I don’t have a comprehensive understanding of the health care bill, and anyone who claims to, which includes 300 million American citizens and their elected legislative representatives, is a liar.

A lying legislator.  Imagine that.

I’m one of those three hundred million Americans who, without knowing what’s behind door #1, is being told I’m buying it.

Does it keep 32 million Americans from having to choose between going broke or going to meet their maker?  And if it does, can we pay for it, given that fewer full time employees are now covering the country’s expenses?  “Rich” has got to be redefined using a lower bar if the rich are going to foot this bill.

Yet the concept of no cap on benefits is a no-brainer in this day and age, when a single surgery can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.  And an end to denying insurance to those with pre-existing conditions, like a family whose kid has a congenital defect that will inevitably rear its ugly and expensive head, appeals to anyone with a heart that beats, and more importantly, feels, empathy for his or her neighbors.

So the jury’s out, probably for decades, on whether this bill will make us a better people, or bankrupt us before we can find out.

And circling back to March Madness, with time about to expire, Obama shoots, and nails his game-winner.  Some leave the arena ecstatic, others fighting mad, still others confused and sullen. Obama rears his heretofore absent potency, and makes it happen.

A historic buzzer beater, no doubt.  With far more at stake than NCAA bragging rights.

                          

A few days after putting up The Falcon’s piece on America’s rabid desire to view and present death and destruction for fun and profit, a Wall Street Journal news alert hit my in box with the following info:

“Years before a young luge racer from the Republic of Georgia flew to his death at the Olympics last week, officials made a series of decisions designed to make the icy track a commercial success after the Games but that left it faster, and ultimately more dangerous, than any competitive track before.”

It seems worthwhile to re-post his frighteningly on point perceptions, while inquiring as to whether it was either CIA credentials I wasn’t aware of, or a particular variety of mushroom that allowed him to divine what occurred years ago in the private meeting referred to above.

NASCAR, The Luge, and Rollerball

posted by The Falcon

The cry goes out as we look for someone to blame for the horrible luge fatality in Vancouver.  Don’t look far.  It’s us.  We want faster, bigger, more dangerous in our sports and the huge cartels that run them are more than happy to oblige.  Nascar lifted a bunch of regulations this year, including opening the holes up in the restrictor plates so the cars can go even faster.  The latest numbers on restrictor plate racing at Daytona are a Vegas gambler’s wet dream.  10 out of the last 10 times the “big one” (Nascar’s pet name for huge crash) has occurred inside the final 8 laps of that race.  All cars are required to have this plate on the carburetor, thus making them equal.  Sounds fair, until you actually watch it and see the cars all bunched up the entire race- literally inches apart. The only way a car gets an advantage is if it has “help.”  Help means another driver gets behind and pushes.  Yes, pushes at 200mph…even around turns (see above regulations lift).

Interviews with drivers sound eerily similar to the Olympic athletes concerns about the brand new, bigger-than-Godzilla luge track in Vancouver.  Carefully worded criticisms because, you see, Nascar like the IOC, is all powerful.  Now haul in the major TV networks, and … you get the idea.  But, again, it aint their fault!  We want it like that! They are only doing business, and in business, you answer the desires of the consumer.  We love reality TV and the so-called mixed martial arts shows.  We love watching Trump dump on and fire people, Stern make fools of fools, and of course, Cowell smirking at the Idol “talent.” There is something about the ugly side of humankind that we are drawn to and today’s sports only gives legitimacy to our accident-chicken -hawking leering. We are living out what William Harrison dreamed up centuries ago… a Rollerball Nation.  How come?

My guess is that after we all realized that America was on as shaky ground as say, The Congo, our internal anger systems kicked in.  With anger being an offshoot of fear, and fear being an offshoot of helplessness, we’ve become wicked little boils on the neck of the Universe, ready to seep and pop. Luckily, there is also instilled in us  a modicum of adherence to law or else it would be guns ablazzin’ !  Instead, we feast on High Def slaughter and, like in Vancouver the other day, tragedy.

And so today, Sunday and opening day for the Daytona 500, I will be feasting.    Pizza, brew, Nascar, Flyers hockey, and if they are running the luge tonight, I’ll be there, baby.  Hey, I didn’t say I was any different than the rest of us… I’m was just sayin’.

                          

from LK: here’s the second piece by The Falcon.

The cry goes out as we look for someone to blame for the horrible luge fatality in Vancouver.  Don’t look far.  It’s us.  We want faster, bigger, more dangerous in our sports and the huge cartels that run them are more than happy to oblige.  Nascar lifted a bunch of regulations this year, including opening the holes up in the restrictor plates so the cars can go even faster.  The latest numbers on restrictor plate racing at Daytona are a Vegas gambler’s wet dream.  10 out of the last 10 times the “big one” (Nascar’s pet name for huge crash) has occurred inside the final 8 laps of that race.  All cars are required to have this plate on the carburetor, thus making them equal.  Sounds fair, until you actually watch it and see the cars all bunched up the entire race- literally inches apart. The only way a car gets an advantage is if it has “help.”  Help means another driver gets behind and pushes.  Yes, pushes at 200mph…even around turns (see above regulations lift).

Interviews with drivers sound eerily similar to the Olympic athletes concerns about the brand new, bigger-than-Godzilla luge track in Vancouver.  Carefully worded criticisms because, you see, Nascar like the IOC, is all powerful.  Now haul in the major TV networks, and … you get the idea.  But, again, it aint their fault!  We want it like that! They are only doing business, and in business, you answer the desires of the consumer.  We love reality TV and the so-called mixed martial arts shows.  We love watching Trump dump on and fire people, Stern make fools of fools, and of course, Cowell smirking at the Idol “talent.” There is something about the ugly side of humankind that we are drawn to and today’s sports only gives legitimacy to our accident-chicken -hawking leering. We are living out what William Harrison dreamed up centuries ago… a Rollerball Nation.  How come?

My guess is that after we all realized that America was on as shaky ground as say, The Congo, our internal anger systems kicked in.  With anger being an offshoot of fear, and fear being an offshoot of helplessness, we’ve become wicked little boils on the neck of the Universe, ready to seep and pop. Luckily, there is also instilled in us  a modicum of adherence to law or else it would be guns ablazzin’ !  Instead, we feast on High Def slaughter and, like in Vancouver the other day, tragedy.

And so today, Sunday and opening day for the Daytona 500, I will be feasting.    Pizza, brew, Nascar, Flyers hockey, and if they are running the luge tonight, I’ll be there, baby.  Hey, I didn’t say I was any different than the rest of us… I’m was just sayin’.

                          

editors note: check the Twitter (Tweet) section for details on the new LK TWIST format.

According to this morning’s Wall Street Journal the “number of man hours an organization devotes to winning the Super Bowl” is one million.

The number of man hours this nation spends, every week, watching tone deaf people attempt to sing is in the tens of millions.

Mindless.

And we wonder why our economy is faltering and our educational standing in the world is sinking like a stone.

                          

With the NCAA basketball tournament now complete following North Carolina’s romp over Michigan State, I can’t help but wonder whether the federal government will intervene and have Michigan State declared the winner in order to prolong the feel good atmosphere in the hard hit Detroit area.

                          

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There’s a kind of cognitive dissonance that results in a headache at best, and a heartache at worst, when one thinks of the hundreds of thousands of unemployed auto workers licking their wounds alongside the partying corporate and sports honchos.

Yes, there’s a positive side to this, as millions of dollars in commerce is coming to Detroit, an area starved for both commercial revenue and sales tax from that revenue. And the locals will embrace the temporary bump, while gritting their teeth knowing that it’s too fleeting to make a substantial and long lasting difference in their lives.

Michigan State earning it’s way to the Final Four also presents a study in contrasts with the likes of the auto executives who let the world, particularly the Japanese and Koreans, pass them by while they themselves crawled along in the slow lane, either devoid of innovative ideas or enacting them at a snail’s pace.

Had Michigan State lost, they’d be out, headed home, essentially fired. Their appearance at the big dance is a shining example of pure capitalism, survival of the fittest, at its best. The fact that it took 8 years and the government to get rid of Rick Wagoner as the head of GM is capitalism at its worst. Cronyism trumping creativity. Government intervention instead of free market forces running the show.

Michigan State is my sentimental favorite next weekend.  It’d be nice to bring Motown’s residents a tiny sliver of joy in the midst of their troubles.

                          

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Blogo has made more than one qualified Chicagoan applying for a position in the new administration bite the dust through no fault of their own, except geographical proximity to the city of corruption and the Cubs.

The last thing Obama needs during his upcoming herculean attempt to get the nation back in gear, is the distraction of the appearance of any sort of improper behavior by him, his staff, his cohorts, and his appointees.

To think otherwise would be naive, and counter to the pragmatism that’s marked his appointments thus far (much to the chagrin of the far left wing of the party, who seem to favor ideology over progress, but more on that in the near future).

                          

You want to know what the smartest kids on the other team are thinking and doing.

We’re not talking about a Watergate type felony here, or even an underhanded Bill Belichick rules transgression. We’re talking about material that’s publicly available, material that reveals both the style and the substance of what’s going to be thrown at the Democratic nominee. After today’s primaries it should be clear to everyone but Hillary that Obama’s the one who’ll be fending off the onslaught.

Read the opponent’s playbook and let Barack know what to look for.

                          

Today’s record companies are run either by private equity poobahs whose idea of talent is the rating they give the girls at the Gentlemen’s Club, or by well paid slaves of publicly traded companies. In the latter case, now that this part of the art world needs to report quarterly results, there is no chance for the type of artist development that would lead to both lengthy, productive careersand artists that generate billions of dollars in revenue. The same holds true for the companies under the control of private equity, with the drive for numbers no less intense but a lot more hush-hush.

Case in point: The Red Hot Chili Peppers. Beginning in 1984, the band released 3 albums that made no money for their record company. Their fourth album scratched its way onto the Billboard Top 200, and their fifth album, Blood Sugar Sex Magik, released 7, count ‘em 7 years after their first public exposure broke the band wide open. My educated guess is that they’ve done at least a half a billion dollars worth of business including record sales, concert grosses, and merchandising.

In today’s environment they would have been dropped (the equivalent of fired) by their record company after album #2 at the latest, and whoever green-lighted that second album would have been sent packing as well. Today’s myopic morons in their corner offices can learn something from professional sports GM’s who bring talent along at a pace that just might bear some fruit. The Joba rules come to mind (google the phrase if you’re unfamiliar with the context).

One thing shared by both the music and sports biz is that both tolerate and even indulge talented types with drug problems, making them major enablers. Although the drugs of choice are as different as, oh, say, steroids and heroin, dope is dope.

And dope brings us conveniently back to the folks running the major label record companies.