BILL O'CRY-LY

From one of last week's Studio Briefings:

Fox News Chairman Roger Ailes phoned NBC chief Jeff Zucker last summer and threatened to "unleash" Bill O'Reilly against NBC and its parent, General Electric, unless Zucker reigned in MSNBC host Keith Olbermann, who was regularly attacking O'Reilly (as "the worst person in the world") and Ailes himself, the Washington Post reported today (Monday). The complaints were later echoed in phone calls to Zucker from Rupert Murdoch, chairman of News Corp, which owns Fox News, the Post said. After the appeals failed, O'Reilly began an assault on GE chief Jeffrey Immelt, accusing him and his company of supporting the Iranian government. "If my child were killed in Iraq, I would blame the likes of Jeffrey Immelt," O'Reilly said during one broadcast. GE spokesman Gary Sheffer insisted that "nothing we supply ... to Iran is in any way endangering U.S. troops." He said that News Corp execs "tell us if the attacks on O'Reilly end, the attacks on GE will end."

I love this story on so many levels that it just makes me feel warm and fuzzy on the inside ... Fox News has got to be the biggest bunch of cry babies on the planet. Day after day, they spew forth nothing but vitriolic hateful garbage against the Left. Yet, if one person dares to call them on their BS, they run around like a two-year-old who just had their ice cream cone stolen.

Let's not forget it wasn't that long ago that O'Reilly and company tried to sue Al Franken for using the term "Fair and Balanced" in his book title. And -- as you may recall -- they were literally laughed out of court.

My message to Keith Olbermann: Bill O'Reilly is indeed the worst person in the world, and I hope you keep saying as much ... every ... single ... day.

P.S. BTW, did you know that Halliberton also does business with Iran? I wonder if Fox News ever brings that up?

"The energy crisis is real. It is worldwide. It is a clear and present danger to our nation. These are facts. And we simply must face them.

"I am tonight, setting a clear goal, for the energy policy of the United States. Beginning this moment, this nation will never use more foreign oil than we did in 1977. Never.

"I will soon submit legislation to Congress, calling for the creation of this nation's first solar bank, which will help us achieve the crucial goal of 20% of our energy coming from solar power by the year 2000."

-- Jimmy Carter, July 15, 1979

Wouldn't that have been nice about now? Instead, big oil poured tons of money into Reagan's campaign, and his first decision as President was ordering the solar panels torn off the roof of the White House.

Are we better off than we were 30 years ago?

ALAN SHORE VS. THE SUPREME COURT

If I had my own TV show, and the goal was to write an episode that perfectly dealt with all the problems of The Supreme Court, I'm not sure it would be possible to top this ...




Sadly, The Supreme Court has to be scolded by a fictional character, because no one would be able to pull this off in real life.

In case you missed it, that little exchange between Alan and Denny Crane when Clarence Thomas says, "Hey!" was a the result of a bet made by Denny that Alan couldn't make Thomas say something during the trial. Because, you see, Clarence Thomas never speaks; never asks questions; nothing. He's what they call in the legal business ... incompetent.

IF IT'S GOOD ENOUGH FOR BOB BARKER ...

Part of being a tree hugging, latte sipping, arugula eating elitist liberal is that I am required to care about animal rights. Thus, at the expense of taking a stand on which Wendy McCaw might agree, I feel the need to talk about a recent Independent article titled Supes Pass Spay/Neuter Ball Back to Staff. After spending about 5 minutes trying to figure out exactly what that means, I dove into the story. If you don't want to read it yourself, here's a quote that pretty much sums it up:

Legislation addressing this issue [pet population problem] and coauthored by Assemblymember Pedro Nava is making its way through the state: the California Healthy Pets Act, a two-year bill from 2007, which would require owners to spay or neuter most dogs and cats. All registered purebreds and animals used for herding, as well as police, service, and rescue dogs, would be exempt, however ...

This isn't the first time I've heard of such laws being bandied about in California, and I've actually had past discussions with some of my friends regarding this important issue. What fired me up enough to write this post, however, can be summed up with another quote from the article:

The matter was in front of the Board of Supervisors May 6, and more than 120 people showed to speak at the meeting, the room split for and against a countywide ordinance ...

The room split ... really!? I've heard the arguments, read the debates, thought about the issues; and for the life of me, I just can't understand who would be against this. Yet, half -- that's right, half -- the people showed up at the meeting to fight it.

Here's the thing ... our animal shelters are hugely overcrowded. By one account; 160,000 dogs are euthanized each year in California due to the simple fact that there is not enough room to properly take care of them. That means that nearly one out of every four dogs is ultimately euthanized in our shelters. Think about that. I mean, how can you not support a law that might help this situation?

It seems to me that the only people who have a legitimate reason to be against this (e.g. breeders and such) would be exempt. So, who are these 60 people that felt strongly enough to go in front of the Board of Supervisors and argue that this is a bad idea? What is the downside here? I really want to know.

In those discussions with my friends, the only real argument made against such an ordinance was that it would reduce the diversity of dogs and that we would end up with nothing but purebreds. I have sympathy for this opinion given that I've owned nothing but mixed breeds in my life. However, I just don't buy that this would be the ultimate effect. The fact is that a law such as this would not completely prevent dogs from reproducing; there would still be strays running around and -- let's be honest -- some people would simply ignore the law (as they do with all laws).

If this ordinance were extremely effective, my gut tells me it might reduce the number of dogs in shelters by half. That would be phenomenal! And guess what: it would increase the chances that those remaining dogs would actually be wanted.

Imagine that.

EW, I'VE BEEN MEMED!

Since Clinton defeated Obama by only a slim two point margin in Indiana, I think he should ... just kidding, Patrick. Nope, no politics today. Instead, I've been memed by Amy:

Here are the rules:
A) The rules of the game get posted at the beginning.
B) Each player answers the questions about himself or herself.
C) At the end of the post, the player then tags five people and posts their names, then goes to their blogs and leaves them a comment, letting them know they’ve been tagged and asking them to read your blog.

1) Ten years ago I was...
getting used to being a first time home owner and dog owner.

2) Five things on today's to-do list:
Buy a card for someone
Read blogs
Pickup this week's comic books
Pickup dinner on my way home
Watch Top Chef

3) Things I'd do if I were a billionaire:
Buy a Montecito mansion with an ocean view and then staff it with people to take care of us.
Make movies for fun and not care if anyone watched them.
Open a "boutique" movie theater in Santa Barbara that serves food and drinks (even during the film); and hire large bouncers that kick people out WHO HAVE CONVERSATIONS BEHIND ME DURING THE MOVIE!

4) Three bad habits:
Stress and worry too much.
Don't keep in touch with old friends.
Over-think things.

5) Five places I've lived:
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Watertown, Sound Dakota
Boulder City, Nevada
Columbia, Missouri
Santa Barbara, California

6) Six jobs I've had in my life:
Bus boy
Pizza deliverer
Dish washer
Resident assistant
Database programmer
Database administrator

I think all the other bloggers I know have been memed already, so I'll have to skip that one.

STEWART ON SCALIA

For someone who thinks the Supreme Court is mostly a bunch of yahoos, it's been a difficult few months as I've been forced to listen to the likes of Thomas and Scalia pimp their books on all my favorite shows. Case in point, Antonin Scalia recently took up two segments on 60 Minutes, and I had to endure Lesley Stahl constantly point out his charm, followed by him making such nonsensical statements as the fact that his social conservative views don't affect his judicial decisions ... whatever ... Then, he follows up that gem by stating he was depressed by many past court decisions but that "things are better now." Thanks, Bush!

There were so many things to be upset about in the interview that I wasn't even sure how to verbalize my anger. Luckily, Jon Stewart took care of it for me in his oh so brilliant manner ...

EVOLUTION SCHMEVOLUTION

If you're one of those strange people who believes in evolution (I do), you may have been a little nervous about Ben Stein's new movie Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed (I was). This entry from today's Studio Briefing might make you feel better (I did) ...

At The Movies' Cohost Roeper Responds To Critics
At the Movies with Ebert and Roeper co-host Richard Roeper wrote today (Thursday) that he has been accused of "liberal bias" for not reviewing the "intelligent design" documentary Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed on the TV show. In his column in the Chicago Sun-Times Roeper insisted that no liberal conspiracy was involved in the omission. "Expelled wasn't screened for us," he wrote, but given the attention the film has received he finally managed to see it. "Wow," he concluded, "What a piece of garbage."