And so tonight it will be official. McCain/Palin vs. Obama/Biden for the next president/vice-president of the United States. **sigh** I’m like most people and have no clue which way this is going to go. I wasn’t really waiting with baited breath on McCain’s VP pick so I can’t say I was floored/shocked/traumatized when he announced last week.
Wanna know my honest concerns about this election? All I keep hearing about is the solution for this, the solution for that. Both parties know how to fix what’s ‘broken’ in America today. Really? It’s not like things broke overnight last week. There have been problems in this country for years. Y-E-A-R-S. Suddenly, both candidates have the answers? I call foul. The majority of our problems can’t be solved overnight and they most certainly can’t be solved on a federal level.
Energy independence? This is not a federal issue. Or rather, it shouldn’t be. This should be up to the individual states. Each state’s energy consumption is different and if a solution for true energy independence is desired, each governor should come up with a plan for their respective state. For example, Delaware and Delmarva Power [finally] partnering with Blue Water Wind to build off-shore wind farms to help generate power. If each state works to solve it’s own energy problem, then there isn’t a national energy problem. Have the federal government fund research into the technology needed to utilize renewable energy but leave it up to the states to adopt it. If a state wants to go green, they will. If not, they’ll be plagued by the same types of energy problems we’ve got right now until it’s citizens get so fed up they fire everyone in the govenment that has been resisting the change. See what I’m saying?
Our president should be no more than a name-signer. He/she approves plans drafted by the cabinet and congress. He/she should NOT devise the plans. That is why they have advisers. It’s also why we have congress. So you want to fix the “broken” Washington? Your first step ought to be to fire everyone in it and that includes both presidential candidates.
The president isn’t supposed to be doing things FOR us. We’re supposed to do them for ourselves and until the states and their governors remember that, I seriously doubt you’re going to see any change in the current list of ‘problems’ facing our nation.
How will I ever get interested in a movie again?! Sadly, as you may have heard already, the man known as ‘movie trailer guy’ and ‘the voice of God’ Don LaFontaine has passed away from complications of a collapsed lung. He was 68. Many people knew him only by the sound of his voice until the recent Geico commercial put a face to the voice. A quick search on YouTube or Google Video, though, will turn up dozens of trailers, interviews and other recorded moments of his life.
From the age of 13 when his voice suddenly changed mid-sentence as he was offering to help his mother with the dishes, he became instantly famous, saying in one of his interviews “I suddenly became everybody’s dad. ‘Sorry, Jimmy can’t make it in to school today he’s not feeling well’. ” His big break in Hollywood coming when the man slated to read the trailer for “Gunfighters of Casa Grande” didn’t show, the studio asked him to record a trailer from scratch. They liked it, bought it and thus the star was born.
A conservative estimate puts the number of movie trailers he’s done at 5,000 and the number of TV spots at around 750,000. (For any of you 24 fans out there, that’s his voice in the previews). He has the distinction of being the single busiest actor in the Screen Actors Guild.
He is survived by his wife Nita Whitaker and their two daughters.
In a world without Don LaFontaine, movies just won’t be the same. Ever again.
In the face of dwindling support, increased opposition in Parliament, inability for any legislation to be passed, Japan’s Prime Minister has resigned. Yasuo Fukuda today announced he is stepping down and wishes for a fresh start for the government and the Japanese people as a whole saying “we need a new line-up to cope with a new session of parliament.”
He did not call for a general election and will instead have an internal party vote to choose his successor. Of course, opposition parties are clamoring an declaring they’ll take control during the next general election. But even the act of replacing him with someone new in his own party who will try to jump start the government is something to speak of.
Think about that for a second. A political leader realizing at constant odds with parliament, getting done while he is in office, his approval rating at 29% and falling, decides that the best thing for the people of his country is for him to step aside and let someone else try to energize the government. Obviously this isn’t something that can happen frequently but it is a one shot chance to turn things around.
Are you wondering the same thing I am? Imagine, in the face of massive public disdain, the lack of doing anything productive for our country and being at increased odds with congress, our commander-in-chief stepped aside and his party voted on someone else to take charge and get things done. Think about how things would be different. Maybe no stalled economy. Maybe no wars in multiple foreign countries. Maybe no financial crisis.
We’ve got the succession of power rules in the Constitution so if the president stepped down, he’d be replaced by the vice-president. Currently, that would be even more of a disaster. Dick “Faceshot” Cheney as president? See ya! I’m off to live in Canada, eh?. Plus I don’t think that type of move meshes well with the American “beat the dead horse till it’s dead and don’t stop till it’s dead” attitude. Though I could be wrong.
I though it very interesting than any political leader would even contemplate, let alone do, something like this. Good for him. Here’s hoping it was the right move for Japan.
Awww. Get ready to shed a tear. Or vomit profusely. Apparently Diddy is upset at high oil prices and it’s cramping his style. High prices are FORCING him to check his spending and fly on commercial airlines instead of his private jet. OH SNAP. See, I knew high gas prices were going to hit hard. I mean, the day you’ve gotta stop using your private jet and settle for a commercial airline. IT’S JUST GONE TOO DAMN FAR!
I’m going to restrain myself here and not even touch the reasons gas prices are so high and that it really doesn’t have much to do with Saudi Arabia in the first place.
In an effort to quell the rising prices, Mr. Diddy has posted a video on YouTube pleading with his Saudi Arabian “brothers and sisters” asking them for free oil. Sorry Didds, I had some drinkies with the Saudi Arabian monarchy last week and asked for the very same thing. All I got was this lousy t-shirt that says “American Toolbag”.
Sometimes I surf through YouTube trying to find stupid videos that will make me laugh. I don’t have a particular type of search that I do, sometimes I’ll type in ’stupid’ and go from there. Last month while I was pumped up about seeing Journey in concert again, I went looking for videos of them, be it live concert footage or some of their old music videos. (You remember what those are, don’t you? Music videos?)
I came across the video for Separate Ways. I have no idea what the band or the director of the video were aiming for. If it was completely discontinuity and random shots of Steve Perry dodging construction equipment on a dock, they hit it head on. Why the hell is Jon Cain’s keyboard mounted on a frickin wall? Anyone??? Help me out here. Ross Valory looks like he’s straight out of an 80s porn movie. And if you define “badass rockstars” as playing invisible instruments…well, all I can say is it’s definitely ’80s’. It is so completely insane that it has inspired several spoof videos, the best one by a group of kids from Oregon (note the Oregon Ducks logo on the garage door windows). It, by far, contains the most hilarity.
But there are other songs. That’s right. Apparently a trend started with totally ripping Journey music videos, or in some cases just creating a video from one of their songs. This is why I’m writing this post. You MUST see two of said videos. One is ‘Ask the Lonely’, which happens to be my favorite Journey song, and the other is ‘Stone in Love’. The two were shot in what seems to be sequential order. They’re stupid, immature and damn funny.
Highlight? 2:16 into ‘Stone In Love’, “Steve Perry” pops out of the trunk of what looks like a Olds Alero and breaks into the chorus while the ‘band’ is in the bed of a pick-up truck driving alongside. Watch at the end of that scene where “Neal Schon” nearly falls out of the pickup.
They just make you want to say, HEY! Remember the 80s? and then ask these guys to make more videos! Can you think of any 80s rock video you’d like spoofed?
And so tonight it will be official. McCain/Palin vs. Obama/Biden for the next president/vice-president of the United States. **sigh** I’m like most people and have no clue which way this is going to go. I wasn’t really waiting with baited breath on McCain’s VP pick so I can’t say I was floored/shocked/traumatized when he announced last week.
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