I really love this video. The Onion got this one right. I like the idea of every American is in their own demographic. It kills the idea of demographics.
I was thinking about John McCain picking Sarah Palin for his vice president. Everyone's first reaction is that he is just doing this to pick up some of the Hillary Clinton supporters. Her first speech even mention the 18 million cracks in the glass ceiling. The press has called this move everything from pandering to brilliant.
Many of the hard core Hillary supporters will not go for this. I do not expect them to. There are still a group of PUMA's out there that are not happy after the convention. Bill Clinton became president by appealing to Centrist democrats. It is those democrats that McCain is going after with Sarah Palin.
Yes, some former Hillary supporters who will go for this. The key is that not that many have to go for McCain for this to be effective. You just need to swing some in the battle ground states. This pick is not for the San Francisco-Feminist Hillary Supporters. This pick is for the Rural Ohio and PA democrats that are members of the NRA. I am surprised that more democrats do not realize this.
It appears that Kevin Smith likes the Watchmen Movie. I will take this as a good sign, I will still ready myself for a let down. There is a lot of time between now and March. The studio could find a way to screw up this movie. I will be somewhat skeptical until I see the movie. Kevin Smith can be wrong since he is seeing it from the inside.
There is one thing I want to hear from Barack Obama's speech tonight. I want to hear that his administration will not treat the Constitution with the same disregard as the Bush administration. I want no warrant wire tapping, no spying on American citizens, and now water boarding. I want no black site prisons, no passing prisoners off to other countries to be tortured, and no holding people without charge. These are the real things that can be done to get America's standing back in the world.
If Barack Obama addresses these things in his speech he will go a long way toward winning my vote. If he does not I worry that the change and hope he is talking about is all a smoke screen.
I am not surprised that Warner Brothers does not know what to do with Superman. The Dark Knight made so much money the logical thing to do is get more movies like it out into the market place. That would include a new Superman movie, Justice League, World's Finest Heroes Movie.
The problem is what do you do with Superman. Are you going to say that Batman begins and Superman Returns happen in the same world? Are you going to Reboot Superman all together to give it a new feeling? What kind of movie to you want the next Superman movie to be.
Christopher Nolan's Batman world seems hard to introduce superheros to. So far he has really sold the world as being a real life place. The Dark Knight really seemed like any American city. The world of Bryan Singer's Superman Returns seems to almost be in a different key. It makes me think the two movies would clash if you tired to mix them together.
You do not have to make Metropolis gritty and dark like the Gotham City. In fact the best way to do is for Metropolis to seem like Utopia while Gotham City is dark and gritty. I worry that no one can really fold another movie into the world of Christopher Nolan's Batman. Maybe you could also a Green Arrow movie there, but it would be hard to sell. Maybe the Dark Knight is so good, that Warner Brothers will not be able to cash in as much as they would like.
I was reading this story of how states want to charge sales tax for digital products. I think it is the wrong way to act to just extend old tax standards to cover this situation. I live in San Jose, I am using my computer in Santa Clara right now, and Apple is in Cupertino. If I bought a song right now, whose sales tax would be charged. Is it different if I was using my computer in Pennsylvania at my parent's house?
I understand that states and local government need sales taxes. I understand that revenue is needed. Personally I want another five years of hands off the internet. Lets see which business models are really going to work. What are we going to do for Smart Phone Apps? How about services that need subscriptions? I think that need tax structures are needed for this to work well. I do not want to look at this tax in five years and see that we did it all wrong.
At the Democratic Convention yesterday everyone kept on saying that Obama is going to create new jobs and he is going to create them in the areas that are hardest hit by out sourcing. These jobs are going to be good playing and for the middle class. There is a lot of talk that they are going to do it, but not a word of how they are going to do it.
I know in elections people do not give out specific plans. They do not want to be judged on the details of their plans in case they get elected and cannot pull it off. The problem is I really want details. I already know what republicans will do to spur job growth. You are saying the republicans have failed. I want to know just want you will do to create those jobs. I do not want to hear "invent in green technology and clean energy." I want to know just want that means. If you want to win over people like me, I think the plans will have to be more detailed.
Yahoo! Sports did a list of the worst Cities to be a sports fan. I am happy to hear that Philadelphia did not show up on this list. In fact Philadelphia teams have done well this decade. Yes, no titles, but lots of playoff appearances. I am happy to say that Philadelphia is not playing big bucks to watching losing teams. They are paying big bucks to see teams that cannot get it don in the playoffs.
I recorded the CNN coverage of the political convention. I will admit that I picked them because they are in HD. If MSNBC was also in HD on my cable service I might need to pick them.
In the first three hours that I watched, it was 80% about the Clinton and Obama struggle. Will the Clinton support vote for Obama? Did Obama do enough to reach out to Clinton and her supporter? Are Bill and Hillary to blame for being bad losers? The same questions over and over again to different people.
The next 20% were about the horse race between Obama and McCain. What Obama needs to do to win. How he needs Clinton Supporters to win. How McCain is trying to drive a wedge.
They used up a lot of time without making mention of the platform at all. They did all this without even covering what Obama wants to do as president. I think this is one of the big problems with American political news. They cover the race far better than they cover the polices and platforms. In the end the electorate is much worse off for it. No surprise that Americans vote for the candidate who they want to share a beer with and not whose policies are better.
PS. CNN, stop having Wolff Blitzer say "The Best Team in Politics." It is cheap and cheezy.
Five reasons that Sports Casters should calm down when it comes to Michael Phelps.
I know Michael Phelps is great and he has the most gold metals ever, both in a single games and overall. I will agree that he had accomplished a task that might never been seen again. I know that nothing can take away from how great of a swimmer.
I ask sportscasters and sportswriters one favor, please stop calling him the greatest Olympian ever. It is hard to compare Olympians over the last 120 years. Many of those athletes did not have the same chances.
1. The professional era of the Olympics is only 20 years old - In the amateur era of the Olympics it would be hard to see any American win ten metals. Paavo Nurmi could have won more, but they pulled his amateur status. What could have Babe Didrikson or Jesse Owens with more than one Olympics to compete in.
2. Swimming gives lots of chances to win metals - A boxer can only win one metal, but has a lot of fights in a single elimination tournament. Team sports only offer the chance for one metal. No matter how good at wrestling you are, you can still only win one metal.
3. More events than ever before - The Olympics have been adding sports every year since it started. Great Olympians of the past might have won more metals if they had more events.
4. Qualification rules have changed - The rules have changed over the years. To say someone is the greatest of all time is saying that everyone is playing under the same rules. This is the reason that baseball is easy to compare over the years. Babe Didrikson qualified for five Olympic events but was only allowed to compete in 3. Phelps did not have this limit.
5. Metal count is a poor measure of greatness - When it comes to the Olympics there are no stats. It is the best in the moment. Metal count is just a number on paper. It goes against why people love the Olympics.
I am not saying that Michael Phelps is not great, just be careful when calling him the greatest of all time. This is a bold claim with no good way to judge.
10. Tom Burke - At the first modern Olympics in 1894 he won the 100 meter and the 400 meter. No one else ever repeated that. I know that only 14 countries took part in the first modern Olympics. It is still cool to be first.
9. Mark Spitz - Seven golds one olympic, nine golds two olympics. This is just cool.
8. Dick Fosbury - Dick Fosbury changed the high jump forever. There are few other athletes who changed their sport all on their own. This is the biggest change to Track and Field in the Olympic era.
7. Bob Beamon - Talk about a historic records. Bob Beamon's long jump world record stood for 23 years. This just blows my mind. This is great.
6. Tommie Smith - There is a lot of ways to see Tommie Smith. Countries are often blamed for bringing politics into the Olympics. It took courage for Tommie Smith to make a statement on the gold metal stand
5. Cassius Clay - The Olympics is a great coming out party for boxers. This might have been the greatest case of that. Cassius Clay had a great public debut at the Olympics. It lead to a great career as Mohammed Ali.
4. Wilma Rudolph - She went from having polio as a child and needing leg braces to walk to winning three gold metals. That is just amazing to me. To me this will always be an amazing feat.
3. Babe Didrikson - The world had no idea what to do with Babe Didrikson. She could have won five metals at her Olympics if she was allowed to compete in that many events. She won two golds and a silver. The silver was just because of the rules being enforced only at the end of the match. She was the first female super-star athlete.
2. Jesse Owens - This is the point where world politics and sports collide. Jesse Ownes was not only a great athlete but he was a great athlete when every eye in the world was on him. He was a great athlete when the 100 meter dash was about more that just a race. It is hard to win when Sports carry deeper meanings. Remember that this was long before Jackie Robinson broke into the big leagues.
1. Jim Thrope - Jim Thrope won the pentathlon and the first decathlon in 1912 Stockholm Olympics. He was the greatest Athlete in the world. After the Olympics he played Football, Baseball, and Basketball. All this and he was striped of his metals after a bogus rules change. It was just a crime.
