Just had to post a quick link to WYOTK

Fantastic spot on global warming. Check it out.

http://www.whatyououghttoknow.com/show/2008/04/29/global-warming/

The ultimate green car

Now, I love the environment as much as anyone but the sad thing is, some bozo out there would think this is a good idea.

Click pic for a larger version.

One of those things that funnier when you’re half asleep

Have you ever noticed that those ideas you think are genius when you’re half asleep are never nearly as brilliant when you’re fully away? That happens to me a lot. I get what, at the time, seem like great ideas only to  wake up and have them, magically, change to “ehhh, whatever” ideas. This is one of them.

Get it? Just say nObama. Yep, sleepy people find me funny as hell.

 

***edited…Just did a search on the phrase nobama. Seems I wasn’t the first to come up with that. However, the design is original. Everyone else just spells it NObama.***

Chicago T.V.

I grew up in a small town outside of Chicago. One of the great things about that was that I was raised watching Chicago tv. Everyone remembers the shows they grew up watching but Chicago tv was different. They had some of the greatest local kid’s shows ever. Anyone from that area that grew up in the 60’s and 70’s will tell you the same thing. Just mentioning the name Ray Rayner will bring a smile to the face of anyone who ever watched his show. Ray’s show was a combination of cartoons, sports scores, do-it-yourself projects (these never turned out well for Ray), a psychotic duck named Chelveston, a big, stuffed, orange dog called Cuddly Dudley and the most beloved thing of all….a list of school closings on snow days. We, also, had Bozo’s Circus, Garfield Goose (still looking for a copy of Journey to the Beginning of Time) and Cartoon Town with BJ and Dirty Dragon.

These were all weekday shows but another great day for TV was Sunday. While Sunday television, in most markets, pretty well stunk (at least until six or seven in the evening), we had some really great shows. Rat Patrol, 12 o’clock High, Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea and The Time Tunnel were shown on Sundays. Later in the afternoon we had a local program called Family Classics that was hosted by Frasier Thomas. On Sunday afternoons, Frazier would put on a suit and tie and bring to our living rooms such fare as Journey To The Center Of The Earth, Tobor The Great, and Mysterious Island, all edited per Frazier’s strict family guidelines.

Throw in a few Cubs games on WGN, Some Creature Features on Saturday nights and you had some great television.

This trip down memory lane was brought on by hulu.com. Hulu is a site that shows some great, old tv shows as well as some new ones. I just spent my evening watching episodes of The Time Tunnel. If you’re not familiar with The Time Tunnel, check it out. It’s an old Irwin Allen (king of the disaster movies) show. If you’re not the type to get hung up on things like historical accuracy and good acting, you might enjoy the show. They, also, have Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea.

www.hulu.com

My favorite web site…..Well, one of them

I discovered these folks on zencast. They offer their videos as podcasts but, also, have them available directly on their site. http://www.whatyououghttoknow.com

Their videos are kind of a cross between those annoying NBC’s "The More You Know" spots and those really annoying Apple computer commercials. Who knew that when you combine two crappy things you could come up with something entertaining and informative?

Here’s a great bit on bond measures.  http://www.whatyououghttoknow.com/show/2008/02/06/bond-age/  I would have embedded the video on my blog but WordPress only allows certain sites to have their videos posted. Thanks WordPress.

The urchin now has a blog

This is the kind of thing that happens when you give blogs away for free.

http://urchinblog.wordpress.com/

The sport of politics

 

Politics is an odd animal. It used to be the way a country decided to run itself. A noble, worthwhile endeavor for the most part.

It consisted of two or more sides with differing ideas as to the direction a country should take. What policies should be put into place. How much you were going to be taxed and how those taxes were going to be used. How much or how little the government should be involved in the day to day life of its citizens. Things like that.

 The different sides would present their ideas, explaining why their ideas were good and the other side’s ideas were not so good. The public would listen and, after deciding who they thought was going to screw them over the least, cast their vote. Sometimes they made a good choice, sometimes a bad choice. The great thing about this system is that when people felt they made a bad choice, they could attempt to fix the problem a few years later by voting the bums out and voting a new bunch of bums in.

A simple enough system that worked great for a long time.

These days, however, elections treated less like a political process and more like a sporting event. Gone are the days when most people, actually, listened to the candidates. In today’s world, people pick a team(read political party). It doesn’t matter what players the teams decide to put on the field, the loyal fans or voter base if you will, cheer them on even if they stink on ice.

Politics isn’t as much about who has the better idea as it is whether the candidate is a Republican or Democrat. Oh, the fans of either side will tell you that it is more than just that. They will tell you that the party they support represents what they believe is best for the country. That the candidates of their party represent ideals that they believe in. This is, of course, a fib.

It really doesn’t matter who the parties run in an election, a good portion of voters will vote for their candidate for one reason and one reason only. So the other side doesn’t win. Their party could run a Snickers bar for office and people would vote for the tasty confectionery treat because it has to be a better choice than what the other side has to offer.

Now, of course, most of these people will deny that it’s as simple as that. They’re voting on principle. Really? Then why is John McCain leading the polls at this point. He’s leading both Clinton and Obama. If the election were held today he would probably win. That means a whole lot of conservatives would be voting for him. Conservatives voting for McCain? John McCain is not a conservative. He even considered switching parties at one point. Conservatives, tell me with a straight face that you and John McCain are on the same page. That he represents what you believe. “But he’ll be strong on the war”. Yeah, and? “Ummmm, did I, already, say he’d would be strong on the war? Besides, if Clinton or Obama wins, they’ll ruin the country. We need a Republican”. Ah ha!

Of course, the Democrats aren’t any better. Barack Obama is winning their primary elections? Barack freakin’ Obama? He has a whole lot of people supporting him that have, absolutely, no idea why. Ask an Obama supporter why he/she is supporting him and you’ll get the answer “Well, he’s for change”. Really? What kind of change? “You know….change change”. But what does he want to change? Not all change is good you know. “Yeah, I know that but he’s for good change. Not bad change…… good change…………..Hey! He’s for Universal Health Care. That’s a good thing. Free health care”. Well, not exactly free. You’ll be paying for it in higher taxes. “Huh? What? He’s for change I tell ya”. So, you’re supporting a guy just because he says he’s for change even though you have no idea what kind of change he means? “Yep. Besides, we can’t let the Republicans stay in office. They’ll ruin the country. We need a Democrat”. Gotcha!

The truth is that the Republicans could run Hitler and the Democrats run Stalin in an election and there would be party loyalist who would argue over who had the better candidate. The Republicans would say that Hitler only killed seven million people while Stalin killed twenty million. The Democrats would respond that Stalin offered Universal Health Care for all the people he didn’t kill so he is a better choice.

Yes, politics is a sport. We want our side to win at any cost. If we lose it can only be because the other side cheated. They stole the election. There was voter fraud or any other reason we can think of to help us sleep better at night. Because, as we all know, it can’t be that some people listened to the candidates and thought about their choice. No, if they voted for the other side or, god forbid, they voted for a third party candidate, they must just be stupid.

 

As a side note. I just wanted to mention something about Rush Limbaugh. I used to have a lot of respect for him. However, his Operation Chaos is about as anti-American as you can get. Rather than letting the political process operate the way it was intended. You know, let the Democrats and Republicans pick their candidate and then run them against each other. He is attempting to mess with the primaries by having Republicans vote in the Democratic primaries. He is having them cast their votes for Hillary Clinton in order to have an effect on who the Democratic candidate is. Even if it has zero effect on the outcome, just attempting it is disgusting. Is this the kind of thing the founding fathers would have approved of? Do you think this is the way they intended the election process to work? I may be wrong but I don’t think so. I really, really don’t like Obama but if he is the candidates the Democrats choose then so be it. That is their right and anyone who attempts to interfere with the process is a fool and does not respect the ideals this country was founded on. This just makes me want to take a rolled up newspaper and hit him on the nose while waving my finger and saying “Bad Rush, Bad Rush”.

Started over

I decided to just delete my old blog and start over. It was getting a little unorganized and I wanted to give wordpress a try. Just easier to wipe the whole thing and start anew. I started a Flickr acct and uploaded a few pics. I think it might be easier to post the older ones there than posting them directly on the blog. So if you feel like looking at a few of my older pics you can find the link on the right side of the page. There are only a few pics there but I’m sure I’ll upload more.