Personally, I haven't watched the Oscars show.....since around 1992. Yeah, it's well over twenty years....going on thirty years. I just don't care. In an entire year, I might go to three total movies and frankly....the award means very little to me in terms of getting me to watch the movie.
As for the viewer count going down? The show over the past decade (you can look over comments made by people) is mostly a political forum and folks don't care if they lose viewers or not.
So where does the lowly rated show go now?
I'm of the mind that the producers and Academy will meet in three months and discuss this whole matter and opt for some non-political type guy to moderate it. Six weeks will pass, and they will admit that they can't find such a person existing who would give them the dynamics required. So a female will be found to moderate, and the 2019 show will be another full-blast political show....which has even fewer viewers than this year's show.
All of this will lead onto a trend where the major networks finally opt around 2021....NOT to carry it, and one of the cable networks buy into this....for a much-lesser price.
The viewer count will continue to a lesser spiral, and by 2025....it'll quietly disappear as a nationally-viewed show. Maybe it'll still be data-streamed and sent live to Europe....but I think you are within ten years of seeing the Oscars amount to something of zero importance to more than seventy-percent of the American population.
Wednesday, 7 March 2018
A Loser TV Show Idea
One of the networks has gone out and scheduled up production of this hour-long drama.
The layout? Well....."Joe" is married to this black dude (yep...a gay marriage). And the black dude husband has come up and gotten shot/killed....by the cops. So begins....'Red Line'. No one says if Joe was a drugged up thug....a PhD scientist....a fighter pilot.....or a community organizer. Maybe that part doesn't really matter.
I sat there reading the two-line description to this.
Basically, this is supposed to draw a bunch of black and gay viewers. That's the logic.
Most of the general black community? The minute you suggest that "George' (the black dude) has gotten killed....yeah....maybe fifty-percent of the black viewer community would get hyped up and watch the show. But then you say that the person left....is not "Tonya" but a white husband? Well....about 90-percent of the black community will just start laughing and saying....'the hell you say'.
The gay crowd? Well, they will look over the idea and then ask....yeah, but isn't this Noah Wyle guy 'regular' (non-gay) in real life? Couldn't they find a real gay actor? So they might go and watch two episodes of this, and along about the 3rd show....just shake their head because there is little there to be interested in.
A sort of fake political trend for some TV production? To be honest, they've run out of good ideas, and this is what we are stuck with now.
Fixing this? Maybe if you'd had "Joe" (the black dude shot), and his wife (Tonya) was ex-Army and Green Beret....sworn to kill the cop eventually for doing her husband wrong, then it might make for one good season. But the black dead dude and the white model-looking dude script? It just ain't going to work.
The layout? Well....."Joe" is married to this black dude (yep...a gay marriage). And the black dude husband has come up and gotten shot/killed....by the cops. So begins....'Red Line'. No one says if Joe was a drugged up thug....a PhD scientist....a fighter pilot.....or a community organizer. Maybe that part doesn't really matter.
I sat there reading the two-line description to this.
Basically, this is supposed to draw a bunch of black and gay viewers. That's the logic.
Most of the general black community? The minute you suggest that "George' (the black dude) has gotten killed....yeah....maybe fifty-percent of the black viewer community would get hyped up and watch the show. But then you say that the person left....is not "Tonya" but a white husband? Well....about 90-percent of the black community will just start laughing and saying....'the hell you say'.
The gay crowd? Well, they will look over the idea and then ask....yeah, but isn't this Noah Wyle guy 'regular' (non-gay) in real life? Couldn't they find a real gay actor? So they might go and watch two episodes of this, and along about the 3rd show....just shake their head because there is little there to be interested in.
A sort of fake political trend for some TV production? To be honest, they've run out of good ideas, and this is what we are stuck with now.
Fixing this? Maybe if you'd had "Joe" (the black dude shot), and his wife (Tonya) was ex-Army and Green Beret....sworn to kill the cop eventually for doing her husband wrong, then it might make for one good season. But the black dead dude and the white model-looking dude script? It just ain't going to work.
Tuesday, 6 March 2018
This New Amazon 2nd Headquarters
As things are appearing, I have this image of what the 2nd headquarters will end up being, and it's probably way different than people suspect. The odds of DC being picked now? It's about a 99-percent chance.
I think Amazon is really building a corporate place that has limited personnel (probably no more than three-hundred folks) and will be this lobbyist-like element for the corporation.
I believe that Amazon will walk in....probably buy the Newseum structure that sits between the White House and Congress, and turn it into a public structure. Forty percent of the structure will stay the same....the rest turn into office space or speaking rooms.
After the smoke clears, the public will come to realize that Amazon is trying to get various things stacked in their favor, and grow the company in massive ways. The thought that it would be a real headquarters? No. It's there in DC for a reason, and they intend to talk political players into decisions which benefit the company over the next century.
I think Amazon is really building a corporate place that has limited personnel (probably no more than three-hundred folks) and will be this lobbyist-like element for the corporation.
I believe that Amazon will walk in....probably buy the Newseum structure that sits between the White House and Congress, and turn it into a public structure. Forty percent of the structure will stay the same....the rest turn into office space or speaking rooms.
After the smoke clears, the public will come to realize that Amazon is trying to get various things stacked in their favor, and grow the company in massive ways. The thought that it would be a real headquarters? No. It's there in DC for a reason, and they intend to talk political players into decisions which benefit the company over the next century.
Saturday, 3 March 2018
Delta and the Discount
For a number of years, Delta Airlines offered up a discount to folks who were in the NRA. Over the past two weeks....Delta dumped that discount, for a public relations opportunity with the anti-gun folks. Georgia then said fine....we will dump your $40 million tax credit within Georgia.
Well....late yesterday, Delta wrapped up a check of how the discount had worked, and established that only 13 folks over the past year, had invoked the NRA ticket discount deal. They were strangely quiet over how much the 13 folks had saved.
I would suspect that the tickets....if you went to the 13 folks....probably were in the range of $15 to $20, for a $250 ticket. So they basically lost $40 million in tax credits over roughly $300 of value to the NRA folks.
Around a decade ago, I worked with a guy who had five or six membership deals, and continually traveled and often bragged on his discount 'working'. In a normal year, he'd pull out near $5,000 for him, the wife, and kids on travel. Each occurred with a discount. So our budget wiz in the office sat there and analyzed the impact of the discounts....asking the guy about the prices of tickets for X, Y, and Z travel....over a year. The financial wiz then used a cheap ticket source and priced the tickets. The membership deals in the end amount to about $350 total, out of the $5,000 spent, when you looked at the absolute low ticket offered.
In simple terms, the savings did exist but was marginal. But the idea here is that people think they are saving money or getting a special deal.
For Delta? I'm guessing the management crowd is angry over the loss of the $40 million tax credit and the way they were jerked around. Thinking of moving the headquarters out of Atlanta? They might, but they'd have to go and find a state with tax credits being offered. Most of those only (I emphasis the word ONLY)....from southern states. And those are all NRA friendly type states.
Added onto this episode, a fair number of people who were NRA supporters or NRA members....probably aren't pro-Delta anymore and would be easily tempted to use other airlines.
The curious thing to this whole story are the 13 folks who asked for the discount tickets as a NRA member. The odds that they are all from one single family? Oh.....well....yeah, that might actually be true.
Well....late yesterday, Delta wrapped up a check of how the discount had worked, and established that only 13 folks over the past year, had invoked the NRA ticket discount deal. They were strangely quiet over how much the 13 folks had saved.
I would suspect that the tickets....if you went to the 13 folks....probably were in the range of $15 to $20, for a $250 ticket. So they basically lost $40 million in tax credits over roughly $300 of value to the NRA folks.
Around a decade ago, I worked with a guy who had five or six membership deals, and continually traveled and often bragged on his discount 'working'. In a normal year, he'd pull out near $5,000 for him, the wife, and kids on travel. Each occurred with a discount. So our budget wiz in the office sat there and analyzed the impact of the discounts....asking the guy about the prices of tickets for X, Y, and Z travel....over a year. The financial wiz then used a cheap ticket source and priced the tickets. The membership deals in the end amount to about $350 total, out of the $5,000 spent, when you looked at the absolute low ticket offered.
In simple terms, the savings did exist but was marginal. But the idea here is that people think they are saving money or getting a special deal.
For Delta? I'm guessing the management crowd is angry over the loss of the $40 million tax credit and the way they were jerked around. Thinking of moving the headquarters out of Atlanta? They might, but they'd have to go and find a state with tax credits being offered. Most of those only (I emphasis the word ONLY)....from southern states. And those are all NRA friendly type states.
Added onto this episode, a fair number of people who were NRA supporters or NRA members....probably aren't pro-Delta anymore and would be easily tempted to use other airlines.
The curious thing to this whole story are the 13 folks who asked for the discount tickets as a NRA member. The odds that they are all from one single family? Oh.....well....yeah, that might actually be true.
Friday, 2 March 2018
The Best Way to Change America?
It took me many years to ponder upon this idea that is continually dragged up and put up as some national trendy topic. Yes, how can we best change America?
Well....it's simple if you really think about it. You need to change people's opinions. So you do the logical thing....you excommunicate them from your mindset.
Yes, if they were friends and their beliefs just didn't go along with yours....you shun them. You reject them. You neglect them. You stand aloof of them. You have no part of them. You evade them.
You can do this at family Thanksgiving or Christmas dinners. You can get into some big conversation over a topic which will anger folks, and they will leave the table, and likely leave the house. You can drag out topics at the PTA meetings, and trigger their exodus. There are hundreds of ways that you can help to excommunicate them from your mindset, and just feel better....that you changed America.
Well.....actually all you did was create a fake environment around you where you only socialize with like-minded people. Oddly, then everything becomes political, and a vote matters. In the 2016 case, the vote shocked the excommunicate-crowd. In this rare situation....the excommunicate crowd....was excommunicated. Yep, that was a real shocker.
We've now gone to create new terms for people with this excommunicate-type of mentality....snowflakes. They were so busy in excommunicating people...that they lost the perspective of different opinions and varying ideas of culture and society. These are the people who can't handle reality anymore because they've excommunicated so many people.
Where did excommunication originally come from? This is one of those curious things. Back around 1,300 years ago....as the Catholic Church became the only accepted religion in Europe....they found that people were lacking in enthusiasm for the religion. People in fact....were challenging various ideas that the church pushed. So the Catholics invented this term....excommunicating. They basically said that society needed to neglect the other folks....stand apart from them....avoid them...etc.
Frederick II was actually excommunicated three times by the Catholic Church....with official paperwork done each time.
Where does this excommunication lead onto? Well....eventually, I think some folks are going to seek some type of mental help and get convinced that the bad folks....the excommunicated folks....are mentally unstable, and we will move onto a more serious problem. But for the time being, sit back and just be entertained by the fifth-grade mentality.
Well....it's simple if you really think about it. You need to change people's opinions. So you do the logical thing....you excommunicate them from your mindset.
Yes, if they were friends and their beliefs just didn't go along with yours....you shun them. You reject them. You neglect them. You stand aloof of them. You have no part of them. You evade them.
You can do this at family Thanksgiving or Christmas dinners. You can get into some big conversation over a topic which will anger folks, and they will leave the table, and likely leave the house. You can drag out topics at the PTA meetings, and trigger their exodus. There are hundreds of ways that you can help to excommunicate them from your mindset, and just feel better....that you changed America.
Well.....actually all you did was create a fake environment around you where you only socialize with like-minded people. Oddly, then everything becomes political, and a vote matters. In the 2016 case, the vote shocked the excommunicate-crowd. In this rare situation....the excommunicate crowd....was excommunicated. Yep, that was a real shocker.
We've now gone to create new terms for people with this excommunicate-type of mentality....snowflakes. They were so busy in excommunicating people...that they lost the perspective of different opinions and varying ideas of culture and society. These are the people who can't handle reality anymore because they've excommunicated so many people.
Where did excommunication originally come from? This is one of those curious things. Back around 1,300 years ago....as the Catholic Church became the only accepted religion in Europe....they found that people were lacking in enthusiasm for the religion. People in fact....were challenging various ideas that the church pushed. So the Catholics invented this term....excommunicating. They basically said that society needed to neglect the other folks....stand apart from them....avoid them...etc.
Frederick II was actually excommunicated three times by the Catholic Church....with official paperwork done each time.
Where does this excommunication lead onto? Well....eventually, I think some folks are going to seek some type of mental help and get convinced that the bad folks....the excommunicated folks....are mentally unstable, and we will move onto a more serious problem. But for the time being, sit back and just be entertained by the fifth-grade mentality.
Tuesday, 27 February 2018
A Little History Story
My brother brought up part of this story, and I sat down to spend several hours last night looking over this curious piece of California history.
So, once upon a time.....there was this election for mayor coming up in San Francisco....4 November 1975.
Two individuals running. Democrat George Moscone (state senator and lawyer). Republican John Barbagelata (real estate guy and on the city council).
Most people in the summer of 1975...gave Barbagelata the edge.
For some odd reason, never to be explained in public....Moscone went and had some meeting with a guy by the name of Michael Prokes. He was in his late 20's.....a journalism student for the most part but hooked up to various social groups and in particularly with the People's Temple.
Yeah, that's the Jim Jones crowd....if you were curious.
No one can say for sure what came out of this Moscone and Prokes meeting, but after this....Prokes has a lot of hyped up enthusiasm to get his people....the People's Temple religious crowd....into the canvasing for Moscone.
What most suggest is that the People's Temple crowd did cover a couple of neighborhoods (certainly NOT all of the city), and they were picky about the choice of the neighborhoods. They just wanted a mass group of people to show up on 4 November from those selected neighborhoods.
What occurred on 4 November? Moscone won by 1-percent (4,400 votes roughly).
The end? No. Barbagelata felt that a fair number of votes were simply bused into the city and were not legit. Proof? None really. There is a strong suggestion which came out of a NY Times piece in 1978....that busloads of folks were carried from Redwood Valley. That's 123 miles outside of the city limits. But again, it's not substantial proof. The comment by a Jone's member that Jones directed them on how to vote? Maybe, but that's not illegal.
Could you have bussed in 4,400 folks to make the difference? Well....you figure sixty folks per bus, and the answer ought to be no. But then they did canvas the neighborhoods and got people to show up and vote. That might have made the difference.
What happened to Prokes (the guy to arrange this situation)? Well.....18 November 1978....three years later....he dies in Jonestown.
Moscone? Well, this is an interesting twist or two. He was way ahead on the gay trend business, and really hyped up on liberal agendas.
Well....eight days prior to the Jonestown business...this odd event occurred in San Francisco.
There was an odd group developing and one of the city council guys was Dan White (former US Army), and tied to a conservative part of town. Over the two years prior, White had gotten into frequent arguments with the developing left-base of the city council (in particular, with Harvey Milk, another city council guy....and gay).
On 10 November 1978, Dan White finally had enough....the trend of the city council was becoming more and more frustrating. So he resigned. Part of this issue revolved around the fact that he could not work for the city as a fire-fighter/cop....receiving a salary as such....while being a city council guy. No one states the pay-scale, but I'm guessing that city council duty paid half of what a cop or fire-fighter made.
Four days go by, and Dan now realizes....that was a big mistake to quit as city council member. He went back to Mayor Moscone and asked to be reappointed.
Well....Moscone says no.
On 27 November 1978....Dan goes into the city hall area and shoots the mayor, and Harvey Milk....dead.
Dan says in his defense....his mental conditions triggered this. Oddly, the judge says fine....giving him seven years in prison for killing the two guys. Yep....seven years for killing two guys. He's paroled in January of 1984....so he doesn't even get the full sentence. Roughly a year later, he commits suicide.
Looking back at Mayor Moscone? Within six to eight years....he would have gone onto running for the US senate, and been in DC. Somewhere by the late 1980s...he would have run for President, around age 60. The odds are....instead of Bill Clinton....you would have had President Moscone (my humble guess).
The Jonestown thing fitting into this? It's the odd piece and you have to wonder about how this all worked out, and this young guy....Micheal Prokes, if he hadn't died there in Jonestown.
So, once upon a time.....there was this election for mayor coming up in San Francisco....4 November 1975.
Two individuals running. Democrat George Moscone (state senator and lawyer). Republican John Barbagelata (real estate guy and on the city council).
Most people in the summer of 1975...gave Barbagelata the edge.
For some odd reason, never to be explained in public....Moscone went and had some meeting with a guy by the name of Michael Prokes. He was in his late 20's.....a journalism student for the most part but hooked up to various social groups and in particularly with the People's Temple.
Yeah, that's the Jim Jones crowd....if you were curious.
No one can say for sure what came out of this Moscone and Prokes meeting, but after this....Prokes has a lot of hyped up enthusiasm to get his people....the People's Temple religious crowd....into the canvasing for Moscone.
What most suggest is that the People's Temple crowd did cover a couple of neighborhoods (certainly NOT all of the city), and they were picky about the choice of the neighborhoods. They just wanted a mass group of people to show up on 4 November from those selected neighborhoods.
What occurred on 4 November? Moscone won by 1-percent (4,400 votes roughly).
The end? No. Barbagelata felt that a fair number of votes were simply bused into the city and were not legit. Proof? None really. There is a strong suggestion which came out of a NY Times piece in 1978....that busloads of folks were carried from Redwood Valley. That's 123 miles outside of the city limits. But again, it's not substantial proof. The comment by a Jone's member that Jones directed them on how to vote? Maybe, but that's not illegal.
Could you have bussed in 4,400 folks to make the difference? Well....you figure sixty folks per bus, and the answer ought to be no. But then they did canvas the neighborhoods and got people to show up and vote. That might have made the difference.
What happened to Prokes (the guy to arrange this situation)? Well.....18 November 1978....three years later....he dies in Jonestown.
Moscone? Well, this is an interesting twist or two. He was way ahead on the gay trend business, and really hyped up on liberal agendas.
Well....eight days prior to the Jonestown business...this odd event occurred in San Francisco.
There was an odd group developing and one of the city council guys was Dan White (former US Army), and tied to a conservative part of town. Over the two years prior, White had gotten into frequent arguments with the developing left-base of the city council (in particular, with Harvey Milk, another city council guy....and gay).
On 10 November 1978, Dan White finally had enough....the trend of the city council was becoming more and more frustrating. So he resigned. Part of this issue revolved around the fact that he could not work for the city as a fire-fighter/cop....receiving a salary as such....while being a city council guy. No one states the pay-scale, but I'm guessing that city council duty paid half of what a cop or fire-fighter made.
Four days go by, and Dan now realizes....that was a big mistake to quit as city council member. He went back to Mayor Moscone and asked to be reappointed.
Well....Moscone says no.
On 27 November 1978....Dan goes into the city hall area and shoots the mayor, and Harvey Milk....dead.
Dan says in his defense....his mental conditions triggered this. Oddly, the judge says fine....giving him seven years in prison for killing the two guys. Yep....seven years for killing two guys. He's paroled in January of 1984....so he doesn't even get the full sentence. Roughly a year later, he commits suicide.
Looking back at Mayor Moscone? Within six to eight years....he would have gone onto running for the US senate, and been in DC. Somewhere by the late 1980s...he would have run for President, around age 60. The odds are....instead of Bill Clinton....you would have had President Moscone (my humble guess).
The Jonestown thing fitting into this? It's the odd piece and you have to wonder about how this all worked out, and this young guy....Micheal Prokes, if he hadn't died there in Jonestown.
How Did Prohibition Fail?
If you went and looked, through most countries in the 1880s-1890s....there was an anti-alcohol movement in a busy state of activity.
In the US....this movement reached the stage where they decided that only by writing this into the Constitution.....making it the only text without freedom (yeah, an odd thing). In both 1913 and 1915, attempts were made in Congress to bring to a closure and pass the prohibition idea. So it came up in 1917, and it passed.
As January of 1920 rolled around, it was to occur. You could still drink alcohol after X-day, but only until your stock was extinguished. By spring of 1920....people were attempting to live without alcohol. And within weeks....various people were distilling their own whiskey, or bringing in booze via some neighboring country.
Capone and crime? Well....they found a lucrative market.
Bars couldn't be public places? Fine, they'd be quietly constructed and hidden.
Women? Well, in this new era....Honky-Tonks were social places and guys could bring their dates or girlfriends. Dancing and boozing became popular. Women accepted the idea of alcohol.
In roughly four years, the whole idea of prohibition had become a joke.
We were a nation of hypocrites....joking about it in public, and trying hard to admit that the law could be enforced....when it could not.
So come 5 December 1933....it was undone and written out of the Constitution.
The saloon-like atmosphere that had been popular before prohibition? For the most part.....it didn't come back. We had been introduced to cocktails in this 13-year period, and liked that more than beer. It was a fresh perspective that we'd gained.
Would any type of modification to the Constitution over guns come to the same fate? Yes. We would revert back to the nation of hypocrites, and likely not observe the law. And the nation would gain some fresh new perspective.
In the US....this movement reached the stage where they decided that only by writing this into the Constitution.....making it the only text without freedom (yeah, an odd thing). In both 1913 and 1915, attempts were made in Congress to bring to a closure and pass the prohibition idea. So it came up in 1917, and it passed.
As January of 1920 rolled around, it was to occur. You could still drink alcohol after X-day, but only until your stock was extinguished. By spring of 1920....people were attempting to live without alcohol. And within weeks....various people were distilling their own whiskey, or bringing in booze via some neighboring country.
Capone and crime? Well....they found a lucrative market.
Bars couldn't be public places? Fine, they'd be quietly constructed and hidden.
Women? Well, in this new era....Honky-Tonks were social places and guys could bring their dates or girlfriends. Dancing and boozing became popular. Women accepted the idea of alcohol.
In roughly four years, the whole idea of prohibition had become a joke.
We were a nation of hypocrites....joking about it in public, and trying hard to admit that the law could be enforced....when it could not.
So come 5 December 1933....it was undone and written out of the Constitution.
The saloon-like atmosphere that had been popular before prohibition? For the most part.....it didn't come back. We had been introduced to cocktails in this 13-year period, and liked that more than beer. It was a fresh perspective that we'd gained.
Would any type of modification to the Constitution over guns come to the same fate? Yes. We would revert back to the nation of hypocrites, and likely not observe the law. And the nation would gain some fresh new perspective.
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