '80? He's now President of FX Networks and has been since 2005.

John Landgraf's produced many of FX Networks' most popular shows, like Karen Sisko, Reno 911, and 30 Days.

NCAA March Madness: NY Times' Pete Thamel thinks Cal's an easy upset

In the NCAA March Madness that is the NCAA Tournament, we have our own March Madness in the form of The New York Times' Pete Thamel, who wrote...

No. 8 California vs. No. 9 Louisville This is an easy “upset” as Louisville has more talent and depth.

What? Easy upset? Not only did Thamel show his own brand of East Coast March Madness (he may not even live in New York, by the way), he wrote a statement that openly invites one to think Cal has no business in the same building as Louisville.

Geez, even Louisville fans are quick to point to their weaknesses. Here's a post found on the Louisville Forum that looks as if it was written for The New York Times:

I think that you're a little off base here. Cal was a pre-season Top 10 team and played Kansas well on the road early in the season. Sure they played in a weak conference, but their resume isn't much worse than ours. Sure our RPI and SOS are solid, but the only tournament teams that we beat were Syracuse and ND. I would be shocked if Cal doesn't give us all that we can handle on Friday. I don't think we have alot of room to be questioning other teams resume's...there were alot of nervous Cards fans at 6:15pm today.

Read up, Pete Thamel. The bet here is egg on your face. How about this evaluation:

To the Cal fan: you will be glad to know that it's been quick guards, not big front lines, that have beat us this year. We try to press as much as possible, especially since we play 10-12 players every game. I dont think we've played a team all year that has played more players than us. We press full court when we make a basket and sometimes like to apply pressure in the half court. Our best D is zone but we switch a lot.

The bigger problem with our team is that we still don't have an identity. We have no go-to player Samuels will get 25 unstoppable points one game and will take two shots the next. Our two wins over Syracuse were led by two players who could go 4 games without playi g a minute and only diehard fans would notice. And if we start a game slowly, we are amazingly bad at getting going. We were absolutely blown out by Marquette and St. John's late in the year due to early droughts. If I were your coach, I would just emulate the Marquette game. Aggressively double-team Samardo when he gets a pass and it will lead to an abundance of turnovers. Get out in transition as much as possible because our transition D is clueless, then work the ball with passes on offense and you will eventually get am open perimeter shot.

One other unique deficiency of our team is an uncanny ability to lose loose balls and rebounds that were right in front of us. We lose at least 4 balls a game when it was right on someone's figertips. I can guarantee this will happen on Friday because it happens literally every game

Something else, the game starts late for Louisville, dinner time for Cal. Here's Pete Thamel's Twitter page so you can give him a hard time on Friday night not to mention all this week: @PeteThamelNYT

Friday night at 7 p.m. PST. Be there. Aloha!

Go Bears!

NCAA March Madness: Washington and Cal Pac-10 Champions?

March Madness, the 2010 version of NCAA's College Basketball Playoff season, is upon us. The Washington Huskies and the California Golden Bears, both Pac-10 champions, have landed bids in the NCAA Tournament. Now, the Bracketology experts comes out.

Washington and Cal join Duke, Vanderbilt, Kansas, Georgetown, Notre Dame, UTEP, BYU, Xavier, Oakland, Florida, Kansas St., North Texas, Villanova, Robert Norris, Morgan St., Texas, Wisconsin, Lehigh, N. Iowa, New Mexico St., Michigan St., Tennessee, San Diego St., Ohio, Oklahoma St., Georgia Tech, Temple, Cornell, Wofford, Clemson, Missouri, Texas A&M, Sam Houston, Baylor, St. Mary's, Richmond, Purdue, Sienna, and Louisville East Tenn. St., and Kentucky on the "Road to Indy" for the NCAA Final Four.

But what's confusing is two Pac-10 Champions? (Ok, this blogger's a Cal graduate, there's the bias disclaimer.) It's down right weird to have two Pac-10 Champions and makes a mockery of all of the battles waged through the season to be the Pac-10 Champion that Cal is. But on the other hand, with the dramatic Pac-10 Championship game that Cal came up on the wrong end of 79 to 75, the format did manage to produce two NCAA Tournament teams, whereas a standard season-only system would have gained just one. So the whining about that stops here - for now - as it's good for the Pac-10 Conference.

Cal's favored to beat Louisville in the Golden Bears' game at Jacksonville, and Washington's an 11-th seed against the 6th-seed Marquette Golden Eagles. Washington's not even considered as a possibility to beat Marquette by the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, and the New York Times' thinks Cal's an easy upset for Louisville.

The Pac-10, as usual, gets no respect, but Cal being "an easy upset" is an outrage. The NY Times Peter Themel, who seems to think he's a Bracketology expert, doesn't even give a detailed reason for his statement using the term "easy."

Grrrr. GO BEARS and... Go Huskies!

Peter Graves, brother of James Arness and Mission Impossible star, dies

Peter Graves, the brother of legendary actor and Gunsmoke star James Arness and star of one of this bloggers favorite shows other than Star Trek, Mission Impossible, and the movie Airplane, died today, Sunday, at 83 years of age.

According to the Associated Press video below, Graves had returned to his home in Pacific Palisades, California after having brunch with his family.

While Peter Graves has roles in more than 70 productions spanning a 60-year career, he will always be known as secret agent Jim Phelps in Mission Impossible.

Video: Peter Graves passes:



Jim Phelps always opened Mission Impossible by receiving an order ("Good morning, Mr. Phelps..") in an uncommon way, and always with the tape recorder self destructing within seconds. Mission Impossible was the the thinking person's James Bond series with interesting plot twists, disguises, and people you wanted to root for. Jim Phelps, the can do boss of the IMF team, was one of them.

1971 Mission Impossible opening scene with Peter Graves:



Peter Graves won a 1971 Emmy for the role of Jim Phelps, and was always known for serious character roles. Then, there was Airplane. Here's a classic scene with Kareem Abdul Jabbar and Peter Graves:




Here, much later in life, Peter Graves reflects on his career:



And in this video, Star Trek Producer and Director J.J. Abrams talks about the idea of bring Peter Graves in for Mission Impossible 4:



Peter Graves is an American Icon who will be dearly missed.

Browns Sign Delhomme, trade Brady Quinn to Broncos for Fullback Hills and two draft picks.

Browns Sign Delhomme, trade Brady Quinn to Broncos for Fullback Hills and two draft picks.
By Bill Chachkes for Football Reporters Online

The Brady Quinn experiment in Cleveland is dead.

QB Brady Quinn's career in Cleveland Ohio is no officially over. Quinn was traded Sunday to the Denver Broncos, who now have 4 QB's on their roster.

This is a great trade for both teams. The Browns get a veteran QB who needs a fresh start, plus a skill player who can add depth in Peyton Hillis, plus two draft picks, A 6th rounder in 2011(assuming there is a draft in 2011), and a conditional 2012 pick. The Broncos get another QB to add to the Mix in Brady Quinn, who never attained the status he and Browns fans, and team management expected. Even after Quinn won the starting job last year, it wasn't enough, he was benched just 10 quarters into his assignment for Derek Anderson. At least Brady will finally get a fair shot to be an NFL QB now. Cleveland also released Derek Anderson and brought Seneca Wallace over from Seattle, and signed veteran tight end Ben Watson early this week.

Can you see Quinn as the starter in Denver? I can, as soon as Kyle Orton starts Looking like the bad version of Brett Farve Jr. again. They also have Chris Simms and Tom Brandstater on the roster, so expect one of those two will be gone and the other to be the third stringer. Quinn will have to earn the starting job over Orton.
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LaDainian Tomlinson to sign with New York Jets Monday

According to Bill Chackhes, who's covered the Jets beat for years, is a blogger at NFL Business Blog and has the new NFL Gridiron Draft Guide, NFL Free Agent Running Back LaDainian Tomlinson is going to sign with the New York Jets on Monday at a press conference.

LaDainian Tomlinson was formerly the star running back and community leader for The San Diego Chargers. But LaDainian Tomlinson's production decreased dramatically over the last two years, from 1,474 yards in 2007 to 745 yards in 2009.

While the San Diego Chargers' GM A.J. Smith was interested in keeping Tomlinson but only in a reduced role; "LT" as he's called, wanted to remain the featured back. LT was released on February 22nd, after nine years with the organization.

On Monday, LaDainian Tomlinson becomes a New York Jets player, and joins a team that was one game away from The 44th Super Bowl in Miami, and had the league's best defense in 2009. The Jets have given LaDainian Tomlinson room to be the featured back he wants to be as Thomas Jones released and picked up by The Kansas City Chiefs.

What deal LaDainian Tomlinson signs will be interesting to read. With the pass-happy NFL and the need to throw the ball well and often, plus the injuries to running backs that have caused the need for several good runners, not one featured one, I don't think the acquisition of LT to be "that guy" was necessary. The Jets could have saved money drafting a back in the lower rounds of the 2010 NFL Draft.

Stay tuned.

Happy Pi Day - 3.14.2010 - Pi Day Jokes and Star Trek

Happy Pi Day! Pi is the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter. But why is Pi Day celebrated today, Sunday, March 14th? Because it's 3.14, and Pi is 3.1415926535. This blogger remembers being introduced to the concept of Pi as a kid while watching Star Trek The Original Series.

In Wolf in the Fold, which was a second season episode originally aired in 1967, Scotty was suspected of killing several women while on shore leave on a planey called Argelius II, but an an evil entity was actually at fault for those murders. Eventually, it tried to take over The Enterprise itself. In order to get rid of it, Spock instructed the Enterprise computer to "compute to the last digit, the value of pi". Here's the scene...



Believe it or not, there are Pi Day Jokes! While many of them are just plain corny, you can't get through Pi Day without them, so here they are:

Mathematician: "Pi r squared”
Student: "No teacher! Pies are round, cakes are square!"

Question: What do you get when you take the sun and divide its circumference by its diameter?
Answer: Pi in the sky by and by.

Q: What do you get when you take green cheese and divide its circumference by its diameter?
A: Moon Pi.

And here's my Pi Day Joke:

What do you get when you take the head of a Conservative Wing Nut and divide its its circumference by its diameter? Answer: Small Pi - they're pinheads!

Stay tuned.

L.T.'s Hype Machine is coming at ya Jets Fans

L.T.'s Hype Machine is coming at ya Jets Fans-By Dr. Bill Chachkes-Managing Partner-Football Reporters Online

Here is a news flash: the Jets will have at least two running backs next season. Yup. One of them might even Be La Dainian Tomlinson. Even if his agent Tom Condon says he is "negotiating" with Both the Jets and The Vikings, the word on the street is "if you have to leave the warmth of San Diego to keep making money, whose money would you rather take? Ziggy Wilf's or Woody Johnson's?"

Odds are "L.T." will be in Green and White shortly, and not Purple and Gold. Lets put yourself in L.T.'s shoes for a moment. 2009 was the least productive season in your pro career, You gained only 730 yards rushing, and in fact, it was the first year you ever gained less then 1100 yards. Your now thirty years old, and you know you are not a "lead" back any more, but a complimentary back at best. Why go to a team with a lot of other aging veterans when you could stay in your conference and be in the media capital of the planet instead of the city of the ice age?

Lets break it down further: Go to a team with a hot "young" coaching staff and a second year QB on the rise? Or a team with a QB who is getting ready to collect social security? The team with young running backs to play with? Or the team whose only other star plays the same position as you and spends 1/3rd of his game check on new sneakers each week?

We know the NY Jets need to constantly grab the headlines because it makes them feel relevant in the sports section each week. this is the signing, like last week's addition of DB antonio Cromartie, that keeps them in the news, which is where they need to stay. They also need to capitalize on their fantastic season, and the fact that no one expected them to play the Colts in the conference title game, In fact, many people still feel the Jets should have been playing in the Super Bowl.

Condon is just saying "we're talking with both teams" to "manage the Media Hype" and keep the spin within his control. He's a smart agent and that what any smart agent would do. L.T. won't win games for the Jets by himself, but they can pay him a short term deal now instead of Drafting a big name back who won't be there when they pick in the late first round anyway.

The Jets also need to sell the rest of their "luxury" personal shylock licenses in the new stadium and Tomlinson helps them do that. Sell tickets, expensive ones, and quickly.

Update: as of 8:30 EST. several outlets are reporting Tomlinson has indeed signed with NY. the Deal as reported by the NY Daily News is fior 2 years at 5.2 million dollars with incentives that could reach 5.7 million.

Agent Tom Condon Told the AP: "He wanted to go a team that he thought had a chance to compete for the championship," . "He wanted to go somehwere where he had a chance to have a significant role, and so with the Jets he also was going to be very familiar with the offensive system."

A Tale of Time, Place, Persona

A Tale of Time, Place, Persona
By J[The Gambler] Gamble for Football Reporters Online

Donte Stallworth drove drunk and killed a man. Plaxico Burress brought a loaded gun into a strip club and shot himself.  They are both top notch receivers and even bigger idiots, so lets talk numbers.
Stallworth was suspended for 1 season,  served 30-days of a potential 15-year sentence in a Miami jail,  and upon return, was rewarded with a $900,000 contract by the Baltimore Ravens.

Burress  rots in a New York prison, already once denied early release, enroute to completing a 2-year prison stint.
Is one crime dumber than the other ? No. Is one crime more egregious than the other. Yes. But in this  tale of time, place and persona, the crimes don’t equate with the times.  That’s what intrigues me about the two cases. There is nothing legally to suggest that the outcomes should have been that drastically different. Yes, NY gun laws are very strict, but the only celebrities who traditionally get jailed for possessing handguns in NYC, are rappers. You know how dangerous those suburban English majors can be.

On the surface,  it appears that one guy got lucky and one guy got shafted. Sort of.  But Plaxico never had a shot. [No pun intended]  He got caught up in political chess with a billionaire Mayor, whose main platform is promoting an image of being  a Pitbull on gun laws and crime.

Seizing the moment, Mayor Bloomberg  went on TV and assured the viewing public that Plax would be convicted to the fullest extent of the law and wouldn’t get treated any different because he was a Super Bowl hero and celebrity. [Well if that aint a reason to show some leniency, then I don’t know what the hell happened to the New York I was raised in] With those irreversible words,  Bloomberg violated every ethical standard in existence and single-handedly put a nail in Plax’s football coffin.  His lawyer wife couldn’t help him. His money couldn’t help him. The Giants couldn’t help him. The mayor wouldn’t.
I can’t help but to think that despite Burress’  fame with the Giants, his reputation as an arrogant player who broke team rules, and felt he was only held accountable on Sundays, helped fuel the backlash of his foolish actions. Bloomberg knew he had Burress dead to rights. Plax became the perfect tool for The Mayor –  who was still under fire for extending term limits for himself without a public vote –to use to divert attention and strengthen his vow to rid NYC of illegal concealed weapons carriers. 
As soon as Bloomberg spoke out, he sullied any chance Plax had for a fair trial. No late game heroics in this massacre. It is rare that a mayor will offer totally subjective opinion on an open case.  He doesn’t even practice this newfound zest with the most hardened mob figures. So it was very odd that he chose to single out an NFL player – who admitted he carried the gun out of fear.  It takes a lot for a man to admit that.

But now these players – so similar – sit on opposite ends of the opportunity spectrum. Stallworth has already started rebuilding his career and image with the Ravens. Plaxico is still clad in prison greens, getting locked down to the sound of steel doors clanging and clicking, instead of catching clutch passes for an NFL contender. He is a faceless, nameless number at this point, with no influence and no chance to proactively rebuild his image, talk to kids, his family or mend broken business relationships.

It’s funny, one unnamed Giant, who I spoke with following the Plaxico incident said, “They are treating him like he killed somebody.” No, Stallworth killed somebody.  But he is the one back in the league, just a short year later. And truth be told, it was probably  much easier to give Stallworth, generally known as a good character “team” guy, a break. Plaxico, in all of his brashness and defiance of team rules,  messed around in the wrong town. Partisan politics are hot right now. If you are a celebrity athlete in NYC, especially a minority, and you are caught in a high-profile situation that can be damaging to the city’s rep or used by high-ranking officials for personal political gain, then don’t expect to be treated with kit gloves because you caught a TD in the Super Bowl.

Plaxico’s crime wasn’t egregious. It lacked intelligence. It Borderlined on buffoonery. When he shot himself trying to grab the gun from slipping down the leg inside of his oversized pants, that was classic stupid. It was embarrassing as hell. But it sure as hell wasn’t DUI vehicular manslaughter. It was however an illegal action, committed in the wrong climate. History is strange like that. It’s results often dictated by time, place and persona. It can be forgiving, as it seems to have been to Stallworth.  For Plax it will show the tragic fall of a legend.

 Time, place and persona means a lot. Not just in the NFL, but in life. This is a classic example. Stallworth murdered a person. Plax murdered  the destiny of a Giants dynasty.  Never mess with a New Yorkers' football.

Tips to (again!) Avoid A Daylight Saving Death!

[Originally posted at DocGurley.com]

We've had the deflating news that Daylight Saving Time (where we lose an oh-so-painful hour of sleep) doesn't even save energy - in fact it may even increase energy usage. Looks like the savings in energy due to decreased light usage is more than offset by the increase in energy used for air conditioning. Sigh. But here's the most important message to keep in mind as we continue to collectively enact this seasonal madness: Daylight Saving Time has been shown over and over in research studies to cause, each year, a definite, measurable (and significant) increase in the number of deaths. When you think about the misery and futility of Daylight Saving Time, the fact that you could actually die because of it seems just so...so wrong. So why do people die because of Daylight Saving Time? And what can you do, personally, to avoid being involved in a Daylight Saving Death?

Wikimedia Commons

Over nine hundred Americans, from the years 1987-1991, are estimated to have died purely because of Daylight Saving Time (DST). Another study, using 1997-8 data, estimated that abolishing Daylight Saving Time would save 171 American pedestrians per year (13% of all pedestrian fatalities in the 5:00-10.00 a.m. and in the 4:00-9:00 p.m. time periods) as well as 195 Americans killed in car collisions per year (3%, during the same time periods). To make matters even more stark, moving DST to an earlier, darker date (March instead of April), as we are this year, is likely to make those numbers go up. Daylight Saving deaths are predominantly due to pedestrians getting killed by cars. People are driving after a smaller chunk of sleep, probably stressed and running late, and, importantly, drivers are not yet accustomed to watching for pedestrians in the dark. Pedestrians are groggy, late, and probably not used to looking out for cars in the dark. Maybe some of the cars even forgot to turn on their headlights. Children, in particular, are vulnerable to Daylight Saving Death--one study showed that, in a small area of northeast England, one child every two years dies because of Daylight Saving Time.

What can you do? First, even if we drive, we'll all be getting out of a car to walk at some point, so these pedestrian tips apply to everyone:

1) Hold that toddler hand tight as you head to daycare Monday. Keep a hand on a backpack strap as you walk your kid to school. Warn older kids of the danger.

2) Wear light, bright clothes--nobody gets to be goth the Monday after DST.

3) Cross the road in the middle of a pack (if you can).

4) Be alert--when it comes to pedestrian vs. vehicle face-offs, the only important law is the law of physics. Watch out for the sleepy, stressed out, no headlights death car!

Tips for drivers, to help avoid pedestrians and other cars:

5) Consider getting up even (know it's painful) earlier. Get a real cup of coffee under your belt if you drink coffee. Leave yourself plenty of time to get where you're going, even with pick ups and drop offs. If there was ever a time to drive defensively, this is it. Leave plenty of space between you and the next car, stay within the speed limit and channel your inner zen.

6) Pretend you're watching out for large, sluggish, humped shapes in the dark that can suddenly dart in front of you. Get your best video-game reflexes tuned up to make sure you're not caught by surprise.

7) Make sure your visibility is the best it can be. This weekend is a great time to really wash that front windshield. Put both the visors up. Made sure your headlights are clear of grime (and turned on!). Consider getting your kids to ride shotgun and help you watch for pedestrians--they love a chance to take charge and shout out information.

8) Hey, if you have the option, next week is the perfect time to take public transport! Just watch out for cars when you're walking.

For everyone--

Start now and use some easy cognitive behavioral therapy tips (proven to be every bit as effective as sleeping pills!) to try to get some extra rest on Sunday night:

1) No caffeine of any kind (no chocolate, tea, coffee, decaffeinated drinks--which still have caffeine) after noon.

2) No alcohol with dinner or later. While alcohol may make you feel "drowsy" in the short run, it actually impairs your natural sleep cycles.

3) No TV, no computer, no "screen" of any kind three or more hours before bed--crack open that great book you never seem to have the time to read!

4) Make sure your bedroom is dark, quiet and cool. If you still can't get to sleep after 45 minutes or so, get up and do something restful (NO TV, no computer, no "screen" of any kind). Rest peacefully until you feel a wave of sleepiness coming and surf that wave back to bed.

Hope to see you all--each and every one of you--after we make the DST shift.

P.S. Extra credit (we recovering premeds believe in extra credit the way some people believe in the Giants: life-changing, powerful, unfortunately erratic). Save even more lives by changing your smoke detector batteries this Daylight Saving Time!

Share in the comments section - do you have tips? Experiences you'd be willing to share? Keep up on the latest health issues in the news by signing up for a Doc Gurley RSS feed by clicking here. Look for future pics and other articles at Doc Gurley - discover the weird, the wacky and the everyday symptoms you want to know about, as well as practical expert tips on staying well. Want to express your inner fan-girl/boy? Become a Doc Gurley fan on Facebook! Want to be on the inside, fast track of health news and tips? Jump on the Twitter bandwagon and follow Doc Gurley! Also check out Doc Gurley's joyhabit and iwellth twitter feeds - so you can get topic-specific fun, effective, affordable tips on how to nurture your joy and grow your wellth this coming year.

Howard Stern's racist slam of Gabourey Sidibe: Zennie on Spider Jones Show

Howard Stern's racist slam of Gabourey Sidibe is the focus of Zennie Abraham's (Zennie62) guest apperance on The Spider Jones Show today, Sunday March 14th, 2010 Daylight Saving Time Day, at 4 PM to 6 PM Eastern, 1 PM to 3 PM Pacific Time at CFRB Newstalk 1010. You can listen live here: http://www.newstalk1010.com/.

Last week, this blogger took on Howard Stern's racist slam of Academy Award-nominated actress Gabourey Sidibe. Here's a recap of that blog post:

I wrote this...

There's no doubt that Howard Stern earns his salary by making outrageous statements. But Howard Stern's slam of Gabourey Sidibe from Precious shows Stern's stupidity. On Monday, on The Howard Stern Show, said this:

"There's the most enormous, fat black chick I've ever seen. She is enormous. Everyone's pretending she's a part of show business and she's never going to be in another movie"

Now it can be said that Howard Stern's the dumbest man on the planet. First, Howard Stern's comment was made in the context of Gabourey Sidibe already having starred in a movie, that being Precious.

Second, because Howard was so busy being prejudiced against fat women, especially "fat black chicks", he turned his brain off and forgot that the role for Gabourey was already created and she played in an independent film that became a major motion picture, and won a ton of awards.

But Howard was so intent on being nasty, all of that escaped him. Howard Stern proved people who discriminate are not smart, they're stupid.

What's really awful about Stern's blast is that no one accuses him of "playing the race card" in using the term "fat black chick"; but there are those, particularly White Supremacists, who would say this blogger's playing the race card in accusing Stern of being racist.

Howard Stern was being racist. And while what Stern said's not a racial ephethet, the use of the term is what's disturbing.

The Spider Jones show is based in Toronto, Canada, according to his website,...

Spider has interviewed such notables as Muhammad Ali, Mark Wahlberg, Jesse Jackson, LL Cool J, Ron Howard, Scott Grimes, Doug Gilmour, Cito Gaston, Oscar De La Hoya, Roy Jones, Kris Kristofferson, James Brown, Guy Lafleur, Carlos Delgado, Jim Brown and countless others.

And now I'm part of that list.

Cool.

What time is it? Current Daylight Saving Time is 7 AM PST / 10 AM EST

It's Daylight Saving Time 2010, and if the time change for Spring 2010 caught you off guard, you're not alone.

America has turned to The Internet to try and figure out what time it is. Right now, as of Sunday, March 14th, the current time is 7 AM PST / 10 AM EST, which is Eastern Time, or the time in New York City versus Los Angeles in the western, or Pacific Time Zone.

The old rule is "Spring forward one hour; fall back on hour." The Atomic Clock, or The Official U.S. Clock, is at http://www.time.gov.

Why do we have Daylight Saving Time? According to About.com...

Daylight Saving Time was instituted in the United States during World War I in order to save energy for war production by taking advantage of the later hours of daylight between April and October. During World War II the federal government again required the states to observe the time change. Between the wars and after World War II, states and communities chose whether or not to observe Daylight Saving Time. In 1966, Congress passed the Uniform Time Act, which standardized the length of Daylight Saving Time.

Which also means that it can really screw with International Time relationships, since it's not a World wide practice. The European Union practices it, but not all of the World.

More soon.

Korean man marries pillow; pillow can't say no

Related searches: Guy Marries Pillow, Korean Man Marries Pillow, Korean Man Pillow, Korean Marries Pillow, Korean Pillow, Lee Jin-Gyu, Man Marries a Pillow, Man Marries Pillow

According to the Metro UK, a 28-year old Korean man, Lee Jin-gyu, married a pillow he's become, er, attached to. Reportedly, he takes the pillow "everywhere", from the park to restaurants, where he makes sure "she" has her own seat.

The pillow is called a 'dakimakura', or a Japanese large, huggable, pillow.

But the question is, has anyone, his parents, someone, tried to talk Lee Jin-gyu out of this "wedding?" Did he take out life insurance in case the pillow meets an untimely fate with a sewing pin? If Lee Jin-gyu wants to have sex, can the pillow say "Not now. I've got a headache?"

And the most important question: Did the pillow say "I do?" No word from the Metro UK.

New York Times' Arthur Sulzberger Jr. takes huge raise; laid off staff

The New York Times laid off 100 people and cut pay for most employees last year for a nine-month period. All employees except two: Chairman Arthur Sulzberger Jr. and Chief Executive Janet L. Robinson. According to The Wall Street Journal, both Arthur Sulzberger Jr. and Janet L. Robinson got huge increases. Janet L. Robinson's overall pay jumped 32 percent to 6.3 million; Arthur Sulzberger Jr.'s pay rose to $6 million, double the $3 million of a year before.

What's alarming is Sulzberger and Robinson took these raises while asking their employees to suffer pay cuts and job losses. In May of 2009, Vanity Fair's Mark Bowden wrote that a "doomsday clock" was ticking for newspapers, and Sulzberger was "struggling to keep his family's prized asset alive." Yeah, he's really working hard to do that, huh?

What Sulzberger and Robinson should have done is put those raises back into The New York Times and maintained as much of their staff intact as possible, pay levels and all.

Sulzberger has cried about the New York Times' problems to anyone who would listen. He's given speeches on the impact of the Internet and Google, in particular, on the news industry, as he did at last year's Webby Awards in this video:



But when it comes time to show that he's trying to save the NY Times, he works to make sure he gets as much money as he can.

It's not too late for Sulzberger and Robinson to reverse their fiscal course and help the people of The New York Times. Let's see if they do the right thing. Otherwise, if newspaper owners and managers like Sulzberger and Robinson are going to be greedy, why should the Federal Government bail them out?

Stay tuned.

Twitter location-sharing is on; be careful how you tweet

After fits-and-starts of being on, then off, Twitter location-sharing is on. Now, you include location information in a tweet. All you have to do, assuming you have a Twitter account, is go to "settings", scroll down, and click on "Add a location to your tweets."

While this feature is great and welcome to all who want to be found, it can be dangerous for those who may be away from home. Someone with an awful heart can essentially "cyber case" a person using Twitter to determine when to try and break in to their home. Or worse.

As the Twitter blog explains, the location-sharing feature is great to inform people of where something's occurring, but the problem is the tweeter has to be in the area where that something's happening.

While I initially was excited about this new Twitter feature, it has the perfect distinction of being a tool that can be used for better or worse.

Stay tuned.

Lady Gaga and Beyonce The Telephone's new make-up soda can look

Lady Gaga and Beyonce's music video The Telephone has done something no iTunes sound release could ever have achieved. (Take that Justin Bieber!) A new make-up soda can look.

In the music video for Lady Gaga and Beyonce's The Telephone, Lady Gaga wears a an "up-do" that consists of soda cans while in prison.

In this video by serenaverbon on YouTube, Serena and her cousin Robin show how to create the look, and in the process have built the foundation for the propagation of a new Lady Gaga-endorsed fashion trend.

On her Twitter page, Lady Gaga gave the video the official Gaga cyber thumbs-up with this tweet:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8_hrDQyBTo "Soda-do, How to." GENIUS little fashion monsters.
about 17 hours ago via web

Jasmin Malik Chua at Ecouterre was the first online to point to the style and wrote "If Lady Gaga has a passion for trashion, she’s managed to keep it on the down-low." Until now. The prison-inspired look seems right for these economically challenged times and could morph into a form of protest against an economy that's slow to produce jobs.

The "Make-up Soda Can Look" could serve as a perfect statement mocking governments like the State of California that spend more money on prisons than for education. If California's becoming a police state, the "Make-up Soda Can Look" might well become the fashion statement that reflects it.

Unless you doubt Lady Gaga's ability to influence fashion trends, just look at this video-blog I created after I passed by the crowd at Lady Gaga's San Francisco concert last December:



In the video-blog many of Lady Gaga's fans were obviously inspired by Lady Gaga in their dress. But while that was for a Lady Gaga concert, my bet is the "Make-up Soda Can Look" will find its way into everyday society.

Stay tuned.

Lady Gaga and Beyonce - music video The Telephone lyrics

Lady Gaga and Beyonce shine in their music video The Telephone Here are the lyrics for The Telephone, and they reveal a set of lines that college girls will be repeating to each other. At least that's the prediction in this space.

The numbers connected with the music video on YouTube are sick at over 7 million views in three days, and climbing. And while YouTube has given The Telephone great visibility, that alone can't explain the staggering view count. Lady Gaga and Beyonce have hit the zeitgeist perfectly and everyone from entertainers to marketers should pay attention to this. Here are the lyrics for The Telephone:


[Lady Gaga]
Hello, hello, baby
You called, I can't hear a thing.
I have got no service
in the club, you say, say
Wha-Wha-What did you say, huh?
You're breaking up on me
Sorry, I cannot hear you,
I'm kinda busy.

K-kinda busy
K-kinda busy
Sorry, I cannot hear you, I'm kinda busy.

Just a second,
It's my favorite song they're gonna play
And I cannot text you with
A drink in my hand, eh?
You shoulda made some plans with me,
You knew that I was free.
And now you won't stop calling me;
I'm kinda busy.

Stop callin', stop callin',
I don't wanna think anymore!
I left my head and my heart on the dance floor.
Stop callin'', stop callin,
I don't wanna talk anymore!
I left my head and my heart on the dance floor.

Eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh
Stop telephonin' me!
Eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh
I'm busy!
Eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh
Stop telephonin' me!
Eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh

Can call all you want,
but there's no one home,
and you're not gonna reach my telephone!
Cuz I'm out in the club,
and I'm sippin that bubb,
and you're not gonna reach my telephone!

Call when you want,
but there's no one home,
and you're not gonna reach my telephone!
Out in the club,
and I'm sippin' that bubb,
and you're not gonna reach my telephone!

[Beyonce]
Boy, the way you blowin' up my phone
won't make me leave no faster.
Put my coat on faster,
leave my girls no faster.
I shoulda left my phone at home,
cuz this is a disaster!
Callin' like a collector -
sorry, I cannot answer!

Not that I don't like you,
I'm just at a party.
And I am sick and tired
of my phone r-ringing.
Sometimes I feel like
I live in Grand Central Station.
Tonight I'm not takin no calls,
cause I'll be dancin.

Cause I'll be dancin
Cause I'll be dancin
Tonight I'm not takin no calls, cause I'll be dancin!

Stop callin', stop callin',
I don't wanna think anymore!
I got my head and my heart on the dance floor.
Stop callin', stop callin',
I don't wanna talk anymore!
I got my head and my heart on the dance floor.

Stop callin', stop callin',
I don't wanna think anymore!
I got my head and my heart on the dance floor.
Stop callin', stop callin',
I don't wanna talk anymore!
I got my head and my heart on the dance floor.

Eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh
Stop telephonin' me
Eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh
I'm busy!
Eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh
Stop telephonin' me!
Eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh

Can call all you want,
but there's no one home,
and you're not gonna reach my telephone!
Cuz I'm out in the club,
and I'm sippin' that bubb,
and you're not gonna reach my telephone!

Call when you want,
but there's no one home,
and you're not gonna reach my telephone!
Cuz I'm out in the club,
and I'm sippin' that bubb,
and you're not gonna reach my telephone!

My telephone!
M-m-my telephone!
Cuz I'm out in the club,
and I'm sippin' that bubb,
and you're not gonna reach my telephone!

My telephone!
M-m-my telephone!
Cuz I'm out in the club,
and I'm sippin that bubb,
and you're not gonna reach my telephone!

We're sorry the number you have reached is not in service at this time.
Please check the number, or try your call again.

Tiger Woods hires ex-GOP aide Ari Fleischer; plans return to Golf

Accelerating his timetable, Tiger Woods has hired ex-GOP aide Ari Fleischer to help with his plans to return to Golf.

The World's Greatest Golfer hired the former press secretary to George W. Bush to help him recast his image according to ESPN.

The speculation in many corners is that Tiger Woods is going to play in the Tavistock Cup or the Arnold Palmer Invitational, and that his eventual objective is the 2010 Masters.

Tiger Woods image of the rock-solid family man was wrecked by the public revelation of numerous affairs with as many as 12 different women from Rachel Uchitel to Jamie Jungers. Tiger Woods admitted himself to a sex-addiction clinic in Mississippi and was just recently released from his treatment program.

While the idea that one can be addicted to sex is questionable, the fact that Tiger Woods went to get help rubber stamps the idea. The real problem was Woods wasn't be faithful to his wife Elin Nordegren. If Woods wasn't married to her, no one would accuse him of being addicted to sex as opposed to just a partying playboy.

The real story may be that Tiger Woods was trying to escape what may be a controlling relationship with his wife without losing her. Reports that Florida medical assistance workers did think Elin beat the crap out of him Thanksgiving night are surfacing. It's not that Woods didn't ask for it, but perhaps the real story was he was always trying to escape Elin's control and maintain his relationship to hold his image.

Whatever the case, all of that seems to be in the past. Let's hope so.

Lady Gaga and Beyonce in music video The Telephone

Lady Gaga and Beyonce rock in the new music video The Telephone. Created very much like a movie, the new video has been seen over 7 million times on YouTube already in just three days. It stars Lady Gaga as the new entry in a woman's prison full of female hardbodies who play rough.

Beyonce plays her friend who gets her out of jail and together they go to settle a score with the patrons in a restaurant by poisoning them.

The music video's story is very much in the style and theme of the movie Thelma and Louise. In that 1991 movie, Susan Sarandon and Geena Davis play the female version of Bonnie and Clyde. It's also a very sexually charged music video, but without obvious sex. Everything from the dress to the name of their truck "Pussy Wagon" points to sex.

Lady Gaga and Beyonce in the music video The Telephone prove that above all, sex sells.

Stay tuned.

What do you get out of SXSW other than Mark Cuban?

Related searches: Mark Cuban, SXSW, tech conference, austin, texas, sxsw panel



SXSW is the giant music, film, and "interactive" conference going on now in Austin, Texas. This blogger is not there, and has a question: What do you get out of SXSW?

In general, the high tech conferences all sport the same format and are becoming just one, big, plain bore. Pick the event, the format is the same: some panel or person talking to an audience, as of that person is the lone expert on a something. And at Web 2.0, they're all placed on a pedestal. The main problem with these sleep-fests is that someone in the audience at times has a better grasp of what the presenter's talking about than the presenter does.

Is this what Mark Cuban gets out of SXSW?

At SXSW, regardless of the session, the "panel / audience" format's the same. Instead of the "Mark Cuban is God at the stage" approach, why not something that involves the people in the room? SWSX-goers could be asked to bring their laptops and go to a specific webpage to do something, to feedback. How about taking it a step beyond that and asking them to post their video comments and questions on a page for display to the group?

Note that the idea is open-ended. You can pour any subject into it and create an "interaction forum" that is more rewarding than sitting on your butt listening to someone drone on and on, or for that matter, watching Mark Cuban get into a snarky argument with Aver Ronen at SXSW.

Why do you go, or don't go, to SXSW. Take the poll:

More surveys on pollsb.com

Oakland Teachers | East Bay Express wrong about teacher pay issue

As the news that the Oakland, California teacher's union's planned one-day walkout was moved to April 22nd from March 24th, this blogger ran across a paragraph in the East Bay Express that has information that was incorrect. In "Some Hard Truths About Oakland Teachers", Robert Gammon wrote:

...the City of Oakland has nothing to do with teacher salaries. Teachers are employees of the Oakland Unified School District, which is a completely separate legal entity that gets its funding from the state, not the city. So the city has no say in how much teachers make. And thus comparing teacher salaries to cops' salaries, as some commenters want to do, is ridiculous, because they're paid by different entities.

Gammon's wrong and he should look at Section 33678 Subdivision (B) of the California Health and Safety Code. The common misconception about California Redevelopment Law and Tax Increment Revenue, is that redevelopment revenue can't be used to provide services in city like Oakland. Redevelopment revenue can be used to augment teacher's salaries for schools within a redevelopment area if the redevelopment plan for that area was amended to do so.

So, the Oakland Redevelopment Agency could provide a grant to the Oakland Unified School District to be used for targeted schools within the 6,000-acre Coliseum Redevelopment Area, the largest project area in the state of California.

And a recent Court of Appeals decision could result in more money being passed through from redevelopment agencies to school districts, but the main point here is that, should it elect to do so, the Oakland Redevelopment Agency could work with the Oakland Unified School District to have higher teacher salaries in East Oakland, if only to reflect the additional problems teachers face in of working in a high-crime area.

Has Oakland used this provision in California Redevelopment Law before? Yes. In fact, former Oakland City Manager Henry Gardner informed me that the City of Oakland's redevelopment agency used it to form a program with the Oakland Police to remove crack houses in East Oakland.

Gardner and I had that conversation in 1997 when I was the Economic Advisor to then-Mayor Elihu Harris. During that time I was lobbying for the adoption of an idea I created called "Redevelopment Project Area Phasing."

Stay tuned.