OMG I never thought I would say this...

Justin Beiber is a great American success story.... and the movie Never Say Never explains it all......the Beiber Fever is real and it's coming to your town.

It turns out he's a nice kid from a small town in Canada who simply took advantage of modern day technology and created a fan base that seems to be sticking with him as he matures.

He is the Networking golden boy....the poster child for going viral. He's the older brother for girls under 12 and the younger brother of girls over 17. He's nobodies dad and he's nobodies uncle and he's nobodies husband. He's just a good looking talented kid who seems to know what he wants to do with his life.....and what he wants to do is entertain.

I think back to how people reacted when the Beatles appeared and 85% of the guys thought their music sucked and that they were faggots. (There were no gays in 1963, so just relax)
(( I hope you aren't one of those nuts who think Mark Twain's words should be changed))

I was a senior in high school when the boys from across the pond hit America, and when I say 85% of the male population didn't like their music and hated they way their hair looked...I'm not exaggerating.

Every teenage girl in America instantly fell in love with them and the rest is history.

It seems that young Mr. Beiber might have fallen into that exact same space.

His shows are entertaining and his team knows how to treat his fan base. His people go out before a concert and give away a certain amount of great seats to young women who don't have tickets for the show. He picks a girl from the audience to come on stage and receive flowers and be part of a song called ONE LESS LONELY GIRL.

Hopefully he will continue to display a NICE GUY demeanor, but we have seen the horror stories that take place with youthful success.

I think he's going to be alright but then again remember...... I'm the same guy who thought McGovern would kick Nixon's ass.

He's definitely has some talent in his corner....Usher being the main one. And Usher seems to have made a great career out of imitating Michael Jackson, so helping Justin shouldn't be that hard. The kid can play various instruments....and he can sing. Now we just have to hear what happens after the voice change.

Anyway I recommend the movie because it has a special message for anyone who is trying to achieve anything of substance....at any age.

And while I was writing this he just got the MVP in the celebrity basketball game at the NBA weekend festivities.

NEVER SAY NEVER is the message and we all should hear it........ and hear it good.


Michael Timothy McAlevey

My baby boomer take on the Grammy's

I was working on a piece of art last night and decided to watch the Grammy's for a little musical interlude.



Few notable observations.


Didn't Taylor Swift sell about a billion albums last year?
Her name was never mentioned.

Whatever Mick Jagger is taking......I want some.

Was Bob Dylan going to start laughing during the performance?

Barbara could have lip-synced and nobody would have cared....she's Barbara.

Who was that tall school teacher chick on the right during the opening number?

It would be so cool if Bruno Mars wasn't gay. He's really talented. Is he gay? Hard to tell.
Doesn't really matter....but if he's straight then he might be the new pop king.

Arcade Fire? Seriously? Do they do the music on CSI Moscow? It was really like background chaos. I realize I'm old but AC/DC could teach them a few things about rhythm.
And the strobe lights gave me a headache.....can't imagine being in the room.

Justin and Will Smith's kid will be replaced, very soon, by those babies on the E-Trade ads.

Lady Gaga has started working out. She needs to be careful that she doesn't develop Elton John's figure.

And since I mentioned AC /DC I've got to ask....... why aren't they doing the Grammy's?
Talk about setting the room on fire.

Katy Perry needs to have some kids with Russell Brand and just relax.

Muze had an interesting sound. Their LED light show was brilliant. Great use of the technology.

Marshall Mathers and Jerry Mathers (The Beav) are not related. Marshall seems like half the enrollment at a local community college. He and Bill Murray should open a clothing store.
Oh yeah I forgot there's already a Goodwill store. And if anyone knows about it....it would be me.

If Neil Young is going to come to the party then they need to make sure he plays a song.

And seriously.....what is Mick taking? He wasn't even breathing hard. All I could think about was when are The Stones tour dates going to be announced? I'm so ready.

One thing that can be said about the Grammy's. We sure don't have to worry about the awards interfering with the performances. Apparently they hand a bunch out the night before. In a few years there will be no awards handed out at the show.....just a list underneath. And I also noticed there were multiple ads selling recordings of the Grammy show. No Video....just audio. I guess CBS controls that puppy. Will they make it available on Netflix in a few months? They don't replay award shows. ....do they?

The Grammy's might be the only award show that could be marketed later.

And the best performance
of the night goes to.....

MICK JAGGER.
cus I need you...you...you.....
Michael Timothy McAlevey.

Will they bring the Pyramids down

Mubarak can't be totally blamed for his brand of leadership. The Egyptian DNA is fairly strong when it comes to authoritarian type figures.

Have you seen the Pyramids?

Maybe the new leadership should dismantle the history of Egypt and start at square one.

Let's see....the new tourist attraction in Egypt could be........hummmm......maybe......sand.

They could paint each grain of sand a different color.

All the college graduates roaming the streets could have a job.

Maybe they could do a sequel to Ishtar and put a few hundred extras to work.

Was that movie filmed in Egypt?

The rumors have started surfacing on how much money Hosni has in Swiss bank accounts.

2 t0 20 BILLION are the numbers I've heard so far.

He'll probably end up in Miami or Beverly Hills.

I can't wait to see how the Muslim Brotherhood puts people to work.

New day.....new dawn....same old sun.

If Democracy is the end result...then the people of Egypt should be congratulated.

It's definetly a wait and see situation.

Michael Timothy McAlevey

ELF PROJECT PHOTOS

Check out yesterday's post for explanation

ELF PROJECT WRAP and bit more info

Now that the Little Fockers movie has finished generating income I can officially wrap up the ELF Project.

There will be an encore if Meet the Mother Focker is released in the near future.

Actually it doesn't have to be anytime soon since the ELF Project idea started in 2004.

I might as well begin at the inception of the idea.

In 2004 I was standing at the corner of Lincoln and Montana in the 90403 zip code when a bus pulled up directly in front of me. On the side of the bus, at eye level, was a giant billboard advertisement of the sequel to Meet the Parents, which was a hit movie in 2000 starting Ben Stiller and Robert DeNiro. The sequel was called Meet the Fockers.

The Fockers part of the ad was 24 inches from my face and printed in bold red print on a stark white background. My immediate thought was.....if I had a can of white spray paint in my hand the top of the O on the Fockers would be covered and that bus would be driving down the street promoting a new movie called.....
MEET THE FUCKERS.

The thought turned into a plan and I started calculating how many buses I could do within a short period of time. I then realized that there were bus stop benches and billboards and that MEET THE FUCKERS could be spread all over town.

In 2004 I was involved in my ARTCEPS publishing company so time was at a premium and the idea simply left by the same door that all other non-materializing ideas leave.....it's either a side door or a back door or a trap door.....still not quite sure which is which and where is where and who went where or why.

And to be honest I've never been one who advocates property damage, which could be a sign of old age or maturity or fear....again not really sure of the motivational factors behind doing or not doing something that could be considered illegal. But spray painting buses just didn't rest comfortably in my personal integrity meter so Meet the Fuckers never saw the light of day.

Over the next few years I managed to bungle my publishing business and had to get a job. Going from person in charge to person on puppet string was quite hard and I stressed myself into some physical problems. Of course it didn't help that I was working for a micro-managing ego-maniac who actually used to use the expression...."I don't like to micro-manage."

Just how deep and detailed a micro-managing philosophy can go is any one's guess.

The term probably didn't even appear until the early 90's.

And boy have I gotten off point.

Back to the ELF Project, if you are still with me.

After I stopped working for Micro Man in 2006 I decided that it was time to focus on my artwork.

Since the 80's I've always spent some time creating designs with a FLOW concept in mind.
In the 80's I was pouring my designs because the flow worked better and the designs had more freedom.

Then in the early 90's I had my Puzzle period which had it's moments....both high and low.

Then February 4 1994 came and Sean went.

AND THEN.......NEO-ILLUMINATION entered my life. It didn't start out with a name but for the next five or six years I would receive a summary statement from some deep spot of my pineal gland, or someplace much deeper, and would write it down on a large piece of art paper or canvas and then create a design around the words. My initial piece took four years to finish.

The summary statements kept coming and I kept writing them down and after awhile I started developing a new sense of flow with my art and decided to create images and then add the statements later.

THAT WAS A HUGE CHANGE OF DIRECTION.

From 1993 to 2002 I was Vice-President of a art company whose main clientele was the furniture industry. I handled the sales force and designed most of the product line. In 1995 I took 10 small original NEO-ILLUMINATION pieces and one large piece to our trade show in North Carolina, along with our normal product line. I sold most of the small items and the one large piece, that I wished I had kept track of. A designer bought it for a environmental law firm in Tennessee but I didn't record the destination.

Even though I was receiving incredible universal insights I was oblivious to certain aspects of how to control and distribute my personal artwork.

The lost of a teenage son can alter the structure of an individual.....and that alteration can last until the end of time. My ending is not quite clear but I would like to know that I've left some sense of style....and my artwork appears to be the most visible sense I have.

The artwork that I've been doing in the last 4 years seems to be much better than anything I've done before.

I know one thing for sure.......it's much prettier.

Pretty is just an odd word when talking about art.....but pretty is pretty.....and it doesn't matter if it's a pretty face or a pretty picture........

Pretty is pretty.

It's a statement when it's done right.

If continual flow and structure are involved then pretty can look intriguing.

I think my artwork is intriguing. It's not suppose to make one think or wonder or question.

It's simply there to enjoy.

THE DESIGNS THAT WERE INTENDED TO HOUSE THE NEO-ILLUMINATIONS HAVE BECOME LANDLORDS OF THEIR OWN PROPERTY.

I'm not sure if there isn't a whole lot of guilt due to ignoring Neo-Illuminations in the new designs....
......but I'm fairly certain that the NEO-ILLUMINATION messages have their own life force and don't really need visual distractions.

I would like to think that my artwork is more than a visual distraction.

I would like to think that......

BUT........

THAT'S WHAT IT MIGHT BE AND THAT'S WHY IT IS JUST SIMPLY....

PRETTY.

You might be asking yourself what the hell does this have to do with the Little Fockers and my ELF Project?

I shall explain......hopefully.

I think The Universe decided that I could use a good laugh after everything I've been through in the last few years.

About nine months ago I bought some very cool white artist tape. I use it to secure images to the boards I work on. In July I went to the $6 show at the AMC ( any movie before noon) and the first preview they showed was a new film that would be opening at Christmas time.
It was called.........

The Little Fockers

At that moment, in that theater, I simply thought about my previous idea in 2004 and then the word TAPE appeared in my frontal vortex and I knew what I would be doing for a few weeks in December.

I had to wait and see what colors the ads were before finding the right tape. Once I saw that it was the same....red lettering on white background....I simply went to Home Depot and bought a few rolls of white duct tape.....and waited for the ads to appear.

The actual name of the project did not appear until my friend Jay from Chicago told me it needed to have a name. I originally called it Little Fuckers Everywhere but that just sounded too crass......then it hit me......it's Christmas time and The ELF Project just simply worked best. Everywhere Little Fuckers was born.

I realized after a few days of changing the O's to U's that I should have made a documentary. The trouble is I couldn't get anyone else interested. I tried to have a photographer I know shoot me as I created Little Fuckers on the side of buses and bus stops and billboards, but she wasn't interested. I have no pictures of me doing the taping. But I took plenty of pictures afterwards.

I learned a whole lot about a whole bunch of different people during and after this project.

Certain people that I knew would think it was funny.....didn't. And certain people who I was positive would call the police....laughed their asses off.

My 91 year dad laughed a little bit but kept telling me I would get arrested.


Arrested for TAPING?

OBVIOUSLY THE CENTER POINT
OF THE ENTIRE EXPERIENCE
IS THE WORD

FUCK

Hypocrisy ran amok during this endeavor.

Certain people who use the word hourly didn't think that it was funny.

THAT TO ME.....IS FUNNY....and odd.

THE WORD IS PART OF OUR FUCKING LANGUAGE. IT'S NOT AN OCCASIONAL WORD USED RARELY. IT'S A WORD THAT IS FUCKING USED EVERY SINGLE FUCKING MINUTE OF THE DAY.

EVERYWHERE

BY
MEN
WOMEN
AND
CHILDREN


After all........it is just a word.......four letters.....and letters that don't spell anything really bad like the words........Death, War, Genocide, Hate, Rape, Hunger, Cancer and Disease.

THE CREATORS OF THE THREE FILMS KNEW FROM THE OUTSET THAT EVERY TIME ANYBODY HEARD THE WORD FOCKER THEY WOULD THINK FUCKER AND YET.................... THAT'S FUNNY.

I GUESS OBVIOUS IS NOT FUNNY

UNLESS IT IS

THE PICTURES THAT SHOW MY ELF PROJECT ARE FUNNY TO MOST OF THE PEOPLE.
AT LEAST 80% OF THE PEOPLE WHO SEE THE PICTURES LAUGH. MAYBE LATER THEY WISHED THEY HADN'T....BUT THEY DO AND THAT'S WHAT MATTERS.

THE INITIAL VIEWING OF THE PHOTOGRAPHS OR THE ACTUAL VIEWING OF A BUS OR A BUS STOP IS THE MOMENT THAT COUNTS.

I've stood at corners and watched people start laughing as they looked at a bus stop that promotes Robert DeNiro in The Little Fuckers. I've sat on a bus stop and pointed out Ben Stiller next to The Little Fuckers and watched hot chicks laugh. I've had bus drivers say that's the funniest thing they ever seen.

The beauty of tape is that anyone who didn't like it could instantly remove the tape.

NO PROPERTY DAMAGE.

I even had Catholic guilt one night so strong that I had a dream which made me get up the next day and go remove a bunch of tape from bus stops ads. A few days later I settled down and put it back on....but those nuns from kindergarten to 9th grade were complete in their trauma classes.

I've said it before and I'll say it again. If those nuns had stuck that wooden ruler up my ass instead of whacking me across the face....I'd be rolling in the papal bucks.

Street art is now a genre. How that Street Art is performed is immaterial.

Whether you like it or not.

Damaging property with spray paint might be one of the basic elements of Street Art but I don't think that is even remotely true.

The idea is to......Create a moment.......whether it be serious or funny.

Art is not just something you hang on your wall if you are an artist. Besides the stuff that gets hung, it's a statement and it's a statement that usually applies or responds to something happening in society.

I made a statement in the month of December in response to the creator's of the FOCKER name.
They made millions of dollars by being subtle.

Was it subtle?

I made nothing for creating The ELF Project and after watching the movie I think I made more people laugh then they did.

I'm getting ready to have an art show within the next few months and I've been told that the ELF Project should not be part of it. I've taken that into consideration and have decided that the 78 pictures I have, should stand alone and not distract from my actual work.

Maybe sometime in the fucking future I will have a separate show and just invite certain fucking friends.

In the meantime.....I can't believe you read this whole fucking explanation.

You are so fucked up!

But thanks.

Tomorrow I will post pictures of the ELF Project 2011

Michael Timothy McAlevey

Family business

I've read my share of vampire crap over the last 30 years. For awhile I was into the Ann Rice take on blood sucking creatures but gradually grew uninterested due to a personal limit of how much blood one can handle that leaves the body. I've seen the Twilight movies but have not read the books.

I've been waiting for a sequel to the original story by Bram Stoker.

That sequel is here and I highly suggest that all vampire freaks run out and buy this book.

The book is called DRACULA The Un-Dead and it happens to have been co-written by a relative of Bram Stoker.....Dacre Stoker. Darce is a great grandnephew of Bram and he really does a great job of adding a new twist to the story.

I don't want to reveal the twists and turns........... so I won't.

Suffice to say I love the direction the story takes and it opens entire new possibilities.

Possibilities lead to more stories and more sequels.

I'm not sure the world needs more vampire stories but this one adds an entirely new take on why Count Dracula did what he did.

Check it out and if you loved the original story don't fall into the trap of.... changes are not suppose to take place when dealing with the original.

"You can change what ever you like in a fictional piece of work, if the changes work"

And especially one can make changes if one is a relative.

The changes in Dracula The Un-Dead work beautifully.

Michael Timothy McAlevey

2/3/11

I choose to celebrate his life on April 25.......not what happened on February 3.

Enough said.

Michael Timothy McAlevey

Sun also sets in Egypt every single day.

It seems that nobody has a clue to the solution in Egypt. I'm not comfortable with an Islamic Fundamentalists government controlling the Suez Canal....and that seems to be what the young unemployed are moving toward. Pretty soon the chanting will be.....GOD IS GREAT.

I, for one, know that God is great but I also have a feeling that Fundamental Islam is about as thrilling as the Religious Right and 17th Century Witch Burning when it comes to what the Creator of the Universe thinks is sensible and loving behavior.

Of course I have no idea what the Creator thinks but I'm banking on the whole lot of love concept.

It seems odd when political unrest turns into a religious agenda.

Africa has been on the Islamic blueprint for a long time. It used to be on the Christian blueprint but Rome just simply pulled up their magic carpet and hit the road.......kinda like what they've done in Haiti.

Haiti is 95% catholic and the situation is completely unacceptable.

Rome should be paying every Haitian to build churches. The money could come from the sale of antiquities.

SERIOUSLY.....THE CATHOLIC CHURCH COULD EMPLOY EVERY MAN WOMEN AND CHILD IN HAITI TO BUILD BEAUTIFUL CHURCHES.

AFRICAN NATIONS THAT ARE ALLOWING ISLAM TO BECOME THEIR RELIGION OF CHOICE WOULD BE DULY IMPRESSED BY ROME'S FORESIGHT AND MAYBE PUT THE ISLAMIC STEAMROLLER......ON HOLD.

IS IT JESUS OR IS IT MOHAMMED TO THE RESCUE?

WHERE'S THE LOVE?

I'M WAITING

Michael Timothy McAlevey

Spectacular

Lighting from volcano eruption in Japan. These might be two of the most amazing pictures I have ever seen.

Makes me want to do a painting.

It's probably going to be hard duplicating this look.

Where's that lightening bolt paint?

Wow!

Michael Timothy McAlevey

Where are the Pharaohs when you need em......

The crisis in Egypt appears to be growing and maybe they should conjure up the spirits of history and bring back one of those Pharaohs that has been sleeping in his luxurious secret chamber.

Are there any more secret chambers left, or have the Indiana Jones wannabe diggers uncovered everything?

The real question to ask in Egypt...... is the conflict going to result in a Sunni or a Shi'a controlled government?

The answer is SUNNI because they are 94% of the religious population already.

Whether you have been paying attention or not, the goal of the Muslim world is to control Africa and in the last 40 years things have gone quite nicely, with the Sunni faction dominating.

Algeria is 99% Sunni

Lybia is 97 % Sunni

Sudan is 70% Sunni

Syria is Sunni....as is Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.

In fact the Shi'a are basically restricted to IRAN (95%) and IRAQ (60/40) and YEMEN (50/50)

There is a lot of complaining by young aggressive Egyptians who claim they can't get work and are being repressed by a military regime.

The fact that ISLAMIC FUNDAMENTALISTS are primed and ready to overthrown President Mabarak doesn't seem to come up much in the reporting.

In 1996 the unemployment rate was 9%.

In 2003 it was 12%.

Today it is 9.4%

The United States unemployment rate is 9.6%

France is 10.1

Mexico is 5.5

South Africa is 25%

Spain is 20.2

Zimbabwe is 95%

Viet-Nam is 2.9 (Which really says something about kicking our ass)

Afghanistan is 35%

So looking at Egypt at 9.4% and looking back at 2003....it appears that things have gotten better....so perhaps the tension is being created by outside influences.

This might be a controlled opportunity for the Sunni's to help increase the anxiety....and then the type of Muslim theocracy that exists in Iran will suddenly be established.

Maybe Iran will give Egypt to Muqtada al Sadr.....oh yeah I forget he's a Shi'a.

It really is confusing to keep track of all this secular bullshit.

If Tutankhamen was in charge none of this would be happening. Pyramids would be popping up and everybody would have a job.

I promise you this....that last remark makes as much sense as the Muslim explanation of why they want to conquer and control Africa.

The difference is I'm being funny and those wackos are marching down the Dark Continent.

Wake up the Pharaohs!

Michael Timothy McAlevey

State of the Union

Unless Google can hire 10 million people I'm not sure the unemployment number will ever fall below 9 percent. And rest assured that the unemployment number is not actually 9 when it says 9. It's more like 12 or 13 because the numbers don't reflect certain statistics involved.

I keep remembering the number 800,000. That's the amount of jobs that were lost in the financial sector during the meltdown of 2008. Just the Financial Sector.

At least most of those people probably have college educations so they might figure it out.

The worker bees that used to build cars, ships and furniture have a much deeper problem and unless the United States can figure out how to build new manufacturing facilities....that problem will only get worst.

The way I look at it.....Environmental or Green technology or EVIROTECH or GREENTECH might be the only way, but we seem to be letting China and Germany get the upper hand.

Why we are not building solid state lighting plants is beyond comprehension. We have accepted the reality that China will build our LEDs and that's that.....end of story.

Solar panel facilities should be popping up everywhere in the continental United States.

RENEWABLE ENERGY research could solve our problems but it would really have to be done with the cooperation of the oil companies and that's not going to happen.

What REALLY needs to happen is that Chevron and BP need to expand their business models.

AND THE UNITED STATES NEEDS TO STOP GIVING TAX BREAKS TO THOSE COMPANIES THAT CONTINUE TO EXPLORE FOR FOSSIL FUELS.

FUTURISTIC THINKING NEEDS TO BE APPLIED TO THE BUSINESS MODEL OF THE UNITED STATES.

THE SENATE AND THE HOUSE DETERMINE THE BUSINESS MODEL.

Can they look to the future before it's too late?

I have to believe its possible.

After all.....

this
is
America.

Michael Timothy McAlevey

Nice to have Mr. Kelley back on Prime Time

David E. Kelley and Aaron Sorkin belong in a category of their own. Their writing talents and social commentary are truly unique and greatly appreciated by those of us who care about such things as socially relevant television programs.

Aaron Sorkin is probably finished with television because of his success with The Social Network and because of the way he was treated while writing Studio 60.

Mr. Kelley, on the other hand, is back on the boob tube with a new show. It's called Harry's Law and it is

PERFECT.

Monday nights at 10 pm on NBC.

For a television show to be perfect it must make you laugh, think, be surprised, have great actors and appear to be on for ten minutes while actually lasting an hour.

Their are many perfect shows on HBO and SHOWTIME.

Their are very few perfect shows on Network Television.

Now I realize the word perfect might be rather strong while talking about TV but I'm in the TV mode of perfection definition. And when referring to multiple commercial interrupted programs it is quite hard to find perfection. The idea has to be dominate and the delivery of that idea has to be perfect or it just gets recorded and watched later.

The DVR has allowed those of us who watch TV to experience more programs than normal. Zipping through the commercials allows us to view a half hour show in about 17 minutes....and an hour show in about 38 minutes. Those saved minutes are precious and can be used to do things we love, or be with someone we love who refuses to watch any form of television.

HARRY'S LAW is so good that I will watch it at it's designated time on Monday at 10 PM and suffer through the commercial breaks.

I CANNOT GIVE IT A HIGHER RECOMMENDATION

Thank you David E. Kelley for bringing responsible social commentary back to prime time TV.

If you don't know who David E. Kelley is, or what he has done in the past, or who his wife is.....than you need to get busy and check him out.

I really don't have time to explain everything.

HARRY'S LAW

10 PM

MONDAY

NBC

Michael Timothy McAlevey

Listen to more

Most people are familiar with the I've Got a Dream speech but it's important to listen to many of his other orations to get a proper perspective on just how powerful a speaker Martin Luther King Jr. really was.

It's a national holiday.....so relax and enjoy your friends and family.

Michael Timothy McAlevey

A release is a release......

The memorial service yesterday in Tucson was important.....BUT I was having a major problem with the amount of applause....especially during Barry's speech.

The students of Arizona were actually ruining the flow of his talk. He made some very important comments about the lack of proper discourse in this country, (I think he read my blog) but the moments that counted seemed to be spoiled by the raucous applause.

My friend Tom said that whenever one stages an event in an auditorium....applause will follow.

I guess the people of Arizona needed a release.

The words were spot on so in the long run, hopefully, that's all that mattered.

Sarah's "Blood Libel" comment seems to be drawing equal attention. I personally did not know the expression but obviously my Jewish friends are quite familiar with the term. I'm actually feeling stupid that I didn't know. It seems to be the catalyst for a ton of odd and evil behavior in the last two centuries.

It also seems that Ms. Palin has begun her run for the White House. "Blood Libel" might be the worst campaign kick off words ever used in the history of contemporary politics.

How much fun will a debate between Barry and Sarah be?

Maybe fun is the wrong word........but a contest between President Obama and Governor Palin would prove to be a sensational event. By the way, are you still called Governor even if you resign in the middle of a term?

Doesn't the political future of our country look exciting?

Now if we could just learn to discuss the differences without Sean, Rush, Glenn and Keith telling us how we should think......then it may prove to be a worthwhile experience.

But it could also get extremely ugly.

It's up to us.

WE, THE PEOPLE, NEED TO SET THE BOUNDARIES OF HOSTILE

DISCOURSE.

RULES OF DECORUM NEED TO APPLY

Please.....no applause needed.

Michael Timothy McAlevey

Obviously I wasn't the only one....BUT

My last entry focused on the event in Tucson and how right wing "ferocious" attitudes could have enticed the 22 year idiot to violence. I didn't realize at the time that so many people felt exactly the same way.

I thought for a few minutes that I was the only one who noticed.

Turns out I wasn't.

Now the main spokesperson for the right wing, Sarah Palin, is taking up the mantle to say that the left is completely off their rockers. She calls the viewpoints...."BLOOD LIBEL."

"Acts of monstrous criminality stand on their own,” she said. “They begin and end with the criminals who commit them."

Ms. Palin is really opening a can of worms with that statement. I would hope that a slight increase in intelligence would allow her to see that family, friends and social influences all matter when it comes to both good and bad behavior.

Mental disorders play a huge part in irrational behavior and a person who is mentally unstable can be pushed in a direction that could prove ugly.

When the pushing comes from figures of authority....and unfortunately media personalities are figures of authority in our media crazed world......then blame can be placed.

All I was saying in the previous article was that the verbal hostility by certain media personalities has gotten out of hand. But the bigger and scary concept is their.....POPULARITY.

Now it's time to ask.....just how popular are they?

I'm going to spend a few days doing the actual research on the viewing and listening numbers and then I will pass them along when finished. My gut feeling is the percentage of people really paying attention to the radical right wing is much smaller that one might think.

How many people listen to Rush Limbaugh?

How many people watch Sean Hannity?

How many people think Sarah Palin is smart?

How many people watch Glenn Beck?

I believe this is a centrist country and that fanatics on the left and fanatics on the right are simply louder than the middle.

Attempting to rally the middle to extreme points of view seems to be the quest of the right. The radicals on the left are making movies, music and art.

Again I can't help thinking that this is part of the Karl Rove agenda.

Anyway.....I'm off to the yellow brick road research center and I will find out just how large or small.....the listening and viewing numbers are.

In the meantime....both sides need to.....

Calm the f..k down.!

Michael Timothy McAlevey

Teaching hostility instead of discourse

The violent and sad event that took place in Tucson, Arizona yesterday is simply an end result of hostility being preached by people who control the pulpits (TV and Radio) of one sided political debate, and by parents who don't know how to teach the art of intelligent discourse.

What is being taught is the art of hostility, anger and extreme ugliness.

The inflammatory expressions of those who disagree with their political adversaries can result in less intelligent people behaving in less intelligent ways.

Acting in a violent manner is a less intelligent method of human behavior.

Part of this is so obvious when you listen to people that don't like the current President of the United States. There's an undercurrent of ugliness that goes well beyond policy and ideals.

The right wing of American politics has literally stepped over the edge of rational behavior. And even that statement will get some nut job off his or her couch and headed to a rally.

The problem is that it used to be the extreme right wing that acted insane. Now it's just the right wing. Regular people who listen to Rush and Sean and somehow think they now know something about the political system and how it should and should not work.

I simply think back to how we, the left wing, behaved when Bush was President. We made fun and we made jokes and we bitched and moaned on a regular basis because GW just made it too easy.

The hostility towards Barack Obama, and Democrats in general, goes much deeper and gets much uglier because as a person he doesn't offer any material like GW did.

What the right wing has decided to do is attack the entire platform of the Democratic Party and with simplistic analytical rhetoric, blame everything that is not working on the Democrats...and thus on the leader of the Party.

I have heard the two words Socialism and Communism more in the last two years then I had heard them in 25 years....total.

Why I think this is another KARL ROVE tactic is simply my paranoia. He couldn't be behind this crap....could he?

ATTACK....ATTACK....ATTACK.....and don't worry about substantial facts and information because most people don't care about facts. The SWIFT BOAT Organization is a prime example of that premise.

JUST MAKE UP TONS OF STUFF AND THEN WATCH IT WORK ON THE PSYCHE OF AMERICAN VOTERS.

The discussions of how economic and political things work is no longer a discussion. It's a one sided preaching done on national Radio and TV broadcasts....and it's done to rally people to rise up and take action. When someone like Sarah Palin uses a TARGET to overlap the picture of a democrat during an election, it is no longer subtle suggestibility.

To an unstable right wing extremist...it's a blatant call to physical action.

The kind of action that took place yesterday.

I've always thought that when someone, under the age of 25, commits a violent crime that their parents should also be arrested and held for questioning.

I'm thinking that maybe Sarah Palin, Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity and the entire Tea Party should be held for questioning regarding the horrible incident in Tucson.

I hope there is some deep discussions with the idiot's parents by Homeland Security.

This was a domestic terrorist attack and every facet of how and why this happened needs to be investigated....which means starting at the home.

Teaching discourse and how to discuss political differences is the intelligent way for parents to behave.

Teaching how to hate and how to be hostile is way to easy....and way too common.

Michael Timothy McAlevey

Starting the new year with a 79....my Bro and a 91model

The game of golf is not black and white....for amateurs it's totally gray. There are so many reasons to enjoy playing a round of golf and then when you add family, and or friends, it becomes extremely hard to classify the experience as anything but enjoyable.

Then you detail the actual game of golf and you find there are at least 15 to 20 reasons why it totally sucks. Those 15 or 20 reasons result in scores in the high 8o's and low 90's. And once in a while it goes well beyond that.... but it's fairly easy to forget those days.

So the process of playing golf, as a once a week duffer, comes down to how many good or perfect ball strikes can be recorded. And who can you share the experience with.

My Brother, my father and my father's best friend is a perfect foursome. Dad shoots right around his age and sometimes in the high 80's. My dad's buddy, Bill Blackman, is a few years younger and shoots in the 80's. My brother Jerry can shoot 78 or 95 depending on the day. He's only been playing for 3 years and hits the snot out of the ball.

I should be shooting in the low 70's. Of course I've been saying that for about 30 years.

The truth is.....I've never struck the ball better than I do now. I make perfect contact numerous times during a round. Perfect contact is when you strike the ball first, take a nice divot and let the club do the work.

I should be shooting lower scores but something goes amiss from time to time and I turn into Mr. Stupid. Mr. Stupid does something with his back swing that causes the club to strike the ground about an inch behind the ball. Now an inch might not seem like much, but in the game of golf it's like from here to Catalina. Mr. Stupid (no muscle memory) shows up about 6 to 10 times in a round.

Whenever I do make a bad shot I always have the extreme pleasure of being able to hear my dear old Dad make some type of unique remark. It's always comforting when you hit your ball into the trees and you hear a voice say....."why did you hit it in the trees?"

I actually regard my rescue shots as one of the best parts of my game. I've had so much practice that I've learned how to drive the ball under trees, between trees and over trees....and sometimes directly into a tree.

And there's a tree at our course that is more like a very large bush and every week I find a ball in that tree. Give and take......that's what it's all about.

I do have one wish for 2011. I would like to see more hot women playing golf. It just makes the course that much more attractive.

And it's also fun to watch my Dad sweet talk the ladies. He's been married three times and it

obviously is something in his DNA. He's actually pretty good at it. I guess when you are 91 and still playing golf.....flirting is just another part of the game.

The best part of everything about golf is that the weekly Tuesday game continues.

I treasure it with every ounce of my body and soul.

Michael Timothy McAlevey