In The News

It was a fairly busy news day, so I thought I'd comment on some of the stories I saw on CNN while eating lunch today.

-Kenneth Lay, the former Chairman and chief architect of the collapse of Enron, died today at 64 from an apparent heart attack, just a month after being found guilty of defrauding thousands of people of millions of dollars.

Honestly, this is the Best Case scenario for Lay. Let's see: spend the next 20-30 years in jail, or drop dead. Hmmmm. I wouldn't be surprised if they found about five gallons of Drano in Lay during the autopsy. Oh, and fuck you, Skilling; you just got this whole rap dumped on your head.

-North Korea conducted seven long-range missile tests, much to the chagrin of the rest of the planet.

N. Korea is funny. Here's a country where, like, 90% of the population lives in poverty with no electricity, yet here their government is, conducting billions of dollars worth of ICBM tests. And, to think: their neighbors to the south chose to develop their economy rather than their military. Stupid South Koreans!

-Atlantic City, due to a New Jersey budgetary crisis, which has caused the state to lay off all of their gambling inspectors, closed all of its casinos. Apparently, the casinos aren't allowed to operate if there are no inspectors available.

I don't know about you, but, if I'm the governor of New Jersey, I'm pulling out my personal checkbook and writing out whatever check it takes to balance this budget, because, quite honestly, there is no reason to be in New Jersey, other than to gamble in Atlantic City. I suspect people will begin moving out of the state very shortly.

-Bertelsmann Music Group, co-owner of Sony BMG, the world's second largest record company, is in talks with Sony to sell its 50% stake in the company to its co-owner.

With all of the shit that Sony has gone through in recent months, this is the last thing they need. "Yeah, we know you're hemorrhaging money trying to get the PS3 into the market, but we think we'd like to sell this record company to you. You can afford it, right?" If I'm Sir Howard Stringer, Sony's CEO, I'm putting a gun in my mouth.