I resemble that remark

As I'm sure you're all aware, rabbit ears and roof-top antennas will become mostly useless as of Feb 17, 2009. That's when there's going to be a switch-over to all digital broadcasts and Luddites such as myself--with my 25-year-old television set and no cable or satellite dish--will need a converter box to watch over-the-air broadcasts.

Or do I? I've been wondering about that lately. It appears I'm not the only one. This little tidbit appeared at IMDB.com....

Suggesting that the days of over-the-air broadcasting may be numbered, a new report indicates that just 15 percent of all households still receive broadcasts via antennas, with about 10 percent of those planning to sign up for cable or satellite providers when the switch to digital transmission takes place on February 17.

The report also indicated that about 20 percent may not purchase converter boxes and instead rely more on DVD and other entertainment. "Terrestrial viewers tend to be more likely to use alternative video entertainment forms such as DVD rentals and broadband video, and the transition may push them further in that direction," the report said.

Earlier this year, the FCC chairman stupidly predicted that America's cities might burn and civilization would fall into total anarchy when the switch-over happened. Click here to read my original post on Jonathan Adelstein predicting possible "widespread panic" among idiots who will miss "Tyra" because of the change-over. (You can also see my PSA regarding the switch.)

It appears that Adelstein's hyperbole was even more hysterical and exaggerated than I had assumed. I could believe that I was in a minority as far as being completely disinterested in the change-over, but it now appears that I may not be.

I have not had cable TV for at least nine years at this point. I haven't missed it, because I have a friend who tapes key shows for me, I get my news from newspapers and websites, and I watch waaaay too many movies to see much broadcast television anyway. So, I may just not even bother with the converter... and someday, when I've got a better-paying job and I'm flush with cash, maybe I'll get cable just to say that I have it.

Tony Hillerman dead at 83

Tony Hillerman, author of the acclaimed Navajo Tribal Police mystery novels and creator of two of the unlikeliest of literary heroes -- Navajo police officers Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee -- died Sunday of pulmonary failure. He was 83.

Hillerman's daughter, Anne Hillerman, said her father's health had been declining in the last couple years and that he was at Presbyterian Hospital in Albuquerque when he died at about 3 p.m.

Dolomite has pimped his last 'ho.

Rudy Ray Moore, a raunchy 1970s comedian who played the title role of a flashy pimp in the movie "Dolomite" and influenced a generation of rappers, has died. He was 81.

Moore died Sunday evening at an Akron nursing home from complications of diabetes, said his brother, Gerald Moore.

Yes, the truth hurts. But it's the TRUTH.

I don't usually on celebrity relationship dramas unless one of the parties involved is being extraordinarily obnoxious, such as Madonna with her divorce against Guy Ritchie.

Among the complaints in her "case" for why she's the injured party is the following tidbit from The Daily Mirror.

Madonna is building an extraordinary divorce case against Guy Ritchie, claiming he was a cruel and verbally-abusive husband who would belittle and ridicule her in front of others.

Lawyers for the singer, who was widely believed to be the dominant partner in the marriage, are putting together a dossier of incidents.

They include allegations that he told her she 'looked like a granny' on stage compared with her younger backing dancers. He is also alleged to have declared that she could not act, and was 'past it' after she turned 50.

Telling Madonna the truth is, apparently, cruel and abusive.

It is a TRUTH that Madonna can't act and never has been able to act. She embarrassed herself (and everyone else watching her because it was so awkward) in "Desperately Seeking Susan", "Shanghai Surprise", and "Dick Tracy".

It is a TRUTH that Madonna looks like a granny up there on stage with backup dancers who are less than half her age in some cases. It is TRUTH that one should stop dressing like a fetish hooker well before the age of 50 (at least in public).

Partisan hack speaks of what he knows best

Dan Rather, an editorialist who managed to pass for a journalist for many years and whose shenananigans finally caught up with him when he eagerly based "news" on forged documents back in 2004, made some comments in advance of last night's presidential debate that were on a topic he's an expert in.

Here's what IMDB reported:

Former CBS Evening News anchor Dan Rather insisted Tuesday that the "so-called" presidential debates are not controlled by the journalists presiding over them but by the two political parties.

He accused his colleagues of showing too much deference to the candidates and operating in general in a "defensive posture" and imposing self-censorship on themselves.

"These so-called debates are not for the people, by the people," Rather said Tuesday at Time Warner's Politics 2008 Summit. "They are for the parties, by the parties. That's what's wrong with them."

Dan Rather is right. The debates we've been seeing haven't been debates at all. They've just been campaign commericals. And, since Rather is an expert in being a partisan media hack, there's no question he knows what he's talking about here.

And it's a shame. If Obama wasn't such a coward and had stood by his pledge to debate McCain "any time, any where"--remember, McCain tried to take him up on that offer with a bunch of townhalll-format debates but Obama turned him down flat--we might actually have gotten some real debates with real questions asked by moderators who weren't concerned with partisan books about to be published or with making sure they look good for the RNC and DNC goons who have bribed them.

I wonder why Rather is speaking out, though. Perhaps he is upset because his colleagues didn't make a greater effort to make the Democrat ticket look better by maybe working in a few more Obama slogans in the questions, or maybe he's still on a pointless crusade to convince everyone he was actually a serious journalist for the past couple of decades?

'Ghost Town' deserves more box office receipts!

Ghost Town (2008)
Starring: Ricky Gervais, Tea Leoni and Greg Kinnear
Director: David Koepp
Rating: Eight of Ten Stars

After misanthropic dentist Bertram Pincus (Gervais) dies during an operation and is brought back to life, he gains the ability to see and speak to the spirits of the dead. One of them (Kinnear) badgers Pincus into breaking up his widow's new relationship because he fears she is marrying a gold digger. In the process, Pincus finds himself falling in love with the widow (Leoni) and finally starts living life. But can love find a way when the spirits of the dead are being pests?

"Ghost Town" is a touching film about living life when we can and recognizing love and taking advantage of it when it comes our way. It delivers its messages in quirky and very oblique ways, with the love between Pincus and the widow first starting to bloom over the mummified remains of an Egyptian prince and Greg Kinnear's character only discovering how truly to love after he's already dead.

Although it deals with weighty subjects, the film keeps a breezy pace and an upbeat atmosphere throughout, an atmosphere that's enhanced by the inherent charm possessed by and on-screen chemistry generated by the the film's three stars--Ricky Gervais, Greg Kinnear and Tea Leoni.

Gervais and Kinnear play characters who aren't terribly likable, yet the charm of the actors is such that the audience spends the film wanting them to reform their ways and find the happiness they both need. It is also infused with humor that ranges from subtle to borderline slapstick, with every single scene offering something that will at the very least have you smiling but more often than not have you chuckling or laughing loudly. (Even the tagline brought a grin to my face: "He sees dead people... and they annoy him." It's funny and it's also a perfect summary of the movie!)

If you're a lover of ghost movies, the film is also worth checking out due to its unusual ideas for what causes hauntings. Given the last ghost movie I saw from David Koepp--"Stir of Echoes" (click here to read my review)--was pretty traditional, it was a pleasant surprise to see something fresh and original here, a twist in keeping with the overall themes of the story but still one that comes as a surprise.

"Ghost Town" had an undeservedly weak opening weekend, debuting in 8th place in the US box office. I recommend you check it out before it's gone. (That recommendation goes twice if you've complained about the lack of good, well-crafted and intelligent movies in the the theaters recently. If you don't support the good movies with your dollars, we're just going to see more and more crap showing up on the big screen.)

More calls for savagery from the 'Religion of Peace'

Last week, one of THE top "holy men" in Saudi Arabia put out a call for TV executives to be murdered by the faithful followers of the Religion of Peace.

This week, a member of the "Higher Council of Clerics" is saying that astrologers should be tried as sorcerers and put to death if found guilty.

I have to wonder: If the sort of idiot who believes there is ANY validity to astrology--let alone thinks it's some sort of magic--can be admitted to the "Higher Council of Clerics," I have to wonder what sort of retarded morons make up the lower council.

What's next? Fatwas declaring that Chinese restaurants should be burned to the ground as lairs of sorcery because of fortune cookies?

Arabs and Muslims may not all be backwards idiots, but what passes for intellectuals among them certainly are.

RIYADH, Sept 14 (Reuters) - A senior Saudi cleric has said purveyors of horoscopes on Arab television should face the death penalty, a paper said on Sunday, days after another cleric argued death for TV owners.

"Sorcerers who appear on satellite channels who are proven to be sorcerers have committed a great crime ... and the Muslim consensus is that the apostate's punishment is death by the sword," Sheikh Saleh al-Fozan told al-Madina daily.

"Those who call in to these shows should not be accorded Muslim rites when they die," the prominent cleric added.

Many of the hundreds of Arab satellite channels have sprung up in recent years specialise in horoscopes and other advice to callers on solving problems that is seen as "sorcery".

In their capacity as judges, clerics of Saudi Arabia's austere form of Islam often sentence "sorcerers" to death.

Fozan, a member of the Higher Council of Clerics, was responding to a controversy ignited by a Council colleague, Sheikh Saleh al-Lohaidan, who said last week that owners of Arab TV shows should be tried and face death over some shows.

Lohaidan, who is the head of Saudi Arabia's Islamic sharia courts, told Saudi radio: "I want to advise the owners of these channels that broadcast programmes with indecency and vulgarity and warn them of the consequences ... They can be put to death through the judicial process."

He was referring to comedy shows and soap operas airing in Ramadan, a month of fasting when Muslims are supposed to focus on God. Critics say Ramadan has become an orgy of food and television consumption once the fast ends at sunset.

Fozan said entertainment channel owners should be "banished" but stopped short of advocating the death penalty for them.

"The position of Muslims and their rulers about these channels is that they should be talked to and if they continue airing depravity and shamelessness they should be banished from this place and others brought in their place."


Turkish soap operas that became hugely popular in Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries this year provoked a storm of anger among Saudi conservatives who fear the spread of secular culture in the key U.S. ally.

The government's official advisor on religious affairs, Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdelaziz Al al-Sheikh, said in July it was not Islamically permissible to watch the Turkish serials.

The owners of Arab entertainment channels, including MBC, ART, Orbit, Rotana and LBC, are mostly Saudi royals and businessmen closely allied to them.

Concerned about the country's international image, some key members of the Saudi royal family have promoted liberal reforms. The clerics fear plans to limit their extensive influence in what is the world's largest oil exporter.

(Reporting by Andrew Hammond; Editing by Richard Balmforth)