Nice day for a White Blogging

Nothing racial intended there—just being my usual smart-ass self...

SPEAKING OF SMART-ASSES...
Reason #1,102 why I hate "I Love The '80s" on VH-1. While channel-surfing the other day, I stumbled across yet another installment of this insipid series, and I couldn't believe how low they had stooped.  They were doing 1985, and these losers were actually making fun of quarterback Joe Theismann's gruesome "Monday Night Football" injury and defensive tackle Lawrence Taylor's subsequent reaction thereof where Theismann's leg got pinned under Taylor and it snapped.  It takes quite a bit to gross me out, but I was watching when it happened and remember being rather rattled for a day or two after seeing this.  I've seen the replay so many times now that I'm pretty much anesthetized to it, but still, it's pitiful that these hack comedian wanna-bes on these VH-1 shows are so jaded that they'd make fun of someone being injured.

JIM HAGER, 1942-2008
Fans of "Hee-Haw" are no doubt saddened by the passing of singer Jim Hager, who died this weekend of a heart attack.  He was half of the Hager Brothers duo, who were regulars on the show.  I remember watching that show when I was little, and I thought the Hagers were cool merely because they had long hair—I remember precious little about their music!  Not to make light of Jim's passing or anything, but I did have to chuckle at the Hager Bros.' official website, which deems them the "World's most famous twins".  Talk about your chutzpah...

CLASSIC MISHEARD LYRIC #80
"See You Tonite"—GENE SIMMONS (1978)  "...and if I can't, I'll cry and cry."  For the longest time, I thought Gene sang "and if I can't talk right, I'll cry!"  Well, with a tongue like that, talking can be difficult sometimes...

LOOK THIS UP IN YOUR FUNK & WAGNALLS...
I just heard some John Madden wanna-be on ESPN use the word "versitality" during their Arena Football League coverage.  Is that anything like "Wessonality"?

By the way, I find it highly hypocritical that ESPN covers Arena Football seriously now after years and years of poking fun at it.  And must they feature the Philadelphia team every week, just because Bon Jovi owns it?  Poffeycock...

"FOUR DEAD IN OHIO..."
Yesterday was the 28th anniversary of the infamous Kent State shootings on May 4, 1970.  I was reminded of it by a fine piece in the Kansas City Star yesterday that profiled college football coaches Gary Pinkel of Missouri and Nick Saban of Alabama, who both had ties to Kent State football in their youth.  I visited the campus of Kent State during a road trip in 2006 and stopped to see where it all went down on that terrible day.  I give the University a lot of credit for not pushing it all under the rug and pretending nothing ever happened—in addition to the memorial that was erected near the scene, they cordoned off the actual spots within the parking lot where the four students were struck down and their names are inscribed in marble.

It's no small coincidence I guess that Platoon was on the cable last night, a film that I can't help but watch over and over again, in spite of all the carnage.  I sit and watch that movie and keep trying to figure out what that war was all about.  I sometimes wonder if I would have participated in war protests or not if I were of age in that era.  At the risk of sounding like a bleeding-heart liberal, I know I would've asked back then the same question I ask today:  What did the Vietnam war solve?  What did the Korean War solve?  What is this Iraq debacle going to solve?  I have yet to find anyone who can give me a straight answer...