Fine, I’ll Say It: Those Two New York Cops Took the Easy Route

August 26, 2012 by J. Nelson

SHOOTING POOLS EXIST — If prison tower guards pool their $$ for each other's mandatory post-shooting psych leave, why not street cops?

Two dead, nine wounded? Hell no do I think those cops had to open fire. It was two against one. Plus they were behind Jeffrey Johnson; they could’ve tackled him and kicked his ass. The iPhone footage from that would’ve allowed them to surf street cred for the rest of their careers. Even the worst case scenario along those lines is better than what really went down.

So Johnson might’ve gotten a round off and shot one of ’em while they wrestled for his weapon: it happens. But the public never swore to take a bullet for a cop — cops swear oaths to protect the public.

Relax – nobody’s blaming Officers Craig Matthews and Robert Sinishtaj for doing their jobs, and I’m not saying Johnson wasn’t a public safety threat. But like it ‘er not, these two safety-conscious, veteran street officers will always have an asterisk next to the Empire State Building takedown. Read more

Chick-fil-A Child’s Play

August 3, 2012 by J. Nelson 3 Comments

Since there’s apparently no escaping the current Chick-fil-A controversy, I’ve gotta ask: Are anti-Chick-fil-A activists actually promoting the tolerance they demand, or are they teaching kids to loudly and publicly demonize those who disagree with them? Despite having another means of redress – i.e. a choice not to give the restaurant chain their money – many Chick-fil-A activists seem to be celebrating their martyrdom instead.

The carnival-like atmosphere captured by news cameras shows singing and dancing, face-painting, colorful costumes, banners, and laughter-loving friends lining sidewalks and holding hands. Problem is, most of those cheery signs are emblazoned with the word, “HATE,” so I’m left wondering what the impressions of a six-year-old watching this spectacle might be. Read more

Because “Warnings are Ineffective”

July 27, 2012 by J. Nelson

If you’re not familiar with ’em, Buckyballs are magnetized BBs packaged with instructions and shape-making challenges. They’re weirdly hypnotic, s0 we leave ours on the bar to see who makes what during idle chatter ’round the kitchen; they’re a hit with friends and guests. This week the Federal government issued a stop-sale order for Buckyballs ’cause too many parents fail to pay attention to what their kids put in their mouths and too few know the difference between kiddie toys and adult brain teasers.

The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) called Buckyballs a serious “ingestion hazard” and convinced 10 retailers, including Amazon.com, to stop selling them (the manufacturer has refused to voluntarily withdraw the product from the market). I say, kudos to manufacturer Maxfield & Oberton: idiot parenting’s the real hazard here. Yet we’re left with a panel of stiffs in Washington again protecting us from ourselves.

Why have Americans been surrendering their sense of personal responsibility at such a disturbing rate? Soon we’ll all end up a bunch of trained seals with our heads tilted back, lolling from side to side and waitin’ for someone to drop a fish into our mouths. Read more

Time Off for Book Behavior

June 28, 2012 by J. Nelson 1 Comment

Four days less for every book Brazil’s inmates read, says their Governo Federal. Inmates earn up to 48 days off each year for reading 12 classics or 12 works of philosophy, science, even humor. It’s an effective, creative approach that need not produce voter-ready results to be successful. And why not? ‘Cause we already know that reading is the most basic of human skills, and just being able to understand those seven words could have a Butterfly Effect.

A Butterfly Effect is where a small change at one place in a complex system can have a large effect elsewhere. Though it also happens to work, teaching prison inmates to read is a truly humanitarian gesture requiring no quantifiable numbers or lowered crime stats as a proof that it does: the very act of spreading literacy is like giving sight to the blind. Unfortunately, here in the U.S. our lawmakers can’t sell each other on the promise of a good deed anymore than you or I can poop gold. But so what? That’s no excuse for not helping someone help themselves, or for not helping ’em reach through the razor wire to interpret the world anew.

There’s No Excuse for Not Using Sony Cameras

June 21, 2012 by J. Nelson 1 Comment

Such picture quality! How can those contrasts be so precise? I’ve never seen bugged-out eyes so huge and clear. You can almost taste the crack resin on his breath from the burning chunk of Brillo-pad he used as a screen in his pipe — wow! I’m telling ‘ya there’s a reason Sony’s XDCAM 422 is the industry standard.

For extended nighttime high speed chases with freakish tongue wagging and multi-collision wrap-ups you just can’t beat Sony. Check out the difference between the lesser quality, undercarriage-mounted heli-cam and the handheld 422 on the ground. You know they’re not strappin’ Sony money to the skids on that bird, so no surprise the air footage is pixy and lame. But that all-up-in-your-sorry-grill XD422 captures details your dreams won’t forget. Read more

Notes from a Non-Parent 5: The Parent-fetish Trap

May 15, 2012 by J. Nelson 4 Comments

Q: Are we, who admit to being too selfish for childrearing, freer to enjoy the company of others’ children?

A: Damn right we are, especially with so much predatory marketing keeping parents’ envious eyes on each other. As moms and dads everywhere condemn the current wave of weirdo parenting while trading assurances that their own kids are free of transmissible dysfunction, it’s only gotten that much more entertaining.

I don’t really care about last week’s Time magazine cover of a confused oaf takin’ a pull off his ma’s tap. I don’t care about extended breast feeding’s quasi-cat lady proponents or this beyond tragicomic “pre-mastication” trend. Yet it’s all fodder for the current national yakkety-yak and it’s overtaken my parent-friends’ usual election year/Facebook/reading list talking points. I listen in, but all I seem to hear is how superior they feel for not going to extremes themselves (while their kids kick shit over and scream “shut up!” when someone interrupts their iPhone game).

My wife and I laugh about how parenting can be as extreme as energy pills made from dehydrated placenta. We see the decision to spawn as extreme to begin with, and no cultural child-worship (or pressure from my wife’s mom) is gonna convince us otherwise. Read more

Hey, I Got Your Avengers Right Here…

May 8, 2012 by J. Nelson

Supervillains — Only if these two were hiding WMDs and the Avengers were sent to stop ’em would I pay $15 to see a movie about it.

Cinema attendance surges in times of economic insecurity and moral ambivalence, and with storm-troops of superheroes out to crush absurdly irrelevant bad guys, movie escapism isn’t so much offered as detonated. But I can’t help wondering, if the Avengers are so great, why can’t they stop the powdered baby pill smugglers?

I mean, wouldn’t you enjoy watching a superhero tackle just one goddamned oil spill? Ooh, or how about a flying goody-goody facing his or her own demons? Where’s our $200 million movie about a fight to the death with power-sapping civil litigation, or sneak-attacks from the evil Captain Vicodin? Read more

Patricia Krentcil: Please Just Go to Hell.

May 2, 2012 by J. Nelson 1 Comment

**Patricia Krentcil is not only a laughably easy target for this blog, she’s as disoriented as a Kansas pig with farm fever. So we’re not gonna slam her too much, but we are gonna ask: are these really our values? Is Krentcil’s nutso body image and clearly low self-esteem just about being batshit crazy, or is it more and more typical of Americans constantly subject to predatory marketing?** And just how ugly do we think we are if this is seen as an improvement?

Police say Pat Krentcil was arrested and charged with child endangerment after she allegedly snuck her daughter into the tanning booth she uses to make herself look like a carnival freak circa 1928. Read more

There’s No Excuse for “Sombrero Pope”

March 26, 2012 by J. Nelson 3 Comments

POPE OR PYTHON!?

That poor man! You’d think Vatikan PR Shocktroops would’ve clubbed anyone coming near the guy with that thing, let alone allow it be placed on his head! Unbelievable!

Also, considering this guy’s membership in an organization known for ethnic nationalism, one might agree that moments of cutesy pandering that involve the cultural kitsch of the countries where your recruiting drives bring you – is in bad taste. Read more

On Juden Pond

March 18, 2012 by J. Nelson

Somewhere around 1920, a minor fungus reserve in Mont Vernon, New Hampshire, made U.S. Geological Survey maps as “Jew Pond,” by which bigoted assholes then referred to it. I hope that long after the votes have been counted and a new name decided upon, the story of Jew Pond won’t disappear with the creepy old-timers who refuse to recognize it by any other name. ‘Cause we can always use a lesson in Yankee narrow-mindedness.

Original Story LA Times

The festering, if serene, hole formerly known as “Jew Pond” is an 80 year-old artificial lake made for the nearby Grand Hotel and its golf course, where people “of Hebrew descent” were decidedly unwelcome. When the automobile came along and carried away the hotel’s intended patrons, its owners were forced to sell the place to the only people who wanted it – Jewish lawyers (gasp!) who catered to previously banned clientele.