Is Obama keeping his promises?

Obameter

Our friends at Politfact have been doing a great job keeping track of the Presidents promises. They have a list of over 500 of them and have rated the progress on each. In short it looks like Obama is doing a decent job at keeping his word. 

• Promise Kept 110
• Compromise 34
• Promise Broken 19
• Stalled 83
• In the Works 255

For a complete list of all of the ratings go here. 

 

GO HAWKS! Bears get a..... meh

What a game! The Chicago Blackhawks have taken the lead in the series over the Nashville Predators 3-2 after a stunning overtime goal from Marian Hossa (5-4 final).  The goal came seconds after the Hawks killed a 5 minute penalty that put them on the defensive for more than 3 minutes to start the overtime period.  But the game winning goal wouldn't have even been possible if Patrick Kane hadn't tied things up with 13 seconds left in regulation. Again, what a game! Kane performed admirably all game but that still does not change the fact that he looked terrible while doing it.

Patrick Kane needs to get a damn haircut.

On the other side of town the Bears wrapped up the draft today with some interesting picks.  I'm a big fan of thier 3rd round pick Major Wright. Not for his talent.... its the name.  Anyone with a name that good has to work out right?  I'm sure that Wolf Blitzer's folks just knew that his monicor would propell him to greatness!  (FYI the votes are in and Wolf Blitzer is the coolest name ever.... EVER!). The Bears also picked up Central Michigans Dan LeFevour.  I'm also a fan of this guy, also due to his name.  We need more hockey players on the Bears.  

Other than that I'm skeptical on the Bears picks.  We are apparently reaching again for another broken player with Corey Wootton. The team has done this repeatedly in the past and it never seems to work out.  Hopefully this time will be different. But enough from me here is what the experts as ESPN said about our picks.  ESPN Bears Draft Grades

(Major cleans out some sorry chump)

Nobody Likes Bailouts!

PolitiFact on Mitch McConnell's Statements

 

(Mitch loves peace)

Dwight  Eisenhower once said, "Never question another man's motive. His wisdom, yes, but not his motives." This is still true today but it is getting more and more difficult to not question some peoples motives.  The political landscape today is much more toxic than when IKE was running the show and this toxic climate is no longer contained on the fringe of our political parties. It has gone mainstream.  Even the politicians themselves are regularly calling each other "socialists" or "un-American". Unfortunately this appears to be getting worse with no sign of changing in the future.
Our leaders apparently can't even read anymore.  Recently Sen. Mitch McConnell stated that the recent financial reform bill "will lead to endless taxpayer bailouts of Wall Street banks".  A simple reading of the bill lead the folks at Politifact to the following conclusion;

In ruling on McConnell's statement, that financial reform "actually guarantees future bailouts of Wall Street banks," we base our ruling primarily on the legislation. It clearly states that the intention is to liquidate failing companies, not bail them out. To do that, it creates a fund with contributions from financial firms, not from taxpayer funds. We do not see any element of the bill that expressly permits ongoing, "endless" outlays from the federal treasury. Is it possible that liquidation may cost the government money, potentially more money than is allowed for in the bill? Yes. But even so, McConnell is using seriously overheated rhetoric. Nothing in the bill "guarantees" future bailouts of Wall Street banks. We rate his statement False.

I truly hope that Sen. McConnell  is genuinely mistaken in his interpretation of the bill but I find that hard to believe.  Perhaps his staff fed him bad information or his definition of bailout is very very very broad (like including the FDIC). Whatever the case is I would urge all of our political leaders to stop with the rhetoric.  It may be helping your political campaign but it isn't helping the country.   In the era of "Death Panels" keeping up this type of angry hype can lead to nothing good.  I wish we had more men like IKE around today.

Way to go Islam. You are such a religion of peace... arenchya?!

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
South Park Death Threats
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Tea Party

Religion is annoying. Very annoying.  Recently the makers of South-park ran an episode that involved Muhammad.... very loosely.  They didn't show an image of the Islamic prophet but that didn't stop the crazies form hurling death threats.  But that isn't really even the point we should be talking about. The point is that we shouldn't put up with the religious crazies making up irrational rules that they attempt to hold the rest of us to under threat of violence. I'm not saying that Islam is any worse than the other million religions out there. What I am saying is that ALL religions are based on myths and illogical thinking and they should not be able to declare things "sacred". This should always perk up all of our ears as declaring something "sacred" is usually a way for people to attempt to dodge a reasonable discussion about an issue.  Don't put up with it!  Don't let this type of intimidation and illogical thinking stand!  I won't. As a very small sign of solidarity against this type of BS (I would like to do more) here is a link to the episode so you can watch it yourself. Unfortunately the network has pulled the episode temporarily. Keep going back until they get it up and support them!

Southpark Muhammad Episode. 

You have got to be kidding me Wallstreet...... really?!

Wallstreet to Obama. "Hands Off"

President Obama has been getting tons of flack during his presidency.......... from everyone.  The right is calling him a socialist and is declaring that he is destroying our country. The left is calling him spineless and some say he is no better than Bush.  In my eyes that means he's probably not doing to bad.  He made a big splash with health care (look the sky didn't fall yet) and now he is moving on to financial reform.  So far the political opposition has been low key. I mean, who in their right mind would openly side with Wall-street right after those bastards almost sent us into the toilet?  OH WAIT! I forgot about Wall-street........
One broker was particularly annoyed that Obama is attempting to put the clamps on the financial industry after having accepted political contributions from Goldman Sachs employees during his presidential campaign.

"He took their money before, so it's kind of hypocritical to attack them now,"

Frank Clemente (Insanely stupid douche-bag stock broker). (CNN)

Another idiot said the following;

"I think he needs to focus on more important issues of the U.S. economy, which is to bring employment back, to bring greater stability," (Random douche-bag lawyer). (CNN)

To douche #1, hypocrisy is "The practice of professing beliefs, feelings, or virtues that one does not hold or possess" (thefreedictionary.com). What the Prez did is not hypocritical. It is exactly what we need more of our representatives to do. Namely follow their conscience and try to do what is right. What you are describing is called quid pro quo (this for that). This is the exact opposite of what we want our elected officials to be doing. You are implying that you think if a political candidate takes money from someone that the candidate owes that doner total allegiance. Not sure if you thought that through.  What happens if the candidate takes money from two places that have different opinions about the same subject?  I'm assuming in your world the higher dollar amount would take precedence........  wow.

To douche #2, properly regulating the industry will help the economy, bring back jobs and stability.  And please don't try to give me that crap about all regulation being bad.  Not all regulation is bad. If you don't think so just try to think about how the gloriously free market treated kids before child labor laws regulated industry. But not all regulation is good. There is a middle ground.  What we need to argue about in this country is what kind of regulations will keep the market in check enough to ensure that everyone has a fair chance at the American dream. This will require careful regulation that helps keep the market away from the dramatic highs and lows that severely disrupt society (i.e. the Great Depression and whatever the hell is happening now) while still ensuring that the motivation provided by the capitalist system of competition, innovation, hard work and reward remains strong.
In short the gentlemen on Wall-street that are griping about their pockets possibly being lightened need to jam a sock in their pie hole. Look at what has happened to the rest of the country because of their irresponsibility. We have all repeatedly seen that they are either unwilling or unable to control their own greed. They have gotten to the point where they will cheat, lie and steal the entire pie and the top executives don't even have to endure the risks that should be associated with their business. Its time to roll back some of the regulations that were lifted under the past few administrations (Bush and Clinton are to blame). Let get it right this time.

Hell has frozen over 2X today in Chicago

So I can get this out of the way.. I'm a Chicago Sports fan. I root for the entire collection of big Chicago sports franchises and no that does not include the Fire or the cities other minor league teams (like the Sox). With that said I did wait several posts into this blog before unloading some Chi-Town sports stuff but these two were impossible to pass on.

Big Z to the Pen?

 

The first item to cause hell to freeze over today was the announcement by the Chicago Cubs that Carlos Zabrano would be moved to the bullpen. The reasoning behind this is still unclear. Big Z has gotten off to a slow start this season but the wheels haven't fallen off completely. Perhaps this is sweet sweet Lou's way to kick the tires and see if Calos has truly matured.  Apparently Mr. Zambrano was ok with the move as no deaths via screaming decapitation were reported by the Cubs.


McCaskey Steps Down and ... McCaskey Steps Up?

 More dramatic is the sudden announcement of the Chicago Bears that Michael McCaskey will step down after the 2010 season. Mike will be replaced by his younger brother George.  This remarkable announcement has come as a great disappointment to many Bears fans who have spent years calling for McCaskey to step down only to see McCaskey step right back up.

I love and hate Esquire

I just received the latest issue of Esquire today in the mail. Initially I was delighted to see Christina Hendricks on the cover. If you don't know or recognize Ms. Hendricks she plays the very.... capable Joan Holloway on “Mad Men”. She is a bombshell and the cover was terrific. Unfortunately the only other photo of her in the entire magazine was a close up shot of her eating some watermelon.......  oh wait I get it. *sigh* I thought you were better than that Esquire (I'm referring to the # of pictures of Ms. Hendricks not the watermelon thing). Thankfully for you I checked into this oversight and apparently the problem only goes as far as the magazines sent out to.... all... of... us .....that paid... WTF?!  Anywho here are some more pics from http://www.esquire.com.

What is wrong with United Airlines?

In short NOTHING (at least for today). I was out on the east coast this week and on my return flight today my United Airlines flight landed 35 minutes early!  Not much else to say about that but Kudos to United. I may have lost my Premier Executive status (and I still haven't forgiven you for that) but if your flights can consistently arrive on time or early like today early I might just stick around.

Bad Big Ben!

Roethlisberger Suspended
Innocent until proven guilty. That is what this countries justice system is based upon. Unfortunately for Ben Roethlisberger the NFL doesn't work like that.  After repeatedly embarrassing the Pittsburgh Steelers and the NFL the comish has suspended Big Ben for 6 games (it can be reduced to 4 with good behavior). When will rich athletes learn?  They won't. They have the big profile, big wallet and big egos that will constantly create situations like this.  Sometimes guys like this turn into relatively harmless playboys. Sometimes guys like this will make a bad decision that turns into blackmail.Sometimes guys like this just can't take it when someone tells them no.

CoCo on TBS

Conan O'Brien is going to TBS!
Some are saying that Conan O'Brien Recently "Jay Leno'd" George Lopez. I say ney! Lopez is not even playing the same sport as the big late night boys. His entire act is shitty 80's "white people talk like ..... yada yada" jokes. Until he can muster any appeal other than "Hey I'm American's Mexican?!" he should (and is) laying rose petals at CoCo's feet so his ratings can grow fat off of the feast (of viewers) that are the hilarious crumbs left on the floor for him by CoCo's Colossal Cornucopia of Capriciously Caucasian Comedy. CoCo is the man.

In the beginning....... part deux.

Now that this thing is going I might as well set some ground rules.

These are my commandments

Rule #1 - Thou shalt understand that I maketh the rules.
Rule #2 - Thou shall never EVER try to telleth me about the rules. I don't careth if I'm contradicting previous rules because I MAKETH THE RULES.
Rule #3 - Don't be stupid. I will call you out on it. If you attempt to call me out I will destroy you. (If you are correct I will delete your post and act as if I said whatever you said all along (see rule #1)).
Rule #4 -Suck It.

In the beginning.......

In the beginning god created the heaven and the earth..... then there was an intermission...... then god said, Let there be light: and there was light. And god saw the light, that it was good: and god divided the light from the darkness...... and then I got bored talking about god because some time later he turned into a total dick. Smiting everything that he had created (while knowing exactly what it would do when he created it..... but I'm rambling). Much much later there came a man... I won't say a hero, 'cause, what's a hero? But sometimes, there's a man. And I'm talkin' about myself here. Sometimes...... there's a man. I'm not quite sure where I'm going with this whole thing but sit back and enjoy the ride.

Cogito Ergo Sum