The Red Monkey

The Transportation Security Administration…has on its Web site a “mythbuster” that tries to reassure the public.

Myth: The No-Fly list includes an 8-year-old boy.

Buster: No 8-year-old is on a T.S.A. watch list.

“Meet Mikey Hicks,” said Najlah Feanny Hicks, introducing her 8-year-old son, a New Jersey Cub Scout and frequent traveler who has seldom boarded a plane without a hassle because he shares the name of a suspicious person. “It’s not a myth.”

Michael Winston Hicks’s mother initially sensed trouble when he was a baby and she could not get a seat for him on their flight to Florida at an airport kiosk; airline officials explained that his name “was on the list,” she recalled.

The first time he was patted down, at Newark Liberty International Airport, Mikey was 2. He cried.

After years of long delays and waits for supervisors at every airport ticket counter, this year’s vacation to the Bahamas badly shook up the family. Mikey was frisked on the way there, then more aggressively on the way home.

“Up your arms, down your arms, up your crotch — someone is patting your 8-year-old down like he’s a criminal,” Mrs. Hicks recounted. “A terrorist can blow his underwear up and they don’t catch him. But my 8-year-old can’t walk through security without being frisked…”

On the way home last Friday, Mikey’s boarding pass showed four giant red S’s at the airport in Nassau. “Oh, random screening,” Mrs. Hicks said…Mrs. Hicks said she wanted to take pictures of her son being frisked but was told it was against the rules.

The worst kind of bureaucrat is the robot whose artificial brain can’t see beyond obeying “The Rules”. There is nothing more important in their diminutive lives than The List.

Jay Leno To Return to The Tonight Show, Conan O’Brien Out

Posted on Thursday, January 14th, 2010 by Peter Sciretta

Update: THR’s NBC sources are denying the claim, but TMZ has been on top of the good intel on the late night fiasco over the past weeks — so for right now, we don’t know who to believe.

TMZ is now reporting that NBC has signed Jay Leno to a new contract that will give him a 1 hour late night talk show from 11:35pm to 12:35 under the title The Tonight Show. That’s right, looks like Conan O’Brien is out after refusing to move with the Tonight Show to tomorrow, at 12:05 in the morning. With Leno back in his old slot, it appears there is no room for O’Brien on the schedule.

Finke has reported that NBC CEO Jeff Zucker was threatening to “ice” Conan O’Brien, by holding him to a three-and-a-half-year no-compete clause in his contract. Videogum points out that the Internet continues to update Zucker’s Wikipedia page to reflect his “death,” which I find both juvenile, yet funny.

• Share this on del.icio.us
• Digg this!
• Share this on Reddit
• Stumble upon something good? Share it on StumbleUpon
• Share this on Facebook
• http://b2l.me/dquhn+%28via+@slashfilm%29” title=”Tweet This!” rel=”nofollow”>Tweet This!
• Buzz up!
• Post this to MySpace
• Share this on Technorati

View commentsComments 

Related Posts

• Conan O’Brien Makes Official Statement, Won’t Do 12:05am Tonight Show, Slams NBC On Air
• TV Buzz: What Does the Future Hold For The Tonight Show? NBC Chief “Dethrones” Conan O’Brien. David Letterman Drinking His Milkshake.
• The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien Debut: What Did You Think?
• First Look: The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien Set
• Jimmy Fallon Taking Over For Conan O’Brien: So What Do You Think?
• The Final Price of the Jay Leno Shuffle: Over $200 Million

Tags

Television, Conan-OBrien, Jay-Leno, Jeff Zucker

Previous: Obama Bank Tax Is Misguided

Dear Poor People: Please Remain Poor. Sincerely, ObamaCare

Posted by Michael F. Cannon

In a new study titled, “Obama’s Prescription for Low-Wage Workers: High Implicit Taxes, Higher Premiums,” I show that the House and Senate health care bills would impose implicit tax rates on low-wage workers that exceed 100 percent.  Here’s the executive summary:

House and Senate Democrats have produced health care legislation whose mandates, subsidies, tax penalties, and health insurance regulations would penalize work and reward Americans who refuse to purchase health insurance. As a result, the legislation could trap many Americans in low-wage jobs and cause even higher health-insurance premiums, government spending, and taxes than are envisioned in the legislation.

Those mandates and subsidies would impose effective marginal tax rates on low-wage workers that would average between 53 and 74 percent— and even reach as high as 82 percent—over broad ranges of earned income. By comparison, the wealthiest Americans would face tax rates no higher than 47.9 percent.

Over smaller ranges of earned income, the legislation would impose effective marginal tax rates that exceed 100 percent. Families of four would see effective marginal tax rates as high as 174 percent under the Senate bill and 159 percent under the House bill. Under the Senate bill, adults starting at $14,560 who earn an additional $560 would see their total income fall by $200 due to higher taxes and reduced subsidies. Under the House bill, families of four starting at $43,670 who earn an additional $1,100 would see their total income fall by $870.

In addition, middle-income workers could save as much as $8,000 per year by dropping coverage and purchasing health insurance only when sick. Indeed, the legislation effectively removes any penalty on such behavior by forcing insurers to sell health insurance to the uninsured at standard premiums when they fall ill. The legislation would thus encourage “adverse selection”—an unstable situation that would drive insurance premiums, government spending, and taxes even higher.

See also my Kaiser Health News oped, “Individual Mandate Would Impose High Implicit Taxes on Low-Wage Workers.”

And be sure to pre-register for our January 28 policy forum, “ObamaCare’s High Implicit Tax Rates for Low-Wage Workers,” where the Urban Institute’s Gene Steuerle and I will discuss these obnoxious implicit tax rates.

(Cross-posted at Politico’s Health Care Arena.)

Michael F. Cannon • January 13, 2010 @ 11:31 am
Filed under: Cato Publications; General; Health, Welfare & Entitlements
Tags: Coverage, gene steuerle, government spending, Health, health care arena, health care bill, health care bills, health care legislation, health insurance, income, individual mandate, insurance, insurance premiums, insurance regulation, jobs, legislation, mandates, marginal tax, marginal tax rates, Obamacare, regulation, regulations, Senate, senate democrats, spending, subsidies, tax, tax rates, taxes, uninsured, urban institute

ShareThis  

Related Posts

• ObamaCare Threatens Innovation
• House Democrats Choose Dishonesty
• The Coburn-Burr-Ryan-Nunes Mandate-Price-Control Bill
• ObamaCare Cost Estimate Watch: Day #180
• Market Bets that ObamaCare Won’t Cut Costs

Related Content from Cato.org

• ObamaCare Is Not Pro-Choice — for Anyone
• A Better Way to Give Dental Care to the Poor
• Should We Entrust Our Health to Obamacare?
• Obama’s Prescription for Low-Wage Workers: High Implicit Taxes, Higher Premiums
• Poor Decisions for the Poor

We need to keep this discussion open because we know what the government promises and what we get is never the same thing. Be wary of everything they tell you.

 

Ruh Roh. According to data gathered by Flurry, which provides mobile analytics, the hotly anticipated and insanely hyped Nexus One may have only sold 20,000 units in the first week. Translation: that’s not a lot. In fact, that’s a heck of a lot less than what the Droid did (250,000 in its first week) and certainly leaves a lot of ground to catch up on given that analysts have estimated that the Nexus One would sell 5-6 million units for this year.

Obviously, since there hasn’t been much traditional advertising of the Nexus One (unlike the Droid) and you can only buy the Nexus One from Google.com/phone, perhaps Google is handcuffing the potential earnings of this phone. After all, it is the best Android available, it should absolutely be successful. Or maybe sales will be mediocre until it hits Verizon and then we can compare apples to apples–sort of.

Would you consider 20,000 Nexus Ones sold in the first week to be a success or a failure? Or is it way too early to tell? Let us know!

[via gizmodo]

Check out scenes from Star Wars Burlesque in Shannon Cottrell’s photo gallery.

Saturday night, downtown club Bordello temporarily transformed itself into Mos Eisley Cantina for a night of Tatooine-styled shenanigans helmed by Devil’s Playground. Star Wars Burlesque reimagined a host of beloved characters from the film series — from the sexy to the androgynous to the grotesque — as scantily clad female performers, with locals On Blast assuming the role of cantina band. Check out the cast of characters below.

Shannon Cottrell

​

For more Star Wars action from last weekend, check out our post on Shogun Vader spotted at Anime L.A.

Character: Jabba the Hutt
Performer: Scarlet O’Gasm

Shannon Cottrell

​
Have you ever wondered what might happen if Jabba the Hutt accidentally swallowed one of his slave girls whole? At Star Wars Burlesque, a balloon-clad vixen bursts through the body of a worm the size of a small planet, engages in some light spanking and then chains herself to a wall.

Character: Princess Leia
Performer: Olivia Bellafontaine

Shannon Cottrell

​
Did you think Star Wars Burlesque could exist without slave Leia? Of course not. This is the scene that might have occurred in Jabba’s palace, were the gangster not such a vile creature.

Character: C-3PO
Performer: Lucy Fur

Shannon Cottrell

​
Nobody tells this droid that they don’t serve “their kind” in a cantina. C-3PO might just kick out Figrin D’an and the Modal Nodes, put on some Kraftwerk and pull off a robot tease like this one. We should also note that Lucy Fur portrayed both Link and Zelda at last summer’s Video Game Girls event. Her performances are always fun and clever.

Character: Boba Fett
Performer: Audrey Deluxe

Shannon Cottrell

​
Remember when fans were clamoring about how Boba Fett should be revealed to be a woman, à la Metroid? Well Audrey Deluxe of Devil’s Playground answered the requests that George Lucas obviously did not.

Character: Darth Vader
Performer: Charlotte LaBelle

Shannon Cottrell

​
Even a villain like Darth Vader needs to let loose every once in a while. When those moments hit, it’s time to turn up Meco’s disco version of Star Wars’ major themes (which, as LA Weekly’s Gustavo Turner noted last week, is the biggest selling instrumental album ever) and take off the mask.

Character: Stormtrooper
Performer: Courtney Cruz

Shannon Cottrell

​
There’s a reason why Courtney Cruz always performs last at Devil’s Playground events and it’s not simply because she founded the burlesque troupe. Her costumes, designed by Carlos Flores, are consistently over-the-top and heavily detailed, in this instance, down to the Stormtrooper pasties. She performed to Front 242′s industrial dance hit “Headhunter.” You should have been there. However, if you weren’t, Devil’s Playground will repeat the show on March 13.

Tags: Burlesque, Courtney Cruz, Devil’s Playground, Liz Ohanesian, On Blast, Shannon Cottrell, Slave Leia, Star Wars

This reminds me of Robot Chicken. The Power Converters.

Ivan Reitman Will Direct Ghostbusters 3

Posted on Wednesday, January 13th, 2010 by Russ Fischer

Since the script for Ghostbusters 3 is currently being written by Lee Eisenberg and Gene Stupnitsky, writers of the Harold Ramis film Year One, there has been some speculation that Ramis could come on board to direct Ghostbusters 3. (Though the relative failure of Year One on both a creative and commercial level didn’t add much weight to the speculation.)

Now we know that Ivan Reitman, producer and director of both original Ghostbusters films, will direct the third as well. What story elements can we expect to see in this third chapter? He isn’t saying.

Speaking to MTV, Reitman said that Eisenberg and Stupnitsky are working on a second draft of the script now. “They have delivered a draft,” he said. “We are working our way through another draft… good work is being done and all of us have our fingers crossed.”

Asked if he will direct the third film, Reitman simply said, “Yes.” We’d known he would be producing at least, but this is the first confirmation that he’ll direct.

He wouldn’t comment on recent rumors about the film. Reitman brushed off statements by Sigourney Weaver

, who said that Bill Murray’s Peter Venkman character may appear in the film as a ghost. “I’m not going to comment on what’s in the script and on what Sigourney may or may not have said.” He offers that there are “some very cool things” in the script now.

That leaves us with the long-standing party line, as typically delivered by Dan Aykroyd, which is that the film will feature a young cadre of new Ghostbusters

in addition to appearances (possibly as mentors to the young’uns) by the classic characters. One of the young ghostbusters may be Oscar, the grown son of Weaver character, and we can expect a lot of new gadgets and dimension-hopping tech. Personally, I just want some comedy that works. Everything after that will be cake.

California, long a trendsetter for eco-friendly living, is breaking ground again this week. It’s set, as early as today, to adopt the nation’s first statewide green building code, which environmentalists say is not tough enough, and is also considering paying residents to cut their energy use.

On Monday, a state panel proposed that most of the new fees California plans to impose on greenhouse-gas emissions be returned to energy-saving consumers in the form of annual dividend checks that eventually could exceed $1,000 for a family of four, the Wall Street Journal reports.

The story says this proposal is part of an effort to find the most efficient way to change consumer behavior.

California is expected today to adopt a  green building code that would reduce water use, mandate the recycling of construction waste and step up enforcement of energy efficiency in new homes, schools, hospitals and commercial buildings, the Los Angeles Times reports.

However, environmental groups, including the Sierra Club and the Natural Resources Defense Council, are mounting a last-ditch effort to derail key elements of the plan, backed by GOP Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. The report explains:

Critics say the rules fall short of rigorous standards adopted by Los Angeles, San Francisco and more than 50 California jurisdictions in league with the U.S. Green Building Council, a national non-profit group of architects, engineers and construction companies.

The council’s voluntary Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design standards have become an industry norm in recent years, with architects and construction firms competing on four levels — LEED basic, silver, gold or platinum — to market their buildings as green.

In 2004, Schwarzenegger ordered that all new state buildings meet at least a LEED silver level.

But parts of the state’s new code, which would take effect in January 2011, would amount to “a setback for California’s leadership on green building,” according to a Dec. 22 letter from six groups. They included the Sierra Club, the Natural Resources Defense Council and Global Green, along with two non-profit certification groups, the Green Building Council and Berkeley-based Build It Green.

Readers: What do you think of California’s proposal to pay residents to save energy?

Good time to add more regulations. Its not like the state is running out of money and needs to bring business in or anything. More money and more handouts wrapped up in this. When is the grifting going to end?

In the last week of February, the Sacramento beer community will join together to salute the great beers of Sacramento, California and the World.  We are planning more than 100 events throughout the Sacramento Valley and invite you to attend.  Click on each day listed to the right to get details about the daily events.

Check our calendar often, as we will be adding events as they are confirmed.

Join our mailing list!  This is the best way to stay informed about events with limited attendance.

If you are a member of the media and want to be added to our media distribution list, please give us your email address and we will contact you.

If you are a retailer who wants to host an event during Sacramento Beer Week, please contact us so we can add to you to our calendar of events, free of charge.

Share this page with your friends!  Share it with your family!

Share it with your enemies and make them your friends through the power of beer!

Cheers!!

•