December 20, 2014

And he supports that lunatic, John of God!!

Which alone should warrant him being struck off the roles.

If you don't know who John of God is, well he's a kook, faith healer who does an old carny trick called psychic surgery and bilks people for their money claiming that they are healed, when he is just doing carny tricks, long ago debunked, as documented here and here.

And even on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show,

by James Randi. Amazingly, the NBC operators were flooded with calls that night with requests to get in touch with the psychic surgeon, in spite of the fact that Randi exposed it as an utter fraud.

That's how scammers and frauds like Mehmet Oz, and Peter Popoff, and John of God, and Benny Hinn and idiot homeopathists and chiropractors and all the eastern mythos new age kooks all get away with it, and get rich, peddling their quackery. They have nobody to hold them accountable. All this stuff is unregulated. The quacks have free reign.

That is, unless somebody holds their feet to the fire and shows their frauds.

January 22, 2014

"What you observe is a great wasteland."

I post this here without comment, and invite DUers to consider that these words were said by the head of the FCC, Newton Minow, on May 9, 1961.

When television is good, nothing — not the theater, not the magazines or newspapers — nothing is better.
But when television is bad, nothing is worse. I invite each of you to sit down in front of your own television set when your station goes on the air and stay there, for a day, without a book, without a magazine, without a newspaper, without a profit and loss sheet or a rating book to distract you. Keep your eyes glued to that set until the station signs off. I can assure you that what you will observe is a vast wasteland.
You will see a procession of game shows, formula comedies about totally unbelievable families, blood and thunder, mayhem, violence, sadism, murder, western bad men, western good men, private eyes, gangsters, more violence, and cartoons. And endlessly commercials — many screaming, cajoling, and offending. And most of all, boredom. True, you'll see a few things you will enjoy. But they will be very, very few. And if you think I exaggerate, I only ask you to try it.

There are few bright lights. As it has ever been, even in 1961.

January 4, 2014

Back when music meant actual singing.

Not yelling.

I love the Everly Bros. They were always classy.

Pass easy, Phil.