Imus and the Mourning

He's back (in black, even). Don Imus, the human race riot of the air waves, returned to the radio with two African American comedians as part of his zoo crew (charade). The question is this: if a racist windbag makes halfhearted apologies on the air and nobody tunes in to listen, does he make a sound?

The big story of the day involves U.S. officials reporting that the Iranian nuclear program is shut down for the time being and that they are not a short term threat to produce nuclear weapons. President Bush remains undeterred, saying American policy will remain unchanged despite the reports. He might justify an invasion based upon a new Iranian policy to crack down on hip hop. Bush never let contrary evidence dissuade him from his strongly held but ideologically flawed plans in the past, so this should be business as usual.

Gillian Gibbons, the teacher involved in the Sudanese blasphemous teddy bear fracas, has spoken about this ordeal after she returned home to Britain. Whatever her message, I'm sure that her testimony will not be utilized in tourist videos promoting vacations to Sudan.

Now that the G.O.P. and the Dems have both held Web 2.0 debates, critics say that the format is here to stay. By 2020, Max Headroom may in fact be the leading candidate for President of the United States.

Rolling Stone's latest feature details the elements that led to the abysmal failure that is the war on drugs. This article breaks down the failures of American drug regulation that birthed a culture that would create a drug called "butt hash."

And I'll finish up with a new media report about the stalker engine/social networking outlet Facebook and its latest battle with privacy advocates. Coming on the heels of the controversial opt-out tracking program Beacon are the reports of Facebook boss Mark Zuckerberg losing his legal appeal to have a Harvard-associated publication take down less than flattering documents about his past in a move aimed at giving the young mogul a feeling of the shoe-on-the-other-foot feeling that goes along with Facebook-style privacy concerns. If Zuckerberg doesn't focus his company on benefiting the consumer using his product, he'll be losing Facebook friends faster than the people in charge of college loans.

Playoffs??!? Playoffs??!?

What a weekend for sports! I can't decide whether the biggest story of the weekend was the collapse of the Mets, the NL Wild Card coming down to game 163, college football's wild weekend where number two jumped number one and scores of other contenders got knocked down, or the NFL weekend where we found out the Bears were who we thought they were, only the Lions didn't let them get away. At least I still have the Cubbies to keep me warm while I'm making the decision...let's play ball.

Now that Congress failed to reach any consensus on what to do in Iraq other than throw more money at the problem, they have decided to focus their efforts on domestic issues like health care and taxes. Hopefully these guys can get SOMETHING accomplished instead of blaming all their inadequacies on Furher Bush and his convictions.

The campaign of genocide in Sudan has now expanded its aim to include aid workers in the ravaged country. If karma actually existed, some of the scumbags in Darfur and the United Nations would pay dearly for their roles as active or complacent contributors to the human rights abuses in this troubled land. At least we still have time to concentrate on missile defense shields and other science fiction while being to busy in Iraq to lend any real assistance to people in real need.

In vegetarian news, 21.7 million pounds of ground beef were recalled by Topps Meat because of E. coli contamination, proving what I have known for more than a decade: eating ground up dead cows is disgusting.

Musical mavericks Radiohead are releasing their latest album on the internet, and they are giving you the option of how much, if anything, you want to pay for it. 50 Cent forced people to pay for his pathetic new album, and as a result, lost his battle of album sales with Kanye West. Maybe 50 should try a Radiohead business model with his next venture.

Finally, Reuters put together an interesting article about musicians and their preference for analog equipment over the digital counterparts. This is a really interesting concept to explore, but for credibility's sake, don't use limited, meaningless terminology like electronica to describe music for fear of how L7 that will really make you look in your inability to genre-fy music you can't truly conceptualize. Electronica has slightly more meaning than did the equally meaningless category of grunge, if for no reason other than the fact the the musicians (much like Bob Dylan at the Newport Folk Festival) do in fact plug their instruments into an electric outlet, much along the same lines that grunge musicians played guitar and showered less often than was media-appropriate. Learn to use the music terminology correctly or fear getting burned, Reuters.

The Wall St. Journal is Fair and Balanced

The announcement finally came in today, and Rupert Murdoch is the new captain of the Wall Street Journal. Many have predicted that he will turn a respected daily newspaper into the Fox News Journal. Others believe that he will try to steal advertising from his media rivals including the New York Times, trying to beat them the old-fashioned way--through sharp business decision making. Whatever happens, I can't wait to see the first Bill O'Reilly column on Lindsay Lohan's latest brush with disaster.

Coming on the heels of Iraq and its feel-good story with the soccer team is the latest report that U.S. troop fatalities in the embattled nation are actually declining. In other words, the glass is half full. Unfortunately, the glass is half full of piss and vinegar, making it very hard to swallow.

26,000 troops have finally been authorized by the U.N. to use force to protect civilians and aid workers in Sudan. Bush would pledge support, but he has to make up another member of the Axis of Evil and start a war with them before he can use the military for any truly useful purposes.

Mike McConnell, a chief intelligence official with the National Security Agency, discussed a series of unapproved moves made by the White House after they were granted approval of a warrantless wiretapping/e-mail program of domestic espionage. The program has always been controversial, and these revelations will win the plan no new fans. There is actually more support in America to sack football, basketball, hockey, auto racing, poker and baseball, thereby making soccer the nation's favorite competitive endeavor.

The White House isn't winning supporters on many fronts, with an editorial in the Los Angeles Times calling George Bush out on his intent to veto a bill that would give medical insurance to 8 million uninsured children. Is it even possible that somebody would disdain public opinion so much that they would submarine medical care for helpless youth? I guess I just answered my own question.

The British are leaving! The British are leaving! The longest standing deployment of troops in the nation's history is leaving Northern Ireland. Whenever they withdraw their troops from Iraq, they'll be finished with all of the military campaigns that are currently irritating British citizens.

The Tour de Drugs is over, and what would the race be without every rider being thrown off tour before the newly-crowned winner is accused of a horrendous doping scandal? Doping expert Werner Franke claims to have presented evidence to German authorities that the Tour winner Alberto Contador, umm, cheated. The Tour de France makes the Grateful Dead tour look like Sesame Street in terms of drug use.

Crazy stories today include security agents at airports being asked to look out for a new insidious terrorist threat--cheese. Certainly some cheese smells strong, but this seems like overkill on security and overprotection from dairy products.

You could also pair the cheese you are eating in the airport parking lot with a nice bottle of red wine, which is a leading source of the antioxidant resveratrol. While some research shows that the quantities of resveratrol in red wine are not large enough to confer real health benefits from regular consumption, others counter with the argument that resveratrol is but one of many healthy parts of the complex liquid that is wine. Science will have to sort out the details, but if somebody tells me that drinking Cote Rotie makes me healthier, I will believe them.

Finally, USA Today columnist Janet Kornblum put together an article about the cruel fallout of online haters. Shut the fuck up you dumb bitch before I put my size 10 shoe up your rumpus. Note: This is a complete satire, performed for a cheap laugh. Besides, I wear a size 10 1/2 shoe.

Woke Up This Morning, Got Myself a Gun

I don't want to say that the last episode of Sopranos was anti-climactic, but the last episode of Sopranos was anti-climactic. No show spends more time teasing you and not accomplishing anything. Basically everything is still in play, and David Chase just delivered a stupid mindfuck of an ending. Just watch the next to last episode, then fast forward to the last 20 minutes of the finale and you'll be on the best possible journey.

If there was any question as to why Vista is eventually going to rule the world, look no further than the Times article about the Justice Department's unwavering support of Microsoft.
Justice may be blind, but it isn't immune to stylishly executed bribery to be sure.

The lack of response in Sudan from the U.S. could be connected to the U.S. reliance on the controversial country's services. Ahh, foreign diplomacy...the only place where you can have your cake and eat it too.

Continuing the cheap puns department, the Army is robbing Peter to pay Paul by arming the Iraqi Sunnis to battle the insurgency. The military sees a long-term occupation of Iraq, so at this point they'll try anything. Perhaps they should check into how popular past arms deals have been.

Joe Lieberman is busy trying to keep his place on the mantle as the Democratic loose cannon. The Holy Trinity of Wackos (George Bush, John McCain and Lieberman) are advocating strikes against Iran based upon the country's support of insurgents attacking American troops. I now know that that the entire cast of Kerry, Edwards and Lieberman in the last Presidential election was a bunch of dolts from top to bottom. I'm voting Kucinich this year.

Giuliani is apparently not loved by Black New York. It seems difficult to believe that a disingenuous man who supported everything and stood for nothing, repeatedly marrying and divorcing cousins all the while dressed like Marilyn Monroe would have trouble winning over voters of any race, ethnicity or gender.

The battle of the sexes got tilted in the favor of the ladies this weekend when filly Rags to Riches beat all the boys at the Belmont, the third jewel in horse racing's Triple Crown. Typically you have to staple me to a chair to get me to watch horses run around a track. The race was a photo finish, and the girl came in first. Trainer Todd Pletcher can check out the new-fangled anti-counterfeiting measures on his celebratory bottle of champagne.

Hopefully LeBron James, the Cavs or some viewers show up to watch Game 3 of the NBA Finals, because these performances make curling seem intense.

Fed Up with the New Hippies

Miss U.S.A., like much of the rest of America, is falling down on the job. Luckily she picked herself up and ignored the boos. Watch the above video and see if she did as well as Joe Torre at shrugging off criticism.

Lawmakers in Washington are aggressively pushing to turn the old big-bad polluter coal into a new eco-friendly fuel of the future. Who knows if robbing Peter to pay Paul will work? Why it's none other than the same parties who promised to get America out of Iraq (a.k.a Democrats) and to win the War on Terror (a.k.a. G.O.P.). If they say it works, then by golly it must work.

George Bush (he of the fighting variety) has decided he can't wait for months worth of U.N. approvals to go to war in Iran. Instead, he's going to try something he should have tried long ago and turn up the pressure on Sudan. Obviously, based upon his performance in Iraq, Bush is going to spend at least two weeks reading about the troubled region before rushing headlong into an invasion.

Speaking of happenstance invasions and semantic blockage, U.S. military commanders in Iraq are drawing back on the effusively praised accomplishments promised by Commander in Chief Bush, settling instead for more modest measures of accomplishment. It will be interesting to hear them explain the "Mission Accomplished" banner. My suggestion for the euphemism that best refers to the situation is, "Not the worst possible fuck up."

If the Bush camp can count one single victory out of the war effort, they can at least say that they defeated Cindy Sheehan. You can't win them all, George, and sometimes when you win, you still lose.

On my never ending quest to separate the wheat from the chaff, the L.A. Times published an editorial criticizing the sincerity of Eddie the Ambulance Chaser (a.k.a. Democratic Presidential candidate John Edwards). Any report that cuts on a guy getting paid $55,000 to lecture on poverty in America deserves a mean-spirited attack on character. One down, Giuliani and company to go.

Salon is overloaded with cool topics that typically get overlooked. They have a great dialog with a panel of experts on colony collapse disorder and the honeybee problem. They also gave everybody more reasons to hate Republicans detailing millions of dollars worth of money made from inflated student loan interest rates. The only thing the Republicans have going for themselves at this point is that many people were so crippled by student loan debt that they will be forced to join the military in lean financial times. The G.O.P. is hoping that their voting constituency will be overseas and/or out of their voting district during the coming election, keeping the Republicans in office. This should help explain their unwavering support of the war effort in Iraq.

In media news, photographer Jahangir Razmi was given a Pulitzer Prize he was awarded 27 years earlier for anonymously taking a photograph of Kurds being executed in Iran. This inspires me to keep pulling for Buck O'Neil (and my personal favorite Ron Santo) to get the better-late-than-never vote this year, and I'm disinterested in whatever rules are keeping them out. There is a commissioner and a veterans committee for a reason.

The funny stories burn like fire, led by the wife of Google's founder spearheading an effort to test through DNA evidence provided by a CEO in a spittoon whether Warren Buffet and Jimmy Buffet were actually related. Some people really do have too much money.

The old hippies that live in Haight Ashbury district in San Francisco where they used to do drugs are fed up with the new hippies and their rampant drug use in the old hippies' new investment neighborhood (or something like that). They should try sending them to Indonesian prison, where police shut down a fully operational methamphetamine laboratory. And they say people don't learn to work in prisons!

News You Can Peruse

The Cubbies...you can set your watch by their consistent inconsistency. Hopefully the new outfielder's potential doesn't end up being Pie in the sky.

The story of the day continues to be the Virginia Tech shooting. The identity of the shooter was announced (he's also a hell of a playwright), but the media angles for this story are deeper than the kid with a gun stories all over the airwaves. Students were keeping up with the story through Web updates. CNN's on the spot reporter was a Va-Tech graduate student with a cell phone camera. This may be the first tragedy brought to you live in grainy YouTube-quality video linked on Facebook.

Sudan has finally agreed to allow U.N. aid workers into the country in a move that is viewed as a potential precursor to a peacekeeping effort. American efforts would most likely be available if they weren't hopelessly quagmired in the Iraq debacle.

Presidential candidates named John are doing everything they can to separate themselves from the crowd by saying and doing stupid things. John McCain still defends guns, even after a South Korean student killed 32 students before he killed himself in Blacksburg. McCain is definitely a few bullets shy of a full clip on gun control...keep your mouth shut, Big Gun. At least he isn't getting multiple $400 haircuts like John "I Feel Pretty" Edwards. When he doesn't make it in Washington, I'm sure Hollywood holds endless potential.

Ohio State was doing their best Ohio University impression when hackers stole the identities of 14,000 employees and 3,500 students. Most identities can be used for ill-gotten gains, but if they got Maurice Clarett's information, they would most likely would get slightly less than the Broncos got by drafting him.

Mother Jones profiled the environmental harm and engineering flaws inherent in Apple iPods. These problems are in addition to the problems they create making oblivious morons to walk in traffic with impunity.

Interesting media stories include the campaign to reform internet radio. The medium may be dying out as the price for royalty fees shot up drastically last year. Great free sites like Pandora will be gradually phased out and replaced by pay-to-play sites. If somebody goes postal because of this, at least you will be able to get video footage at the newly minted Smoking Gun video vault.

In news of the weird, the most popular prophylactic in New York is the official free NYC condoms produced by Lifestyles. The report states that over 5 million lubricated condoms have been used in the back seat of Derek Jeter's limousine this year alone.

Finally, a German military instructor was dismissed after a video of him instructing recruits that they should pretend they were shooting blacks in the Bronx surfaced. People haven't been this upset with the German military since the last time they invaded Poland.

God Bless You, Mr. Vonnegut

The Greatest Living American Novelist is no longer Kurt Vonnegut. Good luck equaling him, whoever next steps up to the plate. Whoever approaches him as a writer will have to do much in life to equal him as a human being. May your afterlife be as productive and fulfilling as your life, Mr. Vonnegut. Bless you and your piercing insight.

You are a wampeter, an object on which many unrelated people's lives are centered. I can tell myself foma, harmless little lies that won't bring you back. A writer like myself hopes not to become part of a grandfalloon in your absence and any attempt for me to find my voice in writing is eternally in your debt.

About the news...so it goes. Al Qaeda groups are linked to a bombing in Algeria that claimed 24 lives. The event highlights a struggle between Islamic and secular groups in Algeria. British soccer fans are irate that the bomb was not aimed a few hundred miles north in the middle of France.

In other hater news, U.S. military officials are renewing accusations of Iranian assistance being provided to Iraqi insurgents. Since American officials needed sheer speculation to start a war with Iraq, the cruise missiles should start dropping in about two weeks.

Further around the Axis of Evil wheel is the report of a U.S. inquiry and subsequent asset freezing of an account in a Chinese bank in the gambling center of Macao. Officials suspected the bank was laundering money for North Korea. These moves stalled North Korea's joining in peace negotiations about their nuclear ambitions. The U.S. sees negative potential from the money, while Kim Jong Il I'm sure claims that he earned the money when he wrote six Wagner-quality operas and that the money is his. Nobody may ever know who is telling the truth.

Don Imus is gone. Good riddance. Just remember Don, free speech isn't free when you pay with your job.

David Sedaris of the Washington Post has come under fire for fabrications in his humor columns. He has also received an unwaivering degree of support from other journalists. Nick Bakay, Kenny Mayne, the author of this column and journalists with a sense of humor might care for an answer. (That answer is truth counts no matter how funny it is, David S., especially in the Washington Post.)

There are indications of a medical procedure that makes chemotherapy more targeted and less toxic in a development reported as a breakthrough in oncology. Keep that number on speed dial.

In a slightly dated report, the Google Earth/Darfur project should provide Bush a computerized model of what is going on in Sudan, but I don't know if that will help. Hopefully another world leader catches on.

Heavyweight boxing might not be exciting like the good old days, but freak-show 7 foot tall 326 pound champion Nikolai Valuev is fighting a challenger who is 11 inches shorter and 101 pounds lighter than he is. David, meet Goliath.

Mike Downey takes on a dome on Wrigley, Dannielynne, Soriano, Bonds, Sosa, Cuban and Bartman in one column. If you can think of a joke punchline that involves all of those characters, comment on the blog here.

Crazy stories that have no news value but are always amongst the most e-mailed include the Lantern story about the 18 year police veteran who gave a presentation on legalizing drugs. The T-shirt and cowboy hat cement his credibility.

Speaking of drugs, British police raided a Rastafarian temple once visited by Bob Marley and issued gun and drug charges. I don't want to say they should have thought it out, but the cops could have guessed the Rastafarians would have marijuana, and they also know that Marley shot the sheriff. Even if he didn't shoot the deputy, it's enough for probable cause stateside.

Poo too weet!