Kennedy v Specter...I smell a fight!

TED KENNEDY AGREES WITH ME!

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PS. I will definitely write a blog on Ted Kennedy in the near future. Is there any man more publicly scrutinized, misunderstood, loved, hated, and determined than Teddy?? Stay Tuned

Arlen Specter: Distinguished Senator, Dedicated Public Servant...Definite Douche Bag!

I want to preface this entry by stating that I have done my best to avoid writing about sports. While I could easily rant about the strengths and weaknesses of the Red Sox, and the recent road woes of the Boston Celtics...I have decided to focus on more poignant and topical issues.(see "Everyone farts at work")
BUT ALAS...the pontificating, paleolithic Senator from the pathetic state of Pennsylvania has left me with no alternative.
As you may recall, last fall after a Patriots romping of the feeble NY Football Jets, their "coach" ( I use parenthesis because he has done nothing but consistently lose, which if you ask me doesn't sound like much of a coach) Eric Mangini, reported the Patriots to the league office for video taping and recording the opposing teams defensive calls. For those of you unfamiliar with this you can get a decent Wikipedia briefing of it here:"spy gate"As a result, the Patriots were fined and penalized to the full extent of the rules and regulations of the NFL, and most recently had a disgruntled ex-employee, Matt Walsh claim that he had videos exposing further misconducts by the Patriots. This week Walsh submitted videos to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell for evaluation, and yesterday Goodell completely dismissed the allegations that there were "other" videos of game day preparations before playoff and Superbowl games. Goodell stated that "the fundamental information that [Matt] provided was consistent with what [we] disciplined the Patriots for last fall." Case closed. Problem solved. Right?

Well yes...except of course for Sen. Arlen Specter who is apparently yielding a major hard-on for the New England Patriots and wants to initiate a Congressional investigation. hahahahaha. Are you kidding me? Congress? Sure. They have nothing better to do than watch NFL videos. I'm sure glad there isn't a recession, war, health insurance crisis, and environmental catastrophe that they could be dealing with. Wait? What's almost as hilarious as Specter's political record were his comments today about the investigation. He stated that "after a lot of consideration it's [my] judgment that there ought to be an impartial investigation, like the [steroids] investigation that baseball had with former Sen. George Mitchell." So was he watching the same Congressional hearings I was watching? And did he say impartial? Yeah he did...what could be more impartial than a Senator from the state where both of its teams (Eagles and Steelers) have been unable to beat the Patriots when it counts. And I am certain that the fact that one of his biggest campaign supporters, Comcast, who is in the midst of an enormous lawsuit filed by the NFL (FCC complaint) makes him completely impartial. What a douche bag!

Spy gate is a dead issue. The Patriots have been punished severely, and now other teams who undoubtedly use similar tactics are now on notice that such actions will not be tolerated. Specter is wasting his time, our time, and most importantly the Government's time AND money. Why can't we get our politicians to feel so passionately about real issues? I mean why is it that the justice system is so backed up that murderers and rapists may not see the inside of a court room for years, but athletes using steroids or football teams attempting to achieve competitive advantages skip the court room and go directly before Congress? Something is seriously wrong!

*Ironically enough for the video tape that were provided the Patriots had a 3-3 record yet since the 2001 season they have a record of 97-27.

The only thing Green about you...

is the money in your wallet...

In a recent conversation with a friend about her decision to not purchase a hybrid vehicle a few things dawned on me.

While I would have understood and been sympathetic to a concern about the usually higher price tag on such vehicles....in this case price was not an issue. At least not directly. Her concern was that it wasn't a good economical decision. The money she would save on gas really didn't add up to the money she would have to spend on the vehicle being hybrid.

Now here is my issue. At what point can we stop thinking all about ourselves for one second, and actually do something to help? She was right...buying a hybrid probably won't allow you to realize any savings economically...but how about the fact that you are using a more fuel efficient vehicle? Does that not mean anything?

I have officially had it with the excuses that people come up with why they can't/won't do their part to become a bit more environmentally conscious. At first I thought some of them were sincere, but I have since realized their contradictions and now I am able to see them for exactly what they are....just plain apathetic!

The fact is...excuses don't fly any more. Rich, Poor, White, Black, Male, Female....it doesn't matter. It is so easy to make small steps. I'm not saying everyone who doesn't buy a hybrid is a failure...but what I am saying is that if people continue rationalizing their apathy and hiding behind excuses for not making changes....then not only do they fail...but WE ALL FAIL!

Who's the shark?

Ya know... people are always quick to call lawyers sharks these days.  I mean it's almost the thing to do...like even my own family made and continue to make jokes about the profession.  While I am aware that they are genuinely made in jest, it still is a bit odd that it is usually people's first reaction when they learn that I, or someone else is an attorney.  Society in general has painted a picture of lawyers as ruthless, money hungry, unemotional drones put on this earth to bill hours and make life complicated.  Perhaps there is a bit of truth to these theories, but the reality is that attorneys are one of the only professions, if not the only professions that are strictly regulated by an ethical code and an ethical standard.  We are self monitored and have a serious structure of checks and balances to ensure disclosure, honesty, and other such boring things.  I think it has a lot to do with the fact that non-lawyers all see it black and white, right and wrong, and just simply do not understand that the legal system is highly procedural and rule based, and as such.....a lot of the costs incurred for the services provided stem from following procedures and achieving results.  That said...who the fuck is keeping an eye on auto-mechanics?

I mean talk about sharks....they are the fucking worst.  Go to 3 mechanics and get three different quotes and three different assessments of the problem.  The only thing consistent will be that the person your dealing with is trying to make as much money off you as 

possible.  And who is regulating them? No one!  You can read reviews online ,which are worthless for the most part, and you can call the

 better business bureau...which is a waste of time.  The fact remains that there is no internal or external watch dog over mechanics.  

Every day people come to them, usually in times of need (why else would you go to a mechanic if you didn't have a problem) and they totally, completely take advantage of the patrons desperate situation.  The average Joe has a very limited knowledge of the inner workings of a vehicle, but that doesn't give Mr. Mechanic license to lie, cheat, and steal does it?  Apparently it does.  Today I went to price out a new muffler.  I got prices ranging from $260 - $500.  One guy even told me I needed two mufflers???WHAT??? I mean I may look especially stupid....but two mufflers? Come on dude.  

In defense of lawyers, we are mandated to disclose our fees, and detail the work which we do.  Last time I checked, mechanics can and often do, adjust rates and service fees at the drop of a hat.  It's arbitrary at best and should be stopped.  If a lawyer was to do that you could report him or her to several organizations....the bar association and the board of bar overseers to name a few, and there is no doubt that something will be done swiftly and justly.  Try getting any such remedy from complaining about a mechanic....it's laughable.  

So my advice to you is this...do your homework.  Get several quotes and read up on the

 problem online as much as you can.  Definitely do not attempt to fix the problem your self. While they may be dishonest...they are still professionals and will most likely fix your car better than you could. Find a good mechanic and love him.  Love him with all of your heart. Bring him cookies, send him cards....suck his dick if you must.  In the end a good mechanic can be a valuable asset...it can save you time, aggravation, and of course money.  But don't be surprised if some day that same mechanic you trusted ends up fucking you in the ass...it's the nature of the game.  Last and most importantly... next time you attempt a lawyer joke... please think twice.  If we are sharks...mechanics are Al Qaeda.

The Gas Tax is A Joke

While I wouldn't call myself an Obama supporter and will probably not vote for him in the fall....I completely support his recent decision to expose the truth about a proposed gas tax break for the summer months.

In case you are a moron and have no idea what this proposal is please allow me to explain....

So the gas prices are getting a tad high...and by a tad high I mean fucking outrageous...accordingly a few of the Presidential front-runners have taken the affirmative stance of offering to cut the roughly $.18 cents a gallon gas tax for the summer months. Proponents are claiming that this would ease the burden of high gas prices and will help put a little extra cash in our pockets. Brilliant! For a recent CNN article click here.

So while the politicians may be correct in stating that the tax break would lighten the price of gas...they have failed to describe what the tax break doesn't do. First of all, it doesn't explain the other tax ramifications. While you are not likely a political scientist nor an economist you should nonetheless understand that if the Government gives a tax break on something they are clearly going to increase taxes on something else to ensure a break even. While this may not directly effect the average consumer...it is still deceptive because this tax break is merely a tool to increase other taxes. But bigger than this, more important than this, and most essential of all is that this tax break does nothing to actually resolve the real problem....which is our dependency on foreign oil.

Obama has taken a stance...a brave one at that and he should be commended for his reluctance on taking the road easily travelled. Instead, he stood his ground and made his best efforts to explain why this tax is nothing but a slap in the face to Americans. What Americans need to realize is that this is a mere band-aid, and while yes it may save us a few bucks here and there on our fill-ups....we need to change our ways.

Talk about condescension. It's almost as if politicians believe we can be shut up for $.18 on every gallon we buy....Can we??? I certainly cannot...nor should you. If gas wasn't so expensive then this gas tax would not even be an issue. We should allocate the gas tax to researching and developing new technologies for efficiency and to initiate the development of renewable energy sources. We should tax the gas companies and not the consumers...we should give incentives to those socially responsible enough to want to make changes. We should not reward greed and control. This is or at least was arguably the greatest nation in the world....why are we still using the same energy source we did 100 years ago? We have evolved, our world has evolved, our technologies have evolved, as have our economies...isn't it time that the fuel driving this great American engine change as well???

Do something about it!

A generation undefined

I recently found myself confronted with the difficult task of describing what generation I am a member of.  I mean there are the baby boomers, generation X, the me generation, and several other names that we have been labeled with.  But in a world where labels are (a) not looked kindly upon (b) tend to over generalize and (c) are never spot on, I felt it much easier to explain a few things synonymous with my childhood to accurately reflect my generation.  I began discussing a few things off the top of my head to identify my age group, but have since decided to continue listing them....do you remember any of these?

You are in my generation if:

You remember when computers were not in every home, when frogger and paper boy were the shit, playing the Oregon Trail on a computer at school.  When your dads cell phone was the size of a VCR (you of course know what a VCR is), when you thought your grand father's members only jacket was all that and a bag of razzles, or perhaps bonkers depending on your choice.  You remember when the energizer bunny first made it on the scene.  When Cheers and the Cosby show monopolized your Thursday evenings. When you came home from school and went outside and made your own games up.   When your parents could give you ten bucks and you could make it last forever.  You remember the DARE program in school, when the challenger exploded while you were watching it.  When you went to school and your biggest worries were superficial and had nothing to do with guns or violence.  You used walkie talkies with your friends.  You could buy a piece of bazooka gum for 5 cents...swedish fish for 1 cent...and a coke for 50 cents.  You wished ALF would come to your birthday party, you owned GI Joes and/or My Little Ponies, and  you always wanted to go on double dare.  You definitely ate your meals with your family.  You had a paper route.  You were scared to try pop rocks while drinking a soda.  

Freddy Kruger scared the shit out of you.  Kathy Ireland was the most gorgeous woman in the world.  You owned or at least wanted to own a starter jacket, gerboud jeans (pegged at the bottom) and a champion sweatshirt.  You wore adidas samba classics.  You remember Larry Bird.  you remember when no teams in Boston ever won anything.  You remember when Michael Jackson was (a) black (b) your idol and (c) the fucking man.  You saw Mike Tyson knock people out in under 30 seconds.  You definitely had Tab soda. You made shrinky dinks in the oven, designed t-shirts with puffy paint, drew pictures with your etcha-sketch, ate fruit roll-ups, and potentially mouser-cized.   

You owned a Madonna album, you received or gave out music singles at a bar/bat-mitzvah, as well as t-shirts or boxer shorts that have not so witty comments on them.  Romper-room was a TV show and not a room for slow kids in the basement of your school.  Gym teachers could yell at you, let you fight, and potentially beat the shit out of you with out fearing bureaucratic punishment.  Roger Rabbit was the most revolutionary cinematic achievement of all time (and you got a boner from Jessica Rabbit...don't you dare fucking deny it).  

Ohhhh man there is obviously more and I could go on forever, but if you know about these then we are on the same page.  I can't think of any good ideas for names, but if you have any clever suggestions for a generation tag line, and of course more memories.....send them along!

Hamas TV: Spreading The Truth

Today is Yom Hashoah (Holocaust Remembrance Day) and Hamas wanted to make sure that we all knew the truth about what really happened 60 years ago across Europe. Thank goodness...because I was confused and thought that something was a bit fishy here.

Once again, our good old friends at Hamas TV have compiled a fact based documentary explaining the realities of the Holocaust. That's right..."Satanic Jews' planned and perpetrated the Holocaust. OF COURSE THEY DID!!!! Why was I so blind???

So the article I read, which can be found by clicking the following link Satanic Jews, goes on to describe that Al-Aqsa TV aired a documentary explaining that the Jews invented the holocaust in order to "rid the nation of the 'burden' of the weak and disabled." Well, I must admit this was a revelation to me. I was under the impression that the Holocaust was made up and never happened, and here they are actually acknowledging that it existed AND letting us know how and why it happened. Again...thank you Hamas!

The video claims that Jews blamed the Nazi's for the events so they could benefit from "international sympathy." Boy did it work.....I mean everyone loves Jews. Brilliant plan!

Lastly, and what stuck out most to me was when Hamas, utilizing top secret information, explains that the figure of 6 million dead Jews is fictitious and nothing more than Jew propaganda. I can always count on Hamas to provide accurate, timely, unbiased reporting....they put CNN to shame.

While I am never amazed that this type of rhetoric and shit is actually being spread throughout the world, I still feel great disappointment. At least we can see through their false claims and rise above their lies. Today of all days we should stop and think about the tragedy and make sure it never happens again.

If you want to see the documentary, they were kind enough to post it on you tube...check it out here Hamas TV.

A long overdue apology

During my life I have no doubt pissed off a lot of people, and have made more apologies than I care to remember. In my own defense, I would like to think that I have made as many, if not more people smile than frown, which is no excuse for my actions, but it does kind of vindicate me...at least it does in my mind. Accordingly, there is an apology I must make that is long overdue.

You see...I am a murderer. A killer. I have killed hundreds, perhaps thousands in my day and now I am finally prepared to get it off my chest. I AM AN ANT KILLER!!!

At first It started as a game. Stepping on ants one by one. The stepping became stomping. Single ants became entire colonies, and I found myself going out of my way to torture and kill ants. It was my goal to eliminate the ants from the planet. I don't know what it was or why I did it, but looking back...it was a sick thing. I mean these ants have families and friends, and I just stepped on them as if I was g-d.

Can you imagine if someone out there stepped on us on a whim? Here we are going about our day....working, trying to do good, and then CRUNCH.

It's a shitty way to go! I think what made me think of this was seeing some little kid stomping on ants the other day as I was outside. I felt like shaking the little bastard....but I fought the urge. I mean why don't his parents explain to him that life, all life, whether ant or human is precious and should not be mistreated. I know it's only ants, but perhaps if everyone started treating things a little better, it would have a great and long lasting effect.

So I obviously avoid killing ants and I am very aware of the ground I am walking on. Next time you are out take a look down and observe...it's actually really cool. Ants are great. We can learn a lot from them. They work hard, work together, and all in the face of imminent death. So again, sorry to all the generations of ants I have killed. I was young and immature.

Torn

So this past weekend I was back home in the suburbs of Boston enjoying a weekend with family and friends. Sounds good right? Saturday was a perfect day...High 60's/low 70's, not a cloud in the sky....it was fuckin' gorgeous. Not to mention the Dunkin' Donuts coffee I had in my hand....it truly couldn't have been any better... that is until my little sister comes down in her baseball uniform so we could go watch her play in her first game of the season.

Now I consider myself a great brother...an amazing brother. I love my little sister more than anything and would no doubt do anything for her, but as she stood in front of me wearing a New York Mets uniform I had a mini stroke and a little puke came up in to my mouth. My first reaction was to make fun of her for wearing a Mets shirt. My second reaction was to hate her. As the blood began to rush back to my brain I gained composure and realized that this was my little sister and I can't be rude to her. So of course I did my best to pretend like nothing was wrong...it was easy, I just didn't make direct eye contact with her. No big deal. After all ... it's just a little league shirt right?

Well needless to say I found myself rooting for the other team as I watched her game. I thought about sabotaging the Mets, but the parents sitting on the side line looked tough and I was not in the mood to fight. Clapping for the Mets was to say the least very difficult. I mean the Mets. Not that they are good or a threat at all, but they are from New York and well...need I say more. There's my sister...standing in the OF in full Met's gear....I guess I should be happy it wasn't a Yankees shirt. However, that would be impossible since the good folks at little league HQ decided that there would be no NY Yankees team, which I might add was a wise and honorable decision.

So I am still struggling with the fact that my little sister will be wearing this Mets shirt all season, but I do take comfort in the fact that she told me after the game she still loves the Red Sox.

Am I a bad brother because I would be fine with my sister's team losing every game this year?

Close but no cigar

There are few things as hilarious yet painful to me as going to a cigar bar. Underneath the thick smokey air that limits your ability to breathe and borders on being torturous is the sweet smell of pure testosterone. Mmmmmm...nothing like some testosterone to get you going.

While it appears that men are merely sitting on red leather furniture smoking their stogies, they are in fact doing far more than you can imagine.

It all starts when you walk in the door. Say good bye to fresh air and say hello to guys bull shitting all over the place. The reality is that the average guy has no fucking clue about what differentiates a good cigar from a bad cigar, a 5 dollar cigar from a 50 dollar cigar, and a Cuban from a cigar rolled in Chelsea. But no guy would ever dare let anyone catch on to his lack of expertise. Rather, it is at this point that Joe Shmoe is all of a sudden a fucking cigar aficionado. The lingo dropped in the walk in humidor, which no doubt has been ripped from reading a few articles in Maxim or other such magazines, is absolutely hysterical...but most importantly it is all Bull Shit.

Dark, light, mild, sweet, spicy, strong, rich, blaaaaa....Why do we feel the need to act like we know? Like it makes a fucking difference? We all know that we hate the shit...it tastes like crap, hurts our throats, makes us reek like an ash tray, and eventually causes cancer. Yet we feel some manly compulsion...a magnetic attraction that we must go to these places.

While the entire scene is hilarious...there a select few things that are my all time favorite.

There's the above mentioned asshole in the humidor talking about shit he clearly has no idea about, but then there is also the licker, the smeller, and of course the starer.

The Licker - this is the guy that talks a big game in the humidor, enjoys spending entirely too much money on a cigar, and has no issue with salivating all over his tobacco. He nestles in to his chair and begins licking his cigar...like its a fucking Popsicle mind you. I mean I guess I have heard that this is an acceptable thing to do...but come on.

The smeller - this is the guy who smells his cigar for a good 5-10 minutes before even thinking about lighting it. If he could stick it up his nose he would. I want to throw my matches at him and tell him to light the fucking thing already because the longer it takes for you to smoke it, the longer it means I have to sit here and get emphysema.

The Starer - He's your basic douche bag asshole. He lights his cigar and then watches the smoke exiting his mouth. He watches the ash build on the end of the cigar. He turns the cigar, he tilts his head back and he blows smoke in to the filthy air. Like I said....your basic douche bag asshole. Like his smoke is the most amazing thing ever to be put on this earth.

All in all....while it's a nice theory. Cigar bars kind of suck. Cigars make your throat feel like someone poured an empty ash tray down your throat and then ran sand paper over it. I can see why people enjoy the dry, raw feeling and the small lump that develops....its amazing. Not to mention the cancer. Seriously your eyes burn and your lungs cry.