Today I read a tweet that went something like this: pray for Somalia, Tunisia, Bahrain, Libya, London.
What a minute … London?
Then I saw another @acarvin RT that basically said, “Now that the UK regime has failed, what should we do? Bombings? Sanctions?”
I saw some further tweets from BBC 5 Live, which I discovered during the last World Cup. I tuned in via, uh, Tunein on my Captivate to the channel and heard about a shooting that occurred three days ago that was “Like a spark that has spread into a forest fire.”
Then I saw this video of a Jamaican national living in London, ranting against the rioting mutants:
MEANWHILE, Navy Seal Team Six are shot out of the sky in Afghanistan.
MEANWHILE, the U.S. government’s credit rating has been downgraded by S&P.
MEANWHILE, Obama is looking more and more like a cross between Jimmy Carter and Richard Nixon.
MEANWHILE, as predicted here at the DailySkew, the dominoes continue to fall.
MEANWHILE, a bottle of Clorox wipes that used to cost $2 now costs $4.
MEANWHILE, Phil Hughes sucks [ed. note: man cannot live on misery and death alone].
MEANWHILE, gas went down $.08 after going up, like, $2.00 over the past year.
MEANWHILE, oil prices have gone down b/c even the speculators have lost faith in the economic recovery.
MEANWHILE, the illusion of stability and perpetual economic prosperity is gone for the time being.
Welcome to 21st century dystopian Earth. Enjoy your stay.
“Riots? What riots? These are celebrations of diversity your lovely government and the crooked bargainers have unleashed for you enjoyment in multiculturalism. Just sit back and enjoy the ride. Not riots at all. Parades.”
Yes. And anyone watching the Mets has known Fred Wilpon is an idiot for years.
I know he’s a nice guy, but as a former Mets fan, I’m sick of the excuses people make for him.
Here’s a random list of items from the late 80′s and early 90′s that prove this point (I know he’s not directly responsible for everything listed, but they happened under his watch and I’m sure he approved):
- trading David Cone
- letting Strawberry go to the Dodgers
- breaking up the ’86 Mets because they were too rowdy
- preferring Jeff Torborg over Davey Johnson
- signing Bobby Bonilla
And how about more recent examples:
- building a ballpark that celebrates the Brooklyn Dodgers, not the NY Mets
- believing in Bernie Madoff
I guess Fred Wilpon forgot the old saying, “If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is too good to be true.”
Heck, being friends with a crook like Madoff speaks volumes about Fred Wilpon’s lack of judgment.
I was inspired to write this after listening to Greenie on ESPN claim that a New Yorker writer took advantage of Fred Wilpon, getting him to “schmooze” about David Wright, Jose Reyes, and Carlos Beltran. Jayson Stark corrected Greenie, pointing out that Fred Wilpon has been an owner for years and should know better. Unfortunately, Stark was surprised by Wilpon’s mistake.
I’m not surprised. Fred is not a savvy businessman, as the Madoff stuff proves. He is not tactful, as the New Yorker article proves. He is overrated, and lucky to be the owner of a baseball franchise. He is living proof that wealth does not equate to intelligence.
He is an idiot, and is a big reason why I gave up rooting for the Mets. The franchise is seemingly cursed, and the blame is partially his.
As someone who does not have MLB.TV or cable, it is rare when I get to watch a Yankees game. Saturday night’s Yankees/Red Sox match-up on Fox was one of those times.
It was a rare prime-time Saturday game. The game pulled a paltry 1.1 rating, thankfully, because it was an embarrassing, ugly game on many levels for Yankees fans. Damian and I were texting back and forth during the game, and we couldn’t believe how ridiculous things got. Heck, the big highlight for me was not even the game, it was the hilarious Alec Baldwin commercial where he punches a Red Sox fan in the face and then pays him $20k to “Fix” his face.
Just for the record, and in the hopes that this will make me laugh years from now, I now share the low-lights that stuck with Damian and I from Saturday night’s Yankees/Red Sox game:
- Joe Buck complaining about the length of time for Yankees/Red Sox games in the 1st inning! I guess he was looking at his watch during Avatar, too.
- Jorge Posada snapped over being put in the 9 hole in the lineup and refused to play. This was the biggest story, bigger than the game. I felt like I was watching Monday Night RAW and it was mostly locker room interviews, with very little ring action.
There were camera shots of Jorge looking upset; I guess the pained look on his face was actually back pain? LOL.
Cashman was practically in tears when interviewed by Fox news. Deep down inside, I know he hates being tough on aging Yankee legends like Jorge; he’s just too much of a jerk to admit it.
It’s pretty clear that Girardi doesn’t give a damn about Jorge, either. Look, as Damian talked about over at his blog, Jorge just wanted to catch a few games this year! It’s pretty amazing how Cashman and Girardi are so stubborn about this. What — the Yanks can’t have a DH/3rd catcher on the roster?
There were tweets from Jorge’s wife, explaining that her husband has been hiding an injury. She stood by her man!
There was Ken Rosenthal, suggestng the Yanks may cut Posada and use the DH spot to rest A-Rod and Jeter, as well as predicting the arrival of Jesus at Yankee Stadium.
- Tim McCarver was confusing young kids around the country AGAIN with all his crazy rules, like how it’s worth the risk to run from 1st to 3rd with less than two outs in the fifth inning when it’s a slow groundball to centerfield, as opposed to a hard groundball to left or looping Texas Leaguer to right … who can keep track of all these rules? No wonder I felt intimidated about the thought of playing baseball, growing up in New York in the 1980′s, listening to all these rules from McCarver during Mets telecasts on WOR. I wish I could go back in time and say to myself, “Forget McCarver. Just relax and play!”
- Taco Bell “Gift Card” Commercial: Welcome to the new economy, my friends.
- Damian loses the satellite feed due to rain
- Sarah Silverman whines about her Red Sox winning the World Series! At least she’s honest and a million times more interesting than Joe Buck; can she be the new play-by-play announcer for Fox? She totally disrupted Buck’s comfort zone for one inning, which was awesome.
- Nolan Ryan rolls his eyes in a Lowe’s commercial
- Andruw Jones gets a rare hit and is stranded
- 2011 Paul Simon sucks; sorry, I defended Rhythm of the Saints, back in the day, but I can’t defend the music I heard Saturday night.
- Speaking of singers, Jose Iglesias is the future Red Sox starting shortstop; Gammons says he’s better than A-Rod. Man, can we wait until the guy proves it for a couple of YEARS before claiming he’s a future legend?
- Back to Jorge — all he wanted was to catch some games. Let the man catch some games! Sheesh.
- Gonzalez goes deep on CC, three-run home run … Annnnd that’s all, folks
He said he wouldn't, but here's Vahl with some 2011 predictions:
-Obama's poll numbers will go up
- we will hear a lot of "gridlock" and "government shutdown" talk this year
- the tech bubble will burst
- Nolan Ryan will regret signing Adrian Beltre at some point over the next SIX YEARS
Something Vahl forgot to mention on the podcast is that you will hear a lot about rare earth metals this year. Rare earth metals will go mainstream. Who knows? Glenn Beck might get a rare earth metals advertiser!
Feel free to add your predictions in the comments section, if you dare!
- how the Android experience reminds him of Linux, for better and for worse. Vahl had to mount a drive (negative), and was able to name stars and constellations in the sky (positive). Vahl didn’t mention this, but he also loves Swype!
– You can do anything in Linux, but you have to know how to do it
– Mounting a drive on the Mac — talk about a Flashback to 1994 University computer labs! Blackberry is actually better at this than the Samsung Captivate.
– Memory on the Android isn’t that much better than Blackberry
– Like KDE Linux of five years ago, Android really isn’t for casual users right now
– You can do pretty much anything on an iPhone, but you have to do it Apple’s way.
– He also talked about how his daughter was able to play an entire song on the Android Robotic Guitar app, and how his son loves Google Goggles.
– Games, games, and more games. Gotta love the Mario knock-offs!
Here’s the Super Mario World music Vahl referred to:
- The Francisco Cervelli/Brian Cashman controversy, Juan Uribe is the new Jose Hernandez, and Cashman signing Russell Martin proves he didn’t learn anything from previous Yankees busts like Tony Womack and Randy “Winn”.
UPDATE:
We got a couple of voicemails I got today from the DailySkew hotline (716-791-SKEW). The first was someone claiming to be Russell Martin:
I guess Russell Martin wasn’t enough to sway Cliff Lee? Sure sounds like Martin loves playing Pac-Man and Super Mario Bros. I’m amazed he took the time to record his voice and replay it as he played through level one, stomping on Koopas.
Anyway, here’s voicemail number two, this time from Russell Martin’s wife:
She requested that I punch a one-way ticket to H-E-L-L while she played Outrun at the local Dave and Busters. I bet she was about to hop on to Spy Hunter after the call.
I can understand Russell Martin’s frustrations. As Damian pointed out to me on Twitter earlier, we would all be frustrated after spending half the season on the DL and only hitting .248.
Hey, he’s 27 years old, and who knows, right? He might bounce back and have another 19 home run season. WOOOOOOOoooooooh!
On today’s DailySkew Mobile Podcast, Tony Vahl talks about:
- Damian’s theory that the Julian Assange sex charges are “totally fabricated.”
- How playing sim games reveals our desire to “game the system to our perceived advantage.”
In addition, Vahl gets into some baseball:
- Damian pointed out that Cashman slipped when he recently restated that Jorge Posada will be the full-time DH. What happened to this year’s faux Spring Training competition for the starting catcher position? I guess it’s down to Jesus Montero and Francisco Cervelli? Yeah, right. Vahl hopes more players will confront Cashman on his pronouncements, like Jorge did.
- Jeff Francoeur has such a tough decision ahead of him. Should he sign with the Royals and be a a full-time player, or sign with the Phillies and platoon? ”While you’re standing in line with your food stamps, just think of Jeff Francoeur and his tough decision.”
On tonight’s DailySkew Radio Podcast, Tony Vahl takes Glenn Beck’s theory that society was better off without DVD players in cars to it’s logical conclusion, announcing he’ll be “Moving into a cave” and going low-tech.
- Dr. Michael Savage announces he will spend the rest of his days working towards ending human experiments on chimpanzees. He explained, quite correctly, chimpanzees have a full range of emotions and are very closely related to humans. He related a story where, when he was a college student, he walked out of a fellowship job when he was ordered to take part in killing animals in experiments.
- Sarah Palin jumps the shark and joins Fox News. Who knows? Maybe she’ll join Joe Buck in the booth one of these days.
Speaking of Joe Buck and jumping the shark — let’s talk Mark McGuire:
-NEWSFLASH! Mark McGuire did steroids and Dave Parker is surprised by that!
And now … DailySkew coverage of the McGuire interview on mlb.com:
- Maris family disappointed by McGuire’s steroid use
- McGuire, while interviewed by Bob Costas, denies Jose Canseco’s allegations that they shot up steroids in a bathroom stall after batting practice while playing together in Oakland A’s
- According to Mark McGuire, Tony LaRussa learned that Mark did steroids TODAY.
OPINION ALERT
Does McGuire and LaRussa really expect us to believe that his return to the Cardinals organization is not a planned and calculated move? Does he expect us to believe that LaRussa did not know back in 1989 what his young players were doing? Or in 1998, when he was chasing the home run record?
This is like a Mafioso-style version of keeping quiet and not being a rat. I feel like I’m watching a Corleone or Soprano on the stand. Like I’m watching that scene in Goodfellas when the young kid kept quiet on the stand and was celebrated afterwards.
- McGuire glad to come clean, and says he could not talk about this in 2005 before Congress because (NEWSFLASH!) he was afraid of being prosecuted. He wanted immunity, but Congress refused him.
OPINION ALERT … OPINION ALERT
I can’t blame him for that.
Also, I think we all knew this is why he didn’t confess back then.
- McGuire says he was not in exile; he chose to start a family and enjoy his life. He said he was retired.
OPINION ALERT
Bullshhhh.
Then why you cryin’ Mark, if you’re so happy with family life? Bullshhhh.
He’s cryin’ cause he got caught.
I’m done listening to this pap.
To quote Damian Hospital: FREE BARRY BONDS
***
Okay, I’m still here. Let’s get some more McGuire:
- McGuire explains a point that many talking heads forget — he had to work HARD in order to improve his swing. No steroid was going to help him with that
- He reiterated that he took steroids to minimize injuries
- He is LAWYERED UP, talkin’ about how he took “low doses.” Come on, man. Quit giving me legal disclaimers.
On tonight’s “hot” DailySkew Radio Podcast, Tony Vahl discusses the Mark McGuire steroids confession as well as why the he, along with Damian Hospital, is a Barry Bonds apologist.
Podcast: Moving Into a Cave?
On tonight’s DailySkew Radio Podcast, Tony Vahl takes Glenn Beck’s theory that society was better off without DVD players in cars to it’s logical conclusion, announcing he’ll be “Moving into a cave” and going low-tech.
He also points out repeatedly how entitlement programs become tools in a politician’s toolbox to tug at heart strings and drum up votes.
Finally, Vahl reads and comments on two articles written by DailySkew co-founder Damian Hospital:
- Why it took Amazon and Paypal so long to dump Wikileaks?
- It was no surprise to Damian that Jeter and Mariano are staying with the Yanks
Let us know what you think of the podcast. Leave a voicemail at 716-791-SKEW with your comments.
Tune in Sunday nights at 9:30 for more DailySkew Radio!