Public Seizure of all Professional Sports Teams

Year after year, major cities across the United States spend millions on building new stadiums and arenas for their privately owned professional sports teams. Watching major league sport is one of this country’s favorite pastimes and should never be taken away from the everyman (and would most likely lead to public outcry). Though I believe that it is a total waste of money and time, it could certainly do with some reform. These huge shrines to the professional player are often paid for by public funds (that is, taxes from you and I, whether it be in property, income, or sales forms). However the payoff goes to the owners, managers, and players of the city’s team. That is why I am calling for a public seizure of these teams. This way, instead of directly into the pockets of the owners, these funds can be used to solve sociological problems at the local level.
As I am currently living in the Southeast, an excitable and often violent proving ground for American Football, I will use Atlanta as an example. In 1989, the city of Atlanta appropriated $214 Million dollars, through the Georgia General Assembly, to build the Georgia Dome, making it the largest publicly funded construction project in history at that time. In 1992, after the dome’s completion, the Atlanta Falcons moved in free of charge. In 2005, the Falcons spent $130 million to extend their quarterback, Michael Vick’s, contract for ten years. This exemplifies reinvestment in the company, but how much does the state of Georgia get? Nothing, except maybe a few PR related community outreach programs, which are really just promotional photo ops for the players. Meanwhile, Falcons CEO and Owner Arthur Blank, a man estimated to be worth over $1.3 billion, sits back and reaps the benefits. When the Falcons play in a sold out stadium, who makes the money. Not the principle investor, but the free-loading tenant. Furthermore, when U2 plays a sold out concert at the Georgia Dome, some third party concessionary (not to mention Prince Bono) reaps all of the benefits that Georgia taxpayers put fourth.
My call for public seizure of professional sports will revert that profit back to the principle investor, the state or city (and its taxpayers) that paid for the stadium or arena that the team plays in. These much needed funds could then be used to pay for various social welfare programs, parks, and general infrastructure for the city or state. It is unfair to expect us to invest in a company that we don’t see any gain from. Furthermore, these teams simply support the economy but have no direct role. There is only one publicly traded professional sports company in this country, the Green Bay Packers, and guess what, they’ve been owned by the city of Green Bay since the beginning. With the exception of owners, a few men of the elite, most other Americans would benefit from this program, allowing us to enjoy sport and a higher quality of life.

CRISIS AVERTED: SOCIAL SECURITY’S FINAL SOLUTION

Washington, DC (Onion) - Following a success in French pension reform, the United States Senate passed today an historic bill reforming the Social Security system in its own country. The bill, under the guise of a worsening economic crisis will deport all retirees over the age of seventy-five. The proposed new law will demonstrate that all such persons, dangerously approaching (if not exceeding) the established life-expectancy, have exhausted all of their potential use for the nation’s economy, and will therefore be deported and exiled to an undisclosed location. The bill calls for the use of half of the current Federal Social Security budget to be freed to be used to purchase the location, transport those who qualify, and set up interment camps to house the deportees for their remaining years. Thousands of Registered Nurses are also being recruited to tropical locations that are rumored to be potential hotspots of geriatric activity.
The bill calls for a massive privatization, or federal purchase, of current assisted living communities where the economically depraved are concentrated and demands that all those who are retired and over the age limit will be deported. The internment isles are set to be modeled off of contemporary facilities but in a tropical setting. A new, and voluntary, program of euthanasia will be set in place and heavily encouraged, especially to those who require specific medical attention.
This new wave of pension reform is said to take the pressure off of the federal government as a large sector of the population is on its way to retirement age and will therefore be totally useless to the future of this country. Senetors in support of this bill thank deeply the so called “baby-boomer” generation for their service and support of their nation throughout their lifetime and appreciate their cooperation and patriotism in this country’s time of need.
The bill will also appropriate funds from next years budget to set up a new government agency to enforce the prospective law. The Age Enforcement Agency (AEA) will work closely with the Social Security Administration and the Department of Defense to make sure that the change goes over smoothly. A new Presidential cabinet post is expected somewhere the beginning of the next fiscal year.
The final clause in the bill will be rolled out by the year 2020, and will make living within the continental United States illegal for those who exceed the age of seventy-five, punishable by deportation and possibly “voluntary” assisted suicide.

UPDATE: Twitter is Hateful

I am now being followed by Hate Need! How in the fuck they found me, and feel that I also have a need for hate is beyond me...I guess I'll have to see if I can find the Ku Klux Klan and see if I can't follow them as well. It's all part of the research of course. Maybe this is the appeal, it is another outlet to be somebody on the Internet that you aren't in reality. Susan is about to become a skinhead in a fake world of status updates...by the way I am currently taking a bath and I have my hair in a Mohawk influenced by the shampoo in it.

The Yosemite Files: Volume One

Just what in the fuck is wildlife management? Besides being an oxymoron, this practice is an attempt for human beings to once again harness the awesome power of our natural world, beat it a few times in the head, and then piss all over it in an attempt to make it better. Wildlife management is a big topic here in Yosemite Valley, especially concerning the American Black Bear (make no mistake: it's not Mexican or Canadian).

Thanks to gross habituation of these large beasts through years of the tourist feeding, photographing, and I assume, fucking of these wonderful animals, they are now deemed out of control. So how do we solve the problem? More human intervention of course! Tens of bears are killed by Park Rangers every year because of the property damage they cause (yeah, that's fair, hold them to a penal code and an American ideal that they couldn't possibly comprehend). Those that haven't caused trouble yet are chased out of human infested areas in an attempt to "save" them (a lot like Christian Missionaries tried to "save" heathen Hereros in Africa).

I think that we just have to accept this as a byproduct of our own collective mismanagement in the first place, you know, like global warming. So, in fear of having our cars broken into (because of improper food storage) we pay people with federal funds, to go around shooting these bears with beanbags and maceballs because they are following the evolutionary path and foraging for the most abundant and easily available food source.

There isn't much management on the squirrel front, but these little fuckers are the most annoying of all. No matter how much you stomp your feet at them they just keep coming back. I like to ask people not to feed them not because I care if they become dependant on human food, or fat like many of the people I see waddling around here, but because I don't want a squirrel in my shadow wherever I go. These little shits are relentless. I had one try to take a drag off my cigarette the other day. I told him I would gladly bum him one, but I don't want his bubonic lips on my square.

In summation, wildlife is either no longer wild (thus the necessity of it's management) or we need to solve this problem at it's source: No more people, no more problem. If we close the park to visitors, the animals here will have no choice but to figure out how to find food from the land, or die. And that my friends is natural selection.

UPDATE: Still Nothing

My Twitter Homepage is full of nothing. I consider SPAM nothing. All it is is a bunch of advertisements trying to get me to download nothing songs from nowhere men. So I guess I have found a small semblance of something...Twitter is yet another advertising platform designed to get you in your private life, down home and all up in your biznass. Result: Twitter is something in the vein of a billboard on the roadside of life.