Posted 2:10 PM by Floyd

In my previous post I referred to "scandalized denunciations" of the Merc's reporting that 87% of Silicon Valley teachers own their own homes. Here's one example:

Your front-page article about teacher housing will effectively kill any opportunity that might have existed to pass a parcel tax to help teachers with housing. ...

You'll have to excuse me if I don't burst into tears. When driving home last night I heard a radio ad exhorting people not to shop at Albertson's or Safeway, in order to assist striking grocery workers in Southern California. I was aware of this dispute and was listening with one ear until the end of the commerical, when it was announced that the ad was paid for by the California Teachers' Association! If the teachers' union has enough money that they can interfere in someone else's labor dispute -- possibly increasing the price of teachers' groceries while doing so -- it's hard to see why taxpayers should be asked to give them a raise.

I often complain that government schools are a monopoly, in that parents are assigned a particular public school to which they must send their child. But there are analogous monopsony drawbacks as well. In the 14 years that I have lived in California, I have worked for three different employers in the city of Mountain View. But if I wanted to work for the Mountain View public school system, I would have one choice of employer. How would I like it if there were one computer software company that was allowed to hire people in the city of Mountain View? Not very much.

Posted 10:59 AM by Floyd

I criticize the San Jose Mercury News a lot -- imagine each letter in the preceding phrase having its own A HREF to a previous blog posting -- so I should be the first to praise them when they do something right. The Merc is in some ways very politically correct; for example, nearly every issue contains some hand-wringing about "diversity." But on other issues the Merc is willing to buck the Democratic party line and do some useful muckraking.

On Monday the Merc published a front-page article titled "Teacher housing crisis a myth", which noted that while teachers are portrayed as poverty-stricken and unable to afford housing, in reality 87% of Silicon Valley teachers own their homes. This led to scandalized denunciations in today's letters to the editor page. (As usual, the educators who wrote on behalf of their profession stopped just short of advocating that teachers be given the same privileges as ancien regime French nobility as depicted in A Tale of Two Cities.)

Today the Merc reported on the failings of light rail:

Light-rail woes grow
By Tracey Kaplan and Gary Richards
Mercury News

Silicon Valley's light-rail network, already ranked among the most expensive and least efficient in the nation, has gotten even worse.

Trains that were once near capacity now carry about 15 passengers per car, among the fewest of similar trolley lines in the country. And from 2001 to 2003, fewer riders and growing expenses combined to more than double the cost of providing a trip. Last year, the VTA spent a whopping $8.42 per passenger per trip -- even though it charged those passengers $1.50.

Data released recently by federal and local transit officials paints an increasingly grim picture of a network that does not appear to be rebounding despite the Valley Transportation Authority's efforts to clamp down on costs.

(By the way, I doubt that trains were ever "near capacity." Maybe on the first weekend that they opened, before the novelty wore off.)

The federal government recently released data for fiscal year 2002 that compares transit systems around the country in a variety of areas, and shows the VTA at or near the bottom in most. More recent data compiled by the VTA has no comparison to other trolley lines, but shows the VTA losing ground from 2002 to 2003 -- particularly in ridership.

The daily number of riders on the system that stretches from San Jose to Mountain View and Milpitas plummeted 44 percent since the peak of the high-tech boom in 2000, from 30,383 passengers to 17,047, as of Sept. 30.

The new data reveals another startling fact: The light-rail system became 46 percent more expensive to operate in fiscal year 2002. Costs shot up from about $37 million to about $54 million, largely because of new labor contracts that the VTA had awarded during the boom and because of a one-mile extension to Milpitas near Interstate 880.

As a result, Silicon Valley's light-rail system sank even lower among its peers throughout the West compared with the year before. For instance, the VTA's operating cost per passenger mile for light rail shot up that year from 86 cents to $1.55, the worst compared with Dallas, Sacramento, Denver, Salt Lake City, Portland and San Diego.

In fiscal year 2003, that cost shot up even further -- to $1.90, according to the VTA. The VTA had cut its overall annual operating expenses by then for light rail to about $51 million, but ridership continued its free fall, offsetting any major gains. This year, operating cost of light rail is projected to fall to $42 million, which would be about $5 million higher than in 2001.

Why is it that no one wants to ride light rail?

Some experts say many of Santa Clara County's light-rail problems are likely to persist once the economy improves because they are characteristic of the large county it serves, or are inherent in the design of the system, which creeps along at 3 mph through downtown.

(Emphasis mine.) A few years back my wife and I had some business in downtown San Jose, and considered taking light rail from downtown Mountain View, where my wife worked. Let's say we took the 1:01 p.m. train from Mountain View. We would arrive at the Baypointe Station in North San Jose at 1:33, and transfer to the 1:38 southbound train, arriving at the Civic Center Station at 1:55. We don't want to cut it too fine when catching the Mountain View train, as the next one won't arrive for another half hour (15 minutes during peak commute times). And we have to walk a long block to our destination in San Jose. This means that the trip will take us just about one hour -- assuming that the trains are on time.

How far is it from downtown Mountain View to the Civic Center stop at First and Mission? According to Yahoo Maps, 11.5 miles. One hour to travel eleven and a half miles! Yahoo predicts that driving would take 15 minutes. Even in heavy traffic it's not likely to take more than 25 minutes. And please note that when you drive, you can leave whenever you want rather than every half hour.

In the real world, a business that hemorrhages money is soon defunct. What happens in the world of government?

Despite the problems, some VTA board members want to expand the 29.5-mile network, although the agency has said expansion beyond the two lines under construction is unlikely.

Santa Clara County supervisor Blanca Alvarado wants to forge ahead with studies to take light rail down the median of Capitol Expressway to Highway 87.

But Dave Fadness, a longtime county transportation commissioner, said the agency should cut its losses, and even consider halting construction of the Vasona line to Campbell.

``What are we going to end up with over there -- 23 people are going to use it?'' Fadness said. ``And we're going to look even worse.''

Valley light rail loses money, and its services are fundamentally unable to satisfy its customers -- so let's expand it! It's like living in an evil alternate universe where WebVan, after losing hundreds of millions of dollars delivering groceries, decides that it will also deliver rental videotapes and DVD's below cost. To support this endeavor WebVan would sell a new issue of stock, and you would be forced to buy it.

I don't think that light rail will be expanded. But what is the most radical option presented? To halt plans for expansion. No one is saying that VTA light rail, like WebVan, must cease to exist.

Posted 5:56 PM by Floyd

Today Slate features an editorial by Michael Kinsley, called "The Pragmatists' Primary: Desperately seeking electability." I suppose it is typical Kinsley in that it is glib and amusing, but fundamentally flawed.

Democrats are cute when they're being pragmatic. They furrow their brows and try to think like Republicans. Or as they imagine Republicans must think. They turn off their hearts and listen for signals from their brains. No swooning is allowed this presidential primary season. "I only care about one thing," they all say. "Which of these guys can beat Bush?" Secretly, they believe none of them can, which makes the amateur pragmatism especially poignant.

Nevertheless, Democrats persevere. They ricochet from candidate to candidate, hoping to smell a winner. In effect, they give their proxy to the other party. "If I was a Republican," they ask themselves, "which of these Democratic candidates would I be most likely to vote for?" And by the time this is all over, most of the serious contenders will have been crowned the practical choice for at least a moment. First it was Lieberman the Centrist. "I'm actually for Dennis Kucinich," a Democrat might say, "because I like his position on nationalizing all the churches. But I'm supporting Joe Lieberman. His views on nearly everything are repellent to me, and I think that's a good sign."

That was pretty funny, especially the part about Kucinich nationalizing churches. But when I got done chuckling I started to wonder: If this really is the thought process of the Democratic primary voter, then why didn't Lieberman do better than "third place in the race for third place?"

Then the General entered the race. And I don't mean General Anesthesia.

Has Michael Kinsley been kidnapped by Maureen Dowd?

A man in uniform, Democrats thought. People like that sort of thing, don't they? And yet he's a Democrat. Or at least he plays one on TV. True, on most issues he has either no known position or two contradictory positions. But he says he can requisition those missing parts. And he's a General. Talk about pragmatic! But when the General traded in his uniform for a fuzzy sweater, he suddenly looked less General-like than Al Sharpton.

I guess everyone is entitled to an opinion but ... if you showed the Democratic candidates to a group of people who don't follow politics, and told them to pick out the retired general, don't you think they would focus on the guy with the short hair and the severe look and no surplus fat? Oh, and who doesn't blink? Would they really choose Sharpton more often than Clark?

Some Democrats cheated and looked into their hearts, where they found Howard Dean. But he was so appealing that he scared them. This is no moment to vote for a guy just because he inspires you, they thought. If he inspires me, there must be something wrong with him. So, Democrats looked around and rediscovered John Kerry. He'd been there all along, inspiring almost no one. You're not going to find John Kerry inspiring unless you're married to him or he literally saved your life.

What happened to "trying to be Republicans"? Do Democrats think that Republicans don't want to be inspired? I think Kinsley subconsciously realized that his premise was silly and tried to move away from it in as few paragraphs as possible.

Patronizing beliefs about Democrats are not limited to Mr. Kinsley. Non-Democrats' viewed Dean's nomination as inevitable because they lacked imagination about how Democrats think. I know that when I heard about Dean I thought "Oh, the anti-war candidate. Well those Democrats are all pinkos, so they'll eat that stuff up." Even after it became clear that Dean could capture only 10-20% of Democratic votes, the patronizing continued. A few weeks back radio talk show host Hugh Hewitt did some ghostwriting for Dean's New Hampshire debate appearance:

"On Tuesday night I spent 15 seconds trying to fire up my volunteers who had a disappointing night Tuesday --congratulations John and John, but overconfidence is a dangerous thing, as I've learned-- I spent 15 seconds pointing at signs and recognizing people from faraway states who'd driven thousands of miles in some cases to stand on corners in sub-zero temps, and I fire them up and try to show that I am not down for the count because they're not down for the count, and television, radio, Matt Drudge and Rush Limbaugh and your network, Brit, try to turn me into a deranged psycho. Fred Barnes called me cracked, for goodness sake. I've been a medical doctor treating crisis cases in emergency rooms for twenty years, and a governor making life and death decisions for ten years, and the American media, threatened by my message that big corporate interests are out of control--and there is no bigger corporate interest than Fox-- decides to marginalize me using a quarter minute of tape."

"Now this process of Karl Rove orchestrated, media-led destruction of the loyal opposition has been going on for months now, but it is going to end here in New Hampshire. The voters of New Hampshire have been around the block a few times, and they know what's going on, and crucially, they know what's at stake. If the media knocks me off, then it will be John Kerry's turn and we will hear endlessly about his protests of the Vietnam War and his quote"French tastes" close quotes, but we won't hear about John's genuine and moving heroism in the face of brutal fire. We'll hear about John Edwards being a plaintiff's attorney fueled by plaintiff's attorneys all over the country as though serving the severely injured is a bad thing, We'll hear about General Clark's anonymous enemies in the Pentagon and we'll overlook his leadership in halting genocide. All of this and more, because all of us threaten the money, Brit, we all threaten the money. This president has made it very lucrative to be Republican, Brit, and those of us who get wind in our sails come under fire, and its not fair."

Hewitt, a conservative, relies on a caricature for insight as to how Democrats think. "They hate Fox News, and they hate Karl Rove, so if Dean fulminates against Fox and Rove he'll be their hero." But Democrats are people, not automatons who open their mouths and yell whenever Rove's name is mentioned. Let's turn this around: Do Republicans like nasty jokes at Hillary Clinton's expense. Yes. Would Republicans like a presidential contender to make a nasty joke about Hillary during the 2008 New Hampshire primary debate? No, of course not. They would find it rude and inappropriate, and would fear that the person who made the joke would be unpopular and unelectable.

The simplest explanation, while hard for onlookers such as Kinsley and Hewitt to accept, is best: John Kerry is the leading Democratic contender because more Democrats like him than any other candidate.

Posted 6:05 PM by Floyd

I feel lazy today. Did anyone write a dumb letter to the San Jose Mercury News?

Why yes they did.

Fear triggered attacks by U.S., Al-Qaida

Despite what you may have thought anyone connected with the Bush administration may have said, there are no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and no links to Al-Qaida.

We invade Iraq just because we decided that Saddam Hussein was a really bad man who might, someday, somehow, be a threat to us.

Funny . . . that is the same reason that Al-Qaida gave for attacking the United States.

David Porter
Mountain View

I frequently mock Merc letters to the editor. But this letter must set some kind of record for idiocy per word:

• Horrible rambling diction. "Despite what you may have thought anyone connected with the Bush administration may have said"? This is the writing of a man whose backspace key is broken.
  
• Borderline falsehoods. There were links between Iraq and Al-Qaeda. One may not view the links as significant, but they exist.
  
• Strained analogy. Bin Laden did not claim that the US was a future threat. His litany of complaints about America, and the West in general, focussed on the past and the present.
  
• Use of psychopaths as a club to beat people. Even if Bin Laden and America shared motives, so what? Shall we ban choreographed dance routines in stadiums because the North Korean regime likes them?
  

The Merc is obliged to print the letters it receives, you say. But the paper did not put this drivel in its own special place on the editorial page, as if it were some nugget of wisdom.

Why yes they did.

Posted 3:37 PM by Floyd

Here's the reason The Declarer ranks number one on searches for Tim Bueller: It's a misspelling. The proper spelling is Tim Bueler.

Bueler is a conservative student in Rancho Cotati (Marin County, north of San Francisco) who started a conservative club at his high school and was abused by classmates. Here's a Fox News article on the brouhaha.

I will probably continue to get hits for quite a while; when I Googled "Tim Bueler" I was asked:

  Did you mean: "Tim Bueller"?

Posted 1:58 PM by Floyd

Washington Post TV critic Tom Shales threw a hissy fit about Janet Jackson's exposed breast. This caused Jim Treacher to mock him as "teacher's little angel":

"...and there was a woman's you-know-what! You could see it and everything! And the horsey made a farty and there was a talking monkey and it said bad things! I'M TELLING!!!"

Also acting like a prig in the wake of the Super Bowl was ... Mickey Kaus?!

Neither the tiny $27,500 fines being considered by the FCC nor the 10X larger fines proposed in new legislation are close to sufficient to hold Viacom and MTV accountable. To achieve any sort of prospective deterrent effect, either some stations need to lose their licenses, or (preferably) high MTV or Viacom executives need to lose their jobs.

Well ... no ... actually ... I don't think anyone "needs" to be fined or censored or lose their jobs. I think NFL "needs" to reexamine its relationship with CBS. I think that easily offended viewers "need" to skip the halftime extravanganza, which consists of second-rate celebrities who are hopping mad that they are not the center of attention on that day.

Kaus wasn't just a prig. Andrea Dworkin and Catherine MacKinnon handed him the violence-against-women crack pipe and he took a big fat hit:

P.P.S.: The issue isn't nudity but the implicit endorsement of acting out male fantasies of violent and invasive non-consensual sexual behavior.

Oh, brother. I must have missed the news reports of Justin Timberlake clocking Jackson over the head with a club and dragging her to a onstage prop labelled "RAPE CHAMBER." I mean, men do sometimes remove their sex partners' clothing, even without the woman's written consent.

Never mind the message it sends to international audiences--say young, angry Muslims, to pick a random example, who may have been wondering whether America really is immoral.

Yeah, and just before the boob-baring occurred those fundamentalist Muslims were happily chair-dancing to images of the nice wholesome leather-clad gyrating Miss Jackson. Just like down at the mosque!

And isn't there about a hundred times as much public nudity in Europe as in America? Why were planes crashed into the World Trade Center and not, say, the topless beaches of the Riviera?

What got into Kaus? I read him every day and usually find him very intelligent and perceptive. Watching Kerry become the front-runner must have left him mildly unhinged.

(Please note that I wrote an entire post about Kaus without having an inline conversation with an imaginary editor.)

Posted 9:37 AM by Floyd

This has to be about the lamest post ever linked to by Instapundit: Jim Moore, a fellow at the Berkman Center at Harvard Law School, tells us that Howard Dean is doing just fine:

Lots of folks are punditing about the Howard Dean campaign—most working with few facts. So here are a couple of facts to mull over. You heard it first:

1. Through today, thousands of grassroots supporters continue restocking the Dean campaign with cash. As I reported here recently, in the 72 hours after New Hampshire more than 10,000 supporters contributed almost $70 each—for a total of $680,000 in three days. This shows the power of the large numbers of people that can easily touch the campaign through the web. I don’t know what will happen next, but I can say that numbers suggest that the grassroots can completely reload the campaign with cash if they want to.

Grassroots supporters can completely reload the Kucinich campaign with cash if they want to. It's a question of whether they will. Dean raised $40 million and blew through $35 million of it. At a rate of $700,000 every three days, the campaign will be "reloaded" by late June. I don't think Dean can wait that long.

2. We all know that where an organization gets its funding has a powerful effect on its priorities—even if the members think otherwise. So I find the following intriguing, given the centrality of grassroots funding in this current period: Probably the most influential person in the campaign right now is Zephyr, our grassroots evangelist. She is organizing all sorts of initiatives and creating momentum. In addition, word has it that Karen Hicks, the community organizer extraordinaire who led our New Hampshire grassroots campaign, and who worked with Marshall Ganz and others to create the house meeting model, is taking on a new and central role in the national campaign.

Let's unspin this: Campaign manager Joe Trippi got pink-slipped, so other members of the campaign have to take on additional duties. And is it really breaking news that senior staffers of the Dean campaign are working on, well, the Dean campaign? I'm reminded of my days as an intern at the Finger Lakes Times, when I would enter this sort of local news into the computer system: "Mrs. Alice Brown has been elected Sunshine Committee Chair of the Seneca Falls Women's Club."

Update: I read a little more of Moore's blog, and I actually feel sorry for him: He's gone way off the deep end. He has recurring fantasies of raising outrageous amounts of money:

In the new Internet-enabled political world, the Dean campaign is capable of raising another $50 million dollars or more.

A million people giving $50 each will do it.

If DeanforAmerica continues to focus on ways to improve democracy in America, the community could raise a billion dollars for Dean. 1 million people times a thousand dollars each.

Dean actually manages to raise a few hundred thou, and Moore treats this event with religious reverence. Literally:

Mindblowing event happening in realtime now: DeanforAmerica has raised $438.000 by about 4:00 PM today--with another update coming momentarily. The rate of contributing is off the charts. This is DFA's second largest single day of fundraising in the entire campaign--and may pass the single day record.

Wow, reflect on that. Implications?

Giving is the sacrament that brings the Dean community together.

Posted 8:49 PM by Floyd

The Merc really outdid itself yesterday. There's bias, and then there's long sappy love letters sealed with lots of hugs and kisses. The latter category would describe this article on term limited politicians:

Piecing together political future
TERM LIMITS OPEN UP RACES, SET OFF FRENZY OF ACTIVITY
By Mike Zapler
Mercury News

The South Bay is about to feel the brunt of a 1990 term limits law, as lawmakers with nearly 75 years of combined legislative experience are forced out of office this year. Replacing them, after a breakneck campaign season, will be an assortment of up-and-comers with modest to no background in state government.

"Feel the brunt?" What about those of us who like to see decades-long officeholders retire? This is like saying that my cat "feels the brunt" of medicine killing off his fleas.

From Redwood City to Santa Cruz, the region will lose three respected state senators: John Vasconcellos, D-San Jose, who has served nearly four decades in the Legislature; Byron Sher, D-San Jose, a 25-year Sacramento veteran; and Bruce McPherson, a Republican who has represented Santa Cruz in the Legislature for more than a decade.

So that's how you spell "Democrat." R - E - S - P - E - C - T - E - D.

Here's how "respected" Vasconcellos behaved when Schwarzenegger was elected governor: he ''called Republican Gov.-elect Arnold Schwarzenegger "a boob," said voters "made a mistake," and announced that when the Legislature reconvenes in January, "I'm not sure I'll go back." '' That's how well-respected people behave in the face of adversity: By picking up their marbles and going home.

Meanwhile, two Silicon Valley Assembly members, Democrats Joe Simitian and Manny Diaz, are seeking promotions to the Senate. Assemblyman John Dutra, D-Fremont, is being forced out of office by term limits.

It's a legislative shuffle frenzied enough to make the most seasoned politico's head spin.

One, two, three, four, five, six politicians are retiring or changing office. This is a frenzy? This makes your head spin? (Of course, Zapler has such a crush on politicians that it probably makes his head spin when four assemblymen get out of a limo.)

Don't take Zapler to a ballet performance or a basketball game. The poor guy would probably have an epileptic seizure.

But in this heavily Democratic area, the spinning will stop abruptly on March 2, because most races will be all but decided in the primary election.

If your head is spinning, and it stops abruptly, wouldn't that also make your head spin?

The likeliest result: many new faces in Sacramento, a few recycled ones, and a serious loss of legislative clout for the region.

It's enough to make Baby Jesus cry!

Vasconcellos served 30 years in the Assembly, securing millions of dollars for Santa Clara County during a stint as chairman of the powerful Ways and Means Committee. He spent the past eight years in the Senate.

"Securing millions of dollars?" How about the taxes Vasconcellos voted for? The mandates on businesses? How much did that cost Santa Clara County residents? Billions?

Edwin Newman wrote books such as Strictly Speaking on the abuse of English. One cliche that he noted was "powerful Ways and Means Committee." I'm glad to see that the cliche also applies at the state level.

In 15 years in the Assembly and eight in the Senate, Sher established himself as one of the Legislature's top authorities on environmental issues.

Well that means a whole fuck of a lot, given that legislatures are prone to conferring environmental expertise on, say, Meryl Streep.
(Remember Alar?)

``Anyone who says they're going to come in and be able to accomplish what Sher and Vasconcellos have been able to accomplish,'' said campaign strategist Jason Kinney, ``is fooling themselves and their constituents.''

I trembled when I beheld the awesome moral authority of Jason Kinney. Speak truth to power Jason! Don't let The Man get you down!

Topping the lineup are two key Senate races covering the heart of Silicon Valley. Political observers say the top contenders for Sher's District 11 -- Simitian and former Assemblyman Ted Lempert -- offer local government and Legislative experience. Simitian has represented Assembly District 21 since 2000; Lempert occupied that seat from 1988 to 1992, and again from 1996 to 2000. Both are former county supervisors, Simitian in Santa Clara County and Lempert in San Mateo County.

Why drag "political observers" into it? It's a fact that Lempert and Simitian have served in the assembly and county board of supervisors.

And both are well-educated, boasting multiple college and post-graduate degrees, including law degrees, from top-notch universities.

Slurp slurp! It's fellatio time!

``They're both brilliant guys who achieved a fair amount in their time in the Assembly,'' said San Jose State political-science Professor Terry Christensen.

Is this pay-per-view? Do I get to watch for free for five minutes?

Lempert sponsored several pieces of environmental legislation during his two stints in the Assembly, while Simitian is touting to voters his work to spare school funding from drastic cuts under former Gov. Gray Davis.

Lempert is a California Democrat. How the hell could he not sponsor environmental legislation? If a California Democrat isn't sponsoring some sort of environmental legislation, he's probably in a coma.

And what is left to accomplish in this area? California has been recycled, reused, composted, protected, and warned about toxic chemicals to within an inch of its life.

The reviews of the candidates in District 13 -- stretching from Mountain View to San Jose's East Side and down to Gilroy -- are more mixed. Assemblyman Manny Diaz, D-San Jose, and former Assemblywoman Elaine Alquist are generally regarded as solid Democratic votes. But some observers say it will be some time before they gain the stature and influence of Vasconcellos.

From which I infer that one attains status and influence through years of solid Democratic votes? There Is No Liberal Media Bias -- hereinafter abbreviated as TINLMB, as I don't want the Merc to be responsible for me contracting carpal tunnel syndrome.

Still, Christensen described Diaz as an ``activist legislator'' and said that both Diaz and Alquist have ties to key voting blocs in the Legislature -- the Latino Caucus in Diaz's case, and the Women's Caucus for Alquist -- that could boost their influence. Both also have Sacramento experience: Diaz, a former San Jose council member, was elected to Assembly District 23 in 2000; Alquist represented Assembly District 22 from 1996 to 2002.

So you have to be an activist to be well-respected? TINLMB!

And what's with all the convolutions about caucuses? Wouldn't a legislator attain respect through leadership, not through membership in a club? I'll translate the caucus verbiage to plain English: "Manny Diaz is a Latino and Elaine Alquist is a woman. This will cut the amount of time they need to be well-respected by 50%."

In a third Senate race, Assemblyman Abel Maldonado, R-San Luis Obispo, an ally of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's, is the heavy favorite to replace McPherson.

And that's the last we'll hear about Maldonado, who is striken with the scarlet letter R next to his name. You can't spell "well-respected" with an R. Well, you can actually. But there's no R in TINLMB!

Posted 10:20 PM by Floyd

I grade the Super Bowl commercials:

Ford: Pace Car of the entire company. Yawn.	D-
Bud Light "What can your dog do?" Attacks someone's genitals. Very classy.	D
Jenkins the Alien says "Use FedEx." Clever.	A-
Got a monkey on your back? Okay commercial until the car appeared.	C-
Bears want to buy Pepsi. Uhuh.	D
Quattro has four blades!?!? Unbelievably ... retarded.	D-
AOL powers the speed bike. Funny characters. Nice shot of the bike jumping 200 feet.	B
Van Helsing fights ... everybody. (I asked where "Van Helsing" came from and my friend Mike said from Dracula ... in which he served as comic relief.) Note: All movie ads were incoherent and cluttered and were rated D.	D
Nasty looking pimp guy enjoys Bud Light and bikini wax.	C+
The movie Troy gets bonus for classical theme. Still fairly incoherent.	D+
It's the Willie Nelson advice doll! How come he never told someone to smoke a few?	B
Ad for the Areo automobile. Why are there two ads? And why, in the second ad, do people shrink? That's a great image: "I'll buy this car and be turned into a midget."	D
I lied when I said all movies started out with a D grade. All Adam Sandler movies start out with a F. Points deducted for assuming that watching Drey Barrymore beat on someone with a metal bar would amuse or interest us.	F-
Referee zones out because he is henpecked at home. If you thought this was funny, please read a year's supply of The Lockhorns.	F
Monster reminds us that all peoples wake up in the morning. Then there is a hideous fat green cartoon thing dancing.	D
Bagpipes player needs cooling down. Awful, but the kid having his eyes shielded is kind of funny.	C-
Miracle on Ice. Incoherent and ludicrous; did every hockey match in the 1980 Olympics involve shouting and a trillion flags?	D-
Levitra. Okay, this is the worst series of ads ever. You spent like $100 million developing a drug and the best you can do is to have Mike Ditka throw a football through a tire? And what's up with Ditka ragging on baseball? Does it make sense to alienate a large part of your audience? No. Would baseball be better, or more like football, if the players had erections at gametime? No. Did any baseball executive waste about fifty draft picks on Ricky Williams, only to find out he was a flop? No.	F
A donkey wants to be a Budweiser donkey. A little silly when he hee-haws, but pretty funny.	A-
The Alamo. A movie.	D
Downloaded teens will download more music legally through the auspices of Pepsi. I sympathize with the politics, but the acting was awful and the whole stunt rather pointless (like so many Pepsi commercials).	C-
The Levitra Challenge. Are there tires in the doctors' office?	F
Oh, and speaking of Levitra: There were many times during the game when the ball spot had to be compared against the first down. The refs pull the chain taut to see if it reaches past the end of the football. Shouldn't that moment be sponsored by Levitra?
A horse farts. Why stop there? Why not shit all over the poor girl?	F-
One in five kids will be an annoying busybody who works on public service ads.	D
Charmin shows us creepy football player ass fondling and then tells us their tissue is "For Your End Zone." I guess this was the anal portion of the broadcast.	F--
The movie Dimension. Made no sense at all.	F
Pepsi ad with fat waitress. Lame.	D-
A blonde boy is ... on drugs? Hello? What's going on? When did IBM turn to dot-com advertisers?	F
Beach volleyball, girls go evens/odds to see who will fetch volleyball. The use of ro-sham-bo would have given this commercial a solid A.	A-
The Secret Window. Here's a secret: Your movie sucks.	F
Kids get their mouths washed out with soap when they swear in admiration at their parents' Chevys. Cute.	B-
Lay's commercial features old people beating the crap out of each other and stealing each other's dentures. Mean-spirited, mocks old people as helpless ... what a disaster.	F
Put AOL's internet accelerator on a wheelchair and it ... jumps straight up? This one sucked.	D-
You inspire NFL players to read off cue cards.	F
Evil Navigators Love Emerald Nuts? What?	C
Vegas is Freedom!	D+
Jack has to let contest winners use his jet, car, and motorcycle.	D
Encouraging Norwegians Love Emerald Nuts. Hail Eris!	C
All the playoff losers sing "Tomorrow". Funny. Why couldn't the "you inspire" players act this well?	B+
We see Fiona in drawn white outlines because someone used an Outlook security hole to steal her normal look.	D
Sweaty guy jumps in a pitcher of water. I've had it with the human bobbleheads!	D-
Guy uses Expedia to avoid evil mimes. Stupid, has sex role cliches. I hate mimes.	C+
Talking chimp hits on his owner's girlfriend. Stupid and creepy.	D
Randy, king of the office supply underworld. "We all have needs."	B
Cialis lasts 36 hours. Middle-aged couples stop short of doing it on my TV screen. I appreciate their forebearance.	D
Another incoherent we-all-wake-up Monster ad.	F
The movie Hidalgo. Guess what: It's jumbled and incoherent.	D
Gillette Mach 3 Turbo will make you feel like a stud every day. What about the athletes with facial hair?	D-
SBC Yahoo allows man to build model rocket. Funny, though not clear what SBC Yahoo had to do with anything.	B
Tacoma cannot be destroyed! My friend Brian: "I'll bet it was driven by Toonces the cat."	B+
SBC treats small business ... huh? What?	D
Cadillacs have a weird rippling effect when driven. I will choose a more normal car.	D-
Man drives racecar to catch up to girlfriend's plane and give her lipstick. "This isn't mine." Clever twist.	B+
Must be tough being a designated driver.	D-
What dot-com account bin did Honda get its raised-by-wolves ad from?	D-
Mastercard: Homer Simpson. Not really that funny.	B-
AOL Top Speed leads to time travel.	C+
Ernhardt takes the handoff! Actually he could have been a blocker too. That would work.	B
"We ID under 75." -- a Virginia band a friend of mine saw in our youth.	D
Glass Freezepops are not for consumption. I hate this stuff on principle, but it was funny.	B+
Can you slam dunk the 7-UP truck?	A
The usual anti-drug ad.	D
The Lady Killer. Tom Hanks does lowbrow urban slapstick?	D-
Jimi Hendrix chooses between Pepsi and a guitar, or Coke and an accordion. Awesome.	A
AIG makes a play to get us into the score zone!	D
Subway informs us that it's not okay to misbehave after eating their food. This was getting a bad grade till they dragged in Wang Chung.	B+