I’m not as liberal as could be assumed from a lot of what I write here. For example, I think the deadly embrace between Corporate America and Organized Labor contributed to the inflation/unemployment spiral of the 1970’s. It also gave us some of the worst cars ever made.
A liberal theme I have expressed often is my distrust of Wall Street. The Federal Reserve and Treasury have served the needs of investment banks very well, but the big firms aren’t satisfied with borrowing money for free. They want unregulated markets, and the only rules of the game they will follow are the ones they write for themselves.
We are still living with the repercussions of the market collapse in 2008, and there is nothing to prevent it from happening again. In fact, it almost did happen again, as explained in a new documentary, Gaming Wall Street.
The documentary reminded me of a book I read that further explains how the system is rigged, and that markets are free only in the “anything goes” sense. Flash Boys, by Michael Lewis.
I’ve been watching movies featuring Hollywood tough guy Lawrence Tierney.
Lawrence Tierney (1919-2002)
Tierney reminds me of a guy I knew in college, named Tom, who was a year ahead of me during my freshman year. Tom and his roommate were in the dorm room directly above myself and my two roommates.
We were a nerdy trio, while Tom was a tough guy majoring in Criminal Justice. He was also a major pain in the butt, taking delight in giving us a hard time. When I’d finally had enough of him harassing us, my roommates literally had to hold me back from taking him on. Tom seemed content that I would dare to challenge him, and from then on we were okay.
Tom is introduced a few moments into this video, and you will hear how he put his Criminal Justice degree to good use.
https://youtu.be/cpnU1tKpTKU?t=4336
One of the last screen appearances of Lawrence Tierney was in Quentin Tarantino’s first movie, Reservoir Dogs.
A podcast series on ransomware from MIT Technology Review and ProPublica. The end of Part 1 automatically leads to Part 4, so I’ll post them in the correct order.
On February 16 I received a message from the non-controversial Joe Pera, promoting his upcoming tour.
Besides being Black History Month, is February also Comedian Month? Because yesterday this message popped up from the controversial Louis C.K. Hmm… “popped up” may not be the right expression to associate with Louis.
Hello. You are in the Boston area. Yes you are. Don’t lie. Anyway I’m writing you all of a sudden because I made an infomercial. It’s really fucking stupid and silly but I think it’s fun to watch and I believe it will make you laugh. It’s going to air in Boston TONIGHT in one hour! (Haha sorry) at 2:05 AM on WFXT which is an independent station and then again at 2:35. It’s channel 25 and 34 digital, whatever that means, I’m sure you can find it on cable somewhere.
Anyway it’ll be on a few times during the week in different spots but this is the first airing so I thought you might like to tune in if you are awake at that hour or set your DVR for 2:05-2:35 AM.
That’s all. Have a good weekend!
Louis CK
Also I am not in Ukraine. My flight was canceled because no one can fly there now.
Was Louis really supposed to be in the Ukraine right now? Yeah, he was.
Louis called WFXT an independent station, but it isn’t, it’s a Fox affiliate. A late night infomercial on broadcast TV? Seems an unlikely place to find a new audience, so I was curious and recorded it. The commercial is also airing in L.A., Philadelphia, and Dallas. As expected it’s a parody of infomercials while also serving as a sales pitch. Here’s the first minute of the thing.
At the end of the video is one of the milder surreal cuts. Some of the others are more typical of Sarah Silverman’s dark sense of humor.
QR Code removed for your safety and security. If you want to enter the address for the web site that’s between you and Louis.
So I’m not surprised that Louis’ old friend in comedy, Sarah Silverman, would make an appearance. Wait. That’s not Silverman, it’s Sarah PALIN!
But wait, for only $5 more you also get last year’s comedy special!
Louis C.K. and Al Franken paid a heavy price for their offenses when #MeToo hit with fevered momentum. Some of the more radical elements within the movement seemed to conflate the abuses of Louis and Al with the crimes of Jeffrey Epstein and Harvey Weinstein. While Evangelical Christians, in a rare showing of forgiveness, didn’t condemn Trump for his obvious offenses.
It’s unclear if the food was contaminated when it was picked up and/or caused by the way it was stored by the students. But I assume the unnamed Chinese restaurant in Boston was shut down immediately by the Board of Health and was investigated by the Massachusetts Department of Health.
