FREE MONEY!!!!!!

 Dateline Los Angeles February 02 2007

The blogosphere is all abuzz with talk of the Interference Inc. marketing "blunder" that yesterday saw a clip of two young men talking to a gaggle of "reporters" about hairstyles of the 1970s, one in a nice set of dreadlocks showing up on youtube and about a bazillion blog sites.'

They were both arrested and will probably be cleared of any wrongdoing, which they should be. They were just doing a job for a couple of employers who should've known better, assuming that anyone even did anything wrong here.

10 cities were tapped as homes to some electronic marketing devices, which seemed, on first blush to be pretty innocent machines, solid state, with LED displays promoting a Turner animated program. On further inspection, though, the good folks in Boston detected the sinister nature to these devices, and activated some sort of dunderhead emergency response that set the city back about a half million dollars before anyone thought to use google or ask a local teenager what was going on.

Today Turner has agreed to pay a half million to Boston to compensate for what seems, in hindsight, to have been a pretty boneheaded maneuver on the part of the city. Chicago is apparently also seeking some compensation, though I haven't seen any report on exactly what they did that involved unusual expense.

Oddly, the devices, now largely if not entirely removed in the wake of Boston's panic attack, were not apparently found to be threatening by any other town. Even in Boston they had reportedly been up for a month or more before they were reported by a transit worker. Way to be vigilant. If that had, in fact, been some sort of doomsday device, guess what? THE ENTIRE EASTERN SEABOARD IS GONE NOW! Along with most of the North American continent. The terrorists win.

Meanwhile, at http://interferenceinc.com/ the marketing firm is putting on it's "My Bad" face with a simple text apology. Smarter than most politicians caught with their pants down. Turner Broadcasting doesn't have anything at all on their home page, and I don't expect they feel the need to apologize.

After all, they just got what is probably many tens of millions of dollars worth of free advertising, for what will likely end up being way under a million dollars. They must feel like the cat that demonized the canary and then had it covered by all the networks.

WTG. Do you wonder if this was the plan from the beginning? After all, why should the Bush administration be the only one working to scare the hell out of us all? Turns out there is plenty of terror to go around, and likely oodles of money to be mde from it.

Ain't modern life grand?

BTW, I am pretty sure that the mullet is the hairstyle from the 1970's that has directly led to the decline of Western Civilization in the form of our society's slide to the political right, and the popularity of bullying in politics. The fact that this style of cut still exists in some midwestern states bodes poorly for human rights in the future.

Discuss.

Grow Some Thicker Skin, Plzkthnx, Now Focus

DATELINE Los Angeles, CA January 30 2007

A lot of ink is being spilled over the President's use of an old school slur on the Democratic Party in his State of the Union address the other night. NPR asked W about it in an interview and it's been reported in the LA Times, among other sources. Mr. Bush said he didn't remember doing it, and suggested he isn't good at pronouncing words, anyway, so it isn't his fault.

In this President's view, nothing is his fault, it seems. At least, that is his story, and I expect he may stick to it in this instance. Reason being, in this case it looks like typical Roveian sleight of hand to me, aimed at controlling the conversation and diverting away from what is important.

Move on, Democrats, there is nothing to see here. Nothing new, anyway. The Republican Party dislikes you, by and large, and all you stand for. Bush and his inner circle are particularly contemptuous of you, and the rest of the nation not in the absolute top tax bracket. This is old news. The "response" to Katrina, forgotten in the State of the Union address this year, is as far as you need to look to figure out what the President thinks of those not above his social strata.

Thank God Barack Obama is still talking about Katrina. Now, if he can make something happen (like getting reconstruction happening in the affected areas) maybe he can be a viable Presidential candidate one day.

To her "credit," Ms. Pelosi assented that the President probably didn't mean anything by his "misstatement."

Madame Speaker, you have better things to do with your time than to respond to this type of Republican Business As Usual. Go back to accomplishing things plzkthnx. If you really need to address this President's attitude, there is plenty of stuff to respond to. Instead of sticking your foot in your mouth by making excuses for his debatably bad behaviour ( I am unconvinced that his dropping of the -ic was completely innocent) then maybe you could address his decision to add another layer of beaurocracy to regulations. Another political appointee to slow down the process is not what the nation's children and workers and environment need. Good for you for taking the high road, but maybe you should be picking your route instead of going where Junior leads.

I would say Stop Wasting Your Time, but if elected representatives are in fact representing me and my fellow Americans, as I believe you are, then in a very real sense, your are not wasting your own time so much as mine.

No offense, and nice job with the first hundred hours, but until it is all law, passed by the Senate and signed by the President, you haven't really done anything. If it never clears those two hurdles, then nobody is really going to care that it isn't your fault that it never became law. Just make it happen. I don't know how you will do it, but start by focusing on what is important, which is not the quest of if the President is a rude a$$hole that stepped on your widdew powiticaw pawtiez widdew toziez, or not. He is, he did, get over it, move on.

Please stop wasting my time, and get something done.