Reminder, Sinclair Broadcast Group is bad

If you've been on the old internets over the last 48 hours you've probably seen this video of a bunch of Sinclair Broadcast Group newscasts reading the same memo about "fair and balanced" reporting. It's super duper creepy, like if you saw it in some sort of David Fincher horror movie you'd be like "come on David, tone it down just a bit why don't you?"

Anyway, John Oliver and his wacky news crew saw the same video and addressed it on last night's Last Week Tonight. As viral as the video has been it sucks that this story isn't being reported on more. It might just be the most important new story going on right now because the ramifications are nearly infinite. Politicizing the news isn't anything new, the difference here is that thanks to decades of deregulation, a single group can now control hundreds, if not thousands, of different outlets.

We're like 7 years away from having just two news choices, the Democratic news channel and the Republican news channel. And of course it won't stop there, those same two channels will own all the radio stations and newspapers in town. With net neutrality roll backs, just wait until Comcast starts offering the "Real America" channel and internet package, with unlimited access to The Blaze and Breitbart.com! Sorry, Huffington Post is going to cost an extra $19.99 a month.

Basically we're all screwed.

Jimmy Kimmel on Bill Cassidy’s Health “Care” Bill

I'm not sure when Jimmy Kimmel became the voice of political reason but F it, Donald Trump is president, anything's possible. Last night he gave a very clear and concise reason why the new Cassidy Graham healthcare bill is straight trash. He didn't end his monologue with girls bouncing on trampolines or anything but it's still worth your six minutes.

The thing I don't think most people realize or acknowledge is that insurance companies are these huge profit driven businesses. They only make money by paying out less than people pay in. I feel like a lot of Americans believe insurance is some sort of savings account, you pay in every month and when you get sick you get to make a withdrawl. That's why you see so many people fighting for lower premiums for younger healthy people. They're not pulling as much money out why should they put more money in? Why should they pay to cover all sorts of procedures they'll never, or likely never, use? They don't want to admit that the basic insurance model is socialism, with the insurance company taking 30% off the top. Everybody contributes so that the people that need to use it can.

It's a fine model when you're talking about your car or your house. It's terrible when we're talking about real human beings. No insurance company should say "sorry, you've had enough" when it comes to medical treatment. Even the shittiest people are priceless, and private insurance hinges on putting a price on everything.

On the plus side, I feel like we're closer than we've ever been to adopting a single payer system. Just ten years ago it would have been political suicide. Now the most popular Senator in the country is actively pushing a plan. That's kind of amazing.

I'm not crazy, when it comes down to it I'm pretty jaded against all things politics. I'm sure that a single payer system would be a giant clusterfuck too, but our current system, and the old system the GOP wants to go back to, is straight up class warfare, where the rich and the healthy succeed and the sick and the poor either die or go bankrupt trying to stay alive. That's about as far from the American dream as you can get.

Sorry for getting on my soapbox, next post will be about video games I promise.

The President's a Moron

Man if you missed the presidents 15 minute press conference on "infrastructure improvements" yesterday you should really check it out. Odds are you've probably been bombarded with quotes from it already but in my humble opinion you really need to watch the whole thing.

The immediate takeaway is that he talk like a child who forgot to study for a book report. For someone who has the best words he sure hooks onto one small phrase and repeats it into the ground. I lost count at the number of times he says he wanted to get the whole story before making a statement. It's especially stupid when you remember he did put out a statement immediately after the events in Charlottesville and it was intentionally garbage. If you take him at his own word he didn't wait to get all the facts to lay blame on "both sides" of the protest there.

It's just all so amazing. Yesterday the president went on national tv and said that there were lots of fine folks on the alt-right side of the protest. I guess they just happened upon the protest being held by nazis and white supremacists by accident? Anyway, I haven't gotten a chance to watch it yet but I've heard this documentary on Charlottesville put together by Vice is pretty much required viewing. I'm going to check it out on my lunch break, for some reason I doubt I'll be less outraged after watching it.



The Amazing thing is this won't hurt the president at all. The odds were pretty good he wasn't getting re-ellected in 2020 anyway and there's zero chance a republican controlled congress is going to impeach him over been too casual with supporting racists. Half of those guys in congress owe their jobs to racists, they're not about to bit the hand that feeds them now. They'll just make some statements for a couple weeks and boom, tax cuts for the rich next month. Ugh, this country is so depressing.

Get Bent Komo 4

A couple weeks ago John Oliver did a segment on Sinclair Broadcast Group, highlighting how they're requiring stations they own to run conservative editorials and how they're trying to expand their footprint across the nation. Around the same time The Seattle Times also did a story about Sinclair focusing on how a lot of the staff at Komo 4 weren't very happy with the mandates from their new corporate overlords. This whole thing is gross and a pretty good example of how unfettered capitalism and the free market screws all of us.

Crosscut has more about that here.

It used to be that media companies like Sinclair were heavily regulated, it was something like they couldn't own more than 6 stations and never two stations in the same market. If they're allowed to acquire Tribune Media they'll own something like 220 stations including two in Seattle. The only people that's good for are the people that own Sinclair. It's certainly not good for the public, who are supposed to own and control the airwaves.

Anyway watch the John Oliver segment then watch the rebuttal from jackhole Boris Epshteyn. It's amazing that his takeaway is "um actually... terrorism is important". You can't even argue with people like this. They just immediately surround themselves with strawmen. No one is saying Terrorism isn't important Boris, we're saying your terrorism reporting is garbage and is politically motivated. It's a difference any rational person can see.



Gah, I need to stop writing about this and just get back to the salt mine. Thinking too much about this will just ruin my day.

Jimmy Kimmel Reveals Details of His Son’s Birth & Heart Disease

I'm not going to lie to you, this monologue from Jimmy Kimmel had me in tears last night. First off, I can only imagine how awful it is to have your kid rushed to major surgery like that so soon after they were born. Just having my son born via "rushed" (emergency isn't quite the right word there) c-section was enough for me. When they wheeled my wife into the operating room and I had to wait outside while they prepped her, it was the longest 10 minutes. A couple months ago my daughter had to have an MRI for a spinal issue and that was equally nerve-racking.

My daughter is fine, in the grand scheme of things but we've been in and out of Children's Hospital the last couple weeks and have appointments scheduled through May. Some days it is tough going there and seeing all the medical issues kids have to deal with. Kids should be outside climbing trees or inside watching too much youtube, they shouldn't be in hospitals.

Anyway I'm missing my point, which is totally political. The United States of America is the richest nation in the world, probably in the history of the world. It's beyond ridiculous that we can't care for each others medial needs. My daughter's spinal issue (which again, isn't that big of a deal) is going to require an MRI every six months to monitor until it either goes away or she's done growing at the age of like 22. Even with insurance that's $3,000 an MRI and I'm not about to do the math to see how much that will cost in until she's graduated and has her own insurance. Without provisions for pre-existing conditions there's a good chance she would never be able to get insurance or if she could it's going to be insanely expensive.

I'm not saying I have all the answers or even any answers. I just know that in a nation with this much wealth its ridiculous that anyone should have to go bankrupt because they needed medical care. How some people are cool with stockpiling tanks we don't need and nuclear weapons we hope to never use, but heaven forbid we pay for someone's liver transplant is beyond me. People's lives aren't just another line in the budget, whatever it takes to keep kids, mothers, fathers, brothers, aunts and uncles alive and healthy is money well spent.

Ok, I'll get off my soapbox now. My next post will be a Mario cartoon or something.

TrumpCare

Triumph Attends Trump’s Inauguration

Conan was smart enough to send Triumph the Insult Comic dog to Trump's Inauguration last week. It's probably a bit too easy for Triumph but what else are you going to do? Sit there and do nothing? You've gotta get those youtube hits son.

It's not exactly as classic as the time Triumph roasted those kids camped outside to watch Star Wars but it's still pretty good. I give it like 3 out of 4 alternative truths.

Gaslighting Links

Donald Trump Is Gaslighting America. I saw a lot of talk on twitter about how Teen Vogue of all people was killing it with their political coverage and I'll be damned if they weren't right. This article about Trump's gaslighting of America is incredibly effective, it's brief without sacrificing substance. The writer backs up her claim incredibly well, it's not one of those articles where the writer has an obvious axe to grind or hot take to make and basically warps every comment and fact to fit their narrative. Good on you Teen vogue.

Microsoft now has the tools to make the Surface Pro the ultimate mobile computer. I'm not 100% sure the key to the Surface Pro is actually using a ARM processor but what do I know, I'm just a schlub who hasn't bought a new laptop in 7 years. I like the idea of better battery life AND cellular integration but isn't the whole point of the Surface that it's not just an iPad, that it's a fully functioning computer? Seems to me like sacrificing processing power is a step backward in the fight against Apple.

Donald Trump Names WWE's Linda McMahon To Head Small Business Administration. I like how Trump is just appointing people to cabinet positions who pretty much hate that department. Rick Perry his pick for secretary of Energy famously said he would shut down the Department of Energy if elected president. Well, he tried to say it. He famously forgot the name of the department in a debate but trust me it was the Department of Energy. The McMahon's are no friend to small business and their labor practices border on illegal like 99% of the time. Also Linda McMahon took the worst Stone Cold Stunner of all time. I hope congress blocks her nomination just for that.

Comic Desks. This is a cool tumblr blog that just shows you the work spaces of comic book creators (both writers and artists). Nice to see some of these guys and gals are as messy as I am.

Winter Links

What Pizzagate has in common with every conspiracy theory. Have you read anything about Pizzagate? Man these guys are absolute nut bags and generally speaking I'm pretty forgiving when it comes to conspiracies. I don't rule out Bigfoot and I wouldn't be surprised in the least if the government had proof of Aliens. I'll even give you some cabal of super wealthy that run everything. Those conspiracy theories at least have a small amount of logic behind them. The idea that the Clintons are using a Pizza place as some sort of cover for a child sex ring is so ridiculously out there that I can't even...

Top Six Winter Driving Tips! Here's tip number 7, these tips are fake. They're funny but remember that they are fake. If you see a Yeti you should DEFINITELY try and mate with it. Passing up on some sweet Yeti action like that is 6 years bad luck.

Time Loop movies that don't suck. This is a pretty good list, frankly I can't believe someone else saw the movie Triangle. There's a couple clunkers in here (Donnie Darko is garbage, sorry cool kids) but you could spend a lot worse time than checking all of these out.

The 25 Best Comics of 2016. I didn't read most of the comics on this list (I think total I read 7) but what I did read was very very good so I'm going to go ahead and say that this is a solid list. It's also a stark reminder that I need to keep cutting back on titles from DC and Marvel so I have more flex money to spend on smaller publishers. Only thing that didn't make the list that feels like a real snub to me is Descender. I couldn't give you a specific title but there was more than one issue this year that really blew me away. Absolutely the best Sci-Fi book going today.

Trevor Noah Just Had His Moment

If you've been on any kind of social media over the last 24 hours you've probably seen mention of this interview of Tomi Lahren by Trevor Noah on last Wednesday's Daily Show. I caught it "live" while playing Overwatch late into the wee hours. It was probably the first time since he took over for Jon Stewart that I was like "ahhhh, that's why they chose him". Noah really knocked it out of the park with this one. He was very calm and unaggressive, giving Tomi just enough rope to hang herself while still pressing the point that many of her opinions were equal parts terrible, hyperbolic and hypocritical.

Of course none of this matters because none of her fans are going to be watching this, if anything the fact that it created so much social media attention probably helps her brand. Politics everyone!

Here's the interesting thing I haven't really seen anyone comment on yet. Comedy Central runs the The Daily Show twice a night, first at 11pm and then again at like 2 in the morning or something. With Dish network I get the east coast feed of Comedy Central so the first airing of the Daily Show is at like 8pm my time, I almost always catch the replay at 10:30pm. Apparently when this episode first aired the interview with Tomi was cut to about 5 minutes, she went on twitter and claimed it was heavily edited to make her look bad. Then Comedy Central in their infinite wisdom aired the entire 15 min interview on the rerun. I have no idea if that was planned or not but it was brilliant. The longer the interview goes the more her arguments fall apart and the more awkward the whole thing is.

This might not be equal to Jon Steward going on Crossfire but I'm hoping this is a block in the foundation of the new Daily Show. I felt their election coverage was really sub par. I'm not one of those people that thinks we "need" the Daily Show but it wouldn't hurt to have something to laugh at every night while Trump "drains the swamp" but appoints the 5th Goldman Sachs executive to Treasury Secretary.

Seth Meyers on Donald Trump's Presidency

Sorry to brigade the blog with so much politics this week but hey, what else is going on, right? Seth Meyers had some pretty good thoughts on our someone's man D. Trump winning the presidency. I thought it was pretty good. Did you even know Seth Meyers has the David Letterman/Conan time slot on NBC? I usually catch it on Friday nights and it's actually a pretty good show, he's certainly done well with the material this election cycle has given him.

The one thing that really gets me with his monologue here is how everything he's predicted about Trump has been wrong. I feel like I'm in that exact same boat. I never thought he'd really run, never thought he's win the nomination and even tuesday night when the results started trickling in I didn't think he could actually win. I just sat there waiting for all those traditionally Democratic states to go blue, when it never happened I was just shocked. I remember around 8pm on Twitter seeing that the NYTimes was giving Trump an 80% chance of winning and you could have knocked me down with a feather.

And speaking of Twitter I read someone on there openly criticize the likes of John Oliver and Stephen Colbert, while they were laughing at Trump, republicans were busy voting. There's certainly a time and place for satire but at a certain point I think the entertainment division of the left got so far up their own ass they didn't notice that it was about to get kicked.

Anyway, this made me laugh. Maybe it'll make you laugh too.

I voted for Kodos

Well that certainly was something last night, wasn't it? I guess I should consider myself blessed to have lived through 2 historical elections. The election of the first ever black president and the first ever umpa lumpa president. Just kidding, it's the first time we've ever elected a president that's never served in the military or public office. I have a couple random thoughts on the whole thing so I thought I'd just let them fly.

I don't believe everyone that voted for Trump is a racist or a sexist or a bigot or even an idiot. I think a large portion of middle america decided that their opposition to the status quo trumped their opposition to racist and sexist behavior. Essentially they're so desperate for an agent of political change they were willing to overlook Trump's many flaws. If you're straight and you're white it's not like Trump is targeting you, right? I don't think that makes those people "bad" people, I just think they've made a mistake based off their privilege.

WOW did the Democratic party blow this. They spent 4 years clearing the path for Hillary a candidate they knew was unlikable and flawed but they did it and they did it eagerly because that's just how politics work. Hillary had amassed so much power within the DNC that there was no real choice (as wikileaks pointed out so clearly). Just a couple weeks ago everyone was predicting this was the death knell of the Republican party and what we really saw was the implosion of the Democratic establishment. Everyone connected to Hillary is going to have a huge stink of failure attached to them, it's going to be 100% turnover.

Trump has surrounded himself with some wildly incompetent boobs like Giuliani and Chris Christie. Wonder how many of them will be rewarded for their good service with cabinet positions? One of the worst things Bush Jr did after becoming president was fill important positions with people that helped get him there as opposed to actual qualified individuals. Since almost the entire Republican party abandoned Trump who is he going to appoint? Chachie?

I've always felt like the President didn't have as much control over policy and the economy as people gave him credit for. I guess we're really going to see that theory put to the test over the next 4 years.

I've never lived through an impeachment (I mean technically did with Clinton but I was too young to really pay attention or remember anything about it). That should be exciting!

Joe Exotic For President

If you're undecided on who to vote for this year, what's wrong with you? Yes all the candidates for president are terribly flawed this year but what's the hold up? If you identify as a democrat or are left leaning in general, you pretty much have to vote for Hillary? What's your other option the guy that wants to build a wall to keep China out? If you're conservative or a republican, you're stuck with Trump doesn't matter how much pussy he grabs. Remember those supreme court nominations?

What about a third part candidate? Sure throw your vote away! And as long as you're doing that might I suggest throwing your vote away towards Joe Exotic. His Pro-Tiger, Pro-Fringe platform is very appealing. He doesn't have the same kind of money Trump and Hillary have but with the internet everything is possible. Remember how we got Kony a couple years ago? Lets make American mullet again.

Twirling, Twirling, Twirling Toward Freedom

I've had this picture of Kang and Kodos on my desktop for a couple weeks now just looking for an excuse to post it, so here we are.

When did it become accepted fact that Bill Clinton is a rapist? I listen to way to much right wing radio and if you listen for more than like 10 minutes to any station you'll find out that Bill Clinton is not just a molester but a straight up rapist. It's like the whole Indian shooting the star on the Tootsie Pop wrapper gets you a free Tootsie pop thing, if you repeat anything enough people will just start assuming it's true.

Kind of funny how Trump is in the position of saying "don't listen to these women, all these accusations all false" when just last week he was trotting out Juanita Broaddrick at the debate. I really wonder if Anthony Weiner is looking at all of this thinking "I haven't done half of what Trump has, there's still a chance for me!"

Donald Trump vs. Hillary Clinton Debate Cold Open - SNL

This cold open from last weekends Saturday Night Live is one of the funniest things I've seen on the show since Chris Parnell was rapping about cupcakes. I almost woke up the entire house when Balldwin/Trump said "The problem with the blacks is..." Man, I can really imagine Trump saying that. Worst is you know his poll numbers would probably go up.

Last Week Tonight: Scandals

Everyone in my office has Debate fever so I figured I'd post this as a nice reminder to everyone that Comedy Central totally f-ed up when they let John Oliver go to HBO. Those two months where he filled in for John Stewart while he was filming a movie should have proved to them that he was the heir apparent. I know Stewart was still under contract then but they should have thrown a dump truck after dump truck full of cash at him until he stayed. I'll be if Oliver was on the Daily Show the Nightly Show wouldn't have been canceled. Comedy Central could stand to let one of those two shows stick around while they found their footing but not both.

Anyway, we're getting precariously close to electing Donald Trump our supreme leader. All he has to do tonight is not shit himself and everyone will be claiming its a victory. I'm pretty sure he'll be the first WWE Hall of Famer elected president. That's not a good thing.

Visual Links

Twitter Permanently Suspends Conservative Writer Milo Yiannopoulos. Man, that guy has a punchable face doesn't he? So the long story short here is that this guy encouraged his followers to tell current SNL actress and Ghostbuster Leslie Jones just how terrible she is. I don't follow either of these two on twitter but a few people I do retweeted some of the stuff that was sent to Leslie Jones and woof, it was horrible. Like Croatian soccer fans throwing bananas at black players horrible. Of course now this Milo guy and his group of asshats is claiming censorship and that the liberal media is intolerant to conservative ideas and blah blah blah.

Worse than his actions are some of the people defending him. I mean his actions are terrible but I get that he's just a hack trying to get attention. There are people out there that legitimately believe it's their god given right to call someone a cunt on the internet. I do not get that.

Rob Liefeld Is Hiding ‘X-Force’ Sketches All Over San Diego Comic-Con. This is a pretty cool little contest from a big name that totally doesn't need to do this. Rob Liefeld gets a lot of crap because he can't draw feet and a lot of his comics just disappear after issue #2 or 3 but he seems like a decent guy. I really wish he'd make his way up to Emerald City Comicon sometime but I think he has a beef with the group that puts it on.

One of these days I'm making my way to SDCC. It looks like a huge expensive pain in the ass and I get that all the cool comics stuff gets totally ignored but still. It's like complaining that the World Cup Final is rarely a good game, you still want to go just to experience it, right?

Cool visual effects in 16bit console games. I love how much Nintendo and to a slightly lesser degree Sega, were able to squeeze out of their 16 bit systems. It's a sort of creativity you don't see (or at least aren't able to recognize) with the current generation of consoles.

"We Were The Best, Richard" 10 Great Moments From Grant Morrison's Batman. I have a lot of Grant Morrison's Batman run and I found a lot of it to be hard to read. He has this habit of just dropping you off in the middle of the action and I'm the kind of reader that can barely remember what happened in the last issue so I was always going back an issue to see if there was something I missed. I'm guessing his run reads a lot better as a trade, or at least it would for me. I should really go back and reread some of those.

Milania Should Plead the Vanilla Ice Defense

Just a quick reminder that Vanilla Ice is a freaking National treasure. Dun dun dun dun dun dun duh.

Sad Links

Breaking: All the Marvel Now (2106) leaks and no more X-men? A few years ago Marvel discovered they could sell more comics by constantly shuffling their line-up and rebooting everything once every two years. Personally I don't see it as a very sound long term strategy but I understand why they do it. Are you more likely to pick up issue #248 of Iron Man off the shelf or #1 of The Invincible Iron Man, or International Iron Man or whatever it is they're calling the main Iron Man book these days.

I think what's really taken people off guard here is that Marvel had its solicitations for October leaked and there's zero X-Men titles on it. Mutants haven't gone away completely (Deadpool still gets two books) but there's nothing here with X-Men on the cover. Considering how popular the X-Men were when I grew up that seems amazing. I don't get what Disney and Marvel are really trying to accomplish here? Do they think Fox is quaking in their boots because Marvel won't publish an X-Men book? Fox barely even knows comics exist. All the execs at Fox probably think that they publish the X-Men book because they own the movie rights. This is the weakest strong arm technique I've ever seen.

A Cosplayer Is Running For Political Office. This is kind of interesting I guess. Cara Nicole Trujillo, a cosplayer from Arizona, is officially running for the Arizona Legislature as a Green Party candidate. Personally I have zero problem voting for a cosplayer but even though she's running as a Green Party candidate she says she's "pro limited government". I think I'm old enough that I understand what that means. Tax cuts for the rich, like Tony Stark.

A Gallery of Retro Video Game Ads. Well there's an ad you couldn't get away with these days. Some of the ads in this gallery are really something. I guess back in the 90s and early 2000's, it was too much to expect for video game companies to hire actual qualified advertising agencies to give them a hand.

Canadians Are Creating Their Own ‘Sad Pokemon Go’ Since They’ve Been Left Out Of The Fun.Since Pokemon Go isn't available on Windows Phone I'm going to do the same thing. I'm just going to wander around outside with a stuffed Jigglypuff, throwing tennis balls at things.

RIP New Sonics Arena, XXXX-2016

In case you didn't hear, yesterday the Seattle City Council voted No on a proposed street vacation (clearing a road of traffic) that is needed to build a new basketball stadium south of downtown Seattle. It's not quite the death knell for the proposed arena but it does undo most of the work hopeful new owner Chris Hansen has put into moving a NBA team back to Seattle.

Overall the issue is pretty complicated and I don't want to write a dozen paragraphs about it, I just can't believe the Sonics have been gone for 8 years now and we're not even close to getting a team back. I remember when they left EVERY pundit they talked to on the radio was positive the Sonics would be back in a few years. Seattle was too big of a market, basketball was too popular here. This wasn't a Kansas City Kings scenario or anything, there's a team right around the corner!

Lies, all lies. I don't think anyone was being malicious just optimistic. The truth of the matter is moving a sports franchise is a big deal, it feels like it happens all the time but it really doesn't and when it does it because a city is DESPERATE for a team. When the Sonics moved to OKC they already had a stadium built, just sitting there waiting for someone. Seattle just isn't going to do that, politics around here are weird. Even if they weren't weird, how do you justify spending like $500 million of public funds to build a stadium for a team that doesn't exist? We need to save that money for when the new tunnel running under the waterfront eventually collapses.

I guess I'll just have to keep ignoring the NBA. I hear Dell Curry is having a really great year.