Take on Lamar's new kidney

I am not one who is rooting for Lamar Odom to kick the bucket, I don't care to cheer his demise but I am also not one who feels he should be afforded any special treatment because he was once an fantastic basketball player. He had Magic Johnson type skills but never had his mental makeup, his internal fortitude or his killer instinct but few people do. Lamar Odom was suppose to change the game with his unique skill set which was a bar which was just too high to live up to but make no doubt about it, he was a terrific player. He won a couple of championships, sixth man awards and had a bunch of other accolades but sadly his biography will probably read more about what he didn't do and what he did do outside of Vegas last week.
I don't have any ill will but also do not believe that he deserves any special treatment because he was an all-star. You hear about endless lines for kidney transplants, lines of people who have done everything right and that is one thing Lamar has not. He does not deserve to jump the line after his self induced viagra and cocaine induced coma and if he does then you will know how ass backwards our society is with hero worship.

I'm rooting for him to pull through but not at the expense of a child who never had a choice and there are plenty of those on the list.

Take on Oscar Pistorius sentence

The outlandish amount of jail time we give to -mostly black and Hispanic- kids in this country for minor drug possession is ridiculous but is matched by the opposite in places like South Africa apparently. I just saw that Oscar Pistorius is being released from jail to serve out the rest of his sentence under house arrest. I get that house arrest isn't total freedom but when you are a wealthy famous athlete, it is certainly not the worst thing in the world. I guess killing your girlfriend for a white man in South Africa is akin to a few grams of weed as a black man is in ours

Take on the all-day breakfast menu

When McDonalds announced the all-day breakfast menu a few weeks ago, it was the kind of innovative business decision that could be the answer to their woes. The problem is that people are moving away from McDonalds in droves and this will never be a long term answer to regaining their dominance. It's a novelty and a lame one at that

@elbump I feel the All-Day Breakfast menu at McDonalds is very "everybody gets a trophy for participating" you used to have to work for your Egg McMuffin

There is truth to that, although I've only been in the opposite place where at 10:30am I want a BigMac but they only have the steak and egg sandwich.

Maybe THAT is the answer. The all-day dollar menu

Take on the dirty water dog guy

Sometimes the TOR entrees just write themselves. There was a story in the DailyNews last week that said that a study found that foot cart operators do not change gloves enough which was as surprising as hearing that those dirty water dogs probably aren't all beef.
The study showed that most cart operator routines went something like this. Put on gloves, serve hot-dog, put on ketchup, give change, scratch nuts, sell pretzel, give change pick nose, spit in kraut, shove their own sausage into one of the buns to scare innocent looking Korean girl walking down the street, serve real hot-dog in same bun to unsuspecting tourist from Ohio, give incorrect change, pick toenail with hot-dog prong, take off glove and use hot-dog water to wash hands.

Take on the Twitter suggestions

Recently I noticed that sometimes I will see a tweet on my iOS Twitter app and it will give me the ability to read more about the subject matter.   It must be some kind of a.i. or whatever that works the logarithm and generally it is decent.   See a tweet that says RIP Lamar Odom and it might have a link under the post that says "read more about the 2008 Laker Team" or "more on the fun that is hookers and blow"

But it isn't that smart because a Deadspin article about a guy prancing Cameron Meredith during the draft as Bill Belichick offers a "best of Grey's Anatomy" option.  I have no idea what the Bears or Belichick have to do with that show as I have never seen a single second of it but and can only think that it featured a romance between Cameron and Meredith that rivaled the love of Jack and Janet

Sent from my iPhone

Take on daily fantasy sports

You know that when Nevada orders you closed, it can only mean one of two things..you are incredibly shady and even the sin capital of the world wants nothing to do with you....or you are encroaching on their turf

When Nevada shut down Fan Duel and Draft Kings today, everybody assumes that the writing is one the wall.  I mean it IS gambling which this country doesn't tolerate unless it is in some desert, some scummy shore town or on sovereign Indian ground (or the state lottery but that is a different story) so you'd think that a game like this should have be banned but it hasn't and will not based on any legislation. 

It won't because it will grease the palms of every politician from here to Reno to keep it alive and it has plenty of grease to lubricate those palms. The only thing that can stop it is the wiseguys, bookies and casino bosses who will do anything to keep their piece of the pie and that will be the reason this enterprise eventually sinks...and I couldn't be happier because it might mean we can go back to BudLite and erection commercials which I miss 

Sent from my iPhone

Take on the democratic debate

I may have been one of the only people in America to watch the democrats debate each other last night but as I know the TOR readers depend on me to give them hard analysis and hot takes, I felt it was my duty to sit through the snooze fest.   Well, I made it almost through an hour before I went to sleep because it was dreadful, there was no fire, no excitement and no pizzazz, which is what happens when you get use to a television star on stage and now you are left with a bunch of stuffy politicians.  
We'll start at the bottom
Lincoln Chaffee.  Never before has a man looked more uncomfortable on stage, the poor guy looked like he had to pee the entire time so you can't blame him for his "my dad had just died and I had no idea what I was doing"'comment on his vote on Glass-Steagall. What made it bad was that he looked like he was wearing a suit which was last worn by his dead dad when he made the comment and then immediately soiled it.  We predict that this will be the last we see of old Lincoln, not just on the debate stage but ever..if you pee in your dad's suit in front of a national audience, albeit it one that was mostly asleep, you are dead..unless your name is Billy Madison

Jim Webb

When your most memorable line is  "I've been waiting for ten minutes to have a chance to speak" then you know you had a rough night, especially if you said that exact same line four times.  We like old Jim but nobody else does and it is not clear to me, or anybody else apparently, why he is running.   He should go home and be with his hunting dogs and maybe find a doctor who can construct him a neck

Mark O'Malley.  

It is never a good sign when people can't remember if your name is Mike or Mark.  I don't know why this is but nobody called Mike Tyson, Mark Tyson but somehow everybody thinks Mark O'Malley might actually be Mike O'Malley and sadly for Mike/Mark, it doesn't matter.    I read earlier tonight that he looked like  he is a model for a cialis commercial which is a great call, Mike looks like the guy you need when you need to throw a football through a tire swing but on the debate stage he is a stiff as a board, maybe because he is with a little help from his purple friend.  He does appear to be running for Hillary's VP which is nice and all especially if he can help Bill out with some Spanish tail on the campaign trail but he should stay home for the next debate 

Bernie Sanders.   

Who would have guessed that yelling and screaming for an hour wouldn't go over well, the poor guy's got more charisma than anybody else on stage but when out up in front of the US public he looks like he should be running for a spot in the Muppets balcony, not president.    We like Bernie, sort of, but he looked lost.   When Anderson Cooper asked him to respond to a comment that Jim Webb didn't make he looked like he just woke up from a nap. He was so discombobulated that all he could mutter was "raise taxes on the rich" which was an odd answer to going in against Assad but whatever.   Between the yelling, the unwillingness to comb his hair and the mid debate nap, he was outclassed.  His best moment might have been the "everybody is sick of your damn emails" thing but we liked this 

https://twitter.com/gawker/status/654110900992000000 when he looked like he was picking up a penny that Jim Webb had dropped, just be glad that O'Malley wasn't standing next to him when he bent over 

Hillary

Your 2016 democratic nominee is Hillary Clinton daughter of a corrupt businessman, wife of a horny politician and mother of the topic of a Malcom XIII original.   She dominated a debate that showed the other four had no place being at.   She so outclassed and over-matched her "rivals" that is is scary especially because she has more skeletons than a Fangoria magazine. She was wrong on Iraq, criminal on Benghazi and dangerous on her emails but still she dominated and looked like a man amongst boys, a man in a terrible pant suit.   The establishment will rally around her, O'Malley will try to bone her with his 4 hour erection and she'll win this thing in a landslide and I still won't vote for her 

Take on the Jeb Bush Plant

Yesterday during some campaign event, Donald Trump got asked a bunch of tough questions by a young woman in the crowd, a young woman who also works for the Jeb Bush campaign. I saw Trump went nuts even claiming that CNN was part of the plan and of course the Jeb campaign immediately issued a statement saying she, Lauren Batchelder, was not a paid member of the staff and they had nothing to do with her being there even if all her social media timelines and biographies seemed to indicate she was. Social media info that she promptly deleted

I really can't comment on this other than to say that Jeb is obviously very afraid of Trump and for a guy who basically had the nomination handed to him on a silver platter, he has figured out a way to fumble this thing away like he is Ahman Green without the arm sleeves

But what is more disturbing and what will sink him completely is the photo that some Google-nerds came up with, it is of the Jeb with his arm around the girl. It is not that he's been photographed with her, he's probably been photographed with tens of thousands of people, it is that he looks like a child molester in the photo and she looks like his frightened captive

Take on Playboy

Wait a second, I think the apocalypse is upon us. Forget the fact that Cubs may win a World Series, Trump is leading in all the polls or that the worst team in our fantasy football league just put up 140, I just read that Playboy will be cutting out he nude spreads. Now I have not read Playboy since my subscription expire in college but I have to say that taking out the nudie pictures of Playboy is like kosher pizza. Yeah they have had a few fantastic interviews including the ones with Jimmy Carter, Steve Jobs, Martin Luther King and John Lennon and Yoko Ono. There has even recently surfaced a Joe Biden one from when he was a bachelor in the 70's but let's be serious, they haven't had an interview worth it's weight in decades

Take on the Democratic debate

We have to equal opportunity but trying to find any interest in the upcoming Democratic debate is a futile attempt. First of all, there are five people expected on the stage (not including a last minute WWE entrance by SuperJoeBiden). We follow politics but we have not idea that there was a candidate other than Hillary and Bernie, let alone three of them. The most important thing you need to know is that along with Hillary and Bernie, the other three are also old and white. Jim Webb, who we actually kind of like is the most recognizable out of the final three, and still has to pay for breakfast at his local diner, Martin O'Malley who lost his middle school secretary election to some girl with corn stuck in her braces and Lincoln Chafee who comes from a state so small that his entire extended family outnumber it and even they don't know he is running.
So it will be the old hag vs the old rag and really nobody cares because as much as Bernie gets great crowds, let's be serious, this is still Hillary's show to lose and lose she will

Take on Randy Quaid

Not since the death of John Ritter have we been more floored about the fate of a childhood hero than what has happened to one Randy Edward Quaid over the past five years. Every time we turn around he is either acting homeless, dressing homeless or literally being homeless which is the most recent string of events where he was kicked out of his house and basically his country. Randy Quaid fled to Canada like many republicans claimed they would do if Obama was reelected and democrats threatened to do when Bush Jr. was reelected before him. He fled instead of standing trial on a myriad of squatting, invasion and other crazy person crimes but the entire time we just assumed he was researching for the next Griswold adventure so we were good with it. I mean, who wouldn't want to see Beverly D'Angelo topless again. Then today he shows up on the Vermont border like a vagabond Walter White looking like a cross between Santa Clause and Bill Murray to prove again that he is not a hero for all Americans but he is one who does it looking like he is going to give you a present

We are convinced that he is not just the greatest American actor of our generation but also the greatest advocate for freedom of speech and beards


Sent from my iPhone

Take on bicycle parking rates

In a city which now has more miles of bike lanes than St Louis has miles of roads, has a huge government backed bike-share program and has more terrible bikers per capita than anyplace else which when you combine it with ridiculous amount of congestion and crazy taxi drivers and even more crazy uber drivers. Well today when I walked out a garage I noticed the rates that they were charged and I was floored.
I pay $15 including taxes to park for 9 hours but right next door they charge $15 plus 8.75% tax for one hour. This means that for parking your bike which takes up virtually no space costs nearly $16.50 for one stinking hour

At that rate you can basically mean you can buy a second hand bike uptown and bike to work and just leave it on the street and buy another used bike to ride back up town

take on the least shocking story of the day

I read a horribly shocking story today about a guy accused of raping his fiancee's 12 year old daughter.. What was not shocking was the photo that accompanied the article, the guy in the picture had a complete face tattoo..  Forget your thoughts about capital punishment but in this case I hope they fry this dude and apply the wires directly to his balls.   Then I hope they take the mother and do the same thing to her because any parent who would leave their kid with a freak like this and not expect the worst, is themselves the worst..  I have never been more clear in my mind that we need a form of population control and these two losers should be first in line to go.

Take on the Matt Barnes/Derek Fisher confrontation

Matt Barnes got into his car after learning that Derek Fisher was bagging his estranged wife and drove 100 miles to kick his ass. I get the feeling of despair of having lost the love of your life, especially the type who has fantastic side boob (http://www.latinpost.com/articles/31493/20150112/matt-barnes-slams-his-ex-gloria-govan-for-topless-photoshoot.htm) but to drive 100 miles to kick the crap out of the crappiest coach in the NBA seems a bit ludicrous. They have been separated for a year and you have to think that there are a lot of other dudes who have shot the three into that chick since D-Fish got his grubby paws on her but still Barnes drove what has to have been an hour and a a half and then was still so pissed that he took to smacking around little Derek.

Can't wait for the first Knicks-Grizzlies game. The NBA is FANtastic

Take on the Dark Knight

Matt Harvey missed a mandatory workout because he was stuck in traffic proving again that he is no Dark Knight. Listen, we have all been there and have all overslept or been stuck in traffic..well actually I am an adult and this have not overslept in 20 years..but I digress.
The point is I am sorry your Spider-Man alarm didn't go off or you got stuck on the Grand Central Parkway or you forgot your cellphone at your friends house but we all know this is just your lame way of getting out of having to pitch in the postseason and to protect your little arm you six foot two pussy.
You are not Tom Seaver, you are not Tom Glavine you are not even Tom the Cat you are one big fat phony.

Take on the Port Authority XBL Lane

There is no more asinine concept in this world that the Exclusive Bus Lane (XBL).  Every morning you see something like this

@PANYNJ_LT: The Exclusive Bus Lane (XBL) to NY is experiencing a delay of 30 minutes due to a disabled vehicle in the center tunnel.

The issue is that it is a single lane running about 5 miles from the Turnpike to the tunnel and if a bus breaks down and your bus is sitting behind it, there is no way out.   And the only way for them to tow the broken down bus is to come from the tunnel side which they can only do once all the busses ahead of the broken down one are off the road which can easily take an hour.   

So @panynj_lt, thanks for the note that there will be a delay, sadly it came after we were already stuck in the vortex that is the Lincoln tunnel XBL Lane so it made no difference, oh yeah, and since you tweeted it and our bus driver cannot (or should not) be checking his TwitterDuck while driving, he would not have know about it anyway.. So really it is worthless 

Sent from my iPhone

Take on the Twitter App

I've been staring at the Twitter app update for three days as it just sits stagnant in my updates folder in the AppStore. It won't load, it won't update, it won't launch, it can't be deleted, it won't do anything and I am stuck trying to use TwitterDuck or TweeterTap to get updates from the sideline of the Jets-Fish game

Who knew how much of a necessity this thing is because these third party ones are no party at all.

Take on the US Weather Model

There is a fascinating article in today's Times about why the US Weather Model has fallen behind the ones used in Europe but they seem to forget one major point. They talk about meteorologists and maps and Doppler and radar and whatever but what they fail to mention is the real reason that US news outfits fall behind..because it is in their interest to.

Nothing brings eyeballs to the sets like an impending storm and as long as they can keep the intrigue and excitement going, the better for their ratings. This isn't that complicated, if you get your breaking news from a place which depends on ad revenue, you will get a slanted view there are no ifs ands or buts about it.it is pure capitalism

Take on the next school shooting

Saw somebody say yesterday that once Sandy Hook occurred and this happened to small children and nothing happened, that nothing will ever happen at this point. Which is sad, but probably true.

I'm not convinced we need to limit guns as much as I am that we need to keep guns out of the hands of people who shouldn't have them.  I can't believe that there is a sane gun owner who would object to the idea of keeping their beloved guns out of the hands of people who are mentality unstable.   The government tells you that you need a fence around your pool, you must be 21 to drink, that you cannot drive drunk, that you need a license and insurance to even drive a car, that you cannot carry a gun onto a plane but somehow having laws that would keep guns out of the hands of people who are mentally unstable makes people crazy

We need universal background checks not just for gun ownership but for gun use and we need every person who wants to have a gun go through a psychiatric evaluation cause, well, we don't need certain types having the ability to kill other types but we won't and we'll be back here again in no time 

Sent from my iPhone

Take on Hurricane Joaquin

The possible hurricane that is leaving the Bahamas like a group of vacationers from Connecticut heading towards the Northeast has gotten every person I know person into a total frenzy. There is no model that puts this little rain storm anywhere near NYC until Monday night but I know a guy who has been checking the weather.com site every thirty minutes to monitor the situation as if there is something he can do to stop it. The local A&P is already out of water, the gas stations already have huge lines and on my commute home I heard people discussing the "greatest storm since the dinosaurs"

God I hope this thing shows up and drops a swinning pool on their roof and their roof alone.