Happy Blue Year!!!

So, I went last night I went to bed around 10:00 PM, slept through all the celebrations, and finally drug my butt out of bed around 0730 this AM.  My opinion for a number of years is that if the Earth is 4.5 billion years old (give or take 50 million) what's one more year.
If there was anything, it was that we've managed to so far survive the age of the Idiot Jerk in the White House. 
A more unpopular president has never been seen so early in his presidency, and for so long.
While some say it's too early to forecast 2018 in terms of politics, a number are already attempting to call the shots, and the handicappers are already beginning to place their bets.  Isn't it interesting that they're predicting an at least an additional 24 Blue Seats in the House, maybe more?  They're also predicting a shift in the Senate.  Now that's something to really celebrate!
With that in mind, I'm wishing everybody out there a Happy Blue Year!!

Let the Blue Flags Wave!!

Revolution is a Liberal Concept

I went to see "Rogue One" last night and was... surprised.  Where as the original "Star Wars," Episode 4 as it is now called, was a Space Western, "Rogue One" is a Space War movie and is, without a doubt, the darkest chapter in the "Star Wars" saga.  The first 6 films were kid friendly with cutsie aliens, and though this latest chapter has aliens they are not cutsie.  "Rogue One" is a movie about revolutionaries, and their revolution, as are all, is bloody.  There are no adorable aliens designed by the marketing department here.  And it is good.  Instead we have freedom fighters who will assassinate if need be, who will sabotage, who will strike at anything and everything they believe to be evil... ie The Empire.  There is no neat and clean Millennium Falcon in this movie, or space slugs, or cafe scenes in this movie.

And as I was driving home afterwards I started thinking about Revolution and those who create it, and those who join up, and those who fight against it.  Even though many, many conservatives would like to put their label on our Founding Fathers, those men were anything but conservative.  Revolution is a liberal concept.  During our revolutionary war, the true conservatives were the Tories and the Loyalists, who did not want change, who wanted to remain steadfast in their loyalty to the throne.  If you don't believe me just look at our constitution.  "All men" is all inclusive, liberal and even today, revolutionary.
"Rogue One" is a revolutionary film which is far from happy.  Characters you care about die.  They sacrifice their lives for a cause which they believe is true.  This a movie about fighting back.  Millions of people in America have gone to see it and for many, I suppose, a bit of an awakening.  "La La Land" may have won a shit load of awards at the Golden Globes, but "Rogue One" may end up being the most influential film of 2016.

Rough Shoulders Ahead for Fox News?

Even though I don't watch Fox News, I get them.  They want to be the conservative mouthpiece of America, which for them means ratings.  Honestly, that is all they are concerned about, nothing else.  News is business.  To be successful your business needs to target a certain type of consumer.  This is why Best Buy doesn't sell clothing and Home Depot doesn't have a dairy section.  Fox wants every conservative in the United States to watch them, and only them.  This is where they run into trouble.  In order for them to maintain their image as the conservative mouthpiece, they need to brand every other media outlet as 'liberal' or 'progressive.'  Unfortunately for them, Independent voters are growing, and you can't count on every one registered as Republican or Democrat to stringently vote the party line.  In other words, if the United States was a two lane highway, in most cases, about 60% of Americans would hang around the yellow line.  True, they may veer a little to the left to pass on some issues and on others a little to the right but over all they go right down the center.  For Fox News to be the conservative mouthpiece. they need to push that yellow line as far to the left as possible in order to call it liberal.  As a result, Fox news seems to be spending a majority of it's time bouncing around on the shoulder and losing clout with those riding down the center line.

Are there rough shoulders ahead for Fox News?

This does not mean they will completely lose their audience, they can always count on that 25% to 27% the blood of the far right flowing through their veins.  Those people will only ever watch Fox so that part of the market is safe.  Others, however started dabbling a while back.  They will not only watch Fox News, but will also watch a little MSNBC and even a couple minutes a week of CNN.  A interesting statistic I ran across was that during the 2012 Presidential Debates more Americans turned into MSNBC.   Hhhmmm.  Were they more liberal, or more centrist.  Could it have been because that news network doesn't preach or pass judgement?  Or that they have both Republicans and Democrats on their staff?  Who knows.  I think we'll just have to tune in and see.