Speed Gibson

I note with sadness and respect the passing of actor Glenn Ford. He is in that fast disappearing class of real men in Hollywood. He could be tough as nails as in the original "Ransom!" or that wonderful father in "Superman" who knew his adopted son was here for a reason. Who's reason, what it was he didn't know, but in a memorable line for me anyway he says, "But I do know one thing: it's not to score touchdowns."

"Casablanca" was on the other day, and I had to watch the ending once again. As lovely as Ingrid Bergman is, it's all about Bogie, a man's man, plain spoken, mostly polite, minds his own business, but not afraid to act boldly when the situation finally calls for it. He's even willing to re-assess that situation when Victor Laszlo gently challenges his assumptions.

There are a few exceptions I suppose, like Robert DeNiro and Russell Crowe. And maybe it has more to do with the scripts. But by and large, the Hollywood leading men of today play wimps on the screen.

Who's replacing Glenn Ford? John Wayne? Robert Mitchum? Kirk Douglas? Charleton Heston? Gary Cooper? Burt Lancaster? Jimmy Stewart? Henry Fonda? And my personal favorite, William Holden?

Until someone does, their movies will live on to remind us of times that were somehow, grit and all, more civilized than today.

It sounds better than it usually is, the idea of broadcasting from the Minnesota State Fair. Once a challenging technical task, technology has made it easy and affordable, even for television.

Joe Soucheray claims to plan his State Fair shows for months ahead of time and I'll take him at his word. The level of discourse is lowered, pushed aside really, in favor of a magazine show. It's probably what I'd do, too, just for the live audience's sake. But listening is another matter.

That Hugh Hewitt, Dennis Prager, Bill Bennett, and Michael Medved are all visiting is great, but they largely do their shows indoors. (Maybe that's changed this year, but it was true in the past.)

The Northern Alliance seems the exception, a show that really adapts well, given their range and types of personalities.

But even that makes me wish for the end of the Fair, Labor Day, the start of school, jacket weather, NFL Football, and that most blessed of months IMO, September.

It's been a long hot summer. The weather weenies on our local TV stations have forecasted 22 of the last 3 rain storms to pass through the area. Anything that might produce rain showed up as a crawl when it got within 300 miles of the Twin Cities.

So now comes a nice, summer thunderstorm. Yes, it was more violent near Faribault, well out of range of the Shoreview antenna farm, but nothing at all threatening here. It rained, with some thunder and lightning. They claimed one inch hail in Fridley, two miles east of our house. We saw nothing, just a nice rain.

But all that expensive equipment (including a famous toupee) was going to be put to use, damn it. Tornado season is just about over. This could be their last chance. A crawl won't do. Network programming must cease as they repeat the same three minutes of information twenty times to fill an entire hour. They will control the horizontal. They will control the vertical. And if we had a lick of sense, we should be cowering in our basements just in case like they recommend.

I know this because when we returned from a meeting, we found all this instead of Big Brother on the DVR. But I'm guessing that channels 5 and 11 did pretty much the same.

Of course, when the ratings giant CSI comes on, well, OK, I guess the threat's over - oh but come back at 10 pm and we'll repeat it a few more times.

I switched to the cable weather channel. It said it was raining. Absolutely correct.

We'll live. We'll DVR the rebroadcast of Big Brother at 12:50 am. That's not the point.

The point is, as I've said before, this nonsense is going to eventually kill people, not save them. By constantly crying wolf, we have learned to ignore this self-serving hyperbole.

Remember last summer's storm that took out tens of thousands of trees, and had power out nearly a week in some areas? There was one fatality, a freak accident of a falling tree limb hitting a man after the storm had largely passed.

Dave Dahl, on Joe Soucheray's show at 4:30 pm didn't see it coming just a few minutes later. That's not his fault really. These more violent storms often develop quickly as did this one. All that fancy radar was useless that night. The damage was done before they could even get on the air, and the power was out for many to even view it by then.

But even if they could have seen it coming, who would have believed them to the point of changing their plans and seeking shelter?

Forgive me if I sound like Bill O'Reilly or Tim Pawlenty. I'm about at the point where I honestly think the Legislature or the FCC needs to look into this. This time, I am as mad as hell.

Target Corporation was named one of the top ten advertisers by the Parents Television Council, based in Los Angeles. I thought at first they were talking about the quality of their ads. It turned out the group was merely complaining about the programs they ran those awful ads on.

They're too violent, they said, naming shows like "Law and Order" and "Desperate Housewives." But Target's TV ads themelves aren't exactly top notch viewing, either.

Target airs some of the most chaotic, silly, pointless commercials I've ever seen. They are on a par with Burger King who brought you Herb and a Burger King himself that makes you motion your kids to get indoors.

Rush is off golfing again, and for the first time I believe, Mark Steyn will be guest hosting, on Thursday.

Friday will feature Dr. Walter E. Williams, hopefully including more of his advice on how to keep your wife in line.

Despite the sincere opinions held and reasoned arguments offered by many people that I truly respect, I am done with Governor Tim Pawlenty. I will be voting for Sue Jeffers in the September primary.

I'm not expecting an upset. I expect Pawlenty to win, maybe even win big. But I hope and feel that Jeffers' numbers will be surprisingly large.

You know the issues, among them being light rail, tax increases, stadiums, ethanol, and The Racino. He summed it up neatly in his recent infamous quote: "The era of small government is over."

In that same interview, Mr. Pawlenty tried to weave these deviations and flip-flops into a tapestry of a coherent philosophy. If his mission is that of a principled reformer as he claims, it is a rather personal one, on issues he feels justified in substituting his opinion for the collective wisdom and experience of his many supporters. But the simplest explanation is usually the best explanation.

"This is intensely practical, vote-driven behavior." — Peter Hutchinson, Independence Party candidate for Governor.

"It's difficult for me to believe that each of these policies has come out of a deep-seated and well-thought-out concern for issues and long substantive analysis of solutions." — David Strom, President, Taxpayers League of Minnesota

I'm not saying that elected officials can't change their minds or chart new territory beyond their campaign promises. But not only does Pawlenty do this on an unprecedented scale, he adds some subtle but noticeable sneering for those of us who object. We are just not capable of understanding his, well, his "Vision of the Annointed."

I'm not mad as hell, but I'm not going to take it anymore.

I was just at Byerly's in Maple Grove, and I'm worried. It seems to be devolving into a "Cub Greatland" like Cub's latest store in Brooklyn Park, Highway 610 and Zane.

The homemade, legendary pies are gone, replaced by a reduced selection made at a central commissary. The whole bakery operation has shrunk by half. They're down to just a single aisle of breads and rolls, with some types scattered to other locations like the deli.

The once challenging soups like the roasted roma tomato served for lunch by the salad bar seem to be disappearing in favor of dumbed down selections like broccoli cheese and baked potato. Even the classic Byerly's Wild Rice Soup is now billed as a Lund's classic.

The deli is about the same, but the inventory of related carryout items seems to have gone down. The take home soups appear to be a third party brand now, not to be confused with the freshly made.

There appears to be a new focus on organic products in produce, which is good. In the product aisles, however, house brands, not even well-packaged house brands, are appearing everywhere. Additional "impulse" racks have appeared, blocking the aisle signage.

Finally, they have installed self-checkout lanes, which make no sense to me at all at an upscale grocer. They seem largely unused for that very reason.

Byerly's / Lunds is still a much nicer store than Cub and the rest. But I fear they're ultimately going to try to sell us Cub goods at Byerly's prices, and that demands more than carpeting.

The Northern Alliance Radio Network continues to expand, adding a third segment from 3 pm to 5 pm Saturdays on The Patriot (AM 1280). King Banaian of SCSU Scholars hangs out his own shingle, ably assisted by Michael Brodkorb, famed exposer of Minnesota Democrats (MDE).

I think this is great for a number of reasons. One, I like King, a personable, engaging fellow who doesn't let his titles and degrees get in the way. Two, there's no time conflict with Taxpayers League Live on KTLK from noon to 2 pm, so I can use my Pogo to record it. Three, there's no more Savage Nation after the NARN. Most of all, it promises to focus on two subjects not covered by the previous four hours: economics and local politics.

If I ran the world (you would be foolish to offer me the position), economics would be required in high school. Not the usual comparative study of capitalism, socialism, communism, etc., but how this country works. There are personal, political, social, and of course, financial dimensions to this, and all are important.

Without economics, how does one truly understand issues like stadiums and mass transit? These are all trade-off's, the proverbial "allocation of limited resources" that economics is all about.

That's the steak. Now add the sizzle of local politics, and who better than MDE? Republicans have their moments and people like Governor Pawlenty, but Democrats are where all the fun is. When something goes wrong, Republicans wince, but Democrats get even, one way being a tip to MDE.

It will take a few shows for the boys to get the format right and the kinks out. Indeed, their first show while good, did seem a little cautious. A couple of the returns from a break reminded me of the Tom Daschle! show occasionally heard on the EIB. But the subjects like the Minnesota economy "on fire" (fuego?) and the "junkyard dog" candidate for Governor were interesting and on point.

Someday, the NARN will expand to take over the weekend. I'm penciling in the 3-5 am slot Sunday morning for High Adventure with Speed Gibson. But meanwile, congratulations King and Michael!

A week ago Monday night I tuned into KTLK at 5 pm, and soon heard the "Welcome Back, Kotter" song. Cute, I thought, and then came the "Blazing Saddles" theme. Oh, did that ever sound so good. I could feel tears welling up just thinking of my then young son singing that theme from all the rides in the car with dad.

I see some bloggers wish he had three hours like before. I don't. I think two hours is the optimum length for talk radio programs. Only the very talented or very well-staffed should attempt third hours, like Rush Limbaugh.

I see some don't like FM. I do. It penetrates building steel, so I can listen at work or most anywhere.

I do find this odd 10 - 9 - 9 - 6 - 4 - 1 six segment format a big odd. But on with the show. Here are my observations.

• I soon remembered what I had forgotten. Lewis is right on the overall points, but often gets the underlying details a little mixed up. One should be a little careful about quoting him without confirmation.


• He's been speaking pretty generally so far, a wise decision while he reacquaints himself with the political and other social landscapes. He'll need some time to get caught up and research the current players. But I'll bet he'll be up to full speed shortly after the September primary.


• Jason Lewis is a gifted talker. He may have just got me to vote for Governor Pawlenty again. He makes a good case that Pawlenty, flaws and all, would still be a much better governor than the rest. But he also understands people like me and gives Mr. Pawlenty plenty of grief on his foolish proposals, most lifted from DFL talking points.


• So far, Jason has had his pick of quality callers and handled them well on the radio. He's in control.

I think it's great that he's back. Hugh I'll catch up with on Townhall.

The benefits of educational choice remains beyond the intellect, dare I say beyond the honesty of the Minneapolis Star Tribune editorial writers.

Although voters widely oppose them and research shows mixed results, school voucher advocates won't let the concept go. Even studies that prove family income and stability have the greatest affect on learning don't deter them. (That's effect, not affect.)

First, where is this wide opposition in the polls? Whose polls? Even a poll showing, say, 30% want educational choice via vouchers, that's a huge number showing significant dissatisfaction with the government-run public school monopoly.

Second, look where vouchers have been adopted. They are very popular among the people that need them most, those trapped in poor public schools. They rise in opposition to the lawsuits that try to remove them. Scholarship programs, another alternative, have application lines stretching out several blocks.

Most important, where have they not worked? All private schools, with a few exceptions, beat all public schools, with a few exceptions, in our own state-wide testing. This canard about family stability and income being the real underlying factor ignores the fact that private education is simply not an option for most of us.

Another canard is that this will waste tax money. This is complete rubbish, given the wide gap in the cost of public vs private education. Yes, there are some pricey private schools, but most run several thousand dollars less per student. A voucher for, say, 70% of the public school outlay would save taxpayers money. Ironically, the public schools would get the other 30%, to do nothing. Their fixed costs are typically less than 20%, so if anything, their financial situation should improve.

Their solution? Basically to work to eliminate poverty, to where (as labor leader George Meany once vowed) everyone makes more than an average income. Even if we could, this would take a generation, consigning the current generation to another round of failure.

Sometimes there is no way to truly know until you try. I was skeptical as can be about Dick Day's six week hiatus from the freeway ramp meters. I thought it was going to be really messy. The result was just the opposite, the reality proving to be that those meters were actually causing much of the congestion.

So how about giving some of those inner city kids a break? Let's try it. They might surprise you.

When I first read this morning's Editorial about the Connecticut Senate Primary in the Minneapolis Star Tribune, I had a strange reaction. "Not that it matters," I asked myself, "but was what I just read unintelligent or unintelligible?"

Was it a win for the left and "the old politics of partisan polarization," as Sen. Joe Lieberman alliteratively asserted Tuesday night, or was Ned Lamont's primary victory a win for wrathful moderates who are tired of Lieberman's brand of bipartisanship?

Right from the start, this is fantasy. This was an election by and for Democrats. Wrathful moderates? Moderates? If this was a referendum on anything, it was whether moderates would survive, let alone vote in this party. Could even a long-time incumbent and Vice Presidential candidate be allowed to differ on just one issue? Or have Howard Dean and Michael Moore undone the years of work by the Democratic Leadership Council, formed to pull the Democratic Party back from the far left, unelectable world of George McGovern and his ilk?

Indeed, [a new Washington Post-ABC poll] suggests that opposition to the war in Iraq was a big factor -- and anything but a left-wing phenomenon.

How could it not be a left-wing phenomenon? The whole party is left-wing, just as the Republicans are right-wing. Let's assume they meant the far left, as in Michael Moore, Howard Dean, and yes, Ned Lamont. The margin of victory was about 3 percent points as I recall. Ned Lamont certainly got the vast majority of the far left, now a sizable force in the Democratic party. Do the math and you realize that most of the moderates, i.e., the not-so-far left in fact voted for Lieberman.

Lieberman could win in November running independently, if enough Republicans and unaffiliated voters still favor his approach.

The smart money is already on Lieberman, in fact. But what's this "his approach" swipe all about? And the earlier swipe at "his brand of bipartisanship"? On most issues, Lieberman is no moderate. He's a liberal, but one who also happens to be strong on national security, which the Barzini's in his party equate to supporting President Bush.


"When, when did I ever refuse an accommodation? All of you know me here. When did I ever refuse, except one time?"

"Times have changed. It's not like the old days when we could do anything we want. You must let us draw the water from the well. Certainly, you can present a bill for such services. After all, we are not Communists..."

Ronald Reagan, raised a Democrat, was fond of saying "I didn't leave the party, the party left me." Rebuffed in the primary, Senator Joseph Lieberman is not going to switch parties, but his party has left him anyway, essentially over a single issue. The issue? The war on terror? National defense? No, it's really his refusal to take up his pitchfork against President Bush. So now Lieberman has filed as an independent, with excellent chances to win the general election.

I compare this to what happened to Republican Senator Bob Packwood of Oregon. Ann Coulter's Slander recounts his history and trouble, describing how the Left turned on him once they no longer needed his "moderate" votes on their issues. His personal shortcomings and scandals were well-known for years, but largely ignored while the Left pandered to him.

The Republicans have had their moments, too, like the very conservative Michelle Bachman's outster of the rather liberal Gary Laidig, a 28 year incumbent. But this was a fair fight, and the voters decided it. It wasn't at the level shown in the recent St. Paul Mayoral race, or by the Ned Lamont campaign for that matter.

This is spilling over into our local politics; again I cite the single issue victory of Coleman over Kelly in St. Paul, that issue being hatred of George W. Bush. In the DFL primary, endorsed candidate Keith Ellison owns the Bush-hatred issue. He is also very liberal on most other issues. But moderation is no longer valued in the DFL, so I think his challengers are trying to be even more hard-left on specific issues like the environment (Erlandson) and health care (Reichgott-Junge).

I don't have an answer or a cure. I just wish we could get back to rational debates on real issues, not mere races to the left or right.

Our Hiawatha Light Rail line has "experienced" three fatalities since it opened just over two years ago. The victims were all at fault, all basically trying to sneak across the tracks despite the safety signals and procedures.

But this was also predicted, based on data from other cities. The problem is that these trains are running at street level, through intersections, sometimes at 50 mph or better. Drivers and non-drivers get frustrated with the 3-4 minute cycles at some of these intersections. They take chances, and a few lose.

What's going to happen if we do achieve this dream of LRT everywhere? How many accidents and fatalities can we expect then? Certainly many more, and yet we apparently will keep building them this way because we can't afford to build an elevated system or subway. It's almost like these deaths themselves are being budgeted.

I don't want to sound like Wayne LaPierre, who shamelessly accused the Clinton administration of "willing to accept a certain level of killing" regarding their enforcement of gun laws. But the facts are that Light Rail is making no dent in traffic congestion; it may be adding to it. It is also losing money, a lot many of us think.

Maybe before we expand the risk of death by the next LRT line, our leaders should tell us again why these lines are so vital.

There's another report out about Minnesota high school graduates needing remedial education in college. The problem seems to be getting worse. The problem seems clear enough: serious and increasing diploma fraud in our public schools. Consider:

Paul Carney, an English instructor at Minnesota State Community and Technical College in Fergus Falls, had college and high school teachers read the same student essays and judge whether they were college-ready. In some cases, five of the six high school teachers viewed an essay as college-ready when none of the college instructors did.

When they sat down to talk about it, Carney said, he found high school teachers focused mainly on the minimal skills to get teens to pass the state basic-skills writing test, a 10th-grade exam that requires only the ability to write a few paragraphs with a beginning, middle and end.

I heard a similar high school teacher response on the radio, that they were being "forced" to teach to the required state tests, rather than to what the students "need" in college.

It says a lot to me that these educators don't seem to realize that such statements really constitute a confession, not an excuse.

Jason Lewis returns to the air tonight. I can hardly wait.

Plus, he is on FM, meaning I can get the broadcast inside my largely AM-proof building where I work. My Pogo recorder is standing by as well, set to record him every night.

With apologies to Michael Medved and the Nihilist, I feel the urge to review (vent) about some recent movies I've seen.

Superman Returns (at the movies) was good, quite a bit better than I was led to believe. The charge that it was slow was baseless in my opinion. Brandon Routh did well, maybe not quite the Superman of Christopher Reeve, but maybe the better Clark Kent.

I did have a problem with some of the other casting, mostly Kate Bosworth who is simply too young (23) for the part. Routh is a mere 27, but acts his way to a believable 32 or so. The Jimmy Olsen character (Sam Huntington) is a dork, and the talented Frank Langella is simply miscast as Perry White. James Marsden (Richard White) and Kevin Spacey (Lex Luthor) were very good in their roles, however.

The movie had some adult moments and situations, even if the too-young Lois could be more convincing. All in all, 3 stars out of 4 for me.

The Producers (DVD) was bad, too much so for Nathan Lane to save. He was as good as he could be expected to be, hamstrung by the musical format that just doesn't work for this show. In the original, everything leads up to the opening "Springtime for Hitler" number. Here, it is perhaps the seventh or eighth such number, losing impact.

Uma Thurman certainly brightened the screen, but the rest of the cast was uninspired. Dick Shawn's memorable "Lorenzo St. DuBois" (L.S.D. - "That's our Hitler!") from the original haunts this inadequate production. Matthew Broderick, however, was absolutely horrible. I give it 2 stars out of 4.

War of the Worlds (HBO) was ugly. Tom Cruise seemed to be channeling John Travolta more than acting. The script was an alien mutation of H.G. Wells, Orson Welles, and Dr. Clayton Forrester put together, mostly aimed at showing off Mr. Cruise's teeth.

This has to be Steven Spielberg's worst movie ever. The script was bad, the casting was bad, the special effects were poor by today's standards, and even the musical score was bad. I give this 1/2 star out of four.

If you get a chance, listen to the 1939 Mercury Theatre broadcast that panicked the nation ten years before television. Imagine a radio audience hearing how the tall Martian machines were crossing the Hudson river into New York City like a man wading a brook, and that more cylinders were dropping everywhere around the world. This movie, even with all the tools of modern movie production generated none of that suspense and terror.

Remember the early days of the FOX network: The Simpsons and everything else. Then they landed the NFL.

Now, KSTP-AM has Joe Soucheray and everyone else. The morning show is unlistenable. Bob Davis is unheard, wasting away in the 9-12 morning slot. Ron and Mark - dead air. After Soucheray? Mischke, a talented guy stuck in the wrong time slot. Dave Thompson beats Michael Savage, but is all steak, no sizzle. Ah, but there is the Bob Davis replay at 10pm.

So now, KSTP-AM has landed the Twins, which will give Soucheray many Thursdays off. Is it enough to reverse the slide from Limbaugh and Lewis to Clark and Rosenbaum? It doesn't seem likely.

What does seem likely is that the Twins broadcasts will be even more commercial heavy to pay off that big contract. Even now, there's an extra "Hey Twins fans" 10 second spot every out or so, and they come back late (2 pitches already in the mitt) from the breaks between innings.

Meanwhile, at KTLK-FM they have my new favorite morning show, Rush live at 11 am, and Jason Lewis returning, saddle blazing at 5 pm. It's only going to get better.

It's truly a shame, that the once daring and mighty KSTP-AM that made talk radio work in this town (with Limbaugh's help) forgot who their customers are. As they themselves now proclaim, they are "The Twins Station" not "The Talk Station".

August 1 began the 19th year of the Excellence In Broadcasting network - Rush Limbaugh. It also is the start of Dennis Prager's 25th year in radio. By coincidence, they are competitors in the 11 am - 2 pm slot, and they're both very good at what they do.

As Prager noted, you have to be interesting to make it this far in radio, and that usually requires a bit of intellect, too. TV is a different story, as shows like Jerry Springer demonstrate.

I'll go further to note Bill O'Reilly's radio show also starts at 11 am (for two hours only). That's quite a choice, between Rush (KTLK-FM), Dennis (Patriot I), and Bill (Patriot II). Poor KSTP-AM has to sit this one out.

If you haven't checked out the audio side of the new Townhall.com, do so. I haven't been able to get their podcast to work in iTunes yet, but they've got playable archives going for most of their hosts.

I used to subscribe to Dennis Prager's site until Salem made him pull the plug. I've been listening via my Pogo recorder instead since then, but now this site has won me over. The only drawback is that you have to use their primitive player window, so I can't use my fancy one that plays back at 1.5x speed. Still, it's workable as I no longer have the time to listen to all three hours. I listen to the first segment, then decide whether to continue or skip to the next hour. Prager and others also have specific clips, which is great for Bill Bennett, whose show is otherwise a pretty thin soup.

I've only got about 4 days to get my schedule under control, for when Jason Lewis returns. After about three months of Joe Soucheray via Pogo, I gave up on him. Just too little content, too much schmalz with the Rookie, so now I have room for Lewis.

So now that leaves my regulars of Rush Limbaugh, Laura Ingraham, Bill O'Reilly, and Jason Lewis via Pogo, of course. Townhall fills in the rest beautifully, including the Northern Alliance.