TRIBUTE TO A LEGEND

Lost in all of last week's boo-hooing over Jacko / Billy Mays / Oscar Meyer was the passing of a real legend. It's been a week now, and nobody here at Top Ten has mentioned it, so allow me to take a quick minute to pay tribute. Last Saturday, while he was innocently napping on the coach, Steve LaTreal McNair (1973-2009) was shot four times (2x head / 2x chest) by his whacko Iranian girlfriend, and died in Nashville, TN.

Let's make one thing clear - McNair was very annoying in real life. But in the Madden Universe - where dreams come true - there was no better field general, no better QB, no better 1st round pick, no better anchor to any team. In several "franchise" seasons between 2002-2006, "Air" McNair was not only an ironman for my Miami Dolphins, but he was also a recurring visitor in opponents' nightmares. Throughout the roller coaster of countless wins and (few) heartbreaking defeats, McNair never once missed practice, demanded a trade, killed any dogs, or dropped my team's moral levels.

So let this be a lesson to all you single guys and engaged webmasters. If you're gonna cheat on your crabby wife, try not to do it with a teenage psychopath. We'll miss you, Steve. Let the Madden Gods always honor your #9 in the Madden Hall of Fame. From this day forward, I will never play with the Dolphins again.

Enjoy these memories (but for God's sake mute the sound):

News: Great Whites Are Like Serial Killers?

As if Great White Sharks weren't already awesome enough, researchers noticed trends in their hunting habits that are very similar to those of serial killers. Even though sharks hunt out of necessity (for food), unlike serial killers, and even though Great Whites are big and bulky, whereas serial killers are usually scrawny psychos, a lot of other things seem to match up.

Firstly, serial killers like to grab their victims in the same area (remember the Lopper in Seinfeld? He preferred Riverside Park) because it's familiar to them and easier to control . Great Whites also like to attack from the same anchor point and use known travelling routes. "For human killers, these would be things like subways, buses and freeways. For great whites, these would include channels, reef edges and other topographical features."

Next, Great Whites behave like pervs, lurking just out of reach in the shadows. The scientists found that when they locate their prey (seals), they stalk them from a distance. They study their habits and tendencies, and stay just far enough away to avoid arousing suspicion.

Finally, the coolest similarity is that Great Whites will avoid hunting in areas where the seal population is most dense, which seems counter-intuitive. Like killers and stalkers, Great Whites want to avoid attracting attention because seals can put up a strong fight. Much like victims calling out for help, seals can gang up on a shark and rip their eyes out or bite them with their bacteria-filled mouths. It's much better to strike the young ones when they are separated from the group. Hmmm, don't serial killers prefer young women?

If you don't already think sharks are cool, you better appreciate their sophisticated hunting techniques. Shark Week on Discovery Channel is less than a month away, so below is some Planet Earth goodness to feast on.


Great White Shark Video - Click here for more blooper videos

Pic of the Day

Liam Neeson and Ciarán Hinds attend a _________ together.

Fill in the blank:
A)pro wrestling event, we'll say King of the Ring
B)premier of some movie called "Eclipse"
C)male bonding weekend
D)street fight
E)beer garden
F)therapy session on how to get their cool hair back

Pregnant Woman Escapes From Bear, Gets Hit By Car--Wait, Whaa??

Ever had a bad day? I'm sure they come up now and again. For contributors of this site, bad days probably max out at spirit crunching Pens losses, a half-cocked Indy sequel, or on that rare occasion, house parties being mistaken for meth labs (cops are idiots). However, I'm pretty sure this woman's bad day trumps most anything you or I have been through.

Ashley Swendson, a 26 year old hippie living in Colorado Springs with her hippie boyfriend, was having her typical pregnant day, taking in a little exercise with her usual stroll on a path near her house. She had gotten well into her walk, eventually passing a stream that looked the way a stream usually does, not too much out of place since her previous walk. Oh, but this time there was a 225 lb. black bear staring her right in the eyeballs (I hate it when that happens). Their eyes met, and after shitting her pants (I'm just going to assume that happened), she pulls an about face and starts to walk away from the bear. Good thinking, you don't want to run and give him something to chase, and you don't want to stand still unless you plan on making a lot of noise to scare the big bastard along. Calmly walking away, she turns and notices that the bear is following her. Though not giving chase, he's definitely taken an interest and is walking along after her.

You can't fault the bear for this either. If you're an animal, just waking up from hibernation, probably starving, you take a look at this woman (a hefty pregnant gal) and you must be thinking, "Okay, obviously big and fat, slow moving, I can just smell those milk filled jugs...If this isn't the easiest lunch I've ever hunted then I'm a retard. Imagine how all the other bears will be laughing if I can't maul this bipedal walrus." So, with his common sense, he walks after her. For about 100 yards (yes the size of a football field), he trails her, at times only a few yards behind.

Swendson doesn't put up with it much longer, and soon her fight-or-flight instinct kicks in. Obviously she goes with flight, and pretty soon starts cheesing it down the path. The bear, trodding after her at first, soon loses interest and instead goes back to being a sucky hunter somewhere nearby. But the woman is long gone by now, running as fast as the bowling ball in her stomach would allow. She's screaming for help at the top of her lungs but no one is answering or coming to aide. Finally, the walking path intersects a roadway right before a bridge. Separated by a guardrail, she thumbles over the obstruction and with no sidewalk to cling to, flees right into the middle of the road.

The bear story would be enough to make the headlines, but instead this woman goes 2 for 2 on Terrible Things To Avoid While Pregnant. A car comes flying down the road as she clears the guardrail and BAM! She topples across the hood of the car. The gall-darn-crazy-woman-driver behind the wheel, audible through a cracked window, yells "I tried to slow down!!" And as Swendson gingerly removes her fat ass from the hood with a cry of "I'm being chased by a bear!!!!!", the lady speeds away. Three other vehicles were behind this loon's car, all driving away too.

It's okay to laugh at this story (unless you've been laughing the whole time anyway because you're a dick) because both Mama and Child are fine. A few superficial injuries later and she's the spotlight of her backwoods community, even getting onto the Today Show this morning. That's not the end of it, three big points to close out the aftermath:

1. The bear, obviously mad at himself for not catching the easiest of adult human prey (I guess adult cripples would be the only thing easier), wanders into a neighboring family's backyard hunting for some juicy kiddies. After getting a description and possible location of the bear, Animal Control confronts the beast, takes it down with a heavy tranq gun, then euthanizes him. So passes Brown Bear, maybe the dumbest bear in Colorado. His passing, however, leads to....

2. The local neighborhood BLAMING Swendson for the bear's death. You heard correct, they blame the pregnant lady who saved TWO lives. The same TWO lives who were victims of a hit-and-run moments after they escaped the jaws of Baloo. The neighbor whose yard the bear frequented blamed Swendsen for what she called the unnecessary death of the bear. A local newspaper printed the story, and the hate messages directed at Swendsen started pouring into chat rooms and message boards. And finally...

3. The idiot who performed the hit and run. Apparently she turned herself in to police two days after the incident. No word yet whether or not Swendson will sue, stating “I wasn’t hurt, but at the same time, why didn’t she stop? I would have done that. What if I was a teenager or a kid? You would have just kept going? That doesn’t make sense."

Bad day or not, Swendsen and her fiancee have decided that they will honor the memory of the bear. When her baby is born, its middle name will be “Little Bear.”

Weird hippies.

NEWS: O'Reilly Hammered for Defending Palin

*Posted April 13, 2009*
Eminem recently released a music video that pokes fun at many women who were famous this past year. Among them are Kim Kardashian, Jennifer Aniston, and Sarah Palin. In the song and music video, Eminem refers to fucking the former VP nominee. We all know Eminem pushes boundaries and has a history of degrading women with his music. In my opinion, it doesn't really bother me because I don't listen to him anyway. But Bill O took exception to his barbs on Palin, and criticized him on the Factor. He believes that while it's absolutely insulting to ALL women that this stuff is allowed to be put on air in and in stores, it's even more disturbing that no one is sticking up for Palin. O'Reilly was the only one in the media to come to her aid, and he claimed that if it had been Hillary Clinton in the song, or, heaven forbid, Michelle Obama, the media would've been up in outrage. I think he's right. If anyone took a public shot at Michelle Obama, especially if it refers to sex, we wouldn't hear the end of it. So that's O'Reilly's opinion and you can judge for yourself if he's right or not, but to prove his point further:

A few days after I saw his piece on the Factor, I finally saw the story picked up in the mainstream media. Yahoo's front page story was from one of their writers, and it was a blog that came out AGAINST O'Reilly. The headline was "Spoof Condemned by O'Reilly." The title and subject of this article was about Bill criticizing Eminem, AND NOT Eminem insulting Palin. Again, whether you think Bill is right to call out the rapper is one thing, but this article, and the others like it, should prove his point that the media doesn't care of defending Sarah Palin.

WORST OF THE YEAR: OctoMom

*Posted April 7, 2009*

With apologies to Barry Obama, there might no other person in the country more polarizing than OctoMom, whatever her name is. We all know the story. This mentally sick woman was sad as a kid growing up by herself, so, father figure be damned, she decided to artificially give birth to a total of 14 sprouts. We can blame her fertility doctor for loading her up with 8 embryos even though she couldn't afford the 6 kids she aleady had (the doc is responsible for those, too). We could blame OctoMom for firing the FREE NANNIES that were helping her at home. But the end, we should blame the American people who sympathized with her and donated enough money so she could afford to go shopping for million-dollar homes. As my brother said (and emailed to her), he already donates enough to her through the taxes that most honest Americans have to pay. Freeloaders suck, and so does the OctoMom, the Top Ten 2008-09 Worst Person of the Year!

NEWS: School Enforces Parental Consent, ACLU is Pissed

*Posted March 15, 2009*

While I'm on my conservative soapbox, let's get this out of the way. In San Diego, a school district recently overturned a policy that allowed students to leave school during the deal medical appointments (including drug treatment, abortions, etc.) without parental consent. The ACLU is up in arms and claims this is a violation of state law. I think they are retarded, but let's look at the case further.

The rule used to be, according to CA state law, that students could leave school without parental consent to deal with sexual, mental, substance abuse or reproductive health issues. Some doctors thing the impact of overturning this could be bad for kids "who would rather die than tell their parents." Hmmm, if kids are are involved with drugs or pregnancy while in high school, maybe they aren't responsible or mature enough to handle going to the doctor by themselves. This raises safety issues about the school letting minors leave without notifying their parents, but it also raises compentancy issues from believing a kid can manage the biggest problems in his life alone.

But let's consider the loony left's position. They would love to point out that if a student is getting abused at home, it would be wrong to notify the abusive parents that the kid is essentially ratting them out. But if the kid told the school about abusive parents, then the doctor's appointment shouldn't be confidential anyway because the cops and social services would get involved. The other claim I read that kids are too scared to tell their parents about STDs or drug use, all I can say to the kid is tough shit. How about we let the school decide what is best for the students while they are at school, and let the parents decide what is best for their children when they are outside of school? Sounds simple doesn't it?

NEWS: Of the Weird

*Posted March 4, 2009*

(as always, brought to you by newsoftheweird.com)

The $500,000 top prize in Alaska's January statewide lottery, to benefit the organization Standing Together Against Rape, for victims of sexual assault, was won by Alec Ahsoak, 53, who coincidentally is a twice-convicted sex offender. [Anchorage Daily News, 1-11-09]

Sweden's Hallands Nyheter newspaper reported in January that a police officer had endured four operations at a private clinic in Gothenburg to correct a birth condition that made one leg shorter than the other, but operations on the longer leg cut off too much, so it is now shorter than the leg that used to be the shorter one. [The Local (Stockholm), 1-27-09]

NEWS: of the Weird

I haven't posted weird news in a really long time, so here's a triple serving of it (as always, brought to you by newsoftheweird.com)

Parenting Handful: Late last year, Jack Burt, 5, of a rural area near Darwin, Australia, admitted to his dad that he had been kicked off the school bus for bad behavior (including hitting the driver in the head with an apple), provoking the father to use the episode as a teaching opportunity, according to the Northern Territory News. For the five-day suspension, Dad would not reward Jack by driving him but would make Jack walk the 2 1/2-hour, seven-mile distance to school and back each day. On the first day after the suspension, Dad proudly helped Jack aboard the bus, hopeful of having instilled a new maturity. However, three stops later, Jack was kicked off again, for fighting. [Northern Territory News (Darwin), 11-28-08]

Family Values: The sheriff in El Dorado, Kan., asked in January for help from the public in locating a missing boy named Adam. According to the sheriff, Adam's parents, Doug and Valerie Herrman, only recently reported him missing, even though they had not seen him since he ran away in 1999, when he was 11. The Herrmans' attorney said that his clients were nonetheless "very worried about him." [CNN, 1-5-09]

Least Competent Criminals: Life Imitates the Three Stooges: In January, inmates Regan Reti, 20, and Tiranara White, 21, who had been booked separately for different crimes on New Zealand's North Island and were handcuffed together for security at Hastings District Court, dashed out of the building and ran for their freedom. However, when they encountered a streetlamp in front of the courthouse, one man went to the right of it and the other to the left, and they slammed into each other, allowing jailers to catch up and re-arrest them. (A courthouse surveillance camera captured the moment, and the video has been a worldwide sensation.) [MSNBC-AP, 1-29-09]

URBAN LEGEND Ann Coulter, Octuplets, and the Downfall of Traditional America

*Posted February 7, 2009*

A sexy cover pose as well as some pretty solid content makes Ann Coulter's new book, Guilty, a pretty good read through the first few chapters. Loyal Top Man readers will remember that webmaster Herb and myself got to see conservative-sparkplug Coulter at Penn State. Among the heckling and stupid questions, Coulter was an enjoyable political commentator slash stand-up comedian. She does say some outrageous things, but a lot of her words should be thought about and taken very seriously. The main thesis of her book is that liberals portray themselves as helping victims when in fact they simply parade victims when debating conservatives. Coulter contends that liberals “are not wounded victims, they are the marauding oppressors,” in a sense they aren’t innocent but guilty. The media has jumped and blasted on Coulter’s chapter about single mothers. She states that single motherhood has been more detrimental to American society than something like smoking. Children raised by single-mothers are more liking to commit crime, drop out of high school, and have mental and emotional disorders. It's ironic that during this economic recession, a widespread smoking-ban in Pennsylvania, and elsewhere I suppose, created by the government in Harrisburg and others, has hurt the revenues of local restaurants, bars, and bingo halls. Something to think about.

And now we have this octuplet case. A single mother, living with her parents, having no job, already having six children, and now getting eight embryos artificially inseminated inside of her. She’s been on the Today Show, book deals have been rumored, and she has her own spokeswoman. Everyone raises the ethical questions, but she is becoming a star. She is the story. What about the babies? Not just the eight newborns, but the six she already has. Fourteen babies with eight newborns that need around the clock medical care. The mother, Nadya Suleman seems or wants to resemble Angelina Jolie. Not only does she not have a husband or money, it doesn’t seem like she has much common sense. What's also very shocking is that Bill O'Reilly is the only person in the media that is really speaking out negatively about the whole situation.

So you have Ann Coulter being blasted for giving some solid facts and trends about single-motherhood, and you have Miss Octuplet being praised for undertaking the task of raising 14 children on her own. What happened to this country? What happened to kids being raised by a mother and a father? What happened to families spending time together and eating dinner together? Miss Suleman may try to even make money on having kids. Traditional American values are being lost in this country. Is it ok to have 14 kids? Yes, but you need financial stability and a husband. It’s ok to be a single-mother, but it’s not ok for the liberal media to proclaim these mothers as crusaders or heroes. This country was built on the traditional family values of honor, respect, humility, freedom, and liberty. Without the traditional family backbone, America is turning into a nation of dishonor, greed, and total stupidity. The United States will not return to greatness unless it reexamines itself and puts the importance of the traditional family first.

NEWS: Christian Bale's Rant

*Posted February 7, 2009*

So Christian 'the Batman' Bale explodedon the set of the new Terminator movie a while back, and it's finally been released to the public. People have come out against him, and some have come out and defended him. Of course, I side with the latter because Dark Knight was sooooo awesome. But the funniest thing to come out of this rant, besides the rant itself, is this article on cracked.com. Someone wrote a journal as the Director of Photography who got yelled at, and it included humorous photoshopped pictures. If you like it when people parody Michael Bay, then you'll love the journal because that's what it sounds like. Also, have fun on the soundboard.

NEWS: Obamamania

*Posted January 28, 2009*

Even if you wanted to crawl under a rock and ignore everything Obama during his inauguration media blitz, there was really no way you could. Movie sites were showing live feeds and discussing biopics (Will Smith or Denzel??? w00t!!!). Sports sites were running stories about Obama (he wants a college playoff!!!! OMG!!!) It couldn't, and shouldn't be ignored. By himself, Obama is a pretty cool President, almost like David Palmer. He's addicted to cigarettes and his blackberry. He's web-savvy and also knows how to ball it up. His policies may suck really bad, but as a figurehead for this country, we could do a lot worse. The thing that really grinds my gears is that we don't just get Obama. We get smug celebrities up on their pedestals. We get Oprah Winfrey crying. We get loony lefties booing Bush (unbelievable) during the final transition. The coolest thing about the inauguration is this picture, a 1,474 megapixel, panoramic view of his speech. I spent 10 minutes zooming into the crowd, searching for random celebs. It's like a real life "Where's Waldo!" Hey, there's P. Diddy! Look, it's Denzel Washington! Bush and Cheney look awesome sitting behind Obama (especially Cheney's hat, but I didn't know he was in a wheelchair). Best hat goes to George H.W. Bush, who had the displeasure of sitting next to Bill and Hillary (more on Hillary later). You can also spot Al and Tipper, Dan Quayle, and a sleeping Supreme Court Justice. Definitely a good time waster.

NEWS: That's the Chicago Way!

*Posted December 11, 2008*

Back in Sean Connery's Untouchable days, the "Chicago Way" meant that if they send one of your men to the hospital, you send one of theirs to the morgue. In politics, the Chicago way is more about pay-to-playshady dealings. Soon-to-be ex-Governor of Illinois, Rod Blagojevich, tried to sell off Obama's senate seat to the highest bidder. He was looking for cash, an ambassodorship, or maybe even Senate seat itself if you nobody was willing to pony up the dough. Obama, similar to his handling of all his other dubious associations, is distancing himself for Hot Rod. For a guy whose transition staff is littered with Chicagoans, it's hard to believe Obama's staff didn't see this coming. The candidate who offered money to Blagojovich is rumored to Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr. GOP Governors Mike Huckabee and Tim Pawlenty weren't surprised by this news, saying that Blagojevich was a loner who didn't come to Governor's meetings. Sounds like a big loser to me. Will this touch Obama? Probably not. They've been wiretapping this guy for months, so if Obama denies knowledge of this whole debacle, it's probably because he knows he's not on any tapes. Despite being a very easy decision, B Hussein still made the right choice.

NEWS OF THE WEIRD (brought to you by newsoftheweird.com)

Ironies

Hummer H2 driver Yvonne Sinclair, 29, was convicted of gross vehicular manslaughter in November in Rancho Cucamonga, Calif., from a 2006 crash that killed two people and in which her intoxication was a major factor. Sinclair had bought the Hummer from proceeds of a lawsuit settlement over the 2003 death of her boyfriend, who was killed by a drunk driver. [Inland Valley Daily Bulletin (Upland, Calif.), 11-13-08]

NEWS: MSNBC Blows

*Posted November 13, 2008*

Surely no one reading this site believes that MSNBC is an impartial news channel, just like they shouldn't believe that this website is impartial. Nevertheless, for those retards who stand by Chris Matthews et al, I present to you the channel's new slogan....Experience the Power of Change. Wow. I really don't know how they can claim to be objective about their reporting. MSNBC has denied that their new slogan has anything to do with Obama (big crock of shit). As much as people like to slam Fox News as being the conservative news channel, it really isn't the case. People like Hill-Rod and Ed Rendell routinely said that Fox News gave the most objective coverage of the election. For every Hannity on FNC, there is a Colmes. Fair and Balanced.

NEWS OF THE WEIRD (brought to you by newsoftheweird.com)

Thinning the Herd

A burglary suspect, running from police on San Francisco's Telegraph Hill in September, jumped over a 3-foot wall, apparently not realizing that on the other side was a 200-foot drop. He died at the scene. [San Francisco Chronicle, 9-11-08]

NEWS: Today's Headlines

*Posted October 25, 2008*

Normally it's easier to find one good story to write about, but the headlines at Foxnews.com today are just staggering. Rather than delve into the stories to find out the circumstances, I'd prefer to just hit you with a barrage of shock and awe. The headlines all found today under the Latest News section contain the following:

• Fisherman reels in dog, alive, one mile out at sea.
• Student dies during competitive eating event.
• Baby eats crack at party.
• Girl drowns after school doesn't ask if she can swim.
• Boy accidentally hangs himself with karate belt.
  

As much as I love Fox News, it's a shame that most of the things they consider news are crimes and tragedy. We need more stories like the Florida man who jumped off a pier to fight off a big shark that attacked his little dog (the man survived, and after surgery, the dog will be okay)

GOSSIP: Jolie Out of Hiding; is Most Popular

*Posted October 10, 2008*

After seeing the tabloid's front covers for the last month, I almost started to believe. Every week, Brangelina was on the cover, and the headline was that they were on the rocks and about to split. Well, Angelina has finally resurfaced, and it turns out she just needed the time to get back into shape. This week, three different magazines (Us Weekly, In Touch, and some other dumb one) have almost the same picture of her in a black dress talking about how great she looks. Big deal. In other Jolie news (I'm on Team Aniston by the way), Angelina has topped Forbes list of Most Popular Cover Girl, dethroning the 2007 champ, Aniston. They say she is the most likeable, most bankable, etc., etc. I still don't like her, but according to Forbes, you must, so you probably enjoyed this article. The top 5 for this year are Jolie, Aniston, Death Ledger, Jamie Lynn, and Nicole Ritchie (FYI: All 5 are on tabloid covers this week at Wal-Mart).

NEWS: Great Depression 2: the Reckoning

*Posted October 10, 2008*

You hear a lot of talking heads projecting doom and gloom for the American people, and we really need to listen, because they are probably right. We as a country have shit credit, no money to lend, a volatile stock market, government bailing out banks and businesses (and states, soon), and foreign investors running to the hills. We all need to face it. Our loser government never bothered to level and warn us of these tough times. It's not like they didn't see the collapse of Freddie and Fannie coming. How funny is it that at the beginning of the year, the government was encouraging us to spend our stimulus checks when it was our refusal to save that got us into this mess. I'm going to get a little preachy here, so if you want to skip down to clips of South Park, go right ahead. The main problem is the American dream that everyone loves believing in. The problem is that this dream is something that people expect even when they haven't earned it. In the good old days, you worked your ass off to save up money for a house because you absolutely needed 20% down our you couldn't buy it. People did own their first home until their thirties! Now, thanks to Barnie Frank and the dicks at Freddie and Fannie, people were buying houses with NO MONEY DOWN! HOW INSANE IS THAT?!? So why would they care that a year into their mortgage they don't feel like paying? It's not like they had much invested in it anyway. Back to the Great Depression. Did you know that during our Great Depression, the entire world market was going through a depression? Did you know that ours was the only one considered Great, and that's thanks to FDR New deal? His policies prolonged the Depression, and his ideology is right in line with big spending Barack Obama. Wow this is depressing. Bring on the TV news, please.

News of the weird (brought to you by newsoftheweird.com)

People With Too Much Time on Their Hands

In December 2003, Yves Julien worked a regular 11-hour shift, plus overtime, all at premium pay, for the Canada Border Services Agency, and then demanded an additional $9 (Cdn) for a sandwich he had purchased when asked to put in the extra hours. The agency said he was not entitled, by contract, because the overtime was already at premium pay. In September 2008, after nearly five years of multiple reviews, hair-splitting legal decisions and lengthy appeals, Julien won his $9. [Globe and Mail, 9-10-08]

NEWS: Bailout v 2.0

*Posted October 2, 2008*

Last night the Senate approved the newly revised bailout package, and tomorrow the House will vote on it. Last week I delved deep into the issue, and since no one who reads this site is interested in the news section anyway, I’ll be brief. The new bill is a lot better than the old one since it now contains Republican ideas like tax breaks and an increase on the FDIC insurance limits for banks. But here are a couple points of interest. A source who works in the treasury department said last week that the $700,000,000,000 that Paulson settled on for the package was not reached through any source of data. Rather, they “just wanted to pick a really large number.” Yet another reason this bill is a bad idea. I haven’t read up on the revised version too much, but the old bill was essentially a blank check to Henry Paulson to spend however he pleased.Most of America was/is against this idea, but the Senators are claiming that while the public’s angry phone calls to representatives did a lot to influence the rejection in a the House(what a novel idea, letting the people decide), after Wall Street dropped 700 points, supposedly the phone calls were changing to “we’ve got to get this done.” I’ll leave you folks with an example. After my second year of college, I received my annual college fund money to spend on tuition, bills, and college stuff. I used some of it to promptly erase the balance on my credit card, kind of like a bailout. Did I learn my lesson? If you’ve seen my balance recently, you’d see that I haven’t. Now I’m erasing the debt using my student loan, which is how the bailout SHOULD go. Rather than the taxpayers (my mom and dad) bailing out the fatcats (me and my credit), this should be handled like a loan to repaid 6 months after graduation. You better believe I learned my lesson this time around, but I doubt Wall Street will.

News of the Weird (from newsoftheweird.com)

Fine Points of the Law

Joey Bergamine, 19, who is preparing for a re-trial in Fayetteville, N.C., on a DUI charge stemming from a July 2007 incident, will argue that he should have been advised of his right to have a lawyer present when his father kicked open his bedroom door hours after the incident to help police officers who had come to question him. Joey's father is the police chief of Fayetteville, and Joey's lawyer said entering a locked room, as well as the subsequent interrogation, constituted "police" action and not "parental" action, and since his dad failed to "Mirandize" him, the charge should be dismissed. [Fayetteville Observer, 8-16-08]

NEWS: of the Weird

*posted September 25, 2008*

Brought to you by newsoftheweird.com

Least Competent Criminals

An unidentified man smashed a 6-foot hole in the wall of the Name Brand Clothing Store in Tulsa, Okla., in August and labored through the night to bust open the safe, but according to the surveillance video, he finally gave up six hours later after making only a small hole in the safe. However, when the store manager arrived later that morning, he found the safe unlocked, probably the result of his forgetfulness the night before, and no contents were missing. Though the crime was unsuccessful, the manager offered to hire the robber, based just on his diligent work ethic. [KOTV (Tulsa), 8-22-08]

NEWS: Bailout to Fix Broken Economy?

*Posted September 25, 2008*

Way to go, people. After bailing out Fannie, Freddie, Lehman, and AIG, you developed such a taste for it. Now, to quench your thirst, you've decided to go ahead and buy up all the bad debt in the country. Whether the bad debt is because of national or international interests, we are buying it all up in the biggest move since the Great Depression. It really doesn't matter, though. The morons who got us in this mess (stupid people who don't live within their means, corrupt CEOs, high-risk lenders, and idiot bureaucrats) probably won't learn their lesson as a result of this. The interesting thing about this is how it affects the election. We will talk about McCain and Obama's stance on this later, but I love how everyone is playing the blame game. They are blaming:

• George Bush and his administration: Well, George Bush has repeatedly called for more regulation against the mortgage giants that went under. In fact, this year alone, he publicly called for reform on Freddie and Fannie 17 times. SEVENTEEN TIMES THIS YEAR! The Democratic Congress ignored his warnings, ignored the problems, and buried his concerns in legislative gobblety-gook. It doesn't absolve GW, but clearly he did his part.
• Bill Clinton and his administration: Former Fannie Mae chairman Franklin Raines was the White House budget director under Clinton. Raines is also an economic advisor to Obama, but why would anyone take advice from a douchebag who ran his company into the ground?
• John McCain and his staff: McCain advisors have been cited as lobbyists to shady mortgage lending firms. Plus, McCain has been in Washington forever and hasn't done anything to help the situation.
  
• Barack Obama and his staff: Obama, in his short time in the Senate, has received the second largest amount in campaign contributions from Fannie Mae. Also, Obama appointed Jim Johnson as one three men to lead his VP search. Too bad Jim Johnson was a former bigwig at Fannie Mae AND Lehman Bros. He had to drop out of the VP search committee once people found out of his corrupt dealings with Countrywide, yet another dirty player in the housing scandal. For two people that are promising change and reform, Obama and McCain continue to surround themselves with the same shady roster of players.

So, you keep hearing about this housing/credit crisis, but you don't know how we reached this slippery slope? I'll break it down for you real easy. Moron lenders gaving housing loans to idiot people who knew they couldn't afford them. These idiot people default on their mortgages, so we have thousands of idiots not paying money back to creditors. The creditors are forced to eat these bad loans, but they lose so much money they are forced to fold. Insurance companies like AIG who have hundreds of millions of dollars tied into these mortgage companies also lose their money and suddenly they are out of business. Now investors are afraid of banking on the U.S. Banks can't give out loans for cars or homes anymore. Businesses who rely on loans to expand and grow can no longer get them, and they are forced to cut back. Average Joe Idiot is out of a job because businesses are cutting back, and now Average Joe Idiot has to cut back on his spending. Because Average Joe Idiot is cutting back on spending, this only hurts Mr. Businessman even more, and the cycle continues until we hit another Depression. That's why Dubya had to do the bailout. We, as taxpayers, must save the idiots, but also the rest of the country.