Florida Man (Of Course!) Shoots Utility Truck Tires Because Who Knows Why

An image taken from a cell phone video shows Jorge Jove,
64, shooting utility trucks in front of his house for
reasons only he seems to know. 

Some utility trucks, parked legally on a Hialeah, Florida street, came under assault the other day because some guy who lives there didn't like them parked in the neighborhood.

As you can see in the remarkable video below, the guy, age 64, opens fire on the tires and radiator of at least one of the trucks.

Guy seemed to be having a bad day.

According to NBC Miami, one of the AT&T utility workers was trapped in the bucket above the truck while another shot cell phone footage while waiting for police to arrive.

Says NBC Miami: "The suspect, identified as Jorge Jove, reloaded his weapon several times, police said. Moments later, officers arrived at the home....and took Jove into custody."

According to an arrest report, Jove told detectives he went 'bananas' and shot at the tires and trucks to stop them from leaving. 

'He just lost his mind for a moment. We don't know what the deal is with him,' said Hialeah Police Detective Carl Zogby."

We don't know either. If Jove didn't want the trucks there, why did he shoot them to make them stay?

Anyway, logic doesn't apply here, does it?

Here's the video:

Is Outrage Over United Airlines Assault A Revolt Against Corporate Authoritarianism?

I don't remember the last time an incident blew up so big on social media as that horrible attack by United Airlines on a passenger over the weekend. 

As you probably are well aware of by now, United overbooked a flight from Chicago to Louisville, and tried to get volunteers to leave the plane.

Nobody did, so they picked people are random. One guy who had to get back to Louisville objected, so United called in the Chicago cops to beat the crap out of him and drag him off the plane.

That's not how the Orwellian overlords at United would describe the incident, but anyone who has seen the video knows it's true.

This has been building for some time now: Somewhere along the line, a huge swath of corporate America has decided the customers are the enemy, and they have free reign to cheat them, abuse them.

All with the help of Congress, who have been paid off by corporations to pass laws that favor these rich donors and screw the rest of us.  You can steal a lot more money from the boardroom than robbing a person on the street with a gun.

That's why United and all the other airlines can overbook flights and kick people off. It's more profitable, and screw it if you can't make it to Aunt Matilda's funeral in Des Moines.

The United assault on a passenger was the most egregious example of corporate authoritarianism yet, and the explosion on social media, was a giant collective, "I'm sick and tired of this and I'm not going to take it anymore!"

Sure, the extreme public ire was aimed at United. But the force of it was inspired by all of our experiences: Gettting screwed by the 150 pages of legalese in every consumer transaction that only a trademark lawyer can understand. Being forced to wait on hold for three hours or more until somebody at the insurance company deigns to answer the phone, then promptly hangs up on you.

That kind of thing.

And it's all dressed up in Orwellian corporate speak that's enough to make you vomit

The United Airlines assault on this passenger was a master class by United on this PR wording.

First, being beat up and dragged unconscious from a plane is not an assault. It was "re-accommodating," as if United regretfully had to transfer you from one five star hotel to another.

United's hired goons - in the form of the odius Chicago Police - said the man's injuries were because he "fell."  Because being socked in the face enough to knock you over is just your clumsiness, you understand.

Later Monday, United CEO Oscar Munoz blamed the victim, saying he had been "belligerent" for not getting off the plane. In other words, the victim apparently had no right to be upset about being denied something he probably paid hundreds of dollars for - a cramped seat on a flight to Louisville.

You're supposed to be overjoyed to be toyed with by a corporation like United!

As Jimmy Kimmel said last night, imagine going to Applebee's and being forcibly dragged out of the restaurant 20 minutes into your meal because the place was "overbooked." It's the same thing as what happened on United!

Kimmel ran a parody ad from United that was funny because it was so incredibly close to the truth. Not just of what goes on at United but many other grifting large corporations. Here's a quote from Kimmel's United "ad"

"We're United Airlines. You do what we say when we say, and there won't be a problem....If we say you fly, you fly, if not, tough shit. Give us a problem, and we'll drag your ass off the plane. And if you do this we'll beat yo so badly you'll be using your own face as a flotation device. United Airlines: Fuck you."

By the way, check out all the proposed new slogans for United in this link.

I hope the public outrage over United lives on, intensifies and spreads to other corporations who treat the public, the environment and everything else like shit for fun and profit.

People are boiling angry over a lot of things anyway, including how the government is run and how it no longer represents us, but represents corporations.

I'm sounding like Bernie Sanders, but this is exactly why he struck such a chord. He's right. The corporations are running the show, and often doing so in a criminal, morality-free way. The extreme anger at United is a symptom of that.

Let's keep fighting. But not physically, like United does.

In case you need a reminder of how brutal the assault was, here you go:

A Comedy About A Rigged Economy Angered Me, And That's A Good Thing

The play "American Hero" now running at Vermont
Stage Company, is a comedy that might leave you
feeling frustrated by the state of America these days.
That, actually, is a very good thing. 

Last night, I went to a preview of Vermont Stage Company's latest production, a comedy called "American Hero."

The play was excellent and I recommend it, for sure, but still, I left after the show feeling kind of pissed off.

That's NOT a diss at all against Vermont Stage.

The cast and crew at this small Vermont theater company did their usual excellent job with this production, and "American Hero" certainly accomplishes its goal of making me and the rest of the audience have quite a few good laughs.

"American Hero," set in troubled shopping mall sandwich shop, is totally worth seeing during its official October 12 to 30 run in Burlington, Vermont.

Without giving too much away, "American Hero" touches on how the economic system is rigged. The haves are thoroughly corrupt in taking, taking taking, while the have nots who are highlighted in the play struggle with the consequences of what the 1% are doing to them.

The goal of Bess Wohl, who wrote "American Hero" was indeed to anger its audience, despite the laughs. It's another example of pop culture underscoring the absurdity and rotteness of the current Guilded Age.

When entertainment taps into an issue that needs all the attention it can get, that's always a hopeful sign. We see pop culture highlighting the rigged economy and income inequality in other venues, such as in the television comedies "Superstore" and "2 Broke Girls."

Musicians like Bruce Springsteen have also been covering this topic for decades now. Keep at it, Bruce!

The attention the New Guilded Age is beginning to receive away from the economic papers and the dull newscasts means regular Americans are Fed. Up. with things.

Television comedies like "Superstore" can help
propel the national discussion of income inequality.

As if we didn't know that already.  Polls over the past year indicate 7 in 10 Americans think the economy is rigged against them. 

People are so insanely mad about the situation that a substantial portion of Americans are prepared to vote for Donald Trump, a misogynist, racist, thin-skinned, ignorant, spoiled rich kid con man because he says the system is rigged against all of the regular people out there.

Never mind that Trump is one of the people who is rigging the economic system against the 99 percent. Like I said, he's good at being a con man.

I suppose Trump is a form of entertainment, so the fact that he mentions the New Guilded Age, even though he helped create it, is probably a good thing, as long as he doesn't win the Presidential election.

Other politicians like Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, are having their day in the sun because they hammer away at income inequality and a corrupt economy every chance they get.

I hear the talking points from the 1 percent entering right now. They're saying that how dare you suggest taking away hard earned money from people who got rich through ambition, hard work, and creativity.

Of course, that's a fallacy. Even on my, Sanders' and Warren's worst days, we all agree it is a very good thing in America to get rich through honest work, smarts and moxy.

Just as long as you don't screw over everybody else while doing it. And screwing over people seems to be the current ethos in corporate boardrooms, political back rooms and in political lobbying offices across this nation.

So when popular culture, even in small venues like Vermont Stage Company use satire and gallows humor to poke at the 1 percent, that's always a good thing.

It fires people up. It makes us feel like we could and should keep working for change, even if the odds seem stacked against us.

Yes, I left "American Hero" last night annoyed at the world around me. Americans are already pissed off. Channeled correctly, with a solid dash of humor, we might actually end the New Guilded Age.

Wells Fargo Scam Is Ugly Look Inside Big Banks

Wells Fargo bank got fined big time for widespread
corruption and hijinks, including opening
bank accounts with fees for customers who did
not ask for the accounts or want them.  

Maybe we should be putting our money under mattresses after all and avoiding banks, given the news about Wells Fargo this week.

Wells Fargo Bank is paying  $185 million in fines to various agencies for opening up millions of phony accounts for unwitting customers.

This wasn't just a few bad apples at Wells Fargo doing this. About 5,300 employees have been sacked for doing this, which means it was part of the bank's culture for doing this.

It looks like the trouble started when Wells Fargo brass instituted, shall we say, aggressive sales targets for its employees.

So aggressive that most of them figured they'd never make it to their goals. So they created fake email addresses to sign up customers for online banking services. Apparently, there were about 1.5 million - yes million - such accounts opened.

The emails were fake, but the customers were real. And these customers did not know they were being signed up. Or would be subjected to fees and such that would help make Wells Fargo big, fat, rich and happy. (Wells Fargo will have to repay these customers fees they paid for their unwitting accounts.)

About $100 million of the settlement went to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Elizabeth Warren's favorite consumer protection agency which was created half a decade ago.

"Wells Fargo built an incentive-compensation program that made it possible for its employees to pursue underhanded sales practices, and it appears the bank did not monitor the program carefully," said CFPB Director Richard Cordway, as NBC news quoted.

I'm glad Wells Fargo is being called on their misdeeds, but as is usually the case when big banks or big businesses are up to no good, the top brass that condoned it are totally getting away with it.

It looks like the 5,300 or so people who were fired were pretty low level people. Maybe they deserved to be fired. But with that many people involved, Wells Fargo must have had a culture in which they did bad things to make profits.

Company culture usually comes down from the top. So why aren't the executives who had to know about this and did nothing still collecting nice big salaries at Wells Fargo?

It's not just envy of the fat cats that are getting away with this. We are all victims of this weird money making system.

As Douglas Rushkoff noted on CNN:

".......We are watching what we might call 'extreme capitalism' at work. Banks don't make money by creating value; they make money by extracting funds from anyone who wants to build a business or even just make transactions."

Rushkoff went on to explain that when the economy was growing vigorously, shareholders in banks were happy because the banks were making money through business loans and general commerce.

In the past decade, things have been slower, so to keep shareholders happy with every rising profits, banks like Wells Fargo try to make more money by issuing more credit cards with high fees and new loans with high origination costs.

So we're screwed. Because banks aren't really creating anything or helping anybody. They're just finding creative ways to transfer more wealth away from most of us, and concentrate it in their pockets.

I don't know if I agree with Rushkoff in the following or not, but his idea is intriguing:

"The only real solution here is for banks, like any business, not be required to grow. Banks, particularly savings banks, are more like utilities than businesses. With their monopoly power on the ability to issue currency, they are in a unique role to enable business of every other kind. This makes them at least as responsible to the public good as their shareholders.

By seeking to extract a higher percentage of our economic activity to pay for their financial services, they don't help anyone. Rather than promoting business, they serve as a drag."

Many conservatives and business types hate the CFPB, the consumer protection agency that is collecting fines from Wells Fargo and want to abolish it.

It's the agency I noted Elizabeth Warren loves.

The fines show that CFPB can help rein in the excesses of the banking industry.  Paying $185 million isn't a big deal for a behemoth like Wells Fargo. But the publicity sullies its reputation. The CFPB basically shamed Wells Fargo into behaving.

Sometimes a little public shaming is the best way to make people - and businesses behave.

If that doesn't work, maybe we should all withdraw our money and stow it under mattresses, I don't know.

Easter Horrors Continue: "Pagan" Easter Bunny Verbally Abused In Church Parking Lot

Our hero, Christine Weick, angrily confronts the
pagan Easter Bunny at a Tennessee church.  

Easter was a couple weeks ago now, but we're still getting reports of the trauma the holiday caused this year.

First, we had the Great Easter Egg Hunt Riots of '16 in Connecticut and Vermont.

Then we had the crime-fighting Easter egg hunters who saved the day in Britain.

Now we have reports of a woman named Christine Weick doing battle with a giant Easter bunny in a Tennessee church parking lot.

Actually, it was a person dressed as the Easter Bunny, but whatever.

The video of the Christine/Easter Bunny battle is at the bottom of this post, by the way. Totally worth the watch.

Apparently, a "pagan" Easter bunny has no business being in a church parking lot, let me tell ya, and Christine let him have it!

"You call yourself a Christian in a pagan custume!" Christine yells at the hapless Easter bunny.

You get 'em girl.

The poor guy standing next to the Easter bunny can only say, "Y'all have a nice day."

Not with Christine around, we won't.

Christine really works hard to preserve the sanctity of Easter. She also yelled and screamed at the ungodly people enjoying an Easter egg hunt in Tennesee this year, too.

(H/T to BoingBoing for this Tennessee Easter News.)

By the way, if the name Christine Weick is vaguely familiar, it's because she's the nutjob who confronted Katy Perry's father in Phoenix last year because he's not controlling and shutting up his superstar singer daughter, who is leading millions of people, including Christine's son, into wicked ways and hell.

Or something like that.

The Christine Vs. Katy Perry's dad confrontation is something to watch, too.

Kudos to Katy's dad, who is a Christian pastor, for keeping his cool. If the glory of God is anywhere, it was with Katy's dad, not Christine.

But what do I know?

I have no idea what other Easter horrors I've yet to inform you about, but I'll keep searching and let you know!

Here's the Christine Vs. Easter Bunny video:

Maybe We Don't Stop Mass Shootings Because They're Good For Fundraising

Today's scene at the San Bernardino mass shooting

As I write this late Wednesday afternoon, another mass shooting is unfolding, this time in San Bernardino, California.  Last I checked at least 14 people are dead, 14 are injured, and they're still looking for the shooters.

The mass shootings are coming on faster and faster and faster. It's almost like the nation is in a civil war, with lots of tiny mini factions fighting it out through terrorist attacks.

I get it. Preventing mass shootings is tricky business. They tend to involve a convoluted mess of hate, extreme politics, a gun culture, and laziness on the part of leaders.

Or is it laziness? I really hope I'm being way too cynical here. Is our nation's inability to stop mass shootings deep down a function of them being good for business?

Obviously most of us loathe mass shootings. Few people want to see innocent people die.

But I notice after every mass shooting, people from advocacy groups, and politicians try to outdo each other saying outrages things about the latest shooting.

On the surface, these loudmouths don't like the death of innocents, either. But is a little part of them, deep down, actually happy these kinds of things are happening with increasing frequency?

After all, the loudmouths say their outragous things, which riles up their base, who donate money to the cause the loudmouth is supporting, and they make oodles of money.

Here's the type of comment I'm talking about:  As the incident was unfolding, pundit Ben Shapiro snarkily Tweeted: "The answer to the San Bernardino shooting is clearly whatever the left wanted to push before the San Bernardino shooting."

Thank you, Ben. Of course I have no idea what goes on in Shapiro's head, or exactly what motivated him to say this.  Maybe he really just loathes liberals and it's as simple as that, who knows? I certainly can't accuse Shapiro of the money making cynicism I described. Because I just don't know.

But are some people using these shootings as a fundraising scheme? Yes, innocent people are dead, but hey, there's money to be made, right?

Another horrible aspect of this, as if there weren't enough, is to make all of us live in some level of fear. Will you, or I be the next person to be caught up in a thing like this?  Fearful people tend not to make rational decisions like calm people would.

So they might vote for a loudmouth reactionary as a response to their fear. Instead of really taking the time to consider who best would bring our country, our society forward in peace.

Another win for the offensive loudmouths.

I so hope I'm wrong.  I so hope I'm far too cynical and bitter.

Lion Killer Is No He-Man, And Everybody Knows That Now: 8/1/15 Update To This Story

Virile he-man (yeah, right!) Walter Palmer
with a leopard he killed a while back.
He's now being pilloried for killing Cecil the lion. 

UPDATE: Reports that Cecile the Lion's brother being shot turn out to be (probably, hopefully) untrue. 

Unconfirmed reports are spreading this Saturday afternoon that poachers have also killed a lion named Jericho, who was Cecil's brother.

Fortunately, at least I hope, a newer update from Reuters indicates Jericho is still alive and OK,

Reuters is reporting that the reports of Jericho's demise were false and premature. Let's hope that the Reuters reporters are spot on accurate. 

Jericho was or is looking after the cubs left by Cecil, so if he had died, the cubs would be in great peril.

Other groups of lions might kill them, or poachers might get them if Jericho had died.

Early reports of Jericho getting killed by poachers set off another firestorm on social media

I'm guessing potential killers of Jericho came partly and unwittingly as a result of all the publicity surrounding Cecil's death. The poachers, who'll apparently do anything for money, figured they could
find Jericho easily enough and there you go.

Again, I hope Reuters is right in that the wildlife group monitoring Jericho says his GPS indicates he's moving around normally and hanging out with a female. Good for him!

I've heard some complaints from my previous posts that shooting lions and tigers and such in Zimbabwe and other such places is good for their economies and to lift locals out of poverty.

I haven't found convincing evidence that the monetary gains are actually real, but here's the much larger point:

Must EVERYTHING in this world be some sort of financial transactions? Can't we just leave some things alone and find other ways to make money other than violence, corruption, and destruction?

This whole thing with the lions is getting sicker and sicker, and making me more and more heartsick

PREVIOUS DISCUSSION:

My guess is Walter Palmer, the creepy Minnesota dentist who went to Zimbabwe to kill Cecil the Lion, has got a microscopic dick, can't get it up and is absolutely horrible in bed.

I don't now this for a fact, of course but I can't come up with any other explanation as to why this loser would kill a lion.

Maybe he's overcompensating?

That's not an original thought, of course. Everybody has been saying this about Palmer all week, and he's basically now Public Enemy #1.

Palmer has been getting more press than Donald Trump, and, as Jimmy Kimmel put it, he has become the most hated man in America who has never advertised Jello pudding on television. 

So much for the idea of parents saying their daughter should marry a nice dentist. Obviously, not all of them are so nice.

Oh, I know. He says he didn't realize the lion was Cecil, thE guides he hired lured Cecile out o a national park without his knowledge, yada yada yada.

He's sort of apologized, basically for not knowing it was Cecil he killed, but why would he kill ANY lion?

It's not for food. Target practice? Couldn't he just shoot cans off a log in the woods?

I guess the reason Palmer shot the lion is he because he just likes killing things. He's a serial killer, but he knows that serial killers of people have a high chance of being caught and going to jail. Plus he probably doesn't want to kill people. Some are probably his friends.

So, he did what he thought was socially acceptable. Killing animals for fun. Now he's finding out it's not all that socially respectable.

Palmer's  "apology" to his patients over the disruption is rich.

"I want you to to know the situation and my involvement. In addition to spending time with my family one of my passions outside of dentistry is hunting. I've been a life long hunter since I was a child growing up in North Dakota."

That's what you call this? Hunting?  Luring a lion out of a protected national park in Zimbabwe with the help of corrupt guides, and then subjecting the lion to a painful death. Shot with a bow and arrow, then left to suffer until being shot later.

Palmer goes on: "I deeply regret that my pursuit of an activity I love and practice responsibly and legally resulted in the taking of this lion."

Notice he says "this lion." In other words, there's the proof right there that he thinks there's nothing wrong with killing something like a lion to, I don't know, prove he's a big virile man who is so tough he can kill a lion for no reason other than to inflate his ego.

And not so fast, buddy with that "responsibly and legally" line.  He might have violated the Lacey Act, which makes it a federal crime to trade in wildlife killed in violation of foreign law, the Huffington Post notes.

From the Huffington Post: 

"'The U.S Fish and Wildlife is investigating the circumstances surrounding the killing of 'Cecil the lion.' That investigation will take us wherever the facts lead,' said Edward Grace, the agency's deputy chief of enforcement, in a statement.

'At this point in time, however, multiple efforts to contact Dr. Walter Palmer have been unsuccessful. We ask that Dr. Palmer or his representative contact us immediately," Grace added."

Too wimpy to face the (potential) music from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife, Dr. Palmer? Gee, you were so "brave" hunting lions, what happened?

True there have been a large number of death threats against Palmer, which is stupid. Anytime someone does something stupid or mean they get death threats from the multitudes of trolls lurking out there. I'm not sure how that helps, but trolls tend to be as unhelpful as Palmer himself.

People are so mad at him that it's forced the shutdown of his dental practice, hence the apology to his patients.

Palmer is obviously horrible to lions and other wildlife. But he's also possibly pretty lousy with people, too.

Raw Story reports that Palmer settled a sexual harassment claim against him in 2009 for $127,500.

A receptionist who worked for Palmer over five and a half years ending in 2005 said she was subject to Palmer's comments about her breasts, buttocks and genitalia.

The report said the receptionist asked that the behavior stop, but it didn't She alleges she was fired for reporting the harassment, Raw Story says. 

At least Palmer didn't then go on a safari to shoot and kill the woman's cat if she had one.

If there's any good that has come out of Palmer's atrocious behavior in Zimbabwe and probably elsewhere, at least there's more awareness that this kind of "hunting" goes on and must stop.

The Internet is beginning to move on to other topics, now. Though I'm sure there will be more news when and if Palmer surfaces.

I just hope he doesn't make any money selling the rights to his story.  He doesn't deserve any kind of reward.

A lot of people have also noted there's plenty of outrage over Cecil's death, but not about other likely more pressing matters. (Black Lives Matter, anyone?)

However, I think it's possible and a good thing to get riled up over Palmer's atrociousness, while also caring about other issues, ones involving human lives, too.

Maybe there will be a payoff of sorts to the kind of wildlife Palmer thinks are his playthings to kill. There certainly is more interest in the issue, at least for now.

Jimmy Kimmel's monologue the other night about the killing of Cecil the Lion, which is a must-watch, by the way, resulted in more than $150,000 in donations in fewer than 24 hours to Oxford's Wildlife Conservation Research Unit, or WildCRU.

WildCRU had been monitoring Cecile via GPS before his death, and Kimmel flashed the organization's Web site on screen during his monologue.

Jane Goodall, that reverential hero of African wildlife, is of course crushed by what happened to Cecil, but sees hope nonetheless:

"Only one good thing comes out of this - thousands of people have read the story and have also been shocked. Their eyes opened to the dark side of human nature. Surely they will now be more prepared to fight for the protection of wild animals and the wild places where they live. Therin lies the hope."

Watermelon Fight!!

The screen sot is blurry, but it tries to show
two watermelon vendors getting wayyy too angry

Sometimes, rivalrys between two similar businesses can get tense.

Sometimes, too tense.

In China, a watermelon vendor was angered by another vendor who pulled up to his neighborhood daily on a three wheel motorcycle to also sell watermelons.

Resentment between the two watermelon salesmen grew and grew (probably in large part because the guy with the motorcycle was unlicensed.

The whole thing blew up into this ugly scene of flying watermelons and fists. I don't know whether to be horrified or amused:

Congress Creatures: Worship Us Or We Take Down Your Lovely Economy!

We can go on and on about how to get out of the government shutdown and get Congress do to their job, but things are getting ridiculous, as some Congress Creatures tip their hands.

To this Texas Congressman, it's the park
ranger's fault that Congress can't get their act
together. Whatever.  

Nobody's dignifying themselves in Washington with this, but two incidents stand out.

One is a video of Republican Representative Randy Neugebauer yelling at a park ranger for keeping people out of a World War II memorial in Washington DC due to the shutdown. 

He said the ranger ought to be ashamed for not letting people in.  Like it was her fault Congress Creatures cut off funding for the government because they wanted to score political points.

Um, this park ranger doesn't control the purse strings.

You and the other Congress Creatures do, Mr. Neugebauer. I'm shocked I have to remind you of this. I'm sure if you and the others put your egos aside, the nice park ranger will let everyone who wants to see the Memorial in.

So don't yell at her to score political points, you buffoon.

Meanwhile, Rep. Marlin Stutzman, R-Indiana, schools on what's important here, and how to best end the shutdown. It isn't about government spending, about Obamacare, or any other important public issue.

The important thing Stutzman tells us, is that our Congress Creatures need their egos stroked constantly.  Really, this is what he said: "We're not going to be disrespected. We have to get something out of this. And I don't know what that even is."

Yes, in the weird, hell that is Washington, the Democrats have to stroke the Republican egos, the Republicans have to stroke the Democrat egos. It's all about them. Not about the lives Congress is wrecking.  Or the work their shirking because they have to mug for the cameras. Jerks.

OK, Your Highness Stutzman. We have to bow at your feet for you to do your job. We have to respect you to make you work like you were elected to do?  And you and your fellow Congress Creatures deserve respect because.........??

Maybe He Should Have Tried Death Metal: World's Angriest Guitar Player

A recently found a video that's been circulating around the web for a year now, but it's worth bringing up.

It's billed as "The Angriest Guitar Player Ever" and I cannot dispute that. No, not at all.

A screen capture from Angriest Guitar Player video.  

It's a guy named the Treeman, from Liverpool, England, trying to learn the chords of a new song and not succeeding.

It would have made sense for him to step back and wait until he calmed down before resuming, but again, that would have made sense. And made for a boring video. So we get to see a hell of a temper tantrum.

On the one hand, it is fun to watch a person go into full on melt down. But it is a little mean, I admit, spreading the guy's bad moment for all the world to see. So it is with mixed emotions that I present him. Though he did seem to allow the video to get on YouTube.

The video is a hilarious instruction of how ridiculous we look when we are angry and frustrated. Warning, language is NSFW and not good for super sensitive ears:

What's With the Mean, Awful Debate Audiences?

For the third time this year, the audience upstaged the candidates during a Republican presidential debate on Thursday.

Too bad it the upstaging was in such a lurid, disgusting way. Where do they get these audiences anyway?

To recap, in past debates over the past few weeks, some audiences cheered when capital punishment was brought up. Kill 'em all! It's fun!

Then in the next debate, some yahoos in the audience cheered at the prospect of a hypethetical man without insurance needing expensive health care. The cheering was for the option of letting the patient die, as punishment for not having health insurance.

At least these audiences are consistent in being pro-death. Except of course for unborn children. After they're  born, they're on their own, I guess.

Thursday night was a debate in which people made YouTube videos of themselves asking question of the Republican presidential candidates.  Steve Hill, a gay soldier serving in Iraq, asked a question about the repeal of Don't Ask Don't Tell. The repeal, which took effect this week allows openly gay soldiers to serve.

Some members  of the audience booed Hill, apparently because he is for gay. I guess the fact this guy is risking life to protect these audience idiots' lives is besides the point.

So, if one of these yahoos has a heart attack and the paramedics come to save him, he'll check whether the paramedic is gay first? And if so, would he rather die than be saved?

Don't get me wrong. I have no problem with full throated debates on capital punishment, health care policy and gay issues. I'd bet most of my conservative and liberal friends would agree this stuff needs to be hashed out.

Also, to be fair, reports are many audience members during the booing Thursday night tried to shush the loud boo hoos in the audience or gave them cold, hard stares.

But really, it's depressing to hear people cheer the deaths of other people, or disrespect a member of the military like that.

It's got to be hard, being a idiot audience members like those that boo soldiers and cheer death.  When these guys hit hard times,  as karma almost always dictates,  will anybody respect them enough to give them a hand?

Maybe they can talk to that soldier they booed. Maybe learn a lesson in humanity.