Reclaiming the Title

You gotta fight! For your right! To Parrrrtayyyy!

2009-05-29T15:54:00.000-07:00

This is our last day at this URL. We're over at reclaimingthetitle.wordpress.com. If you come here next week we'll be updating less than usual (aka not at all). So please join us at the new digs, and enjoy this last post on the original site. Appropriately it's about racist, rich white people.

We haven't commented on this yet, let's remedy that. Maxim's is suing to stay open after a group of Brookside residents successfully lobbied to have it's permit to be pulled despite the fact that they were the only group of people to really oppose Maxim's. And when we say only group we really mean the only group. This wasn't even the official Brookside association of stuck up old white people. It was just a bunch of people who were pissy because it wasn't the upscale expensive restaurant owner Bobby Dhillon said it was going to be. Because, as we all know, someone's already got a stranglehold on the expensive, upscale restaurant market.

Since the whole restaurant thing wasn't working out, Dhillon made the savvy business decision to switch formats at night and turned the bar area into a nightclub. Because when business goes sour you make changes, instead of bitching to your friends about unfair imaginary boycotts.

So an out of town businessman opens up a business in a vacant building (in this case the old Mallard's) and finds success after some initial bumps in the road and strengthens the local entertainment scene while he's at it. It's a fairy tale story and exactly what the city wants, right? Everybody wins!

Oh wait, this is Stockton. It can't be that simple. Especially because the key to Maxim's success apparently involved playing (gasp!) hip-hop (or as a Recordnet commenter referred to it "annoying boom boom noises")! And, I don't need to tell you that hip-hop is a form music that's usually popular with (whispers) black people. Brookside's track record with minorities is well documented, so they proceeded to complaining about noise, lies, and increased crime.

That last one is interesting considering Stockton PD straight up said the restaurant hadn't caused an uptick in crime. And they should know, the highest concentration of cops in all of Stockton is in Brookside. All they had to report was a single stabbing in the parking lot in the whole year Maxim's has been doing business. They must have missed the "gun battle" Recordnet commenter PeterChu witnessed (and apparently didn't report) involving what he assumed were Maxim's patrons. Why did he assume they were from Maxim's? Unless he was directly involved in said gun battle, it just takes us to the point of this whole issue. He judged a book by its cover. Its dark-skinned, hip-hop loving cover.

Racism has been at the center of this issue since it started. Even Maxim's lawyer, David LeBeouf, straight up said it was because Brookside folk don't like black people in their neighborhood. Lawyers are supposed to dance around the issue and put things diplomatically, but hey, wild accusations of racism work too. Mostly because it's totally true. LeBeouf even offered to amend the permit to allow certain types of music, but disallow hip-hop/rap. Now, most normal people would say "Hey, isn't that kind of racist?", but not Brookside. They don't like it because it's unenforcible, not because it's totally racist. Although I would totally have joined the committee responsible for deciding what music was acceptable and what constituted hip-hop had the City Council accepted that proposal.

Of course, if they had accepted that proposal, Brookside's claim that the loud music is a nuisance would be exposed as bullshit. Loud hip-hop isn't ok but loud jazz is? That makes no sense. Loud is loud. Plus, there are plenty of house parties thrown in Brookside on a weekly basis that feature loud music (and occasionally hip-hop!). The difference between that and Maxim's? Well, Maxim's isn't a bunch of entitled white kids.

So yeah, we've debunked Brookside's claims that Maxim's attracts crime and pointed out that their noise complaints are total bullshit, so that leaves only one more problem that they have with Maxim's that doesn't involve race. The "Bobby Dhillon lied to us and said this was going to be a family restaurant!" part. To which we say, grow the fuck up! This is the real world we live in, people lie all the fucking time. And the thing is, Dhillon didn't lie. As far as I know, Maxim's is still a fancy family style restaurant during the day. It's just that occasionally at nights the bar is really hopping and it resembles a night club. You're going to fault a guy for running a business? Like we said earlier, business plans change. It happens. Sorry if you wanted an upscale family joint, but if you wanted it that bad you should have gone there. They're a business, not a fucking charity, they have to turn a profit. Trying to limit how they turn a profit by limiting the music they can play actually is a violation of their first amendment rights. Sure, it might be a very loose translation of the firt amendment, but if they want to use it to tell the world (or at least their bar area) "Awww skeet skeet!" then by all means it's their right to do so.

Luckily, Maxim's isn't going to take this lying down. They're challeneging the City's ruling to deny them an entertainment permit (which may have already been ruled on by now, news is moving slow). So hopefully they get an injuction or whatever and get to keep on partying. Because with publicity like this, you can imagine the amount of people that are going to show up this weekend to give Brookside the proverbial middle finger by loudly partying their asses off. Brookside wanted a fight and it looks like Maxim's is prepared to fight back. They've only been here a year and they got this Stockton thing down pretty good. So fight on Maxim's. Fight for our right to party (We're pretty sure this song would not be banned due to the color of their skin).

Best Crawl Ever

2009-05-29T08:56:00.000-07:00

So I guess I've been charged with retelling the tale of our Pub Crawl drunkedness, which would be easier if I could remember it all. Hell, it'd be easier if I could remember most of it. Luckily I have our Twitter feed, pictures, and the memories of the soberer (aka everybody else) to help jog my memory. Without that we'd be completely screwed.

Regardless, we started off the night early because we always enjoy an opportunity to drink while it's still light out. Misaki's was fairly uneventful, mostly because all of us (sans Bris, the ultimate pregamer) were soberish still. After a quick round of Sake Bombs to remedy that situation we headed towards the Miracle Mile portion of the festivities. Centrale and Alder Market didn't participate this go around, which seems strange considering the only reason I even know about either of those establishments is because of the Pub Crawl.

The bars that were there stepped their game up and embraced the Crawl for all its drunken awesomeness. Valley Brew once again changed its menu from the last time we'd been there (surprise!) and for once, I was disappointed by their deep-fried mushrooms. I'm not sure if we just got an off batch or if they intentionally made them less crispy for the free grub vouchers, but they left a lot to be desired. Luckily ranch fixed that.

Next I'm told we headed to the back of Taste of Brittany, also known as Moulin Rouge. The name brings up memories of a horrible Australian musical, but it's actually a pretty cool place that serves a nice variation of one of my favorite drinks, the screwdriver. We chatted with the owner Dan a bit, he seems pretty cool. We all make a note to come back to next morning for some crepes. None of us make it.

The Matinee earned our derision last crawl with their lackluster Jungle Juice. This time wasn't that much better, but we did get a piece of alcohol soaked fruit to go with it. They packed a decent punch.

After jumping on the trolley towards the Waterfront Warehouse, we noticed the crowd had picked up considerably. While the crowd was still of the slightly-to-considerably older variety, it was still a pretty fun group as everyone was pretty hammered by now. So it was against our better judgement to chug the slurpees masquerading as premixed maitais that they call Hula Girls at the Sunset Grill (nee Waterfront Grill, Boiler Room). Granted, they were delicious going down. But mix all that sugar with the Long Islands, Jungle Juice, sake, beer, vodka, mushrooms, and deep-fried asparagus and the results aren't going to be pretty the next day. But for that night they were fucking awesome. Sunset Grill even had Samoan dancers for some reason.

After that it gets kind of hazy. If I remember correctly we made a quick Chitivas stop and then headed to Beach Hut Deli via trolley. As usual, Beach Hut had the best deal of $1 pints of any beer. A deal which I promptly wasted on Pabst because there was no way I could handle thicker, qualitier beer with all that sweet shit in my stomach. Sadly, Bradley's drink special was also the Orange Lazarus of alcoholic drinks known as Hula Girl, so I stuck around Beach Hut and ate some of their kickass nachos. Because, fuck it, my stomach's already going to hate me, might as well throw in some chips and salsa. Eventually, a band broke out in the corner by the door, which occasionally happens at the Beach Hut.

Eventually we all chugged our beers, and decided we were going to see what was up with ol' Paragary's. You may recall that at the last Crawl we didn't receive the best treatment when attempting to drink there. We drunkenly thought that surely they had come around this time in these hard economic times and take any comer and treat them as royalty. I mean, he's supposedly hurting for customers, right?

Well, we walk in and are immediately shot a dirty look and told that they're closed. Now, mind you the bar is about a quarter full as she tells us this and that it's 10:30 at night on a weekend. An hour and a half before the Pub Crawl ends and well before when any self respecting bar attempting to turn a profit would close. Naturally we ask "Closed? It's 10:30. Why?" and are told that they are in fact, out of drinks. Of course, seeing the full stocked bar behind her, a confused look comes over our face. We reason with ourselves that she means that they're out of the free Hula Girl candy drinks and I go "No, I have money" and proceed to whip out my wallet and display my impressive $45 wad.

I feel I should break here to note that this is probably a milestone in Downtown Stockton's redevelopment that a pessimistic native Stocktonian like myself would willingly open their wallet without fear of ramapercussions in the middle of the night. I mean, this is exactly what they want right? For us to open our wallets to downtown to generate revenue. I wasn't even doing it figuratively, I was doing it literally. And what do I get? I get a "No, we're out." So my friend and I go on a drunken rant about being a paying customer and Paragary's is losing revenue for this reason, and not for any lame subsidy excuses because, well, fuck Paragary's. So the next time Mike Fitzgerald tries to lament the fact that we're petty dicks with a hard on for subsidies, and that's the reason Paragary's has to sell, you can tell him he's dead wrong. It's because shit like this happens. Twice.

After this it gets incredibly hazy as we hiked on over to the Hippo Bar, which is massive, and drown our sorrows in they're late night drink specials (which I hear they have on a weekly basis) that extended past the Crawl. Around this time our group got separated, because that's always a good idea when you're completely plastered. I ended up on a trolley back towards Bradley's that was so packed that some chick came up to me and sat on my lap and then turned to me and said "Don't get hard." Yup, it was a Stockton kind of crowd. It was pretty awesome. Frankly, if downtown concentrated on more alcohol-centric ideas like this to get people down there on the warm summer nights (because, let's face it, booze one of the few things that we can all agree on), that whole revitalization thing might actually catch on.

Quick Links for May 28th

2009-05-28T15:58:00.000-07:00

Just a quick reminder that tomorrow is the last day for this URL, we're over at WordPress now. So update your bookmarks (all 12 of you) for reclaimingthetitle.wordpress.com.

Sorry for the missed day yesterday, we've been busy with our real jobs. That's not to say we haven't been working on the site, we have, we just haven't completed anything yet. The first half of El Duke's Pub Crawl rundown is fucking gold, hopefully that'll show up later this week. But until then, let's knock out some Quick Links for this...really? It's Thursday already? Bad fucking ass. Let's do the damn thing and anticipate Sexy Friday.

Enough is enough Dino Sauro

Look, we get that people have different musical tastes than us. We get that Dave Brubeck was a fairly influential jazz musician. We get that Tony Sauro likes jazz, but for fuck's sake, the deification of Dave Brubeck has to fucking end. It's not that we don't like his music. We're not the biggest jazz fans in the world but we can appreciate what he did and "Time Out" isn't too bad of an album. But for the love of Christ quit making him out like he gave a virgin birth to Miles Davis.

We understand why it happens, people are passionate about things and tend to write about their passion. We love Stockton, sports (although, ironically, not Stockton sports), drinking, and journalism so we write about that shit. Tony's very passionate about jazz, so passionate that when you Google "Sauro Brubeck" on the Record's site you get 228 results, a alarming number of which aren't repeats.

Now, we're not faulting Tony for his volumes of writing about UOP's most famous graduate. Hell, if I could write 200+ columns on getting shitfaced I would. The problem we have is his glowing, almost masturbatory praise for anything the man touches. His columns are as if he pops a Viagra, flips on "Take Five", and starts punching the porpoise only, you know, in written form (apologies for any mental images derrived from that analogy).

Again, we're not saying Brubeck isn't a good jazz musician, it's just that the praise for him should only go so far. It's not like he's this big jazz titan that all hipsters (the original hipsters with the turtlenecks, berets, and fingersnapping. Not the Weezer-glasses variety) bow down to. Even the most dedicated local jazz fan has to admit that they probably wouldn't have known about Brubeck if not for the way Stockton and UOP shove him down our throats every spring.

I guess the point of this rant is that while we understand Dave Brubeck is an importantish figure in jazz and an important figure locally, but we have to keep it in perspective. Not every article/column about jazz merits a Brubeck mention. And if it does, remember he's just some dude who went to school here and not...ummm...shit, I'm out of super popular jazz musicians to liken him to. Yes, I only know one jazz musician. What of it?

How the weren't we consulted for this?

So the Record did a feature on recession drinking, which was a great idea when we did it months ago. But, being the Record, they had to take a good idea and fuck it all up. Sure, the piece was informative, but who wants to hear about the drink specials at Paragary's? I don't want to spoil Duke's Pub Crawl run down but fuck Paragary's. If you show up for happy hour there's a chance they'll run out of alcohol. And Le Bistro? Really? Did they discount drinks so it only costs you and arm instead of an arm and a leg? Fucking Applebee's!!!!???

Although my favorite featured special is the Matinee's. $4 tall cans. That's right, four bucks for a tallski (of domestic!) at what's allegedly a martini bar. Or you can buy 2 tall boys for the low low price of $7. Or if you're smart, you'll run around the corner to the Hi and Bye and grab a tall can of Coors Light for two bucks.

So, since the gauntlet has been thrown down, allow us to come back with out suggestions for the real good drink specials out there for those looking for some cheap, drunken fun. For one, if you're going to drink downtown nothing beats the dollar pints on Friday nights at Beach Hut Deli. The atmosphere is laid back and they usually have a pretty good acoustic band playing in the corner. And if you really want to throw down you have to check out Beer Pong Thursdays. Sure, the competition's a little thin with all the college kids out of town, but just consider this a training period for when they come back in the fall. Nothing damages their frail egos quite like getting schooled by a townie in a game invented by college kids.

If beer's not your thing then we highly suggest hitting up the happy hour at BWDW Fat's Bar and Grill. It runs all the way 'til 8 and you get $5 Long Islands $5 Jagerbombs and other assorted stiff drinks. But don't worry, it's not some sort of alcoholic haven, Tuesdays are actually family night and parents are encouraged to bring the kids to belt out some kid friendly karaoke tunes while Pops gets sloshed on drop shots. And, as the bonus, the family shit ends at 9 and then the hardcore drinking begins with $2 well drinks (although sadly this is only for Tuesday). Like all well drinks. Which, let's face it, is pretty bad ass. And is also why most of my sick days fall on Wednesdays.

Although if you're really intrigued by the prospect of drinking canned beer in a bar, you should head on over east of 99 to Morada landmark Koe's for their Budget Thursday specials. For only $1.50 you can enjoy a 12 oz. can of Pabst, Hamm's, or Olympia. Haven't heard of those last two beers? Go open your grandpa's garage fridge, there's a 50% chance that thing is packed with them.

So there's a couple bars that have excellent happy hours that are actually cheap. And we even included on that involves the family! Plus, we didn't even have to bust out El Torito's legendary happy hour pricing (half off appetizers and specials on margaritas from 4-8. Not to mention Tacos Tuesdays).

WTF Recordnet?

2009-05-26T16:30:00.001-07:00

Earlier today I was working on a post about Don Blount's latest offering (which will probably be up tomorrow, sorry for the slacking) about riding the late night bus and came across something curious. The column can be found here, but occasionally, links older than a day do not show up on the main news page (if at all) so I have to use the Google Advanced Search options and just enter an exceprt of the article I'm looking for. Yes, even with the improvements the Record's site is a bear to navigate. Not the animal kind, the big gay hairy dude kind.

Anyways, out of habit I did that with this column. I entered a passage from his column and Google spit back this. Now, one should note I'm using site search, so the only website that should show up should be Recordnet.com. Yet Google kicks back that site and only that site. Other stories show up fine, but Blount's continues to show up only on this TMCnews site. It appears to be a word for word reproduction, and the column is also on Recordnet.com so theoretically it should show up under the Record's site on Google, but it don't.

So does this mean Google is trying to deny the rest of the world the musings of Don Blount? I sure hope not, that would be mean. Almost as mean as not loaning out your cell phone. But, as usual with these things, it leaves us asking the age old quesiton, what the fuck Recordnet?

That big announcement thing

2009-05-23T15:50:00.000-07:00

Sorry we disapeared the last couple of days. We've been having internet problems. But hey, I promised a big announcement, so here it is.

For various reasons (mostly boring technical shit), we're swtiching over to Wordpress. It's still a move in progress but I've imported all of these posts over to reclaimingthetitle.wordpress.com so go check it out. The template is different and not as customizable as Blogger is, but in general my short experience with Wordpress has been better than with Blogger which can be annoying at times to say the least.

So consider this the soft launch of our move. As you can see not all the posts on here on on Wordpress (including this post), all of Bris Isaak's posts say they're authored by me because he hasn't accepted the author invite yet. and I personally think the wording is too small. But let us know what you think while we work out the kinks. We'll probably post both here and there for about a week before completely abandoning this site for the new one. So update your bookmarks.

Also, to make up for our sudden absence, we'll be covering tonight's Hula Pub Crawl live. How? Via our new Twitter. You can follow us on Twitter and our updates will show up on the sidebar of the WordPress site too.

Now, I gotta go pre-game.

An open letter to the Miracle Mile

2009-05-20T12:29:00.000-07:00

Dear Miracle Mile,

First of all, sorry for your loss. Losing See's Candies must have been hard on you. I'd suggest medicating yourself with excessive amounts of chocolate but, well, you know.

That being said, fuck you in the goat ass with a red hot fire poker. Who the fuck thought it was a good idea to close off half the side streets for repaving at the same fucking time!? Driving the Mile is already about as enjoyable as a Lori Gilbert column, taking away the escape streets is like taking her column and printing it on the front page every day of the week. I mean Jesus, was my drive down Pacific Ave not slow enough for you? Can't you just be happy with the old people who patronize the Mile driving 3 miles per hour and stopping at the light if they even get a premonition that it might soon turn yellow? Were you not pleased with the roughly 246 crosswalks that fucking stretch of road has slowing my commute down? You just had to seal off all my escape routes so I'm stuck behind Gladys for a half hour while she waits for there to be absolutely zero cars in sight (including mine) before she makes that left turn?

There's no point, just fuck the Miracle Mile. I hope Maxim's moves there so they can complain about all the darkies that aren't actually committing crimes.

Sincerely,

Reclaiming the Title

Quick Links for May 19th

2009-05-19T15:47:00.000-07:00

Sorry if we seem a bit distracted today. It's a somewhat extremely important day. It's the day some old Jew opens a bunch of envelopes containing the results of a marathon ping-pong ball selection session. Yup, it's NBA Draft Lottery day and our beloved Kings have the best chance (25%) of getting the first pick. Which means we're probably getting the 4th pick. Hell, I wouldn't be shocked if we somehow got the 5th pick. So to say our minds are elsewhere would be an understatement. Text messages between all of us were exchanged before 7:30, which is incredibly early for all of us.

What does all of this mean for you? Well, if the Kings don't get a top 2 pick and you see a depressed Kings fan sulking in his Kings jersey, Kings, hat, and purple shoes, don't make fun of them. There's a very good chance they will stab you in the neck with the nearest sharp object. So, you know, Raider game rules.

But until then Quick Links!

Oh yeah, something else is going on today

It's Special Election day! Which means we get to recall Governor Schwa...wait, what? It's just a bunch of budgetary ballot measures? Fuck that. I'm not voting and getting my hopes up for the future of my favorite sports team. That's just too much in one day. And the voting would get in the way of my pre-draft lottery drinking.

But for you non-alcoholics, check out that link from the Tahoe paper about the ballot measures. And then I'll laugh at you tomorrow for wasting your time voting for measures that have no chance of passing because they're not a charismatic black man. You know, assuming I'm not already in prison for stabbing a Laker fan after we get the 4th pick.

"Now, what do you mean when you say 'We'd have to lay off more city workers'?"

We understand the budget situation can get a bit contentious, but does Dale Fritchen really need to ask what the backup plan is if we don't get the aid that Gordon Palmer's proposed budget is dependant on? David Siders said it himself, Plan B is no secret. It's fucking layoffs. But when you're in negotiation with labor unions, like Palmer is with the city's firefighters union (and presumably the SPOA if they weren't such dumbasses), you try and avoid saying the word "layoffs" at all costs. Kind of like how if you're trying to sell some bonds you don't even think the word "bankruptcy", let alone say it. If anybody should have learned that lesson it's Dale freaking Fritchen. Political grandstanding to gain favor with city employees is fine and all, only those city employees probably won't be employed the next (and first) time Fritchen's up for reelection. So it really just makes him look like even more of a dumbass. Which I didn't know was possible.

And now for a dose of sacrelige

We're not too big on furthering David Stern's God complex by actually praying to him, but we could probably use all the help we could get. Sure, we could pray to that Jesus guy. But he never comes through for me (although I still hold out hope that one day one of my roommates will magically transform into Katie Morgan). Plus, David Stern has a much better track record with influencing draft lottery results.

(Plays "Taps" on kazoo)

It's a sad day folks. It's the last day for Craigslist's Erotic Sevices ads before they switch over to the totally prostituteless "Adult Services" section for good (by the way, did I see the Royal Day Spa in there?). Many drunken nights have been spent trolling the Erotic section of Stockton's Craigslist after ~~one of us~~ sombody shouts "Fuck it! Let's get a whore!" Only to quickly realize ~~we're all~~ you're pussies and don't feel like catching HPV. Plus who can find 100 roses on such short notice?

So we bid you adieu Erotic Services, trying to decipher the sluts from the hookers (You're a hooker!) on the Casual Encounters page will never be the same again. And neither will my cock after that happy ending. I wonder if there's a novena for genital warts.

Ok, that's it from us today. El Duke promised me he'd be around tomorrow with a lottery result reaction which should be epic either way. Our big announcement is coming soon, we're just working out a few more kinks and we'll be good.

Quick Links for May 18th

2009-05-18T15:47:00.000-07:00

Jesus tapdancing Christ it's hot. Welcome back summer. Luckily summer also brings us women wearing little-to-no clothing so I say bring it on sun! Sorry we're so late today, things have been busy behind the scenes here. We're on the verge of a fairly big announcement but I don't want to tip my hand quite yet. Just know it'll happen sometime this week. But until then Quick Links!

So much for the government harshing our mellow

Last week Mike Fitzgerald was in the middle of getting his Peter Tosh on, he blogged a reader's e-mail about worries that the government's weed would totally suck. Fitzy's argument was that it was better than the alternative, Mexican Tony Soprano weed. And he was right, government weed would be a great alternative to Mexican ganj. Not because of violence, but because Mexican weed sucks, and the feds a hoarding some straight up kill. So yeah, even when he's right, Fitz is still hilariously wrong.

Hey, speaking of The Man, fuck you Steve Moore

Before we get started we'd like to note that this never would have happened if Baxter Dunn were still alive (note: that's a joke, I'm pretty sure he's still with us). That being said, my bulshit detector went off so violently while reading this I thought it was on the fritz. Specifically this line:

"If I were trying to close down Lost Isle, I'd go straight after their liquor license," Moore said.

Which is a fine excuse except that you can't bleed somebody dry by just pulling their liquor license. Pulling the liquor license is an instant kill. If this were Mortal Kombat Steve "Smokey" Moore's fatality would be pulling the liquor license. But he's not going for the fatality, he's going for the green. No, not the green from the previous item, I'm talking about the root of all evil. The county can't get any money out of Lost Isle if they just shut them down. But if they make them jump through hoops to get those extra special permits that always pop up at the last second, fine them, and make them hire extra security (who, spoiler alert!, are often off-duty cops) then they can make some bank. Sure, not as much bank as they would make selling legalized pot and pot accessories, but still enough to make it worth their while. Plus, they'll get them to throw in a special dock just for making them drive out there to do (guh) their jobs.

Look, drunk people are going to fight. Don't punish Lost Isle because there's stupid people. Any bar on any given night can have that one retarded guy with the ~~slutty~~ friendly girlfriend and if she does the wrong thing while dude's got one too many drinks in him, shit's going down. If there's a UFC PPV on, the chances of this happening increases roughly 8000%. Sure, a guy died last year. But hey, Bogey's is still open. I guess what I'm saying is that while security proportionate to the crowd is important, don't ruin everybody's fun because some people are dicks and you're pissed you have to actually work and feel like applying a little political pressure.

And now let's see what Don Blount sa...aww, man. (Still cool though)

Words can't express how disappointed we were when we opened today's paper and saw Michael McCollum's column on photography lighting. Don't get me wrong, ever since I got that digital camera for my birthday I've been taking pictures like I'm some sort of teenage girl going through that artsy phtograpjhy stage (no picture of myself in the morror, yet) , so the lighting lesson was pretty interesting. But, I hate to admit it, but I've grown to anticipate the musings of noted wordsmith Don Blount every week. Sure, sometimes it's boring but sometimes he gives us gems like this:

"However, let's put some other words to Stockton.
Words like: theater, symphony and opera."

I could go on but lists are really more Mike Klocke's thing. But with lofty writing like that, you can't help but anticipate the prose that graces the A2 section only once a week. But hey, cool pictures work too.

Quick Links for May 15th

2009-05-15T12:22:00.000-07:00

Sexy Friday is here, and I'm feeling a little Quick Linky today Quick Links!

RIP Wayman Tisdale 1964-2009

Some days just start off shitty. Today is one of those days. Former King, successful jazz musician, 3-time All-American with Oklahoma, bad motherfucker, one of my favorite NBA players, and all-around ~~good~~ great guy Wayman Tisdale lost his battle with cancer this morning at the age of 44. Tis discovered he had cancer 2 years ago when a cyst was found under his right knee after he broke his leg. They ended up having to amputate (!) that leg in August but the cancer returned and we're less one awesome dude.

I'm not sure what more I can add to this but Sactown Royalty's Tom Ziller said it best. Fuck you cancer. Fuck you.

Technology is awesome (via Digg)

Want to go see an IMAX movie on a big fucking screen? Well, make sure to double check whether or not the alleged IMAX movie theater you're planning to go to has one. Someone has complied a Google Map of which theaters have the actual huge IMAX screens and which ones just have slightly better digital quality. And if you missed yesterday's post, Stockton has a LIEMAX.

Congratulations UOP class of 2009. You're officially fucked, just like the rest of us (NSFW Porky's clip at the end)

UOP's graduation is this weekend and I was planning on offering advice to the outgoing seniors entering the real world, but Drew Magary beat me to it on Deadspin. My favorite (and the most accurate) passage:

"Guess what, fuckos? Party's over. You're out of college now, and your parents are now too poor to nurse you through grad school. No more fantasy life for you. No more ice luges. No more intellectual discourse. No more ripe teenage pussy. That's all over now. YOU ARE FUCKED. Your days will now consist of searching for a job in a marketplace where no available job of any sort fucking exists. Your commencement speaker will probably tell you your class "faces enormous challenges," or some bullshit euphemism like that. This is a lie. A challenge is something you can overcome. You, on the other hand, are completely, unavoidably fucked. You're not going to cure cancer. You're not going to stop wars. You're not going to save the planet. If you're lucky, you may stumble upon a $2 coupon for Honey Nut Cheerios one day. That will be about it."

So yeah, congrats. You wasted 4 years of your life on a worthless degree class of 2009. No, our educational system isn't broken at all, why do you ask?

Hopefully you still remember how to bullshit from all those papers you had to write, that's the only skill you use in the real world. And don't bother applying for that bartender job on craigslist to make ends meet. That Asian kid who always ruined the curve in your statistics class just took it. He was really good at bullshitting.

Noone was really fooled by Tony Amato's grandstanding...until Fitzy came along

Fitz took a break from his latest attempt to relate to the common man to praise Tony Amato for fixing what was mostly a clerical error and for pushing more students towards earning almost completely useless degrees. Naturally he ignores simple things, like the fact that Tony Amato wasn't even around for the 2007 Record story that they blew up and then dramatically ripped in half.

Of course the other question Fitzy doesn't even bother to ask is should we be pushing these kids towards college. Is that putting too much pressure on their parents to afford it? Hell, do they even need college? Yeah, yeah, kids are our future, whatever. But there are some kids who just aren't built for that shit. And frankly, I don't want the kid who decided he'd rather hang out with his friends in Oakland than go to school studying to be a doctor. That kid better not be our future. Unless his future is being a janitor.

But on top of all of that, don't we need to fix our increasingly expensive and increasingly useless educational system first before we start shipping kids off to places that don't properly teach them how to bullshit? Why Fitzy, who just last week was predicting a watershed change in the American way of life, doesn't question whether or not this system even works is beyond me. He's too busy praising a guy who just said "Hey, let's enforce the dropout guidelines." Presumably while crying.

For once Stockton's not the only one getting the shaft

2009-05-14T12:47:00.000-07:00

So late last year the downtown movie theater remodeled one of their screens into an IMAX screen. If you've plunked down the $15 to actually see an IMAX movie then you know that Stockton, as usual, didn't exactly get the full IMAX experience. Don't get me wrong, the picture quality is fantastic and the sound system is awesome, but when people think IMAX they think of a huge fucking screen. Stockton did not get a huge fucking screen. To be specific, we got hosed. The screen is just the size of the wall the projector happens to be facing. Sacramento gets a 6-story screen put up on the side of a parking garage specifically built to house a huge digital movie screen on the side. We get something retro-fitted after the fact that's passed off as an IMAX experience. Basically it's a mini-Max without the mini-price.

But for once the problem wasn't totally Stockton's fault! Sure, the movie theater manager claims it was because the city wouldn't give them the permits to tear off the roof and make that shit huge, but the real answer is that IMAX is giving everybody the shaft by spouting off the oft-repeated lie that size doesn't matter.

Aziz Ansari is apparently a comedic actor of some sort who went to go see the Star Trek IMAX experience at a movie theater in LA. He wasn't too pleased to find out that instead of a huge fucking screen plastered to the side of a parking garage, the particular IMAX venue that he had chosen was of the Stockton variety. Yes, the Mini-Max. And while others just kind of make a mental note of it and don't get duped by IMAX again. Not Ansari. He wants he $5 back! It's the principle of the matter!

Well, after he made a big enough deal the IMAX CEO responded by basically saying "I still make money off that shit so fuck you". And just for fun he threw in a shot about Ansari's commenters. Because if there's any group of people known for their measured discourse, it's internet commenters.

Ansari responds with a tongue-in-cheek televised debate challenge and then explains to the soulless trolls of the internet that his original post was meant to be tongue-in-cheek. Because the fact that he's a comedian didn't tip any of them off that he might be going over the top with his outrage for the sake of a joke.

What's the lesson learned here? That Stockton isn't the only place getting shafted by IMAX. And that the internet is a horrible horrible place.

Ole!

2009-05-12T09:13:00.000-07:00

The Stockton School Board once again pitches a winner. Because, of course, when it comes to school boards and children's education, what matters is a $650 a month car and racism.

My obvious question is why? What makes the school board so enticing that the director of the Stockton Boys and Girls club was on the board? And gave him enough motivation to pay for a re-count?

I think the major story here is how everyone is in it for themselves, instead of making the best choices for a school. Oh wait, schools are meant for education? I was unaware of that.

This education battle has got to stop. Amato, Bill Ross, Dan Castillo, Sal Ramirez, Jose Morales, Colleen Boardman, Beverly Fitch McCarthy and Gloria Allen, please do listen. Racist or not, muck raking or not, constant in-fighting or not, I think race is the least of the issues. I think the biggest issue is that the school board and Super are rapists.

Yes, I just said you all have decided to take the well being and education of the local children and destroy their hopes and dreams Deliverance style.

Especially now, Mexican, white, black, asian, Punjabi, there are bigger issues to take into account. If special election budget issues don't get passed, there is a possibility you will have to lay off more teachers, more janitors and more support staff. Of course, as people lose their jobs, its nice for them to know that the Super is still driving an $80k car. Because while everyone is tightening belts, Stockton overall has no clue how to do it.

You pull the race card when you have nothing to stand on. If you represent the districts you stand for, you will realize Stockton is one of the most diverse cities around. If you want it, Stockton's got it. And even though Don Blount believes that Stockton is littered with KKK activists, its not.

What should be on school board agenda: improve education for students, pay teachers, offer and create programs that enhance students education.

What is on the school boards agenda: $650 a month SUV, racism, and an incompetent board president.

Look, when you don't do your job, the public has a tendency to let you know. Yes, even Stocktonians managed to realize the last board was full of shit and got rid of people, so using this as a chance to jump up and further whatever the hell you are doing might not work too well.

Look rapists, put the kids first. As your sitting there, making a decision, sit there and think, how does this benefit the kids? If you cant think of how, then drop it and move on.

Only Fitzy Can Miss the Point so Badly to Make us Argue Against Marijuana Legalization

2009-05-11T15:44:00.000-07:00

Since pushing for the legalization of the demon weed last week Mike Fitzgerald's blog has apparently turned into his own version of "High Times". I guess when Schwarzenegger said now was the time to debate its legalization Fitzy decided that debate would happen on his blog. Which is both very pro-active and very un-stoner like of him.

One post in particular stood out, naturally it's the one where Fitzy puts his ignorance on full display.

A reader e-mailed him coming out against legalization, not because he's a party pooper, but because the man would totally keep the quality of that shit down through their regulations and stuff man! And while that's an interesting concept about one possible outcome of ending the reefer madness (even though I think, if anything, quality would probably increase because it's not like the government would grow it themselves), Fitzy's firm in his belief that quality Mary Jane is an acceptable sacrifice to stop the Mexican Tony Soprano (a term I wish I was making up).

So, because we can, here's the flaws in Fitzy's rebuttal. For one, this is Cali-motherfucking-fornia. And on top of that, it's Northern California. I don't know where or when Fitzy bought his last sack, but nobody smokes that shitty, Mexican dirt weed here. Nobody's smoked that shit since like the 70s. All the grass floating around here is from the Bay Area/Mendocino County, where, as the reader states, they got their shit down. Those "narco-states" that Fitzy finds so menacing realized long ago that they can't compete with the hippies and have moved onto, you know, actual narcotics (hence the term "narco-state").

It's actually kind of funny that Fitz invokes the name of Tony Soprano (mostly because combined with the Godfather and Scarface, that seems to be all he knows about the mafia lifestyle, so it must apply to the Mexicans too, right?), because if he just watched that show a little bit closely he'd see where the real problem(s) with his entire theory lies. For one, the big drug problem isn't pot, it's pretty much everything else harder than pot. Meth, Coke, Heroin, all over the fucking place. How he didn't realize this while talking to those homeless people I'll never know. When homeslice said that most homeless people were just looking for their next high, he sure as shit wasn't talking about some Medocino Greeno.

But let's imagine for a second that the big illegal drug trafficking racket was pot. Would legalizing it stop that at all? Just because it's legal doesn't mean people still won't try and sell it tax-free illegally. You can buy bootleg DVDs at the flea market for fuck's sake. Legalizing something is not a deterrent for illicit sales, if anything they'd benefit because without having to give their slice to the government, they'd have cheaper prices than in the stores. So not only would it not stop these theoretical pot cartels, but the government would still have to crack down on the illegal sales of bootleg weed. So the theory that legalization would save millions on enforcement is short sighted at best.

But let's pretend (yes, pretending within imagining. Just roll with it), that somehow these cartels can't take the heat from the legal competition and give up selling the reefer. Guess what? They're not going away. No, they spent too much time networking and setting up a system and paying guys to go to America and set up the operation. There's too much money invested to pack it up and go home, so they start selling the harder, illegal drugs (you know, the one's they're actually selling in the real world right now).

So even if we did live in Mike Fitzgerald's mythical wonderland where the Tijuana Cartel (which is a fucking ridiculous name, they're the Arellano-Felix Organization and they're fucking everywhere, not just TJ.) is just hucking pot and killing anybody who stands in their way, his solution just ends up where we are now, with the pushers pushing harder drugs.

Look, we're all for the legalization of pot and we're all for the getting the debate started (obviously since we're engaging the debate), but like we said last week the reason all those prohibitionists are so willing to dismiss Fitzy's arguments for legalization is because he's presenting flawed, weak arguments. Legalizing pot isn't going to neuter organized crime just like the end of alcohol prohibition didn't. They're a business with a sophisticated network, they'll just do what other businesses do when someone eats of their market share. They'll adapt and find new markets to dominate. If they just went away, well then they wouldn't be the tough, scary sons of bitches Mike Fitzgerald says they are.

Quick Links for May 8th

2009-05-08T12:18:00.000-07:00

*Looks at calendar* Let's see, it's...Oh fuck yes it's Sexy Friday! Let's end this Wally-forsaken week and see if we can't do better next week. But until then, Quick Links!

Legalize it!

It's only fitting that this week ends with me agreeing with Fitzy, who put away his elitist "eat at that fucking restaurant I like you bitter fucking fucks!" sword today and busted out his dirty hippie sword (that's still slightly elitist). He says let us smoke in peace! And I couldn't agree with him more. While I have absolutely no faith that pot's going to legalized and taxed even though it makes boatloads of sense.

Of course, we have to point out some flaws in his argument, even if it pains us to do so. For one, saying the devil's lawn clippings is "unequivocally" safe isn't exactly true. Sure, it's never been proven to be chemically addictive, it's sure a shit mentally addictive. Of course, that doesn't make it wrong, mental addiction isn't really something easily scientifically measured since everybody's different. Some people can handle the awesome calming factor of hippie lettuce and still function without it. Others light that shit, smoke that shit, and pass that shit and then realize that it's ridiculously fucking awesome and want to be like that all the time. It's not something Mary Jane can control. Anything in the wrong hands can be a bad thing, but to totally dismiss that and act like the big green is no more dangerous than a chocolate Easter Bunny is really one of the few things still pissing prohibitionists off enough to keep their fight going.

That's the real problem I have with this column, in typical Fitzy condescending fashion he treats the prohibitionists like morons for not bowing to his wealth of statistical knowledge. If you're truly going to have a persuasive argument you have to understand the other side of the argument. Prohibitionists aren't arguing from the logical, scientific point of view. They're coming from a very emotional angle because a lot of the time prohibitionists are conservatives with ties to religion. Weed's wrong because Jesus says it's wrong. To use stats to point out all the reasons they're wrong is basically saying Jesus is wrong. You ever tell a deeply religious person Jesus is wrong? It's not pretty.

And that's why Fitzy's argument sucks, he's using a rational argument with irrational people. His whole argument is useless because he's not changing their minds. And even if he could, doing so by basically calling them fucking stupid is, well, really fucking stupid.

Really? It took this long to get this interview?

The Cantu coverage has thankfully subsided since the gag order was put in place. We've spent our fair share of time speaking out against the ridiculous amount of coverage the Record gave the story but this story about Jose Franco, the man who discovered the suitcase containing Cantu, is an interesting read. We really don't have much to say about it, just really passing it along. It's a pretty well done story about a guy dealing with realizing his biggest fear. I can't imagine what goes through that guy's head when he can't sleep at night.

And finally, a long overdue link

If you haven't checked out Ian Hill's blog, appropriately titled Ian Hill Media, you really should. It's an interesting look at the constantly changing state of journalism as the internet finds new ways to get news and information out there for free, thus killing newspapers dead. Plus we get to watch as Ian learns new skills for his job as web content producer for recordnet.com. Yup, today is "interesting" day. Fucking slow news days/weeks.

I heard a rumor that El Duke make poke his ugly mug in here today in light of Rick Pitino claiming he wants the Kings coaching. So that should be pretty good if it actually happens. If not, have a good weekend, happy Sexy Friday. Let the drinking commence.

Why that last post is horribly, embarassingly inaccurate.

2009-05-07T16:04:00.001-07:00

Fuck. I haven't been writing these posts under the best of conditions
lately and it finally came back to bite me in the ass. I won't get into
details as to why these mistakes happened, what matters is that they
happened and I have to own up to them. So here goes.

For one, I misidentified the writer and claimed that the mayor of fucking Oakland wrote it. Yes, I don't know who the mayor of Oakland is, well, now I do, but still, that was inexfuckingscuable and I apologize for it. The real writer was V Smoothe and the post should reflect that now. Again, apologies to Smoothe and you guys. I should know better.

Second, the thought I had at the end of the post that maybe the reporting of planned layoffs was simpler than issuing layoff notices was correct. If I had just read the entire guide that, you know, I fucking linked to I would have known that. I should have read it all the way through but it was fucking ridiculously long and I didn't have the time to do so. I know that's not a good excuse but it's the truth. I was bad journalism and I feel like a dumb fuck. If I had just held off posting until I read it all I would have seen this part:

"Furthermore, agencies awarded will be required to maintain documentation that demonstrates that the scheduled lay-offs are occurring for local economic reasons unrelated to the availability of CHRP grant funds; such documentation may include local council meeting minutes, memoranda, notices, or orders discussing the lay-offs, budget documents ordering jurisdiction-wide budget cuts, and/or notices provided to the individual officers regarding the lay-offs."

And considering I know about the 90 layoffs that would happen if we didn't get the CHRP grant funds that means it was reported in one of those ways. So Gordon Palmer isn't the jackass referred to in the last post it was me, twice. So apologies to him and again to you, the reader, for me being a dumbass. Please don't hold it against me. I'll go back to making dick jokes tomorrow. Promise.

COPS Hiring Program Explained in Terms even Gordon Palmer can Understand

2009-05-07T11:14:00.001-07:00

Ok, let's get this out of the way before I get to today's post. Yesterday I said talking about the underfunded courthouse security when a new courthouse was on deck was kind of stupid. Roughly 4 hours after that was posted, this happened. So yeah, they could probably use that money and I'm a jackass. Luckily this is Stockton so there's a lot of jackassery going around. Let's take a look at some of that jackassery, shall we?

I stumbled upon Oakland blog A Better Oakland this morning and I did so just in time apparently as V Smoothe breaks down the requirements for the COPS Hiring Recovery Program that our own city is relying on to balance the budget. It's a highly suggested read considering Oakland's facing a lot of the same problems we are.

In addition to that, it only takes about 2 minutes to realize that the Department of Justice was right, assuming that money is coming our way is a horrible fucking idea. Gordon Palmer dismissed that accusation as political posturing, saying "Of course they're going to say that. ... Until they grant the money, they aren't going to tell any city, 'You're going to get the money.'" And then he went ahead and said "If I were in their shoes, I'd probably say the same thing."

Well, here's the thing Mr. Palmer, if we want to get the money, the guy in your shoes (aka YOU) has to also be saying the same thing. Let me explain:

According to the grant application guide (and this is in the Better Oakland post, I'm just rehashing it for you here) there are three ways, and only three ways, we can use the grant money. We can hire new cops to fill positions vacated by laid off cops, re-hire laid off cops, or retain cops that were scheduled to be laid off.

That last one is where we run into a little bit of trouble. As of today, the city has only sent layoff notices to 55 cops. Those cops are expected to be laid off according to the budget Palmer wants to adopt that relies on receiving at least half of the COPS money we applied for, barring some sort of last minute concessions by the SPOA (ha!). See the problem yet?

The grant money only applies to cops laid off or scheduled to be laid off (and hiring new cops, but try and get that past the union) at the time of grant application (which was April 14th). So assuming the grant money is there and planning layoffs accordingly can't work because we're supposed to act like we won't get that money (even though we totally qualify for and should get it). If we don't get that money we're expected to layoff upwards of 90 police officers. In other words, we're downplaying our budgetary woes when we should be exaggerating them. Unfortunately it's not politically smart to do that locally because of fuckasses like Alan Pettet scaring the town shitless with threats of an armed gang of vigilantes roaming the streets.

So what does this all mean? Frankly, I'm not totally sure. It could be that official layoff notices weren't needed and they just needed to put the planned amount of layoffs in the grant application. But I really wouldn't put it past the city to have fucked this up royally.

The excitement is brewing

2009-05-06T14:56:00.001-07:00

I don't know if you realized this, but Stockton cant spend its money right. Shocking, yes. But I cannot take the credit for breaking this. I have to credit Fitzy, wait, Siders, wait, was it Fitzy?

Timeline!

10:41am Fitzy

Writes vague synopsis of data table from CalPers showing employees making over 100k per year. Tells us people from Stockton are on list (shock!).

11.28am Siders

Siders does more than just give a link with vague references. He gives names, monthly totals, and annual earnings from these pension plans in a nice table. Lets us know how many Stockton employees currently make up that list.

2:34 pm Fitzy

Fitzy now goes in depth with some hard news reporting....in an e-mail someone sent him saying his interest had been piqued by the previous vague blog post. So in doing research, John Beckman, CEO of the Building Industry Association of the Delta is the one who breaks down his findings.

There were three posts in the matter of hours, two offered a little more information, and one is, well, I don't know. I can appreciate the columnist trying to break news. Honestly you should get a gold star for this, you really should. You did some digging I guess, although I still am curious how you magically happened to be looking in the Bay Area businesses for sale and came up with that. You used your contact, did some digging, left a message, and got a response. You know, actual journalism, instead of this mess in my Sunday paper that hurt my head. But if you want to stick with it, then go all the way through with it. I shouldn't be reading about Stockton and Anaheim having similar numbers of 100k employees on the payroll from a guy whose not involved. And no, printing his e-mail doesn't count. You should be the one working those numbers to give actual analysis.

I know its a rush to see who might be better, or who might break it first. And I'll assume that the news came across the newsroom in a similar fashion. But its ok to take your time and make it look professional when posting it, instead of just being the first to post it.

Quick Links for May 6th

2009-05-06T11:37:00.000-07:00

Ah Wednesday...wait, it's Wednesday right? I was down shots of tequila and smoking a rare pack of cigarettes in honor of Cinco de Mayo yesterday so my mind's kinda fuzzy today. But I'm pretty sure it's Wednesday, wouldn't mind it being Thursday (or Friday), but it's been a painfully slow news week so I'm no...oh shit! Enough chit chat, Quick Links time!

Cue the training montage!

Wooo! Violent crime stats came out! Sure, if you're a new reader that may not be news to you, but the "Title" part of Reclaiming the Title is specifically the violent crime rate title we lost to Oakland. Sure, we want Stockton to have all titles and be the most decorated champion in the history of cities, but the violent crime rate title is the brass ring.

So how'd we do? Well, the actual violent crime rate won't be determined until later (probably next month) when 2008 population estimates come out, but the preliminary numbers are encouraging. Despite the lowest number of homicides since 1976, the number of violent crimes rose by 2.5%. The culprit? Aggravated assaults. From the linked article:

"'You can see the increase in aggravated assaults; that's really driving it,' said Officer Pete Smith, a Stockton Police Department spokesman."

See, we're totally a fight town.

No word on how Oakland did this year, so let's just hope that a bunch of people moved from Stockton to Oakland to inflate our rate while simultaneously deflating the O's.

Is there some "one vice at a time" law we're unaware of? (4th item down)

We're not going to pretend to understand permit law, but what the fuck does bong sales have to do with someone's ability to legally sell alcohol? Especially in Califuckingfornia. Technically they're for smoking tobacco, dude can't control it if people misuse his products. Other places are allowed to sell blunt wraps and booze and nobody uses those wraps for tobacco. I damn sure don't know anybody who uses piña colada wraps with their Buglers. But selling bongs is crossing a line? Technically they're healthier for you.

We're also massively disappointed with Susan Eggman for insinuating that people loitering out front and a cashier playing cards has any affect on alcohol sales. So what if it's close to a school? To buy any of that shit you gotta be 18 anyways. So how does that affect the kids? It's not like he's selling fucking pot. That's what Victory Park is for.

It is nice to see somebody's still selling looseys though.

Oh, and congratulations on reaching 1000 posts Mr. Siders. Not only is that a shitload of posts, but they were also 1000 times better than anything Fitzy's thrown up on his blog.

As if I wasn't having a hard enough time figuring out what day of the week it is already

Mike Fitzgerald's massive workload of 3 columns a week has been lightened to 2 apparently as Mike Klocke took on the Wednesday columnist duties and for once didn't have to announce changes to the paper. Instead he advocated the need for a more secure courthouse. Which is hilarious because, you know, one's on the way already. That's like us saying the city should layoff police officers to balance the budget. But hey, gotta write about something. So why not argue that the courtroom is dangerous because of one isolated incident involving a crazy meth head?

Of course, one incident isn't enough to be a trend so he included the dubious example of Brian Payne shouting out conspiracy theories. Because, you know, crazy handcuffed cokeheads shouting is totally dangerous.

Look, we understand the courthouse has the potential for danger, but let's face it, everywhere has that potential. And throwing money at a place for temporary upgrades sounds great but, I don't know if you've noticed, there isn't any fucking money. Yes, courthouse security is underfunded, but so is 99% of Stockton (That 1% being downtown Stockton). So yes, we recognize you need money, get in line behind the cops, firefighters, tree trimmers, and pretty much everybody else with outdated shit. Considering the courthouses needs are actually going to be met, forgive us if we really could care less about this "potential powder keg of disaster."

Old man Fitzy misses the way we were

2009-05-05T13:41:00.000-07:00

It's a slow news day (again), so it's time to take a look at Fitzy's column from Sunday. And well, there's a lot to look at.

I'm fairly certain it's supposed to be some sort of anti-sprawl commentary, but it gets lost among the old-timey prosey (those are actual words, right?) style he attempts to write in to describe his childhood ride to Gilroy.

I would love to sympathize with Fitzy. I too hate the sprawl that kills the agricultural land that makes/made San Joaquin Valley relevant. But he makes his point in such an old man "back in my day" sort of way that I just can't bring myself to agree with him. The growth he's complaining about, no matter how poorly planned, was needed. Everybody wants things to remain simple in their small town. Lodi's turned it into an art form. Morada's not even an actual town and it actively combats growth. One of the biggest issues at the mayor's town hall meeting in "the SOUTH!" was how shit wasn't like it was back in the day. Of course shit's not like it was back in the day, that's what makes it back in the day.

Everybody likes to wax nostalgic about a simpler time but simpler doesn't necessarily mean better. Things fucking change, it happens. Growth is inevitable, whether it be personal growth or municipal growth it's going to happen. Towns, like people, have and should always have aspirations to better themselves.

The challenges Tracy is facing aren't any different than the challenges every town goes through when experiencing growing pains. They'll figure it out and they'll be a better community for it. Whether you're a town or a person how you face challenges defines who and what you are. Tracy, as Fitz noted, isn't the town it once was. It's grown, and that's not a bad thing. He just presents it as a bad thing because it didn't grow into what he wanted it to be. Same goes for his constant championing of downtown Stockton. They too are going through some growing pains and Fitz is there trying to keep the status quo. He wants it to be some upscale area where everybody's classy and he can feel safe walking around in a smoking jacket while he and Randy Paragary smoke their pipes (sadly, filled with tobacco. Although sometimes I wonder about him) on the roof of the Hotel Stockton. Well, downtown's growing in a different direction. His response? He pretty much called us petty dicks. Twice.

I'll try and wrap this up soon, but I guess my argument is that, contrary to Fitzy's claims, the quality of life is better than it was when his dad was driving him to Gilroy in that symbolic Chrysler-made Dodge Polaris. Towns, people, everything is constantly changing. Change isn't bad, and change doesn't define who we are as a community. Tracy, Stockton, Gilroy, Lodi, wherever aren't defined by shrinking farmland and cookie-cutter communities. We're defined by how we, as a community, react to that change. And I don't know if you've noticed, but there's a lot of change going on right now.

We're not on the cusp of a giant shift or historic change, it fucking happened. The gauntlet has been thrown down. The very real challenges we're already facing and how we react to them will define our generation. We need to tackle these challenges head on, come up with new ways to move forward. Instead, Fitz apparently wants us to got back to the simpler way things were (note: he never outright says so, but the lamenting of growth combined with the whole quality of life thing seems to insinuate as much. So let us assume for argument's sake), even though that model broke a while back and was replaced by the faltering one we have now. I hate to sound like a politician (or the motivational speaker I seem to be channeling today) but we can't go backwards. That's not progress. We have to go forward, fight back if you will.

We're just in a particularly tough fight right now. One of our eyes is swollen shut so we can't see how much time is left in the round and the economy's peppering us with body blows. Fitzy apparently wants us to cry "No más" and go back to a simpler time that he understands. I don't wanna go out like that. We'll figure it out, I'm not sure how, but we'll figure it out. He said it himself, every generation will do better than it's predecessor. Falling back on the simpler days of yesteryear isn't doing better. And frankly, it's kind of sad.

I don't know how other cities are going to react to this fight, but I know Stockton. We're not a town of pussies God dammit. We're fighters. Sure, our opponent knocked out Chrysler, but we won't go down like that. Remember, real fighters are from Stockton.

Quick Links for May 4th

2009-05-04T14:16:00.000-07:00

Well, it's Monday. We miss anything good over the weekend? I guess we'll find out in today's Quick Links!

Well, it's official. Swine flu has jumped the shark

It's hard to tell when a story has reached it's peak. We thought for sure the Cantu coverage was going to die down but then some farm workers had to find a fucking suitcase and gave the story another 2 weeks of coverage. That militia story seems to have died down, although we suspect with police layoffs coming in the not too distant future that story may blow up again.

But luckily for us we have a fool proof indicator of when a story is going to finally die, and it's name is Don Blount. Don is kind of famous around these parts for being the last dying breath of any story that gains some sort of notoriety around these parts. He chimed in on Obama a week after everybody else did. He gave us his opinion on Stockton being named the most miserable town in America after pretty much everybody debunked that myth and had moved on (and then brought it up again a week later). And the last time anybody mentioned that roving gang of armed (but not legged *rimshot*) vigilantes was when Blount likened them to the Klan (and then, just for kicks, brought it up a week later. Yes, again).

That's an impressive path of destruction for a guy who's only been writing a column for 4 months. He's like the Ted McGinley of journalistic shark jumping. So it's only fitting that the day he writes about the dangers of Swine flu and what precautions to take against it is the same day major media outlets are realizing they may have overreacted just a smidge.

So for those of you already tired of the Swine flu non-demic, it's almost over. See, Don Blount's good for something.

Something about "Stockton" and "fighting" seems vaguely familiar

It's been a few months since the election cycle ended (the upcoming special election doesn't count since, as the Record pointed out, nobody's going to vote in it), but instead of letting us enjoy an extended break after what seemed like 4 straight years of campaign ads, Susan Eggman's getting her fundraise on a little early this year. Which is fine by me since she doesn't represent my district (or at least I'm pretty sure she doesn't since I don't live in the SOUTH!).

Although we have to point out that the early version of her campaign slogan does seem to echo sentiments we've been pushing since last summer, which is encouraging to say the least. Mostly because we're all for people agreeing with us. So Susan Eggman wants to fight for Stockton, let's hope this results in some sort of campaign event where her and Nick Diaz sing some sort of duet (What? You didn't know she sings at campaign events?). Preferably "Eye of the Tiger".

It's not a race thing, Morada just hates religion

I kid of course, actually it's a traffic thing. But I defer to former Morada resident El Duke for this one:

"Traffic on the Frontage Road east of 99 can get pretty bad at times, but their claim is still bullshit. The area they're considering building the mosque at over by Shippee is at the south end of Morada. The only way it'll really affect traffic is if you have to go down to Weinerschnitzel. And nobody goes to that Weinerschnitzel. Even then the traffic can be avoided by jumping on the 3 overpasses that connect Morada to the rest of Stockton and shoot on down the Frontage Road on the west of 99 to get pretty much anywhere. So really, they're just bitching about a slight inconvenience.

Really it's just that Moradans like to think they live in some sleepy rural town that is immune to growth. They're resistant to any change. They opposed the Harvest Bible Church and they didn't even have to build their building. They just occupy the old Sibbs/Mar-Val/Babe's Liquor strip mall. That's how fearful they are of change. They'd rather let a vacant strip mall sit there and rot than have something disturb their quaint little community."

Translation? Morada's like a mini-Lodi.

Slow News Days Suck!

2009-05-01T13:07:00.000-07:00

I hate slow news days, don't you? And don't let bullshit swine flu stories fool you, it's a fucking slow news day. Just look at the front page of the Record today. What's the big news? Mickie Grove Zoo is getting birds! Oh man! So amazing!

Oh, and the police and some other city workers got layoff notices. Not laid off, just notices that they miiiight get laid off depending on the number of people who take advantage of the retirement incentives offered to workers/cops over 50 (those wanting to take advantage have until today to do so). So, you know, more waiting. Awesome.

Oh, and Fitzy is apparently on the restaurant beat now as he tells the tale of Chuck's getting sued for ADA non-compliance by an overly litigious dick in a wheelchair. Yup,lawyers are soulless dicks, that's some crack investigative reporting right there.

But the real sign of a slow news day is how many ads for The Record and its various services appear in the paper to fill space. And good Lord there are a few today. That's nothing really post-worthy, the Record has been slowly turning into a catalog interspersed with news for years now. What makes the ads notable is what they're for. Everybody turn to A13! (We'd link, but why would the Record want these online? It makes too much sense.)

Yes, you too could have a picture of your little one's Kindergarten graduation picture in the Record for the low low price of $40! I don't even think my school had a kindergarten graduation. If we did, years of hard living have erased it from my memory. If only my parents had shelled out 40 clams so they could tell me how proud they are of me for being named "Most likely to continue eating paste" next to a picture of me wearing a paper hat and a bathrobe! It's great to see the Record display such great out-of-the-box thinking like this to recoup some lost ad sales revenue. Because, if there's one section of the community that totally has disposable income in this economy, it's relatively new parents.

Of course, the second biggest community sect with cash just pouring out of their pockets it's people who are getting married! And for the bargain basement price of $25 you can, ummm, announce your wedding in some sort of bride and groom insert the Record's doing next month! Of course (flipping to B4 now), if your wedding was really wacky and over-the-top, you can contact the Record and have them do a feature story on you for free! Did your uncle get too sauced and hit on the bride? Was your bridal party so big the limo had to take people to the wedding in shifts? Did you get to ride the chair at a Jewish wedding that wasn't yours? The Record wants to know! Oh man, the zany stories are endless.

So, to clarify, the Record wants your money for some features they're doing that serve no other purpose other than to make money. See, journalism is alive and well. (Takes swig from flask)

Quick Links for April 30th

2009-04-30T12:12:00.000-07:00

Sorry about the impromptu day off. BlogSpot/Blogger changed a few things with their site that hinders our regular posting ability. We're back for today, so let's knock out some Quick Links! While I contemplate a switch to WordPress.

Somewhere, Alan Pettet is channeling his inner Mr. Burns and letting out an "Exxxcellent"

So it's April 30th, which means it's the City Council's self-imposed soft deadline to have a deal in place with the Stockton Police Officers Association so they can get their budget in on time. So naturally there's still no deal in place and labor talks have ended. And, as with any milestone in this debacle, the number of planned layoffs has jumped again! This time it's jumped up 9 more officers bringing the grand total of the most optimistic budget plan to 52. The city is presumably waiting until those 9 cops have knocked up their wives or at a loved one's funeral (or in the hospital after injuring themselves disposing of that dangerous looking bag of lawn clippings) before dropping off layoff notices in their mailboxes. Of course, that number will shrink once the city offers retirement incentives to some of the older cops who have higher seniority and the resulting higher paychecks. So really, even though we're just a month away from the hard budget deadline, we're still playing the same posturing game we were playing 6 months ago. Now that's progress.

Fuck, it's always something with Tracy

Well, that Swine Flu pandemic that's claimed one whole life in the US (Note: it could be more by now, but well, I don't care) has finally (maybe) hit SJ County. Where? Tracy of course. Was there really any doubt? God's latest dumping ground takes another hit, and just as they gained a false sense of security after the Cantu case! We assume Tracy resident and one time fill-in poster BaconBabe is devastated by this news. Mostly because she hates media overkill as much as we do. Not to mention everybody hates uppity parents bitching about the safety of their children. Hey, speaking of...

This all makes a lot more sense when you realized the SUSD board of trustees is actually the student government

Ok, well at least they're acting like they have the maturity level of the students they have power over. We'd tackle each of these stories individually but frankly, we don't care. We don't have kids and it looks like all of this is just petty, political posturing. There's the guy (Anthony Silva) who's bitter that he lost reelection by one vote, and he just happened to show up the day another guy presents his case to recall the trustee that beat him out. Yeah, Silva's not bitter/petty at all. Then there's other board members bitching about one guy's vote on a seven person board, which makes total sense. And then there's my favorite story, "Tony Amato shouldn't use the rarely used district SUV that he pays the lease for, so let's pick up the tab for that and pay Amato $650 more a month." Confused? Yeah, so was the dumb broad who brought it up, now the district's out another $7,600 plus $650 a month to Amato. But it's ok, it's not like we're in a recession or anything. It's not like retarded populist sentiment is to crucify any sort of avoidable, non-essential spending, even with private money.

How do you know when your article/column is biased?

When the subject calls you to thank you for its fairness and accuracy when it was anything but fair and accurate. Apparently Randy does great business when the biggest festival of the year is in town, imagine that. He also has 3 potential buyers going through the motions with his broker. So soon, affordable food will be available in that space. But until then, you can continue paying twice the price for half the food! But really, this is all about some petty subsidy boycott. Not affordability, at all.

We're #19! We're #19!

In what can only be described as the most obvious example of link-baiting this side of Politico (a practice we encourage by the way), Christian Burkin has complied 2007's violent crime stats into national rankings in a response to Forbes' most recent list declaring us the 5th most dangerous metropolitan statistical area.

He used the crime stats for actual cities as opposed to the previously mentioned MSAs and lowered the population threshold for list inclusion to 100,000. Basically he used the stats and rules normally used when violent crime rates rankings are made instead of Forbes' lazy way of doing things. The result? Well, Detroit's not even the most dangerous city in it's state. Flint, Mich. beats by a whole extra violent crime per 1,000 people. Oakland is actually 5th behind those 2, St. Louis, and Memphis. And Stockton ranks a low, but still impressive 19th (take that Buffalo!).

Suspicious by their absence is Las Vegas, which is kind of funny considering there's not really a metropolitan area around Vegas, just more desert. But hey, math was never our strong suit so we'll trust CB on this one. But we may have to rethink our wager with Sin City now.

An Open Letter to the Las Vegas Wranglers

2009-04-28T08:48:00.000-07:00

Dear Las Vegas Wranglers,

First of all, nice name. Ass Spelunkers taken already? Name homosexuality aside, I love your town, even if I did drunkenly call every scantily clad woman around me a hooker that one night. Man, that was a long elevator ride...

Anyways, I'm writing you because you just evened the series against our hometown ~~Falcons~~ Thunder team. Now normally, I don't give a shit about minor league hockey, but you guys have something we want.

You may have heard that we're the 5th most dangerous town in America, you may not have heard that we have a reputation as a fight town (or at least that's the rep we're trying to push). We're always fighting to be at the top or near the top of as many lists as possible, this is where you come into play. See, Las Vegas is the 4th most dangerous city in America. Which is kind of crazy since I had no qualms about walking around Vegas at 4 in the morning, but in Stockton if I'm outdoors at 4 in the morning I'm running for the nearest bomb shelter and waiting out the night to avoid roving bands of handicapped militias.

But I digress, I want to put our #1 ranking in affordable homes (a list in which you came in 3rd) against your #4 ranking in dangerous cities, winner take all! Either homes in Vegas become more affordable or we get little bit more street cred. Is it wrong to bet the safety of our city on a minor league hockey team? Probably. But I have faith that the ~~Fresno Thunder~~ ~~Stockton Falcons~~ Stockton Thunder have put together the best team picking the bones of your closest rival can provide and we're going to go all the way to the "whatever the hell the championship is named" Cup!

So yeah, think about it.

Sincerely,

Reclaiming The Title

Quick Links for April 27th

2009-04-27T16:50:00.000-07:00

Now that I've finished unloading 3 cans of Febreeze into my bathroom to get that asparagus piss smell out of there, let's see if we can knock out some Monday Quick Links!

Oh, so that's how Stockton's population magically surpassed 500,000

Thanks to Christian Burkin's blog we now know how Stockton is considered more dangerous than Oakland even though Oakland has a higher violent crime rate. Long story short, the people who right those Forbes lists are lazy.

Basically, there's more shit around Oakland so they take that into account calling it a "Metropolitan Statistical Area". Because Oakland's in the middle of a bunch of other cities it's numbers get watered down. On our side of the Altamont, we're decidedly more spread out so our MSA is pushed to just a little under 700,000 and just past the 500,000 person threshold needed to make the list. So essentially, it's all Linden's fault.

So not only is the budget fucked now, but it's fucked 20 years from now? Sweet.

We'd be more pissed at this if we understood it, but we're not experts in medical retirement benefits since none of us is currently retired and only one of us enjoys current medical benefits. As far as we can tell, the city hasn't been saving their money for retiree medical benefits so they have to pay as they're billed or something. We basically have the Boost Mobile of retiree medical plans. So the city needs to work on saving some money so in 20 years they'll be able to pay for their own medical insurance instead of having the future/current generation do it...or something. Math's not my strong suit, that's why I got into journalism.

Where's that bottle of whiskey I mentioned earlier?

Sigh. Now that the gag order's in place the Record's got to get more creative with it's Cantu coverage. Now we get stories like "OMG, this judge has emotions!" and the gem of a story linked above. Anybody who's been paying attention has probably heard one of the many rumors flying around this story. The scene of the crime is a trailer park, it's bound to happen. None of them are printable because there's no real way to verify any of them. Although we do find it funny that the one we were able to semi-confirm, that Christian Sinclair is Melissa Huckaby's boyfriend, is the only one we have yet to see in the Record. But the Record can't let little things like fact-checking get in the way of keeping this story alive, so let's take all those little "rumors" and call them "theories"! They're basically the same thing except the second one isn't libel! "Mayyybe she was in the hospital because she swallowed razor blades!" "Mayyybe she's an attention whore!" See, the "Mayyybe" makes it news, not rumormongering. Everybody wins! Except of course for my sanity.

Fitzy's latest love is a "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss" kind of situation

2009-04-27T12:11:00.000-07:00

We did miss one other thing on Friday, something big. Something that let's you know that spring is in the air, everyone has that little extra spring in their step, birds chirping, all that crap that let's you know it's time for some good ol' fashioned summer lovin'. That's right, Fitzy's in love again! He's now apparently spurned the advances of IFG's Stephen Grossman, on the same day he bought him a Dylan/Nelson/Mellencamp concert too! That bitch!

Yes, he's spurned Grossman (from now on known as the Ex Cannon) in favor of a man who knows Fitzy's true love, downtown revitalization. Yes, in a move not unlike that one girl you know who only dates douchebags in emo bands who wear more eyeliner than she does, Fitzy has fallen hard for Revitalization Director David Harzoff. Whom you may or may not remember from this little incident. He's also known as the guy who replaced longtime Fitz love Steve Pinkerton, who left Fitzy after 12 blissful years to take a better job in Manteca and then blogged about it to presumably rub it in his face ("look how happy I am over here without you!").

What turn of events could cause Fitzy to switch horses so quickly? Well, he was wooed with some pillow talk about downtown housing that got him so hot and bothered he chased down Harzoff after the event at Casa Flores (without paying! OMG this is straight out of a Hugh Grant movie!) and said "Talk dirty to me."

Of course, all that dirty talk was theoretical because we have no money to actually, you know, do anything. But Fitzy was still fascinated and gazed longingly into Herzoff's eyes as he spouted off bullshit for him to report to the masses.

Included in that bullshit is a plan to revitalize the nicest area near downtown (Fremont Street) and tear down a state office building (which I'm sure the state would love) and replace it with more shops and cafes. And then he wants to bring in a developer to turn the B+M building into 4 different things, a first floor family style restaurant complete with it's own gourmet hot dog window, a second-floor dance club (because we don't have enough douchey Euro bars as it is), and a third floor private club (because if there's one thing we've learned from this whole thing it's that the citizens of Stockton love snooty private clubs for the rich). Sound ambitious? Yeah, he's pretty proud of himself. From the column:

"'All of a sudden, that plaza starts feeling a lit more like a district,' Harzoff said approvingly."

Sure, I guess, but this is all just in theory. Like when Bris, Duke, and I talk about buying up Stockton Stooges and opening up our own bar. But, like the downtown's redevelopment district, we're broke so those talks stay just that, talks. David Harzoff doesn't go down as easily. Again from the column:

"This sticking point is being addressed in two ways, Harzoff said. First, he is merging two Port redevelopment districts with the downtown district."

So taking money from other districts to fund even more downtown projects? Yeah, Stockton's voters will love that.

"Merging it with two districts at the port, where business is robust, gives it access to millions. But, Harzoff hastened to add, all these dollars will not be taken from the port, which is generating sorely needed jobs."

So we'll merge downtown's district with two port districts because the downtown district has no money, but we won't be taking money from the port? Makes total sense.

"The second policy shift is balance. A share for downtown, a share for the port, a share for the southside and other districts. Not robbing Peter to pay Paul until Peter threatens a recall."

(Reads that paragraph again.)

(Reads entire column again.)

(Reads paragraph again)

(Downs shot of whiskey)

Umm, what? A share of the port district money? A share of the revenue generated from downtown? A share of redevelopment money in general? A share of delicious pie? What the fuck is he talking about? (Note: We know what he's talking about, he just never actually says it in the column. Which could confuse people who don't know exactly how redevelopment funds work. Which, judging by that town hall meeting last week, is a lot of people.)

Fuck this, I'm done. Fitzy's entire column is a load of bullshit. More championing for the downtown district he's been so fond of. It's like he just ignored the last few years happened, you know, the part where everybody got fed up with the consistent flow of cash into one concentrated area. But instead of completely ignoring that, he just wants to make that concentrated area bigger so we can pump even more cash downtown, yet somehow balance that cash and send it southside as well.

Look, we're all for having a decent downtown entertainment district. We'd love to have more venues for drinking and catching some local band, but for the love of God not now. Nobody's saying let's completely abandon downtown since it's failed, what we're saying it slow the fuck down and let the rest of us catch up. And while we're catching up, concentrate on other areas of Stockton.

Downtown's future was never in doubt, we just don't know exactly what that future will entail. People will come around and downtown will thrive. It may not thrive like Fitzy or others wanted it to thrive (as a hub for the rich movers and shakers of the area), but it will find its niche that's decidedly Stockton and that's when more growth may be warranted. Smart growth, not this trial by error shit Harzoff's spouting (which is what got us in this mess in the first place).

Downtown's going through changes right now, people are realizing that maybe trying to be like other cities is a bad idea (I swear to God the next person who mentions San Antonio's River Walk is getting punched in the mouth), we just need to be like Stockton. Unfortunately those in charge haven't figured out what Stockton is yet. Once they have we can act, but until then shut the fuck up about pumping more cash downtown. We're fucking tired of it.

Live from the Asparagus Festival!

2009-04-25T10:51:00.000-07:00

12:55 Well, it's over. Bertoletti won. Chestnut got behind early and was never really able to catch up. He lost by a couple of ounces. Like 7 pounds 2 oz. To Bertoletti's 7 pds. 4 oz.

They're hanging around talking and taking pictures now. Badlands Booker beat boxed about his $500 3rd place prize.

12:20 Introductions are complete. Everybody's setting up their drinks. They're introducing the scorecard holders who are usually some the city's movers and shakers. Las year we got to heckle the Sheraton owner. Sherrif Steve Moore is here. Doug Wilhoit's a card holder. Wayne Hose ex-police chief is here. Current police chief is here. Kate Post just said some words. Shit's about to go down.

11:55 The event's starting. The guy who's name I didn't catch because he speaks fast is pimping the event and competitive eating as an olympic sport. He also introduced the World's first competitice eating themed rapper (Badlands I wanna say?) and he's rapping right now with the asparagus mascots (one who can't keep their head erect) dancing in the background. Yes, it's awesome there are multiple Joey Chestnut shirts in the crowd. Pat Bertoletti also has a vocal group of supporters.

11:35 So with 30 mins to go the crowd is showing up. I staked out a pretty good spot in front. They're prepping the trays of asparagus a half hour in advance. So they're eating half hour old deep fried asparagus. You gotta respect anybody who can do that in bulk. Nameplates are out. The media's out taking a few prep pics. Noone I recognize yet. Just San Joaquin Magazine. Don't worry, nobody else has heard of them either.

11:10So I've already inhaled my first pound of asparagus and now I'm working on some pasta. Sure, it took longer than 10 minutes but I'm not a competitive eater. They're professionally trained athletes. One of the O'Shea bros (heads of the International Federation of Competitive Eating) is here. He was talking with Festival Director Kate Post for a bit before she walked off to check on other things. The Lightening cheerleaders are over buy 104.1 the Hawk's tent. I should head over there.

10:45 Oh, did I forget to mention I'm live blogging the Asparagus Festival and the World Deep-Fried Asparagus Eating Championships? Because I am. Expect it to be on par with the EliteXC liveblog I did way back when.

It's about 10:45 right now. When I got here I beelined it for the ID wristband check, then bought my tickets to enjoy booze and asparagus. What can I say? Any excuse to drink before noon. Apparently I wasn't the only one with this line of thinking as the line was long and somebody had to come by and tell us the ticket booths deeper in the festival by the main stage were empty. Anything to drink before noon! I'm enjoying some deep fried goodness by the main stage right now where the eating competition is going to be. Somebody's already staked out some lawn chairs right in front of where Chestnut is going to be. The trophy is in the background. But the place is otherwise empty besides the band on stage doing a sound check. Exciting, I know.

Special Dangerous Weekend Quick Links!

2009-04-25T10:09:00.000-07:00

Sorry we weren't around yesterday. We were having some technical issues that kept us offline for most of the day. And of course that has to be the one day shit actually happens this week. And a lot of shit happened yesterday. Enough to warrant a weekend post before I head off to watch the World Deep-Fried Asparagus Eating Championships. So here's a special weekend Quick Links!

See, now this is what Nationally Ranked should be about

I'm not sure what Forbes has against us, but they've put us on another one of their lists again. This time they're pimping our street cred by naming us the 5th Most Dangerous City in America. That's right, in the motherfucking nation! We may not be the champs, but we're in the hunt. Plus we're the highest ranked California city. Suck it Oakland!

Of course, like with their flawed miserable cities list, we must take a look at how they came to this conclusion. From the Forbes article:

"To determine our list, we used violent crime statistics from the FBI's latest uniform crime report, issued in 2008." "We evaluated U.S. metropolitan statistical areas ... with more than 500,000 residents."

Oh hey, that's right up our alley. But, wait, the latest crime report was released in the summer of 2008. And that contained 2007's crime stats. So we're basing this off of 2 year old data, even though the new data gets released in the next couple months. Awesome. All though I could have sworn we lost to Oakland that year.

But hey, we did beat out such illustrious suckholes as Philly and Baltimore. So they can't claim to be more hardcore than us. We're dangerous! We were ultimately defeated by worthy foes Las Vegas, Miami, Memphis, and our old friend Detroit. When the new stats come out in a couple months we probably won't be ranked as high, but until then...

We're #5! We're #5!

Now give me your wallet, I'm from Stockton. I'm dangerous.

Ok, so who booked this? And how long can I kiss them before it's considered inappropriate?

Well, this seems like a big summer concert that will appeal to people of all ages. I'm actually fairly shocked at this announcement. I mean, sure it's 3 old dudes, but it's 3 really fucking cool old dudes. And at $70 bucks a ticket and plenty of advance notice to save up for it, hopefully this concert will be well attended. Of course, this being Stockton's first concert at the Ballpark there's always some room for something to get fucked up. Hopefully nobody rushes Willie on stage like at the Morrissey show. Or the David Lee Roth show at the County Fair a few years back. Feel free to rush Bret Michaels though. Although be careful, he sweats pure hepatitis.

So, to summarize quickly. Willie Nelson, Johnny Cougar, and Bob freaking Dylan are making the last stop on their tour in Stockton and it should be awesome. And don't touch Bret Michaels.

And now, the "Asparatus" story...

Ok, so last year when we went to the Asparagus Festival, we took the Asparabus from Delta. It was within walking distance of my apartment and we intended on getting drunk enough to warrant having a bus drive us the 10 minute drive from downtown to my place.

It was your typical bus ride but my favorite part was the promo video they put on the TV screens in the tour bus. On it, one slide that was in heavy rotation (at least I think there were slides, it was a year ago after all. It could have been just one steady ad) advertised that you were on the bus heading to the Stockton "Asparatus" Festival. Yes, the busses rented out buy the Asparagus Festival played a video presumably made by the Asparagus Festival people, and they didn't spell Asparagus correctly.

We ended up telling the bus driver about the typo figuring he had been getting it all day from fellow Asparabussers. Instead he looked kind of surprised, and sure enough on the bus ride back the video was gone. So not only was Asparagus spelled Asparatus on the Asparabus, but nobody noticed until halfway through the second day.

Yes, I'm easily amused. Now somebody get me that tri-tip and asparagus sandwich.

Quick Links for April 23rd

2009-04-23T11:27:00.000-07:00

Is it really Thursday and we still haven't done a Quick Links? Wow, that's kind of amazing. Well, let's see what nuggets of awesome we can mine from this week. Quick Links!

I told you these guys were evil!

Fuck, we made it to Thursday without mentioning this? Really? Media whore Alan Pettet responded to Don Blount's Klan kolumn from the previous week by claiming that the militia will be a rainbow coalition of men and women. If that didn't convince you the guy's a little bit off, he really cranks up the crazy in his next claim. He claims that an anonymous federal judge will swear the militia in on July 1st and then "Five minutes after we're sworn in, we oust the mayor and City Council and then we can declare martial law."

Ladies and gentlemen, the decent into cartoonish supervillan is almost complete. By this time next year we assume he will have pumped some poor cop full of lead so badly that the police department will take what's left of the body and turn him into some sort of crime fighting cyborg. That's right, Stockton's very own Robocop. It's going to happen dammit!

"Where do you live?" "I represent this distric.." "No, where do you live?" "I live on.." "Are you from the SOUTH!?" "No, I..." "That's all I wanted to know"

So yeah, that town hall meeting the mayor had in south Stockton was hilarious. I decided to attend because the mayor directly interacting with the residents of south Stockton sounded like a recipe for comedy gold. It was, for about 30 minutes. Then it became pretty repetitive. For a while most questions (a term I use loosely) seemed to start with "I moved to/was born in Stockton in 19(insert year before the 70s) and have lived here for over (insert number over 40 here) years. Things have changed a lot." Yes, for the most part it was a meeting about how south Stockton has changed due to growth. It's not like things were "back in my day". And then from there it devolved into one giant race debate. And by "race debate" I mean people accused the city of being prejudiced, even when talking about things the city had little-to-no control over. I came with the intention of asking a question but ended up not doing so. Partially because getting a word in edge-wise was nearly impossible for just Johnston and Eggman, and I wasn't nearly as passionate about my question as others were. And partially because I just felt bad for Johnston and Eggman. No answer they gave was good enough for that crowd.

One man asked why the General Fund is so depleted (because tax and permit revenues were down) and then 20 minutes later another guy complained that taxes and permits were too high. One guy even asked what the city was going to do about the racism in his union hall as if the city could just swoop in and be the racism police. (Although my favorite question was when somebody old enough to be my grandpa asked who owns all the foreclosed homes. That made me feel 10 times smarter.)

In the end it was clear that, if you weren't from south Stockton (which apparently is south of Charter Way, but does not include Charter Way), then your opinion didn't matter (hence the "Are you from the SOUTH" exchange one man had with Eggman). Which is a counterproductive line of thinking at best. The main problem is Stockton and south Stockton are like two completely different cities. Enforcing that by saying people from north of Charter couldn't possibly understand what goes on down south only hinders the progress south Stockton could make. It's about uniting communities, not enforcing petty separations. Hopefully both sides of Stockton eventually realize this and work together to lessen the discrepancies between the 2 areas.

Have we mentioned how horrible the City Council's timing is?

Speaking of the Council, we haven't seen any examples of their infamous horrible timing lately. Luckily Christian Burkin found an example in an American soldier in Iraq who also works for the Stockton PD. Can you guess where this is going? Yes, he's probably getting laid off. I'm kind of disappointed I didn't read this before going to that town hall meeting last night. Of course somebody probably would have asked what part of Stockton he was from as if it matters

Poor Randy Paragary, if only we weren't such bitter pricks he'd be successful!

2009-04-22T10:05:00.000-07:00

Well, we were right. Mike Fitzgerald is the last guy who should be covering this Paragary's story. It's news, and old Fitzy is too biased to treat it objectively like any newsperson should. So, for those of you playing along at home, it's time to play....
(Insert game show theme here)

Spot! The! Bias!

Yes, it's Spot the Bias, the game show where we take somebody's article or column and pick it apart and point out where the writer displayed obvious bias against or in favor of their subject! Today's contestant is Fitzy and his column about the possible sale of Paragary's. Paragary's being Fitzy's favorite downtown restaurant he will obviously be biased in favor of anything Randy Paragary says. What constitutes bias you ask? Well, it could be an adjective, it could be ignoring other factors for the one you want to push, or it could be contradicting something said in the previous paragraph with the very next quote and not saying anything about it. Yes, this will be a glorious example of damning somebody with their own words. But first, the setup!

"Paragary's Bar & Grill, the beautiful but controversially subsidized restaurant that city leaders hoped would help catalyze downtown Stockton's revival, is up for sale.

Price: $555,000, batteries not included. Hopefully neither are the restaurant's challenges."

Here's hoping he lists all of the restaurant's challenges and not just the one he always harps on, but that's all part of the game. So let's play...

Spot! The! Bias!

Our first piece of bias is a personal favorite because it involves damning people with their own words (which I love doing) and it involves this week's Out-of-Context Quote of the Week!

"'It's not a case of sell or close,' Paragary said. 'I'm exploring all options.'"

All options? Then, what about this?

"If it doesn't sell, Paragary said, he will tweak offerings to better suit a standoffish Stockton market."

Oh, hi Out-of-Context Quote of the Week. What's that? Exploring all options includes tweaking the menu for the market before threatening to take your ball and go home? Surely that's not bias. That's just bad business practices.

The bias is in calling Stockton standoffish. We're not dating Paragary's. We're not having a fight with Paragary's where we, as a city, passive-aggressively critique its hair. We're just not eating there because we don't like the expensive food and the snooty atmosphere. That's not standoffish, that's making a business decision based on the factors I just listed. That subsidy thing is old hat, we're way past that now. Even Bris, Duke, and I; the most stubborn people I know, gave up on that subsidy thing a while back and visited Paragary's with predictable results. The reason Paragary's failed is not because of some petty subsidy-based boycott. So let's stop all that talk right now. Ok?

"(The ad) refers to the $2.7 million subsidy - five years of free rent - that generated opposition and a partial boycott"

Care to quote anybody saying they boycotted Paragary's specifically because of the subsidy? No? BIAS! And just bad journalism too. At least it's not like Fitzy fed all of this to Randy Paragary during his interview and Paragary responded with "Yeah, what you said."

"'I've been told through e-mails and letters to the editor and even to my face that certain people do not go there because of what you just described,' Paragary said."

Oh well. At least he got somebody to comment on the "boycott", even if it was Paragary himself. At least people told him how they felt to his face as opposed to sneaking an ad up on San Francisco's Craigslist two weeks ago without telling the city or even his own fucking investors. But let's move on with the game, can you give us vague examples of other subsidized businesses that aren't boycotted because apparently all subsidies are created equal?

"The public has subsidized development - sprawl - in sums that dwarf the Paragary's deal. But they don't boycott subdivisions. The city gave its sports teams a deal sweeter than chocolate covered macadamia nuts. Nobody boycotts the arena."

Again, no quotes from people who say the Arena is ok but Paragary's isn't. It just is man. That arena is always sold out, and everybody supports the Thunder 100%! Oh wait, we don't. Those games don't sell out and one of the tenants of the Arena (the Cougars) are also trying to leave. So really it's the same fucking thing. But hey, when he does get another quote about boycotts, it comes from the same fucking source, Randy Paragary.

"'We,' Paragary said, "bore the brunt of subsidy fatigue.'"

Because, as you know, we forced him to take that place rent free at gunpoint. Man, will the bias ever stop?

"Other brunts poor Paragary bears:"

...

Poor Paragary? Poor Paragary? How can anybody take this seriously anymore? The possible sale of Paragary's is a news story. Fucking write it with some semblance of objectivity you elitist fuck!

Sorry about that, let's continue with the plight of poor millionaire restaurateur Randy Paragary.

"Retail shops never materialized on the Hotel Stockton's ground floor, and downtown is still Skid Row to many."

Oh hey, reasons that aren't subsidy based. It's nice that this is everybody's fault but Paragary's. Fuck it, let's jump to the last piece of glaring bias so we can summarize.

"Therefore, 'in retrospect, I don't think of it as a subsidy,' Paragary said, making a good point. 'I think the deal we made was truly market. Free rent in that location is market. It's just a reality. Anybody who operated in that location will need free rent for a while.'"

Ignoring the fact that he brings up the subsidy again. Think of the last time you saw a reporter remark that the quoted subject made a "good point". Can't think of one? That's because they don't. He can make a point, but when you comment one the quality of that point you're pushing objectivity to the side.

Ok, now that we got all that journalismy bias stuff out of the way, let's get to the main issue here. Mike Fitzgerald and Randy Paragary are basically saying it's our fault for the failure of Paragary's because we don't want to eat there for whatever reasons. They're painfully wrong. Randy Paragary has one person and one person alone to blame for the failure of his Stockton restaurant, and his name is Randy Paragary.

Paragary didn't study the market he was basically paid to enter. He opened a high-class ritzy restaurant in a working-class, blue collar town. Yes, nobody likes it when rich people get financial breaks, but nobody's thinking "Oh man, that guy doesn't pay rent, fuck him" anymore. It's been a while, we've all pretty much given Paragary's a shot. It's not a fit for our town. It fits Sacramento because that place is filled with douchebags who like to pretend their cowtown is some ritzy political metropolis. Stockton doesn't have delusions of grandeur (ok, well it's citizens don't. City Council is another story). We are what we are. If Paragary had done just a simple study of the new market he was getting in to (which any good businessman should do before entering a new market), he would have seen that. But instead he chose to blame everything and everybody else. It's our fault we don't like the atmosphere, it's our fault we can't afford the prices, it's our fault the food tastes like shit, and it's our fault that the customer service is inexcusably bad. And most importantly, it's our fault we're not classy enough to "get" Paragary's. Well fuck you Randy Paragary, I'm classy as hell. At least I tell people I'm moving to their face instead of having them find out via Craigslist you classless fuck.

So yeah, it looks like we were right. The last person to write this story besides Randy Paragary was Mike Fitzgerald. And even then he got help from Paragary. Which is kind of fitting, those two are class acts.

Out of Context Quote of the Week!

2009-04-21T17:41:00.000-07:00

Fuck it, I know it's only Tuesday and I know we should wait for the actual column to come out but this one was too much. Your out-of-context quote of the week is a look into the business practices of Randy Paragary from Mike Fitzgerald's blog:

"If it doesn't sell, Paragary said he will tweak his offerings to better suit a standoffish Stockton market."

In other words, he's looking to sell before trying the simple business practice of changing his menu and/or prices. You, Randy Paragary, are a classy motherfucker. And with business practices like that, I can't imagine why your business isn't profitable.

Mike Fitzgerald is probably the wrong guy to cover this Paragary's story

2009-04-21T17:04:00.000-07:00

In our excitement over news of the eventual sale of Paragary's and Fitzy's reaction to said sale we forgot something (I blame residual affects from yesterday's high holiday). Namely, should Mike Fitzgerald be the one reporting on it? The conflict of interest chart I keep in my wallet sadly says "no".

Why? Well, for one Fitzy hasn't really hidden the fact that he's pals with Randy Paragary. He even went as far to hold a contest on his blog attempting to name the already named roof of the old Hotel Stockton.

More recently he called our understanding of subsidies into question, because subsidies are what I take into consideration when I'm constemplating where to eat. Quality of food, service, atmosphere, and price have nothing to do with it. Plus he argued that we shouldn't hate on Paragary's because it wasn't the recipient of the biggest subsidy. Yet, he never mentions what other places received larger subsidies because all subsidies are created equal apparently.

But, perhaps most damning, is what he mentioned in his initial blog post about the future sale of Paragary's:

"I'll check this out later today. If this is legit, please consider going in with me on this venture."

He's a potential buyer! I know the Record doesn't really give a shit about conflicts of interest, but this seems like a big one. He could skew the coverage to scare away potential buyers! Which is a way more effective way to scare off buyers than talking to employees and customers (oh craigslist, you're so full of hilarity).

So yeah, as much as we'd love to see it for our own twisted purposes, Mike Fitzgerald is the last guy who should be covering the possible sale of Paragary's, besides perhaps Randy himself.

Na na na na, na na na na, hey hey hey, goodbye

2009-04-21T11:39:00.000-07:00

Hilarious news out of downtown Stockton today. Yesterday Mike Fitzgerald happened upon a Craigslist ad for business space that suspiciously resembled venerable snooty restaurant, and purveyor of randomly placed billboards, Paragary's.

After waiting a whole half a day for a response (and taking time to take a jab at the ABC/Garden/whoever owns it this week Buffet and it's plastic palm trees) Randy Paragary returned his call and confirmed that he is in fact ~~a shitty restaurateur~~ leaving.

Thank fucking God. Now hopefully somebody good will buy the space and make it useful to a majority of Stockton. I always thought a kick ass Mexican restaurant would be perfect there. Or maybe an Applebees. Bris and Duke vote for a microbrewery. Preferably one that doesn't have a menu change every time we visit (coughValleyBrewcough). Which would also be awesome.

We can't wait for Fitzy's column about this tomorrow. Will he turn on longtime ally Randy Paragary? Will he defend his friend's decision to leave even though he pays no rent and really only has to lower prices and cut the high class bullshit to be successful? Or will Mike direct his rage at the City Council for attracting multiple tenants with lucrative deals (Thunder, Lightening, Cougars, Paragary's) only to have the owners of all of them say "fuck it" and walk away? Or perhaps he'll talk to ex-~~lover~~Redevelopment head Steve Pinkerton about it! Stay tuned for tomorrow's Fitzy column which we're already predicting will be a gem.

Until next time, fuck you Randy Paragary. Nobody wanted you here in the first place.

I think my Bullshit Meter just broke.

2009-04-20T14:23:00.000-07:00

You know a story has reached its saturation point when Mike Klocke has to devote a column to defending The Record's coverage of it. Or did you forget the time he defended the ridiculous coverage of the 20th anniversary of the Cleveland school shooting a week before it hit newsstands?

This week, Mike Klocke does a better job than I did explaining how overwhelming the coverage has been. But apparently it's all OK, because they..umm.. he never really says. Well, besides the fact that Tracy's eating this shit up, and the Record's the only daily paper in Tracy.

17 out of 19 days the Cantu coverage has been front page news. I'd guess at least 10 of those stories didn't contain any actual news. But, beyond that point, no story should take up the front page for literally half a month. Especially one with as little information as this story has had. And on top of all that, the Record has (up until this column) pretty much ignored the fact that the Tracy Press scooped them big time with that Huckaby interview (not to mention they scooped Tracy PD).

All of that coverage of informationless press conferences and videos of outside the trailer park and all it took was a fucking phone call to break this case wide open. The Record's hurling every resource they have to try and generate pageviews and sell papers, that they're ignoring basic journalistic principles. You can shoot all the videos you want, follow the police department's every move, and even present live coverage of a memorial service, but it's all bullshit if you miss the fucking story.

It's not about Tracy as a community, it's not about some woman's mental health, it's definitely not about Tara fucking Cuslidge, and it's not about The Record and how they're better than other news outlets (mostly because they aren't). This story is about a little girl who was fucking abducted, possibly raped, and thrown into a irrigation ditch. And yet here I am writing about the state of journalism for the third fucking time in relation to this story. Why? Because the Record decided to go the sensationalist route and tackle every single angle to this story but the one that mattered. You may remember it, it's the one about a dead little girl.

Luckily, while the Record was using this as an apparent exercise in the future of journalism, a 22-year old reporter (22!?) named Jennifer Wadsworth was practicing the present journalism not only broke an honest to God story, she broke the fucking case open. Of course you may have missed that amongst the stories of barbecues, useless videos, and Twitter feeds of questionable taste.

And that's why my bullshit meter is broken. Because when you cut through it all, the Record's coverage of this story has been exactly like that of the national outlets Klocke was so ready to deride yesterday. The local touch is bullshit, because the Record didn't use the local touch. They used the jackhammer so often used in national coverage. And in doing so they neglected the most basic principle of journalism, getting information to the people. Which, in hindsight might actually make them worse than Nancy Grace. I don't expect shit from her, she couldn't find Tracy on a map. The Record on the other hand should know better, they do cover Tracy all the time after all. Which is why Mike Klocke's entire column Sunday was bullshit.

I'm embarrassed just covering this.

2009-04-17T12:39:00.000-07:00

Ok, this is just getting fucking ridiculous. I understand jack and shit went on yesterday but did we really need the front and back pages of the A section dedicated to a memorial service for a girl that up until 3 weeks ago 99% of the people that attended didn't know or care about? Do we really need a video of it?

Couldn't the resources dedicated to this be better used elsewhere? The Record's all too eager to use the AP for everything else (including the last time Tracy made national headlines in the Teen Slave case) but when it comes to a little dead girl who captured the hearts of weepy soccer moms it warrants 2 original stories a motherfucking day?

Everybody, and I truly do mean everybody, involved in the coverage of this story should be fucking embarrassed. This is why newspapers are dying. It's not the internet that's killing papers it's the blatant misuse (or underutilization) of the internet by those newspapers. Instead of chasing meaningful stories that will actually matter 2 weeks from now, the Record sends multiple members of their already thinned out newsroom (especially thinned out when you take into account the couple of folks on vacation this week) to shoot videos, take way too many pictures, and get quotes like:

"My daughter liked to skip too."

Or

"It was wrong to kill a little girl like that."

Fuck. That is some God damned hard-hitting journalism right there. Who would have thought that two girls of a similar age would have something like skipping in common!? Or that murder is wrong!?

Of course amongst all of this shit about some little girl we've only "known" for 2 weeks being "Tracy's Angel" is an ill-timed article about Huckaby's defense attorney wanting Cantu's body exhumed so they can get their own definition of what genital trauma is. Fucking classy.

Almost as classy as Twittering a fucking funeral, which I'm pretty sure is a sign of the apocalypse. (Looks out window) Yep, that's the Four Horsemen. Nice knowing everybody.

I'm all for using the internet to it's fullest potential, but live blogging a fucking memorial service? Really? Is tact dead too? I'm not saying the memorial service didn't warrant coverage but, you know, I don't need up to the second updates on it. I can wait. Nothing says "tasteful" quite like texting updates on people's emotional suffering during the memorial service.

Like I said, fucking embarrassing.

April's Rube of the Month

2009-04-17T08:30:00.000-07:00

Well, it's about that time again, time for...

April's Rube of the Month!

This one's more of a throwback to the original rubes in that it involves the stupidity of just an average Stocktonian and really has nothing to do with the Record outside of the fact that they reported it. And I'm glad they did. From the 911 Briefs yesterday:

"Impersonating an officer: A 46-year-old man told police he was driving west on Park Street at about 10 p.m. Tuesday when another driver pulled up behind him and turned on a solid red light that was mounted on the dashboard."

Oh sweet! Olden Polynice is in town! And solid red light? They shined a flashlight at them? I need blinking lights to be fooled dammit! Or at least some official looking radio.

"The victim pulled over, and the other man walked up to him holding a radio and identifying himself as a police officer, according to the Stockton Police Department. The man then walked the victim to the back of his car, searched him and took two wallets and cash, police said. He then drove away on Park."

You know, I always get escorted to the back of an unmarked police car when I run a red light. So I don't see any problem here. Except for the fact that running a red light is like a $250 ticket and that's it. You don't even have to really unbuckle your seatbelt to get one. This guys must have been really convincing. Let's get a description of the guy so we know what to look for.

"The robber's car is described as a white, 1989 Chevy Suburban with dark, 3-inch-wide pin-striping. The robber is described as black, about 25 years old, 6 feet tall with a thin build and short, curly hair."

Seems official so far, what about his uniform? That had to be something really convincing looking that would make the Angels of Christ jealous.

He was clean-shaven and was last seen wearing a dark, short-sleeved polo shirt and pink pajama pants. (emphasis ours)

What. The. Fuck. If someone pulls me over wearing pink pajama pants I'm telling them to kick rocks and driving off. I don't care if everything else about them says cop. They could be driving an official police car, have the uniform shirt, and even the fancy hat with rain guard. But as soon as I see those pink pajamas I'm flipping them off for wasting my time and leaving. End of story. Or I would at least play along until they asked me to get out of the car, pantsed them, and then left.

Somebody got conned by a motherfucker wearing PINK PAJAMA PANTS! So we even need vigilantes? We can all just wake up in the morning and pull people over without even changng out of our fucking PJs! And he didn't even have a gun tucked into the waistband Plaxico-style!

How did this person get a drivers license in the first places if they can't figure out that the guy walking up to their car brandishing a radio and pink pajama pants was a cop!? Isn't that like question 6 on the DMV test? Fuck that, isn't that a question on a kindergarten test? "What do cops wear?" "A. Blue uniforms. B. A hat C. Pink pajama pants D. All but C."

If you can't answer that question, you fail at life. And that's why this anonymous 46 year old man is April's Rube of the Month.

Quick Links for April 16th

2009-04-16T12:20:00.000-07:00

So, Quick Links? Ok, yeah, Quick Links.

What's my favorite word?

So early this morning (ok, around 7, but that's early for me), I got this misleading text message from El Duke that read "Lori Gilbert + rap = comedy gold". Of course, I ran to my computer hoping to see our favorite mature fetishist making a star turn as Queen Laqueefah and was slightly disappointed when that didn't happen. Luckily my disappointment quickly disappeared once I read the headline to her latest article, "Poets slam together rap form, gender issues". Yes, my disappointment was replaced by complete and utter confusion. Poetry AND rap form? Isn't that just called hip-hop? And it's at that point I realized Lori Gilbert was going to be writing about gender issues (a subject in which she doesn't exactly have the best track record) and rap music, which is fitting considering she's probably the only writer less equipped than Tony "Dino" Sauro to write about that subject (and it shows as she pretty much abandons that topic 3 paragraphs in). In other words, this was going to be hilarious.

And it was. It didn't even take 3 paragraphs to elicit a chuckle from me. Mostly this passage:

"The broad view of rap is that it's misogynistic..."

Which is almost immediately followed by this:

"'I never heard that thing about rap,' said Gesine Gerhard, director of Pacific's gender studies program."

It's always nice when an expert in gender studies contradicts your misogyny allegations in their very first quote. Look, we're not saying there aren't misogynistic rap lyrics (after all, the answer to the name of the Too Short song about is "bitch" or more phonetically "beee-yatch!"), but to say that the broad view of rap is that is misogynistic is misleading at best. That's the view old white people have of rap. Mostly because they've listened to one, maybe two rap songs in their entire lives. They don't understand hip hop culture.

But then we get into the discussion about the differences between hip hop and rap (and there is a difference), and that takes us wayyyyy off topic. I guess the point I'm trying to make is that rap really isn't any more misogynistic than any other form of music. Like any form of music it's representative of its culture. And while we as a culture have made great strides in terms of equality, those issues are still there. We're not saying rappers who have derogatory lyrics about women are all socially conscious and trying to bring inequality to the forefront, we're just saying they're representing a part of our culture regardless of how ignorant it is.

Rap has always reflected culture, and a lot of the time it's a part of culture we're not particularly proud of. There's the racial/political issues tackled in the 80s by Public Enemy. Or there's Ice T's "Cop Killer" in which he unleashes his pent up rage at the police for multitude of reasons by cathartically shouting "Fuck the police!" Rap, hip-hop, whatever the fuck you want to call it, is fucking raw. Which is something we may have forgotten recently amongst the overproduced bullshit unleashed upon us by noted gay fish Kanye West.

The worst part about that entire rap rant I just went on? It has nothing to do with the rest of that article because it's actually about a fucking poetry slam, which besides being similar lyrically, has absolutely nothing to do with rap. So why was rap even brought up in this article? Because somebody wanted to make a comment about gender roles in what is otherwise a straight forward article previewing a poetry slam. In other words, Lori Gilbert threw in unresearched bullshit and straight up stated her opinion in an article. Which I hear may be against a main point of journalism or something. Told you she had a poor track record writing about gender issues. But hey, at least you can treat this as the piece on rap and gender issues that the headline of that article teased but didn't follow through with.

Lodi taking progressive steps towards medical pot use? Did I step into the Twilight Zone or something?

So, let me get this straight, because there are no local zoning laws regarding medical marijuana dispensaries, that gives the Lodi City Council the right to impose a moratorium on them for up to 2 years to decide create those zoning laws? Lodi doesn't have pharmacies? Or medical supply stores? Bullshit. Half that town is fucking assisted living communities. They're just scared of what might happen based on archaic views of pot being a "gateway drug" and based on what one dumbass did in Modesto (long story short, he got greedy).

And judging by the report from Lodi Police Chief David Main, they'll be citing the fuck ups more than the people who genuinely need medical marijuana and have to drive to fucking Sacramento to do so. So we're not in the Twilight Zone after all. It's just another day of typical conservative Lodi bullshit.

Using this doll, point to where this woman touched you. Even though we have absolutely no information to indicate that she may have

In what can only be described as a throwback to the initial search for Cantu's body, the Tracy police department is once again admitting that they don't know shit and are now asking the community through the newspaper if they were also "inappropriately contacted" by Melissa Huckaby. Because crowd sourcing the investigation totally worked during the search for Cantu's body. So in 2 weeks look out for some immigrant workers who will come forward and say they found three girls who admitted to being touched by Huckaby (presumably via erotic shoulder rub). God, why won't this story end? Oh hey, what's this? Sandra who?

Here's what we missed...

2009-04-15T16:55:00.000-07:00

Sometime we get busy around here and stories fall through the cracks. Here's a couple stories that we missed (including one from today!) in a feature I'm pretty sure we call What We Missed.
Sarcasm only works in writing when the author is good at both writing and sarcasm. Don Blount isn't good at either

Bad sarcasm aside, let's move to the most important part. Where Don Blount comes from, a group of armed dudes wearing similar clothing patrolling the seedier areas of town in their cars is called the Klan. But we're not in where Don Blount comes from. We're in where Slick Diaz comes from. And where I come from, a group of armed dudes wearing similar clothing patrolling dangerous areas in their cars are called fucking GANGS.

What's that? They can't be because they're old and white? Racist!

Situations like the one surrounding the formation of the SAM are the exact same situations gangs are formed. Community members feel abandoned by the people meant to protect them so they take the law into their own hands and protect themselves and their community. Sound familiar? That's because that's exactly what the SAM is doing. And it's also how the gangs they're so hot to combat got started too.

While we can appreciate what Blount was going for, even if the entire column was borderline unreadable, likening the SAM to the Ku Klux Klan is just short sighted for multiple reasons. The biggest one being the fact that the Klan is such a lightening rod of hate that whatever argument Blount was trying to make (no matter how valid) was lost because people see the word "Klan" and go into some sort of knee jerk defense mode. Which (surprise!) is exactly what happened.

A much much much much much much (much much much ) better choice of words would have been to liken them to gangs. Or, if Blount was really set on comparing them to another group of white people, old timey gangsters. You know, the Godfather kind. Those gangs/families also formed to protect their neglected immigrant community. Sure, they're glorified now in movies and on TV, but it's still better than conjuring up images of the KKK. Doing that's almost as bad an idea as patrolling the dangerous streets of Stockton with loaded weapons and no training.

Irony alert!

While Tara Cuslidge writing about her old journalism teacher getting an award seems somewhat conflict of interesty, it's overshadowed by the hilarity of a column preaching diversity in journalism appearing in the Record. We'd outline the Record's history in diversity but if you've been reading this site (or even just the Record for that matter) you know the Record caters to one group and one group alone, rich old white people.

Ok fine, you want an example. How about the ridiculous over-coverage of minor league hockey while a popular Latino fighter spends the weekend earning a decisive victory over one of his sport's legends and only gets two paragraphs in a sports round up?

Or how about the fact that nobody's flipping out about the Cougars actually leaving town but everybody's shitting themselves over the Thunder just being put up for sale?

Or, you know, spending 2 weeks covering that Cantu case even though there was about 2 days worth of information released? Or the Record's apparent decision that the local music scene wasn't worth it and that Ian Hill was better suited standing outside a courthouse shooting video of an uninformative press conference.

And then there's always the fact that if you're a non-athlete above 17 and under 50 the only way you're getting in the paper is sending something to myRecord, while Lori Gilbert regularly writes about old people for doing shit like waiting tables and not dying (except for that one woman who actually died).

So yeah, it's ironic that the Record is writing about diversity when it's anything but. Hilarious, ain't it?

Why I hate journalism and a meandering rant about the Cantu Case

2009-04-15T11:15:00.000-07:00

We haven't really covered much of the Sandra Cantu case here. Mostly because after about day 3 we stopped following it regularly because there was really only a handful of ways it could have ended, one of them being "found in a suitcase in an irrigation ditch". And, call me crazy, I don't want to hear/read about how a little girl was brutally raped and murdered. That's not exciting journalism for us.

We also ignored it partially because it was quite possibly the slowest developing story we've ever seen. It was frustrating to track because Tracy PD was keeping its mouth shut on fucking everything. Which resulted in multiple articles about the search continuing with no real new information aside from who's car got towed mixed in with trailer park gossip. No really, here's a list of the stories from when Cantu went missing until her body was found (roughly a week and a half):

Cantu disappears
We're searching!
Hey, did you guys do it? No? But you kissed her! On the lips! Still no? Ok, we'll keep looking.
Hey you! Let us look! Oh, still nothing. Well, we're still taking you in!
Yeah, so, we still got nothing.
But we're narrowing things down! (Note: this was 5 days before some farm workers narrowed it down for them)
We're doing a good job! Swear! But yeah, still nothing.
See! We found this t-shirt! Sure it's not Sandra's we totally wasted a day on this but it's something. Ok fine, we got nothing.
We got a helicopter! Oh, and still nothing.
Hey look! Another house searched! And another day of jack shit to report!
So still nothing, but be distracted by this creepy video of the last images of a probably dead girl in what was probably her last happy moments!
Oh my! The poor community! Oh, and still fucking nothing!
No really, poor Tracy!
Man, such a quiet search. Almost makes you think about packing it in and calling it a day.
Oh shit! They found something! Quit stalling and tellll ussssss.
OMG it was her! Quick, shoot a video of the mom's darkest hour!

That was fucking grating wasn't it? Nearly 2 weeks of bullshit. Half of those stories are "Police found jack shit". We're all for covering the search but at what point does rehashing the same story about Tracy PD not finding anything become useless? They could have skipped probably half those stories.

But Tracy PD was dicks and kept leading people on. They told us they had a handful of credible tips, they postponed press conferences with no explanation, and all of it was fucking bullshit because when it was all said and done they still had to rely on a group of farm workers who stumbled upon a suitcase in an irrigation ditch. All that shit about being close was a fucking lie. You hear about them searching the pastor's house before they found Melissa Huckaby's suitcase? I sure as hell didn't.

Of course, the Record sent a reporter out to Tracy pretty much every day for a week and a half so they had to get something back. Most of the time that reporter got nothing so he ended up having to rehash details we already knew. Which is fine once or twice. But not a week and a half of that shit.

And that's all before we got into the search for her killer and Huckaby's arrest/arraignment. The search for Sandra's killer went much more smoothly than the search for her body. Even if the avalanche of online videos increased the already borderline overkill media coverage to "contemplating suicide so I can stop hearing about this God damn story" levels.

Of course, once Huckaby was arrested, this turns into a court case so we get a whole new batch of angles to make your brain melt! Which resulted in my favorite series of stories in this entire shitstorm. The Record got ahold of deputy District Attorney Thomas Testa and found out he was going to be the prosecutor. Which would be a fine story if the other deputy DA wasn't telling the AP about the addition of rape/molestation charges! The resulting combination of those two stories was a fairly entertaining mashup (So yeah, rape and stuff. But hey look! A guy we spent half a day interviewing!)

And then there's the court hearing in which, well, NOTHING HAPPENED. They read off the charges that the DA already tipped everybody off on and everybody stood around trying to get video of some woman who's clearly at her wit's end crying. It was riveting stuff.

The saddest part (besides, you know, the whole little girl getting killed and raped thing), is that people are eating this bullshit up. Countless numbers of people who know I'm kind of a news junkie kept asking me if I saw the story about the court appearance I'm just sitting there thinking (and this is the part where, if you don't already hate me, you will afterwards) WHAT'S THE BIG FUCKING DEAL!? Yes, a girl died. Yes, it's sad. Yes, it happened close to home. But nothing's fucking changed. I see mom's reading these stories with a worried look on their face and I just want to grab them and shout "Nothing is different! Your kid was in just as much danger a month ago as they are now!" Maybe I'm just a sick human being who doesn't really feel a connection to people I've never met and never will meet, or maybe I just recognize media scare tactics

But scare tactics work. Now we can have countless News10 stories about how to keep your kid safe from the dangers of the world and everybody can get some sort of closure even though most people will forget about this case after the first episode of Nancy Grace after the gag order is in place. And in the end, what do we get? A few extra papers sold (a claim I hate making, but it fits here). A little rattled that something like that could happen in a little town like Tracy even though something like this always could have happened in Tracy (and still can in the future). Plus, we get to call some woman we don't know a psycho with mental problems to make ourselves feel better about the world in general. And, as a bonus, we get a false sense of security because now we're aware and informed about how to protect our kids thanks to the overcoverage by news outlets. Which is kind of ironic because a false sense of security is how this whole thing started.

God I hate journalism.

Quick Links for April 14th

2009-04-14T11:18:00.000-07:00

It's time for everybody's favorite lazy space filler, Quick Links!

Isn't this how movie supervillians start?

Well, it finally happened. Alan Pettet's most credible supporter, his lawyer/friend Ron Stein admitted that his involvement in the Stockton Armed ~~Gang~~ Militia was meant to be satirical. Because, you know, the Record's basically an unfunny version of the Onion at this point. Yes, in a move that seems to indicate backlash from his employer/clients (or somebody just smacking him on the back of the head and saying "what the matter with you?"), Stein called the proposed militia ridiculous and is "off the ship". Which we can imagine his pal Pettet loved.

There's no way to know how this truly went down, but I like to imagine a meek Stein walking into a dark, cavernous room and saying "Al, I can't do this anymore. It's too risky." While an already corrupted by power Pettet slowly turns around in his electric wheelchair while petting the cat in his lap and says "Too risky? It's too late for too risky! You've seen the attention this thing's gotten! I'm gonna be on Limbaugh! We have hundreds of followers! Hundreds! We can't turn our backs on them now!" Then a cowering Stein says, "But, but Alan, I thought we agreed this was just a joke. It's getting out of hand. Nobody takes me seriously as a lawyer anymore." Which would naturally be followed by an enraged Pettet saying "Joke? This is no joke. It's bigger than the both of us now. You want to leave? Fine. You disgust me." Then he would turn back around and gaze longingly into the fireplace while descending further into madness.

Yes, I have too much free time on my hands.

Why must you crush my dreams Record!?

Well, after cleaning up the awards last week, this week crime statistics continue to decline. While auto theft isn't a violent crime, it does show that crime in general is on the decline. Plus, the article later states that, just in the first 3 months of 2009, violent crimes are down 11%.

This was a big list though. This isn't just auto theft rate in California, this is a nationwide list. And we let fucking Modesto beat us. Modesto. It's hard to see such a promising ex-champion fall from grace like this. Especially on such a grand stage. But we'll be back, I have faith.

On a side note, with violent crime down 11%, property crime down 21.4%, and auto thefts down 27% do we really need a group of vigilantes patrolling the streets? Crime's not exactly on the rise and throwing a bunch of dudes on the street with guns can really only raise the crime rate...wait a minute. That might just be the thing to salvage our title chances! Militias for everybody! 200+ homicides has to bring the title home. It just has to.

This might just save newspapers

Sometimes, in pursuit of an angle to a story or a gimmick, we forget things. Since we started our crusade to end the string of Lori Gilbert penned stories about old people, we forgot that in the right light old people can be downright adorable. Stories about how old people are still useful aren't adorable and are frankly kind of insulting to our county's elderly. What is adorable? Old playing video games. Serious, go look at the main picture attached to this story and tell me that old lady with her tongue sticking out in deep concentration isn't the cutest thing you've seen since myRecord.

I'm deeply disappointed there wasn't a video to compliment this story as watching two old dudes engage in a friendly bout of video game fisticuffs would have been the best thing Recordnet's ever produced. Seriously, tell Tara Cuslidge to stop acting as the word's most expensive tape recorder for reporters and have her start videotaping these bowling matches. Speed them up to double speed in post and add the Benny Hill theme, post it to the Online Blog and you've got yourself a bona fide viral video. It'll be the funniest thing on that blog since Cuslidge's "Sandra Cantu happened to me!" post, only this time it'll be intentional!

Writer's workshop with Mike Fitzgerald!

2009-04-13T10:17:00.000-07:00

It's tough coming up with daily content for this site. I don't say this to garner pity, I say it to make a point. One of the features we came up with to help generate that content is the Quick Links, which is basically a list of multiple stories that we make fun of. We fully admit to it being lazy writing, but we can get away with that because we're unpaid bloggers who do this in our free time. If you're a paid writer who has, say, 3 columns a week, we expect a little more.

But Mike Fitzgerald's column Sunday wasn't just an example of lazy writing, it was like a lazy writing clinic. By our count, there's at least 3 lazy writing techniques in just that one column. Missed them? Feel free to follow along at home.

As we said, lists are lazy writing. Lazy writing we're guilty of but lazy writing nonetheless. Anytime someone starts a column off with "A few random thoughts." or "Some loose items for a lazy summer Sunday." they're pretty much saying "I couldn't think of anything so watch me blow smoke out my ass." Fitzy does this occasionally. Don Blount's done it already during his short but illustrious stint as the Monday columnist. Mike Klocke not only throws up random lists but also usually lists the same things (more often than not his columns are an El Guapo roll call). And of course Bob Highfill has made the meandering mind droppings column an art form. Tomorrow one of Must Be's bulletpoints will probably be "I wonder when that Nick Diaz fellow is going to fight again. It's been a while hasn't it?" (By the way, watching Diaz pretty much bitch slap Frank Shamrock for a round and a half was glorious. And the Stockton crowd was out in force Saturday night).

But anyway, yeah, lists only work when the items are related. When you're jumping from budget cuts to book shilling to a glorified obit it kind of kills any flow the column could have had. And trust me, I know all about killing the flow of a column/post.

Next, and the one I take biggest issue with, is playing devil's advocate. Presenting something unthinkably stupid and then saying "Just kidding! But it's an interesting thought, ain't it?" Fitzy not only does this, but he couples it with his populist crusade against "frivolous" government spending (OMG! They're spending money! You guys don't have any! Follow me with your torches and pitchforks!). He spends a majority of his column on this one item in which he suggests killing the Asparagus Festival and the presents and then shoots down arguments to keep it. All in the interest of playing Devil's advocate. Of course he forgot one big reason why his idea doesn't hold water, but it would kill the whole discussion right away so he doesn't bring it up. Plus it also makes his whole excess government spending crusade look bad. And we can't have that.

Anyway, the big hole in his entire argument is that, as he states in his column, the city spends roughly $526,000 on the Asparagus Festival. $300,000 of that going towards police OT. But the city's budget shortfall is $31 million. So his entire bad idea is based on the premise that the city would make up less than 1/60th (or 1/30th if you want to count the 2010 Asparagus Festival as well) of the budget disparity by eliminating one of the few entertaining events we have left since the city raped the spirit of St. Patrick. Of course, this lapse in logic hasn't stopped him before in calling for the elimination of free coffee/water for government employees (saving the city $32,938, which is such a small fraction of the budget shortfall it's not even worth calculating. Also, ironically suggested during another list column), so why should it stop him now?

And then of course there's the last bit of lazy writing, copying and pasting. Which is pretty much what he did with that part about Vernell Jefferson. Maybe I've just spent too much time at the Duke family household, but a large family is hardly a big deal. I used to know a family in Lodi that boasted 22 kids (yes, they were Mormon), so this reprint of an obit doesn't impress me at all. So yeah, saying "Hey did you catch this?" and then reprinting it is way lazy. Sure, we do it all the time. But more should be expected from Fitzy. He's a well-paid columnist in a field that's seeing across the board cutbacks, and we're just a bunch of anonymous drivel.

Out of context Quote of the Week

2009-04-10T18:26:00.000-07:00

Blogs and news broadcasts had anticipated an arrest would be made today.

Ummm, nope. Didn't do it. Scoreboard other blogs. Scoreboard.

How to act at a bar

2009-04-10T15:21:00.000-07:00

I go to bars a lot. A whole lot. So I would venture a guess that I know where to go and how to act. Thursdays have been a no brainer of late, due to College Night, a themed night put on by the Downtown Stockton Alliance and Pacific to try and get more Pacific students out and about in Stockton.

The first theme night was costume. Interesting, but nothing to write home about. The second Thursday was cocktail night. Now we started to cook with some hot sauce. You can't go wrong with drink specials and girls in cocktail dresses. Yesterday was comedy night. Definitely not the right time or place.

Now, I'm assuming whoever was preforming was absolutely funny. But, in a bar, on a Thursday, around 10? People are doing the two things they want to at a bar: get drunk and try to slam some strange. So listening to a comedy routine? Not going to happen. And, I assumed this was a lot of peoples first time at a bar due to how they were acting, so I wanted to help with some of the douchier points.

1. If you pack a place for a comedy show, it probably helps if you shut the fuck up so you can hear the routine.

2. If you stop talking to the girl for 15 seconds, I assume she will still be DTF. In fact, those 15 seconds might be saving you from saying something stupid and earning you a date with Palmela Handerson.

3. The easiest way to score is to be an athlete. Or at least pretend to be one. In fact, one of us earned a feather in the hat (or notch in the bedpost) by telling a girl he was the starting point guard for Pacific's basketball team. However, it is still comedy gold to see girls throw themselves on an athlete. Including those who finished ranked 334485967 in the country after losing in the semi-finals of the collegeinsider.com/San Diego County credit union/whatever basketball tournament.

4. If someone is at the bar, ordering at the bar, or sitting at the bar in general, the fastest way to a drink is not through them. In fact, if you notice, the bartenders tend to make you wait. Why? So you quit bothering the guys dropping money and learn some respect and go to a place where no one is standing to get your drink. And the louder you yell, the more pissed the bartenders are. And I cant emphasize enough that you want to be on good terms with your bartender. They remember your drink, refill it when its empty, and pour heavy handed. This might be the most valuable thing you take from this.

5. Notice if you keep having to apologize for hitting someone when your talking, you're A. Italian and B. A douche.

And that's just the start of the helpful guide to a good time at the bar.

Quick Links for April 10th

2009-04-10T12:24:00.000-07:00

Oh hey, it's Sexy Friday. Hope you enjoyed the Michael David Smith interview. El Duke may emerge from his cave today to bring back a revamped Shit To Do post later today, so look out for that. Out of Context Quote of the Week should also appear sometime later. But for now? Quick Links!

It must be awards season. Better go get my tux dry cleaned

Sure, we probably won't reclaim the violent crime rate title this year, but that doesn't mean we can't clean up in all the secondary award shows!

Today, it was revealed that Stockton has the highest dropout rate of any California city. So, as is customary...(clears throat)

Wooooo! We're #1! We're #1!

With that out of the way we have to express our disappointment that this study is based on numbers that are 2 years old. We really wanted to make and Amato/SAT joke but he had nothing to do with these numbers which severely disappoints us. But still, graduating less seniors than we had dropouts is fairly impressive. So congrats future lifetime Delta College students. You're making us proud.

Oh, and that that Oakland!

I hate journalism

These vigilantes clearly have lost their marbles, so the next natural step of progression is to exploit them on a national level! Yes, in a move that must give the Stockton Police Officers Association a massive erection, the Alan Pettet has fielded media requests from the Associated Press, National Public Radio, and Captain Douchebag himself Rush Limbaugh. You guys already know my stance on these vigilantes so I'm not going to beat a dead horse (although SAM might come by and shoot it later).

If you have yet to read it Christian Burkin's blog entry about the SAM is a pretty good read and he offers a unique perspective as an ex-military man and a guy who probably knows more about crime in Stockton than any of us.

I really hope this story dies a quick, painless death. But I kind of doubt it will. Fuck, now I'm depressed. Let's end this on a lighter note.

Nobody pahtied fackin hahdah!

Kissing Suzy Kolber was on a roll yesterday. First there was the least surprising story about a Raider fan ever, then there was the linked post of a letter sent to the students or alumni of Holy Cross. It's pretty much one of the funniest things I've ever read. And that includes Fitzy's plan to buy the Thunder (We'd be Gods!). Although frankly, the two of those are actually kind of similar.

AOL Fanhouse's Michael David Smith talks to us about Strikeforce: Nick Diaz vs. Frank Shamrock and other MMA topics

2009-04-10T08:00:00.000-07:00

You may not know this since the Record has yet to mention it, but local Mixed Martial Artist Nick Diaz is fighting in his first match since the Stockton EliteXC show this weekend against Frank Shamrock as the HP Pavilion in San Jose tomorrow under the Strikeforce banner. In anticipation of the event, and to give it some much needed local publicity, we asked MMA guru Michael David Smith of AOL Fanhouse to answer a couple of questions for us about the event and he graciously agreed. We were even able to slip a question about the EliteXC: Unfinished Business show in there. So enjoy the interview and don't forget to cheer on Diaz as he faces Shamrock live on Showtime tomorrow night at 7 pm. Or catch it online for the low, low price of 24.95. As always, words not written by us in bold.

Slick Diaz: This Saturday's Stirkeforce event marks the return to the octagon of both Frank Shamrock and Nick Diaz after a fairly long break. This will be Shamrock's first fight since breaking his arm in a match against Cung Le and Diaz's first since fighting here in Stockton at the EliteXC: Unfinished Business event last July. Do you expect either of them to show any ring rust this weekend? And how much of a factor (if any) do you think Diaz's legendary cardio should be?

Michael David Smith: I definitely think ring rust could be a factor with Shamrock. It's been more than a year since he's fought and he's 36 years old. I just don't know if any athlete in any sport can take a year off in his mid-30s and not lose something. Diaz I'm less concerned about because he's a decade younger and, as you note, he's got great cardio. He stays in shape with triathlons. That has to give him an advantage if the fight goes into the third round.

Slick: Speaking of the EliteXC event in Stockton, the event was largely considered a ratigns failure even though it featured the highly anticipated rematch between Robbie Lawler and Elk Grove's Scott Smith in the main event. How big of a role do you think that the poor ratings and with the low paid attendence figures for the sole CBS card to not feature Kimbo Slice played in ProElite's decision to close down and sell off their assets after the Petruzelli fight? Had the event done better would they have considered remaining open or did the positive drug test of Bigfoot Silva and the death of the legend of Kimbo Slice doom the promotion regardless?

MDS: The fundamental flaw of EliteXC was putting far too much of its promotional energy into a guy who simply isn't good at MMA, Kimbo Slice. You're absolutely right that the Stockton event didn't do very well, and because the Stockton card didn't do well, CBS officials worried that Kimbo (and to some extent Gina Carano) were the only draws they had, and then when Kimbo lost they didn't think a promotion could be built around Gina Carano. I don't think Bigfoot Silva's positive drug test had much to do with it; it's obviously embarrassing when your heavyweight champion tests positive, but he was not a particularly big draw for them.

Slick: Cristiane "Cris Cyborg" Santos makes her Strikeforce debut this Saturday against Hitomi Akano, but all anybody can seem to talk about is her potential match with Gina Carano. How much are casual MMA fans (and possibly Cyborg herself) overlooking Akano who boasts and impressive 14-5 record with 11 submissions?

MDS: Excellent question. Akano's record is very solid, and Josh Barnett, who trains her, raves about her skills. She's won most of her fights by submission (and Cyborg's only loss is by submission), and in Cyborg's last fight, she couldn't finish an opponent who was ripe for being knocked out. I think Cyborg is the favorite in this fight, and I think Akano is a little small to be fighting someone Cyborg's size, but I think that if Cyborg comes in unprepared, she's in for a rude awakening.

Slick: How much of chance of you think Nick Diaz has of fighting in the UFC again, or have his character issues coupled with his sudden departure to Gracie Fighting Championships a few years back closed that door?

MDS: I wouldn't rule out Nick fighting in the UFC again. The bottom line is that the UFC wants good fighters. If Nick beats Frank and keeps winning in Strikeforce, at some point the UFC would have to be interested. Of course, if Nick keeps winning, Strikeforce will try hard not to lose him.

Slick: Jake Shields is considered one of the better welterweights in the World, but he seems to have a limited number of decent opponents at that weight. His next fight is a catchweight bout against Robbie Lawler in June. Besides his contract with Strikeforce, what's holding him back from joining the elite welterweights of the world in the UFC?

MDS: His contract with Strikeforce is all that's holding him back. But I think he'd rather keep working with Strikeforce than try to get out of his contract and hope UFC offers him something better. And that means Shields is probably going to have to move up in weight permanently, because Strikeforce just doesn't have any 170-pounders who can really give him a tough test. So I think we'll see Shields keep fighting at catchweights or even permanently move up to middleweight.

Slick: Will Diaz ever get his hands on KJ Noons?

MDS: I don't think so. KJ Noons had a big opportunity to fight on CBS, and he decided he didn't want to because he'd rather box instead. If he likes boxing better than he likes MMA, more power to him, but I personally think he's better suited to MMA, and I think it's too bad that we won't get to see a Diaz-Noons rematch.

Slick: Diaz himself has dabbled in boxing a bit. He had his first and only pro match in 2005 beating Alfonso Rocha by unanimous decision in Sacramento. Plus he's trained with former World champ Luisto Espinosa and Gold medalist Andre Ward. And chance he follows Noons into the world of boxing to continue their heated rivalry, even if just for the one match?

MDS: That's an interesting idea. I personally think Diaz would be better off sticking with MMA, but despite his jiu jitsu background, he loves to stand with his opponents and trade punches, so maybe he would try boxing. I'm guessing he doesn't do it, but I wouldn't totally rule it out.

Slick: And finally, which brother vs. brother matchup is more intriguing? Ken vs. Frank or Nick vs. Nate?

MDS: Well, as an old-school fan of the Shamrocks, I've always hoped to see them fight each other. I doubt it will ever happen, but I pick Ken vs. Frank.

Slick (note: This is the part where I bang my head against the desk as this was a follow up question and I totally brainfarted since he basically answered this in the last answer. Luckily he's a class act and answered it twice.): Obviously the Shamrock vs. Shamrock fight would have been a much better fight 5 or 10 years ago before people were practically begging Ken to hang it up. Given Ken's recent record (2-8 in his last 10 fights not counting the Clifton fight) and his disputed failed drug test, what are the chances this match happens? Or, perhaps more importantly, do you think it should happen?

MDS: I don't think there's much of a chance of it happening. I've interviewed both Frank and Ken and neither of them seem to think it's going to happen.

Thanks again to Michael David Smith for taking the time to answer our questions and for putting up with my fucktardery.

Quick Links for April 9th

2009-04-09T14:06:00.000-07:00

Another day another Quick Links. Let's do the damn thing.

So...many...jokes...

Unfortunately the Record used the Hammertime joke already. But seeing Hammer do charity work in Stockton reminds me of an idea we had for an aborted Top 5 post.

The Top 5 was supposed to be Top 5 ways to improve Stockton's public image and, by extension, generate revenue for the city. One of the ideas (and possibly the greatest idea ever.) was for the rapper turned reality star to buy up the dearly departed local landmark Hammer Skate. You can probably guess where we're going with this but I'll continue anyway. Hammer would reopen Hammer Skate as an 80's themed roller rink that would occasionally feature cover bands and ~~washed up~~ legendary 80s performers. All while being documented by cameras for his new reality show "Stop! Hammer Skate!"

I know, we're geniuses and it would be a great way to get Stockton some positive PR and it would presumably also feature the city as it tried to pull itself out of the economic hole we're all in. Plus the tourism revenue could possibly be awesome because who wouldn't want to skate around and wax nostalgic while Hammer and Flavor Flav (who would naturally be involved in some capacity) battle rap in the background.

You know you would watch that show. If/when this happens I better get my cut.

Stockton finally gets a Panda Express with a drive-thru

This is the Panda by Toys R Us, right? How the fuck does somebody jump that curb? Were they even looking at the road? Was the driver my friend who starts to turn as soon as you say "You're gonna wanna take the next right" even though the turn isn't for another couple hundred yards? Stockton drivers are fucking awesome.

When in doubt, check the opinion of Recordnet commenters and pick the opposite

We're not exactly legal experts here, but when we saw this story previewed on David Siders' blog and noticed all of the commenters seemed to come out on Lori Whittaker's side (comments that suspiciously have been taken down now despite not being particularly incendiary), it kind of gave us an idea as to who's right and who's wrong in this situation. But because we're known for our hard nosed research (I crack myself up), I bravely scrolled through the 15-page legal document posted in the linked post. You know, just to make sure our instincts were correct. And well, it looks like they were.

The accusations levied against City Attorney Ren Nosky appear to be petty and there seems to be an ulterior motive with this entire suit (namely, revenge for her cousin). The extend of the sexual harassment charges are "He looked at me funny" (the "leering" charge), "He tried to make small talk" (asking about her personal life), and "he talked about me behind my back!" (discussed her with other coworkers).

Of course, I'm just one guy with zero access calling them like I see them, but all of those charges are in the sexual harassment grey area. Because, let's face it, what constitutes leering? I check out hot coworkers all the time, but am I sexually harassing them? Unless he was doing something obvious like talking to her tits instead of her face this seems like an incredibly vague charge. I can't really say anything about the personal life questions because it depends on the questions he asked. If he asked her is she went out last night then that's a perfectly reasonable question. If he asked her if it was a date or something that's moving towards inappropriate but still fine. If he asked her if she got pounded like a railroad spike then, yeah, there's an issue. And finally, talking about her body with other coworkers? I did that 10 minutes ago. People talk about their coworkers behind their backs. It happens all the fucking time. It's part of workplace culture. Unless he was trying to float the theory around the office that a new set of tits would make her perfect while she was standing right in front of him then this is another vague claim in a legal gray area that, as a lawyer she knows all too much about.

Of course, the charges of sexual harassment are an appetizer. The main course is the allegations of a hostile work environment and inaction by the city in regards to her vague harassment claims. Which, if you read the document pretty much amounts to a whiney "Nobody listens to me anymore!"

She talks about her years of service and how Nosky came in and basically went in a different direction and she didn't like it. She narcs out the city for considering the age of applicants for various jobs which, while technically illegal, is still pretty much done in every job ever. And then, she seems to be surprised that people would react negatively to that. And that's before we get to the unsourced quote of "One Rishwain down, one to go" (although the whole inclusion of the Rishwain settlement seems to be to stir up populist furor over the fact that the city spent money on something that wasn't cops) and what appears to be a half-assed apology from Nosky who admitted that he "was a real prick" to her.

I could go on, but at the end of the day it appears to me to be one giant bitching rant about how she didn't get her way after lobbing vague allegations at Nosky that couldn't be proved because it was a basic game of he said, she said.

I don't know and have never met anyone involved in this case so really I'm not the best guy to pass judgement. I could be 100% wrong, and if I am please tell me so. But until then I'm just going to assume that somebody's pissed that her new boss wouldn't let her coast like her old boss. All based on the fact that Recordnet commenters immediately backed her.

Oh, and the apparent allegation that Leslie Martin is sexist towards women (I'm assuming she's one of Does 1-50 considering she was mentioned in the document as someone who knew of the harassment shit and didn't do anything) is fucking hilarious. The only way that could have been more hilarious is if she accused Susan Eggman of being sexist. If that had happened I'm not sure I'd be posting this today. I'd be too busy laughing.

Quick Links for April 8th

2009-04-08T12:09:00.000-07:00

Now that the incredibly depressing news is out of the way, let's see what else is going on in Stockton today in everybody's favorite link dump known as the Quick Links!

Come to Crazy Larry's Discount Homes where our prices are insa-a-ane!

Wooooo! We're #1! We're #1!

Ok, now that we got that out of the way, we gotta say we're kind of disappointed that in light of all the redevelopment efforts the best HGTV can come up with to sell people on Stockton is that we're close to Sacramento and the Bay Area. It's a good thing we paid all those consultants to help market the city with their various ideas on how to "brand" us. Let's ditch "Celebrate Stockton!" like we so quickly ditched "The Event City" and make the new PR campaign be "Stockton: Close to a lot of shit".

Notice how we're disappointed, but not surprised that HGTV decided our proximity to other cities was more important than our own burgeoning music scene, quality bars, downtown as a whole, fighting reputation, and many other positive things. At least they didn't mention our unemployment rate, apparently high levels of misery, or the looming turf war between vigilante groups.

Can't a homeless guy just be homeless?

In a classic case of deja vu (the term, not the strip club), another homeless encampment was broken up yesterday. This one being the camp that replaced the old encampment under the crosstown that was broken up last month. So if Groundhog's Day rules apply here that means somebody's getting hit by a car on the freeway sometime next week. All to improve Stockton's otherwise totally positive public image. And locking out an old lady from her electric wheelchair is always a nice touch. You stay classy Cal Trans.

So it's come down to this... (Note: Probably NSFW)

It's kind of a slow news day so we'll update you on KSK's Nasty Fetish Tourney that we helped out with a couple of weeks ago. All the fetishes featured on our site have gone down in defeat en route to the championship matchup. And what a matchup it is. In the Sophie's Choice of fetishes necrobeastiality takes on close relative, regular beastiality (yes, I just described beastiality as regular. Luckily I'm pretty sure I'm already going to hell). Last I checked necrobeastiality was winning by a large margin, but there are really no losers in this tournament. Except, of course, our innocence. Once this is over, let us never speak of this again.

Is that you Clyde? Seriously, this isn't cool! I'm the symbol this town needs! Not you!

2009-04-08T08:00:00.000-07:00

Yesterday in the Quick Links I relayed the story of a proposed group of vigilantes that would "activate" (their words, not mine) if the city were to lay off 43 police officers this summer. Everybody and their mothers agreed that it was a horrible idea... ok, well everybody with a brain did (oh, and Mike Fitzgerald). Others called in to say "I have a death wish! Sign me up!" Which really wasn't that surprising.

What was surprising was that somebody called up to say they had that idea already. No really, they even have uniforms. Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you Angels of Christ (Ok, technically it's given by David Siders). They are by far the most depressing militia of all time.

They're run by (or at least represented by) Martin Hernandez of Stockton who decided to protest the proposed layoffs of at least 43 of Stockton's finest. Because, you know, the city wants to lay those officers off.

As if that uniform (which if our knowledge of all things Olden Polynice is correct, can't be legal) wasn't depressing enough, this group comes complete with delusions of grandeur!

From Siders' blog:

"Hernandez said there are 16 people in his group and that he has detained perhaps 20 people in three months for the Stockton Police Department to arrest."

Oh, so their working with Stockton PD. I wonder what they have to say about this uptick in vigilantism.

"Officer Pete Smith, a department spokesman, said, 'I’ve never heard of Angels of Christ.'"

Hmmm, that seems to directly contradict Hernandez's comment. Do they just drop criminals off on the Police Department's stoop? Surely they have more training than the Stockton Armed Militia.

"Hernandez said he learned in Sacramento 10 years ago how to arrest people and use weapons"

Oh, well that's in no way comforting. Nothing says "safety" like 10 year old detainment tactics. At the very least they're a bunch of big guys. You know, like bouncers or something. Somebody imposing looking and this disheveled, unemployed man is just their spokesperson.

"Hernandez, of Angels of Christ, is at the podium... He is introducing Sandra, who he said is also an Angel of Christ."

Aww, isn't that adorable. They let women into their group. Sandra must be some sort of Amazon woman if she can hang with the AoC.

"Sandra said she is a teenager."

What. The. Fuck. Fucking teenagers!?

So let me get this straight. Stockton's proposing laying off upwards of 90 police officers and the residents of our fair city come back with multiple vigilante groups patrolling the streets with one involving teenage girls? Seriously!? This is the best fucking idea we can come up with?

I hate to sound like an elitist (that's Fitzy's schtick) but this is why we have our current government structure. The residents of Stockton can never eeeeeeeeever bitch about the horrible ideas presented by the City Council again. Sure, some of them may present silly ideas like declaring bankruptcy. But that idea pales in comparison to having an armed, overmatched group of vigilantes roaming the most dangerous areas of Stockton or replacing sworn officers with sad-looking dudes and teenagers. Hell, compared to impending vigilante warfare declaring bankruptcy looks like as good an idea as a Scarlett Johannsen topless scene.

Sadly, the national media is picking up on these stories. They love to exploit crazy people apparently. In the previously linked Fitzy article the World's dumbest attorney Ron Stein said he had an appointment his morning to talk to the Associated Press. Great, because if there's one thing Stockton needs it's more negative press. Is it too early to start drinking bourbon?

Quick Links for April 7th

2009-04-07T12:03:00.000-07:00

There's a whole lot of crazy in the news today (mostly in the second item), so let's just dive right in. Quick Links!

Sad ending, chilling reminder

Well, it's over. OK, at least the search for Sandra is over. There's still the matter of some crazy motherfucker out there snatching up little girls and stuffing them into suitcases. Whenever stuff like this happens the usual response is shock that this could happen so close to home. And then the resulting questions about the safety of one's own children. I don't want to pass judgement because I'm (thankfully) not a parent (knock on wood). But one of the interesting questions asked during the press conference last night was what advice Tracy Sgt. Tony Sheneman had for the parents of Tracy. His response was extremely genuine as he is a Tracy parent himself. I'm paraphrasing from memory hear but it was something along the lines of remembering to keep a watchful eye over your children and to kiss them and tell them you love when you get home tonight. It would have been easy make some bravado-filled grand statement about the world we live in today but instead he made an understated and ultimately true statement.

Sometimes there's just nothing you can do but do your best and hope. Everybody always thinks it'll never happen in their own tightly knitted neighborhood. Then the next thing you know a kid escapes from his backyard (or car) and you're on News10 saying "How could this have happened here?" The thing is, it could happen anywhere. It's a scary thought but it's not like it's anything new. That scary thought has recently been brought to the forefront of everybody's minds and it's a shame that something like this has to happen to do so. Now I hear my friends who are parents worrying about letting their kids out to play. One of my friends from Tracy talked about not being able to go out alone at night with a killer on the loose somewhat jokingly. But at the end of the day we can't live in fear like that. I wouldn't want my child growing up in a culture of fear like that. All we can do is try our best to keep a watchful eye over our loved ones, tell them we love them and hope.

They are the symbol this town needs...

Reason # 43,097 why I love Stockton.

Leave it to the crazy residents of Stockton to come up with something 50 times more frightening than the previous item. And trust me, this is pretty scary. I'm not even sure where to begin with this. If there's one thing this town doesn't need it's a group of vigilantes (which is really what they're talking about. They say militia, I say vigilante group. To-may-toe, To-mah-toe) running around with guns and a chip on their shoulder.

Yes, I understand there's constitutional provisions to form a militia. But this isn't Nam, there are rules. I'm not up-to-date on my constitution amendments, but I'm pretty sure one of those rules is not threatening the city with vigilante justice (The "Watch and see. Who's gonna stop us?" line).

In a testament to just how well thought out this whole plan is, the militia (which pretty much every city official quoted in the story thinks is a horrible idea by the way) plans on billing the city $350 per hour for their "services". $350 per hour? Are you fucking kidding me? So that's how Bruce Wayne became a billionaire. He was fleecing Gotham for an hourly rate! How the fuck do you even do that? Is there a vigilante time clock? Can you really force the city to for pay something they don't want? If so, the SPOA likes the cut of that jibb and would like to subscribe to their newsletter. This whole thing is fucking based of the fact that Ann Johnston, Gordon Palmer, Dale Fritchen, Susan Eggman and the entire City Council are basically turning their pockets inside out and saying "we got nothing" to Stockton PD. If they can't pay those guys, how the fuck are they going to pay a bunch of untrained, disabled vets (note the electric wheelchair joystick in Pettet's picture).

And that brings me to the biggest issue, training. Here's this "militia's" idea of training:

"He said the militia will train at a firing range..."

So pretty much, they're training to shoot straight. Which will totally prepare them to do stuff like this (kickass article about the possibly affects of the budget cuts/layoffs by the way).

Then there's also the fact that doing this is basically suicide. How do I know this? Let's jump to the notebook dump at David Siders' blog! (By the way, the latest post scares me, but is not in the least bit surprising)

"Pettet said the militia would patrol 'only the worst neighborhoods,' using four men in one car at a time."

Ummm, Mr. Pettet, they have more guns and people than you in those neighborhoods. But don't take my word for it, here's somebody slightly more respected than us.

"Councilwoman Susan Eggman said, 'That is over the top.' She said, "I think it's like suicide. It's an irrevocable answer for a problem that's not going to be around forever.'"

I see no way how this ends badly. Except for, you know, every way.

Umm, yeah. About that program name...

So yeah, paying it forward means instead of getting something back for doing a good deed you ask the person you did the good deed for to do the same for someone else thus negating the need for reciprocity. It's a great system because it causes people to do good things and not expect praise or recognition for their deeds. Just do good things for the sake of doing good thing. Free advertisement kind of negates that, even if it's not the intent (although we question their intent if they're posing for some cheesy photo with their company name featured prominently. Not to mention that short-sighted NASCAR analogy. I hate to break it to you, but sponsors aren't paying drivers out of the kindness of their hearts. Tony Stewart ain't paying shit forward.)

And on top of that, you usually pay it forward to people, not donations to charitable organizations. You usually pay it forward by doing something nice for somebody, say, helping an old lady with her bags and when they ask how they can repay you you tell them to "pay it forward" and do something nice for someone else. Just taking a percentage of your profits and donating it to charity is the laziest way to pay it forward.

Oh, and yes, Lori also wrote about old people today. Gotta keep the streak alive.

Top 5 omissions from the Record's "Hot Dates" feature yesterday

2009-04-07T08:00:00.000-07:00

It's not officially the start of a season until the Record trots out their events calendar on the front page of the LENS section. We'd link to it but putting it up on their website would make too much sense. Why reference things in the paper when you can just visit their bullshit online events calendar that's full of every weaksauce fundraiser and bake sale put on by the few people in this town tech-savvy enough to understand how to work it? But as usual, the edition printed in the actual paper was missing a few rather important pieces of information. I got the brain trust together and here are the 5 biggest omissions in no particular order.

1. April 8th Ports Exhibition Game vs. the Rivercats

Yes, I know the game's already on the calendar, but their missing the most important piece of information. It's a battle of the California League Champs and the AAA National Champs. AAA ball doesn't come to Stockton often, so it's kind of a big deal. So of course the Record completely ignores that angle. The only way we know about it is because we stumbled upon the Ports' Front Office blog , which is actually a pretty decent read for you Ports fans.

2. April 11th Strikeforce Shamrock vs. Diaz HP Pavillion San Jose, CA

This is Nick Diaz's first fight since the EliteXC show in Stockton and Frank Shamrock's first fight in a long time. Both are local products so it makes total sense that the Record hasn't said a fuckng word about this upcoming card. Nevermind the fact that Elk Grove's Scott Smith is also fighting that night. I thought I saw Jake Shields (local fighter number four) on the card too but now it says TBA instead of his name so I assume he's injured. But still, Stockton's own Nick Diaz vs. Lockeford's own Frank Shamrock in the main event of a Showtime fight card doesn't warrant a sentence of coverage? Is the Record's entire sports department high? They're more than willing to fellate the local hockey, arena football, indoor soccer, and minor league baseball teams but they're not willing to cover what's arguably one of the hottest, fastest growing sports in the country? Especially one featuring at least 3 fighters with local connections? Aren't newspapers supposed to eat this shit up? They even list some random fucking boxing event at Arco at the end of the month and don't even list who's fighitng. MMA isn't WWE guys, it's a real fucking sport. Fucking treat it like one.

3. May 23rd Journey Live in Concert Raley Field Sacramento, CA

Let me get this straight, Sacramento can book Journey for an outdoor show in their baseball stadium and we can't? Fuck you IFG. Also, I gotta ask, what the fuck is the Mayor's Hike and Bike event that's listed there instead? You get an opportunity to hike and ride a bike with Ann Johnston? How would you keep up? Mountain goats can walk up steeper hillsides than people can. And why would anybody pay $20 for that? I know the city's hard up for money but that's not what I had in mind when Mayor Johnston started talking about volunteerism. I'll volunteer my time, not my wallet. And if I'm going to open that sucker up, it better be for something I can't do by myself for free.

4. Fats Party Bus to A's game (Date TBD)

OK, so we're running low on events. We're bloggers so we're naturally shut-ins. But BWDW Fats usually takes a bus to an A's game that results in some debaucherous levels of drinking around this time. I'm pretty sure Ben already knows which games but I'm too lazy to call his ass. Either way, this is way better than half the stuffy, boring events listed on the calendar. Plus, Fats has way better food than Paragary's. Whoever pays $40 for that Around the World bullshit next week is a fucking dumbass.

5. June 7th WEC 41 Urijah Faber vs Mike Brown for the WEC Featherweight title Arco Arena

Major MMA event number 2 that the Record missed. Faber is a Sacramento product and considered one of the best pound-for-pound fighters in the world. No really, MMA expert and AOL Fanhouse blogger Michael David Smith just listed Brown and Faber as 9th and 10 respectively in his Top Ten Pound-for-Pound fighter post yesterday. Faber lost his Featherweight title to Brown last year after holding it for a considerable amount of time and gets his rematch in his hometown. Two of the top ten pound-for-pound fighters in the World going toe-to-toe in a rematch for the title is a huge fucking deal. I'll definitely be there pulling for the California Kid to reclaim his title. So naturally the Record has no idea about it and would rather promote a Jewish Food Festival (even Bris Isaak thinks this is ridiculous, just don't tell his mom that).

About that suitcase...

2009-04-06T20:28:00.000-07:00

So yeah, if you haven't heard by now, they found a "suspicious container" in some irrigation pond in rural Tracy. One they've search previously. They found it around noonish and may or may not have gotten around to opening it. Considering the amount of cops and evidence people in the area (not to mention a coroner), there's a pretty decent chance they found her body in there. Although I wouldn't put it past them to have wasted all this time gathering evidence only to find out it has Walter's undies in there (the whites!). Press conference is in 10 mins. So I guess we'll know soon.

Oh, and the Tracy Press site is predictably down. And Recordnet is running at a snail's pace. Gotta love the way papers embraced the internet. Mike Klocke must be freakign out since it's about a half hour past deadline. Someone let us know if he yelled "Stop the Presses!" before realizing how much that costs.

9 PM update: Yeah, it was her. Tracy's Police Chief just confirmed it.

We don't want to repeat ourselves but....

2009-04-06T12:15:00.000-07:00

State a motherfucking opinion in your motherfucking columns!

We harped on this as early as 2 weeks ago. And well, we'll continue to do so until somebody at the Record shows they got a pair. Let's run down the list again shall we?

Let's start with Fitzy who's Sunday column seems to be warning us that there are Mexican gangs in Stockton. Allow me this moment of faux indignant surprise...

Whoa whoa whoa ! When the fuck did this happen? Gangs from fucking Mexico? Who would have thought that a town where the majority of the population is Latino would have Latin gangs? Thank you Mike Fitzgerald for bringing this to the attention of the people of Stockton. Without this column people would probably just assume that drugs just magically appear out of thin air. I'm just floored that the Norteños and Sureños aren't some sort of club like the Elk's lodge! Those guys are gangs!? Feuding gangs!? Jesus tittyfucking Christ how are we going to combat this? Quick! Get Commissioner Gordon on the phone right away! We need to alert Batman as soon as fucking possible!

Ok, sorry if that was too sarcastic for you, but I was just flabbergasted when I read that column on Sunday. The whole point of the column as far as I can tell is "there's a Mexican drug war". Which is like saying "the economy's not doing so hot right now" or "the Kings aren't an elite team this year". Shit like that just doesn't need to be said, it's just fucking known. Hell, even my 12-year old sister knows about the gangs in Stockton. Anybody who even takes a cursory glance at McNair High knows there's gangs in Stockton. At the very least, if a column's not going to state an opinion, it needs to be informative. This column was neither. Stay tuned for Fitzy's next column entitled "The Earth is round and the Sun will rise tomorrow morning." Although to be fair Peter King thought that column was a fascinating read.

As useless and insulting as Fitzy's column was, at least he didn't pretend it was anything but informing the people of what they already knew. Editor in Chief Mike Klocke's column seems to just be a laundry of list of shit that sucks right now. Which would be fine if:

A. He didn't just do that 2 weeks ago.

B. Was right about half the items on that list. Like saying there's been an uptick in crime when the crime statistics for last year haven't been officially released yet and preliminary glimpses at crime statistics actually indicate a possible slight downturn in violent crimes. (Not to mention we already know that 2008 had the fewest homicides since the days of Disco)

And C. Actually came through with the opinion the headline teases.

For those too lazy, the headline is "There's really only one way to fix Stockton's huge problems". Which would be a fine headline if he actually presented that one way in the actual column. Is he trying to say we should be more like Tracy? Because we can't. Our problems are inherently different. Tracy's not in the middle of a budget crunch. They're not considering layoffs. They're actually increasing hours for cops to find Sandra Cantu. All shit we can't do.

Is he saying we should band together as a community like Tracy has? That's a nice idea but Ann Johnston's been preaching that for months now and that's not really going to fix the problem, it's just a coping mechanism for us. Which is fine, but everybody helping out their neighbor isn't going to make $31 million dollars magically appear. It isn't going to turn the job market around. It isn't going to make downtown profitable. It will just help us get through these tough times.

The only real solution he does offer is this:

"It's becoming more apparent that the only way out of the fiscal mess is through layoffs or contractual concessions with law enforcement (police and fire)."

So, in other words. They're pretty much fucked. Which we really already knew. And that's really only one solution to the growing list of problems facing Stockton and the World today. Even if PD and FD are forced to take concessions and/or layoffs the economy would still suck. Houses with shaggy lawns will still have For Sale signs in front of them. And city workers will definitely still be pissed off at the City Council. Thanks for offering up even the tiniest sliver of hope and then just reminding us that we're completely and totally fucked Mike. Because it's not depressing enough when those thoughts are in the back of my head, you have to go and bring them to the forefront twice in the span of a month.

And then, well, then we get to Don Blount. Don wants you to know that his credit card number got stolen. Why? Frankly I don't know. Why does Don do anything these days? It's becoming more and more apparent that we missed the mark when coming up with a name for Don's column. It's not "Shit Don Blount Saw" it's like we're reading his fucking diary.

No really, observe.

Dear Diary,

Ted Bestolairdes hasn't apologized to me yet. He's such a meany.

Love, Donny

Dear Diary,

I saw some of those old fashioned typewriters and thought about buying one but I didn't. I showed good self control. I think I deserve some Ben and Jerry's for showing such restraint. Americone Dream is just the best.

Love, Donny

Dear Diary,

Some scary dogs were fighting in my driveway. I scared them off though because I'm so big and strong. By the way, did you know Obama's black like me? It's amazing. I bet Obama could scare off stray dogs too. So in a way, President Obama and I are a lot alike. Kind of like we're related. But not brothers, that would be racist. Gotta go, taking the kids on a hike.

Love, Donny

And of course today's entry...

Dear Diary,

Somebody stole my credit card number! Sure I didn't incur any actual losses and my credit card company caught it really quick but if it could happen to me it could happen to anybody! The internet is a scary place.

Love, Donny

The best part is that last one was actually written like a letter to the identity thief. But god Lord, you're writing for a newspaper Don, not your fucking Twitter feed. Quit using the newspaper to update your family and the rest of the world about what's going on in your life. Noone cares. At least this column was somewhat informative. Even if it did miss simple things like "Make sure your anti-virus software and firewall are up-to-date" and "take precautions to prevent keyloggers". Although, to be fair, high-tech phrases like "firewall" and "keyloggers" probably go right over the heads of the average Record reader. I can just see some 70 year old shut in attempting to set the wall behind her computer on fire to prevent those evil hackers from getting those pictures of her grandson her daughter e-mailed to her that she can't figure out how to access. At least it'd give the Fire Department another reason to say "See! You guys need us!"

And that is how you state a motherfucking opinion.

Our newest feature the Out-of-Context Line of the Week

2009-04-03T15:50:00.000-07:00

Throughout the week while reading the Record I see quotes and sentences that, out of context are either randomly hilarious or just completly and totally wrong. So we've decided to finally start writing them down and feature the best one at the end of the week in a new feature we call:

Out-of-Context Line of the Week!

It's a catchy name, we know. We actually had this idea a few weeks ago but just now found the perfect out of context sentence to kick it off. You can probably guess what it is. We've featured the guy who typed it a lot this week. Well, more than usual. But anyway, here it is, in all it's hilarious glory....

The one thing that interest me was the hermaphrodite.
-Mike Fitzgerald (from his March 31st blog entry)

Wow, Fitzy's just cleaning up the accolades this week. Congrats!

The obvious Quick Links for April 3rd

2009-04-03T11:40:00.000-07:00

Oh hey, it's Sexy Friday. Awesome. Although today is a sad day. Mark your calendars. Why? Because April 3rd 2009 is apparently the day obviousness died. How so? Well, let's find out in today's Quick Links!

Captian Condescending and Captian Obvious are the same person! No wonder you never see them both in the same place!

In yesterday's Quick Links we mentioned how the main advantage of bottled water wasn't it's purity, but it's convenience. So you can imagine my total lack of surprise when I opened the paper this morning and saw that Fitzy had dedicated an entire column to the fact that bottled water is basically tap water. Oh my God! So shocking!

We'd love to agree with Fitzy because bottled water is essentially repackaged tap water, but he makes his point in such a condescending manner (which is really his trademark, hence the Captain Condescending moniker) that we can't help but disagree with him. Specifically this line:

I see that University of the Pacific students are swearing off bottled water. Lunatics elsewhere are not.

Lunatics? Really? We made this point yesterday but we'll do it again. The main selling point for bottled water is NOT its purity. It's the convenience of the bottle. You don't have to worry about spilling it like with a regular cup because of the screw on cap, but when you're done with it it's disposable. Frankly, I don't want to have to carry a fucking canteen with me after I finish off its contents. It's much easier to just throw away. Does that make me a thoughtless bastard? In the minds of hippies, yeah, probably. But hey, you can usually recycle those fucking bottles anyways. So using the waste excuse for water bottles is a moot point because they're recyclable and if you really wanted to, you could refill that cheap plastic bottle just like it's more expensive canteen brother. They're the same fucking thing. Only this time the theoretical PT Barnum is laughing at all the hippie douchebags carrying around a $4 cumbersome piece of plastic.

Oh, and about that cost part. Way to pick the most expensive version of bottled water. Vending machines in general are one giant ripoff because, again, they're there for convenience! Any asshole knows that you can go into a fucking store and buy a whole case of bottled water for wayyyyy cheaper than 5 cents an ounce. Using the vending machine price is like me saying clothing is overpriced and then citing the prices at Urban Outfitters or some other weaksauce hipster store with $100 jeans instead of citing the average prices. Nice try Fitz, but your argument doesn't hold water (rimshot).

Well, that's one way to get your case dismissed

Considering the way things have been going downtown lately, I'm surprised they didn't postpone this decision because the defendant wasn't present. There isn't really much to this story but it fits our death of obviousness theme today. Plus this line might be my new favorite joke involving journalism, mostly because they had to get a spokesperson to say it. I wish I had been in the room for this:

A dead person can't be prosecuted, a court spokeswoman said.

You just know there was some meeting where an editor told the writer that they needed to get somebody credible to corroborate it while the writer presumably slammed their head against their keyboard and questioned their career choice for the 35th time that day.

Saving the best for last

Economy in a nose dive!? What the fuck!? When did this happen!? How are we just hearing about this now!? Fucking A! Somebody has to do something! Oh my God, the stock market! When were you going to get around to telling us about this shit!? Thank God there's places like the UOP Business Forecasting Center to warn people about this economic freefall before it's too late! Quick! Get Governor Scwarzenegger and Barack Obama on the phone fast! They're going to want to hear about this as soon as possible! Man, it's a good thing we caught this early or else we might be really fucked.

Kind of reminds a guy why they got in to journalism in the first place. To inform the people of what they didn't know. And to think, people say newspapers are dying. (sigh) Somebody pass me the scotch.

The actual Quick Links for April 2nd

2009-04-02T11:51:00.000-07:00

Hey look, news! And not "Low level public official calls someone a dirty Commie news", actual news! Let's just dive right the fuck in.

Not guilty? Really?

Oh hey, Teen Slave's back in the news. Remember him? Nothing really earth shattering came out of this latest court appearance. They did add charges of child abuse in relation to Schumacher and Lau's 4 other kids. Oh, and everybody but Mike Schumacher plead not guilty (Schumacher needed time to look over the new charges). Which is funny considering Kelly Lau gave that jailhouse interview way back when this first started where she tried to pin the whole thing on the abusive non-aunt. Gotta love people from Tracy. When they bring the crazy, they fucking bring it

This just in! Bottled water is bullshit!

It's stories like these that make me fear for future generations. UOP really needs an entire awareness WEEK to tell people that bottled water isn't any more pure than tap water? Isn't that common knowledge? Bottled water is for convenience, not purity. Of course, being a college full of dirty hippies, UOP couldn't let that stand. So, if you sign a pledge they'll give you a reusable canteen so you don't damage the planet with all that wasteful plastic you throw away. Of course, really I'd probably just throw the canteen away after the first use because really it's no different than a regular water bottle, it just doesn't come prefilled with water. Leave it to dirty hippies to pass out refillable water containers to replace a water container that you can already technically refill. It's all about awareness man!

Well, I'm not the world's most masculine man, but I know what I am and I'm glad I'm a man...

That was a fucking intimate encounter? This is why we rarely write stuff in advance. Less than a half hour after I posted the previous post, Fitzy posted the hermaphrodite story on his blog and it was ridiculously underwhelming. We were expecting something measured that would depict s/he as relatively normal but, you know, with both parts. But instead we get a story about some crazy fucking wiccan. I'm both relieved and disappointed at the same time. The writer tried to throw in stuff about duality and shit in there but frankly, it wasn't all that fascinating. She tried to paint s/he as someone who walks like a woman and talks like a man (Lo-Lo-Lo-Lo-Looooola!) but everything she says about s/he screams "insane woman" to me. They also sound suspiciously like this person. So congrats Fitzy, instead of helping out the transgendered, you just made people think they're more insane than most crazy women. At least I can stop worrying about Fitzy being too blue even for us. I also pray this is the last time I have to use the hermaphrodite tag.

This is what we get for slacking off

2009-04-02T09:30:00.000-07:00

We were kind of busy yesterday so we were only able to throw up the Casey post. We're well aware shit happened yesterday but we just couldn't get to it. Plus I don't particularly feel like making jokes about a missing 8-year old. We like to keep it light here. Sure, we'll make fun of the Teen Slave but he was occasionally chained to a fireplace and had an escape that had varying levels of difficulty depending on which version was being reported at the time. (Oh hey, looks like it's scaling a wall again today. Must have been difficult to do while jumping from a moving car.)

Anyways, we missed some stuff so we need to play catch up. I guess this is kind of a mini-Quick Links. Although if I wake up tomorrow and nothing happened (this was mostly written late last night), then I totally reserve the right to make this the actual Quick Links. But for now, let's call it...

Here's what we missed...

Annnnnnd it's officially creepy!

Well, that didn't take long. Fitzy took what was just a simple morbid curiosity and turned it into a very wrong version of Penthouse forums. Look, we got nothing against hermaphrodites. For one, it's a birth thing. It's not like they choose to be both. Plus, let's face it, hermaphrodite is just a fun word to say. I'm having fun typing it right now. But really, and I mean no offense by this, I don't want to read about how one gets down and dirty. And I'm a curious motherfucker. I'm the one who tried to push the Nasty Fetish Final Tournament as educational (by the way, Necrobeastiality is a juggernaut). But there are some things I just don't need to know about. Granpappy Casey might think I'm a pussy for thinking so, but I don't care.

What I do care about is that it didn't get posted. If Mike Fitzgerald's blog was more disgusting than mine for two days in a row I'm not sure what I would have done. I'm pretty sure I just would have hung up my keyboard. Would you blame me? I mean I came back with a ruptured fucking hemorrhoid (another fun word to say/type, although I admittedly stole that clench-inducing anecdote from the KSK mailbag). Had he posted that story, it would be like a poker game where I bet big with a full house and he comes back with 4 of a kind. ("I see your anal bleeding, and I'll raise you shemale sex.") When that happens you stand up, shake the winner's hand, and just walk away. There's nothing more that can be done. That's what it would have been like had Fitzy outraunched me two days in a row. Fucking scary just thinking about it.

Although I have to admit "hermaphrodite bureau" did make me laugh.

Have we mentioned that David Siders is a bad ass lately?

So yeah, that City Council budget meeting thingy? David Siders showed why the internet is awesome and made that meeting his bitch. He liveblogged the shit out of it and really, I'm just in awe of the whole thing. How can anybody in newspapers say the internet isn't toally awesome after this? It's basically his notes for the resulting story. And for a guy like me with a ridculous appetite for information (But again, not about hermaphrodites), this shit is fucking gold. There's no editor to cut the little interesting parts. Like the fact that, in order to allow time to discuss alternatives, they set a soft deadline for the 30th..of April! Which is a laughable deadline considering how long it's taken us to even get this far. Of course, calling for the presentation to be to the entire council instead of the Budget and Finance committee, and then sending it down to them anyways always helps speed things up. At this rate we'll have a state budget before we have a city budget. Oh did I mention that Obama stimulus money (or as I like to call them "hope dollars") isn't going to be divided up until May or so (that is, if we are to believe News10)? And even if they pushed the soft deadline the hard deadling (June 1st) is only 30 fucking days later. Like we've been saying, this City Council has a knack for timing. Yep, we're totally fucked.

How dare you insult such a great champion...no, a great American like that

We've had our issues with Don Blount, but like all of the stuff on here it's all in good fun. But, well, he crossed a line this time. You can insult me, my family, my friends, my writing, my livelihood, but you do not insult an American hero like Joey Chestnut. The man is the very definition of a national trasure. Jaws has given up a lot to bring the Mustard Belt back to the US where it belongs. Remember when he burst onto the scene in 2005? He looked young and showed tenacious eating skills. We saw him live at the 2008 Asparagus eating competition pictured in Don's post. We were actually only about 15 feet behind that cameraman. The man had aged significantly over the previous 3 years. He's roughly our age but he looks like he's in his mid to late 30s now. Look, here's a picture of when he won the belt in a proud day for every American:

That's 2007, just 2 years ago. Now go back and look at him in 2008. He's probably shaving years off his life to show that the most patriotic motherfucker is a God damn American. No, really. Read that Wikipedia page I linked to earlier. Shit, if you're too lazy here's the important part:

According to legend, on July 4, 1916 four immigrants had a hot dog eating contest at Nathan's Famous stand on Coney Island to settle an argument about who was the most patriotic.

Joey Chestnut's not just a guy who can eat a shitload of asparagus and hot dogs. He represents America, on it's birthday no less, to prove to the rest of the world the America is better and more patriotic than they'll ever be. Even if it means he'll probably die in a way that will forever link him with Elvis and Mama Cass. If that doesn't make somebody a national treasure then what the fuck does?

God, I am so jazzed for the end of April.

On the serious side...

2009-04-01T22:34:00.000-07:00

I know most of our readers probably know about this already, but it doesn't hurt to pass it along. No joke, just trying to help. Click on the picture if your browser cuts it off like mine does.

They don't make 'em like they used to.

2009-04-01T14:18:00.000-07:00

In the interest of being somewhat objective, we've reached out to other locals to give us their perspective on what it's like to live in our little slice of awesome called Stockton. We specifically tried to get people from a wide range of age groups and walks of life. Today's contributor is a famous Stocktonian and former professional athlete. He's also roughly 121 years old. It's the Mighty Casey of Mudville Nine and "Casey at the Bat" fame!

How did we find a fictional baseball character and talk him into writing for our site you ask? Well, we tracked him down in one of the area's many retirement communities. After spending a couple weeks trying to explain the concept of the internet, we just told him we were his illegitimate great-grandchildren and we wanted granpappy's memoirs and thoughts on current events. He types them up for us on a typewriter, presumably one of these, and we transcribe them for the Wide Wide World of Web adding links and emphasis with necessary (ever try HTML on a typewriter? It's tough). So, without further concept explanation, here's his first crotchety old person rant.

Dave Brubeck is a huge gaping vagina.

Back in my day, men were cut from a different cloth. If you made a commitment you damn sure followed through with it. In my playing days they only allowed substitutions for injuries. Real injuries, not some bullshit anxiety disorder that you can't even explain. If somebody pulled that shit back in my day, we damn sure made them regret it. And not that shaving cream pie shit either. I once played on an exhibition team with Johnny Evers, one night he drank a fifth of Jack Daniels in a fashion emulated by a young John Belushi in the motion picture Animal House. Well, the next day he wasn't looking so good he ended up vomiting on a player who attempted to steal 2nd during the 3rd inning. He still was able to tag him out so everything was ok, but then the little pussy asked to be taken out of the game! Obviously we couldn't let that shit stand. Later that night we coerced him into repeating the previous night's feat but this time with some homemade moonshine, the only kind of moonshine in my opinion. Long story short he woke up in bed the following morning next to a Chinese hermaphrodite and nursing the World's biggest hangover. But I'll be damned if that bastard didn't play the full 9 that night and every night after that. And that was just for a series of exhibition games. Like I said, honor your commitments.

So when my nice great-grandchildren brought to my attention that jazz "legend" Dave Brubeck had pulled out of his scheduled performance Friday because of a "viral infection", it really got my goat. I once played for a week with a ruptured hemorrhoid after a Russian whore with unkempt fingernails snuck a finger up my ass without asking. Sure, I had to change my white uniform pants every other inning but I'll be damned if I didn't play every out of every inning. I honor my God damned commitments. Unlike this young Brubeck punk.

Kids these days have no respect for the way things used to be. What does that "legend" do anyway? He plays the piano. How does one get too sick to play the piano? My mustache could play the piano while battling Polio and this young whippersnapper bows out over a little virus? Gut that shit out pussy! You don't know pain until you slide into home with bleeding asshole! And you call yourself a legend. You think I just became the Mighty Casey overnight? No, I had to earn the title of "folk legend". How did I earn that distinction? Partially by honoring my fucking commitments!

I wish I could have just sent my son as a backup so I could stay in bed rolling around with some quality flapper poontang! But no, I'm a man of my word. And that's why I'm the Mighty fucking Casey, and you're just some bitch who messed around with time signatures.

Umm, thanks Casey!

Seven Days of Jolly Drinking, Day 1

2009-03-31T18:27:00.000-07:00

The first day got off to an inauspicious start. Nothing spectacular, just stopped by an old favorite in Valley Brew. Now I say old favorite because they got rid of an all time favorite past-time of mine, and that was $5 pitchers on Sundays.

How do you win me back? $6 dollar pitchers! I'll take that. Three pitchers later, and I'm reminiscing of a summer filled with bad decisions. So my money stretched a good distance. Sports on TV? Check. But, How much hockey can you really have on? Did every TV need to be on hockey? How did they know I love to watch Canadiens brutalize each other?

Strange factor was non-existent. Hey, it was Monday, they can't all be winners, although the waitress and bartender were definitely ok in my book.

All in all it was a good start to the seven days. Tonight should get a little more interesting.

Quick Links for March 31st

2009-03-31T15:45:00.000-07:00

Oh hey, I finally stopped feeling like my head was trying to eat itself from the inside out (Note: this part was written earlier today. I don't get all day hangovers on $25 worth of drinks). I'm totally never drinking again...until tonight when the 7 jolly days of drinking continues. In honor of that, let's try and bang out some Quick Links.

Even when they time shit perfectly, the City Council has horrible timing

We almost missed this because the city announced this in the late-afternoon on a Friday in a classic newsdump, but guess what? Those cops are still probably getting laid off. Except now instead of 29, it's 45. And most of them found out after returning from the funeral for those 4 Oakland police officers. Yeah, it was a classy move.

Especially classy when you consider two things. The layoff notices were given to the lowest officers on the seniority chart, some who won't be laid off if officers with higher seniority decide to take the city's retirement buyout package thingy (its technical name by the way). So really, depending on who takes they early retirement thing, a lot of those officers won't actually be laid off. The other thing is, these were layoff notices announcing possible layoffs in June that we already fucking knew about. Sure, the addition of 16 more possible layoffs was surprising, but the last thing a guy wants to see when he just got back from a funeral is a reminder that his job is in jeopardy. It was the definition of a total dick move.

I guess we now have an idea as to how Fitzy voted in the Nasty Fetish Tourney

If I may channel Bill Simmons for a second...

There's comedy, there's high comedy, and then there's this sentence from Mike Fitzgerald's blog:

The one thing that interest me was the hermaphrodite.

I don't really know what I can add to that. I swear to God I didn't make that up. That actually appeared in Fitzy's blog post about the closing of Gottschalks (wait, that was still open?). Is this some sort of joke? Like an early April Fool's Day kind of thing?

He barely even let's that sentence settle in before he assails you with the mental image of a deep-fried hermaphrodite (which was the most popular booth at the Oakdale Testicle Festivle by the way. And yes, that's real too. This is what happens when you take away the chocolate. And Yahoo deserves a Pulitzer for that headline and lead) without even so much as a warning. Again, I'm not kidding. I would make some sort of joke about how he seems way too eager to know about the sex life of a hermie but I'm just in total awe of that post. How the fuck is his blog more raunchy than mine today? That's just fucking depressing. And to think I thought his ego smothered his sense of humor in it's sleep years ago. Hey wait, what's this...

Time to rifle off a letter to the editor of National Lampoon!

Only Mike Fitzgerald would precede a deep-fried hermaphrodite joke by taking something written in the Onion too seriously. I guess this means his sense of humor really is dead. Which says all sorts of creepy things about the above item.

Ah, there's that joke I was looking for. I knew it'd show up eventually. Man, it feels good to laugh again.

Hippie fiiiiight!k

You know, we haven't checked in on Briefcase Breitler lately. Let's see what's going on over at his blog. What's this? Saturday was that lights out hour thing? And on top of that somebody counter-promoted an event just to piss all the dirty light pollution hippies off? That's fucking funny. Sure, it's not Fitzy wistfully reminiscing about his missed opportunity with a shemale funny, but it's still pretty hilarious. Of course, we're all for anything that pisses off those dirty hippies.

Happy Communist Organizer day! Now what the hell are we forgetting?

2009-03-31T10:09:00.001-07:00

So it's the end of March and it feels like something's missing. Let's run down the monthly checklist.

Completely destroy some stupid idea Fitzy wrote about: Check

Take the city to task for horrible timing: Check and check

Point out Lori Gilbert's affinity for the elderly (Which we hear is a 3 seed in the Nasty Fetish NIT): Check (last item)

Get punched by a midget: Check

Drink: Check, check, and check.

Hmmm, it seems like something's missing. Oh wait, now I remember! It's time for...

March's Rube of the Month!

I know you're probably thinking we totally forgot about it since it's the very last day of March, but we didn't. We just saw something earlier this month that had rubian potential and had to wait for it to play out. Well, it played out like we expected and that's why March's Rube of the Month is a man we talk about quite a bit on here, Mr. Michael Fitzgerald. I'm honestly kind of surprised it took this long for him to earn the distinction. Sure, he was directly involved in last's month's ROTM, but this time he actually gets the nod himself. What can I say? He's a double threat. He's the player-coach of rubes.

So why does Fitzy deserve such a lofty distinction? It's simple really, he allowed his man crush on newish booking agent Stephen Grossman to cloud his judgement. Specifically this line:

Grossman said next week he should be able to announce two new events for the arena.

That was two weeks ago. Let me check the paper real quick...yeah big fat goose egg. Again.

Are we nitpicking? Yeah, a little bit. But when we read that our response was "Yeah, whatever. We'll believe it when we see it." But then again, we're horrible skeptics. It's a quality that's easy to develop when you've lived in Stockton as long as we have. We've had guys promise great acts and fall through before *coughRalphWhite*cough*. Thing is, Fitzy's lived here way longer than we have. He should be just as skeptical if not more. Which is really why he's this month's rube. He should know better than to trust the guy with the least enviable job in the city (well, you know, besides Gordon Palmer's).

I could call Grossman every week and he'd probably say something along the lines of "We're really really super close to booking a big act" just to get me off his ass (you know, so Fitzy can reaffix his lips). I wouldn't print anything like that because it's vague and there's really no information in there. Fitzy prints it because he wants to make his pal look good. And then when nothing happens, he looks like a fucking stooge. And that, my friends, is how Mike Fitzgerald earned his very first Rube of the Month award. It almost definitely won't be his last.

Let the countdown to somebody pointing out the event announcement that we probably totally missed begin. (Note: Vincente Fernandez doesn't count because that's a fucking gimmie)

Let he who has never done anything stupid cast the first squirrell

2009-03-30T13:45:00.000-07:00

"Who are you?" "The spirit of Cesar Chavez." "Why do you look like Cesar Romero?" "Because you don't know what Cesar Chavez looks like." The Simpsons Season 12 Ep. 15

Well, apparently my advice from last week was taken and Don Blount formed an opinion on something. Predictably it was a horribly wrong opinion. I said it Thursday and I'll say it again, people are allowed to be ignorant. Why else would half the people in newspapers still be around?

We touched on this last week. But since Don saw it and decided to push it into this week's news cycle, we'll go a little bit more in depth.

First of all, was what he said really that bad? We're of course taking him at his word that there was no malice meant in what he said. What did he say? That he thought Chavez was a Communist organizer. Is calling somebody a Commie even really an insult anymore? Barack Obama gets called socialist on what seems like an hourly basis on Fox News. That's a legitimate (well, as legit as Fox gets) news organization that's broadcast nationwide. Bestolairdes' transgression was sent in a private e-mail that was leaked to the press. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

The point is, that calling someone a communist is a fucking joke. Nobody outside of the 1950s uses that as a serious accusation. Anybody who takes it as an actual insult is a fucking pussy. It even states in the column that Chavez found it entertaining to combat allegations of communism. It's an absurd accusation. Joe McCarthy thinks it's laughable in this day and age.

I'm actually glad Don Blount brought up Barack Obama's "Special Olympics" remark on Leno as another example of an insensitive misstep because anybody who was offended by that is also a fucking pussy. If you had listened to the context of that joke you'd know Obama was right. Leno was in the midst of blowing him over his decidedly average bowling score and Barry correctly told him to cut that shit out. Why the fuck was that even a news item? Well, that brings me to my next point.

News organizations get e-mails from special interest groups all the time. It's really fucking annoying. And unfortunately, Bestolairdes' e-mail was sent directly to a special interest group. They saw an opportunity to push their agenda right before Cesar Chavez Day and sent the e-mail to the Record. The Record pounced on the opportunity because, as we ~~bitched about~~ noted, last week was a painfully slow news week. The result? Don Blount and the various outraged local Latino organizations are calling for a public apology for an e-mail that they made public! This makes the Latino organizations happy because it puts them in the news in the week leading up to their big weekend celebration. And it makes Don Blount and the Record happy because it fills space and gives them a different angle to present the Cesar Chavez story instead of printing something that resembles a high school term paper on Cesar Chavez Day. Everybody wins, except for Steve Bestolairdes of course.

And that's truly the sad part of this whole thing, in the interest of self-promotion and space filling, intent was thrown out the window. Did Bestolairdes intend to offend Stockton's sizeable Latino population? Of course not. He made an ignorant statement in a private e-mail. If anything, the Dolores Huerta Foundation should be apologizing to Bestolairdes for publicly disseminating his e-mail. He apologized to the involved parties.

If he had accidently hit "reply all" and sent that e-mail out to every city computer or something, then yes, a public apology would be warranted. But he didn't publicize his ignorance, the special interest groups did. All to pretty blatantly promote their agenda. Because, let's face it, Steve Bestolairdes knows who Cesar Chavez was. He's not retarded. He was just a tired man who made a bad joke. Funny thing is, the joke wasn't even about Cesar Chavez. As far as we can tell, dude was making a joke about Barack Obama. A guy who's opponents referred to him as a community organizer in a negative fashion. And a guy who, as we said earlier, is called a communist on a pretty regular basis. He was comparing the bullshit Chavez faced with the bullshit Obama faces today. So, if anything, Bestolairdes was guilty of making a bad joke after a 16-hour day. Which A) is exactly what he apologized for, and B) is something every single fucking one of us has done before.

But let's assume for a second that he didn't know who Chavez was before getting politically gangraped by the Latino special interest groups. Is it really that big of a fucking deal? Isn't that why we have a Cesar Chavez Day? To educate those who don't know as to who the man was? In the article Jennie Rodriguez wrote about the Cesar Chavez Day festivities (which appears on the page opposite Blount's column) one of the people she interviews is a Mexican immigrant named Enrique Jimenez who admits that he doesn't know much about Chavez himself. I don't see Pedro Ramirez running to hand him a pamphlet. And that brings me to my last point.

The only reason this is even an issue, and the reason Blount argues a more public apology is necessary, is because Bestolairdes holds a public office. And everybody's all too willing to jump on public officials because they "should know better." Well guess what? That's bullshit. The beauty of our political system is that any Joe Schmoe can hold a public office. But nobody wants to because for some God forsaken reason people think that if you can get a majority of the people to like you enough to vote for you, you must be smarter than they are. Well, they're not. Just look at the past couple Delta trustee boards. They're people just like you and me. And, I hate to be the one to break this to you, people fuck up all the time.

Especially at this low of a level of public office. I can at least understand some of the outrage directed at Obama for his comment on Leno because he's the fucking President and said it on a nationally televised program. Bestolairdes is a school district trustee. And in one of the smaller school districts at that. Fuck, if I had the money, a death wish, and lived in the proper area I could be a Lincoln Unified Trustee. Yet, Don Blount is comparing him to Barack Obama and nobody seems to have a problem with this? How is that an apt comparison?

Of course, none of this is new. As a society we've been overscrutinizing our public figures for years with no regard for the impact it might have. To see the impact one just needs to look at the postgame press conference of almost every sporting event. You get homogenized quotes like "Both teams played hard" and "I'd like to thank God and my teammates". It's fucking boring.

But guys like Bob Knight or Ron Artest, who are just genuinely being themselves, are vilified for being too honest with their emotions. Ron Artest is labeled as crazy for, in the heat of the moment, running into the stands after somebody threw a beer at him. In hindsight everybody was eager to say "How could he do such a thing with so much money and fame at stake?" When, in reality, if somebody throws a beer at me I'm not thinking "What are the financial ramapercussions of my actions?" I'm thinking "Where's the motherfucker who threw that fucking beer at me? I'm going to beat the fuck out of him." If you think that's an incorrect line of thinking let me know where you're drinking this weekend and I'll huck a Coors Light at you and we'll see what you think then.

I guess what I'm trying to get at in an entirely roundabout way is that we're all too eager to judge others while ignoring our own shortcomings. Everybody fucks up, it's just a matter of to what degree. Bestolairdes fucked up to a microscopic degree and for some reason it's being treated as if he called Chavez the brown Hitler. All to promote some bullshit event.

Was it really worth it? I guess we'll find out the next time somebody tries to pry some actual important information from an elected official. Will they speak somewhat freely (well, as freely as a politician can speak) and let that nugget of information slip? Or will they remember how their pal got destroyed in the press over a tiny misstep and clam up? Think about that the next time you see a "no comment" in a story. That's real journalism at work. Intent be damned, there's pages to be filled.

The Seven Days of Jolly Drinking

2009-03-27T15:29:00.000-07:00

In a down economy, there is always one industry that does well: Booze. Lets face it, people always want to get their drunk on and look for some strange. But when times are tough, people really want to get their drunk and fuck on. So I've come up with a new project, one that fits my distinguished tastes: The Seven Days Of Jolly Drinking!

Here is the concept. Starting this Monday, I'm going to go to a different bar or bars in the area (Stockton/Lodi) and get my drunk on for seven straight days. I cant go to the same bar twice. And since I'm working on a budget, I'm capping my spending at $25 per place. I really want to see where $25 will take you and which bars. Like I know $25 will get me 5 tall boys at one bar and two buckets at another. So I have to plan ahead.

A couple of problems I see coming up. First, Wednesday will be my first test of bars to go or not go to. Stooges in Lodi for Dollar Beers, Touche Euro Lounge for Beer Pong, or Fats for Karaoke. And since those are three of my favorites, one or more is going off the board. Thursday has this new downtown concept of college night, which is also going to take a couple of bars off the board.

Second, this is going to force me into places I wouldn't normally go. Like certain Lincoln Center bars. But this should be fun nonetheless. Im planning on being an unabashed mess by the time all is said and done.

My criteria for a good night are as follows: How far does my money go? How is the strange? How are the bartenders? How are the regulars? Can I talk sports with anyone there, or am I at a too fancy foo-foo bar?

Im sure I'll find other things to throw in my re-caps. But Im really looking forward to this absolute drunk-fest that is about to fall upon the area.

Any suggestions you have of places and specials put them in the comments or e-mail us.

What good has PD done for you?

2009-03-26T14:11:00.000-07:00

Since we've lit up local law enforcement for their work (Or lack thereof) I saw this with Ryan Moats, running back for the NFL's Texans, and couldn't help but be amazed at what kids of jackasses PD can be, even to people in distress. Lest we forget, the Stockton Police department has its own gag order on Melecio Arquines.

And yes, I'm tying the two together. Because the officers were more than willing to talk about Arquines when the shooting first happened, then questions arose as to why the man had bullet-holes in his screen door. They obviously felt justified. Just as this cop who lectured Moats on running a red light. Lectured him long enough his mother in law died while the cop was still giving him the business. When asked about it by his chief, the officer said he was just doing his job. Wow.

As for the Moats, I hate to run to the race card so quick. Obviously this cop felt some sort of disgusting pride/arrogance that he felt the need to not only take almost 15 minutes in giving him a ticket for running a red light, be proceeded to continue an ongoing lecture of his attitude. But that is cops. Talk to any of them. Shit, talk to the cops here in Stockton where we rank nationally high in all crime stats, yet they feel justified and entitled to a raise.

I still turn to the argument that cops are only in it for the check, so they act accordingly. Shooting a guy or holding a guy up from seeing a family member doesn't register to them any worse than forgetting a cover letter on a TPS report. Or at least, in looking at these two events, thats how they see it.

Quick Links for March 26th

2009-03-26T11:08:00.000-07:00

What day is it? Thursday? Fuck. Why can't it be Sexy Friday? Let's look in the paper to see if anything happened. Oh look, jack shit. A-fucking-gain. Thank God the NCAA Tournament starts up again today. Finally basketball that actually matters will be in the news again.

Oh, and I'm pretty sure we're done with the Nasty Fetish Tourney until next week. I'm not entirely sure how long the second round voting is going to go for, but I'm fairly certain we won't be posting any more matchups until next week. Unless of course Punter asks us to post more, then we'd totally oblige. But until then, Quick Links!

Last time I checked people were allowed to not know who Ceaser Chavez was

We didn't touch on this in yesterday's Quick Links because we thought it was ridiculously unremarkable. Granted, we're surprised there's somebody living in the state of California that doesn't know who Cesar Chavez was, but we weren't offended by it. I mean Jesus, all he did was send a private e-mail reply that contained displayed his ignorance. He didn't make a racist comment like Jim Rachels. He asked a seemingly innocent (although, again, incredibly ignorant) question. He even realized his ignorance and profusely apologized before the story even hit the news. So we ask, what's the big fucking deal? Why is this story in it's second day?

We understand Cesar Chavez is an important figure in Latino history. But not knowing who he is shouldn't result in a fucking rally at a meeting. The dozen or so people who showed up showed up there specifically to garner press for their cause, and that's bullshit. It was a classic example of political grandstanding through the press. And they weren't even that fucking subtle about it. Yes, Bestolarides made an error in judgement. One he's admitted to. So there's absolutely no point in showing up to tell him he fucked up because he already knows he fucked up! And that's even if he did fuck up.

Frankly, not knowing/forgetting the history of something isn't that big of a deal. I've forgotten half the shit I learned in high school, does that mean I need protesting press whores handing me fucking history books? No, I'm free to know and not know whatever the fuck I want. Same goes for Bestolarides. He shouldn't be getting shit for his admitted ignorance.

David Siders is a live-blogging machine!

If I had known about this town hall meeting I probably would have shown up...ok, that's a lie. Wednesday night's are South Park night and last night's episode was a million times better than anything that went on last night with with City Council. I know this because David Siders did a running diary of the whole thing. Typical topics were discussed, bankruptcy, trees (of course), IFG, water (oh the unwarranted influence of Mike Fitzgerald), and Sanchez was there to do his usual grandstanding. (Bullshit public grandstanding is apparently today's theme in the Quick Links.) It's a fairly interesting read, but at the same time I'm glad I'm reading it and didn't actually have to experience it.

Misc. Shit

I usually try and have three items to write about in the Quick Links and today's so slow that I ca't do it. The story about the Tracy sub who allegedly molested some kids by touching their shoulder isn't inherently interesting. I blame teen slave for making all other forms of child abuse look tame by comparison. "Oh, some guy got off on rubbing your shoulder? I was chained to a fucking fireplace and force fed booze and pot! Beat that!"

UOP's early exit from the CI.CT was kind of funny but if it happens and nobody sees it, does it really even matter? And what does this mean for a team that for some God forsaken reason was hoping for an at large bid on Selection Sunday? Well, it means that people are retarded and couldn't remove themselves enough to see this team for what it was. A mediocre team at best that was crippled by the university's unsuccessful attempt to keep a rape allegation quiet. This team wasn't going to be good going into the season, wasn't good during the season, and didn't come through during their joke of a postseason. While I feel for the seniors who totally got screwed in this situation, it is what it is. The team was just not that good, and they couldn't even win the lowest level postseason tournament. Prolonging the season officially accomplished nothing. And that's why we'll continue to maintain that the CollegeInsider.com Tourney is fucking useless. The best case scenario for that tourney isn't even that great. Anything less than that is, well, fucking embarrassing.

Quick Links for March 25th

2009-03-25T12:03:00.000-07:00

Thank God for the Nasty Fetish Tournament because jack and shit is going on this week. And no, UOP advancing to the semifinals of the CollegeInsider.com tournament is not news. Mostly because I'm pretty sure if I had tens of thousands of dollars to throw around I could grab the guys I play an occasional pickup game with and advance to the semis of that joke of a tournament.

Anyway, it's Wednesday and we haven't done a Quick Links yet this week. Which I'm pretty sure is a record or something. So yeah, Quick Links!

"Taxes? I thought that was part of our deal"

The plight of the Lexington Waterfront Plaza Hotel Bar and Grill and Feed 'n Fuel continues. This time they didn't pay a tax aimed pretty much directly at them. So not only are contractors not getting paid, but the city's not getting the revenue that was part of the reason they gave the old Sheraton such a sweet deal in the first place. Of course, they're blaming it on the fact that the hotel's still in bankruptcy court, which I guess is a decent enough excuse. But this whole situation does underscore how horrible of an idea building an upscale hotel in what's considered (correctly or not) one of the sketchier areas in town. That idea looks fucking golden though compared to the fact that the hotel's profitability hinged on the sale of multiple $700,000 condos on the top of the hotel. None of this is really new news, but like I said, jack shit's been going on this week. Although it is pretty funny that the VP of the hotel is also the chairman of the tourism board that the hotel tax presumably benefits.

Apparently we learned nothing from previous councils

We've said it before and we'll say it again, Arena's are not moneymakers! That being said we understand why the city's considering this. The Arena was maligned while it was being built, and 4 years later it has yet to turn a profit. Most people are ignorant to the fact that it's tough for any new arena to post a profit, especially when the tenants don't have a built in fan base. So Arena opponents have exploited that ignorance and have been calling for immediate action to rectify that. We're not Arena apologists, but immediate action is kind of what got us into this mess in the first place.

The major problem with the Arena and downtown redevelopment as a whole is that it all happened wayyyyy too fast. Podesto was eager to leave his mark on the city and wanted to get everything done before he was out of office. So everything got fast tracked. Want a movie theater? Boom! It's up. Ballpark? Booyah! Built whether we got the land through legal means or not. Arena? Why, that would be the crown jewel! Make it happen! And throw a hotel up there too while you're at it. What was missing in all of this? Well, for one, a chance to see if any of those things could actually succeed downtown. We all know how downtown was perceived pre-redevelopment. It was an area to be avoided unless you had a parking ticket or jury duty. The city did nothing to address those concerns outside throwing up some fences.

Instead of slowly coaxing us into checking out downtown they hijacked the Asparagus festival and forced us downtown. Instead of saying "Hey, we understand your safety concerns and we're doing something to address them" they said "Crime? What the fuck are you talking about? It's perfectly safe down there!" while stories in the paper told us about shootings in front of nightclubs and late night muggings. And while all of this is going on, they expect us to willingly go down there to support not one, not two, but four(!?) brand new venues/businesses. It's like they took the saying "put all your eggs in one basket" and shoved an 8-ball of booger sugar up it's nose.

If they had slowed down they would have seen that it takes time for any venue to be profitable by itself, let alone 3 of them. Instead the edict was clear "Get it done". And they did. And it's costing us big time when we can least afford it. And now it's causing us to consider horrible ideas to try and renegotiate a horrible contract.

We're not saying renegotiation isn't warranted. We're just saying that the city council needs to display the patience that the previous councils didn't. Learn from their mistakes. Immediate solutions aren't the best ones. The money to buy those teams has to come from somewhere. If it comes from bond dollars (not that anyone's indicated that's where it's coming from, but where the hell else is it going to come from, not a hotel tax, that's for sure), you're really just fucking the future to get shut done now. And if that happens have we really learned anything from this whole debacle?

Something for UOP to consider

This has no local connection but I thought this was pretty cool. Plus, we're featuring one reason the internet was created (the widespread distribution of porn), why not feature the other? Academic Earth is a project that feature lectures/courses from various prestigious universities that we have no chance of attending/affording. Of course linking to this kind of outs me as a huge nerd, but for those looking to further their education and don't have the financial means to do so, this site is a fairly good alternative. Even if it isn't worth some class credit. At the very least you'll feel better about yourself for not watching bootleg Simpsons episodes all night again. Plus if shit gets really boring you can just skip to the next lecture in the series. And you can totally smoke a bowl during class.

Nasty Fetish Tournament Second Round - Caveman Regional No. 1 vs. No. 8

2009-03-25T07:27:00.000-07:00

In an obviously misguided attempt at mocking the playoff structure of the NCAA tournament, we’re inviting readers to enjoy matchups of actual fetishes in a voter-powered tournament, culminating in April with the Nasty Fetish Final Four. That tournament continues today with Round One action. Remember, you’re voting for what you consider the more nasty fetish.

1. Bukkake

Literal Meaning: The act of two or more men ejaculating on the face of a male or female recipient or recipients.

Wiki Says: Bukkake is the noun form of the Japanese verb bukkakeru (to dash [water]), and means simply "splash". The compound verb can be decomposed into two verbs: butsu and kakeru . Butsu literally means to hit, but in this usage it appears to be an intensive prefix as in buttamageru ("completely astonished") or butchigiri ("overwhelming win").

Popular Advocates: The Japanese, Women with dry skin.

8. Sex Machine.

Literal Meaning: Sexual penetration through mechanical means, either through human power or mechanical power.

Wiki SaysAutomated erotic stimulation devices have been created commercially for penetration and stimulation. However, users must be cautioned that excessive force may easily damage the delicate vagina, anus, and rectum; injury may result if a device is used incorrectly.

Popular Advocates: Will Arnett

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Nasty Fetish Tournament Opening Round - Caveman Regional No, 1 vs. No. 16

2009-03-24T12:00:00.000-07:00

Wiki Says: Bukkake is the noun form of the Japanese verb bukkakeru (to dash [water]), and means simply "splash". The compound verb can be decomposed into two verbs: butsu and kakeru . Butsu literally means to hit, but in this usage it appears to be an intensive prefix as in buttamageru ("completely astonished") or butchigiri ("overwhelming win").

Popular Advocates: The Japanese, Women with dry skin.

16. MILF.

Literal Meaning: Acronym for “Mother I’d Love to F*ck."

Wiki says: The term was popularized by the Hollywood film American Pie (1999). Also known as Mom I Like To Feel[1], though the origin of the term predates this (the term was already used for years on the Internet).[2] A more family-friendly version is “Mama Is Looking Fine”, though this is not widespread in usage.

Notable Advocates: Oedipus, the guy from that one MILF-hunting website oh what’s it called…, Brad Pitt.

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Nasty Fetish Tournament Opening Round - Caveman Regional No. 8 vs. No. 9

2009-03-24T07:12:00.000-07:00

In an obviously misguided attempt at mocking the playoff structure of the NCAA tournament, we’re inviting readers to enjoy matchups of actual fetishes in a voter-powered tournament, culminating in April with the Nasty Fetish Final Four. That tournament continues today with Round One action. Remember, you’re voting for what you consider the more nasty fetish.

8. Sex Machine.

Literal Meaning: Sexual penetration through mechanical means, either through human power or mechanical power.

Wiki
SaysAutomated erotic stimulation devices have been created
commercially for penetration and stimulation. However, users must be
cautioned that excessive force may easily damage the delicate vagina,
anus, and rectum; injury may result if a device is used
incorrectly.

Popular Advocates: Will Arnett

9. Pregnant

Literal Meaning: Obvious.

Wiki
says: Pregnancy detection can be accomplished using one or more of
various pregnancy tests which detect hormones generated by the
newly-formed placenta. Clinical blood and urine tests can detect pregnancy soon after implantation, which is as early as 6-8 days after fertilization..

Notable Advocates: Seth Rogen.

Update: Today...at least I'm pretty sure today Tomorrow.

2009-03-23T17:22:00.000-07:00

I'm pretty sure KSK's Nasty Fetish Tourney will be here ~~today~~ tomorrow. So if you're one of our readers looking for a writeup on Fitzy's latest column, that'll be here too. Just sandwiched between matchup between DVDA and Redheads or something. So if you're easily offended, see ya next week.

If you're here for the tourney, here's that post I did last week explaining the site. The matchups will be up when Punter sends them my way.

I would never see the confusion in this

2009-03-23T10:47:00.000-07:00

You know, confusing Rosendo Perez, the reckless driver, with Rosendo Perez, the burglar, attempted murderer, kid beater, and run of the mill domestic violencer. You know, Lodi PD has so much on its plate and all.

They are busy.

Really busy.

Super-duper busy.

Its hard to get people to take you seriously and all when you don't even bother to fact check something you pay for. So I can understand why this guy wants to go through the courts when you turn a guy with a mostly clean record into a disaster case that beats kids. I would be mad too. Lodi PD does not do that much. Lodi is a sleepy town. Yea, its got its occasional meth labs and if you go on the wrong side of the tracks, the laughable Mexican gangs. But on the whole its a sleepy town. Sleepy enough to hand out jay-walking tickets. SO with time and money, taking time to do their crime-stopper ad right would seem like status quo.

I'd hate agreeing with Fitzy if he wasn't so right (this time)...and wasn't the only columnist giving us something to agree with

2009-03-23T10:12:00.000-07:00

One of the many problems we have with the Record is the fact that their columnists suck. All of them. Fitzy writes too much about his pet projects like downtown and our "dying urban forest". Lori Gilbert writes too much about old people. Bob Highfill can't stick to one subject. Don Blount appears to be writing a stream of consciousness column, only that consciousness isn't worth writing about. And Mike Klocke usually reserves his weekly Sunday space to announce cutbacks and layoffs. Regular readers probably already know this, but this weekend provided a clear example of why they suck. They're all pussies who can't seem to actually state an opinion.

Just look at Mike Klocke's column from yesterday. All it pretty much states is that the City Council has a full plate and that their job isn't/won't be easy. Really? I thought navigating the city through a financial/housing market collapse we're largely considered the epicenter for would be a fucking cakewalk. Or negotiating with the local PD, they wouldn't cut the last council any slack and that mayor was an ex-police chief. I thought throwing a bunch of newbs at them would totally make the process go smoother. I would say this column was 100% uninformative, but it did bring to light the hilarious revelation that lesbian City Council member Susan Eggman chose to dress up, of all Harry Potter characters, notorious gay wizard Dumbledore at the Triva Bee/dress up thingy they had a few weeks ago. Although I could be wrong, maybe another character was the gay one. I don't read kids books.

Of course, if you want 100% uninformative, then Don Blount has got you covered. In this week's Shit Don Blount Saw, Don checks out those antiques he blogged about last week. Yes, Don Blount shit out an entire column about roaming what amounts to a higher end flea market. Yeah, it's riveting stuff. Did Don buy the typewriters? (Spoiler: No) Will the antiques come back next month? (Spoiler: Yes) Will anybody show up? (Spoiler: Judging by the pictures, no) Is any of this newsworthy? (Is Don's column ever newsworthy?) And most importantly, will Don buy the typewriters next time!? (Spoiler: Who the fuck cares?) Yes, as usual, Blount's column was a poorly written "Day in the Life" piece. This time about old things and replicas of old things. Lori Gilbert is insanely jealous. My favorite part of this column was the end where people are surprised the city hasn't fucked this event up yet. God I love Stockton. Except for when they fuck up so badly they make me do shit like this.

Mike Fitzgerald's column yesterday was the only column with some fucking balls. The city fucked up the downtown St. Patrick's Day party so much that Fitz actually stated a correct opinion regarding downtown's mismanagement. I'd be surprised, but it was about St. Patrick's Day and his last name is Fitzgerald. He kind of had to get it right lest his family disown him. I'm not entirely sure why he waited a week to blast the event, but at least he did so, because what the Alliance did was unforgivable. They tried to turn St. Patty's Day into a family event.

God damn that's so Stockton I don't even know where to start (Well, you know, besides when we started here). The downsizing of the event was understandable in today's economy, but the rest of Saturday's shenanigans weren't. Charging $5 for the privilege to buy a $5 was just fucking ridiculous. Especially because the event consisted of mediocre local bands playing outside the pay-area in Janet Leigh Plaza (something you can see for free on pretty much a weekly basis), and because the pay-area consisted of a couple of tents, a bunch of folding chairs and tables, a canopy, and a barbecue. All shit I could probably ask my local church for and get for free. They pulled a classic Stockton money grab and tried to squeeze every cent they could out of the increasingly destitute citizens of Stockton.

And all of that's before you get to the fact that they tried to make it a family friendly event. Which is why we're glad Fitzy said something, because a holiday based on the mass consumption of alcohol isn't exactly the best place for kids. Most people drink to get away from their kids! The other half drink because they're depressed about the economy, so thanks for fucking both halves Stockton. At least we know how badly downtown has to fuck up to get Fitzy to disagree with them. It's completely. But hey, at least he actually stated an opinion. For that, we take back 10% of what we said in this post.

Quick Links for March 20th

2009-03-20T12:28:00.000-07:00

Fuck, I'm sick as a dog. I'd call in sick but I had to get sick during one of the two days where calling in sick is most abused, so nobody would believe me anyway. No word yet on the KSK Nasty Fetish Tourney. The matchups will go up as soon as Punter sends them to us. The fact that just announcing the tourney is coming here may have resulted in links to us being taken down on more respectable sites brings me some sick kind of joy. I wonder if that's a fetish we can sneak into the FetishInsider.com tourney. No way in hell we'd get hoodwinked into paying for hosting that tournament like some places I know. Hey, speaking of, Quick Links!

Hey guys, this matters! Really! We're still playing! Pay attention!

For those who don't know, UOP paid a pretty penny ($28,500 a round actually) to host the CollegeInsider.com Tournament. Why? I'll never know. I didn't been know there was a tournament past the NIT, let alone two. Apparently I'm not the only one as the opening game only drew 1,876 fans and UOP was said to have lost up to $10,000 hosting the game. So AD Lynn King promptly signed them up to host the quarterfinals. Makes total sense.

Of course after posting that dismal attendance number UOP's going on the offensive and trying to position the tournament as meaningful when it's anything but. The CollegeInsider.com Tourney is just a giant waste of money. Sure, it gives seniors and extra couple of games to play, but who really cares? We're all in the midst of watching the highest quality college basketball, who would then want to go back to watching a team that couldn't even make the other 2 postseason tournaments. The quality of play is just too low. Plus, what's really the best case scenario? Let's say UOP runs the table and wins the whole shebang, where does that rank them nationally? There are 3 other tournaments considered higher in prestige than the first year CollegeInsider.com tourney. Assuming they all field 65 teams, UOP's tourney victory would rank them 195th or so (math's not my strong suit) in the nation. Is that really worth the roughly $127,000 UOP would have to pay to host all 4 rounds? Couldn't that money have gone towards something better? Hey, what's this....

It doesn't matter if you're good looking, it doesn't matter if you wear Dungarees, it doesn't matter if you're fun to be around. Sooner or later, you're going to get raped

You know, $127k seems like a decent amount of hush money. I bet they could have offered that money to this broad and avoid the bad press instead of paying to play in a tournament where your second round opponent harbors one of the spurned alleged rapists. We're not coming down one way or the other on the whole rape issue, we don't know the details, but one would thing UOP would have made sure that this story wouldn't pop up a year later. Especially during a time when most kids and their parents are deciding on colleges. And double-especially with their unfortunate second round matchup in their Mickey Mouse tournament. Words can't express how disappointed I am that Steffan Johnson is ineligible for this game. That's how you pack an arena, with an alleged rapist. Just ask Don King.

I wonder how Fitzy feels about tree rape's seeding in the fetish tourney

Apparently Fitzy's new goal is to include as little actual information in his columns as possible. First there was his community-owned team idea where one of his reasons (the top reason actually) for owning the team was "We'd be Gods". The meaning of which is still not entirely certain. And now he's doing retreads from his blog (which we would link to if the Record's search engine was anything resembling competent). Of course Fitzy's long crusade for trees seems like one giant retread because he rarely says anything new. Urban forest is dying, City Hall is blowing it if they don't address the issue, city will be ugly without trees, volunteer to help, blah blah fucking blah. Who needs new information? It's not like he writes for a newspaper or anything.

Special preview! Don Blount sees typewriters!

And if you thought a column about trees was exciting, wait til you read Don Blount's column about antiquing or something. What information will be revealed? Probably none, other than the fact that typewriters are old any nobody uses them anymore, which means college hipsters are going to start buying them all up and turning in typewritten term papers for irony's sake. And you know what that means, trend piece! That sound you hear is journalism dying a little bit.

Enough with the freaking out already

2009-03-19T10:56:00.000-07:00

What the fuck is this, bad idea week? First we discovered that somebody thinks we want to know the answer to the question "I wonder what the life of a nationally ranked women's high school basketball team is like" is. Then Fitzy floated his horrible idea for a community-owned Stockton Thunder. And now the City Council has decided to one up Fitz and is considering buying the team outright in addition to buying out the remainder of its contract with IFG.

On the surface it seems like an OK idea. The deal with IFG continues to hamper the Arena's ability to even come close to turn a profit and a buyout clause in the IFG contract would allow Thunder owner Michael Reinsdorf to require the city purchase the teams anyway should they pursue a buyout (we've mentioned the shadiness of this whole relationship before right? Really fucking shady). Plus, if the city were to buy the teams, it would only be for the short term. Yesterday, our main reason against a community owned team was the the team's long-term profitability. That wouldn't be the case with this deal.

But it's still a bad idea just for timing's sake. This council seems to have a penchant for bad timing and going through with the first option would only piss off, well, pretty much everybody. Cops would be pissed because, if we have the money to buy a fucking hockey team, we should have enough to finally give them their raises and shut fuck up about layoffs. Already laid off city employees would be fuming. City services would be royally pissed after getting reorganized earlier this month for budgetary reasons. And most important of all (at least to Mike Fitzgerald), what about the dying urban forest!?

And the thing is, they'd all be justified. Especially with the less expensive option B (subcontracting out venue management to a 3rd party) sitting right there. All we have to do for that option is wait for the teams to be sold. We're still having a hard time fathoming why everybody's jumping at the opportunity to buy/save the Thunder. We said it earlier this week, they're not going fucking anywhere. Everybody needs to slow their fucking roll and realize we're talking about a 4-year old minor league hockey team (well, 4 years in Stockton at least) in a brand new arena, and not the fucking Moon Grizzlies (h/t KSK). Jesus, and I thought Kings fan's freaking out was overkill.

David Siders has the specifics of both proposed options up on his bad ass blog. It involves a lot of math and numbers and I was a journalism major so I'll let you figure it all out.

For those here for the KSK Nasty Fetish Tournament...

2009-03-19T09:20:00.000-07:00

Hey guys, I'll save you some time and just explain the basic premise of this blog for all 3 of you who are curious. We usually focus on the shit that goes on in the city of Stockton, CA and any town within spitting distance (as well as swallowing distance). It's part-media watch part-local news analysis part-whatever the fuck we feel like. Most of it only really makes sense if you're from the area, but I think it's still an interesting read if you feel like getting a sense of what it's like living in a town that's claim to fame is being ground zero for the housing crisis (oh, and for being the home/personal playground for Chargers owner Alex Spanos). So if it sounds like something that interests you, feel free to look around. If not, I understand. I get bored writing about this shit sometimes myself.

So yeah, welcome to the site. Have fun freaking out some of my regular readers with your casual attitude towards stoma-fucking.

Fair warning: We're going really off topic today

2009-03-19T08:34:00.000-07:00

Update: This has been pushed to tomorrow.

There's going to be a bit of a programming change today. Normally we'd just throw it at you because what's really normal around this place anyways? But something tells me I should probably warn you that we're going to be taking part in Kissing Suzy Kolber's Nasty Fetish Tournament (original concept explained here).

Too lazy to follow the link? Well, basically it's a tournament between the most disgusting sexual fetishes the internet has to offer.

The fetishes will be placed in your standard tournament bracket and pitted against each other for you to vote on to see which is truly the nastiest fetish (for example: Beastiality vs. Midgets or Fat Chicks vs. Feet). That part's important, you're voting for the fetish you think is the nastiest. We'll be hosting some of the matchups that were supposed to be on With Leather but for whatever reason that didn't happen, so we threw our names into the ring because, well frankly we're suprised as to how sheltered we were. Once you get past realizing there's something as disgusting as Vore out there (although, to be fair, I don't think anybody can beat Necro-Beastiality, which is exactly what it sounds like), it's really a very educational exercise. And if there's one thing we're here for, it's to educate...and make dick jokes.

So sometime soon we'll have the first matchup up on the site. I presume they're safe for work, but I guess that really depends on how closely your boss watches your web browsing. Don't worry though, it's not like we're posting 2girls1cup or anything. At least I'm pretty sure we're not, I'm trusting Punte that it's not. Which is a scary fucking thought now that I think about it.

So yeah, you've been warned. Complaints can be directed here.

Who wants to piss away some money and a hockey team?

2009-03-18T11:45:00.000-07:00

I owe Bris Isaak $25. Let me explain.

Last week the Thunder were put up for sale. Casual fans freaked out because they thought there was a chance the Thunder could move. They're wrong. But of course being wrong never stopped a sports fan before, why start now?

We consider ourselves something resembling experts in these situations because, as Kings fans, we've had to deal with the prospect of our team leaving us like gypsies in the middle of the night for seemingly forever. Which brings me to my debt. When this news broke early last week, my Hebrew homie and I ran down the different possible scenarios that could play out and the resulting media coverage. Because if there's one thing you can count on with the Record, it's that they'll at least cover the minor league hockey team. One scenario was "How long do you think it'll be before some hack suggests the community buys the team Packers-style?" We even narrowed it down to either Bob Highfill or Fitzy. Bris gave it a week, I had more faith in them than that. Why? I'll never know.

Yes, a week to the fucking day since Mike Reinsdorf announced the team was up for sale, Mike Fitzgerald decided he was that hack and suggested that we, the increasingly poor people of Stockton, buy the team. We specifically use the word "hack" because of just how poorly written this column is. We usually don't assail Fitzy's writing ability because our problem is more with his opinions and subject matter, he's usually stylistically-sound. But this time he appears to have gotten an e-mail suggesting an idea that comes up every time any team ever is up for sale, and then did absolutely no research beyond calling Ren Nosky and asking "This is possible in theory, right?" It's a horribly flawed column. So much so that we're going to FJM it. We have a lot of work to do with this one so go refill your coffee real quick. Don't worry, I can wait.

Ready? Ok, good.

"In 2007, in England, 20,000 fans paid about $40 each to purchase a majority share of the Ebbsfleet United Football club, with an option to own the entire team outright," Sherman writes.

Oh, so if a British soccer team can do it, we can. The level of passion Brits have for soccer is exactly the same level Stockton has for hockey. When you're citing soccer as an example, you know you're in for a bumpy ride.

Sherman goes on with this intriguing idea: "Here is the neat part, I think: Each transaction a team makes, all of the owners get to vote on. Coach stinks? Vote him out. Need a center? Vote to pick up a new one! The team has been very successful in England."

Intriguing? When did the definition of intriguing change to "giant clusterfuck"?

They don't micromanage the coach. But they could. Here's a sample Web ballot on fielding the week's team:

» "I want to give the coaches the responsibility of picking the team."

» "I want to pick the team and allow the coaches flexibility."

» "I want to pick the team but not allow the coaches flexibility."

» "I abstain."

They don't micromanage the coach, but here's a ballot where they're micromanaging the coach. Makes total fucking sense. The only result of that could be chaos.

This may sound like a recipe for chaos. It's not. Ebbsfleet won a major trophy last year; it's debt-free; and its Web presence brought in owner-fans from 122 countries.

So wait, polling 20,000 people about lineups and playing time wouldn't result in chaos because they won "a major trophy"? Not the title, just a fucking trophy? What is this? Little league? Have you listened to talk radio lately Fitz? Those are the sports fans you want to give the reins of the team to. The only result is chaos. The second the Thunder have a bad loss, someone will call for the coach's head, we'll have a vote, and because we're owned by a bunch of uninformed fucktards (the very next sentence after the quoted passage notes that some of Ebbsfleet's owners don't even know soccer and just own a share for novelty's sake), the coach could be fired for shit probably wasn't even responsible for. Not to mention who the fuck would want to play for a team where your playing time is dependant on the drunk asshole who yelled at you for fucking up his fantasy hockey league when your knee blew out last season when you were in the pros? (Full disclousre: I may have played the part of "drunk asshole" in this scenario before)

Of course, right now I'm ignoring the fact that this model for team ownership is contradicted in a quote further down in the same story! But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's move on.

Offhand, I can think of several good reasons for Thunder fans to buy the team:

Translation: "Here's some unresearched justification for my stupid idea." This should be fucking gold.

We'd be Gods.

...

Was this written by Fitzy or a bunch of frat dudes headed to Spring Break with a pound of mary jane, a 6-foot beer bong, and 6 kegs of Icehouse in the trunk? ("We're gonna be fucking Gods man!")

Let me get this straight. Owning a minor league hockey team makes us Gods? It's that easy? What does that make the recently deceased Bill Davidson? He owned the Detroit Pistons, the Tampa Bay Lightening, and the Detroit Shock. Three professional teams (well, as professional as the WNBA can be). Does that make him like Ghanddahommed Christ (a combination of Ghandi, Budda, Muhommed, and Jesus)? Although team ownership equaling Godliness would explain how Al Davis has stayed alive for so long.

We could invite Alex Spanos to our sky box, with the bowing and scraping waitress serving cocktails and munchies.

Ummm, ok? Am I missing some sort of inside joke here? Is this some sort of backwards way to try and score some cheap Chargers tickets? An attempt to sell the naming rights to the Arena to him because if there's anybody who'll put his name on anything and everything it's Alex Spanos? And who still fantasizes about bowing and scraping waitresses? They're people too. The only people who make wait staff do that shit are dicks. And munchies? Are we schmoozing Spanos or getting him stoned? I could get behind that idea.

Nobody could move the Thunder.

Even though the only people talking about a move are misinformed fans. Oh and technically we could move the Thunder. Or, you know, if someone from out of town bought enough shares of the team from various fan-owners to gain a majority of the voting shares and voted to move the team to their city. If you think a Stocktonian hard up for cash wouldn't sell their stake to the first decent bidder then you're a dumbass.

Another point in favor of this deal - though I feel guilty saying this - involves the sweet deal the city gave the Thunder.

Quick note: this is coming from the same guy who said this a week ago.

And prepare yourselves, because this is the part where the wheels really come off the bus.

But if we owned the team, this politically and financially intolerable situation would go from "problemo" to "no problemo." We'd benefit from the sweet deal.

This is ignoring the fact that owners don't pocket the money from that deal, it goes directly back into the team. So, you know, the situation actually stays the same. The city will still be struggling to make ends meet. The benefit is spending less out of pocket on operating costs. Which is another flaw we'll get to in a second. First, let's allow Fitzy to explain his backwards logic.

The pressure would be off the politicians to worm out of the contract; the people's faith in City Hall would be restored; local democracy would be refreshed.

So if I'm reading this correctly, our faith in local government would be restored because we banded together and solved one of their contract problems for them. How exactly does that restore our faith in City Hall? He never says, it just does. Was he drunk when he wrote this? He's using drunk guy logic.

There's no legal obstacle, City Attorney Ren Nosky opined.

Nosky then proceeds to list 2 legal obstacles off the top of his head.

"As long as the new owners met the financial criteria" - that means as long as we pay the rent - "and showed a base knowledge of running a sports franchise - and I assume the people would retain somebody with that knowledge - there wouldn't be any impediment," Nosky said.

So we should all be able to vote online on things like lineup changes, but also would need someone to make those decisions for us. So we'd need money (again, something not many Stocktonians have lying around), and a puppet who would assure the ECHL that somebody competent was running the franchise, but would bend to every whim of Joe Sportsfan voter. Makes total sense.

But hey, about that money thing...

Reinsdorf has declined to state the price. Let's play with some math. If the team sells for $5 million - and I have no idea if that's anywhere near the right cost - and if 50,000 people chip in, that would be $100 a piece.

50,000 people, in a warm weather city, paying $100, for hockey. But no, really, this is totally workable. Because the cost of running a sports franchise doesn't fluctuate at all.

Look, the major problem with this entire situation is the same problem owners of teams across the country are dealing with. Revenue streams will eventually go down. Eventually everybody who wants a t-shirt will own a t-shirt. The honeymoon will wear off and the team will post a horrendous record out of the gate and ticket sales will plummet. That sweetheart deal with the city will eventually expire. Then what? That's why millionaires own teams. When the shit starts coming in, they can make it through the storm because they have the spare cash to throw into the team when the team isn't generating that revenue by itself. What happens if that happens to us?

Well, we have two choices, tax the city or sell off our shares at a probable lower price and watch the team move away. That's the most retarded thing about Fitzy's column, the result would actually put us in more danger of losing the team in the future. Sports franchises are rarely good business decisions. Nobody makes money through sports, they do it because they love it. You can only make a profit off a team if you're a nationally recognized brand like the Packers, Yankees, or Celtics. Plus, out of the top 5 sports (Football, baseball, basketball, Nascar, and hockey), hockey is the 5th most popular. Especially without a parking structure to generate revenue, I kind of doubt that merchandising is going to result in enough cash to cover whatever budgetary gap we'd eventually face.

Investing in a minor league hockey team is a guaranteed way to throw away money. While it looks like a good idea in the short term it would only harm the team and actually do no amount of good for the city and could/probably would result in higher taxes. In short, horrible idea, presented by a horrible columnist. And I'll leave you with one more quote that kind of sums up this whole column.

We need detail people.

No shit Sherlock.

Come on man, everyone's doing it

2009-03-17T14:35:00.000-07:00

Step aside bank robbing, volunteering is the new trend! Who knew Ann Johnston was psychic?

Quick Links for St. Patrick's Day with a bonus Top 5!

2009-03-17T14:19:00.000-07:00

Happy St. Patrick's Day, Quick Links time.

Because if there's one thing we need on TV, it's more reality shows

Hey, you know what we need? A really boring sports-related reality show. Out of the 3 major sports, which is the lowest rated? Basketball? Ok, that's not boring enough. What if we made it women's basketball? The WNBA's ratings have steadily declined every year it's been in existence. That's a perfect boring reality show! But wait, that Candace Parker might actually be the Jordan with (c-cup) tits that the WNBA has needed for years. We can't take the chance that this show could be good. What about women's college basketball? Wait, their skill level is too high. Somebody might actually be entertained. What's a level of competition that noone outside scouts and parents care about? I got it! High school women's basketball! And better yet, we'll make it a sheltered private school so the smallest percentage of Americans can identify with these girls!

Yeah, if you couldn't tell, we think this is the worstest idea ever presented of all time...ever! It's so bad that, even before he'd read it, I asked Bris for his worst idea for a reality show and his response was "Knight School" but for women's basketball. Which is sadly way too close to reality. While we understand this series is probably destined for Lifetime, if anywhere, and is in no way anywhere near our demographic (which is funny since we're basketball die hards), I still decided to get the brain trust together for a mini top 5.

Top 5 things we'd rather watch than Nationally Ranked

El Duke: I'd rather watch a full season of America's Next Top Granny Porn Star than this shit.

Bris Isaak: I'd rather watch Lori Gilbert go down on her life partner.

Slick: I'd rather watch a locally-based version of The Hills, presumably called "The Foothills".

El Duke: I'd rather watch a remake of The Godfather staring Dane Cook as Don Corleone.

Slick: I'd rather sit through an entire Jonas Brothers concert.

Although, to be fair, Bris noted he is interested in seeing how St. Mary's coach Tom Gonsalves justifies implementing a full court press when his team is up by double digits.

Talk about last second...

Buried beneath the second page of Don Blount's review of "I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change" (isn't relationship humor hilarious? And yes, this is the return of shit Don Blount saw), is actual news. Thanks Record redesign! KRS-One is coming to Stockton....tomorrow. Yes, in a turnaround that would make E-40 jealous, the show was just announced today and takes place at 9 p.m. tomorrow. This is kind of a big deal considering The Blastmaster is one of hip hop legends and he changed the face of battle rapping as we know it. Not to mention he's one of the few socially conscious rappers left. What? Did you forget that rap can have a message? Either way, this show is going to kick ass.

Going back to the well

Lori Gilbert took a break from writing about her favorite subject to write about the state journalism last week, this week she's back inside her wheelhouse. Although this time her subject is slightly younger than her average subjects, she's only 50. Unfortunately that subject is a fucking doll. Lori reveals her painfully lonely childhood (and considering she kept them and felt the need to bring them to the newsroom, adulthood as well) of playing with dolls. It's typical boring Lori Gilbert bullshit. And I can't believe I read the whole thing.

Ok, that's it for today. I can't believe I haven't had a drink yet today. Fucking work.

Quick Links for March 16th

2009-03-16T13:22:00.000-07:00

Note to self: always save periodically. I fucking hate this computer sometimes. Here's Quick Links take 2.

I wonder if they paid by check

Sad news out of Stockton today, Jim Rachels is no longer the primary owner of the Stockton Thunder. He announced the sale of controlling interest of the team to a group based out of Livermore. Unlike with the pending sales of the Thunder and Lightening, there is a chance that the Cougars could move. And very much like those same teams, noone cares. How little to people care? The Cougars won the title of whatever league they're in now and the story didn't even hit the Record's website until, if I'm reading the timestamp correctly, about 20 mins ago.

Rachels earned a place in our hearts as our favorite local team owner after alienating his target fan base a few years back. So we're kind of sad to see him go. Maybe he can come back with an NBADL team and talk about how he wants to make sure the Arena starts serving watermelon and grape drink.

St. Patrick is rolling in his grave

This year's downtown St. Patrick's Day festival fucking blew. It was realllllly disappointing, and not just because we missed an opportunity to drink Christian Burkin under the table. For one, beers in the fenced off outdoor portion of the festivities were fucking $5. That was after you paid $5 just for the privilege to drink in their little fenced off area with a band nearby. And on top of that you still had to pay for the corned beef sandwich. In other words, they took a relatively inexpensive event and turned it into a blatant cash grab. So instead of allowing everybody to watch our wallets get raped in full view of the public in Janet Leigh Plaza, we hoofed it to Bradley's which had no cover, cheaper beer, and a similarly priced corned beef sandwich. So yeah, El Duke apologizes for suggesting Beach Hut over Bradley's. Bradley's was the obvious way to go. Way to fuck up a decent event Downtown Alliance.

All dog's balls go to heaven

I really have nothing to add to this, I just really wanted to use this headline.

Well, it's official. The Harry Potter trend is dead

Sure, the final book was released a while ago, but if there's ever a sign of a trend-apocalypse it's when old white people think something's cool. This is doubly true when it involves politicians. Unless of course that politician is Barry Obama. Then it adds another 5 years of relevancy. So just remember, when the government thinks something is cool, it's usually a sign that that thing is about to die a slow, painful death...oh fuck.

Shit to do for the weekend of 3/13-3/15

2009-03-13T17:30:00.000-07:00

Welcome to a semi-extended St. Patrick's Day version of the shit to do post. Sorry there wasn't one last week, I was still recovering from that devastating punch I took from a midget. To make it up to you, I won't phone it in this week like I'd been doing the past couple weeks.

Sexy Friday the 13th

Didn't we just have one of these scary Sexy Fridays? Fucking February. Well, as the bad ass flyer above says, Mr. Plow (that's their name. Their name again, is Mr. Plow), The Atom Age, and 9:00 News are playing the Blackwater tonight at 8. That flyer's pretty dark for a bunch of dudes from Canadia. I didn't know America's hat had a darkside, you know, besides Quebec. $7

Also Tracy's Megan Slankard plays an apparently free show at the Janet Leigh Plaza downtown tonight at 7 as part of the Downtown Alliance's Evenings on the Plaza series. I've heard she's pretty good. Of course, slap a guitar on any hot chick and everybody's perception of "pretty good" gets distorted a bit. Free?

Saturday 3/14 (AKA Pi Day)

For non-math nerds this weekend means one thing, st. Patrick's Day pre-gaming. A lot of bars hedge their bets and celebrate our greatest holiday the Saturday before if the 17th happens to land on a weekday as it does this year. Of course people who dismiss St. Patty's day for something as trivial as work are pussies, but it also means extended drink specials so I'm not going to look a gifthorse in the mouth. For those who may be disappointed that they can't afford to down as many green beers and Irish car bombs as they would like in today's economy, I'd like to direct you towards our feature story on recession drinking for some helpful tips. Our guide to Thanksgiving Eve drinking also mostly applies here minus the high school reunion part. Unless, of course, you're drinking in Lodi. Which is like drinking in one, long, neverending high school reunion.

As far as where to drink, downtown's a good bet. Bradley's is doing their yearly party thing this weekend which means lots of green beer and disgustingly good Irish cuisine. Buy your beer at Beach Hut Deli though, I'm pretty sure it was cheaper their last year.

Keeping with the Irish motif, Finnegan's and their ridiculously awesome drink specials might be the best deal in town. $1 green beer, $4 pints of Guiness, fucking $3 Irish Car Bombs, amd $3 Black and Tans. Read that again. The artist formerly known as Flynn's is really stepping their game up. Plus, if I'm reading their MySpace correctly, those drink specials apply on both Saturday and Tuesday. Show up early to avoid a cover though.

And it wouldn't be a drinking holiday without the suggestion that you check out downtown Lodi. Stooges usually has the cheapest drinks regardless of the time of year and is in a nice central location in relation to Ollie's, Lodi Beer Co., Stogies, and Gary's Lounge making downtown Lodi the ideal place for bar hopping.

But if you must stay sober, you can check out the Blackwater at 8 and see Reggie Ginn, Gardening Not Archecture, John Vecchiarelli, and Chelsea Wolfe. $5

Sunday 3/15

Pop two asprin, downbottle of Pepto, turn on TV, fill out bracket accordingly.

Quick Links for March 13th

2009-03-13T15:16:00.000-07:00

Oh hey, it's Sexy Friday. Fucking sweet. Let's knock out some Quick Links to help you get through the home stretch before the weekend. And apologies for this being so late, my internet connection took a shit.

This maverick renegade is so good that the arena will only be empty two-thirds of the time!

After spotting him the rest of 2008 as a lost cause, Fitzy checks in with IFG's Stockton rep Stephen Grossman (presumably not related to Sexy Rexy) today. The verdict? Jack shit. He wants 10 events/concerts in 2009. We're about a quarter of the way in, how many concerts/events have there been? What's that? Oh yeah, GIANT FUCKING GOOSE EGG. Good to see that strategy Grossman was talking about was to call promoters over and over again as if he were Mickey in Swingers. ("Oh hey, LiveNation? This is Stockton again. It's been 12 minutes and you haven't called back. Just wanted to make sure you got my message. Can we have Santana yet? Call me back!")

Oh and Fitzy, we hate to repeat ourselves but, the reason the public thinks redevelopment was wasted was because of the money that went to your pals at Paragary's and the money that went to the Sheraton. What was it we said yesterday? Something about subsidizing a playground for the wealthy in a town where the average resident is well, not wealthy. Again, that's where all the hostility from. We're not stupid, we know the Arena's not going to be a big money maker. It can't even sell off it's naming rights for fuck's sake. It's there so people will come downtown for sporting events the hopefully go see a movie. So when bitching about the Arena, it's foot traffic that's important. Not dollars and cents.

Our only anti-drug PSA

Regular readers are probably aware of our casual attitude towards most drugs. We say "most" because there's one drug that not even we will touch, and that drug is fucking meth. Lately, meth's been a factor in the Paradiso case, the Flag City shooting, and now that crazy dude who tried to run down the cops. And that's just off the top of my head. We're still trying to find the positive in doing meth. Weed mellows you out. Alcohol makes you love everybody (it's not uncommon for the phrase "I'd take a bullet for you man!" to be thrown around like a crowd surfing midget when the RTT crew goes on a bender). Hell, even shrooms and acid makes you see funky shit. What does meth do? Kills your teeth, keeps you awake for a week, and ages you 10 years in 10 minutes. And then you still gotta come down. The "Meth made me crazy" defense needs to be retired because you've got to be fucking crazy to try that shit in the first place. Shit like meth makes me miss the days when the a WTF murder was something like "Drunk guy hits guy in head with rock after he welches on a pool bet." (Have we mentioned how much we miss Jack's Back lately?)

If a team leaves and nobody notices, was it ever really there?

We're linking to this for 2 reasons. One, the opening lines are a laugh riot. The Thunder are not in any way, shape, or form a part of the essential fabric of this city. They haven't even been here for half a fucking decade yet. Worst case scenario if they leave? We have a bunch more available Arena dates open for IFG to ignore and an easy way to tell who all the rubes in the city are. They're the ones wearing Thunder gear. History doesn't happen overnight. We're not just going to magically wake up one day and bleed...err what are the Thunder's team colors again? I'm pretty sure one of them is pink.

See, in-fucking-difference. That's what would happen if the Thunder left. 300,000 people would shrug their shoulders and move on. Then we would point and laugh at the 6,000 people who actually thought going to minor league hockey meant they were a part of something.

And second, this editorial also clears up that whole "which contract are we talking about" debate from the other day. We were right, Fitzy was wrong. We'd be happier if that didn't happen on a regular basis.

Speaking of indifference...

This probably isn't good news for the Record. Of course Gawker was stupid and assumed newspaper editors/publishers use conventional wisdom. Judging from what we've seen here they don't know the meaning of either wisdom or conventional. But hey, they do see a lot of shit!

There's the elitist Mike Fitzgerald that we all know and love

2009-03-12T13:24:00.000-07:00

Sometime last year (around election time to be specific) Fitzy recognized that his blatant fellating of downtown redevelopment had caused a rift between him and the average Stocktonian. Most Stocktonians are disenfranchised with the redevelopment that Fitz has been unabashedly supporting so he went about rehabbing his image. He positioned himself as a champion of the working man by calling out city employees for having paychecks larger than that of the average Stockton resident (ignoring the size of, say, his own paycheck) and for the sweetness of their retirement packages (not to mention his attack on the lifegiver). He even finally admitted that the previous councils who got us into this redeveloped mess were "reckless", 2 years after he compared those same councils favorably to a smash mouth football team. Of course he couldn't completely remove himself from downtown campaigning and tried to bring Paragary's along for the ride with hilarious results.

Well, after all that work we seem to have come full circle. Now the reason downtown redevelopment is lagging is because we're bitter, resentful dicks who can't possibly understand something as complicated as subsidies! If we only gave Paragary's a shot we'd realize that it's not that bad of a place (we did, and it is that bad of a place) and that the city had to let them stay there rent free after we took care of building renovations for them. Shit's too expensive downtown! But apparently not too expensive that we can't afford to give away land to a big hotel chain for $1.

Of course, Fitzy's also ignoring the real knock against Paragary's that has nothing to do with government subsidies. Their food tastes like shit. They could be paying the city $100,000 a day in rent and it wouldn't change the fact that you have to pay $10 for a burger that tastes like it was flame broiled in my taint.

And in the end, that's why redevelopment is stalled. It has little to do with the subsidy holdouts because, as Fitzy notes in the comments of his blog post, pretty much anywhere in Stockton has private businesses that benefited from government subsidies (he fails to deny that he basically called us all retards though). The reason downtown is such a "lightening rod for resentment" is because they subsidized the wrong businesses. They subsidized a stuffy restaurant with expensive, bland-tasting food. They sold land that apparently is so expensive it needs to be subsidized for a dollar and then still gave the Sheraton a subsidy on top of all that. The result? An expensive hotel that hosts parties for the city's rich movers and shakers. It has nothing to do with the subsidies and everything to do with what they went towards, a giant playground for the wealthy in a town where the average resident is decidedly not wealthy.