Day: March 19, 2014

‘BANKERCIDE’

There seems to be so many suicides of bankers this year, a new word should be created..
Nonetheless, a 28-year-old banker died after leaping off of a building—a way bankercide seems to be taking place. The New York POST reports, 
Kenneth Bellando, who worked at Levy Capital since January, was found dead on the sidewalk outside his East Side building on March 12 after allegedly jumping from the sixth-story roof, sources said.
Bellando, a former investment bank analyst at JPMorgan, is the son of John Bellando, chief operating officer and chief financial officer at Condé Nast. His brother, John, a top chief investment officer with JPMorgan, works on risk exposure valuations.
Several John Bellando emails were cited during testimony at the Senate Finance Committee’s inquiry into the bank’s losses during the infamous London Whale trade fiasco.
Very interesting.
It’s the type of stuff that makes you ponder if a nefarious back story is taking place.. are things coming? Are bad days upon us? Is financial collapse ready? Or are bankers just .. going overboard?
Bankercide. You heard it here first.

A Nightmare on Elm Street girls all grown up

Wes Craven re-tweeted a HORRORCON tweet  of the NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET GIRLS ‘all grown up’ .. Actually beyond all grown up–the NIGHTMARE series was famous in the 1980s through 1990s.. They are horror icons of last century, and many owe their interest in horror to the famed woman of the ELM STREET series..

In the photo: Heather Langenkamp, Amanda Wyss, Tuesday Night, and Lisa Wilcox. They were the women who battled Freddy Krueger in dreams–and reality–during the long running horror series. Their fame and fortune rests almost solely in their appearances in the famed series started by Wes Craven about the man from nightmares slashing teenagers in their sleep.

NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET was an iconic classic that shook theater goers to their core when it was originally released.  The dark presence of Freddy Krueger eventually got replaced by a more prankster and joke telling mass murderer in later films. But the film’s creators mostly chose female heroines to ensure Krueger’s passing–before rising again in the next film.

Seeing all of the horror iconettes together is good.. There are lots of horror fans who loved their roles and their abilities to put on a good show during movies.

In some flicks, the horror villain seems to get the more attention. In the NIGHTMARE series, I’d argue that these women were the true stars and actually, if you boil it down, were amazing role models to females who saw the movies.. they never wavered and they never failed, often becoming much stronger than the muscular men who fell victim to Freddy.

I have said it before and will say it again: Horror movies and professional wrestling both encapsulate the generation and society at the time best. What happens in both tells the story of the generation at that moment–what’s hot, what’s not, attitude, and other things. Stone Cold Steve Austin brought us into the roaring ‘tough guy’ 90s.. the SAW films perfectly summarized our early 2000s of terror and torture..

And these strong women of the 1980s gave us a reason to cheer.
Even though we laughed at the quips that Freddy told in nightmares..

Mothers of the children of the disappeared

Numb to the victims

Death happens every day.. mass death occurs. But we should be used to it or accept it—however do accept it often.
I am struck by the reaction of the world and media to the missing flight 370. We are facing the possibility that the 239 passengers and crew faced an overwhelmingly horrific death—the way they expired may be viewed different depending on which viewpoint you have as far as what happened to the flight itself. But by this point, it would seem obvious that there’s no life from within that plane.
And we are numb to it.
Numb in the sense that we aren’t talking about the lives aboard.. we aren’t speaking of the beautiful children who faced an awful early departure from this realm.. we aren’t talking about the wives and husbands, moms and dads, employees and employers.. The stories of all 239 people have seemingly vanished as much as their flight itself. Gone for good into the memory hole.. Never to be spoken about again.
A mass death occurred in some way, most likely..But their lives don’t seem to matter. They’re just the back story to the Malaysian mystery.
The people who seem to be suffering the most are the families of the missing.. There was a news conference held in Kuala Lumpur with updates about what we know on the missing plane—as far as the news conference, think of it like this: we don’t know a thing and anything you’ve known is wrong. But during the event, families of the missing became frustrated and emotional, screaming out in tears and anger. They were also angry at the response or lack thereof from governmental bodies. As a result, they were swept away as the media watched, families who are going through agony and misery simply dragged away from the news conference in front of reporters.. Even the BBC reported that a reporter from their agency was pushed away from family members carrying banners critical of the government. The BBC reporter, Jonah Fisher, faced a wall of police as he tried to talk to the wailing wall of people..
My point, if any, is that the story of where the plane is and how it went missing is extremely important. And the flight simulator with its programmed routes, along with the sudden movement of Flight 370 itself, are big issues. But the heart of the story are the lives aboard. If a flight carrying no one vanished they story wouldn’t matter nearly as much. But a flight carrying so many lives, so many stories, and so many souls, makes this matter much more. But at the same time the media is hardly talking about those lives, and really not permitted to speak to the families of the missing.
There seems to be something rotten in Malaysia. Either the government is hiding something or has simply dropped the ball so hard that the time frame to find the plane is now dwindling to the point of no return.
I am struck by how little attention is being paid to the lives aboard this flight. The images of the children of the disappeared was striking when I saw them the other day. But they are not just becoming forgotten.. missing plane parts are more important that body parts. 
As the families drift into darkness, rushed away from reporters snapping photos, ask yourself this: Are we just accepting of mass murder and mass death? Are we even phased by it anymore? Is it just a side story on the big story? 
War makes news only because of the men who plan war. The victims, often children birthed into a world of heartbreak, are forgotten. Collateral damage. We say. We think.
But what do we really think, deep down?
Are you a bystander in life, just watching mass death from a distance? Did you lose your connection to humanity, thinking what happens “there” will not affect here? What happens to “them” is less important than “us”? Ask yourself that..?

These are the first images released of the children aboard Flight 370.. Their beautiful faces speak for themselves. I wish for a world without tragedy and fear for children. Obviously judging from daily news, this planet  hasn’t attained any goal of goodness or love. If a horrible accident occurred on board this plane, it’s assumed that all 239 passengers succumbed to their ill-fated demise quickly. I fear that did not happen.. I especially cringe thinking about the plane experiencing a hijacking gone wrong, or something even worse for the innocent people aboard the flight. Yes, indeed.. those who tune out of heavy headlines may be the happiest.  I’m not like that. I soak up the news as much as a Sheryl Crow soaks up the sun. And for that, I am typically upset about what some nation or person has done to an innocent child in a dark part of the planet Earth.

Weird Wednesday

The midweek meltdown is beginning. I am particularly tired this early morning, not sure if it’s due to increased travel or perhaps increased radiation from Fukushima. I have a tin foil hat but it doesn’t seem to fit any longer.. Maybe an upgrade needs to be made to the deluxe version.
Until that..
News and more news.. better and worse and even worse than that. Presented for your reading displeasure..

A space rock craze hits South Korea after a meteor shower.. The hunt is on for valuable souvenirs in a corner of the country.. There seems to be lots of meteors and asteroids these days..

The world seems to be talking a lot more about war–more than we should. And Washington’s BLOG writes a great piece on how the media’s reporting on Russia and Ukraine is just as bad it was about Iraq..  I completely concur with that premise..

On Ukraine/Crimea/Russia, a wrap:
Fear over war as a Ukrainian officer was killed at a military base in Simferopol..
Ukraine on armed alert as war fears grow..
Biden goes to Poland to ‘reassure allies’..
Russia warns the west over Crimea sanctions..
Putin reclaims Crimea..

The newest NSA revelations say this: The surveillance program is able to go back in time replay your phone calls–recorded in a database for all snoops to hear..

People hold Snowden masks in Brasilia
The revelations about the NSA are on our newsfeeds  because of Edward Snowden. On Tuesday, Snowden remote controlled a robot from his undisclosed location and spoke to a TED audience. He said some more information–perhaps the most tantalizing yet–is coming..

Giant dust storms swallow part of Texas..

TIME (and lots of other sources) is laughing at ‘conspiracy theories’ that claim African Americans were injected with HIV.. While the HIV issue may be untrue, let’s remember some facts about the past: The United States government injected people with plutonium.  The United States injected African Americans with syphilis..  So why is TIME magazine laughing at something–though perhaps untrue–that could be a logical conclusion given other famed injections from the past?

Greenland’s glaciers are melting faster than anyone feared they would.. 

A sad end to a strange story.. you may recall a few weeks ago, the story of Walter Williams, 78, who woke up alive in a body bag in a morgue? Williams has now passed away–again.. This time, according to news reports on the death of Williams, his family is handling the death well, given the near death experience that made national headlines two weeks ago..

China: A worm lives in girl’s throat for two months.. 

What we know so far about the newest STAR WARS movie..
Episode VII will feature some very familiar faces..
Timeline revealed..

Duke porn star hits the stage at NYC strip club
School’s out! Duke porn star hits the stage in New York City.. Belle Knox wiggles her way across the stage at the famed Hell’s Kitchen strip club.. She chose the song CHERRY PIE. I am sorry Ms. Foxy Knox, but I cannot hear CHERRY PIE now without thinking of the final scene of BAD GRANDPA.. Just ruins the moment now with laughter.. But good luck. No doubt you’ll be the richest DUKE student ever..


Another bad omen for Miley Cyrus: The BANGERZ tour bus catches on fire! It ‘burst into flames’ .. MORE..

View image on Twitter
News program accidentally flashes penis during news coverage of crash coverage!

Pennsylvania: Amish buggy hits an SUV twice and flees the scene!