Why 'Cars 2' Has Some Conservatives Furious

Could an animated film about cars become Big Oil's next nemesis?
In a recent interview with The Wall Street Journal, "Cars 2" director John Lasseter discussed the major overhaul to his upcoming film, a revamp that makes Big Oil the bad guys.
He told the paper:

I kept thinking about, "OK. A spy movie in the world where cars are alive. What would be a really good kind of über bad guy? Who is an über bad guy?" I kept going to big oil. This is before what happened in the Gulf of Mexico. Why isn't alternative fuel more... Why isn't everybody jumping on that bandwagon? It makes so much sense: Electricity, solar, whatever. There's ethanol. There's all this stuff you could be doing. And so I thought, well, that could be really cool in that you could have big oil versus alternative fuel. That's when we kind of crafted the bad guy's story.
The greatest bad guys, you understand where they're coming from. They believe they're doing the right thing. Sometimes it's for greed, sometimes it's for other reasons, but they are what they call the center of good. They always believe they're doing the right thing.

A "Cars 2" trailer advertises, "On their next big road trip, they're not only racing across the world, they're racing to save the world."
Some conservatives are already enraged. The Lonely Conservative blog wrote, "We conservatives and believers in free markets are accused of being paranoid when we say the Hollywood industry is trying to indoctrinate our children with left wing propaganda. But now movie directors and producers are coming out and admitting what they're doing. I'm just glad I found this out before I allowed my kids to persuade me to take them to see the movie 'Cars 2.'" Indeed. Evil films can brainwash children into caring about the environmental degradation that their generation will have to pay for.

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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/21/cars-2-big-oil-john-lasseter_n_881251.html

 

Can’t a movie just be a movie?  It is art (depending on your definition) get over it!  Let the children enjoy their movie! 

Bret Baier, Calls Out Jon Stewart

Bret Baier defended the media's coverage of the Anthony Weiner scandal in an interview with the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
The press—and, in particular, cable news—has been criticized for the amount of space it devoted to the Weiner scandal. During his appearance on Fox News, Jon Stewart called the coverage an example of the media's tendency towards "sensationalism" and "laziness."
"Do you think the coverage of Anthony Weiner scandal is an example of pack journalism?" Baier's interviewer, Patricia Sheridan, asked him.
"No," Baier said. "It was an example of the media collectively saying, 'Why won't he answer a simple question with a simple answer?' The whole thing didn't add up from the beginning. So when he became combative, evasive and vague when he first started talking about it, he MADE it a story."
Speaking of Jon Stewart, Baier said that his appearance on "The Daily Show" in March went "fine," though he added that he didn't think he was going to be talking so much about Fox News. (The two wound up arguing about whether or not the network has a political slant.)
"Clearly Jon had his point of view going in," Baier said. "...The pre-interview for that interview, the producers were telling me how he was really interested in my trip to Afghanistan ... so I said during the pre-interview, 'I'm, sure there's going to be a lot of talk about Fox News Channel.' And she said, 'Oh, yeah, yeah.' It ended up being pretty much that is all he wanted to do."

Baier also spoke with Brian Kilmeade on Monday about Stewart's contentious appearance on "Fox News Sunday." He said that Stewart tends to be disingenuous in the face of criticism. "When something goes he wrong, he punts to ‘I’m a comedian,’” he said.
Baier also talked to Men's Health about Father's Day over the weekend.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/20/bret-baier-defends-anthon_n_880551.html

Water and oil do not mix.  Fox needs to quit putting comedians on their shows and treating them as serious pundits.  Jon Stewart needs to quit inviting Fox pundits to be on his show and than treating them like comedians.  Jon; these guys drink the Kool-Aid every day.  They will not give you a break for being a comedian.  They will not let you off the hook because you are a satirist.  Stay off each others air, you’re confusing yourselves and your respective audiences!

What to Watch This Summer

When the series picks up June 26, Bill and Sookie are kaput, but "a longing still exists between them," Stephen Moyer (Bill) tells Us. Still, says creator Alan Ball, "there's no shortage of hot supernatural men around her."

Watch it this Sunday on HBO.  The new season begins this weekend!

Premiering July 24, the final season "gets back to the roots: the guys," creator Doug Ellin tells Us. Vince is in rehab, "and we'll soon find out if he's able to pull himself together."

NBC's Bachelor/Survivor hybrid is "speed dating on adrenaline," exec producer Tom Shelly says. In Costa Rica, coed teams get physical (one task: build a raft). Then partners swap.

The exec producer of ABC's new Thursday night series, Lisa Hennessy, promises "meltdowns, injuries and laugh-out-loud 'fails' as 13 three-person teams race through Morocco. P.S.: The scenery is great too!

Bristol Palin Lost Virginity While Drunk

NEW YORK (AP) -- Bristol Palin writes in her new book of losing her virginity to boyfriend Levi Johnston on a camping trip after getting drunk for the first time on too many wine coolers.
She awoke in her tent, alone, with no memories of what had happened as Johnston "talked with his friends on the other side of the canvas." She had vowed to wait until marriage. And she had lied to her parents about where she was going.
Palin, a 20-year-old single mother and the daughter of former Alaska Republican Gov. Sarah Palin, tells a story of "deception and disappointment" in the book, "Not Afraid of Life: My Journey So Far."
The memoir, co-written with Nancy French, is scheduled for publication by William Morrow this week. The Associated Press purchased a copy Friday.
Palin's book covers growing up with her family, which she portrays affectionately, and the excitement of her mother's political life as governor and then, in 2008, as the GOP vice presidential candidate. But the main theme is her on-and-off-again relationship with Johnston, with whom she had a child and was briefly engaged while caught in a media spotlight.
She blasts him as "the gnat named Levi Johnston constantly spreading false accusations against our family" and calls him a self-involved slacker "who cheated on me about as frequently as he sharpened his hockey skates."
But Palin, self-described as a good girl and straight-A student, had been drawn to him and his bad-boy manner from the time they met in seventh grade.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/20/bristol-palin-lost-virginity-levi-book_n_880242.html

Really?  You made a bad decision while you were drunk?  How many babies have been conceived I wonder; because momma was drunk and daddy was a jackass?  I think the bad decision started well before the first cap on your wine cooler was unscrewed.  Levi Johnston?  You couldn’t tell what he was about.  Your most basic gut instincts weren’t telling you to stay away from him, that he was only into you because of what he could get from you (under the covers and otherwise).  You couldn’t see that once he got everything he was after, he would discard you like a used condom.  I hope your judgment has improved.  You deserve better than this; your baby deserves better than this. 

Jon Stewart LIVE On Fox News, Tells Host 'You're Insane'

Jon Stewart entered the proverbial lion's den, appearing live on Fox News Sunday to debate "media bias" with host Chris Wallace.
Early in the interview, Wallace flashed a previous quote of Stewart's calling Fox News a "relentless agenda-driven 24 hour news opinion propaganda delivery system," and asked Stewart, "Where do you come up with this stuff?"
Stewart responded, "Uh, it's actually quite easy."
Later, when Wallace argued that a clip about Sarah Palin from the Daily Show was political commentary, Stewart told Wallace, "You're insane... Here's the difference between you and I. I'm a comedian first. My comedy is informed by an ideological background, there's no question about that. But the thing that you will never understand...is that Hollywood, yeah, they're liberal, but that's not their primary motivating force. I'm not an activist. I am a comedian."
"Do I want my voice heard?" Stewart continued later. "Absolutely, that's why I got into comedy. Am I an activist, in your mind? A partisan ideological activist?" Wallace responded, "Yeah." "Okay, then I disagree with you," Stewart said. "You can't understand, because of the world that you live in, that there is not a designed ideological agenda on my part to affect partisan change because that's the soup you swim in. And I appreciate that, I understand it. It reminds me of in ideological regimes, they can't understand that there is free media other places because they receive marching orders."
However, it was in a later exchange that Stewart got actually angry at Wallace, as he talked about what he called the misinformation that Fox News gave its viewers.
"The embarrassment is that I'm given credibility in this world because of the disappointment that the public has in what the news media does," he said.

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"I don't think our viewers are the least bit disappointed with us," Wallace said. "I think our viewers think, finally, they're getting somebody who tells the other side of the story."
"Who are the most consistently misinformed media viewers?" Stewart shot back, his voice rising. "The most consistently misinformed? Fox, Fox viewers, consistently, every poll."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/19/jon-stewart-fox-news-sunday-video_n_879964.html

If only the news organizations could figure out that comedians and political satirists are just that; comedians and political satirists.  Comedians can in some small ways effect change, public opinions and points of view, but they can never be our source for news and accurate information.  That’s the problem with Fox and the others.  They take people like Jon Stewart, Bill Maher and the others way too seriously.  They are afraid of them because through their comedy and satire these satirists point out the flaws, inconsistancies and outright misrepresentations that so-called legitimate news organizations serve up.  Where is the integrity and professionalism?  What was Chris Wallace doing when he decided to invite Jon Stewart to be on his show?  The simple fact that Wallace thought Stewart was a worthwhile and important guest shows just how out-of-touch Fox is.  Why would you legitimize a comedic satirist?  Fox; you are so deep in your own bulls**t you don’t know what the real issues are.  Someone should have stopped you from inviting Stewart; someone should have told you that he was better on late night talk shows than sitting across the desk form a legitimate newscaster. I do truly believe that you Mr. Wallace really are insane.

More than 400 people bared it all for the record books.

More than 400 people bared it all for the record books.
Sunday morning off the coast of Wales, it was a sea of skin as hundreds ran into the chilly waters. The 400 people gathered on a secluded beach on the country's southwest coast to vie for the world record.
Setting aside their clothes – and their embarrassment – attendees from all over the world gathered to take part in the 7 a.m. skinny dip. The early meeting time at the hidden Rhossili beach was chosen to make the clothes-free swimmers feel more comfortable as organizers hoped to keep away gawkers.
The massive skinny dip was more than meets the eye, though. The swimmers, laughing and splashing in the frigid water, were helping to raise money for the Marie Curie Cancer Care charity. To break the record, bathers had to wade into the water up to their waists and endure for 10 minutes.
The event has yet to be verified by Guinness, but organizers believe they've broken the previous world record of 250 skinny-dippers. That's one record that's sure to bare some attention.
http://newsfeed.time.com/2011/06/19/skinny-dippers-strip-down-for-world-record-attempt/

What do ya know?  Records are broken everyday.  I think we could have lived without this one.  Is there a point?  Isn’t it shark season?  Way too many full moons in this photo.

Pakistanis Tipped Off Militants Again, Says U.S. Officials

WASHINGTON — U.S. officials say Pakistan has apparently tipped off militants at two more bomb-building factories in its tribal areas, giving the terror suspects time to flee, after U.S. intelligence shared the locations with the Pakistani government.
Those officials believe Pakistan's insistence on seeking local tribal elders' permission before raiding the areas may have most directly contributed to the militants' flight, though they also suspect low-level security officials may have tipped the militants off.
U.S. officials have pushed for Pakistan to keep the location of such targets secret prior to the operations, but the Pakistanis say their troops cannot enter the lawless regions without giving the locals notice.
All officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss matters of intelligence.
The latest incidents bring to a total of four bomb-making sites that the U.S. has shared with Pakistan only to have the terrorist suspects flee before the Pakistani military arrived much later. The report does not bode well for attempts by both sides to mend relations and rebuild trust after the U.S. raid on May 2 that killed Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad, a Pakistani army town only 35 miles from the capital Islamabad.
The Pakistanis believe the Americans violated their sovereignty by keeping them in the dark about the raid. American officials believe bin Laden's location proves some elements of the Pakistani army or intelligence service helped hide the al-Qaida mastermind, bolstering their argument that the raid had to be done solo.
The U.S. officials explained Saturday how they first offered the location of the third, and then the fourth site, in order to give Pakistan another chance to prove it could be trusted to go after the militants.
In the tradition of `trust but verify,' the Americans carefully monitored the area with satellite and unmanned drones, to see what would happen, after sharing the information a third and fourth time, the officials said.
In each case, they watched the militants depart within 24 hours, taking any weapons or bomb-making materials with them, just as militants had done the first two times. Only then, did they watch the Pakistani military visit each site, when the terror suspects and their wares were long gone, the officials said.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/18/pakistan-tipped-off-militants-suspects_n_879836.html

Are we going to learn?  I wonder if perhaps someone should have a talk with Congress.  They send our tax dollars into Pakistan only to find that the country they are sending all this money to doesn’t much like us.  Will we ever learn?  Will we?