Moeller TV Listings 1/31/07
Tomorrow night, David Letterman celebrates 25 years in late night. Dave will welcome Bill Murray to "The Late Show." Murray was the first guest on NBC's "Late Night with David Letterman" on February 1st, 1982, and he led the parade of guests on "The Late Show" as well, August 30th, 1993.
In commemoration of this thrilling event, take your pick of these nearly 2800
classic Letterman moments compiled on YouTube.
Question and answer
Who said it?- "Dates certain, Mr. President, are not the criteria here. What is the criteria and what should be the criteria is our immediate withdrawal from (there). And if we do not do that and other Americans die, other Americans are wounded, other Americans are captured because we stay too long-- longer than necessary-- then I say that (my italics)
the responsibilities for that lie with the Congress of the United States who did not exercise their authority under the Constitution of the United States and mandate that they be brought home quickly and as safely as possible.Answer- Senator John McCain, October 19th, 1993, in regards to Bill Clinton's decision to maintain a military presence in Somalia.
Isn't the internet a marvelous tool? So much for the Republicans' argument that only the president can make decisions about military deployment. No American in history has emboldened our enemies more than George W. Bush. It's time for Congress to cut off funding for his imperial occupation of Iraq.
---
Cardinals' World Series hero Jeff Weaver just reinforced for me again Jerry Seinfeld's old gag that cheering in sports is essentially just rooting for laundry. I was completely ambivalent about Weaver before he wore the Cardinal uniform last summer, and then he quickly became one of my favorites in October, exemplifying quite well the Birds' overachieving status. He filed for free agency in November and I'd been putting the odds that he would return to the Cardinals in '07 squarely at 50-50. Fair or not, my prejudices dictated that if he agreed to return to St. Louis for the coming year, my entire personal opinion of him as an athlete and as a man would soar, and if he didn't, he would forever after be the stooge who didn't know a good thing when he had it, and who let his agent sacrifice the pitcher's career achievement and public adulation for a bit more money which he couldn't rightly spend regardless.
Well, Weaver officially became a Seattle Mariner this week. He had told Cards' manager Tony LaRussa that he wanted to return, and instructed the team's GM that a long-term deal was more important than the dollars in the contract. Then he turned down the club's two-year contract for a one-year pact with the Mariners, returning to the American League, where he says he hates pitching. He leaves the World Champions, where he was penciled for the #2 slot in the rotation, for a perennial cellar-dweller in a four-team division, and for a home ballpark in the corner of the country where he has a career 6.55 ERA. He leaves Dave Duncan, the pitching coach who resurrected his career, for a job in the stable of first-year Major League coach Rafael Chaves. And wait until he finds out that that's not Gold Glovers Scott Rolen and Albert Pujols patrolling the infield corners for scorching line drives at Safeco Field, it's Adrian Beltre and Richie Sexson.
Good luck, stooge.
---
Quote of the Day: Miami Herald's Greg Cote, "NFL officials have come out with a list of prohibitive items that cannot be brought into the stadium Sunday. The list includes umbrellas, coolers, beach balls, banners, weapons, and O.J. Simpson."
Reds
I just finished watching the new 25th Anniversary DVD Edition of "Reds," and not enough extraordinary things can be said about it. Warren Beatty's 1981 film is the story of the intersecting lives of American Communist John Reed (author of "Ten Days That Shook the World" and the only American buried inside the Kremlin), his writer/feminist wife Louise Bryant, and their social circle of Greenwich Village radicals during the revolutionary period from 1915 to 1920.
The three hour and 15 minute film, equal parts drama and history lesson, is the greatest romance epic in American film history, the final half hour never failing to leave me awash in my own blubber. Beatty, Diane Keaton, Maureen Stapleton, and Jack Nicholson sparkle, and the movie is enlivened by the narrative of about two dozen elderly "Witnesses" to the lives of Reed and Bryant, including author Henry Miller and comedian George Jessel, who both passed just prior to the film's theatrical release. Their presence, and the depiction of such historical figures as Anarchist Emma Goldman, labor leader Bill Haywood, and playwright Eugene O'Neill had me sprinting to the internet in the aftermath of this latest viewing.
Beatty's remarkable achievement as writer, director, and lead actor in "Reds" might have even been surpassed by his success as the film's producer-- coaxing the Paramount/Gulf & Western company to put $35 million behind-- what Beatty calls in one of the DVD's documentary extras-- "a 195-minute movie about a Communist who dies" during the same period that the Reagan Revolution was beginning. "Reds" is often remembered as a Russian epic, a kind of flip-side "Dr. Zhivago," but it's really about Americans and our specific strand of social optimism, about the alternating heroism and often-tragic consequences of our idealism.
---
Nearly a full generation after the collapse of the Communist bloc, and much longer past the beginning of radical disillusion caused by the installation of the Soviets' totalitarian regime, it's interesting to speculate about how one today might have dealt with the rising tide of history if magically transported back to that particular time and place. After all, American women were still denied voting rights when the Bolshevik Revolution commenced in 1917. American Socialists were the leading proponents on the nation's political stage for equal rights, the socio-economic safety net, safe working conditions, and a legislative end to unprosecuted lynchings across the South.
Reed would surely be fighting today for the workers of the Ford Motor Company. Just after an announcement that 40,000 jobs would be cut in the coming years, Ford
announced last week a breathtaking $12.7 billion annual loss for 2006. Executives blamed the company's problems on the costs of health care for their assembly line employees, but they simultaneously announced that they're considering performance bonuses for their top executives. "More of the compensation of senior leadership is tied to their performance," said CEO Alan Mulally, deep into his corporate fantasyworld. "This team has made great progress. You have to keep the talented people you really need." An amazing perspective.
As a society, we also lack today, as we did in the teens, for a system that allows for crusading, truth-telling journalists like Reed. Notice that the article linked above appeared in that particular newspaper's "Business" section, a staple element of both print and electronic mainstream media in the new millennium. Yet, how many news outlets offer time and space for a workers' section. All they do is list the job openings. No wonder we wind up with so many skewed facts and fucked-up social priorities, while said media outlets continue to lose their battle against an eroding customer base.
Due Process, and more miscellaneous items
Who says those later color episodes of "Andy Griffith" weren't just as terrific as the black and white offerings?
Inspiring.---
I just ordered "On the Waterfront" on DVD so
this Stanley Crouch article caught my attention today.
---
I've become a bread snob. I won't buy a loaf containing anything less than
fifteen grains. I sneeze at 12 grains.
---
Much is being made on liberal blogs about the selection of Rich Little to perform at this year's White House correspondents dinner. The rub being that he won't confront the president like last year's star attraction Stephen Colbert. The criticism, however, has spilled over into the realm of "Little's washed up" or "Is he still alive?"-style comments. I think Rich Little is damn funny. He acquitted himself quite nicely late last year during "The Late Show's" Impressionists Week. I probably laughed more in those six minutes than I've laughed at "The Daily Show" the last three months. That program's become so snarky and pandering, it's practically unwatchable. Besides, if you're the type of person who's looking to the White House correspondents dinner for cutting edge comedy, the problem may be you.
The 99 reasons
My favorite weekend on the sports calendar arrives this Saturday. It's the weekend wedged between the one with the two NFL conference championships and the one that hosts the Super Bowl. Nothing will be happening on the football front Saturday or Sunday. The off-weekend only exists to make possible another seven days in which to hype the big game.
In commemoration of this scheduling spectacular, here's
a link to Thomas Boswell's
Washington Post classic "Why is Baseball So Much Better Than Football?", exactly twenty years old last Thursday. Some of it is outdated (#44 is downright tragic), but most of the references are adaptable, and the major point arrives home safely (pun intended).
...and this was even written before Terrell Owens came along.
Miscellaneous items
On February 1st, comedienne Sarah Silverman's first starring TV show "The Sarah Silverman Program" drops on Comedy Central.
The Village Voice's gossip columnist Michael Musto has a no-holds-barred
profile of our nation's loveliest provocateur.
---
He's been unleashed in the Senate!
Bernie rules.
---
The Oscar nominations were announced and here I was still waiting for the big pictures to come out. What a dud year for cinema.
---
This baseball item barely made it into Sunday's
Chicago Tribune within a
story about ticket sales, but the Cubs have given Sammy Sosa's old uniform #21 to former Cardinals oil rig fire Jason Marquis. So much for the debate about whether the club would ever officially retire the number. Those are some short memories in the Cubbies' front office. One of the things I distinctly remember about the evening of September 8th, 1998, was the announcement by Cardinals' co-owner Bill DeWitt that Mark McGwire's #25 would one day join the Birds' list of retired numbers. Six years after Big Mac's retirement from the game, we're still waiting for that honor to be bestowed as well.
Buckle up
Well, there's nothing we can do about it: Hillary Clinton is a candidate for president. The wife of our national rutting pig, and some weak-kneed, centrist advisors are betting that the American people haven't yet had their fill of that charismatic Clinton disfunction, and they're looking to extend that well-funded, center-right Bush/Clinton family and corporate cabal well into the 20-teens, its fourth decade of consolidated power.
Let us hope that grass-roots Democrats are as committed as their words when it comes to denying Hillary the nomination. She's a ticking time bomb as a standard-bearer for the party, one likely to take out both the Senate and the House of Representatives if allowed to blow in November 2008. She's the most hated and ridiculed politician in America outside of George W. Bush and his cabinet. She's an unabashed flip-flopper on a viciously-unpopular war, currently in mid-flip (or is it
flop). She has not a single legislative accomplishment to attach to her resume as a Senator, nor a defining governing philosophy, and she could help the Congressional cause of Democratic candidates in all of about six states if she headed the ticket in '08.
All she has to offer is all that Barack Obama also offers-- strong symbolism to some among the disenfranchised. While others like John Edwards, Dennis Kucinich, Wesley Clark, Nancy Pelosi, John Murtha, Ted Kennedy, and Al Sharpton do the heavy lifting of taking aim at the failed policies of the president and the likely-GOP nominee in '08, John McCain, Clinton and Obama stand back from the battle, muttering only empty rhetoric, hoping against hope that they can be all things to all people because of gender or race.
The "third-way" centrist Democratic Leadership Council may think things will work out that way. After all, that's been the winning ticket in Democratic primary battles when it's more important to score corporate cash than actual votes (one equals the other), but general elections and state Congressional races have proven to be quite a different animal, which is why DLC founder Al From has lost every race he's ever organized. Independent and at-large Americans, and hopefully now, most Democrats, want real leaders, not followers and poll-driven phonies.
Let's hope against hope that Americans will see past the superficial, personality-driven "first woman vs. first minority" narrative destined to be sponged by the corporate media.
---
Democrats have no choice left but to cut off funding for the Iraqi War. The American people vehemently oppose escalating this war, as do both houses of Congress and the generals guarding our occupation. President Bush is a psychopath. He wrecked his presidency beyond repair by listening to fools and zealots (it didn't help that he was also both,) and now his military solution is to send 20,000 more men and women to the desert to be mutilated and killed. He announced his plan to escalate, and his spokesman demanded patience to debate the issue. But, meanwhile, the first increase in troops, which is happening this week, was scheduled in just three weeks. Bush's mental state makes him oblivious to the suffering of American servicemen and women and Iraqis. His only focus is a political one-- hoping to force his opposition into appearing weak, and extending the bloodbath for 24 months until it can be pawned off on his successor, who will obviously be mandated to end it. Then he can claim that the mission was abandoned before it could be won.
And who knows, Democrats may indeed pay a severe political cost for legislative action. But the right thing to do often requires sacrifice. (Isn't that what we tell our soldiers?) Democrats paid the political price for backing Civil Rights in the 1960s, and they paid it again in 1994 after they raised taxes and balanced the federal balance, setting off an economic boom. Meaningful social progress in the larger picture should be the ultimate goal of all political action, even if it means some in the fight lose their jobs. Once and a while, you might even get a pleasant electoral surprise.
43 hours
The newly-Democratic House of Representatives has delivered. Speaker Nancy Pelosi set out a six-item, 100 hour legislative agenda that was completed today after just 42 hours and 15 minutes, with promises of more progress to come! The House passed measures that would adopt the 9/11 Commission's security recommendations (Yeah!), increase the minimum wage (Right on!), expand stem cell research (Indeed!), require Medicare to negotiate for lower prescription drug prices (Now we're really rolling!), redirect $14 billion in tax breaks for Big Oil towards renewable energy (Ohh, Baby!), and lower interest rates on federal student loans (Maybe now Iowa Student Loan borrowers will
lighten up.)
Credit where credit is due here, people. The Republicans' big legislative revolution, 1994's "Contract With America," delivered on many of its promised goals (no matter how damaging), but we were still waiting for those promised Congressional term limits when voters kicked the GOP to the curb in November. Time for the Senate to follow suit in OK'ing this week's legislation, and then for our putz of a President to put that veto pen in his hip pocket.
---
KIOA-FM was rockin' again tonight on the 8pm commute, and moving rapidly through the alphabet: It was the Beatles' "Hippy Hippy Shake," followed by Brother Ray's "Hit the Road, Jack," and Marvin Gaye's "Hitchhike." I arrived home just before the playing of the subpar "Hitchin' a Ride" by Vanity Fare and who knows how many other songs pertaining to hitchhiking.
Caucus-tacular
Hard to believe, but it is now less than a year (362 days) until the Iowa Caucuses. John Zogby polled 596 likely Democratic voters in the state and uncovered these results (4.1% margin of error):
Former Sen. John Edwards 27%
Sen. Barack Obama 17%
Former IA Gov. Tom Vilsack 16%
Sen. Hillary Clinton 16%
Sen. Joseph Biden 3%
Sen. John Kerry 3%
Rep. Dennis Kucinich 1%
Gov. Bill Richardson 1%
Unsure 13%
Expect the CM Blog editorial staff to pick its candidate before spring. If, by mistake, I wind up at the GOP caucus in my precinct, I'll be backing Tom Selleck. I like him.
---
Hey! Do you like old fashioned FM radio? KIOA 93.3, your good times and oldies station in Des Moines is playing its entire library of songs in alphabetical order. Their ads are confusing and their website no help at all, but it must be a pretty lengthy promotion. (Nights and weekends, maybe?) Tonight, coming home from work, I heard "Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy" by Bette Midler, "(Who wrote the) Book of Love?" by the Monotones, and "Born to Be Wild" by Steppenwolf. I just checked back an hour later and caught the end of "Bridge Over Troubled Water." I defy you to tune out!
---
Speaking of radio, my brother just got hooked up with Sirius satellite radio, and he told me about the time that he's spent listening to Howard Stern. It dawns on me that I've never heard more than a minute of Stern on the radio. I bring him up frequently on this blog as a First Amendment champion, see him on TV all the time, and can recall much of his movie, but it's safe to say I'm more interested in the idea of Howard Stern than the entertainer himself. It's kind of like me and marijuana. I've never smoked it and have no particular desire to.There needs to be at least one person in the country who supports the legalization of marijuana who doesn't use it.
Mediacom v. Sinclair
The new season of "American Idol" began tonight but thousands of central Iowans were deprived the chance to see the debut thanks to the ongoing contractual dispute between Mediacom cable and Sinclair Broadcasting, and an ongoing boycott spurred by the defeat of performer Nikko Smith in 2005.
I pay enough for cable, and I have no love for the radical right-wing agenda of Sinclair, which infects every addition of their local news broadcast on the local FOX affiliate, KDSM. Sinclair offers virtually no local or service-oriented programming (even their half-assed news department works out of Cedar Rapids), and still they're granted a free license from the Federal Communications Commission to use the people's airwaves.
What we need is monumental change at the FCC. Satellite receiver technology provided the cable companies with the competition they needed for so long, but those cable companies are still forced to carry local stations in their lineups in lieu of other network affiliates from across the country. Sinclair is pleading with Congress not to get involved in a dispute between "two private businesses," but Congress is completely within its rights to hold hearings on the competency of the FCC and its policies.
---
Slate.com publishes a lot of dumb articles designed to elicit controversy (i.e. "Is it always bad to drink when you're pregnant?" and anything written by Christopher Hitchens about Iraq), but
this one might take the cake.
---
The Cardinals visited
the White House today.
Baby, this and me were really meant to be
It's finally on its way!!! Not quite in time for my birthday,
"WKRP in Cincinnati- Season 1" will be released on Digital Video Disc technology April 3rd, sparking rumors of the first-ever Moeller TV Festival devoted to just one program.
You know it's going to contain all of the original licensed music because it's priced through the roof and it's cheaply-packaged with double-sided discs. But I'll take it. What's important is that the episodes are completely uncut.
---
My cable company, in addition to making these other
headlines, is causing me difficulties in my internet access this week. Therefore, I'm blogging from work today. Here are some topics to munch on...
---
Consider this
intriguing evidence against the conventional wisdom that the minimum wage hurts small business.
---
My Hall of Fame ballot, if they would have sent me one:
(10 person maximum)
Dave Concepcion
Andre Dawson
Rich "Goose" Gossage
Tony Gwynn
Mark McGwire
Cal Ripken
Pete Rose (write-in)
Lee Smith
---
What Cal Ripken said about Mark McGwire on Tuesday: "It doesn't bother me that it's a story one bit, but I don't think it's my place to cast judgment. It saddens me that baseball had to go through that."
What Ripken should have said: "Mark deserves to be in the Hall of Fame. He was twice the player I was."
What Tony Gwynn said about McGwire on Tuesday: "I hope that one day he will get into the Hall of Fame, because I really believe he deserves it... In the late 1980s and early 1990s, we had no rules. We knew, players knew, owners knew, everybody knew, and we didn't say anything about it. As a player I kind of focused on what was going on on the field, and as far as I'm concerned, he dominated an era."
What Gwynn should have said:
Wouldn't change a thing.
Hall voters set the bar
Praise deserves to go out to members of the Baseball Writers Assocation of America for setting clear guidelines on steroid use and Hall of Fame worthiness. In the world of baseball statistics in regards to induction, clear guidelines are the rule of the day: 3000 hits, 500 home runs, 300 wins. Now with steroids, the same applies.
If you played in the era of steroids, your accomplishments are tainted or highly suspect. Unless you are Tony Gwynn or Cal Ripken. If you were ever linked to indicted physical trainers who brought steroids into an MLB clubhouse, than there is a groundswell of opposition to getting you out of the Hall of Fame, unless you're Reggie Jackson. If you were ever caught cheating or confessed to cheating, rather than simply being
suspected of cheating, than you are obviously unworthy of induction. Unless you are Don Sutton, Gaylord Perry, or were with the
New York Giants during the 1950s. If you led a questionable life for the nation's youth to emulate, than you should wear the scarlet letter "D" for denied. Unless you are one of the first 280 members inducted into the Hall.
If you ever used Androstenedione when it was a legal, over-the-counter, supplement, than you shall be barred from the Hall of Fame. If you ducked the questions of Congress, than you will be deemed unworthy of enshrinement, which includes you, Sammy Sosa. If one of your former teammates claims you used steroids or has hinted at it, you'll be kept out, which includes you, Rafael Palmeiro, Miguel Tejada, and Roger Clemens. If you had a performance surge between the unnatural ages of 33 and 37, than you must be kept out to insure the sanctity of the Hall, and that includes you, Manny Ramirez, Carlos Delgado, Frank Thomas, and Jeff Kent.
If you had a cocaine addiction, like Ferguson Jenkins or Orlando Cepeda-- no problem, you're in. If you were a drunk like Grover Cleveland Alexander or Mickey Mantle, you're cool. If you were a virulent racist, like Kenesaw Mountain Landis, Ty Cobb, Cap Anson, or Tom Yawkey, there's room at the table. If you're prone to newspaper diatribes about global Zionist conspiracies, like Steve Carlton, join us at the first tee at Cooperstown's Leatherstocking Golf Course on Induction Weekend.
The standards have been set. Decisions on induction should be much easier henceforth.
To the occupiers go the spoils
It was never about oil, you see. The war in Iraq was about
the liberation of the Iraqi people.
---
Citizen Nader
sees some troubling signs in the early days of Democratic congressional leadership.
---
The Insiders: We ought never feel bad for
defeated Congressional reps. They always seem to land on their feet.
---
Has it been
a year already?
The Democrats take control
Nancy Pelosi is two heartbeats away from the presidency (one with a bad ticker), and Rep. John Murtha is promising extensive hearings on the Iraq War. Is this the new day in America we've been waiting for? We don't know for sure, yet, but President Bush won't be budging an inch, you can bet on that.
The prez was humiliated at the polls, but this is how he has responded: He prepares a plan to
add 20,000 troops on the ground in Iraq, rejecting an exit plan by old pal James Baker designed to help him save face, and he follows up his illegal wiretapping of Americans by claiming new powers to open our mail without a judge's warrant. That's going to be one hell of a State of the Union on January 23rd. Only
one thing will make it more interesting.
Speaking of Baker, it's now worth noting that "moderates" Joe Lieberman and John McCain are now firmly to the right of the former Secretary of State on the Iraqi issue, both far to the right of the country at large. On a day in which "bipartisanship" was the watchword in Washington, it's important to point out that a mainstream, consensus political party already exists in the United States-- it's called the Democratic Party.
CNN poll results testify: (favor/oppose/no opinion)
Allowing the government to negotiate with drug companies to attempt to lower the price of prescription drugs for some seniors: 87/12/1
Raising the minimum wage: 85/14/1
Cutting interest rates on federal student loans: 84/15/1
Creating an independent panel to oversee ethics in Congress: 79/19/2
Making significant changes in U.S. policy in Iraq: 77/20/3
Reducing the amount of influence lobbyists have in congressional decisions: 75/21/4
Implementing all of the anti-terrorism recommendations made by the 9/11 Commission: 64/26/10
Maintaining the current Social Security system to prevent the creation of private investment accounts: 63/32/6
Funding embryonic stem cell research: 62/32/5
Let's all be careful not to fall into the trap of the "mainstream" press, confusing "bipartisanship" with denying the will of the people.
Wednesday night television
The New York Times' Virginia Heffernan pays tribute today to the durable "King of Queens." I'm sure the last name is just a coincidence.
And it's late notice on this blog, but I hope you have a chance to catch the debut of "Knights of Prosperity" tonight on ABC at 8 central.
Tom Shales has a preview.
---
"The 700 Club" televangelist and leg-press Goliath Pat Robertson says that God has recently notified him of a terrorist attack on the United States that will result in a "mass killing" in late 2007. In a related note, a man in downtown Des Moines wearing a garbage bag for underpants told me that Anna Nicole Smith will "find happiness again" this year.
35 things to get excited about in 2007
Nancy Pelosi as Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives
The theatrical release of "The Final Season" and its Iowa premieres
John Edwards' presidential campaign, and its primary focus on the widening gap between rich and poor
The terrific theater of Barry Bonds chasing Hank Aaron's all-time home run record
The new political pressure to act on Global Warming because of the newly-revealed short-term threat to polar bears
No Rick Santorum, Bill Frist, Tom DeLay, or Donald Rumsfeld
The promise of more celebrity crotch shots
Moeller TV Festival #6
Re-mastered and re-packaged James Brown classics on compact disc
The prospect of Barack Obama actually telling us something about his agenda if he were to be elected president
The return of universal health care to the national policy debate
Bobby Knight as college basketball's all-time winningest coach-- it couldn't have happened to a nicer guy
The last odd-numbered year with George W. Bush as president
The Rose Parade--- Dammit, it's over already?
The best reality show since "Taxicab Confessions"?
The first "post-Bobby" Whitney Houston album
A 95th year on Earth for
Studs TerkelThe continued Latin American explosion throughout Iowa and the Midwest, helping us combat our rapidly-aging and -declining population, and spicing up the culture, in general
A bull-headed Howard Dean still chairing the Democratic Party, and now having the electoral success to back the agenda of the Democratic wing
Four sporting heroes-- Albert Pujols, Scott Rolen, Jim Edmonds, and Chris Carpenter-- each collecting their first championship ring at Busch Stadium in April
Wrigley-ville's high expectations for Alfonso Soriano
The re-opening of the I-235 eastbound ramp at ML King in Des Moines-- Please God!
Dennis Kucinich forcing his Democratic caucus and primary opponents to talk about the war in their presidential campaigns
The final season of "Moonlighting" available on DVD in March
Breaking out a headband on the tennis court in the spring
J.D. Drew getting booed at every home game in Fenway Park
More Rosie O'Donnell on "The View"
Less Donald Trump everywhere
Catching that Ralph Nader documentary
Jeff Suppan leaving Missouri state politics
The awarding of the 2009 MLB All-Star Game to St. Louis and the Cardinals
An Academy Awards telecast potentially enlivened by the presence of Eddie Murphy, Borat, and an Al Gore acceptance speech
"The Simpsons" on the big screen
A year-long "M*A*S*H" marathon on the Hallmark Channel (so far, so good)
The Cardinals' pursuit of their 11th World Championship and first ever back-to-back titles
