loco_moco's Blog

... but this all gets so goofy, I think we can forget the cigar and just grab a spliff instead.

And no, it hasn't got a blessed thing to do with Bill Clinton (whew!)

Which of you caught the tidbit in yesterday's WaPo stating that the Catholic Church is concerned about ticket scalping for the Pope's stadium extravaganza?  So concerned, in fact, that they've barcoded the seat number onto each of the tickets. 

And if "the Archdiocese sees or hears of a ticket being scalped" on ebay, craigslist, etc., warns the good Monsignor, "the ticket will be cancelled".

Now, just how will the Archdiocese know which ticket to cancel?  Ah, there's the rub.  It appears Mother Mary will have to come to them, whispering words of wisdom as to precisely which seat is being hawked.  Because bar code readers don't work very well on craigslist ads, experts have informed me.

But wait!  There's more!  In fact, mind-boggling as this is, it isn't even the goofiness I'm referring to.

Rather, that honor must be bestowed on the "targeted ads" that have inundated the internet -- ads that are triggered by so-called keywords on the web page.

Evidently one of the keywords on that page was "scalped".  Because the ads were all about how I could regrow a new, lush mane to carpet my bald spots!

(They should really be pitching this to the Pope.  After all, he's way older than me, and he needs some hair to fasten his funny hat to.  Baldness would be an occupational hazard for him, because then his only recourse would be to glue his hat to his scalp with doublestick tape or bubble gum.)

If it gets any goofier than this, I'm probably gonna end up bald from tearing my hair out in despair, long before it falls out naturally.  But I guess I should be counting my blessings that at least there weren't any ads for tomahawks.

So, Metro is planning to color-code its new buses according to their routes!  Now there's a convenience they should've implemented long ago.

It'll be so much easier now to spot the black buses headed for Southwest, the brown ones on their way to Langley Park ... and those destined for Bethesda and Chevy Chase, tastefully accessorized in rich $hade$ of green.

So the Mint is vetoing DC's selected quarter design because it doesn't cotton to the "Taxation Without Representation" inscription?

Stiff 'em, then.  Show 'em no quarter.

This is just another slap in the face for DC, another show of blatant disrespect, another demeaning display of paternalism.  It's time to Just Say No.

NO, we won't revise the design.  NO, we won't submit an alternative one.  NO, we don't want "our own" quarter if the one that best describes DC's political plight happens to give Big Daddy a big red rash.

At this point, the only other appropriate design would be the one bearing a picture of the Washington Monument and an inscription that reads "DC Gets The Shaft".

You weren't even gonna give us a quarter, until we complained.  So here you go!  Take back the lousy two-bits you tossed in our direction to shut us up.  Take it and shove it in your sphinctered slot where it belongs.

We don't need no stinkin' quarter.  We need our God-given political rights.  It's time to make a nationwide statement by rejecting any ersatz, hand-me-down, politically correct design.  We'd rather be unrepresented than misrepresented.

Just my two cents.

Good cops are worth their weight in platinum!  (And no doughnut jokes, please.)  But, gee whiz.  Bad cops are having a hard time hiding behind their badges anymore.

A year and a half ago, Arthur Lloyd was sentenced to 15 years for manslaughter after he shot and killed Ryan Stowers in a strip mall off Rockville Pike.

A week and a half ago, Scott Campbell was indicted on two counts of vehicular manslaughter for engaging in an unauthorized chase that ended in a horrific double-fatality crash on the Beltway.

And an hour and a half ago, Keith Washington was duly convicted of manslaughter by a jury of his peers.

Congratulations to Glenn Ivey for his successful prosecution of this difficult case!

It's looking less like Love Street and more like the Hershey Highway for Motor City Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick right now.  Having denied under oath before a jury that he'd had a long-term affair with his top aide, he now faces charges of blatant perjury after the Detroit Free Press revealed amorous details of e-mail mash notes between the two:

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gMmCL2ZE66E0ZnDD
mXkjF5E4b9NgD8UD8O5O2

Hizzoner's next romantic fling may well be a not-too-eagerly-anticipated nightly rendezvous with his new Block "B" buddy Bubba.

However, the point of this post is really about those pesky e-mails the press got their hands on, and why some folks are apparently just too dumb to clean up the incriminating evidence.  Mayor Kilpatrick left a trail a mile wide, and it cost him his mistress -- and likely his mayoralty -- and potentially his pucker power too.

On the other hand, the White House did things just right.  They didn't stop at simply deleting their millions of incriminating e-mails.  They prudently destroyed the backup tapes too.

So, alas, Dick Cheney and Karl Rove's tumultuous affair will tragically remain a secret of the ages!

You just gotta wonder about the state of America's ad industry when they come out with something like the "Bonified" Chicken ad that's running currently.

Y'know, the one that says "Bonified" chicken is the best, and if it's "Bonified" chicken, it's gotta be from the, let's say, Pluckin' Good Chicken fastfood emporium.

Some words need to be employed with discretion, pronounced carefully, and used only in a context where the risk of miscomprehension is minimal.  Words such as "Uranus" and "niggardly" are examples.  "Bona fide" is another.

Under the circumstances, it would've been more prudent to pronounce this particular word as "bonn" - a - fide rather than the way they chose, "bone" - i - fied. 

As a result of their unfortunate choice, I just can't shake a particular mental image -- one fueled by media reports of just what sorts of shenanigans allegedly occur in the backrooms of fast food places, and compounded by speculation as to whether the underpaid workers are back there adding a 12th. secret spice to the chickens, and just how they might be accomplishing that!

"Hey, it's almos' time for the dinner rush.  Better go in back and bonify us a bunch  mo' chickens so we ain't caught short."

You can try that "Bonified" chicken if you want.  Me, I'm sticking to the boneless chicken fingers ... oops, hold on, let me rethink that one too.  After all, who knows where those fingers've been?

Gov. Martin O'Malley, true to the heritage of so many Irish-American politicians, is blessed with the gift of gab and a golden tongue.  And gee, it never occurred to me before, but a golden tongue must be awfully heavy!  Maybe that's why he tripped over it a couple of times in his latest statements about slots.

He wants the voters to have the final say, because legislators just haven't been able to grab hold of the reins.  Says he,

"We have beaten this dead horse into a coma."

Sweet Mither Machree!  'Tis a miracle, for sartin!  If he beats it a little longer, perhaps the beast'll wake up and start winning races at Laurel!

Just imagine the crowds this miracle horse would draw to the track.  It would be the salvation of horse racing in MD, and we wouldn't need to consider slots any longer.

But wait, O'Malley isn't done yet.  He goes on to add,

"It has been a monkey wrench in the workings of our democracy..."

Marty, I don't know about monkey wrenches.  I do see where slots would put a monkey on the back of too many people who don't need to be encouraged to gamble, and don't have the money to spare anyway.

Why don't we put this monkey on the back of your miracle horse instead?  Think of how many curious new gamblers a monkey jockey will attract.  If you try this stratagem, everyone will have to acknowledge that you're the top banana.

So Guv, I urge you to choose these alternatives -- and quit horsing around with the public and monkeying around with slots!

This fascinating new coinage comes to us from the Pentagon, courtesy of a front page WashPost story today.  It refers to troops' efforts to interrupt the manufacture and transportation of roadside bombs before they are emplaced and detonated -- hence, to the "left" of the "BOOM!" on a normal left-to-right timeline.

But this new phrase is also destined to have marvelous applicability in the socio-political "theatre of operations". 

The next time we begin to hear the jingoistic rhetoric, and see the political machinations start to rev up, for another opportunistic "preemptive" war like the current one -- we will be shrewd enough and bold enough to speak up immediately and declare:

NO -- we are going to stop this one "Left Of Boom"!

Excuse me while I have a good laugh at the story that Bill Clinton is threatening to sue the Osso Buco restaurant, in Greenwich Village, for displaying a photo of the owner and Chelsea Clinton in the front window.

Excuse me again while I go out on the web and check Chelsea's birth year:  1980!

Excuse me, Bill, I know you've tried your best all these years to make Chelsea a public non-person.  But what on earth makes you think you can sue on behalf of your 27-year-old daughter?   Is she non compos mentis and this is the bassackward way we all find out, or what?

Excuse me, but Chelsea's a big girl now, Pops.  I don't think the owner laced her Barolo with goofy juice and hypnotized her into posing with him -- or worse.  But if she does feel offended, used, or invaded, she can initiate legal action herself.  You yourself, however, can't shelter her under your petticoats anymore.

Gov. O'Malley has tipped his hand.  What he really wants to put slots in a whole slew of places far removed from horse tracks.  Also, coincidentally, far removed from the concentrations of people in the Baltimore/DC Metro area who remain unalterably opposed to the idea in any way, shape or form; "out of sight, out of mind".

Well, there's a shred of logic in his proposal anyway.  By scattering the slots to the far corners of MD -- Allegany, Anne Arundel, Frederick and Harford -- they'll become less accessible to the urban poor who stand to lose the most if they succumb to the allure of cheap, state-legitimized gambling, aka "regressive taxation".  Instead, they will drain the meager resources of our rural poor -- but there's not near as many of those folks, so the social impact will be less.

Thus, I'll have to modify my original proposal that MD forget all about slots and instead simply establish a state monopoly on crack sales to help balance the budget.  But it's an easy modification.  They will only have to change from crack to crystal meth instead, which is by far the preferred drug of choice in the hinterlands where these slots are proposed to be located.

With this latest revelation it becomes abundantly clear that Gov. O'Malley is much less concerned about preserving MD's horse tracks, and much more intent on preserving a sweetheart relationship with a certain horse's patootie who is the MD Senate's slots-pimp-in-chief.

I mean, is it really just me?  When I see Lisa Nowak on TV, like I just did on the afternoon news, the only thing I can think of is that commercial where the young mother sings,

"E - ven  an AS - tro - naut  has to go pot - ty!"

(The emphasis on AS-tronaut when she sings it only makes it better)

Back on May 26, I let 'er rip about how certain media were making a point of emphasizing a pedophile suspect's totally irrelevant connection with the ACLU -- while minimizing his much more significant daily activities as a coach of multiple youth sports teams.  At that time, Fox5 was among those who unfortunately took the low road.  ("Sliming the ACLU", May blog archives)

The fool pled guilty, and was sentenced today, which made the evening news.  And now I'm obliged to say, kudos to Fox5 for doing a "180" on their May coverage and getting it exactly right this time!

Their leadoff to tonight's story identified him as a Little League coach.  And throughout the lengthy segment, that was the aspect they played up.  There was only a brief mention of his ACLU history towards the end of the segment.  Of course, it was entirely appropriate to mention it in the story, and they kept it in the proper context and perspective.

I'm delighted to see that our local Fox5 newscasters were able to break with the kneejerk anti-ACLU portion of the media, and present this story in a way that truly deserves the description, "Fair and Balanced".  Way to go, Fox5 News.

What a lovely spectacle to see Sens. Craig and Specter wielding their ethics as if it were a prophylactic:

-- Donned protectively only when the situation unequivocally demands it.

-- Cavalierly tossed aside at all other times, so as not to detract from one's enjoyment.

Craig's actions in the restroom stall are arguably equivocal enough to have won him an acquittal -- and he could also have made a good case for entrapment -- had he chosen to plead not guilty. 

But his sly, slippery word games -- first in his initial public statements, next in the released transcript of his police interrogation, and now with his misdirected cell phone call --demonstrate his consciousness of guilt beyond any reasonable doubt.

How unfortunate for him that he chose, as the weasel-word in his "resignation" speech, the word "intent".  It only serves to emphasize his transparent intent to solicit public sex, and his subsequent intent to minimize and rationalize his behavior and its natural consequences.

Craig and his cloakroom buddy Specter:  The senators with the rubber ethics.

Hey, let's cut this fella some slack, now shall we? 

I mean, he's a US Senator.  He's certainly operating within the scope of his authority when he proposes an act of congress.

Some bloggers are whining "how can it be illegal to tap your feet in an airport restroom?"  Well, we're not talking about someone listening to their IPod here.  There is some history behind this foot-tapping stuff.  You don't have to take it from me, take it from the Michigan Supreme Court who disciplined a Michigan Circuit Court Judge for tapping his foot in -- guess where --

an airport restroom in the Detroit-Wayne County Metro Airport in 2002.

http://www.michbar.org/opinions/supreme/2002/071502
/15672.html

I have to admit this is new stuff for me too, but it's good to know that I better steer clear of any Mr. Bojangles I might encounter in the restrooms from now on.

Today's Post published a partial list of specific VA abuser fees.  Right up there at $3,000, along with the big nasties like DUI or felony reckless driving, was a singular stunner:

"Presence of a smokescreen-generating device on the vehicle"

Now truthfully, when I hear that, I wonder why all this hoo-haw about some of these politicians going 20, 25 miles over the limit ever' once in awhile??

On the basis of the above violation,  simply having one of those politicos behind the wheel or in the back seat ought to be sufficient grounds for a $3000 penalty every time one of 'em gets out on the road. 

Start enforcing this one, and boy howdy just watch the VA coffers overflow with dough!!