Jimmy Kimmel’s excellent Oscar monologue

As usual, I did not watch the Academy Awards ceremony last night. I was glad to read today that Frances McDormand won the Best Actress award for her performance in Three Billboard Outside Ebbing, Missouri along with Sam Rockwell for Best Supporting Actor. I had praised that film and McDormand’s performance before in my review of the film. The host Jimmy Kimmel gave an excellent opening monologue that was both funny and pointed and gave a shout out to the students at Parkland and their March for Our Lives rallies on March 24, although another unknown group has claimed the Mall in Washington DC for that day to film a ‘talent show’..

Here it is.

[Read more…]

The utterly corrupt Trump administration

There was a brief flurry of excitement when it looked like Donald Trump was going against the NRA and the gun lobby and proposing restrictions limiting the easy availability of guns. I did not share that excitement because I felt it was only a matter of time before Trump reversed himself and went back into the arms of the lobby and his gun nut supporters. And sure enough, that reversal happened the very next day, after a meeting with a top NRA official.
[Read more…]

A handy alert system

I wrote before about how to become more aware that you are about to say something obnoxious so that you can avoid doing so. But if you happen to be the kind of person who cannot help himself, reader flex sent me this clip from a Canadian sketch comedy show with comedian Rick Mercer about an alert system that warns people around you that you are going to give them your opinion even if it is not wanted.

The chaotic nature of gun use

Donald Trump has suggested that teachers should be armed with guns to deter killers. Of course, the fact that an actual police offer (and maybe even four) was on site at the Parkland school and did not act shows that having an armed person present is not a solution when there is the ability for any person to buy a rapid-firing weapon that can kill many people in just a few seconds. Teachers are also pushing back saying that they joined the profession to teach people, not to be law enforcement officers.
[Read more…]

Stephen Colbert nails it

As we know, Florida senator Marco Rubio got an earful from a stadium full of people outraged by his abject subservience to the NRA. Stephen Colbert has a telling segment about one moment during the event and how many in the media commented on the fact of his showing up for it.

[Read more…]