Thursday, June 28, 2007

What Ann Coulter REALLY said...

You know, context is everything. So often we hear things that people have said and we think that they must be an idiot or something, but a lot of times it's because we don't hear the whole comment that someone said. Case in point is the Rodney King video. The MSM kept playing the video of him being beaten by the cops. What most people didn't see, was the first part where they kept telling him to lay down on the ground. And they never showed the part where he lunged at an officer which is when they went to town on him. So, most people only saw King getting beaten and not what happened before, making it appear that the LA police were beating up a poor defenseless black man.

Now, what happened the other night on "Hardball" with Chris Matthews with Ann Coulter and Elizabeth Edwards is almost the same thing. It's what we in the media call "ambushing" someone. Coulter was ambushed by Matthews and Edwards after her comments on GMA. I found the GMA clip and you can see what she said. Whether or not you like Coulter, the MSM has this nasty habit of setting people up to be ambushed. Ann can be a bit caustic at times, but she tells it like it is. How is it that Elizabeth Edwards had the phone number to call Matthews at the very moments when Coulter was on, yet didn't have another number for average viewers to call? And, why is Elizabeth Edwards calling in to try and have Coulter stop her "attacks"? Where is John Edwards? hiding behind her dress? And, the Edwards have been using the whole Coulter thing to try and raise money, which in itself has "fairness doctrine" written all over it, which is basically the Democrats way of trying to silence Talk Radio. The Democrats can't field a liberal on the radio with any sound ideas because liberalism doesn't have any!

So, I have here the transcript from Matthew show, courtesy of Rush Limbaugh, taken from the soundbites where Edwards calls in. Ann was unfazed and just rolled with it. Edwards accuses Coulter of bringing up the death of their son, Wade, yet the Edwards have been expoiting his death for years and there is all kinds of documentation about that. Somehow, it's okay for say, Bill Mahrer to lament that the vice president is not killed in a terrorist bombing and not a word is said, but let someone on the right, the very vocal Ann Coulter say anything about a Democrat and these people all of a sudden are offended! The hypocrisy is amazing. The Edwards have used their son's death and Elizabeth's health to further (or try at least) John Edwards political ambitions.

During the interview with Ann Coulter, Elizabeth Edwards called in to the show and it was set up with NBC that she would call in. Coulter was sandbagged. She was set up, didn't know it, but it didn't faze her. Chris Matthews says to Elizabeth after she called in, "Do you want to say something directly to the person who's with me?"

ELIZABETH EDWARDS: In the South, when someone does something that displeases us, we ask them politely to stop doing it. I'd like to ask Ann Coulter, too, if she wants to debate on issues, on positions, we certainly disagree with nearly everything she said on your show today, but it's quite another matter to -- for these personal attacks, the things that she has said over the years not just about John, but about other candidates, it lowers our -- our -- our political dialogue precisely at the time that we need to raise it. So I want to use the opportunity, which I don't get much because Ann and I don't hang out with the same people, to ask her politely to stop the personal attacks.

COULTER: Okay, so I made a joke, let's see, six months ago, and as you point out, they've been raising money off of it for six months.

COULTER: I didn't say anything about him actually either time.

ELIZABETH EDWARDS: Ann, you know -- you know that's not true, and once more, it's been going on for some time --

COULTER: And I don't mind you trying to raise money, it's better this than giving $50,000 speeches to the poor just to use my name on the web pages, but as for a debate with me, yeah, sure, we'll have a debate.

ELIZABETH EDWARDS: I'm asking you politely to stop -- stop personal attacks --

COULTER: How about you start raising money on the web page, then? No, you don't have to, because I don't mind.

ELIZABETH: It did not start with that. You had a column a number of years ago --

COULTER: Okay, the wife of a presidential candidate is calling in asking me to stop speaking? You're asking me to stop speaking? Stop writing your columns. Stop writing your books.

ELIZABETH: -- which made fun of the moment of Charlie Dean's death and suggested that my husband had a bumper sticker on the back of his car that said, "Ask me about my dead son."

COULTER: That's -- now -- three years ago.

ELIZABETH: -- dialogue. It debases political dialogue, it draws people away from the process.

So, the bottom line is this; it's okay for Democrats to say hurtful and mean things about Republicans, whether the President or wish the death of the Vice President, but once you have someone on the right hit back with anything, then all of a sudden, somehow it's terrible and they need to be muzzled. For what it's worth, Ann Coulter is not an elected public official, she is not running for political office. Much like Bill Maher, she is a commentator. Now Ann can be a bit caustic as I said, but she is entitled to her opinion. The Democrats think that they are the only ones who can say anything and that dissenting opinions are somehow wrong.










Ann Coulter on GMA 6/25
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Monday, June 25, 2007

While I am at it...Coffee anyone?

I love coffee. Always have, probably always will. There is nothing like a good cup of coffee freshly brewed first thing in the morning, or in my case, mid-morning since I work nightside usually and don't get up until around 9am or so.

I had to buy a new coffee maker. My old one was just getting old and sometimes it would just spill over the basket as the spout would get clogged. Well, seeing as how I have no desire to buy a HD TV anytime soon, I mean, who wants to watch a lot of crap in sharper definition anyway? I decided to splurge and buy a new HD coffee maker. I actually had to read the manual on this thing and it's impressive.

I still haven't figured out how to get the Ipod to play in it and where the hell the USB port is or the DVD drive to install new software updates, but I will learn. I think it even has bluetooth capability so that I can be anywhere near and tell it to brew when I want coffee. Hell, for all I know, I might be able to use it to make phone calls! Screw that new IPhone, I bet this puppy will give it a run for it's money!

It's a Mr Coffee Model, sleek Black and Red (2 of my favorite colors) and it goes pretty fast. It has this green clock on the front that is eerie to see when you are half asleep at 4 am in the morning. I have been trying to find out where I can buy some headers, a 3/4 race cam and a high rise Edelbrock Interceptor intake Manifold and maybe some pop up pistons when I decide to hot rod it. Then maybe, I will be able to make coffee twice as fast!
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Sunday, June 24, 2007

Closer to the dream-Warning, TV geek alert!

Since I work in TV, have for many years, I have no doubt been exposed to the next generation of TV, Hi-Def, or as we call it in highly technical terms, "HD". Channel 12, KPNX is the first station to go to HD in the Phoenix market, and now KTVK Channel 3 is HD. I am sure that the rest of the stations will be following suit anytime now.

But, one of my biggest dreams was to finally re-configure Master Control and the TOC. The way it is currently laid out is inefficient, what I call "Drive-by Installation". That is where engineers have gotten a new piece of equipment and just basically thrown it in rack, powered it on and then said to the "vidiots", "you're on your own, good luck", leaving the operators to de-bug the stuff by themselves. You can't really blame the guys, because it's ultimately up to the higher ups with the money who really ought to just do it right instead of trying to scrimp on cost. That really does end up costing them more in the long run as many times we end up having to do something else to make it work correctly. Sometimes I really wonder how this country works if management at our company does everything the way they do, how many other company's do the same thing? I also think sometimes I work at "Initech" of "Office Space" fame. But hey, every place has it's Lumberg and Milton right?

One of my major pet peeves in the TV industry is that for some reason, new equipment has to be installed during sweeps periods which is not a good idea. The reason I am sure is that management wants to show off new stuff to impress the viewers, which is really kinda dumb, given the fact that if the operators are not up to speed, it can be a train wreck if something goes wrong and then you have management breathing down your neck thinking it was your fault!

Anyway, the engineers at the station have started to work on installing the new HD ready switcher and ancillary equipment. I am excited as I had a hand in laying out how it will look and work, keeping in mind that the operators need to be able to access everything in one place. The city of Phoenix is currently building the new light rail system right on Central Ave where we are located, and I have joked under the old configuration, we would need track to get to everything in master to do our job. If you want to do A, you have to go over here, if you want to do B, you have to go over here, so you get the idea, it's all not very efficiently laid out for the MCO's.

So, below is a pic of the new desk with the new flat screen monitors they just installed. They also hooked up the new Miranda PresStation SD/ HD switcher (below), which I understand from the lead engineer, "Darth Voss" (God love him, he's great) that it's is not as good or as versatile as the old standby, Grass Valley M-2100 (up above, it looks better when lit up like in the shot below). I have been reading the manual (am I a geek or what?) and it does have some pretty neat functions and I am looking forward to learning how to use it. The PresStation is capable of controlling up to 200 different channels (can you say Network?) although I am not sure of the configuration the station got. On top of all that, KPNX has finally made a move toward dedicated digital as they just installed the GVG Trinix routing system, which is the industry standard.

I would have preferred they upgraded the M-2100 to handle HD since all the MCO's are familiar with that switcher and it wouldn't take any more time to familiarize ourselves with it. But hey, management are not normally known for their common sense and to me it's another example of the powers that be wanting to get the "bestest, mostest and newest" with as little money as they can. Word has it that we may end up with a new switcher in '09 as the Miranda is not as versatile for a market the size of Phoenix, more like Tucson or even Flagstaff. but here are a few pics I took the other day.




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One of the best and funniest shows on TV today

I love Robot Chicken. I started watching that show, well, for awhile now. The other day they ran the star wars robot chicken marathon. I have seen this particular clip before, but it's hilarious. So I had to post it. That show just rocks. It's on Adult Swim, the cartoon network, usually on Tuesday nights, but they have adult swim Sunday -Thursday. This is just too funny.
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