The dead are not grateful.

Ironic that so many of these rock bands think it's "cool" to have morbid names like Eagles of Death Metal and feature such stage decor as the skeletons seen here. Sadly it's not so cool when real death intrudes on their trendy motifs as it did in Paris.  I've never understood why young people with so much to live for have such an affected fascination with death and dying, but I hope this terrible Paris massacre inspires some bands to choose more life-affirming names.

In a way I feel bad for Ben Carson. I remember when I was competing in the Olympics, we were constantly under scrutiny by the organizers and the press. I remember telling  Jennifer Lopez I had to cancel dinner because I thought the publicity might hurt her career. Naturally she was angry. I think that's why she married Marc Anthony. But she got over it, and I had three gold medals to comfort me. But I was in it for the sport, not the money which is why I told Wheaties to shove it, but not in those words. Like Ben,  I wasn't looking for attention and glory. Not at the Olympics, and not when I turned down the scholarship at the Naval  Academy. So I can appreciate Ben's problems with the press. I think he's sincere. Let me ask this: If they didn't keep the wheat in the pyramids, where did the keep it? I've been to Egypt four times and I never saw any wheat storehouses. And what kid doesn't stab a  friend or two all in good fun? Ben is a neat guy and I hate to see everyone picking on him. But he's tough. He can take it. After all he is the great great grandson of Kit Carson. 

"...it was the worst of times."

'ACT OF WAR' 
ISIS CLAIMS CREDIT

Two comments this Saturday morning after the attacks in Paris. At least one news outlet (HuffPost) wrote that ISIS, "CLAIMS CREDIT". Don't they know that you take "responsiblity", not "credit". Killing 120 people is not an admirable act.  Also columnist Howard Fineman wrote that, "We are all Parisians, again." What kind of idiocy is that? When were we all Parisians before? And isn't it time to retire that cliche, which was not a cliche when President Kennedy said we were all Berliners. The Paris attacks are hideous, horrific, and frightening because such carnage can happen anywhere when they involve soulless zealots. It's hard to imagine that there is an army of creatures filled with so much hate that they can kill so indiscriminately. But I am sure that we, the civilized, will stupidly employ reason and law to deal fairly with these monsters once we capture them, if we capture them outside of their moment of terrorism. That's a pity. Because to dispatch every proven member of ISIS whether home-grown or newly arrived for another country, including and especially the United States, I would like to see the return of the guillotine, and I will happily take up knitting.

credit noun (PRAISE)

› [C/U] ​praise or ​approval, esp. to ​recognize ​achievement:[U] You have to give him credit for being so ​honest.[U] How can he take credit for ​work he didn’t do?

America's pious pinhead.

This past Friday, presidential candidate Rafael Cruz said that he believes anyone who wants to be president must fear God and pray daily and that "an atheist is not fit to be president." In short, he feels that every president should believe in magical thinking, assume that some supreme being somewhere in the sky will hear a president's plea for world peace and act on it, and that that "old time religion" is necessary for any occupant of the White House. He clings to this belief despite the fact that there is world hunger, global warming, horrible violence, millions of homeless refugees, and hundreds of other daily occurring atrocities which Cruz's pray-worthy God doesn't seem to have any interest in preventing, (not to mention that He made Cruz himself god-ugly). Plus how naive is this moron to assume that none of our presidents have been atheists? Of course they couldn't out and say so in a pseudo-Christian country, but it is foolish to assume that all of our past presidents were as blindly superstitious as he is. Also considering that Rafael is such a liar, panderer, and hypocrite, it wouldn't surprise me a bit if he weren't an atheist himself, although I don't think he's enough of a rational thinker for that to be the case.

Liam calls it in.

I've just watched one of the worst films I've seen in years. I probably shouldn't even admit that I would waste several hours watching anything is worthless as Taken 3, but I did. The good news is when you're watching poorly-directed trash like this, you can muse about other things. Like: Would Liam Neeson ever land high-salaried drek like this if, at 63, he hadn't kept a full head of hair. Or: How do directors as mediocre as Olivier Megaton get to helm million dollar projects like this, even if they are crap? Or does it even make sense that a man, to find the killer of his wife. will endanger hundreds of people on the L.A. Freeway, destroy several buildings, create a panic at a college that could have left students trampled, destroy lots of private property, beat the hell out of cops just doing their job, demolish a two million dollar aircraft and possibly killing the pilots, and never face any kind of arrest at the end? Or: When did all the mediocre directors get together and decide that you have to change the screen image at a headache-causing every three seconds to keep up the momentum which was never there in the first place?  What's the point of bitching about it. Rotten serials like Taken 3 will be made again and again, and probably rake in lots money from willing morons or moviegoers like me who actually liked the first Taken. What I found most amusing about the entire experience is that at the end of the film, the first credit to be seen was: Directed by Olivier Megaton. So I guess he didn't realize that this piece of shit was something to be embarrassed about. On the other hand Megaton sounds like a pseudonym, so maybe he did.

I don't like Comcast anyway. But is it a coincidence that my service seems even slower on Sunday?  Longer waits. More disconnects. More screw-ups. If this is true of you, too, you can let me know by
clicking, "No comments", the idiotic way this blog encourages readers to make comments.

MISSING FOR EIGHT YEARS.

The most disturbing thing about Leah Remini's fascinating expose of the Church of Scientology is the question, "Where is Shelly Miscavige?". This is a question Ms. Remini has asked repeatedly about her one-time friend who has been missing, or at least non-communicado, since 1990. As the wife of the powerful head of the church David Miscavige, one is very curious what could possibly have happened to her. Even more of a mystery is why did the Los Angeles Police Department refuse to even follow up on this missing person's report, taking the word of church leaders that, "she was fine and did not want to be found." (Imagine if someone had said that about Elizabeth Smart.) The story is that she is at the Church's desert compound  (a punishment center in Riverside County, California.) Considering that Miscavige has been accused of imprisoning and personally beating up disloyal members at this compound, the idea that Shelly is dead is not so far-fetched. Since the Church was able to blackmail IRS agents into giving them undeserved tax-free status (allowing them to amass billions) it is not unlikely that their influence is felt with many law enforcement departments, possibly even the FBI. One will only know that this is not the case when these crime-solving authorities get off their asses and find Shelly Miscavige, dead of alive.