Astros? They're not the favorites

Scripps decides to produce 3 West Coast newspapers from Corpus Christi, Texas

The newspaper business is continuing its dismal descent, in case you were wondering.

E.W. Scripps is laying off droves of people on the West Coast and giving their jobs to workers at its Corpus Christi, Texas, newspaper.

"Scripps is changing the game, making proofreading, layout and some news decisions for California and Washington take place a thousand-something miles (and a couple of time zones) away in Texas. Other companies are likely to follow, if they haven’t already done this," observes Steve Greenberg.

"What does this mean to the newspapers? It means there won’t be local people to catch local place names, history or other regional idiosyncrasies that good local copy editors can catch, nor any real “institutional memory” of local people and institutions."

The sports editor at the Ventura County Daily Star was among the casualties. "This decision will wipe out 15 jobs at our paper, three in sports," writes David Lassen.

Santa Barbara Independent columnist Barney Brantingham said outsourcing jobs at the Ventura daily to Corpus "has led to cracks like, `It’s now the Ventura Lone Star,' and questions about whether Texas editors will know the difference between El Rio (a Ventura County community) and the Rio Grande. "

While we're on the subject, we heard 3 or 4 weeks ago that the local Brazosport daily laid off a reporter, which our source said gives The Facts a grand total of three full-time reporters, plus another person who reports the news part of the time and handles copy editing duties part of the time. (A few other non-editorial employees also were allegedly were laid off, we were told.)

We were gonna do a full-scale blog post on the apparent deteriorating fortunes of the B'port daily til we forgot about it.

Check out this Bear Cam!

Up near Ely, Minnesota, a 3-year-old black bear named Lily gave birth to a cub on Jan. 22 -- all on a live Web Cam.

Since then, the camera's caught the daily doings of Lily and her cub (they sleep a lot, naturally), but it's pretty interesting, and there are selected clips you can click on if you're not patient enough to stare at a computer screen for hours waiting for something to happen. A microphone is set up, too, so you can hear all the bear noises.

There's lot of information on the Web site so Banjo says check out Black Bear Den Cam.

Quote/unquote ...

"I remember the goals they scored on me better than the shots I blocked."
-- Amadeo Carrizo (pictured), legendary Argentine goalie, looking back on his career

"The lasting damage done by the national government was that it put its seal of approval on ethnic and racial discrimination and developed policies which had the result of the practical abandonment of large sections of older, industrial cities. The financial community saw blighted neighborhoods as physical evidence of the melting pot mistake. To them, cities were risky because of their heterogeneity, because of their attempt to bring various people together harmoniously. Such mixing, they believed, had but two consequences -- the decline of the human race and of property values."
--- Kenneth Jackson, "Crabgrass Frontier" about the effect of the discriminatory policies of the federal Home Owners' Loan Corporation

"Throw theory into the fire. It only spoils life."
-- Russian anarchist Mikhael Bakunin, in a letter to his sisters, Nov. 4, 1842

"Philosophy is to the real world as masturbation is to sex."
-- Karl Marx (1818-1883)

"I bet on a horse at 10 to one. It didn't come in until half-past five."
--- Henny Youngman (1906-1998)

(Editor's note: Quote/unquote is gathered in St. Louis by Wilson.)

Best DWI stop in all history (on Reno 9111)

[via Ebert at The Sun-Times]

Ron Paul rocks conservative conclave

Our local congressman, well, you've got to hand it to him, even if you think he's wrong.

Who woulda thought a few years ago that Brazosport's Own would be the star of the big CPAC deal?

Says here:

Paul was the only speaker so far to fill the entire convention hall at the Conservative Political Action Conference, and some of his supporters were turned away after the room reached its capacity of 1,100 people.

[snip]

“Debt is the monster, debt is what is going to eat us up and that’s why our economy is on the brink,” Paul said. “The next step is a currency crisis because there will be a rejection of the dollar and the rejection of the dollar will be a big, big event.”

On foreign policy, Paul urged a pullback from American obligations around the world.

“We are now spending one trillion dollars a year to manage our world empire,” he said. “There is nothing wrong with being a conservative and having a conservative belief in foreign policy where we have a strong national defense and don’t go to war so carelessly.”

Rock on with ya bad self, doc.

update...breaking news...update....

From The Washington Post's blog The Fix:

Texas Rep. Ron Paul won the 2010 CPAC straw poll tonight, a victory that will further energize his already enthusiastic supporters but will have little effect on the coming presidential contest.

Paul, who ran for president in 2008, took 31 percent of the vote. Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney had won the past three CPAC straw polls but placed second this time with 22 percent. Romney is considered the current frontrunner for the 2012 nod.

No other candidate scored in double digits. Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, who did not speak at CPAC, took third place with seven percent. (Full results are below.)

Be careful not to read too much -- or much at all -- into these results. Paul's supporters are loyal and loud but not, ultimately, that large a group as proven by the fact that he did not win a single primary or caucus in 2008.

2010 CPAC Straw Poll Results
Ron Paul 31%
Mitt Romney 22%
Sarah Palin 7%
Tim Pawlenty 6%
Mike Pence 5%
Newt Gingrich 4%
Mike Huckabee 4%
Mitch Daniels 2%
John Thune 2%
Rick Santorum 2%
Haley Barbour 1%

Watch this. It's only 120 seconds out your life that you won't get back anyway

Quote/unquote ...

"Every other name is taken. Think of a great band name and google it and you'll find a French-Canadian jam band with a MySpace page."
-- Former Led Zeppelin bass player John Paul Jones, on his new band Them Crooked Vultures, named because other names, including Caligula, were taken (WSJ, 2.17.10)

"Why do the deal for the Rams? Because some people around the nation think St. Louis' best days are behind us. We needed to do something dramatic."
--- former Sen. Thomas Eagleton, June, 1995

"Patriarchy is dying a slow, slow death; but patriarchal power still tyrannizes women in households and in brothels. I expect to see deeper and more massive resistance from women in the next century, especially in the Third World."
--- Andrea Dworkin ('99), author of "Woman Hating" ('74) and "Pornography" ('81)

"Art is about making something out of nothing and selling it."
--- Frank Zappa (pictured)

"Everything has been figured out except how to live."
-- Jean Paul Sartre (1905-1980)

(Editor's Note: Quote/Unquote is aggregated with respekt in St. Louis by Wilson.)

Keep your balls clean, people

- Watch more free videos

Jewish Texans mark Holocaust

Bein' the lead dog aint' all peaches 'n cream

It's the pressure, ya know.

People always wantin' this, wantin' that.

You hit your numbers, great, but one bad quarter and the wolves start circlin'.

And the backstabbin'! People talkin', pryin' into your personal shit, where'd you go last weekend, who's that you were talkin' to, how much you pay for that.

And the media. Fuck the media. Always lookin' for an angle. Isn't there any good news? Is good not newsworthy? You wanna be the lead dog? Try dealin' with the media. Know what I mean?

You're never really off the clock, either. At home, you get the calls. This happened, that happened. Christ, can someone else make a decision? Take some responsibility? Make a tough call without me holdin' your sweaty-palmed hand?

OK, yeah, the money's good. The perks. Blah-blah-blah. But it is worth your health? Your mental health? The cost to your family? A good night's sleep.

I just don't know anymore.

Thanks, Hearst Corporation

For what, this thanks?

For bringing us high quality, news-you-use magazine journalism.

Right to the supermarket checkout line!

(A tip o' the hardhat, of course, must go to our great country's supermarket managers/marketing strategists, without whom the moms & dads, aunts & uncles, pa-paws & grannies of the USA would not be given such unexpected opportunities to explain to their 7-, 8-, 9- and 10-year-olds the role of focused, imaginative foreplay.)

When I think of Canada, I don't think Olympics, I think of SCTV

Sugarland pursuing minor league baseball

Bob Dunn reports Sugarland could have a minor league baseball team in its midst by the 2012 season.

He likes the idea and it sounds swell to me:

Personally, I’d rather take the kids to a nice minor league park where you can sit close enough to watch the teams, as opposed to suffering the traffic, parking hassles and financial trauma of paying for Astros tickets and then renting beer and soda at $8 to $16.

What about a team name?

Here's an idea: the Sugardaddies.

quote/unquote ...

"Where progress has been made, wherever any kind of injustice has been overturned, it's been because people acted as citizens, and not as politicians. They didn't just moan. They worked, they acted, they organised, they rioted if necessary to bring their situation to the attention of people in power. And that's what we have to do today."
-- Howard Zinn, “The People’s History of the United States” author who died recently

"We have what it takes -- and an obligation to do a good job. A concentration of power is not healthy for the internet industry."
-- Qi Lu, new boss of Bing, the Microsoft challenge to Google

Two blasts from the past:

"The Empire State (building) was not densely populated in those days, and Burck discovered, to his delight, that one lonesome proletarian had the job of going, hour after hour, day after day, over the empty floors with the sole task of flushing the toilets. Gil thought it was to keep mosquitos from breeding in the stagnant pools."
--John Kenneth Galbraith, in his memoirs, recalling moving his office into the Empire State building in the 1940s, when it wasn’t crowded

"To change the mood a little, i'll be posing down the pub,
i'm seeing my reflection, i'm looking slightly rough
i'll fancy this, i'll fancy that, i'll want to be so flash,
i'll give a little muscle and spend a little cash
but all i get is bitter and a nasty little rash
and by the time i'm sober i've forgotten what i had
and everybody tells me it's cool to be a cat, cool for cats."
-------- "Cool for Cats" by Squeeze

(Editor's note: quote/unquote is compiled in St. Louis by Wilson)

Bob hops in the Way Back Machine, goes to the White House to sing about the times they are a'changin' ...

[via Pressing Issues]

Here, ya go. Try this ...

Is Ron Paul's re-election in danger?

We don't think so, but the Dallas Morning News has noted he has three opponents in the Republican primary -- "more than he has faced in his past six primary campaigns combined" -- and they have ties to "have ties to the anti-tax Tea Party movement."

Paul spokesman Jesse Benton pooh poohed the opposition.

"We are not taking these challengers very seriously," Benton said. "But we would never take any votes of the 14th District for granted."

Benton, we suppose, is being honest, but we think it's a mistake to admit you don't take three primary opponents "seriously."
Better to say something innocuous if you're a spokesman for a congressman up for re-election; there's no sense in waving a red flag in the face of the opposition, gettin' them all stirred up, but we could be wrong.

Over at The Raw Story, a writer sees irony in the Tea Party-based challengers taking on Paul, a venerable figure among many of our citizenry fed up government taxation.

The Washington Independent's Dave Weigel, meanwhile, said Doc Paul may be vulnerable on one point:

There is one thing Paul does that might backfire. While Paul votes against basically all spending bills, he notoriously gets earmark requests into those bills, so that local projects survive when other members vote those bills through. That barely dinged Paul in 2008, but it may become an issue now.

Yeah, maybe. But we doubt it.

***

For his part, Doc Paul himself tried to explain the difference between himself and the Tea Party movement during an appearance on MSNBC's Rachel Maddow show, according to the Houston newspaper (guess the newspaper's Washington Bureau couldn't get Paul on the horn and interview him their ownselves) ...

Appearing on MSNBC's "The Rachel Maddow Show," the Lake Jackson Republican said a hawkish foreign policy separated the Tea movement from his 2008 Paul "revolution."

Paul cited his support for a non-interventionist foreign policy, support for civil liberties and an end to the war on drugs as key differences between his libertarian style of small-government conservatism and the neoconservative interventionism of Tea Party leaders.

"My message is somewhat different," the Houston-area congressman said. "I've been much more precise in what we should do."

Paul said there is widespread public unhappiness with government because "they know there's something wrong in Washington."

"The people are coming together because they're unhappy," he said. "Our country really is bankrupt...It's out of control government."

But Paul, who faces Tea Party opposition in the March 2 GOP primary, said Republicans have infiltrated the Tea Party movement to push it toward an interventionist foreign policy that is anathema to Paul's approach.

"The Republican Party wants to make sure that there is a kind of neo-con influence" on the Tea movement, he added.

This is funny if you don't live in Iraq or one of those other places where loud noises are usually cause for concern

The geezers are alright

You may have heard who's performing tomorrow during halftime of the Super Bowl.

The boys gave an accoustic preview on Thursday to the assembled media down in Miami.

Click here to check it out.

Ron Paul has $1.9 million in his back pocket

Of all the congressmen from Texas, the small-town obstetrician, as he's sometimes called, has the second biggest wad of cash in his re-election account.

So reports The Texas Tribune.

So if you think you can knock him off, you've got an uphill fight on your hands, it would seem.

Only Lloyd Doggett, the liberal Dem from Austin, has more of that groovy re-election cash, with a tidy $3.1 million burning a hole in his stone-washed jeans.

Speaking of Paul, who we've really grown to like as our national deficit zooms out of control, he was interviewed the other day by bankrate.com, which asked when everything started going to hell.

Said the doc:

" That's a vivid memory for me: Aug. 15, 1971. It was a Sunday night, and (President Nixon) removed the last linkage to gold, closed the gold window. He put on wage-and-price controls and 10 percent tariffs. The astounding thing was, the financial community loved it. The stock market went up. But it ushered in the decade of the '70s, which turned out to be a disaster, so my instincts were right.

From 1971 on, if you look at any charts on price inflation, expansion of the money supply, increase in debt, (you'll find that) so many charts just explode from the early '70s until now. Those curves are unsustainable. The economic laws are demanding that something has to give. The biggest concern I have is this easy money where central banks can accommodate politicians.


Bankrate: Why don't our leaders rein in the Fed?

Ron Paul: Politicians to a large degree like it. They might complain a bit, but they like it because they can fight their wars and run their welfare state and not be responsible."

So if you think Ron Paul and his gold standard schtick is ridiculous, go ahead, knock that chip off his shoulder. It's a free country. Take him out. But remember, he's got $1.9 million worth of chips.

quote/unquote ...

"He's treated better than the average child in Pennsylvania."
-- William Deeley, responding to animal rights critics who think the groundhog is mistreated

"The cynics are right nine times out of ten."
-- H. L. Mencken

"Remember always that all of us, and you and I especially, are descended from immigrants and revolutionists."
--- Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 1938, to the Daughters of the American Revolution

"If my doctor pronounces me brain dead, I would like to see the new Ashton Kutcher movie."
--- Paul Rudnick, "My Living Will", New Yorker 2005

"F**king retarded."
-- reported statement by presidential Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel to liberal groups and White House aides in August when some wanted attack ads vs. conservative Democrats

"It was, of course, a miserable childhood. The happy childhood is hardly worth your while."
-- Frank McCourt, author of "Angela's Ashes," who died in 2009

"I felt so bad for the guy surrounded by reporters like he was, I think I accidentally made him feel worse with my question. I personally just don’t care that much the poor guy was caught with his pants down in a photo that Oden says is about 18 months old and was supposed to be private. So I apologize, and I'm deeply embarrassed to say I actually asked Oden the following question while television cameras were rolling: 'Why are you embarrassed? A lot of people are impressed.' I couldn't tell from the impassive look he gave me if he wanted to laugh, run or strangle me. But, pro that he is, he answered the question the only way the 24-hour news cycle allows. He repeated how embarrassed he was."
-- the Willamette Week, on Greg Oden (7 foot, 285 pound Portland Trailblazer center) having nude photos he gave a girl friend posted on a website

"It is better to have a permanent income than to be fascinating."
--- Oscar Wilde (1854-1900)

(Editor's note: quote/unquote is compiled by Wilson in St. Louis.)

Interviewing myself about the Super Bowl football contest

Will I place a wager on the Super Bowl?

No.

Does this mean I'm opposed to Superbowl betting?

No. To each his own and live and let live are my mottos. Or is it motti?

Why were the Indianapolis Colts originally 4-point favorites and now they're 6-point faves?

The betting public -- this includes the squares who aren't all that clued into gambling and the sharps who are more experienced -- placed more money on the Colts when the betting opened. So the sports booking emporiums increased the odds so more people would bet on the Saints. So now you add 6-points to the point total that the Saints tally at the end of the game instead of 4-points. So now, if the Colts win the game 49-44, if you bet on the Saints you would win your wager cause you add 6-points to the Saints total, thus making the "betting score" Saints 50, Colts 49. Get it?

Do I have a "gambling problem"?

No.

Do I know anyone who does?

Yes. I worked with him. Played poker with him on Wednesday nights, a long time ago. Small stakes -- quarter ante, three-bump limit. Small potaters. We played some boo-ray, too. He loved the boo-ray. It's a three-card game that's French in origin.

Does he have a bet on the Super Bowl?

I hope not.

Would he derive more enjoyment watching the game if he had placed on a wager on the outcome?

Enjoyment may not be the word. His brain, or at least the subcortical region of his brain, would probably be doing backflips during the contest. There's apparently kind of a buzz going on in there when a wager is placed.

Would I get more enjoyment from the game if I had placed a wager?

Nah. I'd probably be miserable. See, I yell at the TV without have money on the outcome. I just enjoy the athletic spectacle of it. I could watch a pee-wee football game and be highly entertained, too.

Is the subcortex of my brain stimulated nonetheless?

I'm not qualified to say.

What will the subcortical region of Peyton Manning's brain be doing during the Super Bowl?

Again, not qualified to say, but have you seen the size of his forehead? I'd say there's a big subcortex in there. What it's doing? Beats me. But he's a helluva quarterback. And underrated as an actor.

What about Drew Brees?

His forehead isn't as big as Manning's.

Does this mean I think the Colts will win?

Yes. But not because of the apparent difference in forehead size. It's just a hunch.

(Editor's note: BoDog is a paid advertiser of The Brazosport News. We urge you to patronize them for all your wagering needs!)