While recuperating at home, i got to watch a lot fo TV, and I noticed something interesting: Spanish language commercials on English stations! I wonder why Jack in the Box and Time Warner Cable are advertising in Spanish? Could it be that Hispanics are becoming the majority?

Well, if that doesn't get the Enlish Firsters knickers in a knot, this news will: "'Desperate Housewives,''Lost,''George Lopez' and the new comedy 'Freddie,' starring Freddie Prinze Jr., will be dubbed into Spanish, as will the network's theatrical movie premieres and some specials" and broadcast on the SAP channel to appeal to the nations 41 million Hispanics, the fastest growing minority.

Soon, ABC will put out a show in Spanish with English on the SAP channel. Then we'll get to hear the stirring slogan, "This is America! Speak English!' echo from sea to shining sea.

As Babel Fish and I wrote earlier: "I, para uno, dan la bienvenida a nuestros overlords nuevos [ de la minoría ]. Quisiera recordarlos como una personalidad confiada en de la TV [ o blogger ], yo puedo ser provechoso en el redondeo encima de otros a trabajar en sus cuevas subterráneas del azúcar." Therefore, I support ABC's bold move to capture the hearts of the future majority.

And a note to you English Firsters out there: If you don't want to have to learn Spanish, have more kids!

Big Brother is Getting Closer

Parents today are able to monitor the location, speed and diet of their teenage children. With cell phone tracking, chips in the cars, and debit card-like meal cards, parents can get 24/7 updates via email about where the kids are, how fast they're going, if they're making jackrabbit starts, and if they're eating enough vegetables.

Kids, hide the phone! Turn the damn thing off. Get rides with your friends. Every adult has some secret they keep from their parents. It would be a shame if you are the first generation that doesn't

My Last Katrina Post - I Hope!

Now that the way in Iraq is over--What do you mean it's not over? It's not on the news, so it must be over.

A lot of people are upset that Bush didn't have troops in New Orleans as soon as the last drop of rain fell from Katrina. News headlines on Tuesday morning proclaimed, with relief, "New Orleans Dodges Bullet" and reported that Katrina didn't directly strike the city. Within hours, the levee holding back Lake Ponchatrain broke and the city was flooded. Thousands died. Thousands that didn't have to if Ray Nagin, Mayor of New Orleans, had only ordered the city's school buses into action to enforce the mandatory evacuation. (Thousands cleaned out a wal-Mart, and not for just food! I understand looting for food. I don't understand looting for clothes and TVs.) But no, Nagin, a Democrat, announced the evacuation (but, only after the state ordered an evacuation) and promptly evacuated, leaving the poor citizens of his city to fend for themselves. After the hurricane was over, he wondered why the Feds weren't doing anything to help the folks he abandoned. Why isn't Mayor Nagin being called to task for abandoning the sick and the elderly in their hospitals a nursing homes? Why aren't Mayor Nagin's feet being held to the fire for his city's lake of preperation for the catashtrophe? Could it be because he's a Democrat, and as we all know, they can't do anything wrong?

What really offends me is the effort to accuse and blame only Bush. If you ask me, there's enough blame to go around at all levels of government. Nagin didn't provide a means of evacuation to those that needed it. And FEMA was slow in getting people into the field. ALL levels of government are at fault here, people! Not just the Feds!

But some bloggers insist on blaming Bush and the people who elected him. One blog even flirted with the idea of abandoning New Orleans completely because Louisiana was a Bush state. Then he remembered that New Orleans voted for Kerry and that the mayor was a Democrat, so he decided to help with relief efforts. One blogger said it was the fault of the sheep who elected Bush and hoped they could live with it. He used a few expletives to describe people with different views than he held, the first rule in civilized debate and tolerance, no doubt.

This Balkanization of the country, this division between Right and Left, has been building over the last 20 years or so, making any crisis political, and as a result, divisive. This appears to be the real legacy of Katrina.

So long, Little Buddy! Bob Denver 1935-2005

As a child of the late 60s and early 70s, I spent a lot of time stranded with the Castaways. And Gilligan could always make me laugh.

Thanks, Bob, for all the good times.

On Friday night, the History Channel was scheduled to break from their coverage of World War II and broadcast "Isaac's Storm," the story of the 1900 hurricane that destroyed Galveston. Instead of broadcasting the film, however, they broadcast a special about bootleggers.

You don't have to be a rocket scientist to realize that the show was pre-empted due to sensitivity concerns about hurricane Katrina. Which is a shame, really, because we could have learned something from the film."

A coastal city is destroyed by a hurricane. Thousands are killed. Galveston was rebuilt, and thrives today.

There are bloggers and TV pundits who continue to tell us that New Orleans is destroyed--gone forever. They're wrong, of course. But the History Channel missed a chance to be relevant and informative, and decided they would rather not offend anyone. And for that, we are all the poorer.

Don't you just hate it when you write an entry and you summarize something with a throw away line; then a few weeks later, someone comes along and uses a similar idea (I won;t say they got it from me) and writes something much better?

Here's a great article from The Onion.

I eagerly await the first lawsuit from one of the citizens of New Orleans who ignored the mandatory evacuation of their city. The lawsuit, of course, will be on the grounds that the city did not do enough to make them leave when they were convinced they could ride the storm out. I know the suit is coming, because we have people standing in front of the convention center, dodging small arms fire aimed at the rescue helicopters, wanting to know why no one is helping them.

Remember the McDonald's coffee lawsuit? McDonalds was held liable when a woman took the lid off her coffee to add sugar and cream, spilled her coffee. (Please not that on every page portraying the facts of the case, the cup tipped over. She didn't spill it. It just tipped. Or at the very least, the action is in the passive voice, "the contents spilled on her," implying, of course, no fault on her part.) The woman suffered severe burns over 6% of her body and only sued Mickey D's when they refused to pay her medical bills. Notice that she did not sue the car manufacturer for not making a flat seat...

In Rochester, NH, a woman is in the process of suing her doctor because she said she was obese and could only get healthier by losing weight.

I broke my ankle on the city's golf course. I was walking down and slight slope when my left foot slipped, and my right toe caught on the turf. Following the examples above, I should sue the city, right? I should make my fellow citizens pay for my medical care, and for the time away from work.

Personally, I blame bush. If he weren't so distracted by the war in Iraq, he could have prevented my accident.