Ralph Wiggum Makes Me Smile

If you do not like it, you can go drink some bleach!

The Reason Juan Williams Should Have Been Fired

For those of you who have not been watching Fox News for the past few days the most important thing in the world was NPR's firing of a one Juan Williams for saying this on the O'Reilly Factor. "I mean, look Bill [O'Reilly], I'm not a bigot (this is what people say when they are about to say something bogus), you know the kind of books I've written on the civil rights movement in this country, but when I get on a plane, I got to tell you, if I see people who are in Muslim garb and I think, you know, they are identifying themselves first and foremost as Muslims, I get worried. I get nervous."

Let just get this out of the way, the 9/11 hijackers, shoe bomber, the Time Square bomber and the underwear bomber did not wear a Thobe, Bisht, Shalwar Kameez or Ghutra and Egal. They had on slacks, jeans, button ups, polo's and hooded sweatshirts. Terrorists probably know that wearing traditional Muslim clothing to the airport is not a good idea when you are dealing with a security detail who's expertise about Muslims comes from the TV show 24, Call Of Duty 4 and watching action movies where brown people are the villains. Now that I think about it, as a fan of 24, the Muslim villans on that show never really dressed in the traditional clothing that Mr. Williams seems to be so afraid of. If anything you have less to fear from Muslims wearing "Muslim garb". Thinking critically about the situation, you should be put at ease when you see someone dressed in the items listed above because fairly or unfairly there is a good chance they have been profiled thoroughly.

With that said as a professional journalist and commentator Juan Williams should be able to think more critically than someone (me) who plans their day around completing the daily challenges on Halo Reach, as a man of color he should have an understanding of how easily some of those in the general populous can turn their fear of minorities into unfair treatment and sometimes violence, and as someone who should know how the media game is played by now, he should have known better than to say what he said on Bill O'Reilly's show. Not being consistent with NPR's editorial standards and practices, and undermining his own credibility as a news analyst is something you get a stern closed door talking to about. Juan Williams should have been fired for being intellectually dishonest and for being a fear monger. Luckily, there is a place for people who think like this and they just gave him a $2 million contract.

This Guy Has No Reason To Be Smiling

Yesterday I did something that I have never done, and that was feel sorry for Clarence Thomas. During yesterday's news cycle it was revealed that his wife Virginia decided to call Anita Hill and leave this on her voice mail.


“Good morning, Anita Hill, it’s Ginny Thomas. I just wanted to reach across the airwaves and the years and ask you to consider something. I would love you to consider an apology sometime and some full explanation of why you did what you did with my husband. So give it some thought and certainly pray about this and come to understand why you did what you did. Okay have a good day.”

Now if he put his wife up to this, I feel sorry for him becuase having your woman fight your battles for you in this manner are the actions of a born again bitch. If his wife did it on her own, then I really feel sorry for him because he clearly does not have his woman in check. Most people don't even bring up Anita Hill when they speak about Clarence Thomas. His views on the reach of Executive Powers and the 4th Amednment are much more worthy of conversation. I don't know what how she thought it would be benefiting her husband by refreshing everyone's memory about how his confirmation brought Long Dong Silver into the American lexicon.

Anita Hill did the classy thing when she got the voicemail. She dismissed the request, contacted the authorities, and said no comment. Now if she was not such a classy individual, I see her return voicemail going something like this.

"Good morning, Virgina, this is Anita Hill. First bitch, let me start by saying that I don't appreciate people calling here playing on my goddamn phone. If anyone is owed an apology it is me. Your husband has not always been henpecked and simple. The last thing you want me to do is give you a full explanation about what went down. Back in the day when we worked together at the EEOC, Clarence was a stone cold freak and liked to tell people all about it. Since it is clear that you've got more heart than your punk-ass old man, why don't you quit with the childish phone games and come see me so we can talk this out woman to woman. We can talk about about how I was willing to take a lie detector test 19 years ago and your husband wasn't, we can talk about how your PAC took half a million dollars from a secret donor so you could dress up like an idiot and sell tax cuts for the rich to working class people, or we could just talk about how you need to shut the fuck up when grown folks is talking. Have a nice day"

Happy 25th Birthday NES

The Nintendo Entertainment System came out 25 years ago today. If you are anywhere close to my age this system defined a portion of you childhood and made video games popular again in America after Atari and Mattel completely destroyed the market in the early 80's.

I remember when I first heard about them when they were test marketed in New York for Christmas 1986. I told my best friend Kevin that I was going to ask for one for my 10th birthday. He told me that his mom said they were going to go out of business. Now mind you this is April 1987 and there was no internet, video game press and we did not know anybody who had one so with this information I never even brought it up to my parents. Fast forward 4 months, I went to his house after his 10th birthday, and guess what Kevin got? This muthafucker got the zapper, the robot, and the at least 5 games. I should have kicked his ass up and down Burlington Ave for telling me that lie, but he had had Super Mario Bros & Excitebike so as a 10 year old I got over that shit pretty damn quick. Fast forward about 19 years, as the best man at his wedding I told this story in front of all of his friends and family.

Since I am a huge video game nerd, here are some other random facts about the NES and my life that I just feel like sharing.

When Super Mario Bros 2 came out, it was really hard to find but my parents still found a copy and I got it for me for Christmas. I told the other kids to suck it after I got back from Christmas break. After I beat it, I actually rented it to other kids in my class for 3$ a weekend.

I never beat the first Mega Man, that shit is still one of the hardest games ever created.

Never challenge DJ Metrognome to a game of Super Tecmo Bowl, it is the only game he knows how to play and he will embarrass you with the Kansas City Chiefs.

The games averaged $50 each in the 1980's, which means with inflation Contra would cost well over $100 in 2010.

I am convinced I am the only person who actually liked The Adventures Of Bayou Billy.

If you are friend of mine chances are I don't know your phone number but I can still remember the code to get to Mike Tyson in Mike Tyson's Punch-out. Ask me the next time you see me if you think I'm lying.

Atari was supposed to partner with Nintendo to put the system out, but they turned down the partnership when they found out Nintendo put out a version of Donkey Kong for the Colecovison. They should teach a class in college on how petty shit can lose you billions of dollars and use this as an example.

I gave my NES to my cousin Tiffany when I was in high school, that was a mistake.

My mom told me if we get you this Nintendo, we are not getting you any other video game system ever. She stuck to her guns because when I wanted a Sega Genesis 5 years later she told me to kick rocks.

Keep T.I. in Jail!

Some people make stupid decisions, and some people are just criminals. T.I. is just a criminal. He is going back to jail for 11 months because he could not wait to get out of his $300K Mercedes to smoke some of that good California weed.

I know some people may be broken up and feel sorry for this dude, but I am actually mad he did not get more time. How does a 3 time fellon who is already on parole for federal weapons charges get only 11 months for coke weed and pills? There is somebody locked up right now for 11 months because they drove while suspended and had no proof of car insurance.

At what point as a man do you realize that missing your kid's birthdays for selfish reasons is not cool? For that reason alone, I don't want to see any free T.I. shirts, and he does not deserve any shout outs from anybody. We need to stop turning every rapper who goes to jail into Steven Biko. I know too many people who are more talented than T.I., Lil' Wayne, or DMX that will never get their shot, to miss one night of sleep on these fools who are handed the keys to the kingdom.

Do you know who I really feel sorry for in all this?, not his wife, his kids, and damn sure not his record company. They should be used to this shit by now. I fell sorry for Plaxico Burress. Despite having a previous criminal record that only includes traffic tickets, Burress got 2 years in prison for shooting himself in a club. I may view him as stupid when he gets out, but not a criminal. When Plaxico applied for parole recently he was denied, in fact I think it is a pretty safe bet that T.I. will be doing shows again before Burress has an opportunity to catch another touchdown. I guess Burress should have found someone to tell on when he got in a jam, that is the only way I can explain T.I.'s never getting the book thrown at him.

Body & Soul

For those of you of a certain age, you may not remember a time when female rappers did not have to whore it up, act as if they were mildly retarded and cover themselves in tacky tattoos to get on TV. This is one of my favorite videos from that era.

My Anti-Crash Moment

In the summer of 1992, my family was blessed with the opportunity to go to Spain for our summer vacation. My father had won some kind of corporate contest, and he and my mother got to go to Barcelona for the Olympics. Luckily they weren't like those negletful parents in 80's teen movies, so after they had kicked it over there for a week my sister and I flew and met them in Madrid. Since my dad had been building frequent flyer points for the better part of the 80's we flew over there first class for free.

As I'm settling into my first class seat and soaking in the almost suffocating hospitality, the white passenger in front of me turns around says "still in first huh?" What?, oh I get it Mr. White Man, you see a brother chilling in first class and he had to be bumbed up. I guess I can't pay for an internationl ticket (which I did not) like you, since you can't pay for plane tickets with food stamps. Luckily I said all of these things in my head before I reacted to the situation, because I had forgotten that I had on my Atlanta Braves hat. The guy was not a racsist, he was a baseball fan and yes the Braves were in first place. So I replied "yep still in first". He proceeded to give me the thumbs up and did not bother me the rest of the flight. Relieved that I was not going to have to put up with his foolishness for the next 12 hours I ordered the chicken cor don bleu with lime sorbet for desert, put on my Public Enemy tape, and enjoyed the rest of my flight.

I ripped this from my old blog that nobody read because yesterday Bobby Cox managed his last game with the Atlanta Braves. This is how my mind works.

Guy is clearly not getting back together!

I don't know if he is serious or not, and I don't really care. If they turned this into a weekly show I would demand that he keep the yellow suit for every episode. I figure if you show up to a white persons house dressed up like Curious George's best friend, they have to let you train their dog.

What Don't You Understand About 12 Items Or Less?

I consider myself to be a pretty calm individual. To me getting angry about the things that happen in everyday life is a waste of my mental energy. That said there is something so stupid and petty that I cannot get over, people who don't know how to use the automatic checkout at the grocery store.

I'm a staight up bachelor, so I never buy more than 20 dollars worth of food at a time. I know this sounds strange, but I'm also really cheap when it comes to buying food. I've figured out that if you don't buy junk food and you pay attention to your weekly circulars and use a cupon here and there, you can feed yourself for a week on between 15 to 20 dollars and that includes beer. That said when I go to the grocery store I want to get in and get out, so I use the self check out lines that do not require me to even deal with a check out person. This should usually saves time, but every once and a while it winds up extending my stay at the store because these lines are like rest havens for the mentaly challenged. Below is a list of people who need to stick with traditional check out and perhaps wear helmets in public as not to incur any more brain inuries.

THE NON-READER: The directions in the self check out are not hard to follow if you can read, but if you want to see exactly where the public school system has failed a segment of America. You need to look no further than your local grocery store. What is really sad is that most of these terminals talk in both english and spanish. So most people who can't read also are unable to listen.

THE CHECK WRITTER: It is 2010, why are still writting checks for anything other than your rent, mortgage, or car payment? I'm sure there is a list of things people still write checks for but 17 dollars worth of candy and potato chips should not be on that list.

THE COMPUTER ILLITERATE: If you have never logged on to the internet or played minesweeper on a computer stay out of this line!!! I don't like discrimination of any kind, but when I see an old person in this line I know they are going to add an extra 5 minutes to my day. The worst is when one of these people have to figure out what to do when buying produce because that involves extra keystrokes and even more reading & concentration.

THE ASSHOLE: This is the person who knows how to use the self check out, but does not care that this line is usually for people with 12 items or less. There is a reason why the scales only hold so much. The worst thing about this is when somebody comes into the 12 items or less line with 150 dollars worth of groceries, nobody who works at the grocery store will tell the person to get the hell out of line, so I have to risk getting into it with some mouth breather when all I wanted was some ground turkey and 24 Oz cans of Bud Select.

No, I Wasn't Kidding

Last night, I was out and about and a friend who read my post about people wearing fake polo and asked me if I really got everything I ordered from Ralph Lauren in gift boxes? Yes I do.