Imagine, if you will, a daytime soap that has its first scenes on a beach filled with young adults.
ABC was aiming not so much at the usual soap audience, but trying to hook in teens and young adults who now had to find something else after American Bandstand shifted from weekdays to Saturdays. Never Too Young, however, like a lot of soaps before it, lasted a year or so before being cancelled. Not for lack of trying.
The first episode gets off to a good start, at least from a musical sense, with Ramsey Lewis' instrumental rendition of "The In Crowd". The only really familiar names in this cast are Tony Dow (ex-Leave it to Beaver), and Tommy Rettig (ex-Lassie).
Not included with this video is Arlene Dahl's Beauty Spot, a 5 minute program that followed Young, and both shows were cancelled on the same day in June 1966.
We'll start by letting Farron Cousins break this down.
As Farron points out, Judge Aileen Cannon cannot risk granting this childish request from the Oldest Baby in America without putting herself in jeopardy. Trump doesn't care. He has a phobia about accountability and responsibility. He wants to use those documents as material to con his marks at rallies. He is putting Cannon's career on the line because of his selfishness. Regardless of what happens, this will be the reaction from the Nectarine Napoleon:
"WAAAAAAHHHH! I want those papers back! WAAAAAAHHHHH!
Four months ago, everyone assumed the Mets would be contenders for at least a NL Wild Card.
Today, they're tearing down what was supposed to be a playoff team.
Last month, infielder Eduardo Escobar was dealt to the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim for prospects.
Thursday, during a rain delay, co-closer pro tempore (in the absence of Edwin Diaz) David Robertson was traded to Miami for prospects.
Tonight, co-ace Max Scherzer has been traded to Texas for Luisangel Acuna, the brother of Atlanta star Ronald Acuna, Jr., a clear sign that owner Steve Cohen & embattled GM Billy Eppler have waved the white flag, convinced that the Mets won't make the playoffs at all.
File photo courtesy of Yahoo!.
Scherzer has shown signs that his career is winding down. He outpitched the Yankees' Domingo German in his last start on Tuesday, his last in a Met uniform. Injuries have also plagued his stint in Flushing, in addition to a 10 game suspension in April for a foreign substance violation. With the trade deadline at 4 pm (ET) on Tuesday, August 1, the Mets are not done just yet, with more rumors circulating.
The Mets, in their 2nd season under Buck Showalter, have underperformed. Whether it's injuries or inconsistent play, it became clear that the rest of the National League, and the American League, for that matter, were not going to let the Mets sneak up on them like they did last year. 101 wins right now is not going to happen.
The Mets thought they had an All-Star rotation after letting Jaccob deGrom sign with Texas. He's out for the season with Tommy John surgery. The Rangers are now getting a Scherzer on the back end of his career, but he has an opt-out after this season, and could return to New York under the right circumstances. I doubt that'll happen. Carlos "Cookie" Carrasco has gotten lit up more often than a fireworks show, and, as these words are being written, is already trailing Washington in just the 2nd inning. Jose Quintana, a major free agent signing, has struggled in 2 starts, and gotten tagged early in both starts against the White Sox & Yankees after coming off the injured list. Tylor Megill, a surprise last year, is in Syracuse trying to find his mojo.
Right now, the Mets are in 4th place in the NL East. They will not sink any lower if they can help it. The early injury plague, as usual, caused a psychological problem within the team, causing their lack of overall performance. The next man up mentality that carried them last year isn't there like it should.
But did they give up too soon? Until tonight, I'd say yes. Now, not so much.
Fox No News loves to insult their audience's collective intelligence.
It must've been a slow news day, or at least from the conservative perspective, however skewed that is, for the panel on The Five to invent a crisis situation involving Mexican drug cartels and shoplifting. Farron Cousins explains why this makes zero sense.
Greg Gutless and Dirty Watters know they're telling a tall tale to their audience, but I don't think everyone's buying into this latest piece of yellow journalism. There've been no headlines in the papers suggesting anything that those two nimrods even discussed actually happened. Gutless should've saved this garbage for his solo talk show.
Dynamite is expanding on Disney's Gargoyles with a 2nd monthly, Gargoyles: Dark Ages, which will, as creator-writer Greg Weisman sees it, fill in the backstory behind the popular monsters. Paired this time with artist Drew Moss, Weisman begins the history of the Gargoyles by setting them in, as the title implies, in medevial times. If regular series artist George Kambadais ever has to need a fill-in cover, Moss can certainly fill the bill. We're digging.
Rating: A.
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Veteran writer Mark Waid is coasting on his past success and his reputation.
His latest World's Finest series stars the Teen Titans, reimagined for the 21st century.
That's right. The original team, with Robin, Wonder Girl, Kid Flash, Speedy, and Aqualad, joined by Bumblebee for diversity reasons. However, Waid's idea of meshing the classic Titans lineup with today's social media obsessions is not a good idea, as illustrated by Speedy & Kid Flash needing to record the team's missions to pump business. That's not what the team was created for in the first place. Waid knows that, and there are better ideas he could've used.
To think I wasted $4 on this?
Rating: C--.
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DC is launching a manga line of titles in September, and produced a manga ashcan preview to get folks interested. At least three books are planned, featuring Superman, Batman, and the Joker. All three books land September 5, each with a $10 cover price. From what we've seen, it has potential, teasing just enough content.
No rating.
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In January, we discussed Greg Weisman's Young Justice: Targets miniseries, and recommended waiting for the trade paperback. Advice heeded. Queen Perdita, Beast Boy's ex, has been kidnapped, prompting the team to make an effort to rescue her. There are some team members who were not included in the final season of Young Justice on Max, including Stargirl. Each chapter flies by very quickly, which makes me think Weisman wanted to do a longer series, but was told he couldn't. He's better off if he had done a year's worth of material, but then, Gargoyles occupies a ton of his time these days.
Rating: B.
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DC's October event has the Justice League returning in a massive crossover event involving Legendary Pictures' Monsterverse. The League faces off with not only King Kong, but also Godzilla. Check the trailer:
Comics fans are going to be confused, since Kong has been licensed to Dynamite, and Godzilla to IDW, but this is the burgeoning cinematic universe we're dealing with here, and I suspect if this sells well, a DTV version will follow, along with the licenses for Kong & Godzilla moving to DC.
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Meanwhile, Image is the new home for Hasbro's GI Joe & The Transformers as part of what will be known as the Energon Universe, named for the Transformers' homeworld. The Transformers return in October.
Also, Image's adaptations of Universal's cinematic monsters kicks off with Dracula, also in October. There's a lot to consider.
When Purina decided to release a cat calendar for 1979, they needed a jingle, and found it easier to do one to the beat of Neil Sedaka's "Calendar Girl".
Kyle Allan is the singer here, though some folks might be fooled into thinking Sedaka himself recorded the jingle.
We all know rock icon Ted Nugent isn't exactly the sharpest tool in the box these days, given his right wing leanings. The man that gave music fans "Cat Scratch Fever" and was a member of Damn Yankees in the 80's with the likes of Styx's Tommy Shaw and Night Ranger's Jack Blades drank too much GOP Kool-Aid along with the predictable Jack Daniels, and his mind is gone.
How else to explain Nugent posting on social media a conspiracy theory claiming that the government, at the time under then-president Donald John Narcissus Trump, orchestrated the January 6 insurrection at the capitol to cover up a rigged election. A brain-dead conspiracy theory shared by Trump himself on Truthless Social. All that did is add to the burden the paranoid Trump now must bear as he faces indictments and greater scrutiny.
Farron Cousins explains:
Like, the whole point of the insurrection was to prevent the certification of the 2020 election, and keep the oldest baby in America in power. It didn't work.
Meanwhile, Trump is doing what he does best, whining and crying like the permanent toddler he is, as he is pleading for his drones in Congress to help him.
"WAAAAHHHHH!!! I don't want to go to prison! Help me! Help! WAAAAHHHHH!"
As if that wasn't bad enough, you had Florida Misrepresentative Rusty Gaetz putting on his Donny Osmond face and acting as a guest host on Newsnacks Monday with Alina Habba-Dabba-Doo as his guest. Brian Tyler Cohen breaks this down.
As Brian points out, there's nothing Congress can do to help the Nectarine Napoleon. It's been suggested by legal experts such as Glenn Kirschner that prosecutor Jack Smith has the authority to deposit Trump in jail until trial to put an end to Trump's relentless whining and pleading to the Legion of The Brainwashed. Never has anyone been so scared of discipline at such an advanced age, but, then again, Trump was pampered so much as a child, he probably owns stock in Procter & Gamble.
The 1964-5 season spelled the end for James Aubrey at CBS. Three series he purchased from a friend, Keefe Brasselle, and his Richelieu Productions, all went belly-up. We've already talked about The Cara Williams Show a while back, but now it's time for the other sitcom in the Richelieu stable, The Baileys of Balboa, meant to be a star vehicle for Paul Ford (ex-You'll Never Get Rich, aka The Phil Silvers Show), but more of an ensemble comedy with Les Brown, Jr. (son of the bandleader), Sterling Holloway (the original voice of Winnie-The-Pooh), and, not seen in this episode, Clint Howard (later of Gentle Ben after a star turn on Star Trek) and Judy Carne (ex-Fair Exchange).
Edit, 3/10/24: Had to change the video. Here's "Sam Sells Out":
Going from a CO forever angered by a con man in the motor pool to a father and businessman frustrated by his employees wasn't much of a stretch for Ford. And therein laid the problem. As we all know, Judy Carne would rebound two years later with Love on a Rooftop before gaining icon status on Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In.
Between "Barbie" and Christopher Nolan's latest, "Oppenheimer", the two films collected a combined $237 million in the domestic box office last weekend. "Barbenheimer", as the press refers to this two-headed cinematic phenomenon, effectively proved that the average movie-goer is tired of right wing morons like Timex Cruz, Choo Choo Charlie Kirk, Bent-over Shapiro, and the rest of the conservative moron army, whining about pop culture icons like Barbie, and before her, Mr. Potato Head, Sesame Street, and the M & M's mascots to distract from the fact that the Republicans have little or no policy agenda, and their only real agenda is serving their false god. I don't need to tell you who that is, of course.
Shapiro, for his part, decided to be a jerk and buy some Barbie dolls, then burn them in protest of the Greta Gerwig film, starring Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling. No one is raising a stink over "Oppenheimer", though, and that film is more of a historical drama. $82 million says it found its audience.
Farron Cousins explains why the conservative idiot squad failed.
Shapiro, at least, admitted to seeing "Barbie", and probably saw "Oppenheimer", too, but claimed, as Farron points out, that his producers "made him go". Yeah, right, tell another tall tale, Bent.
Shapiro, for wasting money buying Barbie dolls so he could burn them, and lie about why he went to the movie, gets the Weasel ears this week.
Kinda makes one wonder why these same dimbulbs never publicly whined about the "GI Joe" movies.......
In concept, the NBC Follies was a throwback to the days of vaudeville, with a dash of the theatrical glitz of ABC's Hollywood Palace, but lacked the longevity of the latter.
Sammy Davis, Jr., a frequent Palace host who also had a short-lived variety series on NBC in the 60's, served as host, with venerable Johnny Olson as the announcer. Unfortunately, Follies was one season and done.
This sample episode features the Smothers Brothers, Diahann Carroll (ex-Julia), Mickey Rooney, & Jerry Lewis, and includes a skit that today would be politically incorrect involving Chinese stereotypes.
I've mentioned that Sammy Davis, Jr. was all over the dial during the 70's between this, Sammy & Company, and various guest appearances and TV-movies. The man was B. U. S. Y.
No rating. I think this was past my bedtime back in the day.
Purina expanded its line of dog food products in 1979 with the introduction of Bonz, and, as this commercial demonstrates, it's just as effective on a dog's teeth as a real bone would be.
Two actors narrate. One is Michael Bell, not sure about the other.
More recently, after acquiring Alpo, Purina tried remarketing this product as Alpo T-Bonz. Haven't seen it around, so maybe it's gone for good this time.
40 years ago, come tomorrow, the Kansas City Royals and the Yankees engaged in what was then another chapter in a rivalry that began in the 1976 postseason.
About three weeks after Dave Righetti no-hit the Boston Red Sox, there were more fireworks in the Bronx after the Royals' George Brett had hit what appeared to be a game changing homer with 2 out in the top of the 9th. Billy Martin had other ideas......
What follows is the complete game, including the resumption of the contest nearly a month after the controversy.
In the end, it amounted to some gamesmanship on the part of Martin, but this game of human chess would backfire on Martin.
Lew Ayres had played Dr. Kildare on radio and in a successful movie series for MGM. It made sense, then, at the time, for the studio to try out Ayres in a TV version of the series.
MGM filmed a pilot in 1960, a half hour drama instead of the hour long version that would come to fruition a year later with Richard Chamberlain. Take a look at the following pilot, and then, we'll see why they had to make a change.
I'm going to take a guess here, and say that this pilot did not sell anywhere because at the time, networks weren't as hot for "pre-sold" product as film studios are today. That MGM retrenched and tapped into the young adult demographic by casting Chamberlain as a younger Kildare shows that they had made the right call. Though uncredited, Robert Redford and Everyman character actor Olan Soule, whose resume by that point had included Captain Midnight, Dennis The Menace, and the original Dragnet, are easy to spot.
A widowed chief of police with three daughters hires on a divorcee as his housekeeper. A simple enough concept that helped NBC begin to climb out of the ratings basement.
Gimme a Break! was the first sitcom from producer Alan Landsburg (That's Incredible!, In Search Of...), and ran for 6 seasons (1981-7). Actress-singer Nell Carter, fresh from Lobo, is the housekeeper acting as a mother figure for the daughters of police chief Carl Kaminsky (Dolph Sweet). Two of the three daughters (Kari Michaelson, Laurie Hendler) were written out after the first five seasons, while the youngest one (Lara Jill Miller) was reduced to a recurring role in the final season.
Season six also saw future stars Rosie O'Donnell, Matthew Lawrence, and Rosetta LeNoire join the show.
Now, let's go back to the beginning. Carter also sings the theme song.
In recent years, Miller made a bit of a comeback as a voice actress (i.e. The Life & Times of Juniper Lee).
Up until recently, this next item was in regular rotation on WROW, which has since either excised it from its playlist, or scaled down how often it's played.
"It" is "Don't Get Around Much Anymore", which represented the most recent record in the station's library, as it was released in 2011 on Tony Bennett's "Duets II" set. The legendary crooner teamed with artists such as Mariah Carey, Aretha Franklin, Carrie Underwood, and, on "Don't Get Around Much Anymore", Michael Buble.
In memory of Bennett, 96, who passed away earlier this morning.
This week's Dunce Cap winner, Marjorie Taylor Greene, embarrassed herself and the GOP yet again with yet another juvenile stunt on the House floor.
While questioning two alleged FBI "whistleblowers" in relation to the investigation into President Biden's son, Hunter, Empty-G paraded some posterboards containing nude pictures of the younger Biden.
Like, who does that??
The mission is simple and clear. Embarrass the Bidens as much as possible, all because former president Donald John Pinocchio Trump, already indicted twice, is facing a third indictment from special prosecutor Jack Smith, and the GOPers can't deal with it. Their false god has been exposed as a fraud many times over, and yet, they still defend him.
What Empty-G and the rest of the GOP Idiot Patrol fail to comprehend is that despite being the president's son, Hunter Biden is a private citizen, and thus is being harassed in an effort to undermine his father's administration.
The nude images, likely obtained illegally, were the last straw. Empty-G, recently divorced, may have actually exposed the reason why her husband left her.
She's not all there, kids. This is what happens when you hang around a deranged lunatic like Trump.
I honestly think at this point, the next time Ms. Moldy Peaches returns to Georgia, she may find a couple of guys in white suits and a butterfly net waiting to take her to the nearest psychiatric hospital. The GOP's obsession with humiliating the Bidens and Democrats in general has reached this level. Old school Republicans who haven't been converted to the Cult of Narcissus are shaking their heads.
As for Empty-G, let's remind one and all of what she really is:
We've often talked about how some shows get cancelled just for being on the wrong night of the week, opposite tough competition in the form of popular shows on other networks.
Peaceable Kingdom, a return to television for Lindsay Wagner (ex-The Bionic Woman) and Tom Wopat (ex-The Dukes of Hazzard) was one such show. Slotted on Wednesdays opposite NBC's Unsolved Mysteries and ABC's 1-2 punch of Growing Pains & Head of The Class, Kingdom didn't even get two full months on the air before CBS pulled the plug. 7 out of 12 produced episodes aired. My folks were into Unsolved Mysteries or cable movies.
At no time does Elvis Costello appear in this clip for 1977's "Watching The Detectives", which makes use of plenty of old film footage, including Charlie Chan, Sherlock Holmes, & Our Gang.
"Dumb Dora", of course, in this case, is Georgia Misrepresentative Marjorie Taylor Greene, who meant to insult President Biden at a Turning Point conference over the weekend by linking his programs with the work decades earlier of Franklin D. Roosevelt and Lyndon Johnson.
However, after being encouraged by MSNBC's Joe Scarborough, the Biden administration took Greene's words, and turned it into a campaign ad, which aired this morning on Morning Joe.
The administration's account on Twitter posted the ad, with Biden writing, "I approve this message".
As children, we were taught to think before speaking. That lesson is lost on Empty-G, who gets another Dunce Cap.
Last week, Donald Trump sent some of his ambulance chasing stooges to Georgia to try to toss out the grand jury investigation into his petitioning Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger into "finding" votes to reverse the state's result in the 2020 election, and wanted DA Fani Willis disqualified. The motive was obvious. The accountability-challenged Trump is finding out that all those years of being pampered are not going to help him now. The Georgia Supreme Court unanimously dismissed Trump's weak petition.
You can just imagine the reaction from Trump himself.
It's like the theme from Baretta back in the day. "Don't do the crime if you can't do the time."
That giant orange onesie is looking more and more likely......
Raphael "Ted" Cruz, or, as we prefer to call him, Timex Cruz, just doesn't get it.
On Sunday, Cruz was shredded by former White House press secretary Jen Psaki, now on MSNBC, for starting yet another fight he can't win in the culture wars.
Cruz, you see, raised a stink over a scene in the movie, "Barbie", based on the legendary Mattel toy line, and opening later this week, which purports to depict a map suggesting China's claim to the South China Sea, a claim disputed by the film's producers, Warner Bros., which stated that the map is meant to represent the title character's journey into the real world.
"Barbie". Sesame Street. Dare we think that ol' Timex might be hankering to take a poke at a certain band of reptilian superheroes whose next movie opens in 2 weeks?
File photo courtesy of Yahoo!.
What Timex and his fellow GOPers are doing is distracting voters from the issues they'd rather ignore. Then again, a freshman Senator is proving to be just as dumb.
That would be Alabama Senator Tommy (Inner) Tuberville, formerly a football coach at Auburn before he decided to be an idiot and become a politician. Tuberville's sin is blocking military promotions in a misguided protest over the Pentagon offering compensation for travel expenses for female service members needing abortions outside their home states, if you will. Remember, the GOPers have this obsession with eradicating abortion altogether. Senator Innertube would be the kind of rube a certain bloviating baby would choose as a running mate if he can't get a female VP. Gotta ensure the good ol' boy vote, y'know.
Finally, Ronna McDaniel, chairperson of the Republican National Committee, also took some heat on the air, this time from CNN's Chris Wallace, in trying to defend the party's intention to support that same bloviating baby if he ends up convicted of his various crimes.
The bottom line is that the walls are closing in on the bloviating baby, despite his claims to the contrary, which suggests he lives in a mirror universe or something. The Republican Party, more than anything, needs a total overhaul.
Radio icon Paul Harvey had been on the air for 30 years when he launched a separate, daily commentary program, The Rest of The Story, in 1976. A few days a week, maxing out at 6 days a week at one point, Harvey filled the blanks on the stories of historical figures and celebrities.
Harvey's son, Paul, Jr., wrote & produced Story, and, one must assume, its video companion, which aired in these parts for a while. When the elder Harvey had health issues late in his career, a number of guest hosts, including Paul, Jr., and prominent politicians Mitt Romney & Mike Huckabee, filled in until Paul, Sr.'s passing in 2009.
Following is a tale explaining the origins, if you will, of the Wright Brothers.
Canadian singer-songwriter Bruce Cockburn became an FM radio staple with his 1984 album, "Stealing Fire", which produced two singles, "If I Had a Rocket Launcher" and this next entry, "Lovers in a Dangerous Time", which was covered by his countrymen, Barenaked Ladies, 7 years later, on a tribute album.
Charlie Kirk, founding father of Turning Point USA and college dropout, wore his inner bigot on his sleeve when he made some pathetic, disparaging remarks about African-American women such as Supreme Court Justice Katanji Brown-Jackson, MSNBC anchor Joy Reid, and former First Lady Michelle Obama.
I'll let Jesse Dollemore take it from here:
As Jesse notes, Kirk brought in disgraced producer Derek Neff, who was fired by Fox No News as Tucker Carlson's producer months ago because of his blatantly racist POV, months before Carlson was dismissed by that same network.
What the problem really is, though, is this. Kirk didn't apply himself and dropped out of a community college. The women noted above applied themselves, and have become famous. They didn't steal their way to college. They earned their spots. Kirk is issuing dog whistles to his fellow bigots. He won't admit he made a mistake by not finishing school, because that would tell those same people who listen to him that he is a weakling. Then again, most of us knew that already. What he also is, of course, is a Weasel.
I'd not be surprised if Reid uses her platform on MSNBC to tear Kirk a few new ones.
Northwestern University was hit with a double whammy this week, as their football & baseball coaches were dismissed in the space of 72 hours.
First, three days after he'd been suspended for a 2 week period, football coach Pat Fitzgerald was let go over allegations of hazing involving his players. David Braun, a defensive coordinator brought in during the offseason, will be named interim coach, according to Yahoo!.
Then, on Thursday, two months after the end of a miserable 10-40 campaign, baseball coach Jim Foster was given the boot after reports surfaced that he'd been bullying other members of the athletic staff, and, we presume, some of his players. Foster had only been the coach this season.
In this day and age, some people are just too slow to learn that what constituted acceptable behavior years ago simply isn't anymore.
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Tonight's Mets-Dodgers game will be available only on Apple TV+. Mets fans, of course, are hoping that former radio broadcaster Wayne Randazzo, now one of the TV voices, along with Matt Vasgersian, of the Angels, will call the game.
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Speaking of the Mets, Pete Alonso went one and done in the Home Run Derby on Monday, beaten for the 2nd straight year by Seattle's Julio Rodriguez. The only other NL entry, Mookie Betts, was also one and done, eliminated in the 1st round as well. As we all know by now, Toronto's Vladimir Guerrero, Jr., steamrolled by Alonso four years ago, won the tournament, besting Tampa Bay's Randy Arozarena in the finals.
Guerrero's win comes 16 years after Vlad, Sr., then with the Angels, won the Derby.
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Soccer star Megan Rapinoe, prepping for the women's world cup, has declared she will retire after the current season. Her endorsement deal with Subway wasn't renewed, probably so they could pay Peyton Manning....!
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The Jests will be this year's subject on HBO's Hard Knocks. QB Aaron Rodgers probably was the lure. Maybe there'll be some psychologists in the viewing audience that can explain the team's perpetual underachieving against certain teams (i.e. New England) every year.
Three years before Guns 'N' Roses released their cover, country singer Ronnie Milsap took a swing at the Skyliners' 1958 hit, "Since I Don't Have You", which cracked the top 30 on the AC chart for Milsap.
As with "Lost in The 50's Tonight" 6 years earlier, Milsap sets the video at a high school dance.
You could probably excuse Donald Trump's false claim that he "didn't know" E. Jean Carroll, when there are pictures that say otherwise, and chalk it up to his memory failing him due to his advanced age. However, when he first made defamatory statements about Carroll, while he served as president, he tried to claim that this was part of his official duties.
News flash: Gossip is not an official presidential duty, jackass!!
The Department of Justice came to the realization the other day that Trump is just using them to avoid accepting responsibility for his falsehoods.
Farron Cousins explains:
You could imagine the reaction from America's Oldest Baby:
"WWAAAAHHHHH! They turned on me! WAAAAHHHH!!!"
Add to this the fact that Trump took Alina Habba-Dabba-Doo off all of his cases, and assigned her to a Super PAC, and hasn't yet found a more competent attorney to take her place should tell you something.
As the old saying goes, Diaper Don, you made your bed(s), and now you have to lie in it.
When a news organization such as Fox News is so obsessively engrossed in spreading lies about the 2020 election and the subsequent insurrection two months later in Washington, they're bound to turn on one of their own viewers.
According to Ray Epps, that's exactly what they did, or, more specifically, now-former Fox garbage peddler Tucker "Tabloid" Carlson did.
Carlson & his former employers are being sued by Epps for defamation. The suit was filed in Delaware, the same state that is home to President Joe Biden, and where Fox News lost a defamation suit filed by Dominion Voting Systems earlier this year.
Ray Epps. Photo courtesy Yahoo!.
Epps is an admitted supporter of former president Donald Trump. Voted for Trump in both the 2016 & 2020 elections. He bought into the big lie that the election was stolen, but on January 6, 2021, Epps chose not to enter the Capitol. That he wasn't arrested led Carlson & Fox No News to insinuate, constantly, that Epps was secretly working for the FBI, a falsehood that Fibber Jordan and his cast of idiots tried to use when FBI director Christopher Wray, a Trump appointee, mind you, testified today.
What Epps had in mind on 1/6/21 was more of a peaceful protest, which the GOPers would like you to believe actually happened, but the video says otherwise, 2 1/2 years later. Epps, we must understand, felt betrayed by Fox No News & Carlson, hence the suit. He & his wife had to move out of their Arizona home, his wife had to give up her dog breeding business, because of death threats from some of the looser screws of MAGA World.
If Fox gets the same judge that ruled against them in the Dominion case, Epps has a good shot at winning. How long will it take before Trump turns on Epps, though? I shan't be surprised if it's before the end of the week.
"The Honeydrippers: Volume One" was a 5 track EP released in November 1984, featuring Led Zeppelin's Robert Plant & Jimmy Page, Paul Shaffer (Late Night With David Letterman), & Jeff Beck, Page's bandmate in the Yardbirds, among others.
The first single was a cover of Phil Phillips' "Sea of Love", which peaked at #3 on the Hot 100.
Truth be told, no one had even known about Phillips until this was released.
Following the 1973 World Series, Mets superfan Karl Erhardt appeared on To Tell The Truth. The "sign man" took questions from panelists Bill Cullen, Peggy Cass, Kitty Carlisle, and guest panelist Gene Wood (Beat The Clock, ex-Anything You Can Do).
Erhardt plays the 1st game in this episode.
Erhardt passed away 15 years ago, before Citi Field opened.
It is a soap opera that may finally be reaching an end. Ever since losing his bid for re-election in 2020, Donald Trump has publicly insisted there was fraud, when in truth there was none to be had anywhere. In recent days, three of his lawyers have had to face the consequences of going along with the whining & crying of the Oldest Baby in America.
John Eastman, for example, is facing disbarment in California. L. Lin Wood voluntarily surrendered his license earlier this week, rather than run the risk of disbarment.
And, then, there is Rudy Giuliani.
File photo courtesy Yahoo!.
The man who was once "America's Mayor" more than 20 years ago has clearly become "America's Disgrace", and now faces disbarment in Washington, where his license had already been suspended, as it is in New York. In an interview unrelated to this matter earlier this week, Giuliani insisted he could solve the case of a bag of cocaine that mysteriously turned up at the White House. While other GOPer idiots are quick to accuse Hunter Biden of being the owner of the bag, Giuliani isn't exactly following suit. The GOPers, of course, are trying to distract from the myriad of legal issues facing Trump. As if that's going to do any good.
Giuliani insisted on peddling lies in a number of places. Not just Washington, but in Georgia as well, all in service to an insecure man-child unaccustomed to losing. Let's not stop with Washington. Giuliani should follow Wood's lead, and surrender his license, own his situation, and accept the fact he was wrong all this time.
But, we know he won't, unless he's left with no choice. He's making Wood look like a Rhodes scholar by comparison.
A year after Carly Simon's iconic "You're So Vain" topped the charts, some genius thought it might be a good idea to include that on an album of covers by the stars of TV's The Odd Couple, Tony Randall & Jack Klugman, in character as Felix Unger & Oscar Madison, respectively.
The joke was that this was given to Oscar. This plays like a scene from the show.
There were musical numbers on Odd Couple, which we'll feature down the line. This, however, is the only track from "The Odd Couple Sings" currently available on YouTube.
The juvenile, high school infighting between Colorado Misrepresentative Lauren Boebert and Georgia's Marjorie Taylor Greene was the straw that broke the camel's back, it seems.
The camel, in this case, being the GOP Freedom Caucus, which voted two weeks ago to expel Greene from their ranks. It wasn't until another member of the group, Andy Harris, owned up to the vote to bounce Greene, that this even got out in the first place.
As Jesse Dollemore explains, the caucus believes that Greene and her obsession with getting a headline a day has made her too mainstream for the group.
What brought this about, really, was Greene having a cow over Boebert one-upping her on introducing articles of impeachment against President Biden, which, of course, won't go anywhere. Greene thinks she has the exclusive right to do that, but the kicker is that Boebert actually did something intelligent for a change and tried to use protocols to introduce her DOA article. Greene couldn't let that pass. Whatever happened to being on the same page, ladies?
What Greene wants is to have the credit for getting Biden out of office, if at all possible. That ain't happening. That'll be up to the voters next year. Deal with it.
The field is now set for the 2023 Major League Baseball Home Run Derby, the precursor to this year's All Star Game. Both take place in Seattle next week, with the Derby on Monday (ESPN) and the game itself on Tuesday (Fox).
Juan Soto (San Diego) will not defend his crown, but that does not mean the Mets' Pete Alonso has a chance to 3-peat after Seattle's Julio Rodriguez denied him in the semi-finals last year.
The pairings:
1. Luis Robert, Jr. (Chicago White Sox) vs. 8. Adley Rutschman (Baltimore).
2. Alonso (Mets) vs. 7. Rodriguez (Seattle).
3. Mookie Betts (Los Angeles Dodgers) vs. 6. Vladimir Guerrero, Jr. (Toronto).
4. Adolis Garcia (Texas) vs. 5. Randy Arozarena (Tampa Bay).
It seems a little strange that the field is very slanted in favor of the AL, and not just because Seattle is the host team. In addition to Soto, a fair number of NL sluggers, including Betts' Dodger teammates, Freddie Freeman & JD Martinez, Philadelphia's Kyle Schwarber, who got a total el snubbino, Atlanta's Ronald Acuna, Jr. & Austin Riley, and St. Louis' Paul Goldschmidt & Nolan Arenado, opted not to take part. For the NL to keep the trophy, they need Alonso and/or Betts in the finals.
Richard Levinson & William Link's greatest creation, Columbo, had a humble beginning in an episode of The Chevy Mystery Hour, later rechristened as The Sunday Mystery Hour near the end of its run.
In "Enough Rope", we are introduced to Lt. Columbo (Bert Freed), as he investigates the murder of a doctor's wife. Richard Carlson co-stars. This would be remade, after a run on stage starting in 1962, as "Prescription: Murder", the first of two Columbo pilots leading to the NBC Sunday Mystery Movie. "Prescription" starred Gene Barry (The Name of The Game) in the role originated by Carlson, with Nina Foch as the doomed wife.
Here's "Enough Rope":
The Chevy Mystery Hour came from singer Dinah Shore's production company, with Henry Jaffe as executive producer. The subsequent Columbo pilots and series were produced by Universal, starting in 1968.
A new Disney fan channel has debuted on YouTube, specializing in episodes of Disney's Wonderful World of Color, later known as The Wonderful World of Disney.
Right before Christmas of 1967, Disney served a 2-part tale, "A Boy Called Nuthin'", with Ronny Howard (The Andy Griffith Show) in the title role as a Chicago lad heading west to visit his uncle. Forrest Tucker, fresh from F-Troop, and Richard Bakalyan, who made a few Disney pictures, and cartoons, too, co-star.
Hal Horn can add this to his Tucker collection, if he hasn't done so already.
No rating. This didn't replay when I was growing up watching the Sunday Disney package.
Kent Christmas is a pro-Donald Trump Christian pastor from Tennessee who has made some ridiculous, over the top declarations from the pulpit in recent months, including a suggestion that Christians could, ah, martyr themselves in much the same way Muslims do. He's since walked that back, claiming, of course, it was out of context. Well, of course.
We are 2+ weeks away from the release of a live-action "Barbie" movie, which has Margot Robbie ("The Suicide Squad") and Ryan Gosling as its leads, and a supporting cast that includes Kate McKinnon (ex-Saturday Night Live), John Cena (Peacemaker), Simu Liu, and Dua Lipa. Christmas, without seeing the movie, claims the film, whose plot is being kept a very, very top secret, is loaded with LGBTQ+ themes. There are LGBTQ+ actors in the film, such as McKinnon, but how would Christmas know what's in the movie if he hasn't been to an advance screening?
Oh, yeah, God told him it wasn't any good.
Christmas is one of these right wing "prophets" in the tank for Trump, and now thinks because he has a YouTube channel that airs his sermons, he's all that and a bag of chips. Nope. Not even close. If you're looking for references to the condemnation of homosexuality in the New Testament, it'll be filed under fornication. Jesus, however, taught love, while the Apostle Paul reminded us of the baser instincts of man. Christians like Christmas tend to ignore Jesus' teachings, since Paul's lean more toward a return to the Old Testament.
However, for taking umbrage at a pop culture icon's film debut without even seeing it, Christmas gets this:
"Barbie" likely still could rule the box office when it opens July 21, but judgmental men like Christmas act on assumptions, and likely will be proven wrong.
A July 4 weekend series between ancient rivals Boston and the Yankees culminated in the most ultimate way possible. And it was George Steinbrenner's birthday, too.
The video is from WPIX's broadcast. The audio is from the team's radio broadcast, which opens with Phil Rizzuto & Bill White. Ah, the days when the announcers would alternate between TV & radio, a practice that only the San Francisco Giants, I think, continue today.
I remember watching this game with my late father and with my brother. Dave Righetti would convert to closer to continue his career, and then went on to be a pitching coach with the Giants before retiring a while back.
After scoring a #1 hit with "Set Adrift on Memory Bliss", PM Dawn returned with a gentle romantic ballad from the Eddie Murphy movie, "Boomerang". Here's "I'd Die Without You":
When I first wrote a review of Matt Houston, I noted the fact that it was a civilian-centric reboot of Burke's Law, which, coincidentally, Aaron Spelling acquired the rights to reboot more than a decade later.
For Houston, Spelling populated his guest list with plenty of familiar names in a lot of cases. Case in point: Season 1's "Joey's Here", with guest stars Troy Donahue (ex-Surfside Six), David Cassidy (ex-The Partridge Family), Monte Markham (ex-The Second Hundred Years, The New Perry Mason), Norman Fell (ex-Three's Company, The Ropers, Dan August, etc.), and Jessica Walter.
Wrestler-turned-actor H. B. "Hard Boiled" Haggerty, a member of Jack Webb's repertory company in the 70's (i.e. Adam-12) appears as a bodyguard to a company executive (Fell). Frank Welker lends his voice to the title robot, who seems to have gone awry.
Yes, that's Paul Peterson (ex-The Donna Reed Show) as a security guard. Peterson played a variety of security guards and cops on the series.
It wasn't long before Paul Brinegar (ex-Rawhide) and Dennis Fimple, who played the ranch hands, were cut. Penny Santon stayed on until the end of the season before being released.
All Star reserves & pitchers were named today for the All Star Game, airing July 11 on Fox.
As usual, there are snubs, and some teams will only have 1 player on the roster due to performance on the field, such as the underachievers like the Mets. Here we go:
American League:
Pitchers:
Gerrit Cole, Yankees. With Aaron Judge unable to play, Cole becomes the Bombers' lone representative.
Luis Castillo, Seattle.
Sonny Gray, Minnesota.
Nathan Eovaldi, Texas.
Kevin Gausman, Toronto.
Shane McClanahan, Tampa Bay.
Framber Valdez, Houston.
Michael Lorenzen, Detroit.
Kenley Jansen, Boston.
Emmanuel Clase, Cleveland.
Felix Bautista & Yennier Cano, Baltimore.
Shohei Ohtani, voted in as the DH, will also pitch.
Reserves:
Salvador Perez, Kansas City.
Adley Rutschman & Austin Hays, Baltimore.
Vladimir Guerrero, Jr., Bo Bichette, & Whit Merrifield, Toronto.
Jose Ramirez, Cleveland.
Brent Rooker, Oakland.
Luis Robert, Jr., Chicago.
Yordan Alvarez, Houston.
Adolis Garcia, Texas.
National League:
Pitchers:
Zac Gallen, Arizona.
Spencer Strider & Bryce Elder, Atlanta.
Marcus Stroman & Justin Steele, Chicago.
Mitch Keller, Pittsburgh.
Josiah Gray, Washington.
Clayton Kershaw, Los Angeles.
Alexis Diaz, Cincinnati.
Josh Hader, San Diego.
Devin Williams, Milwaukee.
Camilio Doval, San Francisco.
Reserves:
Pete Alonso, Mets.
Matt Olson, Ozzie Albies, & Austin Riley, Atlanta.
Dansby Swanson, Chicago.
Will Smith, Los Angeles.
Elias Diaz, Colorado.
Jorge Soler, Miami.
Lourdes Gurriel, Jr., Arizona.
Nick Castellanos, Philadelphia.
Juan Soto, San Diego.
Between now and game day, there will be the usual late replacements for injury and/or players choosing to opt out of the game to rest. Atlanta has the most players with 8, followed by Texas with 6. While Alonso is the Mets' lone rep at the moment, he might have some company if there are any late changes.
Republican Presidential debates for 2024 start next month, with Fox News hosting the opener. Former president Donald Trump, who once thought the network was his favorite channel, is as of now refusing to participate, and keeps changing excuses for why.
A YouTube commenter suggested it's because former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie could shred Trump on stage, and, as Farron Cousins asserts, so could former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley. Trump's myriad of legal problems would be a target for the rest of the field to exploit, and Christie in particular almost certainly would.
Here's Farron.
Judge Aileen Cannon is the wild card. If she keeps the August 14 trial date, you have to believe that unless she's being closely watched by more experienced jurists, she'll try to help Trump as much and as best as possible, even though that would bring heat on her, as if she doesn't already have that.
Fox would love it if the GOP field dog-piled on Trump, and he certainly deserves it. Of course, you know what his response will be.....
"WAAAAHHHH! They're mean! They hate me! WAAAAAHHHH!"
If there was ever a time and an opportunity for the GOP to move on from the Annoying Orange, this is it.
Most of us have been to summer camp. I spent two years at a day camp in town, and the worst that came out of it was having to be kept at home for about a week or so due to chicken pox.
Archie Comics, in their continuing quest to recapture the vibe of horror anthology books of the past, rolls out another by-the-numbers one-shot, Camp Pickens.
The writers may not be afraid to take advantage of the book being non-continuity----even though he's depicted on the cover, Archie himself doesn't appear----but they'd be better off if this was a book length story, instead of a couple of shorts and a framing sequence starring Jughead. As it is, each short doesn't really recapture the spirit of DC or Marvel's anthologies from the 50's through the early 80's. It falls short instead. Weak.
Rating: DOA (Dead on Arrival).
If you were watching Superman & Lois, which wrapped up season 3 earlier this week, you know that the writers there had begun the process of bringing Lana Lang, newly estranged from husband Kyle, together with John Henry Irons, aka Steel.
DC was already well into that plotline in the Superman line of books, and it appears Lana & John are engaged to be married, which will factor into the new Steelworks miniseries, a spin-off from Action Comics, written by actor Michael Dorn, who voiced Irons/Steel in Superman: The Animated Series several years back. You don't need to be reading Action to get a handle on things, as the key plot is explained in the first issue. Irons wants to retire his alter-ego, and convince the citizens of Metropolis to become more proactive, and less dependent on Superman and company, the idea being that the heroes and average citizens can work together as one.
Steelworks is off to a good start.
Rating: A-.
News you can use: Darkwing Duck's lookalike nemesis, Negaduck, gets his own miniseries from Dynamite in September. I say miniseries because I don't think it's going to be an ongoing for very long. Dynamite is gradually building the Disney line, at least the licenses they have, piece by piece.
Archie's horror division welcomes back Madam Satan in a 1-shot in September that is the kind of book length tale they should be doing. In contrast, for old school Archie fans, Sabrina returns right after Labor Day with a new Halloween special that follows last year's format (1 new story, 2 reprints), and continues where last year's special left off, with the return of Amber Lightstone, set up as Sabrina's arch enemy, now with 2 sidekicks of her own. Should be a book lengther instead of a short story that ends too quickly, as last year's did.
