Coffee Crisis!

We had a coffee crisis here at the office today that once again made me thankful I’m not a coffee drinker.

Found out today that the Starbucks near the office will be one of the ones closing which, which coupled with the closing of a “Java Express” drive-thru coffee place a month ago, has caused panic inside our offices.

The nearest drive-thru coffee is now the famous Las Vegas Sexxpresso (www.sexxyespresso.com) where all the baristas wear bikinis or lingerie.

Maybe I should try this coffee thing after all.

What Are Gas Prices Again?

General theme of Bush's "makes us all feel better about the economy" news conference: It's all the Democrats and Congress' fault (that firm hold they've had on the executive branch for eight years); don't worry, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will be just fine; there's no short-term fix except for offshore oil drilling; and how much are gas prices now?


Didn't think Bush's approval ratings could go any lower but he's proving me wrong. He's like Josh Hamilton in the home run derby: Already has the record and keeps knocking our more disapproval home runs anyway.

And did you notice how the stock market dropped during the conference. It was like all the Mortimer and Dukes were yelling out, "sell! sell!" all at once. I would too after watching that travesty.

Betancourt Rescue: Something Fishy?

I truly hate going into conspiracy theory territory.

Trying to find the aliens at Area 51 is fruitless when all they were doing was testing the stealth fighter. Trying to find the other shooter in the JFK assassination negates the tragedy of that day. Saying 9-11 was a controlled demolition spits on the graves of every single person who died on that day.

But I can’t help but think that there’s something fishy about an unusual visit by John McCain coinciding with the rescue of 15 hostages from the Colombian FARC rebels.

I don’t mean to downplay the truly joyous moment of seeing Ingrid Betancourt, three American prisoners and 11 other held for nearly six years enjoy their new freedom. But watching official government news agency (for now) Fox News and other right-wing media proclaim McCain as having something to do with the rescue got the wheels turning.

Then came word that the White House knew in advance about the plan to go after the hostages (http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5hX5TF0FO-soIVFBJfsd6YRHIFHhg), possibly as early as President Bush’s own trip to Colombia in March. And we now know that McCain made the visit at the urging for both the executive branch’s state department and one his top fund-raisers: Chiquita CEO Carl H. Lindner Jr., who is so happens got in trouble recently for giving more than $1 million to another Colombia terrorist group, the AUC.

Following along? Well, just ask this: Why in the midst of the competitive 2008 presidential race was McCain making a side trip to Colombia? Not exactly a hotbed for electoral votes.

McCain claims it was under the guise of a trip to promote free trade with Colombia … and if there’s one issue that’s on the front-burner of American voters minds right now, it’s not the economy, Iraq or health care, it’s free trade with Colombia.

Might just be too much of a conspiracy theory, but when you run a secretive and manipulative administration like the one currently in power – with its secret courts, Constitutional violations and wars under false pretenses – you have to give it at least a thought.

Psychic Friends

Being the PR guy for a firm that builds space modules, you figure I get my share of crazy calls sometime. But this one toped them all.

It was a person claiming to be a psychic from Australia who wanted to warn us that aliens were coming and planning to drop pedophiles on the Beijing Olympics. She wondered if there’s anything we can do to stop it, and I assured her we’ll do the best we can.

You laugh now, but will you be laughing when Costas comes on Aug. 8 and says. “Before we go to the opening ceremony, some breaking news. Apparently, spaceships have appeared over Beijing and they’re dropping pedophiles.”

Winning the Crazy Cat Lady Vote

As Hillary Clinton announces she is finally stepping off the stage, I was wondering how the Hillaryis44.com crowd might take it. Would they follow their leader and aid the push to make Barack Obama our 44th president?

Well, certainly this post today on the site shows that these supporters, many of whom supported Clinton simply because she was a woman, want to support the candidate who will make sure to end women’s right to choose:

I can only hope John McCain can beat him. I think McCain is going to need our help.

-- Hillaryis44.org poster

It gets worse. I was part of a group that helped discuss and formulate the Nevada Democratic party platform for the recent state convention, and our discussions have actually continued since the last gavel sounded.

Today, I got this disturbing E-mail from a person in the group:

I for one am not happy with the way the men in this party have treated a woman who has worked tirelessly in public service all her life and stood by a cheating husband regardless what people thought.

The media lost Hillary this election. Obama was on a honeymoon just wait. As for me if he does not pick her as his VP I may not vote at all this time I am so disgusted with the way this party is treating Hillary.

I am not working for Obama without Hillary on the ticket.

I just had to reply:

Simply ask yourself this.... Is it worth risking having McCain go into the Oval Office and ensure that the Supreme Court will not only take away women's right to choose, but have a majority to sustain that for a generation?

Is it worth going against everything that your candidate stood for over the past few months?

In the coming days, Clinton will endorse Barack Obama. Will you heed the call?

Guess I wasn’t convincing enough. Her reply:

My heart has been torn apart by all of this and I am tired of settling. Why are women always asked to wait you will get your turn. In my eyes this is the same thing that happened to women when they stood with the black men asking for the right to vote. Then what happened black men got the right to vote and said later for you women left us behind took us another 20 years to have the right to be able to vote. We still dont earn as much money as the men.

Why do we still have to fight this RIGHT TO CHOOSE issue over and over again. This is again an issue of a Womans Right and MEN have the audacity to use that as a wedge whenever they want women to give in to their side.

You guys need to make it understood that it is HILLARY or NO ONE ELSE for VP or women like me will not fall in line like dutiful women. NOT HAPPENING.

Now I sat near that same lady at the convention and even looked just like the crazy cat lady from “The Simpsons.” At one point, she was practically ready to attack two of my Vegas-to-Reno van mates who were doing nothing more than sitting still. They also happened to be black, which doesn’t surprise me about the racial tone her comments took.

The question becomes this: How do we convince crazy cat lady to understand the stakes of this election mean more than the cult of one personality?

Questions like this are why Obama supporters shouldn’t feel this is a foregone deal and a landslide in November awaits. The thought of an easy coronation to the White House is what did Clinton in, and we can’t fall under the same spell.

There is a lot of work ahead.

Who has Momentum in the General Election?

One only needs to contrast between these two pictures:

Barack Obama's big kick off to the general election June 3.


John McCain's "big" kickoff to the general election on June 3.

Seeya in November.

Lost Season Finale - My Thoughts

Having watched “Lost” from the beginning like the good Dharma-orientation film-watching person I am, I felt very satisfied with last night’s finale. If anything, there wasn’t that cheated feeling of leaving too much hanging … but there was still a lot to chew on.

My random thoughts. Obviously, don’t read ahead if you haven’t seen the finale yet…

- While three years have passed for the Oceanic Six, have three years passed on the island? If so, things might be a LOT different with those left behind. Keep in mind that the four seasons we’ve watched were just a span of months in island time. We’re talking THREE YEARS. That could mean Kate gets back to Sawyer, only to see he’s been married to Juliet for a couple of years. Just no babies, unless Juliet figured that out. Too bad… there’s a part of me that actually wanted to see Jack and Juliet more than Jack and Kate. They could also easily go the Narnia route and have a LOT of time passing on the island, where the Oceanic Six will arrive to find the grown grandchildren of Sawyer, Juliet, etc.

- Let’s keep in mind that whether three years have passed on the island or not, to them Jack, Sayid, Hurley, Kate, etc. are dead. They watched that ship go kabloey. And knowing what apparitions Jacob/Christian Shepherd served up for them in that time, they may not only have a shock when the Oceanic Six return, but may not believe they’re real.

- Heck, three years is such a long amount of time that it’s reasonable to think that the left-behind Losties at this point are rag-wearing mad members of the Richard Alpert Others, with possibly Sawyer as leader in Locke’s absence.

- Why is Locke not on the island? My theory, going back to a lot happens in three years, is for some reason the island had to be moved again. This time, it was Locke who had to make the sacrifice to leave the island.

- Probably the biggest hanging question from the episode I hope gets answered but may not be: What happened to physicist Daniel and his raft of unnamed Losties? I thought they did too much development of Daniel and his knowledge of the island’s properties to just discard him like that. Maybe he was close enough to the island to be swept up in that vortex and go along with it? And in a case of probably wishful thinking, maybe he happened to pick up a former Korean mob henchman who jumped off an exploding freighter? Michael’s a goner for sure, however, as the island let “him go.”

- Loved the effect of the island disappearing, complete with the ocean filling up the empty space the island left like an empty tub. Though my theory is not so much that the island moved somewhere else, but moved a couple of minutes ahead in time and is ALWAYS there, just not in the present. Think of missing a train that left the station a few minutes ago and is out of sight. Even if you run as fast as the train along the tracks, you won’t catch it and you won’t see it, but it's there. The challenge for the Oceanic 6 will be to figure out how to catch that train.

- The Ms. Wildmore boat moment wasn’t quite as tear-jerking as the Desmond Christmas message moment, but it was still sweet.

- Sun blames Jack for Jin’s death and has now taken her dad’s role as the callous leader of a corporation – and talking alliance with Wildmore no less. Why do I see her as Ramses to Jack’s Moses? Though the twist here is Jack will need to convince her to come back to the promised land as well.

- Octagon Global Recruiting obviously reflect a viral marketing event surrounding the San Diego Comic Con. Sound similar to what the “Dark Knight” folks did last con to get folks looking around Old San Diego for the Joker.

- In case you’re wondering about the two “alternative endings,” they simply show - I stick with my theory that Claire actually died in the explosion of that house in Dharmaville and she’s as much an apparition right now as daddy Shepherd.

- I’m surprised not many have brought up that the island itself may be the fabled lost city of Atlantis…