The Angry Jew

The rantings of an Angry Jew in The Pacific Northwest

I received a reply from the Program Manager at our local country station this morning.  It read;

I’m not sure why that version is deleted.  That was the version that the records labels send to radio to play.  I’ve never heard the real version on the radio.  I wish I had an answer as to why they deleted it, but I don’t.  We just played what we were sent.

We don’t have a list of words that don’t make it on the air (except the famous seven dirty words).  Each market and state are different and the FCC leaves a lot of that up to individual markets.

Thanks for the email.

So the record label is the culprit.  Well then, let’s see what they have to say?  I am waiting for the contact information for the label, and once I have it, I will ask them what the hell is going on.

“I have more respect for people who change their views after acquiring new information then for those who cling to views they held thirty years ago.  The world changes.  Ideologues and zealots don’t.”

Michael Crichton

Author

Young Russian:  I’m like a squirrel.

Angry Jew:  What???

Young Russian:  Oh, you have never seen the movie Ice Age?

Angry Jew:  No.  I thought maybe you wanted to put my nuts in your mouth.

As I was out and about today, enjoying the day, I had the radio on my truck tuned to a local country radio station.  They played “Pictures” by Kid Rock and Sheryl Crow.  In the song, there is a line sung by Kid Rock that goes “…Fueling up on cocaine and whiskey.”  Well, the station in question blanked out the word cocaine.  What the hell?  When did the word cocaine become un-airable?  Did I miss another email?

Here we are fighting a war on the stuff, and we can’t even sing about it on the public airwaves?   Has it become “The devil who’s name we dare not speak”?  Are they afraid kids are going to rush to their local crack den on hearing a Kid Rock song?  Have we become so P.C. that the mere mention of a drug, not the advocacy of it’s use mind you, but the actual name of the substance, is enough to bring down the wraith of the FCC?

Well folks, you know me, I had to write the Station Manager and ask.  I sent him the following email today, I’ll let you know if I get a response.

On Saturday afternoon around 3PM, your station played the song “Pictures” by Kid Rock and Sheryl Crow and you deleted the word Cocaine from the line “Fueling up on cocaine and whiskey.”  I was wondering why?  Seeing as how alcohol use, often to excess,  is a common theme in country music, how does this word rate censorship?  

How can I obtain a list of words, phrases or themes that your station finds objectionable.

Its seems America can not get a break.  We just can’t win anymore or are we just having trouble picking our battles. 

Despite Six Billion dollars spent, we are losing the war on Cocaine.  According to Federal Drug Czar John Walters, in the period February 05 to October 06, the retail price for 1 gram of pure cocaine dropped 11% to about $135 dollars a gram.  In 1981, the first year the government begain collecting data, the price was $600 a gram.  Also, according to DEA data, purity is trending upwards.

In a report to be released next week by The State Department, sources state that there wasa 30% increase in terrorist attacks worldwide in 2006.  Now these figures do not include attacks on military targets in Iraq and else were, just those against noncombatants.  Worldwide, there were about 5,800 terrorist attacks that killed at least one person.

Are we winning these wars?  God, I hope so.  Just imagine what the numbers would be if we were losing.

Despite secret prisons, torture, curtailed civil liberties, no knock warrants, mandatory sentencing guidelines, and all the other crap the government has tried, we are worse off then we were 2 years ago.  I don’t see how any sane person can come to any other conclusion.  Then again, who said politicians were sane.

Its to time to admit defeat and start thinking outside the box.  There has to be a better way to get these problems under control.  I don’t think legalization is going to solve the drug problem, I don’t know if sending hit squads from Blackwater Security to go after terror cells one on one instead of fighting an entire country will work any better, but we really need to try something new.  Anything new.

I guess the most suprising thing to me is the lack of public outrage at these figures.  Then again, it’s not like the Colombian Drug Lords just entered rehab, or that Al Quida Leaders referred to Americans as a bunch of ”Nappy Headed Crackers.”  That is what it takes to get any kind of media attention these days.  I am sure if it were discovered that Cocaine production was a contributing factor to global warming, Al Gore would have another Oscar in a matter of months.  Hell, neither of these stories were even front page news.  The drug story was a 1/4 column on page 5, below the fold and the terror story was on the back page. 

What a sad thing it is to be a member of a “developed nation” where, as long as the problem isn’t going up our sisters nose or blowing up in our mothers face, we really just don’t seem to give much of a damn.   

If you see Oregon Governor Ted Kulongoski moping around the Capitol this weekend, do the man a favor and buy him a drink, or better yet, a burger, and give him a hug.  He has had a rough week.

To start, Ted decided this would be a good week to shine the media spotlight on the problem of hunger in Oregon.  He vowed to live, for the whole week, only on what he could get with $3.00 a day, the same amount the average Oregonian would receive from food stamps.  It’s a shame that no one told him that $15 does not got far at Fred Meyers, the most expensive grocery chain in the state.  But it did make a lovely photo op.  The shopping trip seemed to go well, even though his aides were seen slipping him coupons in the check out lane.  No fair Mr. Governor.  Next time try Grocery Outlet or Winco Foods.  The stores are not as pretty, but your money will go a lot further.

Then yesterday, the State Legislature gave him a mighty kick in the groin by voting down his pet project, the 84 cent tobacco tax that was to fund his Healthy Kids Plan.  I guess he can take comfort in the fact that it won a simple majority, the vote was 32-34, but not the the three-fifth’s majority needed to pass a new tax.  I guess the smokers in our fine state can breath a little easier.  (Oh how I love a good pun, but it is the bad ones that make me grin.)

So Ted, here is my advice.  Take a deep breath.  Have a shot of Thunderbird, and figure out a way to get health insurance to our kids that does not unfairly burden a small segment of our population.  Give Rep. Tom Butler of Ontario a call.  He has an idea for a 5 cent a roll tax on toilet paper that might just fit the bill.

You have to hand it to the folks at Comcast Cable Television.  The did a Comcastic job of screwing up what other companies can only dream of, a legal monopoly. 

You see, here in Portland, as in many other places around the nation, Comcast was the only cable service provider in town.  If you wanted The Disney Channel, Lifetime, or ESPN, you had to call them.  You didn’t have a choice.  If your house faced the right way and you had a phone line (I’m strictly cellular now) you could go Dish Network, but that was your only choice.    Did they treat it like the “Golden Goose” it was.  Did they nurture this “Cash Cow”?  Hell No.

Instead, they just raped it for all it was worth.  A while back, things got so bad here in Portland, that the Public Utilities Commission laid down the law.  They set standards of service that Comcast would have to meet in order to retain their franchise.  These standards included rate increases, maximum hold times at call centers, and maximum waits for hook ups and repairs.  

Anyone who has seen a gangster movie had to know what was coming next.  It’s like watching Scarface.  There is Comcast Montana, fat and happy.  He’s got it all, but he has lost his edge, he has got to take the fall.  And fall he did.

In to town rode Verizon.  Well Verizon took one look and rubbed its chubby little hands together in glee.  Another plum ripe for the plucking.  Verizon has been laying fiber optic cable all over Portland like a drunk sailor in a whorehouse on payday.  They have now received permission to begin offering cable TV packages over this new network.  Verizon states they will be able to begin servicing customers by early 2008 or sooner.

Needless to say, Comcast has been crying foul.  The reason, you ask.  It seems the Board of Commissioners has also given Verizon a package of conditions they must adhere to when it comes to customer service.  Alas, Verizon’s conditions are not as stringent as the one Comcast must follow.  It’s not fair, cries the bloated, staggering Comcast.

Listen you Cockroaches (insert bad Al Pachino impression here), you had it all and you pissed it away.  If Verizon offers the same package as you do for a dollar less a month, customers are going to leave you in droves and you only have yourselves to blame.  You had the world, chico, and everything in it.  But you got greedy and sloppy and now it’s time for your victims…opps..customers to slip on their dark shades and unload a double barrel shotgun in your back.

So Comcast, say hello to our little friend, Verizon. 

Rosie O’Donnell announced today that she and ABC have been unable to reach terms for her new contract, and that she will be leaving the daytime hen party The View in June.

I may loose my right to pee standing up for admitting this, but I used to watch Rosie’s show and The View, where Rosie replaced Americas Hottest Soccer Mom, Meridith Vierra.  I lost all respect for O’Donnell when she ambushed Tom Selleck on her show.  The poor guy was there to promote a film project, and she tried to turn it into a debate on gun control.  Kudos to Tom for the way he handled himself, shame on Rosie for turning a fluff interview into a debate on a topic she herself knows little about.  So I tuned her out.

I ignored her feud with Trump, payed little attention to the way she played the “Homophobe” card every time someone disagreed with her, I even ignored the irony of her rag on Anna Nichole just hours before her death was announced.

Why can’t more people do this?  Don Imus said something that angered the black community, why not simply stop listening to him, ignore his sponsors, and move on.  Every time we get up in arms about some person in the media spotlight saying something we don’t agree with, we give them the thing they crave the most, publicity.  Imus got more airtime and print coverage then he has ever received and we gave it to him , for free.

You want to get rid of these morons. These attention whores?  Just ignore them, when they don’t get enough spotlight and show their true lack of any redeeming qualities, they will just dry up and blow away   

Last Thursday, Helen Robson Walton, Widow of Wal-Mart Founder Sam Walton, passed away at her home in Bentonville, Arkansas.  She was 87.  In accordance with her final wishes, her age will be rolled back to 56, and the body will be interred in a Chinese sweat shop.

There is a columnist in The Oregonian who I rarely if ever agree with.  His name is Steve Duin.  Most of his stuff, in my humble opinion, is sensationalistic trash, but today I am forced not only to agree with him, but to say he is taking too mild a view.

His commentary in todays paper centered on the case of an Oregon State University student who shot and wounded a homeless man collecting cans from dumpsters behind the students frat house.  The student grabbed a .22 caliber rifle and fired from an upstairs window, wounding the man in the upper thigh, barely missing his genitals.  The student, then hid the rifle in a friends car, and went out for pizza with his frat brothers. 

The student has been convicted, and sentenced to 150 days in jail, three years probation, $3000 in fines and restitution, and 400 hours of community service in homeless shelters.  The victim in the case received $30.00 for a new pair of pants.  And this, this is justice?

The student offered up what has become the defense de jour.  Friends, family members and clergy all saying he was a good kid who made a mistake, not the kind of kid that prison was meant for, blah, blah, blah. 

Give me a break, the kid shot this person, who was no threat to him, for fun, kicks, sport.  He stood in a window, took careful aim, and fired, no different then Charles Whitman in Texas oh those many years ago.  I wonder how many “Losers”, like Mr Cho, this fine young gentleman with his whole future ahead of him, taunted and teased?  How many potential killers has he helped to create?

If this case is any example of what is going on with our college aged youth, their level of disregard for the simple sanctity of human life, is it any wonder why a poorly adjusted, taunted and distraught immigrant lost control and extracted revenge.  We have created our own monsters.

4 months in jail is a joke.  What they should have done is give his homeless victim a rifle and let him have a shot at the kid.  With any luck, his aim would have been a little more true.