Wednesday, December 29, 2004
Random Musings
Back in New York for the X-Mas holidays (hey, I'm not being PC. Evidently the X stands for Christ in Greek, so X-Mas is pecfectly appropriate). Anyway, some random musings as they have popped into my mind while vacationing.
-I never watch the local news. Simply put, local newspeople are morons that make Maureen Dowd look worthy of a Pulitzer. In fact, I rarely even watch any news at all, except for maybe a few minutes of Fox News here and there (Yeah, I said Fox News, big whoop, wanna fight about it?). Anyway, I unfortunately walked by the television Sunday night as the Stepford people were broadcasting the local NBC newscast. Roughly the population of Delaware died in a natural disaster in southeast Asia, but the big headline news these modern day not Einsteins were running with was the natural disaster brewing in New York: almost an inch of snow was crashing to the ground in New York City. AN INCH OF SNOW?!?! In the northeast? In December? Stop the freaking presses. How can we deal with such an impending disaster that might make someone shiver in lower Manhattan? 100,000 dead Indonesians? Eh, who cares? The local newsbabe might need an extra coat of hairspray.
-Speaking of my blessed hometown, I was reminded of this city's disgraceful behavior during the Civil War. I have just about completed Carl Sandburg's tremendous biography of Lincoln, and he chronicled the draft riots which took place in '63. Anyone familiar with this city's history remembers how the kind citizens of New York didn't take too kindly to the calls for more enlistments, and proceeded to burn mansions, cause mass havoc in the city, and hang black people from lamposts. Plenty New Yorkers in fact wished to secede from the Union themselves, and many was the daily newspaper, especially the Daily News and others which regularly lampooned President Lincoln and lent aid and comfort to the southern rebels. But of course we have heard modern commentators mock the current south for its behavior of a century and a half ago. Little do they note the equally offensive behavior of the supposedly enlightened city folk who did as much as to wreck the Union cause as any Johnny Reb.
- Well, that's really all I wanted to say. Yeah, it's a crappy random musings column when you have two items, and one of them relates to events 150 years old. But I am back home, and I have been away from the computer, so there's not much to kevetch about. Well, I could call out Jets' offensive coordinator Paul Hackett for his completely unimaginative play calling, but it is the holiday season, and why trouble someone who's about to get canned anyway?
-I never watch the local news. Simply put, local newspeople are morons that make Maureen Dowd look worthy of a Pulitzer. In fact, I rarely even watch any news at all, except for maybe a few minutes of Fox News here and there (Yeah, I said Fox News, big whoop, wanna fight about it?). Anyway, I unfortunately walked by the television Sunday night as the Stepford people were broadcasting the local NBC newscast. Roughly the population of Delaware died in a natural disaster in southeast Asia, but the big headline news these modern day not Einsteins were running with was the natural disaster brewing in New York: almost an inch of snow was crashing to the ground in New York City. AN INCH OF SNOW?!?! In the northeast? In December? Stop the freaking presses. How can we deal with such an impending disaster that might make someone shiver in lower Manhattan? 100,000 dead Indonesians? Eh, who cares? The local newsbabe might need an extra coat of hairspray.
-Speaking of my blessed hometown, I was reminded of this city's disgraceful behavior during the Civil War. I have just about completed Carl Sandburg's tremendous biography of Lincoln, and he chronicled the draft riots which took place in '63. Anyone familiar with this city's history remembers how the kind citizens of New York didn't take too kindly to the calls for more enlistments, and proceeded to burn mansions, cause mass havoc in the city, and hang black people from lamposts. Plenty New Yorkers in fact wished to secede from the Union themselves, and many was the daily newspaper, especially the Daily News and others which regularly lampooned President Lincoln and lent aid and comfort to the southern rebels. But of course we have heard modern commentators mock the current south for its behavior of a century and a half ago. Little do they note the equally offensive behavior of the supposedly enlightened city folk who did as much as to wreck the Union cause as any Johnny Reb.
- Well, that's really all I wanted to say. Yeah, it's a crappy random musings column when you have two items, and one of them relates to events 150 years old. But I am back home, and I have been away from the computer, so there's not much to kevetch about. Well, I could call out Jets' offensive coordinator Paul Hackett for his completely unimaginative play calling, but it is the holiday season, and why trouble someone who's about to get canned anyway?
# posted by Paul Zummo : 12:23 AM
