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Just the real facts!

Just the facts, use them to make an informed vote this November!

In May 2015, conservative New York Times columnist David Brooks mentioned on PBS’s Newshour that the Obama administration has been remarkably scandal-free:

“President Obama has run an amazingly scandal-free administration, not only he himself, but the people around him. He’s chosen people who have been pretty scandal-free.”

As Obama’s administration winds to a close, that remains true. Not one criminal indictment for anyone in the Obama administration over the entire eight years of his tenure. In fact, it is the only Presidential administration since Watergate to end with zero criminal indictments. 

The GOP leadership in the Senate is trying to ram through as many as Trump’s controversial nominees as quickly as possible. Most of them have not yet completed FBI security clearance checks or ethics reviews by the United States Office of Government Ethics, something that OGE Director Walter M. Shaub, Jr. has said in a letter has never happened in the four decades since the OGE was established. 

This actually puts Trump’s nominees at personal considerable risk. The OGE serves to protect them from potential violations of ethics laws. An ethical review before Senate confirmation allows them to address potential ethical conflicts by, for example, divesting themselves of their stock holdings or even withdrawing their nomination. But if an ethical violation is discovered after confirmation, it could result in criminal indictments and potential jail sentences for those individuals.

If Obama’s administration is considered to be the least scandal-ridden, it made me wonder which administrations in recent history were the most scandal-ridden?

Comparing scandals by administration

In comparing scandals by administration, first I had to decide what constituted a scandal. How many were genuine problems versus those artificially hyped by opposition parties. Benghazi? Whitewater? Travelgate? 

Even when someone was forced to resign over a scandal, how much of that was politically motivated rather than a criminal issue, like Joycelyn Elders’ masturbation comments or Shirley Sherrod’s firing over what turned out to be a doctored video?

I ultimately relied on Wikipedia’s list of federal political scandals in the U.S., but limited it to only the executive branch scandals that actually resulted in a criminal indictment. I also decided to only go back as far as Richard Nixon, whose participation in Watergate ultimately resulted in him being the only sitting president to ever resign. This lets many other scandal-ridden administrations off the hook—notably that of Warren Harding and the Teapot Dome scandal, and of Ulysses S. Grant and the Whiskey Ring and Black Friday scandals—but so be it.

The chart below only includes people who served in the administration, and excludes others (like members of Congress and private individuals) who may have also been swept up and indicted for the same scandal. The “Convictions” list includes both those who went to trial and were found guilty as well as those who plea bargained and pleaded guilty. The “Prison Sentences” should be considered a minimum figure, as Wikipedia's list wasn’t always clear on penalties and I wasn’t able to look all of the unclear ones up. 

EXECUTIVE BRANCH CRIMINAL ACTIVITIES BY PRESIDENTIAL ADMINISTRATION

ADMINISTRATION

PART

BARACK OBAMA   Years     criminal      criminal      prison

Democratic              in office  indictments  convictions   sentences

                                        8             0               0                  0

                                                                 GEORGE W. BUSH        8             16             16                9

Republican

BILL CLINTON               8                2              1                1

Democratic

GEORGE H. W. BUSH   4                1              1                1

Republican

RONALD REAGAN        8               26             16              8

Republican

JIMMY CARTER             4                1                0             0

Democratic

GERALD FORD             2.4              1                1             1

Republican

RICHARD NIXON           5.6             76              55           15

Republican

Overall, Richard Nixon’s administration had the most criminal indictments and convictions. Wikipedia’s list enumerates 13 specific individuals who were convicted and imprisoned over Watergate alone, but notes that a total of 69 officials were indicted for the scandal and 48 were either convicted or pleaded guilty. (Nixon himself is not included; after his resignation, President Gerald Ford gave him a blanket pardon, sparing him from any potential indictments. However, his first vice president, Spiro Agnew, is included for indictments unrelated to Watergate.)

The Reagan Administration is next with 26 indictments and 16 convictions (including guilty pleas), followed by the George W. Bush Administration with 16 indictments, all ending in convictions or guilty pleas. The Nixon Administration had at least 15 people serve at least some time in prison for their crimes, while Bush 43’s administration had at least 9 and the Reagan Administration had at least 8. (Scooter Libby’s sentence is included here even though Bush pardoned him in 2007 before he was sent to jail, since the pardon did not expunge the crime and the pardon itself is a political act, not a judicial determination. But others whose convictions were later overturned—like Oliver North’s and John Poindexter’s—are included under indictments but not convictions since it wouldn’t be appropriate for us to second-guess the courts’ reasoning for overturning those convictions.) 

All those Clinton White House “scandals”? Despite hundreds of thousands of dollars spent on hearings on Whitewater, Travelgate, the use of the White House Christmas card list, and other oddities, almost all resulted in absolutely nothing. Clinton himself isn’t included. As with Nixon, the impeachment proceedings themselves should count as an indictment, and in the end his only citation was for contempt of court, which I didn’t interpret as the same as an indictment. (I will update this if folks show me this was incorrect.) The only indictments for his administration were of his Secretary of Agriculture Mike Espy (who was acquitted of all 30 charges) and of Espy’s chief of staff Ronald Blackely, who was convicted of making a false statement and sentenced to 27 months in prison. 

The George H. W. Bush Administration only had a single criminal indictment, but it’s notable for two reasons. It was the only time that a U.S. treasurer has ever gone to prison. But Catalina Vasquez Villalpando’s conviction and sentence is probably less notable than who didn’t go to jail: President Bush 41 himself escaped potentially ruinous scandal by granting clemency to six people indicted in the Reagan Administration’s Iran-Contra scandal, thereby avoiding trials that could have exposed Bush 41’s involvement.

Executive branch criminal actions from Richard Nixon through Barack Obama.

Comparing scandals by party

Just glancing at the chart above, it’s pretty clear which administrations are the most criminal, but let’s roll up the data anyway.

EXECUTIVE BRANCH CRIMINAL ACTIVITIES BY PARTY SINCE 1968

ADMINISTRATION total years  criminal      criminal        prison

                                 in office   indictments convictions   terms     

DEMOCRATIC             20              3                    1                  1

REPUBLICAN              28            120                 89                34

THE RIGHT WING

The Past 5 GOP Presidents Have Used Fraud and Treason to Steer Themselves to Electoral Victory

The deception started long before Donald Trump.

By Thom Hartmann / AlterNet

  People are wondering out loud about the parallels between today’Republican Party and organized crime, and whether “Teflon Don” Trump will remain unscathed through his many scandals, ranging from interactions with foreign oligarchs to killing tens of thousands of Americans by denying them healthcare to stepping up the destruction of our environment and public lands.  

History suggests – even if treason can be demonstrated – that, as long as he holds onto the Republican Party (and Fox News), he’ll survive it intact. And he won’t be the first Republican president to commit high crimes to get and stay in office.  

In fact, Eisenhower was the last legitimately elected Republican president we’ve had in this country.

Since Dwight Eisenhower left the presidency in 1961, six different Republicans have occupied the Oval Office.

And every single one of them - from Richard Nixon to Donald Trump - have been illegitimate - ascending to the highest office in the land not through small-D democratic elections - but instead through fraud and treason.

(And today’s GOP-controlled Congress is arguably just as corrupt and illegitimate, acting almost entirely within the boundaries set by an organized group of billionaires.)  

Let’s start at the beginning with Richard Nixon.

In 1968 - President Lyndon Johnson was desperately trying to end the Vietnam war.

But Richard Nixon knew that if the war continued - it would tarnish Democrat (and Vice President) Hubert Humphrey’s chances of winning the 1968 election.

So Nixon sent envoys from his campaign to talk to South Vietnamese leaders to encourage them not to attend an upcoming peace talk in Paris.

Nixon promised South Vietnam’s corrupt politicians that he would give them a richer deal when he was President than LBJ could give them then.

LBJ found out about this political maneuver to prolong the Vietnam war just 3 days before the 1968 election. He phoned the Republican Senate leader Everett Dirksen – here’s an excerpt (you can listen to the entire conversation here):

President Johnson: 

Some of our folks, including some of the old China lobby, are going to the Vietnamese embassy and saying please notify the [South Vietnamese] president that if he'll hold out 'til November the second they could get a better deal. Now, I'm reading their hand, Everett. I don't want to get this in the campaign.

And they oughtn't to be doin' this. This is treason.

Sen. Dirksen: I know.

After Nixon left office the same way he entered it - by virtue of breaking the law - Gerald Ford took over.

Ford was never elected to the White House (he was appointed to replace VP Spiro Agnew, after Agnew was indicted for decades of taking bribes), and thus would never have been President had it not been for Richard Nixon’s treason.

-21%

The third was Ronald Reagan, elected in 1980.

He won thanks to a little something called the October Surprise - when his people sabotaged then-President Jimmy Carter’s negotiations to release American hostages in Iran.

According to Iran’s then-president, Reagan’s people promised the Iranians that if they held off on releasing the American hostages until just after the election - then Reagan would give them a sweet weapons deal.

In 1980 Carter thought he had reached a deal with newly-elected Iranian President Abdolhassan Bani-Sadr over the release of the fifty-two hostages held by radical students at the American Embassy in Tehran.

-30%

Bani-Sadr was a moderate and, as he explained in an editorial for The Christian Science Monitor earlier this year, had successfully run for President on the popular position of releasing the hostages:

"I openly opposed the hostage-taking throughout the election campaign.... I won the election with over 76 percent of the vote.... Other candidates also were openly against hostage-taking, and overall, 96 percent of votes in that election were given to candidates who were against it [hostage-taking]."

Carter was confident that with Bani-Sadr's help, he could end the embarrassing hostage crisis that had been a thorn in his political side ever since it began in November of 1979. But Carter underestimated the lengths his opponent

in the 1980 Presidential election, California Governor Ronald Reagan, would go to win an election.

-in the 1980 Presidential election, California Governor Ronald Reagan, would go to win an election.

Behind Carter's back, the Reagan campaign worked out a deal with the leader of Iran's radical faction - Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini - to keep the hostages in captivity until after the 1980 Presidential election.

This was nothing short of treason.

of 2013:

After arriving in France [in 1981], I told a BBC reporter that I had left Iran to expose the symbiotic relationship between Khomeinism and Reaganism.

Ayatollah Khomeini and Ronald Reagan had organized a clandestine negotiation, later known as the “October Surprise,” which prevented the attempts by myself and then-US President Jimmy Carter to free the hostages before the 1980 US presidential election took place. The fact that they were not released tipped the results of the election in favor of Reagan.

And Reagan’s treason - just like Nixon’s treason - worked perfectly.

The Iran hostage crisis continued and torpedoed Jimmy Carter's re-election hopes.

And the same day Reagan took the oath of office - almost to the minute, by way of Iran’s acknowledging the deal - the American hostages in Iran were released.

And for that, Reagan began selling the Iranians weapons and spare parts in 1981, and continued until he was busted for it in 1986, producing the so-called "Iran Contra" scandal.

But, like Nixon, Reagan was never held to account for the criminal and treasonous actions that brought him to office.

After Reagan - Bush senior was elected - but like Gerry Ford - Bush was really only President because he served as Vice President under Reagan.

If the October Surprise hadn’t hoodwinked voters in 1980 - you can bet Bush senior would never have been elected in 1988. That's four illegitimate Republican presidents.

And that brings us to George W. Bush, the man who was given the White House by five right-wing justices on the Supreme Court.

In the Bush v. Gore Supreme Court decision in 2000 that stopped the Florida recount and thus handed George W. Bush the presidency - Justice Antonin Scalia wrote in his opinion:

"The counting of votes ... does in my view threaten irreparable harm to petitioner [George W. Bush], and to the country, by casting a cloud upon what he [Bush] claims to be the legitimacy of his election."

Apparently, denying the presidency to Al Gore, the guy who actually won the most votes in Florida, did not constitute "irreparable harm" to Scalia or the media.

And apparently it wasn't important that Scalia’s son worked for the law firm that was defending George W. Bush before the high court (thus no Scalia recusal).

Just like it wasn't important to mention that Justice Clarence Thomas's wife worked on the Bush transition team and was busy accepting resumes from people who would serve in the Bush White House if her husband stopped the recount in Florida...which he did.  (No Thomas recusal, either.)

And more than a year after the election - a consortium of newspapers including The Washington Post, The New York Times, and USA Today did their own recount in Florida - manually counting every vote in a process that took almost a year - and concluded that Al Gore did indeed win the presidency in 2000.

As the November 12th, 2001 article in The New York Times read:

“If all the ballots had been reviewed under any of seven single standards and combined with the results of an examination of overvotes, Mr. Gore would have won.”

That little bit of info was slipped into the seventeenth paragraph of the Times story on purpose so that it would attract as little attention as possible around the nation.

Why? because the 9/11 attacks had just happened - and journalists feared that burdening Americans with the plain truth that George W. Bush actually lost the election would further hurt a nation that was already in crisis.

And none of that even considered that Bush could only have gotten as close to Gore as he did because his brother, Florida Governor Jeb Bush, had ordered his Secretary of State, Kathrine Harris, to purge at least 57,000 mostly-Black voters from the state’s rolls just before the election.

So for the third time in 4 decades - Republicans took the White House under illegitimate electoral circumstances.  Even President Carter was shocked by the brazenness of that one.

And Jeb Bush and the GOP were never held to account for that crime against democracy.

Most recently, in 2016, Kris Kobach and Republican Secretaries of State across the nation used Interstate Crosscheck to purge millions of legitimate voters – most people of color – from the voting rolls just in time for the Clinton/Trump election.  

Millions of otherwise valid American voters were denied their right to vote because they didn’t own the requisite ID – a modern-day poll-tax that’s spread across every Republican state with any consequential black, elderly, urban, or college-student population (all groups less likely to have a passport or drivers’ license).

Donald Trump still lost the popular vote by nearly 3 million votes, but came to power through an electoral college designed to keep slavery safe in colonial America.

You can only wonder how much better off America would be if 6 Republican Presidents hadn't stolen or inherited a stolen White House.

In fact - the last legitimate Republican President - Dwight Eisenhower - was unlike any other Republican president since.

He ran for the White House on a platform of peace - that he would end the Korean War.

This from one of his TV campaign ads:

“The nation, haunted by the stalemate in Korea, looks to Eisenhower. Eisenhower knows how to deal with the Russians. He has met Europe leaders, has got them working with us. Elect the number one man for the number one job of our time. November 4th vote for peace. Vote for Eisenhower.”

Two of his campaign slogans were "I like Ike" and "Vote For Peace, Vote For Eisenhower".

Ike was a moderate Republican who stood up for working people - who kept tax rates on the rich at 91 percent - and made sure that the middle class in America was protected by FDR's New Deal policies.

As he told his brother Edgar in 1954 in a letter:

"Should any political party attempt to abolish social security, unemployment insurance, and eliminate labor laws and farm programs, you would not hear of that party again in our political history."

And Eisenhower was right - the only way Republicans have been able to win the presidency since he left office in 1961 has been by outright treason, a criminal fraud involving conflicted members of the Supreme Court, or by being vice-president under an already-illegitimate president.

And that's where we are today, dealing with the aftermath of all these Republican crimes and six illegitimate Republican presidents stacking the Supreme Court and the federal judiciary.

And this doesn’t even begin to tell the story of how the Republican majority in the senate represents 36 million fewer Americans than do the Democrats. Or how in most elections in past decades, Democrats have gotten more votes for the House of Representatives, but Republicans have controlled it because of gerrymandering.  

This raises serious questions about the legitimacy of the modern Republican Party itself.  

They work hand-in-glove with a group of right-wing billionaires and billionaire-owned or dominated media outlets like Fox and “conservative” TV and radio outlets across the nation, along with a very well-funded network of rightwing websites.  

The Koch Network’s various groups, for example, have more money, more offices, and more staff than the Republican Party itself. Three times more employees and twice the budget, in fact. Which raises the question: which is the dog, and which is the tail?

And, as we’ve seen so vividly in the “debate” about healthcare this year, the Republicans, like Richard Nixon, are not encumbered by the need to tell the truth.

Whether it’s ending trade deals, bringing home jobs, protecting Social Security and Medicaid, or saving our public lands and environment – virtually every promise that Trump ran and won on is being broken. Meanwhile, the oligarchs continue to pressure Republican senators to vote their way.

Meanwhile, a public trust that has taken 240 years to build is being destroyed, as public lands, regulatory agencies, and our courts are handed off to oligarchs and transnational corporations to exploit or destroy.

The Trump and Republican campaign of 2016, Americans are now discovering, was nearly all lies, well-supported by a vast right-wing media machine and a timid, profit-obsessed “mainstream” corporate media.  Meanwhile, it seemed that all the Democrats could say was, “The children are watching!”  

Fraud, treason, and lies have worked well for the GOP for half a century.

Thus, the Democrats are right to now fine-tune their message to the people.  But in addition to “A Better Deal,” they may want to consider adding to their agenda a solid RICO investigation into the GOP and the oligarchs who fund it.

It’s way past time to stop the now-routine Republican practice of using treason, lies, and crime to gain and hold political power.

[stopitjuststopit]

You’ve heard of a “3dog night.” This is a “3cap day”. This is the first time in history I’ve had to place the 3 caps of my teams on the TV to root them in! Dodgers & Trojans on at 5 pm, Lakers @ 7:30. The first two are monumentally important! Go Trojans, Dodgers and Lakers! (at Granada Hills, California) https://www.instagram.com/p/BpKjEVqAReiI3KEdaH9OGaP5xLzvQHglLShHgQ0/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=cqxbab6yv9o2

[stopitjuststopit]

Two Grammies with the boys after a Sunday early dinner at Yard House. Of course a yogurt and Dipndots chaser too. (at Yard House)

[stopitjuststopit]

GOP Ryan speech

It’s really quite a chore to sit and watch the proceedings at the RNC Convention without talking back to the TV. Although it is fun to see the only speakers actually endorsing the candidate are his family. The hardest to watch was Paul Ryan while trashing the President for any and everything, he also spewed out blatant lies about the agenda of the Republican party. He spoke of wages never going up as his candidate states about the minimum wage that Americans make too high of wages already. He speaks of the poor, and how the GOP will create more jobs for them, but his candidate actually makes nothing that is made in the U.S. He speaks of the economy being stuck while facts and history show that whenever there is a Republican in the White House the economy is trashed and the deposits rise dramatically. This is not a party as they claim to be fiscally responsible and smaller government. They spend like drunken sailors on leave while using more government to tell people what to do with their bodies.

He said the democrats are progressive elitists, while his party still supports tax cuts for the richest 1% of the population, and BTW his candidate is one of the !%. He spoke of middle class security and poverty growing as his party is responsible for the dying middle class with their support of the most drastic income inequality this country has ever known. Speaking of security, he wants to dismantle Social Security and calls it an entitlement, when hard working Americans have paid most of their working lives into it. While Congress [who actually is on their own entitlement program] has robbed billions from social security which should be paid back to the fund.

He wants to dismantle Medicare, and repeal Obamacare which is flawed only because compromises were made to appease the GOP House. It was supposed to be a single payer program like the entire free world already has in place for their citizens. He claimed that progressive Democrats are retreating from the world, when the GOP constantly endorses an Isolationist position in the world. He speaks of supporting our veterans when each and every time a bill comes up for better veteran benefits, Republicans in congress vote against it.

He said when it comes to ideas we [Republicans] have the advantage. That’s so true if he means bad ideas? Does he mean not believing climate change is real [even though the lion share of scientist around the globe disagree?] Is it being against the green movement, and alternative energy sources, or rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure to create more jobs? Their idea must be drilling for more oil and mining for more coal, and fracking!

This is the party that supports greed. Big Oil, Big Pharma, the AMA who know that Americans who are sick and dying is way more profitable to them than finding a way to keep them healthy. It’s better to the bottom line if Corporate America is allowed to pollute and trash the planet, also at the expense of our health.

Finally Ryan says that Republicans believe everyone is equal, no one is written off, and there is worth and goodness in every life. That statement is true unless of course you are talking about African Americans, Mexicans, Asians, Muslims, Women, and LGBT. So please Mr. Ryan don’t attempt to take credits for issues that we all know you have no intention of supporting now or anytime soon.

[stopitjuststopit]

GOP Ryan speech

It’s really quite a chore to sit and watch the proceedings at the RNC Convention without talking back to the TV. Although it is fun to see the only speakers actually endorsing the candidate are his family. The hardest to watch was Paul Ryan while trashing the President for any and everything, he also spewed out blatant lies about the agenda of the Republican party. He spoke of wages never going up as his candidate states about the minimum wage that Americans make too high of wages already. He speaks of the poor, and how the GOP will create more jobs for them, but his candidate actually makes nothing that is made in the U.S. He speaks of the economy being stuck while facts and history show that whenever there is a Republican in the White House the economy is trashed and the deposits rise dramatically. This is not a party as they claim to be fiscally responsible and smaller government. They spend like drunken sailors on leave while using more government to tell people what to do with their bodies.

He said the democrats are progressive elitists, while his party still supports tax cuts for the richest 1% of the population, and BTW his candidate is one of the !%. He spoke of middle class security and poverty growing as his party is responsible for the dying middle class with their support of the most drastic income inequality this country has ever known. Speaking of security, he wants to dismantle Social Security and calls it an entitlement, when hard working Americans have paid most of their working lives into it. While Congress [who actually is on their own entitlement program] has robbed billions from social security which should be paid back to the fund.

He wants to dismantle Medicare, and repeal Obamacare which is flawed only because compromises were made to appease the GOP House. It was supposed to be a single payer program like the entire free world already has in place for their citizens. He claimed that progressive Democrats are retreating from the world, when the GOP constantly endorses an Isolationist position in the world. He speaks of supporting our veterans when each and every time a bill comes up for better veteran benefits, Republicans in congress vote against it.

He said when it comes to ideas we [Republicans] have the advantage. That’s so true if he means bad ideas? Does he mean not believing climate change is real [even though the lion share of scientist around the globe disagree?] Is it being against the green movement, and alternative energy sources, or rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure to create more jobs? Their idea must be drilling for more oil and mining for more coal, and fracking!

This is the party that supports greed. Big Oil, Big Pharma, the AMA who know that Americans who are sick and dying is way more profitable to them than finding a way to keep them healthy. It’s better to the bottom line if Corporate America is allowed to pollute and trash the planet, also at the expense of our health.

Finally Ryan says that Republicans believe everyone is equal, no one is written off, and there is worth and goodness in every life. That statement is true unless of course you are talking about African Americans, Mexicans, Asians, Muslims, Women, and LGBT. So please Mr. Ryan don’t attempt to take credits for issues that we all know you have no intention of supporting now or anytime soon.

[stopitjuststopit]

“WHEN YOU’RE IN CHARGE IT’S ALWAYS YOUR FAULT”

That’s right Jim Buss, you did this. It’s all on you Bro!! You were so insistent on driving your sisters fiance out of town you hired this jerk instead. Neither of you knew the personnel on your roster was not a fit for his system. So in trying to cement a legacy for yourself, you destroyed your dad’s legacy in one fell swoop, and killed the last years of Kobe’s career in the process. Not to mention driving Pau out of town too.  

If Phil was coaching that year, there’s no way Kobe plays all those minutes in the last 33 games will the team into the playoffs. The result is a ruptured achilles and as we say the rest is history. 

Now even though we are armed with the 7th pick last year, the 2nd pick this year, you can’t stop swinging and missing at every free agent on the planet. Everyone knows there’s a doufous running Laker basketball operations now!! So as you put it we’re supposed to cut you some slack for 3 more years? If it looks like a skunk, smells like a skunk, it’s got Pepe LePew written all over it dude!! Hang em up now and save all us Laker fans any more embarrassments.

BA

[stopitjuststopit]

INGLEWOOD NOT CARSON FOLKS!!

[stopitjuststopit]

OK now I have heard it all. The Chargers and Raiders [who hate each other] are going to join forces to build a stadium in [you'll pardon the expression] Carson? This makes no sense on just about every level. First the site is on a landfill and just a few blocks away from a housing development that's oozing oil out of the ground because Exxon Mobil previously owned the property. Next the chance of the NFL placing 2 AFC teams in the same stadium is not likely. 

The Raiders coming back would only bring more fan violence back as they would certainly attract the gang banger element that made the games so uncomfortable the last time they were here. I certainly remember those games, and the fact that anyone wearing the other teams gear was taking their life in jeopardy every Sunday. Now add the fact that they have been a really terrible team since they left here 20 years ago. They can continue to stink in Oakland and not bring that stench south again. 

Let's get that Inglewood Stadium deal done, and bring our Rams back. St. Louis was just renting them for a while anyway. We beat them 48 years to 20 years. The Rams moved here from Cleveland in 1946, and stayed until that bogus chorus girl ran off with them in 1994. The Chargers would make the perfect second team to join them in Inglewood. One NFC west, and one AFC west team is much better, and a safer fan experience all around. 

So Stan Kroenke's now got both of these teams running so scared now that they are willing to actually like each other and move into a land fill. How utterly desperate of them. The fact still remains out of any team that might possibly  have an interest in moving here, the Rams have the best built in fan base, and history in Los Angeles. 

[stopitjuststopit]

So after the disheartening 8-5 loss Wednesday night, Donnie "not" Baseball is playing the silver linings card. Of course he is considering he's the reason they lost!! Plaschke stated 2 managerial blunders in extra innings, but if you count falling asleep in the dugout while Jansen imploded, it makes 3. If Rick Monday, and Charlie Steiner can easily see Jansen lost 5 mph off his fastball from the broadcast booth, why didn't Mattingly see it from the dugout? At least he could've pulled him before he gave up the go ahead run.

The skipper still hasn't learned from these errors in judgement from last seasons playoffs, and continues to make the same blunders. I'm just a fan, but he's paid big bucks to do this, yet he is ignorant to the simplest baseball strategies. With the slow footed catcher Ellis in scoring position he doesn't put a runner in for him even though he has a third catcher in the dugout. The next batter singles, and voila Ellis can only move to 3rd base. Now Donnie puts the runner 

in,.............. really now Donnie??  I could predict the 3rd. blunder, as he made it several times against St. Louis in last years NLCS. This guy just loves to bunt runners over so his hot hitter on deck will draw the intentional walk, with a ,180 hitter now on deck. I may be just a fan but at least "I"  can see Donnie Baseball is not a capable Major League Manager. 

BA

[stopitjuststopit]

Back in my Frat days I was known as the King of Corn, which might explain this post. Lennon once said of McCartney, "the only thing you did was Yesterday". But of course John's mother once said to him at the dinner table "all that I'm saying is give peas a chance". Not sure any of this explains much of anything, other than my wacked out sense of humor. Enjoy it or not.......your choice. BA

[stopitjuststopit]

"Really LADWP, you gotta be kidding with this BS?"

The town is abuzz about the 1921 water main in Westwood that ruptured yesterday afternoon, creating a a 30-foot geyser and then a 15-foot sinkhole in Sunset Boulevard and flooding parts of nearby UCLA. LADWP couldn't turn the main off until about four hours after it first ruptured and there are "at least" two sections that are still leaking near the break, which over the afternoon let loose something like eight to ten million gallons of water. (The whole thing is reminiscent of the summer of 2009, when the city's aging pipes, unable to handle variations in water pressure due to water rationing, started bursting all over the place.) Meanwhile, UCLA's still a mess—as of this morning, more than 700 cars are still at least partially under water, a section of Sunset is still closed, and the cleanup effort will probably take days, says KPCC. (How many days? No one's saying yet.) The deluge would be unbelievable, were it not for camera phones and Twitter. We've collected several of the most stunning flood photos after the jump.

I posted the story above for the uninformed among you. But the DWP has got some extreme balls to tell us we can only water our yards 3 days a week for 8 minutes on each sprinkler station. Damn every winter i drive by a park that's got pre-set rainbirds going during a thunderstorm. And now they drop 10 million gallons of prime H20 all over the UCLA campus. It's time the city and DWP get off their butts and start a maintenance program before L.A. turns back into a desert.

BA

[stopitjuststopit]

  Let the games begin………………………………………..

  We all know what happens when a huge political story is about to break. Along comes Paris Hilton, Britiney Spears, Lindsey Lohan, and whatever the Kardashian flavor of the month is. The general public is then so distracted they completely forget about or just don’t care about the other story. This is the way I felt when the Lakers front office  announced they were bringing back D’Antoni for next year. I was outraged, and thought Laker fans all over the southland would be too. But right at the same moment up pops Lindsey Lohan in the form of an 80 year old racist billionaire. Yes Good old Donald Sterling took all the heat off the Lakers continuing blunder. The story was non-existent, could not be read about it, or hear it talked about because of the feeding frenzie Sterling created.

  Then the most unlikely of scenarios took place, Mike D’Antoni up and resigned. He saved the Laker brain trust of all further embarrassment. Although we still must remember, they WERE going to bring him back. Now this brings me to the crazy shit going on all over sports these days. Yay the Dodgers got paid 8.5 billion dollars by Time Warner Cable to broadcast all their games, and voila 75% of the Dodgers audience now are unable to see even one game. Maybe it’s Vince Scully’s last year, who knows? Hey the Yankees have their won station, but New Yorkers can actually watch the Bronx Bombers everyday if they want to.

  This madness has reached down to NCAA Division 1 sports, as the new super conferences, are sporting their own networks too. Oh Yeah but just try to find a cable venue that carries, the new PAC 12 network. Again it’s the dreaded Time Warner Cable only!!

  So our sports have come down to clueless coaches, corrupt NCAA officials, cheating NBA referees, and a commissioner who not only let them do it, but encouraged it. He did nothing for 33 years while Donald Sterling played the race card even though he owned a team in a league that is 75% African American. The NFL news looks more like a police blotter, and minor league baseball has taken to biting ears off!!

  Am I gonna stop caring about  it? Not hardly, but it’s getting harder to actually see even my own three teams, that I want to watch The Lakers, the Dodgers, and the Trojans. Maybe we can get the Rams back now that Georgia has passed on? Let’s hope so.

  BA

[stopitjuststopit]

The 1989 California State Fair asked for the Hollywood Studios to help put together a special effects exhibit in an 8000 sq. ft. building. They all declined except my boss at MGM, David Gerber. I organized a stunt show, an interactive blue screen show, a robotics exhibit, an interactive effects make-up exhibit, and a foley exhibit. This is the video I created to play on the  6 foot monitor at the entrance. Hard to believe it was 25 years ago now...................enjoy.

BA

[stopitjuststopit]

FANCY FREE, AND PITCHY TOO............................WTF?

BA

[stopitjuststopit]

THE STAR SPANGLED BANGER........................OOOPS.

more corn wars.

BA

[stopitjuststopit]

Wait what about "Rolling Stone Soup", "Dennis the Menace 2 Society", "Rihanna & Charlie Brown", "Baby Blues Suede Shoes", and "Dagwood & Debra Harry"? BA

[stopitjuststopit]

"TO BEE OR NOT TO BEE?, THAT IS THE QUESTION" BA