Irrelevant observations

My favorite bad movie actor, Dennis Quaid, has a new movie coming out. He plays the president of the United States. Ever since someone floated the idea of Air Force One 2 to me, I always thought Randy Quaid would play a great president (especially as the son of Harrison Ford).

I heard David Duchovny's voice on a pet food commercial today. How the proud have fallen. But at least he'll be remembered for something. Some actors toil away for 25 years with nothing to show for it.

I wanted to write about Cynthia McKinney, but I couldn't figure out where to start. At any rate, it disturbs me greatly that a public servant has the gall to say that they've been harmed because a police officer doesn't recognize all 535 members of congress on sight. I watched one of her press conferences, when Harry Belafonte was rambling on about how he didn't like how a Capitol Police officer had told a group of children to move in an orderly fashion. Ms. McKinney's eyes were rolling about in her head, as if she was under the influence of some powerful narcotics. I hope we get to see more of that on television.

I don't know what Springfield, Massachusetts is like. But apparently it's a bit rowdy. Some people should not share this planet with the rest of humanity.

I'm glad that Duke is taking the scandal with the lacrosse team seriously. But I wish that had been the basketball team. Bowing out of the NCAA tournament might've been more difficult decision than canceling the lacrosse season.

Globalrichlist.com

I've had this website sitting in a window here on my computer most of the day, pondering what sort of commentary that it is upon the way people live their lives. The link to it said 'prepare to feel guilty.' Once you arrive, it asks you to enter your salary and then it shows your position in the world on a slider and tells you:

You are in the top 0.911% richest people in the world.

There are 5,945,324,435 people poorer than you.
How do you feel about that? A bit richer we hope. Please consider donating just a small amount to help some of the poorest people in the world. Many of their lives could be improved dramatically or even saved if you donate just one hour's salary (approx $33.33).

How do you feel about that?

Now, I don't want to give the wrong impression here. I'm not against charity. In fact, last year I gave more money to charity than 5,139,611,901 people earned. But I felt pretty good about being in the top 0.911% of worldwide earners. I would've felt even better if I could've gotten into the top 0.839%. And I couldn't help thinking that even though I probably could greatly improve the lives of some of those 5,139,611,901 people with one hour's salary, I know it would be nothing compared to how much those 5,139,611,901 people could improve my life if they would each donate one hour's salary to me. Or even one minute's salary.

Also on the site are some rotating factlets of truthiness. My favorite is 'Three decades ago, the people in well-to-do countries were 30 times better off than those in countries where the poorest 20 percent of the world's people live. By 1998, this gap had widened to 82 times.' People tend to look at the gap between the rich and the poor as a bad thing, and in many cases it is. But if you're using the poorest countries as a baseline, I don't think it's a bad thing. If your lowest common denominator is 'shitty,' I think it's a great thing that the well-to-do countries are 82 times better than 'shitty.' If they remained only 30 times better after 22 years, people would rightly question the future of our civilization.

I'm the 54,316,565 richest person on earth! Go away, you're not getting any.