Author: Richard

Watch the Real Videos reenacted on The People vs OJ Simpson

On account of me being an American, I am following my patriotic duty to closely follow the FX series American Crime Story and its maiden voyage: The People vs O.J. Simpson. The drama and pacing as a piece of media is surprisingly not bad at all (I originally tuned in to see a shitshow of bad soap-opera ridiculousness but was shocked to actually enjoy it) but my real interest is in seeing how real-life events from the not-too-distant-past are being re-created. Aside from David Schwimmer taking me out of all suspension of disbelief, I have enjoyed the casting and comparing each actors portrayal to their real life counterpart. Cuba Gooding Jr actually captures OJ’s mannerisms and expressions pretty well a lot of the time but unfortunately his much smaller stature than the football player constantly brings it down.

https://twitter.com/StarWipe/status/702236616283267072

If you too are doing your duty as a patriot, or interested foreign-national, you may find these news clips that were re-enacted on the show of interest.
I will do my duty to the nation like the unflappable hero that I am and update this post accordingly as new episodes come out and new clips are found.

Here’s what I’ve gotz so farz:

1- “He’s back again”…the 911 call
Nicole Brown calls for help as an enraged OJ Simpson is heard screaming threats in the background. Takeaway quote: (When the operator asks her to stay on the line) “I don’t wanna stay on the line, he’s gonna beat the shit out of me”…

2- The Awkward Attorney Press Conference
Here is John Travolta (played in real-life by Robert Shapiro) and Ross-from-Friends (played in real-life by Robert Kardashian) on the afternoon of Friday, 17 June 1994 giving a press conference in response to O.J. Simpson vanishing from his house and failing to show up at Parker Center to be charged with murder. Shapiro explains to the press and Robert Kardashian reads a letter O.J. wrote that day before disappearing, commonly interpreted as a suicide note.

3- Bronco Chase
A little under 2 minutes into the clip you hear A.C. (driving the Bronco) on the phone with police delivering the “you know who I am goddammit!” line along with other details shown in the show about the chase:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DdDLaOi_bxk

[Episode 4]:

4- O.J. pleads “Absolutely 100% Not Guilty”.

But not the way the show showed it… Unlike the show depicted: it wasn’t Judge Ito presiding, O.J. had to be tapped to stand after he is addressed by name (he didn’t just pop up with his attorneys following), and he delivers his plea in a defensive manner instead of the smug way Cuba Gooding Jr says it in the show…

5- Bailey vs Shapiro…
Attorney F. Lee Bailey on Larry King, passive-aggressively smack talking Robert Shapiro: This may not exist but I’m still looking… Instead I found this:
Not depicted in the series (yet?), Robert Shapiro in a Larry King interview responding to a recording from F. Lee Bailey 11 minutes and talks about the rift between them as well as denies that he made the suggestion for a man-slaughter plea depicted in Episode 4:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qRVAOKjcjQU

6- Faye Resnick Tell-All Book Interview

Nicole Browns friend Faye Resnick talks about her tell-all book with Larry King, covering Faye’s cocaine rehab 3 days before the murder and other tidbits mentioned in the mini-series…
https://youtu.be/9IwEORL_GE8
In real life, Faye was on a tv and Larry’s set was not the iconic map pointillism that is more recognizable to his shows history but the show changed the set and made the backdrop the more familiar one. & Larry King plays his 1995 self in the show.

For lots more bits, this 20/20 episode covers all the main beats excellently:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YhmJZHDh1gg

DAMN DANIEL is the best thing to happen to the internet in ages…

Zero percent irony. I like it and approve of it and am happy for these dudes.

If you’re late to the party: this string of snapchats of a dude commenting on his friend Daniels style (twice with white Vans) somehow caught fire and is now millions of views strong, half a million likes and re-tweets and it’s all beautifully wonderous. Here it is:

https://twitter.com/josholzz/status/699432086965366784

Enjoy the remixes…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YXYsHiTwJjo

Explaining the Obvious Logical Rules on Replacing a Dead Justice

Alternate title: The correct yet totally hypocritical party stance of replacing Scalia.


Photo Credit: Creative Commons/Shawn Calhoun

Justice Antonin Scalia died in his sleep on a hunting trip, leaving a vacancy on the Supreme Court which now raises a bunch of questions regarding which party gets to nominate someone to fill that vacancy.

The rules on replacing a retiring or life-retired (read: dead) Justice are: The President nominates a person for the vacancy and the Senate Judiciary Committee (Senators who are part of a kind of “judge pickers club”) publicly interviews them with questions and then the Senate votes on whether or not to confirm the nominee as a Judge on the Supreme Court. Right now the White House is filled by a Leftist Democrat and the Senate (and its judiciary committee) is controlled by center-Right Republicans. So who gets to fill this seat?

In an interesting plot twist: both Republicans and Democrats are factually correct (in different areas) and yet total hypocrites on the issue.

Specifically, Democrats claim President Obama should obviously be appointing the new judge for a speedy confirmation by the Senate and Republicans say since President Obama has less than 1 year left as President, the new one that takes office in January 2017 should be the one to make the nomination (which they hope will be a Republican).

Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) may be a total partisan hack who peddles easily debunked talking points from her hippie base on the regular, but she’s right in her comments on this subject…

“Senator McConnell is right that the American people should have a voice in the selection of the next Supreme Court justice. In fact, they did — when President Obama won the 2012 election by five million votes,” Ms. Warren, a former Harvard Law School professor, said in a statement.

“Article II Section 2 of the Constitution says the President of the United States nominates justices to the Supreme Court, with the advice and consent of the Senate,” she wrote. “I can’t find a clause that says ‘
except when there’s a year left in the term of a Democratic President.’”

She added: “Senate Republicans took an oath just like Senate Democrats did. Abandoning the duties they swore to uphold would threaten both the Constitution and our democracy itself. It would also prove that all the Republican talk about loving the Constitution is just that — empty talk.”

That’s all true in the most “duh” of fashions. Unfortunately for Warren though, the same Constitution they all took an oath to uphold, applies to the other party as well, and the unmistakable fact of the matter at hand is that of course Congress can deny Obama this appointment.

Consent means the Senate is under no obligation whatsoever even to hold a vote on any presidential appointment. The Senate’s obligation is to do what the Senate wants, and only what the Senate wants. Those are the rules. To try to hold senators to a different rule is to try to change the rules on them–and people tend to resent that. Everyone is free to disagree with the positions individual senators or the Senate as a whole take on individual nominations or prospective nominations. But there is no question that senators individually or collectively can deny their consent to any actual or prospective nomination for any reason–just as the American people can vote for whomever they want, for whatever reason they want.

Indeed, President Obama isn’t even entitled to nominate a replacement for Justice Scalia–or at least, Congress can deny him that right. The Constitution gives Congress the power to decide how many seats there are on the Supreme Court. In 1789, there were only six. Given sufficient congressional support (i.e., veto-proof majorities in both chambers), Congress could reduce the number of Supreme Court justices from the current nine to eight. McConnell, Cruz, and Rubio could propose doing so right now. It seems strange to criticize senators who are merely expressing in what circumstances they will withhold their consent when Congress has the power to deny the president the ability to fill this vacancy entirely by itself eliminating this vacancy.

At the same time Democrats turn a blind eye to President Obama repeatedly ignoring constitutional limits on his power, they claim Republicans would dishonor the Constitution if they use powers the Constitution clearly grants them. That is unlikely to dissuade Senate Republicans from delaying a vote on Scalia’s successor until 2017. Nor should it.

So now that it is established that it is both an easily verifiable “duh” that yes, the President can go forward with this process as usual but yes, the Senate can halt this process as usual – the real question is what *should* happen logically, morally, and reasonably.

Here’s where the derpiness starts…

Seems to me that the timing of an election should play no role in judicial appointments and claiming otherwise is just playing politics in the kind of loophole bullcrap ways everyone hates about politics.

As a historical precedent, however…

There is ample precedent for rejecting lame duck Supreme Court nominees.

[T]he Senate does have an obligation to fulfill its “advice and consent” obligation. Says the Constitution, the president “shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the supreme Court
” A preemptive rejection of any possible Supreme Court appointment is self-evidently in conflict with that obligation. The phrase “do not let it become about whoever Obama names” makes that explicit.

A man as versed in the Constitution as Senator Cruz should be embarrassed to posit that the nation could owe a debt to Scalia, that a “debt” to a dead man should play any role in a process governed by the Constitution, or that a sitting president’s nominee should be preemptively rejected before his or her identity is known. There is no agreed upon standard of what legitimate advice and consent entails. But any standard that rejects a nomination before it is even made fails the laugh test.

James Madison’s Constitution is not a living, breathing document that changes in meaning as an election approaches. A president is no less legitimate as a lame duck. The Framers intended for the Senate to give up-or-down votes based on a nominee’s merit, however it’s defined. The timing of an election should play no role.

The precedent of the Senate halting a nomination process was upheld by some pretty key Senators in pretty recent history, however. Mainly: New York Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer. And former Senator Joseph Biden. And former Senator Barack Obama. – i.e. – the current sitting President and Vice President who are now arguing the opposite position on account of being total hypocrites in regards to Senate rules applying to a Presidency.

In Bidens case, it’s especially egregious because his argument was made in the absence of a vacancy. He was just pre-emptively making the case that “in case this happens, the president should be advised that this is the normal way of doing things and it would be wrong to do it any different way”… Oops…

Trump tells Jeb Bush that GW Bush lied us into war. Audience of Republicans applauds!

It is a bad state of affairs when the Republican party’s best candidate is also the one virtually guaranteed to lose if he ever won the nomination. The awesome thing about Trump is that he is sticking it to the Republicans on their absolute worst issue in decades and he’s doing it in a way that doesn’t humiliate them for it. Democrats have a nasty way of smearing anyone who disagrees with them, while Trump is exhibiting exactly the right way to do something like this and attack the power structure, not the follower, in cases where appropriate.

“Obviously the war in Iraq was a BIG. FAT. MISTAKE.” – Donald Trump / majority of Americans, including Republicans.

First – notice the bias in this video by CBS on how they chose a thumbnail in where Jeb is smiling and Trump is frowning when the actual video shows an upbeat Trump absolutely demolishing Jeb. It’s not a photoshop or anything – Trump and Bush both made those expressions – it just isn’t a thumbnail that summarizes the content well at all. Take a look –

This is an amazing point in history because everything he said feels true – a majority agrees with it – but its kindov actually *not* true – but for the most part *is* true.

And that is the problem with Donald Trump… he opens himself – in a very GW Bush kind of way, coincidentally – to unfair attacks and smears on himself and his policies by begin factual on a subject but not entirely accurate on a specific word choice within that bubble. That gives enemies an opportunity to attack and not be non-factual when they mislead the public with an attack.

Specifically: The “Buh lied” trope has never been proven and doesn’t have strong evidence to support it. All accounts show that Bush and his top administration officials actually did – and had reasonable reason to – believe that they would find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. To an extent, they did find such weapons – but never the most scary that they claimed were likely being worked on or hoarded in the country. That lack of validation to their claims plus the objectively bad management of the war has made a clear “wasn’t worth it” label on the effort. It cost billions, slaughtered thousands of innocents, and hurt America. So Trump starts 100% right with saying it was a mistake and then veers off into iffy territory by saying Bush knew he was lying the whole time.

That’s the biggest problem here and with this guy in general: Trump, used the Democrat talking point that Bush “lied” us into war. Which is wrong, but not wrong in the way that matters, because its “basically” right… meaning – it’s directionally right, just not specifically accurate in the exact words used. And that appears to be Donald Trumps whole thing. Probably due to his background in real estate and Hollywood showmanship – he speaks far too casually and that is both his appeal and likely his downfall. He’ll say shit like “we had a beautiful time, it was tremendous – beautiful – absolutely stunning – and then after – we went out, we got some ice cream – it was a beautiful time” and lying liars will call him a liar because he actually got frozen yogurt, not ice cream. (*this is a made-up quote & scenario to illustrate the point, btw. we all know Trump would never get frozen yogurt and is 100% an ice cream man).

Imagine Donald Trump actually won the nomination (lol) and that he somehow won the election (like, if Hillary was caught on video or audio exhibiting all those stories about how nasty and mean she allegedly is to staff behind the scenes, for instance) – the media and his hack enemies would have a Scrooge McDuck moneybin’s wealth of fodder to lie about alleging “Trump lied” for saying things – exactly like this – that are “basically true” but require clarification. When other politicians do this, its called misspeaking, being imprecise, or in this case – just having one wrong opinion stated among 4 other facts about the subject. Doesn’t matter. Republicans need to wise up and learn the game or they will get crushed.

In this situation, however, Republican critics don’t know what to do because they want to hate Trump, but… he agrees with them on the most important issue of the past 18 years… The GW Bush led Iraq war was a bad move. Bush deserves blame at least, impeachment as a moderate compromise, and prosecution for war crimes at most. Trump takes the moderate position here amidst a larger anti-war stance and no one knows what to do.

Except Republicans that is. They like it. Republicans and independent Bush voters on whole never liked the war garbage. It was always a stain that had to constantly be defended and was never articulated well by the administration. That’s why Trump is getting support.. he is literally more liberal in all the best ways – in this case, being more anti-war – than his democrat opponent.

It’s an amazing thing to see. But a dangerous view of where it could lead.

Voice of Plucky Duck, Joe Alaskey, dead at 63

My childhood hero, Plucky Duck has fallen.

Joe Alaskey, who also voiced Grandpa from Rugrats and – to paraphrase the words of a line from the theme of the Plucky Duck Show – “Lots of other characters, but who cares who they are“. Plucky is all that matters and todays loss of his vocal provider is a day of mourning.

Plucky of course was a character born out of the magnificent show, Tiny Toon Adventures, which was the one and only valid product of the early 90s “younger version of familiar characters boom” after networks scrambled recycle their intellectual property and ride the Muppet Babies success wave. In Tin Toons, the characters weren’t younger versions of their counterparts (in this case, the WB lineup), but rather toons-in-training seeking to be the next crop of such characters. As far as I was concerned, however, the show was merely a vehicle to showcase Plucky: a green tank top wearing mallard who idolized Daffy Duck and likewise was constantly hatching schemes revolving around his greed and egotistical pursuit of personal glorification.

From the Tiny Toons opening theme:
Plucky Duck typing at typewriter: “The Scripts were rejected…”
Giant Plucky head popping out of typewriter: “Expect the unexpected!”
-Fkking brilliant….

Here is Alaskey announcing the Plucky Duck show (my favorite cartoon of all time) spinoff from Tiny Toons that only lasted a few episodes but was glorious (I still listen to the mp3 rip of the theme song fairly regularly) and explaining how he came up with Plucky’s voice. The deconstruction that he did a Daffy Duck inflection and switched the frontal lisp to be a lateral lisp is simple yet brilliant.

Here’s the original Tiny Toons theme (one of the best in the history of cartoons):

On the Tiny Toons Christmas Special I remember jumping out of my skin with excitement during the “It’s a Wonderful Life” parody in where Buster Bunny was shown an alternate reality where Plucky was the star of Tiny Toons. Buster (and presumably the audience) is supposed to be horrified by this but I was so excited and inspired that it could well be said that the real birth of Richardland was born at that very moment…

This spawned the pre-mentioned spinoff in where that gag was turned into an actual 13 episode show with this brilliant stupendous awesome opening:

It is with a heavy heart that I vow to carry on the Plucky legacy…

4 Superbowl 2016 Lowlights

OMFG! I’m so excited for this years Superbowl football team competition game!!! jk. I know nothing about the teams or even the sport and would say I am unable to care less except for the fact that I know I hope the ponies win over the kitties cuz everyone is telling me the kitties are gonna take it, so I’m betting on TeamHorse. I intend to spend the time focusing on things that actually matter and peeking my head into the Grand Hall every once in awhile when Wheeler yells that commercials are on but anything else I catch will be noted.

UPDATE: Didn’t do much as far as life-blogging the event cuz it bored me to tears so badly but go me for betting on the winners. Now here are 5 losing moments from it all:

1- National Anthem Butchery
The American National Anthem should be sung up-tempo at a brisk pace without dramatic change to the inflection of the words. Why is this formula so abhorrent to musical blowhards? Lady Gaga is more talented and has better style than the silly hair and glitter suit with matching eyelids she wore while underperforming the anthem in that drawn out goofy style. Talented singers should be using the opportunity to showcase the anthem, not their spin on it. I like the idea of a Lady Gaga style rendition of the anthem delivered in a Gaga style costume and get-up, but not this style and not this get-up. I disapproved.

2- The Black-Power Halftime Show


For historians looking back at this post, I should note that this is written in the year 2016 in America, the least oppressive, most opportunity-giving country to minorities of all kinds on the planet. Beyonce went of the deep end with a literal “black power” performance. The “literal” addition is necessary to note that it’s not a disconnected observer tsk-tsk-ing something they don’t understand in some by-gone time of cultural bubble commentating but rather an information exposed internet-connected time where the ridiculous pandering to the lowest common denominator of by-gone segregations are being bizarrely glorified. Having such a whine-fest of supposed victimhood of an entire race of people, 60 years after any law allowing any kind of government allowable suppression of a race in the midst of a black-skinned presidents 2nd term in office is so small minded and counter-productive to unity, tolerance, and general acceptance that it is the kind of thing that deserves scorn and ridicule, not celebration at such a big event. Idk what the people who approved this display where thinking. It doesn’t help anything to re-inforce victim mindedness through an empowerment message when there is no racial oppression of any significance to overcome. Be empowered because you’re a person in a free society, not because you’re a black person in a white society. Get with the times, you dummies.

#Beyoncé Super Bowl performance yesterday. #DoubleStandard#BlackPantherparty#SuperBowl50

Posted by Johnathan Gentry on Monday, February 8, 2016

3- Absent: Good Commercials. Present: Dumb Attacks on them
The only thing I watch during this event and I already forgot them all. The only ones I remember are from tangential stories about them like the monkey baby thing allegedly being a tongue twister (i have no problem saying it) and the abortion rights group NARAL getting mad at the Doritos commercial that “humanized” a human fetus. I’m fine with people choosing abortion if their pregnancy has negative affects on their Doritos or other snack chip supply but it it’s more than a little-bit-completely stupid of an argument that developing human babies shouldn’t be humanized just because it makes you feel better about snipping it outta you, should you want to. Funny that humanizing animals is encouraged but humanizing human babies – omgz! noez!

4- Ponies Beat the Kitties
Everyone told me the cat team was going to ride the horse team to an easy win so evidently this was a big upset. Good.

Uber is trying too hard with its weird new logo

Uber has changed their logo in an ongoing tweak of their their brand identity and while the latter makes sense, the logo thing is kindov weird. As it was just put to me by someone else commenting on the issue: It’s like Coca Cola changing the formula because “eh… it’s been awhile”.

Why would Uber change their thin and elegant “U” on a black background to a bloated backwards “C” with a square in the middle resting in a bunch of turquoise loops.

Joshua Topolsky points out: the old logo was “very bad but useful” while the new logo is “very bad and useless”.

Looking for actual answers on what this is about doesn’t come up with much:

“This updated design reflects where we’ve been, and where we’re headed. The Uber you know isn’t changing, our brand is just catching up to who we already were,” explains Uber, referring to the company’s expansion into logistics through its UberRush service.

The company will also move from having one brand to serve its global enterprise, to an individual look for each of its 65 countries, with tailored colors and patterns, illustrations, and photos, Uber told Wired. The idea is to create more flexibility in the brand.

And the complexity goes even deeper from there…

https://twitter.com/nxthompson/status/694901448392441857

The worst part of it all? No Uber condoms… or anything “bedroom”-related (including boxers). Not associating a logo with sex is less silly of a policy than phrasing it by specifying just condoms – but even Disney makes underwear.

The lengths of the terms of logo usage show deeper insight into the aspects of perhaps trying too hard that the company is going to in this rebranding effort. Their terms stipulate that you can’t put the logo on anything that will be stepped on (no Uber floormats) put in the trash (no Uber cups), or eaten (no Uber cookies or cakes). That last one is the dopiest. No Uber cakes because cakes get sliced up (and that could damage their brand integrity or something) and cakes get eaten and Ubers new image can’t withstand the thought of it’s logo being turned into poo.

Amy Schumer’s real failure is selling out to PC Principal

Amy Schumer is getting bashed for stealing jokes but I dint that topic to be without smoking-guns and far too pedestrian even if there was outright proof paired with a full admission from Schumer herself. I like Amy and she falls in my “can’t help but to root for” category but she is letting me down with her capitulation to political correctness, the opposition to which is what built her foundation of fame.

Gavin McInness dissects the topic exquisitely, here:

 

Dumb “If you’re cold, they’re cold” meme has dumb ripple effects on zoos

Awhile ago a meme began surfacing in different iterations using a completely  baseless emotional fallacy that claimed “If you’re cold, they’re cold” regarding cats and dogs in the snow. The premise is of course the lie that “cats and dogs are people too” and thus should be treated exactly the same as what would be humane or kind to a human being, instead of simply what is humane and kind for a cat or a dog.

I blame it for furthering pop-culture ignorance on how fur-laden animals generate and retain body heat in contradistinction to puny fleshy humans.

I’m connecting the dots from that mass distributed ignorance to the fear instilled in animal keepers now who are too afraid to post animals in snow without disclaimers that they are not abusing them by letting them freeze to death or otherwise causing them great suffering.

The Twitter account for the Smithsonian’s National Zoo & Conservation Biology Institute wants to make extra super sure you know their animals are safe in snow. So much so that nearly every tweet from January 21st-23rd mentioned some kind of thinly masked disclaimer that the animals are not being horrifically neglected. 

Lizards wrestle in the street (VIDEO)

I have zero information on this other than they appear to be monitor lizards (update: found a video that labels them as such and replaced it below) and I’m going to take a wild stab in the dark and suggest that this didn’t take place in America (though you never really know… I’m lookin at you, Florida).

https://youtu.be/K_9u-KF3BqI