There are lot of reason why I love this show, but I just wanted to briefly highlight one reason why I've added this show to my personal pantheon of great cartoon shows. That pantheon of shows now only consists of "The Simpsons", "Family Guy", "South Park", and "Phineas and Ferb" ( BTW, I still believe that collectively, the timeless comic brilliance of the Warner Brother Bugs/Daffy/Elmer/Road-Runner/Porky/Sylvester/Tweety shorts tops any of those shows, but I kinda consider those shorts to be a different category than cartoon TV series. ). All four of these shows are brilliant in ways that are similar ( They all are great in terms of musical numbers and pop culture references ), and each have a quality which distinguishes them from the others. I think "The Simpsons" is the smartest show of the 4, "South Park" is the most topical ( Trey and Matt sometimes release a South Park episode that parodies things that had happened earlier in the week. I'm still amazed that they can put together a topical cartoon that quickly ( I guess the simple animation helps ) ), and Family Guy is the best at hitting that hilarious sweet spot right on the edge of bad taste ( Some might think this best describes "South Park", but I think "South Park" sometimes goes to edge of bad taste for the sake of going to the edge, while "Family Guy" almost always goes to the edge to be funny. If you want good example of "Family Guy" hitting that hilarious sweet spot on the edge of bad taste, get yourself a DVD with the uncensored version of the "When You Wish Upon a Weinstein" episode. ). I think what distinguishes "Phineas and Ferb" is heart. Perhaps that shouldn't surprise me, considering that "Phineas and Ferb" is in the Disney stable, but this show is great at including little moments that can really touch your heart. I was reminded of that when I was watching the end credits of a "Phineas and Ferb" episode today. This particular episode ( It's one of the early ones, but I only got on the P&F train about a year or so ago ( thanks to an article in Wired magazine )) takes place in a Museum. While the Flynn-Fletcher family was in the Museum, Lawrence ( Ferb's dad and Phineas' step-dad ) had purchased an audio tour of the museum ( on an audio tape ). In the end-credits, we find him in bed playing his favorite part of the audio tour over and over and again. He repeats his favorite part out loud, and makes a "boop" sound each time rewinds the tape. Just look at how his wife reacts when this wakes her up.
Rich
Edit: FYI, I just noticed that the director of the "When You Wish Upon a Weinstein" Family Guy episode is one of the co-creator's of "Phineas and Ferb".
Edit 2: Oh, and both "Phineas and Ferb" co-creators met while working on "The Simpons" together.
Sunday, April 22, 2012
Thursday, March 29, 2012
Material Guy
I haven't done a completely random blog post in a while, so here goes ...
Tonight, Peter asked me to play him the "real song" version of a song he was playing an instrumental version of on the Wii Music game. The song turned out to be "Material Girl". I found him the video online ( see below ) and watched along with him. It's probably been about 25 years since I last watched this video, and I just noticed something about it that I had never noticed before.
Watch Madonna - Material Girl in Music | View More Free Videos Online at Veoh.com
To put it bluntly - the dude in the beard is really creepy.
Now, he's not creepy because of the beard ( though I must admit, it does look a little bit creepy on him ). He's creepy because of his actions.
Perhaps it's because I'm getting old and my memory of the 80's is getting a little bit hazy, but the "Material Girl" video isn't exactly what I remembered. Sure, the "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes" homage/ripoff was just as I remembered, but I always remembered this video as being a bit of counterpoint to the lyrics of the song. In other words, while the speaker in the "Material Girl" song is an unapologetic materialistic gold-digger, Madonna's character in the video is a girl unimpressed by money who ends the video making out with a poor bearded schlep in a crappy pick-up truck.
There's just one problem with that description, however ...
The bearded dude wasn't poor!
In fact he was the opposite of poor. He was apparently a rich and powerful Hollywood executive, as is evident by the way Arliss is kissing up to him in the opening scene ( BTW. I don't care what Robert Wuhl is in. Every role he plays is Arliss, even if it's something that was filmed a decade before Arliss premiered ( just like Danny McBride will now be Kenny Powers for the rest of his life ) ).
There nothing wrong with being rich, but there something creepy about a guy who misrepresents himself in order to get into a woman's pants. Sure, he was pretending to be poor when he was really rich, which some might consider to be noble. However, he was only pretending to be poor because heard Madonna character say she didn't like rich guys while he was eavesdropping on her ( The eavesdropping was only a small part of the bearded dude's constant stalking during the video. It's also clear from the scene with Arliss, that this guy views Madonna's character as a possession rather than a woman. Specifically, we see the following in the opening scene:
00:22 seconds: Creepy Bearded Dude ( CBD ) : I wanna meet her.
00:24 : Arliss: You got it. Anytime. Name the place - name anwhere - any street - you got it!
00:27: CBD: Now!
00:27 - 00:31 ( Creepy pause )
00:31 - 00:32 ( Really creepy look from CBD. He looks at Madonna's character ( on the movie screen ) the way a starving lion might look at an injured antelope. )
)
If you still doubt that CBD is a creep, watch the scene starting at 4:16, specifically what happens at 4:21. CBD gives a poor farmer a wad of cash to buy/borrow his crappy pickup truck, and then dismissively waves him away. He practically shoos the farmer away, the way somebody might shoo away a fly. He's basically saying, "Get out my sight you poor piece of crap, so I can use your truck to get me some Madonna pussy!". So, this guy is not only creepy, he's a world-class douchebag!
So now I don't know what the hell the message of this video is, other than perhaps "Madonna likes to get it on with douchebags" ( paging Mr. Canseco ).
In any case, it's time for bed. Hope this post was random enough for you.
Rich
Tonight, Peter asked me to play him the "real song" version of a song he was playing an instrumental version of on the Wii Music game. The song turned out to be "Material Girl". I found him the video online ( see below ) and watched along with him. It's probably been about 25 years since I last watched this video, and I just noticed something about it that I had never noticed before.
Watch Madonna - Material Girl in Music | View More Free Videos Online at Veoh.com
To put it bluntly - the dude in the beard is really creepy.
Now, he's not creepy because of the beard ( though I must admit, it does look a little bit creepy on him ). He's creepy because of his actions.
Perhaps it's because I'm getting old and my memory of the 80's is getting a little bit hazy, but the "Material Girl" video isn't exactly what I remembered. Sure, the "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes" homage/ripoff was just as I remembered, but I always remembered this video as being a bit of counterpoint to the lyrics of the song. In other words, while the speaker in the "Material Girl" song is an unapologetic materialistic gold-digger, Madonna's character in the video is a girl unimpressed by money who ends the video making out with a poor bearded schlep in a crappy pick-up truck.
There's just one problem with that description, however ...
The bearded dude wasn't poor!
In fact he was the opposite of poor. He was apparently a rich and powerful Hollywood executive, as is evident by the way Arliss is kissing up to him in the opening scene ( BTW. I don't care what Robert Wuhl is in. Every role he plays is Arliss, even if it's something that was filmed a decade before Arliss premiered ( just like Danny McBride will now be Kenny Powers for the rest of his life ) ).
There nothing wrong with being rich, but there something creepy about a guy who misrepresents himself in order to get into a woman's pants. Sure, he was pretending to be poor when he was really rich, which some might consider to be noble. However, he was only pretending to be poor because heard Madonna character say she didn't like rich guys while he was eavesdropping on her ( The eavesdropping was only a small part of the bearded dude's constant stalking during the video. It's also clear from the scene with Arliss, that this guy views Madonna's character as a possession rather than a woman. Specifically, we see the following in the opening scene:
00:22 seconds: Creepy Bearded Dude ( CBD ) : I wanna meet her.
00:24 : Arliss: You got it. Anytime. Name the place - name anwhere - any street - you got it!
00:27: CBD: Now!
00:27 - 00:31 ( Creepy pause )
00:31 - 00:32 ( Really creepy look from CBD. He looks at Madonna's character ( on the movie screen ) the way a starving lion might look at an injured antelope. )
)
If you still doubt that CBD is a creep, watch the scene starting at 4:16, specifically what happens at 4:21. CBD gives a poor farmer a wad of cash to buy/borrow his crappy pickup truck, and then dismissively waves him away. He practically shoos the farmer away, the way somebody might shoo away a fly. He's basically saying, "Get out my sight you poor piece of crap, so I can use your truck to get me some Madonna pussy!". So, this guy is not only creepy, he's a world-class douchebag!
So now I don't know what the hell the message of this video is, other than perhaps "Madonna likes to get it on with douchebags" ( paging Mr. Canseco ).
In any case, it's time for bed. Hope this post was random enough for you.
Rich
Sunday, March 25, 2012
How do you solve a problem like Mitt Romney?
( My sincerest apologies to Rodgers and Hammerstein )
( Sing to the tune of "How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria". )
How do you solve a problem like Mitt Romney?
He's got positions so hard to pin down.
How do you find a way to beat Mitt Romney?
He's got chameleon skills
that never fail to ...
astound.
Many a politician tried to beat him.
Many tried to get him to take a stand.
But what can you make him say
to give himself away?
How do you get him to tip his hand?
Oh, how do you solve a problem like Mitt Romney?
He's made an asset out of being bland.
Hear that sound?
It's the sound of Mitt Romney moving to the left.
The closer he gets to the nomination, the more of a Moderate he'll become.
Those of you who remember John Kerry's 2004 campaign might not agree with the premise of the little ditty above. You might think that Mitt Romney's flip-flopping tendencies would be a liability in the 2012 presidential campaign. However, while his flip-flopping was certainly a liability in the race for the GOP nomination ( which he's pretty much has wrapped up ), I think it's actually going to help him in the general election.
I know that a lot of my fellow Liberals watch Romney struggle in the GOP primaries and think "Obama's gonna beat this guy easily". However, the polls tell another story, as does common sense.
I think we're all aware that the election is going to be decided by a bunch of conviction-less dolts that the media charitably calls "Moderates". These folks have been hearing Romney say a lot of scary Right-wing stuff lately, as Romney futilely tries tries to attract conservative GOP voters. Considering that these Moderate voters would generally be scared off by such Right-wing positions, do you think it hurts or helps Romney that these Moderate voters can't sure if Romney really means what he's saying?
Furthermore, everyone knows by now that the Right-wing of the Republican party HATES Romney. They hate him with a passion and they are not afraid to say so. When lots of Moderate voters see the Right-wing attack Romney I'm sure they say to themselves "Gee, if the Tea Party and the Christian Right hate Romney so much, I guess he can't be that bad.".
And that in a nutshell, is Obama's problem with Mitt Romney. Far-Right Conservatives in the GOP, despite their best efforts to shoot themselves in the foot and nominate an unelectable Conservative, are actually helping Romney by making him look like a Moderate.
Now, don't get me wrong. I still think Obama is slightly more likely to win than not, but Democrats had better not get complacent, and Obama had better not try to run as a Moderate. Obama's got to do everything he can to make clear distinctions between his positions and whatever positions Romney is adopting that week.
Let's face it - while American has made a lot of progress in race relations over the years, we still live in a nation were stuff like this happens. We shouldn't forget that McCain was leading Obama in the polls in 2008 before the economy collapsed and McCain made the bone-headed remark "the fundamentals of our economy are strong". America may not know exactly what to make of Mitt Romney, but if nothing else, they know that he's extremely white. Obama had better make sure that enough people in the country understand that there is more that separates him from Mitt Romney than skin color.
I'll tell you this much - if Obama campaigns the same way he's governed, he'll lose for sure. I'm going to be really worried if I don't hear the sound of Obama moving to the left real soon.
Rich
( Sing to the tune of "How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria". )
How do you solve a problem like Mitt Romney?
He's got positions so hard to pin down.
How do you find a way to beat Mitt Romney?
He's got chameleon skills
that never fail to ...
astound.
Many a politician tried to beat him.
Many tried to get him to take a stand.
But what can you make him say
to give himself away?
How do you get him to tip his hand?
Oh, how do you solve a problem like Mitt Romney?
He's made an asset out of being bland.
Hear that sound?
It's the sound of Mitt Romney moving to the left.
The closer he gets to the nomination, the more of a Moderate he'll become.
Those of you who remember John Kerry's 2004 campaign might not agree with the premise of the little ditty above. You might think that Mitt Romney's flip-flopping tendencies would be a liability in the 2012 presidential campaign. However, while his flip-flopping was certainly a liability in the race for the GOP nomination ( which he's pretty much has wrapped up ), I think it's actually going to help him in the general election.
I know that a lot of my fellow Liberals watch Romney struggle in the GOP primaries and think "Obama's gonna beat this guy easily". However, the polls tell another story, as does common sense.
I think we're all aware that the election is going to be decided by a bunch of conviction-less dolts that the media charitably calls "Moderates". These folks have been hearing Romney say a lot of scary Right-wing stuff lately, as Romney futilely tries tries to attract conservative GOP voters. Considering that these Moderate voters would generally be scared off by such Right-wing positions, do you think it hurts or helps Romney that these Moderate voters can't sure if Romney really means what he's saying?
Furthermore, everyone knows by now that the Right-wing of the Republican party HATES Romney. They hate him with a passion and they are not afraid to say so. When lots of Moderate voters see the Right-wing attack Romney I'm sure they say to themselves "Gee, if the Tea Party and the Christian Right hate Romney so much, I guess he can't be that bad.".
And that in a nutshell, is Obama's problem with Mitt Romney. Far-Right Conservatives in the GOP, despite their best efforts to shoot themselves in the foot and nominate an unelectable Conservative, are actually helping Romney by making him look like a Moderate.
Now, don't get me wrong. I still think Obama is slightly more likely to win than not, but Democrats had better not get complacent, and Obama had better not try to run as a Moderate. Obama's got to do everything he can to make clear distinctions between his positions and whatever positions Romney is adopting that week.
Let's face it - while American has made a lot of progress in race relations over the years, we still live in a nation were stuff like this happens. We shouldn't forget that McCain was leading Obama in the polls in 2008 before the economy collapsed and McCain made the bone-headed remark "the fundamentals of our economy are strong". America may not know exactly what to make of Mitt Romney, but if nothing else, they know that he's extremely white. Obama had better make sure that enough people in the country understand that there is more that separates him from Mitt Romney than skin color.
I'll tell you this much - if Obama campaigns the same way he's governed, he'll lose for sure. I'm going to be really worried if I don't hear the sound of Obama moving to the left real soon.
Rich
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Ben & Jerry & Jeremy
C'mon. You really didn't think I could go the whole month without writing a post about Jeremy Lin, did you?
I'm not sure how this post will end up, but I do know where it's going to start. It's going to start with this link.
Last week, a Ben and Jerry's ice cream shop in Harvard Square introduced a frozen yogurt flavor named "Taste the Lin-Sanity". That in itself, wasn't very controversial. After all, everyone's trying to hop on the Jeremy Lin bandwagon these days ( We already got Knicks Lin #17 T-shirts for the boys and Ruth's Dad. Ruth didn't didn't get one for herself, which surprised me a bit. I told her that if a guy with MY last name was playing for ANY professional sports team ( well except for the Yankees, Dolphins, or Patriots ), I'd be wearing that guy's jersey 24-hours a day. ), and Lin did go to Harvard, so you could see why the Harvard Square location of Ben & Jerry's would try to cash in. However, what was controversial was that the "Lin-Sanity" flavor had fortune cookies in it. This caused enough controversy that Ben & Jerry's issued an apology.
Now, while the idea of a Jeremy Lin fortune-cookie flavored frozen yogurt bothers me, I'm bothered even more by the the response of most people to the Ben & Jerry's apology. If you look at the comments attached to the linked ESPN article above ( and the comments by the commentators in the video attached to the article ), you'll see exactly what I mean, but a good representative comment was ...
I also think this country is ridiculous, but I think it's ridiculous because 99% of the people in this county have no idea what's wrong with introducing a fortune-cookie flavored frozen yogurt to "celebrate" a Taiwanese-American basketball player. I think it's ridiculous that people still think it's okay to make juvenile Asian-themed jokes about Jeremy Lin, like "Who said Asian's can't drive?" ( This includes one of my favorite comics, Bill Maher. I was very disappointed that Maher did a bunch of cringe-worthy Asian jokes on his show, including such beauties as "Peking Dunk" and "Moo Goo Guy Slam" - see here and here for the clips ). I think it's ridiculous that Lin's teammates greeted him with Japanese-style bows after he hit one of his first big shots.
Why do I think it's so ridiculous? Well I covered this extensively before in the video below back in September of 2007, but allow me to go on another little rant about this ...
Let's say the Jeremy Lin story had happened exactly the same way, except that he had been a California-born Harvard-educated guy named Jeremy McGraw or Jeremy Schmidt instead of an California-born Harvard-educated guy named Jeremy Lin. If that was the case, those Ben & Jerry's employees would never have even thought about introducing a shamrock green frozen yogurt to celebrate Jeremy McGraw. They would never have even thought about introducing a German Black Forest Cake frozen yogurt to honor Jeremy Schmidt. I say they "would never have even thought about it" not because I think those Ben & Jerry's employees would have thought that a Irish-themed or German-theme dessert would have been offensive. I say they "would never have even thought about it" because they literally would never have thought of it. The idea of making an Irish-themed dessert to honor the American-born Jeremy McGraw would never have crossed their minds. It would have never crossed their minds, because all those Ben & Jerry's employees would have thought of Jeremy McGraw as American rather than Irish. They would have thought of Jeremy Schmidt as American rather than German. However, the vast majority Americans still think of Jeremy Lin as Asian rather than American.
This bothers me a lot. It's bothered me for a long time. I'm a pretty patriotic person, and I believe that America's greatness is based on its diversity. I truly believe that the heterogeneous nature of the US population makes the USA the greatest nation in the world. Sure, nations like England, Germany, and Japan have had their day, and countries like China and India seem to be on the rise, but nations like those will always be limited their lack of diversity. Those countries are limited by the fact that only the majority race and majority culture has a real chance to get to the top. In the USA, anyone can get to the top. They best, brightest, and most ambition people in the world aren't flocking to England, Germany, Japan, China, or India. They're coming HERE, to the good old USA! America is at its best when we follow the spirit of those words at the base of the Statue of Liberty. It's at its best when its people realize that being an American isn't about where your ancestors were from - it's about were you're going. It isn't about what you look like, it's about what you can do - what we all have the opportunity to do. That opportunity should exist for anyone who calls this place home. All the people who live here and collectively make this country great are Americans, and it sickens me that most people in this country think of Jeremy Lin as Asian rather than American. It sickens me that most Americans would think of my wife as being Asian rather than American. I really would have liked to think that our nation would have come farther by 2012, which is why I find stuff like Jeremy Lin fortune-cookie flavored frozen yogurt so disheartening.
That being said, I believe things will get better over time, and I think Jeremy Lin has a unique opportunity to make things better. Let's face it, the guy is pretty much a walking stereotype-breaker. Every time he drives the lane and dunks the ball he helps break the stereotype of the meek unathletic Asian. Plus it appears that Jeremy "gets it" too. Check out this quote from Mr. Lin:
“a lot of people say I’m deceptively athletic and deceptively quick, and I’m not sure what’s ‘deceptive.’ But it could be the fact that I’m Asian-American.”
I really hope Jeremy's success continues and he has the courage ( rather than trying the "play nice" and be non-controversial in order to maximize his endorsement bucks ( See Jordan, Michael ) ) to keep speaking out. Very few Asian-Americans have had the forum that he has now, and I hope he can help the rest of America to understand what it really means to be an American.
Rich
I'm not sure how this post will end up, but I do know where it's going to start. It's going to start with this link.
Last week, a Ben and Jerry's ice cream shop in Harvard Square introduced a frozen yogurt flavor named "Taste the Lin-Sanity". That in itself, wasn't very controversial. After all, everyone's trying to hop on the Jeremy Lin bandwagon these days ( We already got Knicks Lin #17 T-shirts for the boys and Ruth's Dad. Ruth didn't didn't get one for herself, which surprised me a bit. I told her that if a guy with MY last name was playing for ANY professional sports team ( well except for the Yankees, Dolphins, or Patriots ), I'd be wearing that guy's jersey 24-hours a day. ), and Lin did go to Harvard, so you could see why the Harvard Square location of Ben & Jerry's would try to cash in. However, what was controversial was that the "Lin-Sanity" flavor had fortune cookies in it. This caused enough controversy that Ben & Jerry's issued an apology.
Now, while the idea of a Jeremy Lin fortune-cookie flavored frozen yogurt bothers me, I'm bothered even more by the the response of most people to the Ben & Jerry's apology. If you look at the comments attached to the linked ESPN article above ( and the comments by the commentators in the video attached to the article ), you'll see exactly what I mean, but a good representative comment was ...
An apology was not necessary. This country is getting ridiculous.
2398 fans like this.
I also think this country is ridiculous, but I think it's ridiculous because 99% of the people in this county have no idea what's wrong with introducing a fortune-cookie flavored frozen yogurt to "celebrate" a Taiwanese-American basketball player. I think it's ridiculous that people still think it's okay to make juvenile Asian-themed jokes about Jeremy Lin, like "Who said Asian's can't drive?" ( This includes one of my favorite comics, Bill Maher. I was very disappointed that Maher did a bunch of cringe-worthy Asian jokes on his show, including such beauties as "Peking Dunk" and "Moo Goo Guy Slam" - see here and here for the clips ). I think it's ridiculous that Lin's teammates greeted him with Japanese-style bows after he hit one of his first big shots.
Why do I think it's so ridiculous? Well I covered this extensively before in the video below back in September of 2007, but allow me to go on another little rant about this ...
Let's say the Jeremy Lin story had happened exactly the same way, except that he had been a California-born Harvard-educated guy named Jeremy McGraw or Jeremy Schmidt instead of an California-born Harvard-educated guy named Jeremy Lin. If that was the case, those Ben & Jerry's employees would never have even thought about introducing a shamrock green frozen yogurt to celebrate Jeremy McGraw. They would never have even thought about introducing a German Black Forest Cake frozen yogurt to honor Jeremy Schmidt. I say they "would never have even thought about it" not because I think those Ben & Jerry's employees would have thought that a Irish-themed or German-theme dessert would have been offensive. I say they "would never have even thought about it" because they literally would never have thought of it. The idea of making an Irish-themed dessert to honor the American-born Jeremy McGraw would never have crossed their minds. It would have never crossed their minds, because all those Ben & Jerry's employees would have thought of Jeremy McGraw as American rather than Irish. They would have thought of Jeremy Schmidt as American rather than German. However, the vast majority Americans still think of Jeremy Lin as Asian rather than American.
This bothers me a lot. It's bothered me for a long time. I'm a pretty patriotic person, and I believe that America's greatness is based on its diversity. I truly believe that the heterogeneous nature of the US population makes the USA the greatest nation in the world. Sure, nations like England, Germany, and Japan have had their day, and countries like China and India seem to be on the rise, but nations like those will always be limited their lack of diversity. Those countries are limited by the fact that only the majority race and majority culture has a real chance to get to the top. In the USA, anyone can get to the top. They best, brightest, and most ambition people in the world aren't flocking to England, Germany, Japan, China, or India. They're coming HERE, to the good old USA! America is at its best when we follow the spirit of those words at the base of the Statue of Liberty. It's at its best when its people realize that being an American isn't about where your ancestors were from - it's about were you're going. It isn't about what you look like, it's about what you can do - what we all have the opportunity to do. That opportunity should exist for anyone who calls this place home. All the people who live here and collectively make this country great are Americans, and it sickens me that most people in this country think of Jeremy Lin as Asian rather than American. It sickens me that most Americans would think of my wife as being Asian rather than American. I really would have liked to think that our nation would have come farther by 2012, which is why I find stuff like Jeremy Lin fortune-cookie flavored frozen yogurt so disheartening.
That being said, I believe things will get better over time, and I think Jeremy Lin has a unique opportunity to make things better. Let's face it, the guy is pretty much a walking stereotype-breaker. Every time he drives the lane and dunks the ball he helps break the stereotype of the meek unathletic Asian. Plus it appears that Jeremy "gets it" too. Check out this quote from Mr. Lin:
“a lot of people say I’m deceptively athletic and deceptively quick, and I’m not sure what’s ‘deceptive.’ But it could be the fact that I’m Asian-American.”
I really hope Jeremy's success continues and he has the courage ( rather than trying the "play nice" and be non-controversial in order to maximize his endorsement bucks ( See Jordan, Michael ) ) to keep speaking out. Very few Asian-Americans have had the forum that he has now, and I hope he can help the rest of America to understand what it really means to be an American.
Rich
Monday, January 30, 2012
American Exceptionalism
I certainly don't intend to vote for anyone other than President Obama this fall ( I can't see myself ever voting for any Republican in any election unless the Republican party radically changes what they stand for at some point in my life. ), but I enjoy politics in general as a spectator sports, and the Republican contest for the 2012 Presidential nomination has been as entertaining as any political contest in recent memory. The Republican electorate's futile search for a viable non-Romney candidate has been fascinating. It's been entertaining as all hell to watch all the Republican in-fighting and the rise and fall of candidates like Michele Bachmann ( Her anit-gay yet flaming-gay husband has been worth the price of admission. I will never again wonder why Michele Bachman is so f*cked up. ), Rick Perry ( Ooops! ), Herman Cain ( Insert pizza-related sexual harassment joke here ), Rick Santorum ( God, I don't even know where to start with this guy. Just go ahead and Google "Rick Santorum closet" and have some fun. ), Donald Trump ( ????? ), and Newt Gingrich ( who was at the bottom of the polls and had his whole campaign staff resign, then rose to the top of the polls, then dropped back near the bottom before the first contest in Iowa, then rose back to the top of the polls in time for the South Carolina primary, and now has dropped back into to second place again just a week later ).
Newt Gingrich has been by far the most fascinating of the GOP candidates. Considering his personal history ( He cheated on his first wife and discussed divorce with her when she was in the hospital for cancer. He was cheating on his second wife while he tried to get President Clinton impeached for infidelity, and divorced his second wife months after she was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis. ) and his political history ( He was charged with ethics violations when he was Speaker of the House or Representatives. He was reprimanded and fined $300,000 by the House by a 395-28 vote. ), it's no surprise that polls show that less than 30 % of the country views him favorably. As somebody who wants President Obama to win in November, I was pretty happy when it became apparent that Newt actually had a realistic chance to be the GOP nominee. However, after watching the speech below, I've decided that it would dangerous to underestimate Newt.
That speech was brilliant. I don't agree with a single word Newt said in it, but it was brilliant. In 20 minutes, he said just about everything a GOP candidates needs to say to attract GOP voters ( plus he managed to make a sly play for Ron Paul's voters ). Newt hit all the rights notes, including the notes for all the "hidden messages" that all Republican candidates need to send if they want to attract racist Republican voters while not offending non-racist Republican voters. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to imply that all Republicans are racist. What I'm trying to say can best be summed up by this quote from Bill Maher:
"I'm not saying all Republicans are racist, but if you're racist, you're probably a Republican"
Newt Gingrich has been by far the most fascinating of the GOP candidates. Considering his personal history ( He cheated on his first wife and discussed divorce with her when she was in the hospital for cancer. He was cheating on his second wife while he tried to get President Clinton impeached for infidelity, and divorced his second wife months after she was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis. ) and his political history ( He was charged with ethics violations when he was Speaker of the House or Representatives. He was reprimanded and fined $300,000 by the House by a 395-28 vote. ), it's no surprise that polls show that less than 30 % of the country views him favorably. As somebody who wants President Obama to win in November, I was pretty happy when it became apparent that Newt actually had a realistic chance to be the GOP nominee. However, after watching the speech below, I've decided that it would dangerous to underestimate Newt.
That speech was brilliant. I don't agree with a single word Newt said in it, but it was brilliant. In 20 minutes, he said just about everything a GOP candidates needs to say to attract GOP voters ( plus he managed to make a sly play for Ron Paul's voters ). Newt hit all the rights notes, including the notes for all the "hidden messages" that all Republican candidates need to send if they want to attract racist Republican voters while not offending non-racist Republican voters. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to imply that all Republicans are racist. What I'm trying to say can best be summed up by this quote from Bill Maher:
"I'm not saying all Republicans are racist, but if you're racist, you're probably a Republican"
This may not be something that Republicans want to hear, but it's reality, and every Republican political operative knows it. In the game of politics, any campaign manager who is actually earning his or her paycheck will try to win votes by any means necessary. Winning "by any means necessary" means not leaving any votes behind. It means trying to win every vote that's out there to win, including the votes of racists.
Oh, and by the way, if you think that pandering to racist voters is something that only Republican candidates do, I have two words for you ... Sister Souljah.
However, while both Democrats and Republicans have played the racist-card in the past, Republicans certainly have more to gain from it, especially considering who happens to be President right now.
So as I mentioned in this post, Republicans often need to talk in code, and Gingrich is a master at it. A particularly good example of this can been seen in the YouTube clip above starting at the 11:25 mark. Newt says ".. but the centerpiece of this campaign is American Exceptionalism verses the radicalism of Saul Alinsky." and "he ( President Obama ) draws his ( understanding of America ) from Saul Alinsky.". He also makes sure to link President Obama to Saul Alinsky again near the end of the speech. I highly doubt that many voters have any idea who Saul Alinksy is ( I'll admit that I didn't until I looked it up ), but I'm sure most voters recognize that the name "Saul Alinsky" sounds extremely Jewish. So, I wouldn't be surprised if Newt keeps putting "Obama" and "Saul Alinsky" in the same sentences of his campaign speeches, because if there is one thing racists voters hate more than a black guy, it's a black guy who hangs out with Jews ( BTW, Barack Obama was 10 when Saul Alinsky died, so he clearly never met the man, but I don't think racist voters are going to do the research to figure that out. ).
In any case, it's not really Newt or his hidden messages that riled me up and inspired me to write this post. What really got me going was Newt's invocation of American Exceptionalism. Newt's certainly not alone in the GOP field in invoking this concept. Mitt Romney wrote a book called "No Apology: The Case for American Greatness", so no matter who Obama faces in the general election, he's going to to be attacked on this issue.
The concept of American Exceptionalism can be traced all the way back to 1831, and it has certainly evolved over the years, but when Republicans invoke it these days they are usually trying to say that the USA is a near-perfect nation which never does anything wrong. They are trying to imply that anyone who doesn't believe that is unpatriotic. I find that concept to be abhorrent on many levels ( and actually quite an un-patriotic ), and I hope that Obama has the balls to trash this concept when Romney or Gingrich inevitably attacks him with it. However, I'm not really counting on Obama to show any balls, especially because he's been quoted as saying the following about American Exceptionalism:
"I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism."
I can kinda see what Obama was trying to say here. He was talking in the kind of code that Democrats sometime need to talk in. He was trying to assure people like me that he thinks the GOP concept of American Exceptionalism is silly, but he's doing it in a way that he hopes will keep people from thinking that he's unpatriotic. However, I think the comment above isn't a strong enough defense against the inevitable "American Exceptionalism" attacks. The comment above makes him seem wishy-washy to folks like me, and not-sufficiently patriotic to the believers in American Exceptionalism. I think President Obama need to tackle this issue head on. If I were on the President's campaign team, I would advice him to say something like the following if somebody like Gingrich brings up American Exceptionalism in a Presidential debate:
"Republicans like yourself like to perpetuate the fallacy that those who do not believe in American Exceptionalism are not patriotic. You imply that those who do not believe in American Exceptionalism do not believe the USA is the greatest country in the world. Well, Speaker Gingrich ( or Governor Romney - BTW, I'll willing to accept that former Presidents should be called "President" in perpetuity, but it's little silly to use to term "Speaker" to refer to a guy who was booted out of his Speaker job by his own party. ), I do believe we live in the greatest country in the world. However, just because the USA is the best country in the world, that doesn't mean we shouldn't work hard to make it better. Resting on our laurels isn't what made America great. Patting ourselves on the back isn't the American Way. Working hard is the American Way. I believe that all Americans should be working hard to make this country better. Words alone won't make us better. Belief alone won't make us better. Only action will make us better. We need to take the actions that will give every American the opportunity to succeed. ( After that, he should point out Democratic policies that will improve America and help ordinary Americans succeed. )."
Anyway, time to send this post out in time for the Florida Primary. I'm really looking forward to following it tomorrow night.
Rich
Anyway, time to send this post out in time for the Florida Primary. I'm really looking forward to following it tomorrow night.
Rich
Wednesday, December 28, 2011
Occupy Wall Street, the 1%, and the Lucky Coin.
Income equality has been getting a lot of attention these last few months - so much so that's it's certainly going to play a big role in 2012 Presidential election. Most people you run across have an instinctively emotional reaction to the issue ( "Wall Street Pigs!" / "Dirty Hippies!" ) which is often shaped in large part by their political leanings and personal history. However, I don't think you can really get to the bottom of this issue, or decide what actions ( if any ) need to be taken unless you consider the roll luck plays in all of this.
Personally, I don't have a problem with income inequality per se. I like living a relatively free society ( "relatively" is an important qualifier here, because I'm certainly not an anarchist or a Ron Paul-esque uber-Libertarian ), and in any free society you are going to have winners are losers. Left completely to their own devices, some people will succeed and some people will fail, and ultimately that leads to "haves" and "have nots".
However, while I certainly recognize that life is inherently unfair ( and never can be made completely fair ), I do believe in fairness. While I know that the playing field of life will never be completely level, I feel like society should take steps to make the playing field more level, which in turn would lower the degree of income inequality. #
( #: I could probably write an entire book about the steps I think society should take to make the playing field more level, but because I don't want to distract from the main point of this post, I'll just list two examples below:
1) The estate tax ( Or as conservatives like to call it, "The Death Tax" ) needs to stay, and if anything, needs to be at a higher rate. While I do believe well-off parents should have the right to give their kids the benefit of their wealth, I feel this needs to be tempered a bit for the sake of fairness. If a person becomes wealthy simply because of accident of birth rather than his/her own efforts, I don't think it's too much for society to ask that person to give at least half of his/her inheritance back to society so the money can be used to help the less fortunate. Bill Gates kids are always going to have an unfair advantage over kids who grow up in poor families. We certainly shouldn't be changing the tax code to give the Gates kids an even larger advantage ( and for whatever it's worth, Bill Gates agrees ( See the 2:30 mark of this video ) ).
2) Public school funding should be made more equitable. In the USA, public school funding comes largely from local property taxes. This means that kids who are already lucky enough to grow up in wealthy suburbs with high property taxes, also get the benefit of very well-funded public schools. It's just not right that kids with well-off parents get to go to public schools with the best teachers ( If you were a talented and in-demand teacher, and suburban schools were paying $20,000 more a year than schools in poor inner-city areas, where would you choose to teach? ) and the latest high-tech equipment, while kids in poor areas go to schools with 40 year-old textbooks. I know that it's unlikely that public school funding will ever change in my lifetime, but I really believe that funding for public education should come entirely from federal taxes and the money should be distributed such that every child in an American public school gets roughly the same quality of teachers, textbooks, and equipment. I should also note that I'm saying this as a parent of two school-aged kids who lives in an area with extremely high property taxes. I know a more equitable public school funding system would result in less public school funding going to my own kids, but I really think the USA needs more fairness in public education. My kids don't need a fancy video board in their classrooms if that means poor kids need to use obsolete textbooks. Heck, I don't even think half of these fancy new educational tools are needed for a better education. We just had a basic blackboard and #2 pencils in our classrooms when I was a kid, and I turned out fine. )
Of course, conservatives will argue that any attempt to "redistribute wealth" via more equitable taxes or public funding reeks of "Socialism" ( See "Plumber, Joe" ). Conservatives will make passionate arguments based on fairness ( but they'll make a very different kind of fairness argument than the one I'm making ). They'll argue that any system that distributes money from people who work hard to people who don't work hard is inherently unfair.
Of course, therein lies the crux of the issue. Therein lies the argument that often begins ... "Why should I give my hard-earned money to ...".
The truth is, a lot of conservative folks believe that there is a nearly linear relationship between hard work and success. They feel that the rich have earned every cent they've made, and that it is unfair to distribute money from the hard-working rich to the lazy poor.
OK, to be fair, most conservative don't hold views quite that extreme, but there is certainly an undercurrent of that feeling behind all conservative ideas about tax policy. There is certainly a belief that rich people have earned their wealth and deserve to keep their wealth. I'm certainly not going to try and refute that the vast majority of rich people have worked extremely hard to accumulate their wealth. Most rich people do work really hard. However, I think a lot of conservatives make the following incorrect logical inference:
Most people who are wealthy have worked very hard.
Therefore ...
Most people who are not wealthy, did not work hard.
The conclusion above simply isn't true, because it fails to take basic probability ( what some might call "luck" ) into account.
Let's say you had 1024 coins, and decided to play the following game with them:
1) You start by flipping all 1024 coins and discarding all coins that do not land on heads.
2) In each subsequent round of the game, you flip all of the coins that are left, and discard all coins that do not land on heads.
3) You play until just one coin is left ( if all coins are eliminated in a round, you should play the round over ), and the coin that is left is declared the winner.
On average, you'll be left with one coin after playing 10 rounds of this game. I think most people would recognize that there was nothing special about the winning coin that made it come up heads 10 times in a row. I think most people would recognize that if you played the same game again, the "lucky" coin that won the last game would have a 50% chance of being eliminated in the first round of the next game. The lucky coin didn't win the game because it had some special ability to come up heads. The lucky coin didn't win because it somehow deserved to win. The lucky coin won because in a probabilistic sense, one of those 1024 coins had to win.
However, as much as people are willing to accept the influence of random chance when it comes to coins, we tend not to consider the influence of randomness in the lives of people. I'm sure we've all watched those CNBC biographies of successful people from time, and the narrative is almost always the same. The subject of these biographies is always ambitious, persistent, and hard-working, and we are presented with a series of events in the person's life which lead to the person's success. Along the way, the subjects of these biographies need to make some critical decisions, and the subject becomes successful because he or she almost always makes the right decision. After watching these biographies, you left are with the impression that successful people are successful because they are smart enough to make the right choices in their lives. However, from a pure probability standpoint, it is more accurate to say that successful people made they right choices because they are the people that ultimately became successful.
In other words, exceptionally successful people are not successful because they have some extraordinary ability to always make the right decision. In any group of exceptionally successful people, you'll find that all the people in that group made the right choices necessary to become successful, because if they had not made the right choices, they wouldn't be in that group of successful people. The exceptionally successful people in the world are essentially lucky coins.
Now, don't get me wrong - I'm not trying to say that hard work and talent don't matter at all. I actually think they matter a lot. Not everybody can become a self-made billionaire, and the people who achieve that level of successful are almost all extremely hard-working and talented. I firmly believe that there is a positive correlation between hard work and success, as well as a positive correlation between talent and success. I'm quite sure that the average person who makes $200,000 a year is more hard-working and talented than the average person who makes $50,000. I'm sure that the average billionaire who makes $200,000,000 a year is more hard-working and talented than the average person who makes $200,000 a year. However, the person who makes $200,000 a year isn't 4 times as hard-working and talented as the person who makes $50,000. The billionaire who makes $200,000,000 a year certainly isn't 1000 times as hard-working and talented as the person making $200,000 a year. Even the most extraordinarily talented people need some degree of luck to achieve extraordinary success. Somebody like Steve Jobs was almost certainly a one in million talent and visionary, and he probably would have been a success even if he had been relatively unlucky in business.
However ...
What if Steve Jobs had been raised by his biological parents rather than the adoptive parents who helped mold him into the person he would become?
What if he had not been adopted by parents who lived in area full of high-tech companies ( Including
Hewlett-Packard, where Steve attended after school lectures and took a summer job. )?
What if Steve adoptive father hadn't work on electronics with him in the family garage?
What is Steve's adoptive family didn't have a garage?
What if Steve Jobs had never met Steve Wozniak?
What if Xerox had realized how valuable their mouse/GUI system was before sharing it with Jobs?
What if Ross Perot had not decided to invest in NeXT when the company was running out of money?
What if Apple hadn't decided to invite Jobs back to the company in 1997?
There may have been 100 people out there with the talent and vision equal to Steve Jobs, and I would bet that almost all of them achieved a large measure of success in their lives. However, a few them were probably ruined by a few unlucky breaks early in life, and most of the 100 probably "only" become millionaires rather than billionaires.
I firmly believe that I live in the greatest country in the world, and I love that my country affords each person the opportunity to be a great success. However, that opportunity clearly isn't distributed equally, and random chance can certainly play a role in who fails and who succeeds. I believe in the American Dream, and I certainly don't want to take that dream away from those who have achieved it.
However, it makes me angry when people suggest that the wealthy pay too much in taxes already. The wealthy are generally very talented and hard working, but they are also generally quite fortunate, and I certainly don't think it's unfair to ask them to share more of that wealth with those who are less fortunate ( Oh, and don't get me stared on all that Laffer Curve nonsense, or we'll be here all day! ). The bottom line is that the wealthy have attained wealth that is far out of proportion with their level of hard work and talent. It's time that those "lucky coins" share a few coins of their own.
Rich
Personally, I don't have a problem with income inequality per se. I like living a relatively free society ( "relatively" is an important qualifier here, because I'm certainly not an anarchist or a Ron Paul-esque uber-Libertarian ), and in any free society you are going to have winners are losers. Left completely to their own devices, some people will succeed and some people will fail, and ultimately that leads to "haves" and "have nots".
However, while I certainly recognize that life is inherently unfair ( and never can be made completely fair ), I do believe in fairness. While I know that the playing field of life will never be completely level, I feel like society should take steps to make the playing field more level, which in turn would lower the degree of income inequality. #
( #: I could probably write an entire book about the steps I think society should take to make the playing field more level, but because I don't want to distract from the main point of this post, I'll just list two examples below:
1) The estate tax ( Or as conservatives like to call it, "The Death Tax" ) needs to stay, and if anything, needs to be at a higher rate. While I do believe well-off parents should have the right to give their kids the benefit of their wealth, I feel this needs to be tempered a bit for the sake of fairness. If a person becomes wealthy simply because of accident of birth rather than his/her own efforts, I don't think it's too much for society to ask that person to give at least half of his/her inheritance back to society so the money can be used to help the less fortunate. Bill Gates kids are always going to have an unfair advantage over kids who grow up in poor families. We certainly shouldn't be changing the tax code to give the Gates kids an even larger advantage ( and for whatever it's worth, Bill Gates agrees ( See the 2:30 mark of this video ) ).
2) Public school funding should be made more equitable. In the USA, public school funding comes largely from local property taxes. This means that kids who are already lucky enough to grow up in wealthy suburbs with high property taxes, also get the benefit of very well-funded public schools. It's just not right that kids with well-off parents get to go to public schools with the best teachers ( If you were a talented and in-demand teacher, and suburban schools were paying $20,000 more a year than schools in poor inner-city areas, where would you choose to teach? ) and the latest high-tech equipment, while kids in poor areas go to schools with 40 year-old textbooks. I know that it's unlikely that public school funding will ever change in my lifetime, but I really believe that funding for public education should come entirely from federal taxes and the money should be distributed such that every child in an American public school gets roughly the same quality of teachers, textbooks, and equipment. I should also note that I'm saying this as a parent of two school-aged kids who lives in an area with extremely high property taxes. I know a more equitable public school funding system would result in less public school funding going to my own kids, but I really think the USA needs more fairness in public education. My kids don't need a fancy video board in their classrooms if that means poor kids need to use obsolete textbooks. Heck, I don't even think half of these fancy new educational tools are needed for a better education. We just had a basic blackboard and #2 pencils in our classrooms when I was a kid, and I turned out fine. )
Of course, conservatives will argue that any attempt to "redistribute wealth" via more equitable taxes or public funding reeks of "Socialism" ( See "Plumber, Joe" ). Conservatives will make passionate arguments based on fairness ( but they'll make a very different kind of fairness argument than the one I'm making ). They'll argue that any system that distributes money from people who work hard to people who don't work hard is inherently unfair.
Of course, therein lies the crux of the issue. Therein lies the argument that often begins ... "Why should I give my hard-earned money to ...".
The truth is, a lot of conservative folks believe that there is a nearly linear relationship between hard work and success. They feel that the rich have earned every cent they've made, and that it is unfair to distribute money from the hard-working rich to the lazy poor.
OK, to be fair, most conservative don't hold views quite that extreme, but there is certainly an undercurrent of that feeling behind all conservative ideas about tax policy. There is certainly a belief that rich people have earned their wealth and deserve to keep their wealth. I'm certainly not going to try and refute that the vast majority of rich people have worked extremely hard to accumulate their wealth. Most rich people do work really hard. However, I think a lot of conservatives make the following incorrect logical inference:
Most people who are wealthy have worked very hard.
Therefore ...
Most people who are not wealthy, did not work hard.
The conclusion above simply isn't true, because it fails to take basic probability ( what some might call "luck" ) into account.
Let's say you had 1024 coins, and decided to play the following game with them:
1) You start by flipping all 1024 coins and discarding all coins that do not land on heads.
2) In each subsequent round of the game, you flip all of the coins that are left, and discard all coins that do not land on heads.
3) You play until just one coin is left ( if all coins are eliminated in a round, you should play the round over ), and the coin that is left is declared the winner.
On average, you'll be left with one coin after playing 10 rounds of this game. I think most people would recognize that there was nothing special about the winning coin that made it come up heads 10 times in a row. I think most people would recognize that if you played the same game again, the "lucky" coin that won the last game would have a 50% chance of being eliminated in the first round of the next game. The lucky coin didn't win the game because it had some special ability to come up heads. The lucky coin didn't win because it somehow deserved to win. The lucky coin won because in a probabilistic sense, one of those 1024 coins had to win.
However, as much as people are willing to accept the influence of random chance when it comes to coins, we tend not to consider the influence of randomness in the lives of people. I'm sure we've all watched those CNBC biographies of successful people from time, and the narrative is almost always the same. The subject of these biographies is always ambitious, persistent, and hard-working, and we are presented with a series of events in the person's life which lead to the person's success. Along the way, the subjects of these biographies need to make some critical decisions, and the subject becomes successful because he or she almost always makes the right decision. After watching these biographies, you left are with the impression that successful people are successful because they are smart enough to make the right choices in their lives. However, from a pure probability standpoint, it is more accurate to say that successful people made they right choices because they are the people that ultimately became successful.
In other words, exceptionally successful people are not successful because they have some extraordinary ability to always make the right decision. In any group of exceptionally successful people, you'll find that all the people in that group made the right choices necessary to become successful, because if they had not made the right choices, they wouldn't be in that group of successful people. The exceptionally successful people in the world are essentially lucky coins.
Now, don't get me wrong - I'm not trying to say that hard work and talent don't matter at all. I actually think they matter a lot. Not everybody can become a self-made billionaire, and the people who achieve that level of successful are almost all extremely hard-working and talented. I firmly believe that there is a positive correlation between hard work and success, as well as a positive correlation between talent and success. I'm quite sure that the average person who makes $200,000 a year is more hard-working and talented than the average person who makes $50,000. I'm sure that the average billionaire who makes $200,000,000 a year is more hard-working and talented than the average person who makes $200,000 a year. However, the person who makes $200,000 a year isn't 4 times as hard-working and talented as the person who makes $50,000. The billionaire who makes $200,000,000 a year certainly isn't 1000 times as hard-working and talented as the person making $200,000 a year. Even the most extraordinarily talented people need some degree of luck to achieve extraordinary success. Somebody like Steve Jobs was almost certainly a one in million talent and visionary, and he probably would have been a success even if he had been relatively unlucky in business.
However ...
What if Steve Jobs had been raised by his biological parents rather than the adoptive parents who helped mold him into the person he would become?
What if he had not been adopted by parents who lived in area full of high-tech companies ( Including
Hewlett-Packard, where Steve attended after school lectures and took a summer job. )?
What if Steve adoptive father hadn't work on electronics with him in the family garage?
What is Steve's adoptive family didn't have a garage?
What if Steve Jobs had never met Steve Wozniak?
What if Xerox had realized how valuable their mouse/GUI system was before sharing it with Jobs?
What if Ross Perot had not decided to invest in NeXT when the company was running out of money?
What if Apple hadn't decided to invite Jobs back to the company in 1997?
There may have been 100 people out there with the talent and vision equal to Steve Jobs, and I would bet that almost all of them achieved a large measure of success in their lives. However, a few them were probably ruined by a few unlucky breaks early in life, and most of the 100 probably "only" become millionaires rather than billionaires.
I firmly believe that I live in the greatest country in the world, and I love that my country affords each person the opportunity to be a great success. However, that opportunity clearly isn't distributed equally, and random chance can certainly play a role in who fails and who succeeds. I believe in the American Dream, and I certainly don't want to take that dream away from those who have achieved it.
However, it makes me angry when people suggest that the wealthy pay too much in taxes already. The wealthy are generally very talented and hard working, but they are also generally quite fortunate, and I certainly don't think it's unfair to ask them to share more of that wealth with those who are less fortunate ( Oh, and don't get me stared on all that Laffer Curve nonsense, or we'll be here all day! ). The bottom line is that the wealthy have attained wealth that is far out of proportion with their level of hard work and talent. It's time that those "lucky coins" share a few coins of their own.
Rich
Sunday, December 25, 2011
How the Jets Stole Christmas
My immediate reaction to yesterday's Jets debacle was the "The Jets stole Christmas", which led me to fire off the tweet below:
And what happened then...? Well ... in Jets-ville they say, that Mark Sanchez fumbled the football away.#JetsStoleChristmas
There was a time in my life when I would have spent hours fleshing this Grinch/Jets idea into a full-fledged parody poem. However, those days are gone - my two little guys keep me far too busy. However, that doesn't mean I can't write a stanza or two ...
Every Jets fans in Jets-ville liked winning a lot ...
But it seems like the Jets,
Who played games in Jets-ville,
Did NOT!
The Jets played like crap! The whole football season!
Why did they suck? No one quite knows the reason.
It could be because their O-line wasn't right.
It could be be because their OC wasn't bright.
But I think the most likely reason of all
may have been their QB turning over the ball.
Merry Christmas all!
Rich
P.S. Go Knicks!!!!
And what happened then...? Well ... in Jets-ville they say, that Mark Sanchez fumbled the football away.
There was a time in my life when I would have spent hours fleshing this Grinch/Jets idea into a full-fledged parody poem. However, those days are gone - my two little guys keep me far too busy. However, that doesn't mean I can't write a stanza or two ...
Every Jets fans in Jets-ville liked winning a lot ...
But it seems like the Jets,
Who played games in Jets-ville,
Did NOT!
The Jets played like crap! The whole football season!
Why did they suck? No one quite knows the reason.
It could be because their O-line wasn't right.
It could be be because their OC wasn't bright.
But I think the most likely reason of all
may have been their QB turning over the ball.
Merry Christmas all!
Rich
P.S. Go Knicks!!!!
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