So on his radio show, Mayor Mike Bloomberg said that the cops won’t enforce the city’s new ban on smoking at beaches and parks.

So, who will?

Us.

That’s right, Bloomie said, quote, “This is going to be enforced by public pressure. [...] Mainly….everybody’s going to turn to you and say, ‘Hey, you shouldn’t be smoking.’ And you know, most people listen.”

Yeah, most people.

He must be referring to smurfs, pixies and tree nymphs. Cuz it ain’t us.

And so we see another example of Bloomie’s mammoth misunderstanding of human nature.

We don’t like busybodies. We don’t like meddlers. And we don’t like jerks butting in over our butts.

More important, everyone knows that the average life span of a snitch, is far shorter than a smoker’s.

People hate snitches more.

Imagine the rise in assaults between these intrusive nitpickers, and drunk vacationing Germans, chain-smoking coke dealers, or worse – angry, short talk show hosts looking for chain-smoking coke dealers.

The sad fact: every effort to manipulate smokers causes a new kind of suffering. When smoking was banned in bars, many closed – and hot, raspy waitresses were out of work.

Fights in front of existing bars increased, among outdoor smokers and sober tourists, causing a rise in nuisance complaints.

I got hit in the face a lot. mainly by me.

But this latest b-s is a sick clue into bloomies psyche – that he would make a law, and expect you to tell the tattooed biker to follow it.

Because Mikey won’t.

(more…)

Okay.  First of all let me start off  by saying that I have been a musician (piano and more recently guitar – and the spoons) since I was a youngster.  And very few bands influenced me more than the Fab Four.  And of said mop-tops from Liverpool,  Paul was my favorite but I always thought John Lennon was a little cooler in his edginess and willingness to explore musically…sometimes brilliantly (“She Said, She Said”) other times embarrassingly (“number 9?…number 9?…number 9?)

It was with great sadness this thirteen year old heard the news from Howard Cosell, thirty years ago today in fact, on Monday Night Football, that he’d been murdered by that scumbag Mark David Chapman.  Actually, if I may borrow from Dennis Miller, I take that back for that would be an insult to bags of scum.  

Fact: John Lennon changed the music scene for the better and enriched rock-and-roll and all off-shoots from the Sixties onward in a profound way that only a truly gifted artist could.  Still, like his partner Paul, John’s music was never quite so there after the Beatles broke up, showing that a unique synergy did exist, even if by the end they were writing by themselves and for themselves.

That last observation is just a hint of honesty that I think is necessary to remember him properly.  To eulogize Lennon the man rather than just the music takes some frank talk.  And no Lennon song so instills in me the urge to have an adult discussion with the legions of fans who see not just a musician but rather a  mystically enlightened figure than his anthem of the hippy pacifist culture:  “Imagine.”  It is a beautiful piece, elegant in its simplicity of melody.  But the lyrics, quite frankly, irk me.

“Imagine no possessions.  I wonder if you can.”   What I wonder more is whether those who sing this modern-day kumbaya, an homage to an equalitarian society that Orwell would scoff at, are aware that the man who penned these words was worth an estimated $150 million when he died – much if it in real estate, including five apartments claimed in the Dakota co-op on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. Three units just for storage—for all those possessions he couldn’t imagine … I guess.  It sort of deflates the message, does it not?  At least it reveals that, for all his talent, Lennon was at his core a textbook limousine liberal who bounced from four-star hotels, to luxury private jets, to castles in the country and posh penthouses in the glitziest of cities to pontificate his world without class, borders, countries, God or, of course, possessions.  (more…)

George Soros, celebrity hedge fund billionaire and darling of the left, has been a busy man the last fifteen years.  While his capitalistic business ventures that began in the 1970s may have brought him his fortune and international financial fame, it’s his activities in the 1990’s that are having the most impact here in America today, on our television and Hollywood movie screens.

We’re especially reminded of this in recent times, as we see the overabundance of falsely portrayed stories on film and video, and at the same time the complete absence of other stories from the mainstream view. 

That’s no accident.

Soros gained his political reputation this last decade largely by staunchly opposing the Iraq war and publicly comparing former President George W. Bush to the Nazi Regime.  Drawing on his proclaimed expertise on Orwellian propaganda techniques and modern day mind-control marketing, George Soros once vowed to dismantle the conservative infrastructure, a pledge that hoisted him to the mantel of hero to the far-left wing of the Democratic Party.  By 2004,dozens and dozens of Soros’ political advocacy organizations had been erected and pumped full of millions of dollars aimed at evicting George W. Bush from the White House.  (more…)

Wall Street Journal:

Forget product placement, NBC Universal is trying “behavior placement” with some of its shows. Characters from programs such as “30 Rock” and “The Office” are acting out eco-friendly behaviors that advertisers hope will sway viewers. WSJ’s Amy Chozick reports.

In just one week on NBC, the detectives on “Law and Order” investigated a cash-for-clunkers scam, a nurse on “Mercy” organized a group bike ride, Al Gore made a guest appearance on “30 Rock,” and “The Office” turned Dwight Schrute into a cape-wearing superhero obsessed with recycling.

—–

Forget product placement, NBC Universal is trying “behavior placement” with some of its shows. Characters from programs such as “30 Rock” and “The Office” are acting out eco-friendly behaviors that advertisers hope will sway viewers. WSJ’s Amy Chozick reports.

Coincidence? Hardly. NBC Universal planted these eco-friendly elements into scripted television shows to influence viewers and help sell ads.

The tactic—General Electric Co.’s NBC Universal calls it “behavior placement”—is designed to sway viewers to adopt actions they see modeled in their favorite shows. And it helps sell ads to marketers who want to associate their brands with a feel-good, socially aware show. (more…)

Before we begin…

Perhaps it’s genetic and, because I’m Irish-American, I’m sounding like Joseph McCarthy when he railed against Communism with his Un-American Activities Committee. Plus, with a name like Moriarty, given that’s the “handle” for the major villain in the World of Sherlock Holmes, I’m doubly cursed.

My sometimes awkward efforts to trace the growth of communism in the American performing arts does not have the substantive weight of an historical scholar, but it does have my over-forty years of personal experience behind it.

In an almost childlike way but with plenty of time to ponder my past in film and theater, I offer up a truth that, for me, has only been glimpsed in depth by Glenn Beck. (more…)

The Public Broadcasting System’s taxpayer-funded ‘Sesame Street’ has, at cursory glance, presented young American children with what colorfully appears to be one of television’s few safe havens of educational fun. 

Yet, embedded in its visually intoxicating muppetry and otherwise innocently entertaining educational content there lurks highly controversial political messages designed to promote multiculturalism and global citizenship:

–

 ”We all sing with the same voice, the same song, the same voice. We all sing with the same voice and we sing in harmony… 

I live in southern France, I’m from a Texas ranch, I come from Mecca and Peru… I come from everywhere, and my name is you…” 

That’s right kids! We’re ‘All’ the ‘same’… um, except that we’re all different.  (more…)

I remember three images from September 11, 2001:

1)  People jumping from burning buildings.
2)  Congress standing outside, humbly bowing their heads, and praying.
This was a shocking sight.
3)  The pews of my church completely full of people…and for several months after.

It’s human nature to remember God when we’re in big trouble.  Even agnostics offered up a prayer that day.  We needed super human help from a higher power to defeat the Enemy Without.

God answered our prayers, and along with the excellent leadership of Bush, Cheney, our fantastic military, and superb FBI and CIA, we have been safe for eight years.  Thank you.  (more…)

Hollywood has, for the last thirty years or so, made military members the butts of jokes – they’re either crazy Vietnam vets (Rambo) or corrupt institutionalists (The Hulk).  But most of all, they’re victims (see Platoon).  They’re victims of uncaring governments, of obtuse generals, of racist politicians.

Such portrayal couldn’t be further from the truth.  Since the end of the draft, America’s military men and women have courageously volunteered to defend our country; they have put themselves in harm’s way for a higher purpose than themselves.  They aren’t selfish or stupid – or dupes, as John Kerry suggested (“You know education, if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework, and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. And if you don’t you get stuck in Iraq.”).  They are heroes.  As Orwell put it, “We sleep safe in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would do us harm.”  And today’s soldiers have trained themselves to be rough and ready; they haven’t been coerced or forced.  If the highest sacrifice is the sacrifice by choice, these men and women make the highest sacrifice every day. (more…)

Few books in history, if any, have left such a powerfully lingering effect with their last four words as the classic tale of a totalitarian nightmare by Eric Blair (aka George Orwell), ’Nineteen Eighty-Four’: “He Loved Big Brother.” In those four words, the utter destruction of a human being, and by extension humanity itself, was complete. The novel remains a most dark and compelling tale, and is even taught as a full course in many college classrooms.

John Hurt in Michael Radford’s ‘1984′

The essential fact, the very heart of the matter, in George Orwell’s timeless classic is “the ability to say two plus two equals four. If than can be done, all else follows.” Yet the nightmare Big Brother regime of ‘Nineteen Eighty-Four’ must by necessity keep redoing the math, even as it keeps rewriting history. Those who do the correct math, and refuse to see the equation otherwise, are the greatest dangers to Big Brother’s existence and are doomed to suffer fates worse than death. (more…)

In the past few days there have been several reports about officials, high and low, using new politically correct language to describe things which have been around awhile. The best example is the new head of the Department of Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano, refusing to use the word “terrorist.”  She preferred describing terrorist actions as “Man Caused Disasters.” The problem with politically correct speech is that it hides the obvious. Even Big Freakin’ Hillbillies like me understand an illegal immigrant is someone who broke the law to get into this country. We of simple minds get confused when folks from the Ivy League start describing them as “migrants.” To us, migrants are plain spoken folk, those who waited in line, did the right thing and came here in accordance with our laws. (more…)

There is growing alarm among talk radio personalities and executives nationwide as the Obama administration embeds socialistic values into the American mainstream.  Thanks to President Reagan, broadcasters have been free from the Orwellian Fairness Doctrine for over twenty years.  The number of talk stations has grown from 125 to now over 2000 thanks to his great wisdom of repealing this doctrine which muzzled free speech.  Radio and Television owners simply didn’t want to risk being turned into the FCC and potentially lose their broadcast license if they said something controversial.  I worked for twenty years under this doctrine and we never broached major controversy – free thought and expression was tightly controlled over the airwaves.  When Reagan dropped the restrictions, Rush Limbaugh and a multitude of other conservative hosts emerged and succeeded because there was so much pent up demand by those who felt their views negated by restrictions and by the overwhelming liberal media bias.  Now, Democrats want to restore speech restrictions and it is simply covert censorship. (more…)