As the McWorld Turns

What was once THE WORLD is now being called McWorld by

    keen observers of our consumer culture. The McNews reports the

    big story of the day: McDonald's may soon  be serving its McCustomers

    a different Mcburger. I am reminded of the Classic Coke fiasco.

         Don't mess with success ! Or in this case, don't mess with a

    mess. I'm  one of those soon to be OBSOLETE baby boomers who

    remember what REAL hamburgers tasted like -and smelled like as

    they sizzled on the grill of the friendly, neighborhood Greasy Spoon.

             McWorld is taking EVERY nostalgic memory away from us !

    I can now identify with that character in the Twilight Zone episode:

    " Walking Distance ". Imagine just being able to walk back into

    the saner and safer world( ??? ) of 1959 !

              But the McWorld news can only tell me that the monsters

    are due on Maple Street.

               It seems that McPeople are terribly worried about

    clones - HUMAN clones.  McPeople at least are alike everywhere -

    as alike as McDonald's hamburgers !

Graceless on Christmas Eve ( WHJJ )

              I  make no claim to being a pious soul myself . But

    often enough the VILLAGE ATHEIST type annoys me. Or was he just

    another jerk in the entertainment business ? I am talking about

    the  TALK RADIO fill in for smart,congenial, and popular Arlene

    Violet on Christmas Eve ( WHJJ ).

               Of course the lines went dead. It is one thing to be

    intelligently and politely controversial. It is quite another thing

    to be obnoxious and downright TOXIC.

                 Imagine a guy who finds fault with the humane sentiment:

    " There but for the grace of God go I " !

            A guy who scolds people for not giving a hard earned 20

    dollar bill to a hopeless derelict.

             A guy who seems to believe that every religious person who

    believes in a GOOD God is a dimwit.

              TALK RADIO is an art form , not just a forum for cranks.

    And that guy -who even maliciously mispronounced Arlene Violet's

    name - should be shown the door.

                Believing that EVIL is just  EGO, he was hardly egoless

    himself in thinking the majority of his listeners morons in their

    religious faith.

               As a ratings gimmick in your face PROFUNDITY flunks

    miserably.

               Rudeness and disrespect should not be the norm for

    TALK RADIO !

               Carl Sagan handled the science vs. faith controversy

    with great tact and sensitivity. View the movie " Contact " or

    read the novel.

A Lott of distraction

 If I were a Republican, I would feel free to comment

    on how to punish Trent Lott for his " Gone With The Wind " nostalgia

    for the dead past of the Old South. Clearly those days of accepted

    segregation of black people and respectable racism can NEVER come

    back.

             But ironically the most beloved black militant, Malcolm

    X, for most of his Black Muslim career, preached just this: black

    separatism. And he had a keen nose for sniffing out Jewish " control "

    or influence in the civil rights movement. It escaped him until his

    last days that  liberal and radical Jews were just naturally empathetic

    to the oppressed, to the victims of all forms of discrimination.

               Today phony Democrats will try to make a lot of political

    hay out of Trent Lott 's  party time drivel.It is only human to

    indulge the idiosyncrasies of a 100 year old LOYAL son of the

    South ( also an old SOB ! )

              It takes more political courage to tell the whole country

    on the floor of the Senate or the House that HEALTH CARE is a basic

    human right than to beat the dead horse of an OUTLAWED racism.

                But few Democrats are champions of WORKING CLASS

    America. " Political correctness " is a just a cheap way of

    seeming PROGRESSIVE while millions of working class people -of

    ALL races and ethnic groups - are on the edge of the social abyss !

                 What matters to our more RESPONSIBLE leaders is the

    sacred illusion of democracy. Just replace RACE with CLASS and

    a lot of Malcolm 's more wild rhetoric make great sense.

           Just for the record, I voted for Ralph Nader.

TV NEWS - WHY THE SCREAMING FANS ?

I am not neurotically annoyed by too many things. But

    perhaps middle age has made the sense of disgust -unlike the other

    vital senses -more acute. I hear more things in hell, to be sure.

            I often fantasize  about ridding myself of the damm TV

    forever. But I am too attached to the VCR -which is blessedly free

    of noisy, dumb, and obnoxious commercials.

              I must catch the morning news on Channel 10. What I can't

    stand - and don't understand - is the very beginning of the program

    where the cameras always zoom in on the screaming-hyenas - FANS - of

    Katy and Matt, I guess . How can they be so infantile over a moment

    of media attention ?

                  What a contrast between the nightmare news and the

    demeanor of the celebrity news people - ( they ooze narcissism ) -

    and the bestial FANS in the street.

              The Providence horror writer H.P Lovecraft got it right

    about the future of humanity.  A decayed species will inherit the

    earth. Public education gives most kids a vocabulary of 100 words

    - BASIC ENGLISH. A dismal future for the newspaper business !