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Contact Us: Swapsale@aol.com

EDITORIAL

NOTICE OF EVACUATION

Due to the increasing frequency of cataclysmic weather events worldwide, we have been forced to move up our plans for the evacuation of this time period.  We are still accepting reservations for the following time periods: Los Angeles 1947, New York 1950, and San Francisco 1956.  You will need appropriate clothing for the time period -- please check weather conditions for the month and day you will be transported to  --  as well as a way of purchasing currency for that time period.  Gold and diamonds are recommended.  Remember: carry-on luggage only.

The evacuations will begin this July and must be completed by June of 2014.  If you plan on riding out the events in this time period we wish to remind you that probes set to the year 2016 have not returned. 

You may continue to monitor this site for important updates.  Additional information can be obtained from your normal Time Relocation sources.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO SPAGHETTI-O's

Had I been forced to guess, I'd have said Spaghetti-O's have always been with us -- that there has never been a time in my long life that they haven't been on the supermarket shelf.  But of course, there haven't always been supermarkets and, as it turns out, Spaghetti-O's first made their appearance on those shelves in May 1965. I am certain, however, that they helped get me through college and a number of lean years thereafter. 

I learned about Spaghetti-O's birthday on the news this week.  That's what passes for news these days. That and a whole bunch of stuff about Obama, Benghazi, the IRS, and AP's phone records.  But those are just distractions, to keep us from focusing on what's really going on.  Not in the news this week (unless you were really paying attention) is the fact that carbon dioxide levels have passed 400 parts per million.  They haven't been that high for 3 million years, a time when human beings didn't even exist.  Many scientist have long considered this level of CO2 to be a potential tipping point that could dramatically escalate global climate change.  As if things weren't already alarming.  Check out Ice Attack in this issue's Weekly Watch, and our feature article on Methane.

Meanwhile, Happy Birthday to Spaghetti-O's.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

SWAPSALE SURVEY

Please help us make Swapsale.com a better website.  All you have to do is cut and paste the following survey into an email, fill it out, then send it to Swapsale@aol.com.  We will be forever grateful.

SWAPSALE SURVEY:

On a scale of one to ten, ten being best, here is how I rate the following Swapsale features.

IN MEMORIAM:____

CELEBRITY NEWS:____

SWAPSALE AUCTIONS:____

MOVIE TRAILER THEATER:____

SATURDAY MORNING TV SHOWS:____

FUNNY VIDEO CLIPS:____

CRAVEONLINE NEWS:____

SWAPSALE'S SERIAL THEATER:____

COSPLAY PIX OF THE WEEK:____

WEEKLY WATCH:____

ZENESCOPE COMIC BOOK RELEASES:____

GAMES:____

80s ROCK SCNE:____

TV PREVIEWS:____

WEEKLY DVD RELEASES:____

WEEKLY COMIC BOOK RELEASES:____

STATUES:____

SWAP TALK:____

WEEKLY OTR SHOWS:____

WEEKY SUNDAY COMICS:____

FEATURE ARTICLES:_____

My favorite Feature Articles are about FILM__, COMICS__, HEROES__, TELEVISION__, MUSIC__, PULPS__, MAGAZINES__, CHEESECAKE__, CARDS__, PIN-UP GIRLS__, BOOK REVIEWS__, SCIENCE__, PEOPLE__, HISTORY__, TRENDS__, ART__, SCI-FI__, PAPERBACKS__, TOYS__, CONSPIRACIES__  (You can check more than one item.)

I WOULD LIKE TO SEE MORE______________________________________________________________

I WOULD LIKE TO SEE LESS_______________________________________________________________

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS__________________________________________________________________

Thanks for taking the time to help us make this a better website.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

SPACE PATROL CAP UP FOR AUCTION

One of my most prized possessions has been a kids cap from the 1950s TV show, Space Patrol.  It was a premium give-a-way, and also sold in stores but very hard to find these days, especially one that's been autographed by the cast of the show.  I got this one over ten years ago on eBay from someone who clearly didn't know what he had.  He probably figured the writing on the cap detracted from it's value, no doubt written by the kid who owned it.  Wrong!  With help of Cadet Ed at the solarguard.com, I was able to verify the signatures are authentic.  

When I listed it for sale on this website back then, I put a price on it of $1200. That was what it would have taken for me to part with it without waking up in the middle of the night weeping.  So, no surprise, the listing has just been sitting there while I enjoyed the hat, displayed as you see it here, in my office. 

However, things change.  I've have two kids in college so I've got to get realistic about selling things, even those items I most prize.  I haven't decided on an opening bid yet -- it's a painful process -- but what;s certain is that this time it will be priced to move.  Space Patol fans take note:  This is a very rare and special item you are unlikely to find anywhere else.

For more pix and info click here.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

OUR CORRUPT CONGRESS

in 2011 the CBS news show 60 Minutes revealed that our Congress has been (for God knows how many years) legally doing something that, if caught, any other American would go to jail for: insider trading.  That's right, our elected Senators and Representatives (and their senior staffers) -- who regularly come into possession of information that will impact the stock market, have been routinely  profiting from their insider status, making can't miss stock buys.  The 60 Minutes revelation caused such a furer that -- amazingly enough -- our elected officials felt pressured to pass the Stock Act, making the practice illegal.  It was signed into law with great fanfare by President Obama.

What you may not know is that on Thursday April 11 the Congress quietly passed a new bill which more or less gutted the Stock Act.  Obama, with no fanfare this time, signed the bill into law on April 15, thus proving to anyone with half a brain that our elected officials are still above the law.

FACT CHECK:

http://www.opensecrets.org/news/2013/04/senate-guts-stock-act.html

http://news.firedoglake.com/2013/04/15/insider-dealing-for-insider-trading-congress-guts-stock-act-reporting-requirements/

http://finance.yahoo.com/blogs/breakout/stock-act-gets-gutted-why-care-173159298.html

Shame on them.  And shame on President Obama. 

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

ABOUT THE BOSTON BOMBINGS

Out of the horror came a small miracle: the Boston police department, the FBI, Homeland Security and the American people all working together to quickly identify, track down and capture those responsible for so much pain and suffering.  God bless all of them.

And God bless America!

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

MAKING THE OLD NEW AGAIN

The above words would seem to be more than appropriate for this week's installment of Swapsale.  Our weekly comic strip, Planet Patrol, which concluded last week, has been swapped out for an old favorite, 'Buck Rogers in the 25th Century.'  That 1940s strip from the Sunday funny pages should run for the next 57 weeks.  (You can find the first installment here.) While it's true that I ran this strip once before, that was quite a while ago.  We've acquired a bunch of new site visitors since then and, besides, I think it's worth a second look. 

We are also replacing the just concluded Flash Gordon movie serial with 'Undersea Kingdom' starring Ray 'Crash' Corrigan.  It will be running a chapter a week for the next 12 weeks.  You can find that at Swapsale's Serial Theater. 

Then there's this week's feature article on the 1960s TV show 'Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea.'  The article includes a complete episode of that show.  (You'll find it here.)  And let's not forget the 'Rocky Jones' episode posted in this week's Saturday Morning TV feature.'

Of course, you could say that making the old new again is a weekly endeavour at this site. Still, this week's edition seems like a home run to me.

Finally, Space Patrol fans might want to check out Elliott Swanson's missive in this week's "Comments" section.  

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

ANOTHER SPACE PATROL NOVEL?

Dr. Warren Chaney, author of the Space Patrol novel (among other things), has inspired many fans of the 1950s TV show Space Patrol.  I'm one of them.  Now, it would seem, so is Elliot Swanson, another SP fan whose name may be familiar to Swapsale site visitors for his many appearances and contributions to this site.  For one thing, Swanson's the guy who actually made a working Bade Runner gun that shoots real bullets.  He's also the guy who made the 3-D lentcular art for the Space Patrol limited Edition DVD that we sell. (You can check that out here..) 

Elliott, it seems, has been inspired by Dr. Chaney to write his own Space Patrol novel, the first segment of which can be found here.  Based on what he's written so far, I love it every bit as much as I love Warren's.  But let me warn you about something: it's a very, very different take on the old space opera that's certain to create controversy among SP fans.  I, for one, can't wait to see the reaction.

Finally, speaking of Warren Chaney, don't miss his very thoughtful email this week.  You'll find it in the "Comments" section below.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

PLANET PATROL ENDS NEXT WEEK

It's been a long run.  Over a hundred pages of story.  But Planet Patrol, my major comic book opus,  comes to an end next week.   It was a blast creating it.  And it was great hearing from those of you who egged me on.  Much obliged. But now it's time to once again start publishing some old Sunday classics.  Starting in two weeks, that will be some Buck Rogers strips from the 1940s.

For those of you who missed my strip, or who would like to revisit it, you can catch it from the beginning by clicking here.  For everyone else, it's onward and upward.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

MY FAVORITE SCI-FI SHOW (AT THE MOMENT)

"Continuum" first aired on the SyFy channel on Monday, January 14th.  It's about a group of future American Terrorists who manage to escape prison by time traveling into the past, along with a female police officer who is accidently transported with them.  Set in our own near future, the show follows the officer as she pursues the terrorists who are intent on implementing their radical agenda in their new time period, as a way of jump starting it.  But we soon divine that they have simply become the very people who started the resistance that would inspire them in the future.  But the time paradoxes don't end there.  Last week it was revealed that our female officer's trusted ally, the only person from our time period who knows her true identity, will become the very person in the future who engineers the terrorists' time traveling escape.  In short, the show is smart and entertaining.

There aren't a lot of TV shows I can say that about.  "Archer" comes to mind.  So does "Doctor Who."    If you like those shows, I certainly recommend you check out "Continuum."

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY

First, the good. We've insituted a new feature: Games.   I  figured that, since so many cosplayers dress up as game characters, it was probably overdue. Let's see how you guys like it.

The bad: we've been getting a little sloppy lately.  It's the increased work load.  We keep adding features but our staff remains the same.  Basically, I hope site visitors don't notice the mistakes.  If they do notice, I hope they'll forgive them.

The ugly:  we start updating this website on Thursdays.  On Thursday, the seventh, as we were in the middle of making the updates for last week's edition, someone -- I'm not mentioning any names -- accidently published the site.  We scrambled to fix it as best we could but, some of the updates had to remain published.  As a result, many of you saw portions of this past week's updates a few days early.  I apologize for that confusion.  And I promise it won't happen again.

This site is a lot of work.  I wouldn't do it if it wasn't a labor of love.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

UPDATE: TOM CORBETT, SPACE PATROL, CAPTAIN VIDEO AND ROCKY JONES APPAREL.

Last week I mentioned that Mike Elmo, the guy who makes the above mentioned sci-fi apparel, had warned me he might not be able to produce these items in the future.  As it happens, just twenty-four hours after I published that editorial, Mike called to say his manufacturer had just notified him that, effective immediately, they would no longer produce the embroidered jackets and shirts.  There simply were not enough orders to make it worth their while, given the amount of effort involved.  So, as it turns out, not only will we no longer be offering any Major Mars shirts, now the only sci-fi apparel we have for sale are the red, long sleeve Space Patrol shirts made by me.  And, of course, the Space Patrol holster and belt which we'll soon be out of. Those of you who already have the shirts and jackets are lucky.  No one else is offering anything like them.  Those of you who waited to order them are just out of luck.  Sorry about that.

You do however, have one last chance to get a Mike Elmo embroidered item: the Major Mars shirt being put up for auction this week.  The opening bid ($125) is a bit high, but as I mentioned in last week's editorial, it's the only one Mike ever had made.  (I can be seen modeling it here.)  If it doesn't sell at that price I will gladly keep it. 

For those of you who are unfamiliar with Major Mars, click here for three MM episodes.  The MM auction can be found here.  Remember:  This is your very last chance to get any Mike Elmo items.

 From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

Photo by Lance Wolf

A FEW WORDS ABOUT ROD THORP

As you may have noticed, this week CraveOnLine begins a retrospective on Die Hard, the movie series starring Bruce Willis.  The movies are based on a novel by Roderick Thorp called Nothing Lasts Forever (1979).  Thorp, who had also written The Detective (1966) which became a movie starring Frank Sinatra, was a friend of mine.  We were both living in Laurel Canyon in Los Angeles on the afternoon  the fires broke out in 1979.  At a party in Malibu when word of the fire reached me, I raced back to save my dog.  However, when I got there, the police refused to let me drive to my house even though the fire hadn't reached my section of the canyon. 

http://www.lafire.com/famous_fires/1979-0916_KirkwoodBowlFire/091679_Kirkwood.htm

Thorp, who had been at his house on Grandview Drive when the fire broke out, elected to stay and fight the blaze, despite threats of arrest from the police.  Working on his roof in the mid September heat with nothing more than a garden hose, Thorp battled the blaze hour after hour, his only assistance coming from water dropping planes which, as Thorp later put it, "were a godsend."  When it was finally over his house was still standing while most of his neighbors homes, including those of photographer Phil Groves and blues singer John Mayall (also friends of mine), had burned to the ground.   Thorp also managed to save the house immediately to his right, owned by Patrick Wayne (John Wayne's son), who was out of town at the time of the fire.  The fire missed my section of the canyon completely.

Ironically, Thorp lost his home a short while after that when he fell behind in his mortgage payments.  It wasn't until the first Die Hard movie (1988) that his career really rebounded.  Although he never got a shot at writing the screenplay for Die Hard, he got some nice royalty checks for selling the rights to his book.  Of course, with each successive movie the checks became less and less.  At some point Thorp referred to them as "chump change."  Rainbow Drive (1986) and Devlin (1988) became movies for HBO.  Yet despite a career that most writers would be proud to claim as their own, when he died in 1999 Thorp was broke.

That, unfortunately, is the fate of many, perhaps most mid level writers these days.  Unless you're Stephen King or J. K. Rowling, surviving as a writer is a struggle, largely because the publishing houses have found there's more money in self-help and tell-all books.  Thorp started out as a New Jersey college professor teaching creative writing.  But with the Success of The Detective, caught up in the glamour of Hollywood, he moved to L.A.  He would have been smart to have kept his professorship as a safety net.  But his life would have been less interesting, and, arguably, his writing less productive.  Writers without a safety net can never stop writing.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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THE 65TH ANNUAL DGA AWARDS CEREMONY

Occasionally I get invited to awards ceremonies.  Some of the events I've attended have featured speakers like Olivia Wilde, Michael Moore and Jesse Jackson.  Nothing against those people but for the most part the ceremonies were pretty dull.  That, however, was not the case with last night's 65th Annual Directors Guild Awards Dinner held in the Ray Dolby Ballroom at the Hollywood & Highland Center. 

Host Kelsey Grammer, kicked things off with a series of one liners that had everyone cracking up, including me.  This set the tone for the rest of the evening with each speaker, presenter and award winner -- Ben Affleck, Steven Spielberg, Lena Dunham, Ang Lee, Michael Apted, Kathryn Bigelo, to name a few -- displaying uncommon charm, wit and intelligence as they addressed their peers.  This was a group of very smart people.  And, of course, a group of very famous people, both on stage and in the audience.  Honestly, it was dazzling.

Attendees were advised in advance not to bring cameras.  However I noticed that many of the people there had brought their cameras  -- they're directors after all.  I, on the other hand, having obeyed the directive, I missed my chance to capture the many celebrities on film.  Still, my cancelation prize was pretty cool; each attendee got a tiny statuette featuring a gold director's chair with their name on the base.  Pretty cool. 

It goes without saying that this was the best awards ceremony I've ever been to. Now all I have to do is figure out how to get invited to next year's event.

For more on the DGA awards click here.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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53 YEARS AGO

I entered the United States Air Force on January 1960.  After basic training I was assigned to McCord Air Force Base just outside of Tacoma Washington.  Those were very formative years for me.  For the first time in my life I met people with diverse views and backgrounds, not proscribed by the provincial attitudes of small town America.  One of the people who had the most influence on me was Walter Landfair, an army enlisted man attached to our air base.  Walter was short -- maybe only five four -- and I was tall, all of six two.  Together we looked like Mutt and Jeff.

Walter was brilliant. He taught me how to think critically and logically.  He was also more than a little weird, insisting he came from Venus.  (Back then it was believed Venus might be habitable.)  Yes, Walter agreed, he was human.  But back in the 1800's, according to him, a small group of scientists on Earth, having discovered the secret of anti gravity, immigrated to Venus where they set up their own society, based in science.  Occasionally Walter would drop this façade and talk about growing up in San Francisco but even then -- when this apparent inconsistency was pointed out to him -- he'd maintain the fiction that he was a Venusian who would occasionally visit Earth.

I never heard from Walter after he was discharged. However, for many years after that I assumed I'd see his name again, probably on the cover of a science fiction magazine like Analog or Galaxy. Alas, that never happened.

I've always wondered what happened to him.  So I'm writing this editorial in the hope that somebody reading this might have the answer.  After all, they say all of us are only separated from someone else by six intermediaries.  Anyone out there know Walter Landfair?

For more on the six degrees of separation concept, click here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six_degrees_of_separation

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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THE BIG DAY!

Well, we think today is special.  This is the day we've expanded the number of items we put up for auction each week and also the number of days we list new auctions.  Going forward this site will list our Big Auction every Sunday -- we're switching back to Sunday from our Monday auctions, an experiment that didn't produce the results we anticipated -- plus we'll list at least one new auction item every day after that.  That's right; we will now have daily auction listings.  You can click here to see all our mew auctions.

This new auction format means a lot more work for us and, frankly, since we're a small operation, may turn out to be another failed experiment.  But for now, we are giving it our all.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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OUR NEXT BIG MOVE

Yes, we've got more big plans for this website.  In fact, they're so big, I'm not even sure what they are exactly -- even though we plan to launch this new feature next week.  I can, however, tell you the upgrade will involve our auctions.  Expect more items, cooler items (such as what is shown here) and maybe even daily auctions.  Not sure yet.

BTW, the above item -- a "3D Movie Poster" from A Nightmare On Elm Street -- is actually a molded sculpture, beautifully rendered, a real work of art.  But that's just a teaser.  Other items will be from Star Trek, Family Guy and Hot Wheels, just for starters.  They will not supplant our current auction format.  These auctions will be in addition to what we've been doing all along.  So check us out next week.  And get ready to bid .

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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NEXT WEEK'S NEW MOVIE SERIAL

Twelve weeks ago, when I announced that we would once again be running complete movie serials -- a chapter a week -- on this website, I said that our first feature, Captain Marvel Vs. The Scorpion, was one of the best.  Actually, upon reflection, there are a number of serials that are better qualified to be listed as among the best: Phantom Empire, Buck Rogers, and the Fash Gordon serials above all.  So I'm happy to announce that starting next week, the original Flash Gordon will be appearing in Swapsale's Serial Theater.

I don't know what I was thinking when I said Captain Marvel was one of the best.  I still think it's damn good.  But a lot of them are good.  (And many more are not.)  Flash Gordon, however, tops my personal list.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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PREDICTING THE END OF THE WORLD

Well, as it turns out, the Mayans blew it -- the world didn't end, we're all still here.  However, there will certainly be other predictions of this sort in the future so I got to thinking, why don't we, the Swapsale audience, try our hand at making our own prediction. 

Sound crazy?

After the recent election cycle I wrote an editorial about the wisdom of crowds.  Here's a slightly revised version of what I wrote:

In 1906 British scientist Francis Galton came upon a weight guessing contest involving a fat ox.  Eight hundred mostly average people participated in the contest, few of whom had any expertise regarding Oxen. He later made the comparison to a democratic election; "The average competitor was probably as well fitted for making a just estimate of the dressed weight of the ox, as an average voter is of judging the merits of most political issues on which he votes," he wrote. When the contest was over Galton gathered the tickets from the organizers and calculated the mean of the groups guesses.  While no individual guessed the ox's weight, the 800 participants, averaged together, pretty much got it on the nose. The ox weighted 1,198 pounds.  The group guess was 1,197.  So Galton postulated that the crowd was smarter than even the smartest individual in it.

That got me to wondering about other applications -- aside from judging the weight of an ox or how many jelly beans are in a Jar -- the wisdom of crowds could be applied to.  Could it, for example, predict future events?  Did Nate Silver of the New York Times use the wisdom of crowds supposition to predict the November election results with such stunning accuracy? According to Ravi Iyer & Jessie Graham at the University of Southern California "Wise crowds...have been shown to be better than political scientists at predicting election outcomes (Sjoberg, 2009) and as good as FIFA [Federation Internationale de Football Association] at predicting soccer outcomes (Herzog & Hertwig, 2011)."  

The Los Angeles Times reports that "Nine years ago, Congress blocked a Pentagon agency from setting up a website that would have allowed anyone with a credit card to bet on the likelihood of foreign assassinations, coups and terrorist attacks. The idea was to take advantage of the "wisdom of crowds," a social science maxim that contends the average of a group of forecasters, under certain circumstances, tends to be more accurate than even the most knowledgeable single forecaster."

So here's my proposal: Let's see if we can predict when the world (as we know it) will come to an end.  Yes, I understand that at first blush this sounds crazy.  Unlike guessing the weight of an ox or the number of jelly beans in a jar, there's, at least on appearance, a complete lack of data.  Or is there? One could argue we are surrounded by data; the science, the politics, the environment, the social movements -- all those things that make up our world.  It doesn't strike me as being significantly different from predicting an assassination or terrorist attack. 

Then there's the notion of the collective unconscious postulated by Carl Gustav Jung, the noted Swiss Psychotherapist.  He believed we are all connected to a higher level of wisdom that we can occasionally tap into. 

But how, you might ask, will we know if the prediction is correct?  If the result states that the world will end in a million years, we'll have to wait a long time for confirmation.  If the prediction is that the world will end in our life time, winning will be scant consolation.  Only a losing prediction will answer if we were accurate or not.  But we will learn, in any case, the group state of mind.  Optimistic? Or pessimistic?

One last thing: to be at all credible, we'll need a large response.  Research at Carnegie Mellon University showed that "small but powerful groups can easily distort what the "crowd" really thinks."  So please email (to swapsale@aol.com) how many years you think we have until it all comes crashing down and any additional notions you might have about the ending of the world.   And ask your friends to do the same. The more respondents we get, the greater our accuracy.

This is just an experiment. It will be interesting to see the result.

UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA:

http://www-bcf.usc.edu/~jessegra/papers/IG.2012.Wisdomofcrowds.PI.pdf

CARNEGIE MELLON:

http://readwrite.com/2009/09/17/the_dirty_little_secret_about_the_wisdom_of_the_crowds

LOS ANGELES TIMES:

http://articles.latimes.com/2012/aug/21/nation/la-na-cia-crowds-20120821

CARL JUNG:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collective_unconscious

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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OUR CHRISTMAS SCHEDULE

Hopefully you haven't noticed, but this is a slightly abbreviated edition of Swapsale.com, due to the holiday season and the onslaught of relatives due to arrive on Christmas eve.  (And believe me, onslaught is the right word.)   What with all the preparation for their arrival -- house cleaning, setting up the tree, buying presents, preparing the turkey -- there was far less time to devote to our humble internet operation. So, as you noticed last week, we've suspended our auctions until December 31, 2012 (although in truth we've found this is not a good time of year for them anyway, what with everyone else being preoccupied with the same things we are) and taken a few other short cuts as well. We've also published this week's edition a little earlier than usual so we'd be able to help with the Christmas preparations. 

Anyway, we think this is still a pretty good issue and would especially like to draw your attention to this week's Feature Article: A 1950s Christmas.   It's a trip back to a different (and some would say better) time where all we had to worry about was being nuked by the Russians.  Who knew they would be the "good old days"?

Next week, we'll once again be running at full tilt.  Meanwhile, we hope you all enjoy the Holidays. 

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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THE NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS

The holiday season has been darkened by the unspeakably horrible, gut wrenching mass shooting this December 14th at the Sandy Hook Connecticut grammar school, one of thirteen mass shootings this year, depending on how you measure such events. (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/special/nation/us-mass-shootings-2012/)  Back in the 1950s, when I was a kid, it was a better world.  That's not to say everything was perfect; we had our Texas Tower shooting and Charles Manson, but nothing like this -- nothing so unrelenting and apparently ingrained in the very fabric of our society, to the point where you have to fear going to the mall, to work, or sending your kids to school.  Something is wrong with us as a nation.

Of course the first thing the news media wants to focus on is gun regulation. As a gun owner who strongly supports the second amendment, I approach this issue with trepidation and note that in a number of recent cases background checks would have made no difference.  Nonetheless I concede that our gun laws in many states are way too loose.  We should fix that.

However, we have a deeper problem in this country than lax gun regulation.  There is a rot that has taken hold which has cast neighbor against neighbor, state against state, race against race, class against class, and urban against rural.  The American people are angry and frustrated by a system which has cast them adrift at a time when predators such as banks, government agencies and mega businesses are out to screw them.  If you come down with a catastrophic illness, good luck with that health insurance you've been paying into for the last thirty years.  And if you are mentally ill, just try getting help.  We have become a nation of us against them and "them" is everyone and everything that is beyond our control -- which is most everything.

Nothing will change in any meaningful way until we stop reacting defensively and with fear.  We should, as a nation, resolve to see even the lowliest among us as our brothers and sisters, reaching out to them any way we reasonably can.  We should be kinder, gentler and more loving.  We should ask, not what is best for us, but what is best for the majority.  We must become a nation of people again, not a nation of disparate groups seeking to protect their own self interest.  It is anger, isolation and desperation that drives  people to the edge of sanity.

Should we undertake such an endeavor, we will certainly fail from time to time but, over all, if we persist, we will most certainly become better people.  And a better country.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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THE DARK KNIGHT RISES

Finally saw it this weekend OnDemand.  Excellent movie.  So much better than the Tim Burton films that kicked off the franchise.  Indeed, this whole reboot has been just what was  needed, in my view, to pay proper homage to the Batman; smart story and character development.

However, I do have one minor nit-pick: the drawn out defeat of the Batman and his consequent imprisonment.  It was way too drawn out.  I'm not even sure it was needed.  Yes, I understand that the story line demanded Batman be defeated but I'm sure there was a better, quicker way to get there.  Here's the problem: when Batman becomes a character from Les Miserables, it is no longer a Batman movie.  We saw that with the second Chris Reeve Superman movie.  When Superman gives up his powers he is no longer Superman.  Thus the movie loses the very character that brought the audience to the theater.

Anyway, as I said, that's a nit-pick.  Over all the film is good enough to survive this false step.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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ON THE ROAD

I was in high school in the 1950s when I stumbled upon the book On the Road by Jack Kerouac.  It was about Kerouac's true-life adventures hitch-hiking and driving cars across America with his pal Dean Moriarity (actually Neal Cassidy).  The book was a life changer for me; before I turned 27 I had hitched-hiked (and hopped freight trains) across county 9 times, my final journey taking me from New York to Seattle to San Francisco during the Summer of Peace and Love.  Hitch-hiking back east from San Francisco at the end of that summer I was picked up in Iowa by a psychopath who had just been released from San Quentin. Without going into a lot of detail, I'll just say I was lucky to escape with my life.  That's why I never hitch-hiked again.

Jack Kerouac and Neal Cassidy

Nonetheless, it was a great time for me.  Despite lacking the funds, I could travel anywhere in the country just by sticking out my thumb.  What a wonderful sense of freedom.  During that time I met some great people and had some great adventures while discovering a world far beyond the boundaries of Boonton, New Jersey, the town I grew up in.  And yes, there were drugs and like our current president, I inhaled. 

When it came time to settle down I headed to New York's East Village where I helped start Interview magazine for Andy Warhol (still being published to this day) and did a comic strip for an underground newspaper.   It was a path I have pretty much stuck to.

I mention all this because of the movie, On The Road, based on the Kerouac novel, due to be released December 21.  Frankly, I can't wait to see it.  I might even drag my 71-year-old ass out of the house and to a movie theater (rather than wait for it to appear on TV as is my wont)-- assuming the Mayans don't screw things up.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

LAST WEEK TO ENTER!  NOTHING TO LOSE!

Click on banner to win three free Zenescope trade paperbacks!

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TEARS FOR CAREN

My Hollywood agent, Caren Bohrman, passed away this week.  (See In Memoriam.) Although we hadn't worked together for a very long time she always took my calls.  And she made it clear that if I ever got serious about reentering the entertainment business, she was ready to represent me.  Which is why I've considered her to be my agent for the last twenty years.

It was Caren who got me my pilot with ABC.  And Caren who, in an industry filled with sharks, introduced me to people I'm still friends with today.  I've had other agents and they all disappointed me in one way or another.  But even when things turned to sh*t, Caren continued to believe in me.  Or at least made me feel that she did -- which was good enough.  I've never met anyone who didn't like her.

I've lost an agent.  But the world has lost a warm, loving and creative person.  There's no doubt she will be missed.

CAREN BOHRMAN INTERVIEW: http://www.scriptologist.com/Magazine/Interviews/Caren/Caren_pf/caren_pf.html

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

Click on banner to win three free Zenescope trade paperbacks!

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THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN

I finally got to watch The Amazing Spider-Man on my 70 inch 3-D TV.  To my delight, I found the comic book reboot to be (almost) everything I want and demand from a superhero movie. Most importantly, it had a story and well thought out characters.  For my money, the previous three Spider-Man films paid more attention to special effects than to story and character.  Even worse, the effects depicted scenes that simply defied physics.  In order for a superhero movie to succeed, it is, in my view, crucial that it not strain credulity.  You are already asking the audience to take a major leap of faith just with the basic premise that your hero has super powers.

When the first series of Spider-Man films came out I was odd man out in my feelings about it.  Most of the people I know -- many of whom are comic book geeks like myself -- loved them (the first two, anyway).  I thought they were just okay for reasons already articulated.  But now I see a Rotten Tomatoes approval rating of 73% for this new film and an audience rating of A-. Not bad. Hopefully all this -- including the smart Iron Man and rebooted Batman films -- mark a new trend for superhero movies.  Fingers crossed.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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WIN 3 ZENESCOPE TRADE PAPERBACK COMIC BOOKS!

I'm delighted to announce that Swapsale, in conjunction with Zenescope Entertainment, will be giving away 3 trade paperbacks worth a total of $41.97.  (For more information on the contest, click here.)  But that's just the first of many contests we'll be offering.  Over the next several months -- if not longer -- we will be offering more comic book give-a-ways as well some DVD contests and, if things work out, a few nifty surprises not yet nailed down.  It's our way of saying thank you to all the many people who have supported this site by visiting it on a regular basis. 

ON OTHER MATTERS

Regarding the election, let me draw your attention to something called The Wisdom of Crowds: In 1906 British scientist Francis Calton came upon a weight guessing contest involving a fat ox.  Eight hundred mostly average people participated in the contest, few of whom had any expertise regarding Oxen. He later made the comparison to a democratic election; "The average competitor was probably as well fitted for making a just estimate of the dressed weight of the ox, as an average voter is of judging the merits of most political issues on which he votes," he wrote. When the contest was over Calton gathered the tickets from the organizers and calculated the mean of the groups guesses.  While no individual guessed the ox's weight, the 800 participants, averaged together, pretty much got it on the nose. The ox weighted 1,198 pounds.  The group guess was 1,197.  So if your candidate lost you might take some solace from the fact that the crowd was smarter than even the smartest individual in it.

FACT CHECK:

http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2012/08/06/wisdom-of-crowds/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wisdom_of_Crowds

Finally, for those concerned about my sister and her husband, victims of hurricane Sandy (see last week's Editorial), they are fine although their electrical power has been intermittent since it's restoration about a week after the storm hit.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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HURRICANE SANDY, CLIMATE CHANGE AND THE ELECTION

We've all watched in horror as the East Coast got slammed by what we used to call a hundred year storm but which now occurs every few years.  I've been particularly concerned about my sister who lives in Manhattan on 14th street right next to the Con-Ed substation that blew up during the storm.  I haven't heard from her since the storm hit. 

14th Street and Avenue C

There's no question that we are witnessing the effects of global climate change caused by the our planet's overall warming, the result of human activity.  The only scientists who argue that point are those in the pay of the fossil fuel industry including Exxon and the Kock brothers.  Ditto the politicians who get their campaigns financed by these people. 

FACT CHECK:

http://news.yahoo.com/scientists-look-climate-change-superstorm-223342829.html

When I think about my 66-year-old sister an her husband dealing with the nightmare of lower Manhattan, Mitt Romney's words mocking President Obama over climate change at the Republican convention really aggravate me. "President Obama promised to begin to slow the rise of the oceans and to heal the planet," he said derisively. "My promise ... is to help you and your family." On Meet the Press Romney told David Gregory "I'm not in this race to slow the rise of the oceans or to heal the planet. I'm in this race to help the American people."  Slowing global warming would help the American people.

As if that wasn't bad enough, Romney has said he favors privatizing FEMA. 

FACT CHECK: 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/31/paul-krugman-mitt-romney-fema_n_2050113.html

How, exactly, would that work?  Will you have to write a check before they rescue you from your roof?  It's a fact that at least one privatized fire department let a home burn down because the home's owner hadn't paid a yearly fee for fire protection -- even though he offered to pay them on the spot.  Given that, how hard is it to imagine a privatized FEMA letting people drown?  There are some things the government simply must be responsible for. 

FACT CHECK:

http://www.wpsdlocal6.com/news/local/Firefighters-watch-as-home-burns-to-the-ground-104052668.html

I'm not a big Obama fan.  But Romney scares the hell out of me.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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WHY I'M VOTING DEMOCRATIC

There are a number of reasons why I feel the Dems are the better bet.  Here are a few of them:

1. Republicans, including Romney, believe in "trickle down economics," more accurately known as "supply side economics."  That's the belief that tax breaks for the rich creates jobs because the more money these job creators have the more likely they are to hire people.  We've had that policy pretty much starting with Reagan all the way through George W. Bush. During that time we've seen a great transfer of wealth from the middle class to the rich.  It destroyed our economy in 2007-2008.    Democrats, on the other hand, believe in Keynesian Economics which postulates that big business will only hire more workers if there is more demand for their products.  Hence, the government creates jobs -- building roads and bridges, for example -- which gives the middle class money to spend on goods and services, which, in turn, creates demand that fires up the factories once again.  FDR used Keynesian Economics to get us out of the Great Depression.

FACT CHECK:

http://factchecked.org/2009/dictionary/keynesian-economics/

http://factchecked.bootnetworks.com/Dictionary.aspx?myTerm=Supply-side+Economics

2. The Romney-Ryan plan to "save" Medicare, in essence, gives us a choice between traditional Medicare and a voucher program. According to FactCheck.org It's likely that under the Republican plan "as current beneficiaries get older, they’re increasingly going to be the only ones left in traditional Medicare. For them, then the cost of the program will likely rise faster.” Additionally, according to the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation, nearly six in 10 Medicare recipients would pay higher premiums under a hypothetical privatized system like the Romney-Ryan plan.  They also note that there could be "striking regional differences that could lead to big premium hikes in some states and counties." The Kaiser Family had one caveat: their analysis was hampered by the lack of detail in the Romney-Ryan proposal. (The lack of detail in their plan should be of concern to all of us.)  Ultimately the Romney Ryan plan would likely destroy traditional Medicare over the long term.

FACT CHECK: 

http://factcheck.org/2012/08/a-campaign-full-of-mediscare/

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/15/romney-ryan-medicare-privatized-system_n_1967285.html

http://tinyurl.com/8bj3l6h

3.  It seems as if Mitt Romney  will say anything to get elected.  Sure, you can say that about most politicians, maybe all of them.  But from where I sit, Romney has taken this trait to a new level. 

FACT CHECK:

http://mediamatters.org/research/2012/10/23/another-debate-another-litany-of-romney-falseho/190860

http://mediamatters.org/research/2012/10/04/romneys-debate-dishonesty-came-straight-from-fo/190360

http://mediamatters.org/blog/2012/10/16/challenging-the-12-million-jobs-claim-and-chang/190676

http://nashriggins.com/2012/09/07/the-evolution-theory-mitt-romney-republicans-abortion/

4. The Republicans got us into two unfunded wars and destroyed the economy.  Seventeen of Romney's  twenty-four foreign policy advisers are George W. Bush neo-cons.  I don't want to go back there.

FACT CHECK:

http://www.policymic.com/articles/11219/mitt-romney-foreign-policy-team-17-of-24-advisors-are-bush-neocons

5. I'm for Obama Care which is the same as Romney Care, the plan Mitt Romney put in place when he was Governor of Massachusetts.  It's working fine there so I see no reason why it wont work for the rest of the country.  Governor Romney has promised to get rid of Obama Care including the part about preexisting conditions (unless you already have insurance).

FACT CHECK:

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2012/oct/05/mitt-romney/mitt-romney-says-his-health-care-plan-covers-pre-e/

Finally, you might want to check out this week's feature article on the Detroit bailout.  It's about hedge funds, one of which Romney is involved with.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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THE RETURN OF SWAPSALE'S SERIAL THEATER

I'm pumped!  After the passage of way too many years, we are bringing back Swapsale's Serial Theater.  And this time it's free!  Each week -- starting now -- we'll be adding a new episode of the 12 chapter  Adventures of Captain Marvel starring Tom Tyler, for my money one of the best movie serils ever made.  Just click here, then click on the ticket booth to enter the theater.

Yeah, we should have done this a long time ago but, well, we're a small operation and, hopefully you'll agree, we have been upgrading this site all along anyway, adding new features like CraveOnLine, 80s Rock Scene, Celebrity News, Cosplay Pix of the Week and more.  Nonetheless, Swapsale's Serial Theater is pretty darn cool, right?

But here's the best news: We do not intend to rest on our laurels. Sometime in the next few weeks -- in collaboration with Zenescope Entertainment, we will be raffling off a whole bunch of really cool comic books.  And that will be followed by even more free prizes. Keep your eyes peeled for that.  Hoo-Hah!

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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THE RYAN/BIDEN DEBATE

I call it a draw. Again, both sides omitted key facts and misrepresented others.  However, as a senior citizen collecting Social Security (and who will soon be getting Medicare) my primary concern was (and is) the Romney/Ryan Medicare plan. 

That's a complicated issue.  Medicare is going broke.  And neither the Republicans nor the Democrats have, in my opinion, a satisfactory solution to the problem.  So the question is, which plan is worse.  For my money that would be the Republican plan.  Here's how the L.A. Times sums it up:

"[The Republican] proposal says that Medicare beneficiaries entering the program after 2022 should get a fixed amount of federal money to buy either a private insurance plan or the traditional Medicare plan.

Although the Romney-Ryan plan preserves Medicare as an option, the voucher will not necessarily be adequate to pay for it.

Under the GOP plan, the value of the voucher will be tied to available plans in different areas in the country, assuring that it is sufficient for the two lowest-cost options. If a senior wants a more costly health plan, he or she would have to pay the difference.

That means that if Medicare is not one of the two low-cost options, the voucher would not be adequate to guarantee Medicare coverage."

For the entire article click here:  http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-fact-check-ryan-medicare-debate-20121011,0,1064609.story

For those of you who don't trust the Times (and there's good reason for that), there's FactCheck.org:   http://www.factcheck.org/2012/08/a-campaign-full-of-mediscare/  Be warned, however: The analysis is very detailed; you will really be wading through the weeds here.  Patience and concentration a must.

As for me, I'm convinced that the Romney/Ryan plan -- with its voucher option -- is not workable.  If you're sixty-five or over, I think it might be hard (or impossible) to find an insurance company which will give you the same kind of coverage you get from Medicare at a rate you can afford.  More than that, a voucher option takes money from Medicare, assuring that it will go bankrupt. Finally, AARP has endorsed the Obama Health care plan including the Medicare spending cuts. 

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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THE FIRST PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE

No doubt about it, Obama got his clock cleaned.  However, while both candidates made misstatements and omitted key facts, it was Romney who came off as a "serial exaggerator," says factcheck.org.  (Noble prize winning economist Paul Krugman was less kind regarding Romney's "facts." See his comments here:  http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/05/opinion/krugman-romneys-sick-joke.html?_r=0.)

Case in point: The 5 trillion (actually 4.8 trillion) dollar tax cut.  According to factcheck.org Romney's 20% tax cuts actually would add up to [approximately] 5 trillion dollars if extrapolated over a ten year period.  Additionally, while it's true that Romney has repeatedly said his rate cuts and tax eliminations would be offset and the deficit wouldn’t increase, the Tax Policy Center concluded that it wasn’t mathematically possible for Romney's plan to make these cuts without either favoring the wealthy [at the expense of the middle class] or increasing the federal deficit.  Of the six "other studies" Romney pointed to, two were from pro Romney bloggers and only one was non partisan.  The non partisan study, says factcheck.org, could only be pulled off if you assume "an extra 3 percent “growth effect” to the economy resulting from Romney’s rate cuts. That’s an extremely aggressive assumption, and in conflict with recent experience."  

To see the entire analysis of the debate, click here: http://factcheck.org/2012/10/dubious-denver-debate-declarations/  You will find detailed criticism of both men, logically explained.  Read it carefully and read it all.  If you intend to vote you owe it to yourself to study this report.  Actually, if you're going to vote you owe it to all of us to study this report. 

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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WHO ARE THE 47 PERCENT?

First of all, the actual number of people not paying taxes is a little over 46%, not the 47% quoted by presidential candidate Mitt Romney.  Here's how the Tax Policy Center breaks it down:

28% paid payroll taxes, meaning that although they had jobs, once they took their tax breaks, they were considered too poor to pay any Federal income taxes:

That leaves 18%, most of whom are low income workers or the elderly living on Social Security:

Of that amount, 7% earned less that $20,000 a year but paid no payroll tax:

The remaining 1% who didn't pay taxes are mostly the super rich who used tax loop holes and off shore accounts to avoid paying their fair share:

For more info go to: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/special/politics/tax-reality-check/notax.html

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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THE WEALTH GAP

We keep hearing talk about the "redistribution of wealth."  It comes from the Republicans who maintain that increasing taxes on the rich is class warfare because it takes money from them and redistributes it to the poor and middle class.  That is, in fact, quite true.  However, what is omitted from the dialogue is that for the past 30 odd years the tax breaks for the rich have taken money from the poor and middle class (mostly the middle class) and redistributed it to the rich.  Just look at this chart compiled by the Congressional Budget Office:

What you are looking at is the wealth gap, created by tax breaks for the rich.  As you can see the disparity between rich Americans and the middle class was far less dramatic in the 1970s when (incidentally) the economy was doing relatively well.  The money the rich saved in taxes came out of the hide of working class people in the form of cuts to the funding of schools, infrastructure improvements, hospitals (which used to be nonprofit), entitlements (such as Social Security and Medicare which is why we keep hearing that these entitlements are going broke) and the like. 

However you vote this November, please keep these facts in mind.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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ATTENTION STAR WARS FANS

Aside from the Varan lobby card that's up for auction this week, please note that we are also offering a very rare, hard to get Star Wars Stormtrooper collectible timepiece.  If you can find it on eBay -- or anywhere -- it usually goes for around fifty bucks.  We're offering it for an opening bid of $39.95.

. 

This item is way cool!  Aside from its rarity, the time piece comes with a Millennium Falcon watch case. The back of the blister pack has a cool pic of the troopers plus info on the troopers and the shooting of the movie.  If you are a Star Wars collector, this is a must have item.  For more info click here.

BTW, we also think the Varan lobby card, with an opening bid of $29.00 is a bargain as well.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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REMEMBERING CHESTY MORGAN

Last week, if you read the CraveOnLine section of this site, you saw a pic of Chesty Morgan as she appears on a just released DVD of her 3 movies -- not Academy Awards contenders. (To see that article click here and scroll down to 9-2-12.) This week, with little to write about -- the speakers at the Democratic National Convention, while prone to exaggeration and hyperbole, were more or less free of outright lies -- I thought I'd talk about my one encounter with the famous stripper.

It was the early 1970s in New York City.  I was interviewing her at a Times Square restaurant for a tabloid I was working for.  The first thing I noticed about her -- well, okay, the second thing -- was that she had a lovely face.  The problem was, that's not the portion of her body your eyes were drawn to.  Just walking over to the restaurant with her was an experience; men were bumping into each other as she walked past.  And in case you are wondering, by all accounts including Chesty's, her remarkable breasts were 100% natural.

Her story was remarkable.  When she was married, Chesty insisted, she would only make love with the lights out.  That's how shy she was.  Then her husband was killed by a robber.  Unable to pay the bills, and at the urging of a friend, she eventually agreed to try stripping.  Her life (and attitude toward her own body) changed almost overnight.  She laughed when she told me how once, when her car broke down on the Bell Parkway, three cars slammed on their brakes at the same time as she waved her handkerchief in distress. I had no trouble believing that.

As it turns out, Chesty is still alive, retired in Florida.  It's not known how old she is but I'd guess she's at least in her eighties.  I wouldn't mind interviewing her again.  That would give me an excuse to run the 3-D pic I have of her.  It came from the book that is up for auction this week: The Big Book of Breasts 3-D.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off.   

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JUST THE FACTS, MAM

Those of us on the left and those of us on the right agree that there's a lot riding on this years presidential election.  So I'm sure we can also agree that, as Joe Friday would say on Dragnet all those many years ago, our politicians should stick to "just the facts."  Regretably, the facts were in short supply at last week's Republican National Convention.

Here are some of the patently false things that were said by various speakers at the convention:

*Obama has raised taxes on the middle class.  In fact he has cut takes for that segment of the population.

*Obama swiped 716 billion dollars from Medicare.  Actually, he took that money from Medicare providers; it will have no impact on Medicare recipients.  Also, V.P. Candidate Paul Ryan takes the exact same amount of money from Medicare but it's not from the providers and it's at best unclear where that savings would go.

*Ryan has said he wants to protect Medicare for future recipients.  In fact, he would turn it into a voucher system.  It would no longer be Medicare.

The were more falsehoods, unfortunately, but you don't have to take my word for it.  Here's what Factcheck.org had to say about the following speeches:

Romney's-

http://factcheck.org/2012/08/romneys-big-night/

Ryan's-

http://factcheck.org/2012/08/ryans-vp-spin/

Santorum's-

http://factcheck.org/2012/08/santorums-distorted-dependency-claims/

Christi's-

http://factcheck.org/2012/08/christies-fact-free-keynote/

There are important arguments to be made on both sides of the aisle.  But a debate filled with lies and half truths is not worth having.  Indeed, it is not a debate at all.  It's a tragedy.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off.   

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A SMALL FILING PROBLEM

Some of you may remember how, a while back, I mentioned that this website had 26000 files on it -- way too many.  That happened because, well, back in the early days of site publishing, I had no idea what I was doing, or, more to the point, how to eliminate images.  I thought that if I just took them off the site, they were deleted.  Yes, in retrospect, that was pretty stupid.  It was an act of stupidity which left me with a problem.  26000 files.

I started on the problem some months ago.  Working diligently I knocked the files back from 26000 to 23000.  Not bad.  But then I took my foot off the gas.  Next time I checked, thanks to all the new images I had added, I was back up to 25000, a disaster from my point of view.  So for the last two weeks I have renewed my file cleansing efforts.

But there's a problem: Given the size of my site and the almost 12 years that I have been publishing, and with so many files to eliminate, I can't be sure that I'm not accidently eliminating files that I've still got posted.  So that's where you come in.  I'm asking site visitors to alert me if they see a problem anywhere on this massive site, mostly regarding missing images. 

There are simply too many pages, too many departments, for me to accurately check them all, especially as I keep my focus on eliminating all those old, out of date files that still remain.  In the past you guys have been very generous when it comes to giving me a heads-up.  So I'm really counting on you now.  If you see a problem just email me at: swapsale@aol.com

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off.   

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JUST IN: SPACE PATROL VOLUME 15

Some months ago, with the release of Space Patrol, The Lost Episodes volume 14, I announced that there would be more DVDs to come.  Well, it's been a slow and painful process, but I'm pleased to announce that volume 15 has finally been added to our listings.  The episodes on this volume are The Black Falcon of Planet X (#144), Destruction From Planet X (#145), The Ice Demon of Planet X (146), Slaves of Planet X (147).

You can buy SP Volume 15 on this site for $12.95 by clicking here.  Or you can bid on this DVD on eBay where we are listing it with a starting bid of $5.95.   Either way, it's a bargain.

Finally, regarding Space Patrol, it looks as though Dr. Warren Chaney -- the author of the Space Patrol novel that we've been running in serialized form --  will be writing and perhaps directing a feature length movie.  You can find out more about that in this week's edition of Swap Talk.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off.   

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ALF AND ME

According to CraveOnLine.com, Sony Pictures is making a feature length movie based on the 1980s TV show about a cat eating alien living with a human family.  William Bibbiani's review of the show for CraveOnLine isn't very kind but I enjoyed the early episodes.  In fact,  I wrote a couple of episodes for the show.

ALF was produced by Tom Patchett and Paul Fusco.  Patchett was my guy.  I never met Fusco who was the puppeteer and usually on set.  Rumor had it that Patchett and Fusco didn't get along.  Indeed, by the time I handed in my second episode Patchett had left the show.  With Fusco in charge my first episode got changed from Alf accidently swallows a bomb to Alf gets a cold.  I thought the idea was lame but did the rewrite as instructed, giving it my best shot.  When it aired all my best jokes had been removed. The second episode I wrote, Alf builds a time machine out of a lawnmower, never got produced. 

Naturally, I consider Patchett to have been the brains of the show.  In fact, his writing credits include The Bob Newhart Show, The Tony Randall Show and The Carol Burnett Show to name only a few.  He was also the executive producer of a number of other fine shows including Bagdad Cafe with Woopie Goldberg.  Although that show wasn't a hit, I mention it because the other producer on the show was Zev Braun.  I worked with Zev on a pilot for ABC in the early 90s.  We are friends to this day. 

I wish Patchett well with the movie.  It could be great if only they lose the puppet.  After all everything is CGI these days. 

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off.   

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MARILYN MONROE FIFTY YEARS LATER

I was never a big Marilyn Monroe fan.  Jayne Mansfield was more my type.  But there's no doubt, mine was a minority view.  Fifty years after her death (on August 5th 1962) Marilyn remains the definitive sex icon of her genertion and, arguably, all generations since.  If you only counted her singing "Happy Birthday Mister President," she would be indelibly stencilled on our minds.  But, in point of fact, she has left behind an impressive body of work that includes "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes" and "The Seven Year Itch."  Given that this is the fiftieth anniversary of her death, I'm reminding you we have an in-depth article about her posted on this site.  You can find it here.  

On another matter, I was sad to learn of author, political curmudgeon Gore Videl's death.  I interviewed him a few years back for a magazine feature I was working on.  The interview was conducted at his home in the Hollywood Hills where the literary legend graciously had his personal chef make us an really extraordinary lunch.  Although already in his 80's, I found Vidal to be as sharp as a tack and as irascible as ever.  Whatever you think of his politics you have to take your hat off to a guy who defined life is his own terms.  There was never a time when Vidal didn't tell people exactly what he was thinking.  You can find a just posted Swapsale article on him here.

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off.   

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NAZIS ON THE MOON?

If you've checked out this week's Preview Theater, you've seen the trailer for Iron Sky, a sci fi comedy  about Nazis escaping Earth in 1945 to hide out on the moon.  What could be more cool, in terms of a feature movie?  The problem is, I was totally unaware of this film until today.  Given it's 7-25-12 release date, I should have had this up at least a week ago.   In my defense, however, it's a German, Finnish, Australian movie that's only getting a limited release in the U.S. 

Based on the response to this film in Europe and the trailer on the Preview Theater page on this site, Iron Sky is a pretty cool satire, even if it does take shots at us Americans.  I can't wait for it to be released on OnDemand.  If, however, you want it to play in your community, you might try going here: http://www.ironsky.net/site/   They are trying to build demand for the film's wider release.  Meanwhile, here's yet another teaser for Iron Sky:

From our secret mountain top retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off.   

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THE HORROR AT AURORA, COLORADO

What has happened to us?  Columbine.  Virginia Tech.  Tucson.  The list goes on.  For a while it seemed like mass shootings were limited to the U.S. but recently we saw a mall shooting in Canada and that terrible shooting of all those kids in Norway.  I remember a better time.  Sure, there was Charles Whitman, the Texas Tower shooter back in 1966.  But as horrible as that was, we all knew it was an aberration.  Something that wouldn't be repeated -- at last not for a long, long time.  These days you're almost afraid to leave your house.

I certainly have no answers. I'm not anti-gun.  I own a couple of weapons.  I do think the NRA has too much power.  They seem more concerned with selling weapons than protecting people.  I certainly don't want to see guns sold to people who are mentally unstable or criminals.  The NRA has no such concern.

But I think the problem is deeper than that.  We have become meaner as a people: our politics, our policies, our survival of the fittest, screw the other guy attitudes.  And yes, even our media, including entertainment with its increasingly unbridled depictions of violence.  We need to soften our attitudes. We need to reach out to our neighbors and fellow citizens.  If people are struggling with economic realities or mental illness, the easy availability of guns adds a toxic mix to this soup.  How we fix this is a topic for debate.  But it's a debate we must have.

One final thing: In light of the Aurora tragedy, the Batman poster seen here, seems uncomfortably appropriate: shattered glass.

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THE PSYCHEDELIC 60S

This week I've listed for auction, Magic Mystery, a DVD about Ken Kesey, author of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and, more to the point here, creator of the Merry Pranksters, the group of hippies that traveled the country in a psychedelic school bus turning people on to LSD.  The DVD is a documentary put together from footage shot by Kesey and the Pranksters as they traveled in the bus which they had named "Further." 

Although I was not on the bus and never met Kesey, I found this movie to be a trip into the past, at least in part because it features some of the icons that influenced me as a kid growing up in Boonton, New Jersey.  Jack Kerouac appears in the documentary when Kesey and the Pranksters show up in New York. Kerouac was a major influence on me in high school, due to  his book, On The Road, about his adventures driving cars and hitch hiking across country with his pal Dean Moriarity (real name Neil Cassidy).  By the time I was 26 I had hitch hiked across country five times, the last trip being to San Francisco during the summer of Peace and Love (1967). 

The Poet Allen Ginsberg also makes a few appearances.  His poem Howl go me writing and actually reading poetry in the Cafe Bizarre in Greenwich Village for a short period of time. I got to meet Ginsberg when, as a college student, I invited him to give a reading at  my school.   

I met Timothy Leary years later and also someone who had actually been on the bus with Kesey, Lee Quanstrum.  Lee told me enough stories about those days to almost make me feel as if I knew Kesey and Neil Cassidy. 

Rounding out the DVD is the music and the footage of the Pranksters themselves, high and a bit crazy.  They'll remind a lot of oldsters like myself of old friends and lovers.  Most of us never went as far out as the Pranksters, but I think anyone who was caught up in those Electric Kool Aid Acid Test days -- even a little -- will agree that this DVD is the next best thing to a time machine.

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THE HIGGS BOSON: ANTIGRAVITY ANSWER?

Like most people, my knowledge of quantum physics is very, very limited.  But that doesn't stop me from speculating.  So here's my question: given the fact that the Higgs boson is the reason we have mass, and given the fact that mass creates gravity (or at least influences gravity), does the discovery of the Higgs boson -- if that is indeed what they have discovered -- mean that our scientists will soon be able to unlock the secret of antigravity?  You know, by finding a way of canceling out the Higgs boson.  Maybe by creating some kind of anti-Higgs boson field?

Just wondering.

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ANOTHER HERB DEEKS ROCKET KIT

I told you a couple of weeks ago I'd check with model maker extraordinaire Herb Deeks to see if there were any other kits of his missing from this site. (Scroll down to see "Sheriff's Rocket," the first kit I discovered I was missing.)  Well, it turns out there was another Deeks kit; the Martian rocket from Zombies of the Stratosphere. 

Happily, I can now report, problem solved.  You can order this kit here.  It's really cool.

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FALLING SKIES

I watched the two hour season 2 premier of the Spielberg produced show last weekend.  Unlike season one, I thought the presentation was pretty good.  They added some complexity to the storyline so there's less chuffa this time around.  That means less padding with bull crap birthday parties and the like.  That stuff was painful to watch.  There are still some quibbles I have with the show but given the dearth of good sci-fi on TV, I'm willing to overlook them.

Back in the 1990s the show's director (and co-executive producer) Greg Beeman directed a pilot I was producing and writing for ABC.  The show didn't make it to the fall season but that certainly wasn't Greg's fault.  He's a pro.  It was a pleasure working with him.

Given Falling Skies on screen and off screen talent, plus their recent changes in direction, I think season two has real possibilities.

One last thing: fans of Space Patrol and Warren Chaney's Space Patrol novel won't want to miss this week's article by Warren about the reconstruction of the Terra V.  You can find it here:

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COMMANDO CODY ROCKET

Proving once again that I'm not the sharpest knife in the draw, I only recently discovered that model maker extraordinaire Herb Deeks has had a Commando Cody Sky Marshall of the Universe rocketship kit available for years.  In fact, he's had this kit available for so long that, according to Deeks, "the mold is about shot and once it goes I wont be making another one."  

If you want to grab one while they're still available, I've listed the kit on the Models page.  Meanwhile I'll be checking with Herb to see what other cool kits I've been missing.  Talk about having egg on your face.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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ABOUT THE MOVIE JOHN CARTER

I watched John Carter this weekend on my 3-D TV. I wasn't expecting much; the critics were not kind to this film and I believe it was a box office flop.  So I was pleasantly surprised by what I saw on screen.  Great special effects, a solid storyline and some pretty impressive 3-D.  Even my wife, who is not a sci-fi fan, agreed the movie was pretty good.

If I have any criticism of John Carter it's that once our hero got on Mars it took too long for him to hook up with Princess Dejah Thoris, and thus thrust the action forward.  But that's a minor quibble.  As it stands, the poor box office showing will probably negate any follow-up films of what could have been a cool franchise.  That's too bad.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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NEW SPACE PATROL DVD

It's been a while in coming but we've finally made another transfer from our VHS collection of Space Patrol Lost Episode videos: #14.  You can buy it here for our regular price of $12.95.  However, this week only we are putting it up for auction with a starting bid of a mere $5.95.  Episodes on the DVD are: The Underwater Spaceship Graveyard (June 18, 1954, #182)  The Primitive Men of Planet X (Sept. 12, 1953, #142), The Hate Machine of Planet X (Sept. 19 1953, #143).  Also on this DVD is a rare bonus: a 1952 March of Dimes pitch by Buzz and Carol shown in theatres that year.  plus the original commercials including one for the Ralston rocket. 

The transfer of this VHS tape is part of a new push on our part; over the next few months we will slowly be transferring the rest of the VHS versions we have to DVD as well.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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MY TOUR OF DUTY

I joined the Air Force in January 1960.  I spent the first half of my four year tour at McCord AF Base in Tacoma, Washington.  I was there for the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962.  It was a tense time, although my involvement as an artist on the base meant my role was limited to doing charts for the pilots daily weather briefings.  Not exactly Top Gun stuff. 

The second half of my tour was spent at Hahn AF base in Germany.  That was a great assignment for me -- I spent much of my free time in the economy with my German relatives who welcomed me with open arms.  Driving my 1952 Mercedes Benz -- which I bought for $250 -- I got to see a great deal of the country.  I even hopped an AF flight to Berlin, then took a tour bus past the Berlin Wall into East Berlin.  My only negative memory is of the day Kennedy was assassinated.  The German people were, for the most part, genuinely moved to tears.  That was not the case with all of my fellow Airmen. Upon hearing the news of Kennedy's assasination, one young man in my barracks gave out out a celebratory whoop, then said, "We always said we'd get him if he came down south."

I was lucky to be in the service at a time of relative peace.  Vietnam was just starting to heat up as I got out to go to college.  Yes, I joined the anti war protesters.  However, I never protested against the men and women in service to their country.  I have nothing but respect for our country's warriors.  I don't know that I could have followed in their footsteps.  I thank God I didn't have to.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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MY FIRST CAR

Recently my sister, Marlene, sent me a bunch of pictures from the family album. They show an era long past so I'll probably post more of them in the future, although I'm not sure where.  The Features Department under History?  Or Trends?  An About Me page?  For now, however, I'm just posting a picture of my first car.  It was taken -- I think -- on Owls Head Court in Brooklyn, New York.  It was a working class neighborhood near Shore Road.  We moved to a dead end street off of Shore Road shortly after this picture was taken which was right around the end of WWII.  That's my father went from slicing baloney in a delicatessen to running his own import/export business.  (I wrote something about that last Father's Day, if you care to scroll down.)

Thanks, Marlene, for sending the pix.  The memories are bitter sweet.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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ANOTHER NEW FEATURE

Last week I announced the addition of an 80s rock section to this site.  This week we've added a Celebrity Newz feature.  Yeah, I know, it's a little low brow -- titillating gossip, for the most part, about today's movie stars and personalities.  Still, a lot of what we do on this site is pop culture, even if the primary focus is on things past.  And, as I said last week, our intent is to make visiting this site a fun, entertaining experience for as many people as possible.   BTW, Cher is one of the celebs we feature this week; check out her hairdo.  Wild!

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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A NEW FEATURE

A month or so ago we added CraveOnLine to this site.  Those guys do a great job covering Film, TV and Comics from a more contemporary -- yet frequently still retro -- point of view.  This week, for example, they present us with a a Tippi Hedron Q&A, updates on Sherlock and True Blood plus a bunch of other stuff.  Last week I think the highlight was a John Cusack Q&A. 

Now  we're adding links to RockerZine, an online magazine that covers 80s rock, an era in music I don't know a lot about.  As stated when we added the CraveOnLine section, this is all part of our attempt to expand the reach of our site.  Nothing is being eliminated from the retro sections you expect to find here -- in fact we're adding to them too.  Saturday Morning Cartoons is one example of that. 

Let us know what you think.  We take reader suggestions very seriously.

 From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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BLACK MUSIC RADIO IN 1957

Last week I discussed Dick Clark and Alan Freed, two rock n roll media icons in the 50s.  For teenagers back then, listening to Freed and watching Clark was a must.  But for those of us in Boonton, New Jersey who were really into the music and its R&B roots, there were also the black radio stations broadcasting out of the Newark area, such as WNJR. I'm told that WNJR was the first station on the East Coast to feature a syndicated version of Alan Freed's show when he was still in Ohio, broadcasting as "Moondog," although I missed that.

These stations, though white owned, featured black on air talent which included Pat Conell (Pat the cat in the switchin kitchen), Jocko (e to the o, this is your rocketship, Jocko), and Bruce Raymon (I am the Bruce called Raymon the chatterer). If you could deal with the ridiculous number of ads -- Reach for Dixie Peach hair pomade --  you could listen to rhythm and blues artists not played on Freed or Clark's shows.  That's where I first heard "Without a Friend" by the Strangers, "Honest I Do" by Jimmy Reed and many more great but obscure records. 

These on air jocks were pioneers who, unfortunately, are all but forgotten now.  In researching this editorial (to make sure I had my facts right) I found very little.  Here's the best of what I came across:

http://home.earthlink.net/~jaymar41/WNJR.html

http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~njsrhps/newsletters/srhpsnews4_08.pdf

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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REMEMBERING DICK CLARK

Back in the 1950s, if you were a teenager in Boonton, New Jersey, chances were good that, after school, you went home to watch Dick Clark's American Bandstand.  In fact, since Boonton wasn't all that far from Philadelphia, the city Bandstand broadcast from, you might have actually appeared on the show.  One of my friends did.  

Of course we all knew that Clark was not hip.  He was way too white bread.  But being white bread was a plus for Rock n Roll in the 50s.  Until Dick Clark came along Rock was considered dangerous, the music of Juvenile delinquents.  Clark made Rock n Roll safe.  Parents could relax.

The other media representative for Rock n Roll in the 50s was Alan Freed, broadcasting out of WINS radio in New York and later WABC.  Freed was hip.  In fact, he was the father of Rock n Roll, having coined the term and having produced the very first all rhythm and blues radio show (for white Americans) on WJW in Cleveland, Ohio.  When the payola scandals hit around 1959, ABC had two big fish under investigation for accepting bribes to play records (a common practice back then).  Clark and Freed.   The way I heard it, ABC decided to sacrifice the guy who made the least amount of money for them.  Freed was gone.

For the record (as it were), I know for a fact that Freed took Payola.  Two of my friends -- Pete and Jimmy -- made a record while still in High School and, if you can find a copy of it, you'll see that Freed is credited as a co-writer of their songs.  That's the way it worked for the DJ; it's shocking how many records from that era have Freed listed as co-writer.  I have no idea if Clark took payola.

You can find Pete and Jimmy's record here.

If you'd like to read more about Bandstand, click here.

Clark's obit is here.

More on Freed here.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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WHAT I'LL BE WATCHING ON TV

I hated TNT's Falling Skies last year.  A big disappointment, especially since it had Steven Spielberg attached to it.  But then so was Terror Nova on Fox, also a Spielberg backed project.  So why give Falling Skies another chance when it resumes in June?  Because they hooked me with the season ending which saw our hero (whatever his name is) taken away in an alien space craft.  I doubt I'll be happy with this new plot twist but I can hope.

This Tuesday, however, I'll be watching SyFy's Fact or Faked.  The preview trailer is certainly compelling enough.  You can check that out at TV Previews.  (The Falling Skies preview which is also on that page doesn't give anything away -- it's just people running and shooting.)  Full disclosure: I believe in psychic phenomena, UFO's (although I don't know what they are) and the possibility that Ancient Aliens (as seen on H2) have visited our planet.  So Fact or Faked is right up my alley. 

Regarding Awake on NBC and Touch on Fox -- They're both a big yawn for my money.  Anyone remember 2007's Journeyman on Fox?  That's the last sci fi show I can remember really liking. (Except for Doctor Who, of course.)  And they yanked that fast enough.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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THE PROBLEM WITH CALIFORNIA

Fair warning: don't read this week's editorial if you don't like hearing bad news.

In a new study, the Journal Environmental Science and Technology reported that California, especially the central and southern part of it, is being slammed with radiation from the ongoing Fukushima disaster in Japan.  Although our government has reassured us that Fukushima -- now generally agreed to be worse than Chernobyl -- is no threat to Americans, the Journal's investigation revealed that seaweed tested off the California coast had a radiation count 500% higher than normal.  Here's a sample of their report:

Projected paths of the radioactive atmospheric plume emanating from the Fukushima reactors, best described as airborne particles or aerosols for 131I, 137Cs, and 35S, and subsequent atmospheric monitoring showed it coming in contact with the North American continent at California, with greatest exposure in central and southern California. Government monitoring sites in Anaheim (southern California) recorded peak airborne concentrations of 131I at 1.9 pCi m−3

For more on this go here: http://www.infowars.com/california-slammed-with-fukushima-radiation/

As if that wasn't bad enough, we're now told that California's San Onofre Nuclear Power Station -- located near Disneyland -- has been shut down due to radiation leaking from corroded pipes.  North County Times reported the following:

You can get the rest of that report here:  

http://www.nctimes.com/news/local/sdcounty/san-onofre-nuke-plant-will-remain-shut-down-until-problems/article_239565ae-366e-53d8-8193-92c6ddbc22ce.html

But that's not the end of it.  I live 20  minutes (as the crow flies)  from Rocketdyne in Simi Valley, the site of a nuclear meltdown -- to be specific a "partial core meldown," exactly what happened at Chernobyl -- that occurred in 1959 and which has been covered up ever since.  On the positive side, the Rocketdyne reactor was much smaller than the one at Chernobyl so much less radiation escaped. 

You can check that out here: http://www.loe.org/shows/segments.html?programID=06-P13-00003&segmentID=1

Then there's the late Jay M. Gould, a statistician and epidemiologist -- as well as an appointee to President Jimmy Carter's environmental protection agency advisory board --  who repeatedly warned that people living near nuclear power stations have a higher risk of cancer.  He told me personally that women living within fifty miles of a nuclear power plant have significantly higher rates of breast cancer. 

You can learn more about Jay M. Gould here: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/19/nyregion/19gould.html

The problem with all of the foregoing is that the the government seems to prefer cover-ups and the media refuses to report on these events and facts in any meaningful way. Until they do the citizens of our great country will have no idea just how dangerous nuclear power is.  Most of the power plants in this country have reached their expected lifetime usage -- forty years.  Now the nuclear power industry wants their licenses renewed for another forty years.  That's not a good idea. 

Actually, it's a really, really bad idea.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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WE ARE EXPANDING

You've probably noticed that over the past year -- especially the last few months -- we have been regularly adding new features to this site.  Funny Videos is one, Saturday Morning TV Shows is another.  Last week we hooked up with CraveOnLine.com, a super cool website that focuses on a lot of the same things we do -- comics, film, TV -- but with a greater focus on current events, as compared to our focus on things from the past.  We think they are the perfect compliment to Swapsale.com, giving us a range we have been missing up until now.  We urge you to check out their weekly updates.

Of course we want to assure our regular followers that we not subtracting anything from this site.  Everything you've always liked about Swapsale.com will remain the same.  We're just getting bigger -- and hopefully better.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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NO LONGER RUNNING AWAY

Despite a life story that would make most people just give up, Cherie Currie of the 1970's rock legends The Runnaways is back bigger and better than ever.  Most recently she wrote the recent hit movie, The Runnaways.  The movie, based on her autobiographic book, Neon Angel, was executive produced by her former band mate Joan Jett.  Now she's working on an album produced by current Velvet Revolver drummer, ex-Guns N' Roses drummer Matt Sorum.

In between The book, movie and album and her days with The Runnaways, Cherie has -- literally -- carved out a reputation as a premier chainsaw artist.  Check out this sample of her work:

You can see more of her awesome art here: http://www.chainsawchick.com/

As you might assume based on the forgoing, Cherie is an amazingly talented and intelligent woman.  It was a pleasure meeting her.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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THE FUTURE OF TV

Happily, I can report that despite the tension in the David household last weekend as we tried to set up our new 3-D TV, I'm still married.  As it turns out I'll always be married, at least if I want to stay plugged into this digital age.  Without the help of my wife I would have never been able to hook up our new Sharp 3-D TV with the shutter type (active) glasses.  Indeed, if we ever did get divorced -- given the fact that our tech age is getting more and more complex -- I would probably wind up watching an old black and white Dumont TV. 

Of course the $64,000 question is was all that tension worth it.  I can report emphatically, it was!  Having finally gotten the system hooked up properly we went to OnDemand and bought the 3-D version of Hugo.  Within minutes it was snowing in our TV room.  Seriously.  The snow in the opening sequence of that movie appeared to be outside the frame of the screen falling on our floor.  Way cool.

I know I said a few weeks ago that I planned on rushing out to my local movie theater to see John Carter.  That plan is now void.  In fact I doubt I'll ever go to a movie theater again.  Sure, I'll have to wait a little longer to see that movie but this way I can watch it while laying on my couch.  Besides, I have to justify the cost of the TV -- it wasn't cheap.  Given the rising cost of theater tickets, I should break even in say five or six years.

Speaking of John Carter, check out this week's feature article on the art inspired by Edgar Rice Burroughs John Carter of Mars.  Julie Bell, Boris, Jusko and more are represented. Great eye candy.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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TELEVISION, MOVIES AND 3-D TV

As noted in previous editorials, we've been making an effort to post complete episodes of TV shows that we profile in the Television section of our featured articles.  We started with Richard Diamond, then did Gunsmoke, then Maverick and, last week, Peter Gun.  This week we've gone back to one of our earlier television articles, the one on 77 Sunset Strip, to put a complete episode there as well. If you're interested, you can view it here.

Meanwhile, to coincide with the movie release of John Carter this week, we're featuring an article on Amazing Stories, the magazine which published a number of John Carter of Mars stories.  You can check that out here.

Finally, we just bought a 3-D TV.  We're hooking it up now.  If it works out as well as I hope it will, I'll never go to another movie theater again.  However, hooking the thing up aint that easy.  A lot of tension in the David household right now.  I'll let you know how it goes.  And if I'm still married next week.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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AN EMAIL FROM MIKE ELMO

I've made a number of friends through this site.  Politically they're a varied lot but all of them have a passion for the golden days of radio and television.  Mike "Rocky" Elmo has a particular passion for Rocky Jones, Space Ranger, although his golden days interests are not limited to that.  He also has a habit of sending very cool emails which I don't always post although I probably should.  A couple weeks ago he sent one that I absolutely should have published immediately but didn't.  What can I say?  I get distracted.

Well, this week I'm finally posting it in the "Comments" section of this site.  Check it out.  It's worth your time.

BTW, I recommend checking the Comments section, at least every so often. If you don't you might miss something really cool.  Like Mike's email.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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WHAT'S NEW

You have probably noticed that we are making a major attempt to bring you classic TV shows that are complete episodes, much as we do with our Old Time Radio shows.   This has been most obvious with our newest segment, Saturday Morning TV Shows.  However, if you have been paying attention we've also started including complete TV episodes in the Television section of our featured articles.  It started with Richard Diamond.  Last week we added a complete Gunsmoke episode and with this posting, you'll find a complete episode of Maverick, the 1950s show starring James Garner.  Ironically, the Maverick episode is a parody of Gunsmoke.  I remember being blown away by that episode as a teenager living in Boonton, New Jersey.

I should also point out that we are once again offering Space Patrol Gold Volume 1 on DVD.   It's been out of stock for a while because our duplicator was no longer able to offer the DVDs to us at a unit price that made sense.  So, after doing some panicky research, we have now gone into the duplication business ourselves, purchasing top of the line machines identical to what our duplicator used.  You can order any of our SP Gold Editions here.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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JOHN CARTER

I can't wait for the movie to come out (3-9-12).  Of course, I have my fingers crossed. I suppose I should mention that there is no connection between the Warlord of Mars comic from Dynamite and the movie (aside from the fact that they are both based on the Edgar Rice Burroughs classic).  I'm not sure how the copyright laws work in regard to the Burroughs estate but there does seem to be some wiggle room.  Dynamite is apparently not able to use the name John Carter on it's cover but that's not a problem inside the book.

The writer of the Warlord comics, Arvid Nelson, told me that Dynamite intentionally stayed close to the story's pulp origin.  That's what I'm praying the movie will do as well.  There hasn't been a good pulp style adventure sci-fi flick since the original Star Wars movies (well, the first two, anyway) and the early Indiana Jones movies, although I suppose you could argue IJ wasn't really sci-fi.  It was their pulp/movie serial basis that made them great.  That and the fact that they were all well written. 

Nelson's done a good job with the comic.  Hopefully the movie will be as good.  Whatever else, at least it will be in 3-D (at selected theaters).

You can find the trailer for this movie here.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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THE TERROR OF VALENTINE'S DAY

Valentine's Day was originally created to honor early Christian martyrs named Valentine. (Apparently there was more than one.)  But in what's referred to as the High Middle Ages, thanks to Geoffrey Chaucer, it became associated with the notion of romantic love.   Ever since then men, both married and single, have been thrown into a state of panicked confusion (if not outright terror) every February 14th.  The over riding question: what the heck to I have to buy her to get off the hook?

Regardless of the nature of your relationship, the answer is never easy.   If you're courting, rule of thumb says you'll have to go bigger (and spend more money).  However, if you go too big you risk looking stupid.  Even married men have to take this occasion seriously. I've been married twenty-five years but God forbid I should forget to buy a card and a box of candy and maybe some balloons. 

Speaking from the married male's point of view, we look at February 14th as the day we have to do something to keep the woman in our life from going all PMS on us. That's it. Single men, of course, are praying for easy sex.  Romance smowmance.

Of course the reign of terror doesn't end on February 15th.  Next up: Mother's Day.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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SOME COMMENTS ON THE PASSING OF DIRECTOR JOHN RICH

I knew John Rich (see In MEMORIAM).  I didn't know him well but we worked together on 12 episodes of a Henry Winkler produced TV sitcom called Mr. Sunshine starring Jeffrey Tambor.  This was not a high point for me; I'm a smoker and the year was 1986 when, it seemed to me, smokers became pariahs overnight.  I immediately became the outcast among the writers of the show.  And I responded by withdrawing socially, a move that only made things worse for me.  Add to that the stress of going through nicotine withdrawal. Despite my floundering, Winkler was always nice to me and so was Gene Reynolds of Mash fame but only John Rich ever came to my defense.  I believe he saw my value to the show. I've always appreciated that.

When the show ended Paramount had no interest in picking up my contract so I bounced over to Fox studios where I worked as a producer for a year.  During that time I got a three page humor comic published in Playboy.  That apparently got the attention of my former Mr. Sunshine mates.  I was told by my agent at the time that they were wondering if they had let the wrong person go.  Probably not.  I still smoke.  But it was nice to hear my stock over there had risen, if only slightly. 

Like I said, I didn't know John Rich well but in a business filled with sharks, ready to attack when they smell blood in the water, he ranks high on my list of good guys.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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MY SECOND MOST FAVORITE TV SHOW

If you click on TV Previews this week you'll notice that the animated FX show, Archer, actually premiered it's new season on January 19th.  My bad.  I'd been looking forward to the new season of Archer for some time but for somehow it never occurred to me to announce it on this website.  That's particularly curious because this website, for the most part, reflects my interests.  Old age maybe.  And over work.

For those who have not seen the show, Archer is a -- in my view -- a very funny (and sexy) spy spoof featuring the agents of ISIS: Sterling Archer, Malory Archer (his mother and boss), Lana Kane, Archer's beautiful ex girlfriend (and constant critic), Pam Poovey, HR Director and office gossip, Cyril Figgis, the ISIS Comptroller (he has trust issues), and Cheryl Tunt, Malory's secretary, ditzy, independently wealthy but unable to access her fortune. 

None of the foregoing does justice to the show.  But if you like smart humor and cool animation, I just suggest you give it a try. (Full disclosure: From my view point, Archer is a spy version of my sci fi opus, Planet Patrol.)

Oh, as regards my number one favorite TV show, that's Doctor Who, of course.

 From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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CENSORING THE INTERNET

There is no doubt in my mind that the big guys -- the movie industry, the comic book industry, virtually any publisher -- and the government, for that matter -- would like nothing better than to get control of the Internet.  In that regard, they almost succeeded last week with two bills: SOPA, the Stop Online Piracy Act and PIPA, the Protect Intellectual Property Act.  These acts would have allowed the government to block access (shut down, in effect) any site where a copyright owner -- or anyone really -- claimed copyrighted material was being pirated.  Thankfully, a huge internet protest launched by Wikipedia and Google and supported by a whole bunch of other Internet websites brought that effort to a grinding halt last Wednesday the 18th of January.  Wikipedia shut itself down for 24 hours. Google, which directed people to email their protest to the Congress, had a black banner over the illustrated part of it's opening page.  As a result the politicians who were championing the bill (almost all of them, Republican and Democrat) freaked out and the bill was put on hold.

To be clear, I am not in favor of piracy, internet or other wise.  But these two bills gave total power to the big players with no legal recourse to little guys like me.  Or, for that matter, to some of the big players like Google and Wikipedia, both of which could have been severely hurt or even put out of business by these acts.  Just think of what these bills would have done to YouTube (owned by Google) if it had passed.  Shutting down YouTube -- or even a key part of it -- would have screwed things up for me too.  I doubt you'd be seeing anymore Saturday Morning TV Shows on this site.

But here's where I could really get hurt: When I started this site one of the first articles I ran was about how today's science might be used to actually replicate the powers of super heroes like, say, Superman.  To illustrate the article I used a cover from a Superman comic.  A week later, upon receiving a cease and desist from D.C. comics, I took that image down even though there is something called "Fair Usage."  In a court of law, my use of that image would almost certainly have been upheld because it was germane to the article and because I was not representing that I was the copyright holder and I was not making money by selling anything to profit from the article.  Of course I didn't have the money to fight D.C. in court so I folded but with these new laws even that option would have been taken off the table.

That said, I encourage those of you who care about free speech to investigate this further by going to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PROTECT_IP_Act and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop_Online_Piracy_Act and  http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Security/SOPA-PIPA-Online-Piracy-Lead-Weeks-Security-News-651755/

I leave you with this: "Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty." -- Wendell Phillips, (1811-1884), abolitionist, orator and columnist for The Liberator,  in a speech before the Massachusetts Antislavery Society in 1852, according to The Dictionary of Quotations edited by Bergen Evans

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THE ART OF LORENZO SPERLONGA

I want to draw your attention to one of this week's feature articles.  I first met Lorenzo in the late 1990s, shortly after he had moved here from Italy.  Impressed with the sophistication of his art, I convinced him to work on several projects with me.  Then he hit the big time, hooking up with Kevin Eastman, publisher of Heavy Metal comics.

When Lorenzo stopped by my office recently-- we still work together on occasion --  he dropped off 6 door hangers, all like the one you see here.  They are, I think you'll agree, a nice sample of his work.  So, I want to offer them at no charge to the next six people who make a purchase from me.  However, since I don't want to offend anyone who thinks the art is too sexy, you will have to request it when you make the purchase.  This may require a separate email from you. 

Meanwhile you can see more of Lorenzo's art by clicking here.

Finally, let me remind you that last week's animation cel auction -- the Sonny and Cher cel and the Charlotte's Web cel will remain active until this Wednesday  (1-18-12) at 5 pm West Coast time.  You can review those auctions plus this week's auctions by clicking here.

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OUR BIG ANIMATION CEL AUCTION -- PART 2

Here's our press release:

Swapsale.com will kick off its next cycle of animation cel auctions on Sunday January 8, 2012 with a very rare production cel from the opening credits of The Sonny and Cher Comedy Hour. The show, which premiered in August 1971 and ran through May 1974, was a major hit for CBS and only ended because of the couple's divorce.

LOOKING BACK AT NEW YEARS CELEBRATIONS

For those of you who found no charm in this year's Dick Clark's Rockin New Years Eve celebration with Ryan Seacrest, we've set the dials on our time machine to New Years eve 1957.  Just strap in and press play...

Wishing you all the best for the new year.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

TO READ PAST COMMENTS CLICK HERE:  COMMENTS  

TO MAKE A COMMENT CLICK HERE: Swapsale@aol.com

1-1-12

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BAH!  HUMBUG!

It's Christmas once again at the David household. Every room of the house has been turned into a bedroom with every couch in every room (we have four of various sizes) doing duty as beds for visiting family members, encamped here for the holiday weekend.  There are kids under the age of six and dogs of various types (all small enough to trip over) and more opinions (about how to cook a turkey or when and even how to open presents) than you'll find at the United Nations.  And, like the United Nations, political tensions abound with armed camps -- those on the left and those on the right -- sending coded messages across the dining room table.  (It ultimately becomes a contest to see who can annoy the other fellow most.)  When it's over, with each family member having retreated back into their respective lives, we will all of us complain about the other.  And yet, despite the bruised egos and inconvenience, it's a certainty we will all do this again next year.

Happy Holidays!

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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TO MAKE A COMMENT CLICK HERE: Swapsale@aol.com

12-25-11

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A FEW THINGS

1.  I want to point out that, after many, many months of inaction, Dr. Warren Chaney has begun to pump out chapter after chapter of his upcoming Space Patrol novel, the pages of which are being published here, as part of Dr. Chaney's agreement to give Swapsale readers a first look.  You can find Chapter 5, his latest installment here:

CLICK HERE

2.  This site is so big that I sometimes forget about all the things I have posted here.  This past week I rediscovered the Bettie Page Theater.  Bettie Page fans should check it out.

BETTIE PAGE THEATER

3. When I mentioned meeting Batman producer Michael Uslan a couple weeks ago I had just begun to read his fine book, The Boy Who Loved Batman.  Even so, I could already tell it was going to be a great read.  Now that I'm well into the book, I can reaffirm that notion.  Uslan takes us through his life -- and his ongoing infatuation with comic books and Batman -- with wit and insight.  His detailed recollection of events -- many of which involve key comic book and entertainment industry luminaries  -- is nothing short of remarkable.  People who are into comic books, movies and even a good biography, will love this book.   

THE BOY WHO LOVED BATMAN

Happy Holidays!

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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TO MAKE A COMMENT CLICK HERE: Swapsale@aol.com

12-18-11

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BEAM ME UP!

Santa is being good to me this holiday season.  Last week I met Michael Uslan, the producer of the Batman movies.  This week it was William Shatner, aka, Captain Kirk.  He was kind enough to autograph a Star Trek standee for me (See image). He also took a look at some boots I bought about twenty years ago which I was told were his from Star Trek.  Unfortunately he couldn't confirm that.

I was surprised to discover that after Star Trek was cancelled Shatner fell on hard times.  At one point he was actually living in a camper in the San Fernando valley.  It was the Star Trek movies that got Shatner back on his feet and, of course, he went on to recreate himself as an actor, most recently playing the role of Denny Crane on David E. Kelly's Boston Legal.  He won a Golden Globe and an Emmy for that.  He had previously won an Emmy for the same character on Kelly's The Practice which preceded Boston Legal. 

So life is good.  I met William Katt (The Greatest American Hero) a couple years ago.  All I need now is to meet Doctor Who.  Either Matt Smith or David Tennant would do.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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12-11-11

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BAT NEWS

I was delighted to have lunch with Michael Uslan last week.  He's the producer of the Batman movies -- all of them!  Terrific guy!  I don't think there's anything he doesn't know about comics.  (In fact, he's a recognized comic book historian.)  More importantly he understands what the super hero mythos is all about.  That's why he optioned the Batman rights from DC Comics.  But here's the deal: when he optioned Batman no one else realized what an important property it was. Go figure.

MICHAEL USLAN AND ME

Over lunch Michael told me something I found astounding.  It took him 12 years -- from the time he obtained the rights to Batman -- to get the first movie optioned and made.  All the studio heads could think of was the campy 1966 TV show.  And no explaining on Michael's part could get them to see beyond that.  Since I worked in the entertainment business for a while I shouldn't have found that surprising.  But I did.  I mean, it's Batman for God's sake!

Michael was in town to promote his book, The Boy Who Loved Batman.  (You'll find a review for it here.)  People who like comics will really dig it.  Actually, anyone who enjoys good story telling will like it. Michael gives us his life story -- and it's packed with fascinating information and anecdotes.

Sadly the lunch was rushed -- Michael had a lot of rounds to make for his book tour.  But I'm going to try and convince him Swapsale is his ticket to big book sales -- just so we can have lunch again.  That's how much I enjoyed our all too brief get together.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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12-4-11

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THINGS CHANGE

I have moved the auctions info to it's own page.  This is part of my ongoing attempt to reduce the length of this site's main page.  As I've said in past editorials, I've received complaints about the main page "going on and on and on."  Hopefully this change will not cause any confusion.  I believe the link to the new "Auctions" page is big enough.

Also, I'm adding a new feature -- Saturday morning cartoon shows from the 1960s and beyond.  First up on the docket: Clutch Cargo.  It's a complete episode.  Next week it will be a complete Flash Gordon cartoon. 

The Science Channel is now cable casting sci-fi dramas.  They started by picking up the rebroadcast rights to 2002's Firefly.  Now, effective this past Saturday, they've picked up a 2004 Canadian series called ReGenesis.  Sorry I didn't get that info to you sooner but it just never occurred to me that ReGenesis was a sci-fi drama.  I mean, come on!  It's the Science Channel, not the Syfy Channel! 

There's one change I have little control over.  Recently YouTube has started putting ads in front of their offerings.  This is especially annoying when the ad pops up in front of a movie trailer.  Movie trailers are ads!  So, in effect, you have to watch an ad to watch an ad.  I try to avoid posting those trailers on our "Movie Trailer Theater" page but it's becoming increasingly more difficult to avoid them. 

Not all change is good but at this site we will always strive to change for the better.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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TO MAKE A COMMENT CLICK HERE: Swapsale@aol.com

11-27-11

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MEMORIES OF PALISADE AMUSEMENT PARK (AND BUSTER CRABBE)

Despite being a divorced working woman in Manhattan, my mom would frequently pile us kids -- me, my sister Marlene and cousin Rich -- into her 1948 green Ford coupe for a Saturday outing to Palisades Amusement Park in New Jersey.   The big deal, aside from the rides and the giant salt water swimming pool was -- at least for a while -- the chance to get your picture taken with Buster Crabbe.  I guess posing with a bunch of screaming kids couldn't have been a high point in Buster   

                                                                                                                                          Rich, me, Buster and my sis

Crabbe's career but it was a pretty big deal for us kids.  We knew of the actor thanks to our Dumont TV on which we watched the old Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers serials.  I was hooked on them.

Although Palisades Amusement Park was torn down years ago, you'll be able to find it resurrected in this month's Features section, along with a second related article, this one about Buster Crabbe comics.  Enjoy.

Finally, this: Check out the "Comments" section for a very thoughtful (if critical) email from John Bassert.  Your comments are welcome.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

TO READ PAST COMMENTS CLICK HERE:  COMMENTS  

TO MAKE A COMMENT CLICK HERE: Swapsale@aol.com

11-20-11

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DOG DAYS OF AUTUMN

Nothing much to report this week. We did have a slight technical glitch with our old radio shows; Crime Does not Pay was supposed to go online this week but -- my apologies -- we will have to post it next Sunday.  Also, Dr. Warren Chaney has returned with the third chapter of his Space Patrol novel.  That too was supposed to get posted this week but be assured, it will be available at this site next weekend for sure. Meanwhile, since it's been a while since Warren wrote the first two chapters of his novel, may I suggest that SP fans refresh their memories of what has already transpired by clicking here.   It's a cool read with terrific graphics.

Until next week then.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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TO MAKE A COMMENT CLICK HERE: Swapsale@aol.com

11-13-11

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MORE OLD TIME RADIO

You may have noticed that we've added some new old time radio shows to our regular lineup: Gang Busters and Boston Blackie.  More will be forth coming.  Richard Diamond, Philo Vance, Dick Tracy and Crime Does Not Pay are already slated to appear within the next few weeks.  As usual they will be offered here each week for free.

Also, I'd like to take this time to thank Dr. Warren Chaney and First Sergeant (Ret.) David Cameron for their terrific contributions to our articles section; the recounting of their experiences during the early days of television (The Magic Mansion series, click here: TELEVISION) is something you're not going to get anywhere else.  And it's information that should not be lost to history.

Anyone else out there interested in making a contribution?  It doesn't have to be about television (although that would be nice) but it should add to our knowledge of pop culture.  I'll be waiting to hear.

 From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

TO READ PAST COMMENTS CLICK HERE:  COMMENTS  

TO MAKE A COMMENT CLICK HERE: Swapsale@aol.com

11-6-11

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ANIMATION AUCTION ENDS THIS CYCLE

We are ending our series of animation cel auctions for this cycle with the Batman and Robin offering. But not to worry, the next cycle will begin on Sunday, January 8, 2012. It will feature the animation cels we didn't get to this cycle plus a bunch of new cels which we will be listing in the weeks ahead.  Keep watching this site for updates.

Meanwhile, we have been experiencing some (hopefully) minor problems with our web site.  We think we have it under control but, with computers, you never know for sure.  So we're in the process of creating a backup site.  I'm giving you a heads up on this just in case things slip out of our control.

As I've mentioned before, part of the problem with our site has been the massive number of files we publish each week; 26,000 when our site went down about eight months ago.  We've eliminated over 4000 files since then but that's obviously a drop in the bucket when you've got the number of files we have.  Deleting the files has been a painful process; I hate to eliminate past listings which feature so many beautiful toys, movie posters, comic books, ect., even when the listing is out of date. So a word to the wise; if there's an image you really like on our site you might want to grab it rather than take a chance we will soon be deleting it.  That's especially true of the Swap Talk postings.  That's where we're making most of our cuts.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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TO MAKE A COMMENT CLICK HERE: Swapsale@aol.com

10-30-11

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HAPPY HALLOWEEN

Growing up as a kid on Seaman avenue at the very top of Manhattan sixty years ago was pretty terrific.  Nobody worried about crime back then; kids roamed the streets like pack rats, without mothers worrying about where they were or what they were up to. So when Halloween came around my cousin, sister and I would go from apartment building to apartment building knocking on doors to say "trick or treat."

I was about nine or ten when my mother made me a Superman costume for Halloween.  It was beautiful.  A work of art.  I was really proud as we traveled around the neighborhood that night, filling our bags with candy. That is, until some big kids, walking down the hill behind us, yelled out "Get Superman."  No mistaking who they meant by that. 

I took off like a rocket.  Aided by the fact that I was running down a hill, I was almost flying, just like the man of steel, as I headed for my Fortress of Solitude, in this case, my apartment building.  I'm pleased to say I made it without further incident; nothing motivates like fear.

Years later, living in Hollywood, I did Superman once again, this time with Rod Thorp, the author of the Die Hard novel that became the basis for the Bruce Willis films.  Our girlfriends had decided to surprise us with those costumes but if they had asked I would have said one Superman is enough.  Batman would have worked for me.  Or maybe even a costume where I didn't have to keep my stomach sucked in all evening.

A few years later I dressed like a character from Planet of the Apes.  I actually had one of the ape costumes used in the movie, and the prosthetic mask to boot.  (It came in two pieces; the upper mask and lower jaw.)  Way cool.  However, I went to a party at rocker John Mayall's house (leader of the Bluesbreakers) that Jane Seymour was attending.  She was super hot back then, and I was sitting right next to her...in an ape suit with the prosthetic mask glued to my face.  Sensing that this was not the ideal outfit to woo her in, I ripped the mask from my face.  But that left my face covered in glue, creating the look of a leper.  She left with this British guy, a friend of mine, who had the good sense not to wear a costume. 

For all of that I've always loved Halloween and continued to dress up for it until I could no longer find a costume in my closet that fit.  But this year I've solved the problem; it's a Jedi robe.  I should be able to fit into it for years to come.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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10-23-11

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THE TRUE ORIGIN OF SUPERMAN

Did you know that Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster originally conceived of Superman as a bald villain?  The year was 1933 and Siegel was publishing a fanzine in which his story about a telepathic villain bent on world domination appeared.  Called The Reign of the Superman, it was, of course, illustrated by Shuster.  Siegel then re-imagined the character as a hero who looked like Douglas Fairbanks Sr. but even with that, it wasn't until much later in Superman's evolution that the costume was added.  At one point Siegel, not satisfied with the progress he and Shuster had made in getting their character published, even sought the help of different artists.  What would Superman have looked like if Shuster hadn't drawn it?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superman

I'm mentioning all of this because we're excited about our latest animation cel offering; an original Superman cel from the Saturday morning TV show Super Friends.  Here's your chance to get a part of Superman's rich and ever evolving history.  If you think you might want to take advantage of that opportunity, just click here.  The opening bid is only $199.95.

Meanwhile, our current Flintstones animation cel auction is getting a lot of attention on eBay and while no one has bid yet we feel confident that the item will do well.  That auction will end on Wednesday, 5 pm October 19.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

TO READ PAST COMMENTS CLICK HERE:  COMMENTS  

TO MAKE A COMMENT CLICK HERE: Swapsale@aol.com

10-16-11

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FLINTSTONES REVIVAL SET FOR FOX

This past May Seth MacFarlane, creator of Family Guy, American Dad and the Cleveland show, announced he will be producing a new Flintstones series for Fox to begin production now for airing in 2013.  One can barely imagine what this new iteration will look like, given Macfarlane's freaky sense of humor and past history.  I for one will be looking forward to its appearance.

The Flintstones, which first aired (in prime time, no less) on September 30, 1960, continued its run until April 1, 1966. It celebrated its 50th anniversary last year. Animation cels from that show have become highly collectible; it's not unusual for them to sell for thousands of dollars.  One sad thing about MacFarlane's version of the Flintstones -- it's unlikely any animation cels will come out of it since everything is digitized these days.

Of course, you have a chance to get one of those original Flintstone animation cels right here this week.  If you're interested just click here.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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TO MAKE A COMMENT CLICK HERE: Swapsale@aol.com

10-9-11

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THE "OCCUPY WALL STREET" PROTEST

One of my boys, Jordan, flew to New York City to join the protesters on Wall Street.  (He took the photo seen here.) It's something he insisted on doing.  He even dropped a college semester to go there. I'm proud of him.

Whether on the left or the right, I don't see how anyone could have a problem with this movement.  It's the banks that caused the economic problems we are currently suffering through.  It was their actions which forced us to bail them out with our tax payer dollars.  How did they repay us?  By continuing to do exactly what they did when they caused our economy to collapse in the first place.  It's called casino capitalism.  They're raking in billions of dollars while giving nothing back.  They are, in fact, sucking the wealth out of our country and into their pockets.  And our bought and paid for politicians on both sides of the aisle are letting them get away with it.  Actually, they are helping them get away with it. If I was twenty years younger I'd be down there with the protesters myself.

I watch the CNN Sunday news shows every weekend.  Not one of them mentioned the events on Wall Street even though a mind boggling 700 protesters had been arrested a day earlier.  Shame on them.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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TO MAKE A COMMENT CLICK HERE: Swapsale@aol.com

10-2-11

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SOME ADDITIONAL THOUGHTS ON 9/11

I have always had my doubts about the official 9/11 story.  Too many loose ends, too many unanswered questions. Especially regarding the collapse of building seven which was never hit by a plane.  Here's a short video that sums up the issues:

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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9-25-11

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THOR: GOD OF BLUNDER

I finally got to see Thor on OnDemand.  That's one god awful movie, as it were.  In truth I was never a big Thor comic book fan -- was anybody? -- but I didn't hate the book.  I'd even buy it occasionally.  But the movie?  You have to ask yourself how this kind of crap gets made.  Well, I used to work as a producer and script writer in Hollywood, so I actually know how a movie with at least some potential can go off the rails.  Usually it's too many cooks.  But that doesn't explain how a class A actress like Natalie Portman gets roped into signing on for a film like this.  Did she think she'd come off like Margo Kidder in the first Superman movie?  That's my guess.

I suspect that the people who produced and wrote the film were not comic book geeks.  They had no idea of what makes a good superhero film.  Despite all the special effects, they lost the magic almost from the beginning.  But the biggest mistake, in my opinion, was dividing the movie into two segments; half of it takes place on Asgard, the other half on Earth.   So neither gets the attention it deserves.

Just as importantly, Superhero movies need at least a few magical moments, as when Superman rescues Lois Lane as she falls from the top of the Daily Planet building. "I've got you, Lois," Superman says. "You've got me?  Whose got you?" Lois gasps.

That's inspired.  That's what I want to see.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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TO MAKE A COMMENT CLICK HERE: Swapsale@aol.com

9-18-11

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REMEMBERING THE TWIN TOWERS

I was in college in Paterson New Jersey when the World Trade Center was being built. By the time it was finished in '69 I was back in New York City.  I remember looking out at the Twin Towers from my girlfriend's apartment with a kind of ambivalence.  The Empire State Building was supposed to be Manhattan's signature building, not those two rather bland posts jutting skyward.  King Kong never climbed the Twin Towers, I thought.  But, of course, before long he did. And, ultimately, the World Trade Center did become New York's signature buildings.

I was already a well established resident of California when the two towers came down in 2001. Like most people I watched in stunned disbelief as the horror of it unfolded.  We had, all of us, been transported, almost literally kicking and screaming, into a new age.

Now it's ten years later.  A new skyscraper is being built.  I watch its progress with ambivalence.  The Twin Towers are supposed to be the signature buildings of New York.  Not this new, oddly inelegant creation.  I suppose, however, it wont be long before King Kong climbs to its pinnacle.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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9-11-11

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MORE NAME DROPPING

Danny Trejo is a movie tough guy who really is tough.  You have to be tough if you're serving time in San Quentin.  In fact, while in prison he became the California state prison champion in the lightweight and welterweight divisions.  That's tough.

Of course now he's known for a series of movie roles including, most recently, Machete.  Funny thing though, when you meet him the tattooed  tough guy comes across as a pussy cat.  Still, I wouldn't want to piss him off.

BTW, the reason I look so goofy is because I was holding my head out and up in an effort to minimize the jowls.  That kinda worked but at a price.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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TO MAKE A COMMENT CLICK HERE: Swapsale@aol.com

9-4-11

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CENSORSHIP ON EBAY

My apologies for the delisting of last week's auction, The Horror The Horror by Jim Trombetta with an intro by R.L. Stein.  However, it wasn't my fault.  It was taken down by eBay because, they claimed, the book contained adult material. I was, naturally, flummoxed. There is absolutely no sex or nudity in that book. So I contacted eBay.

A very nice young lady answered the phone.  I explained the situation to her, pointing out the irony that a book about comic book censorship in the 1950s is being censored by eBay in the 21st Century. In response, she informed me that a very careful and detailed review had been made by the appropriate eBay department.  They found that the material in the book had been censored by Congress.  "Yes," I said.  "In the 1950s. That's the point of the book; congress had once censored material that was perfectly harmless and, in any case, much tamer than many non adult comics today."  I encouraged her to "just Google the title; you'll find numerous reviews of the book with pictures of the comic covers in question." But no amount of reasoning had an impact, although, to her credit, she remained nauseatingly cheerful the whole time.  In any case, I will obviously not be relisting that book.

Instead, I'm offering it here. There's just one copy so the first person to email me will get it for a mere $14.95 plus $2.95 postage. (It's list price is $29.95.) If no one wants it, I'll just add The Horror The Horror to my personal collection. I was tempted to do that anyway. 

If you're interested, here's our review of the book: THE HORROR THE HORROR

Email me at: swapsale@aol.com

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

TO READ PAST COMMENTS CLICK HERE:  COMMENTS  

TO MAKE A COMMENT CLICK HERE: Swapsale@aol.com

8-28-11

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SCI FI ON TV

This fall will see a bunch of new sci-fi TV shows.  I have my fingers crossed but based on this summer's programming I'm not optimistic.  Steven Spielberg's Falling Skies has been a major disappointment. So to Alphas on the SyFy channel and Torchwood on Starz. 

Falling Skies strikes me as just unbelievable.  Even if an alien invasion looked the way it's being depicted on that show (unlikely), the human response would not.  The show depicts humans gathered in communities (a high school currently) and driving down roads and highways without any apparent concern about alien aerial surveillance.  Really?  Even more annoying, the show plays out like a soap opera in which people still have the same petty concerns (birthday parties, for example) that they had pre invasion.  I don't buy that.  An invasion of that order would be transformative.  Survival would be the only concern.

Torchwood disappoints because, with the exception of the show's most recent episode, it bares no resemblance to the British version of the show.  Torchwood, in short, is not Torchwood.  It's an entirely different animal that, like some alien space creature, has absorbed and swallowed the original which it pretends to be.

Alphas is just sloppy with its logic and, ultimately, a big yawn.  Let's hope the fall offers something we can get behind.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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8-21-11

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MORE POLITICS

I had planned to move on from the political debate we've been having here over the last couple of weeks.  Then, this past week, Dylan Ratigan went ballistic on his MSNBC show:

He speaks for me.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

TO READ PAST COMMENTS CLICK HERE:  COMMENTS  

TO MAKE A COMMENT CLICK HERE: Swapsale@aol.com

8-14-11

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GUEST EDITORIAL 2

Not surprisingly, Warren Chaney has responded to my response to his response.  I'll just say that I disagree with most of what he says.  However, what bothers me most is that his "facts" and mine are, for the most part, not the same.  In that regard I'd like to point out that in 2009 Google personalized their search engine.  In other words, it's designed to give you what you want.  Warren and I could type in the same exact info and be lead to entirely different sites, depending on our biases.   Add to that cable shows like Fox News and MSNBC News -- both of which have a strong political bias -- and you can see why intelligent people frequently come to such fundamentally different conclusions.  Of course, I feel certain my facts are the correct ones.

Now, here's Warren:

   Given that I called it right about the liberal’s handling of the economy last week, I started not to respond to the response but in the interest of reader fairness and liberal education, I changed my mind.

PARAGRAH ONE: ACORN is out of business because of phony right wing charges that were later disproved!

 Actually , none of the above is true unless one restricts their reading to left  wing commentary like say..ummm, The Nation or Huffington Post. The cited article provides no footnotes, no references and by extension, no facts. But the article cited does rave on marvelously about the Koch brothers. No facts again of course, but very nice raving. Liberals are excellent at that.

 Back to the facts. ACORN was defunded because of corruption caught on film. Liberals scream selected cuts but FOX NEWS played each video in its entirety. The are on line now and one may view them to their heart’s content. A Carter appointed Judge in New York (Nina Gershon) tried to overturn the Congressional mandate during her December 11, 2009 ruling but then she was overturned on August 13, 2010. On November 2, 2010 filled for liquidation. But were they? In 2010 they reorganized under a different name in Ohio, but in a settlement with the Buckeye Institute, agreed to “cease all Ohio activity” and surrender  it’s state business licenses. Hmmm. Not bad for a company claiming to be out of business.

 ACORN maintained it’s voter-registration arm, Projects Vote which was indicted for election-related activities in Nevada. Thus far the group continues to operate under the radar.  This year the House Oversight Committee concluded that “ACORN deliberately organized itself to escape legal and public scrutiny by hiding “behind a paper wall of nonprofit corporate protections to conceal a criminal conspiracy on the part of its directors, to launder federal money in order to pursue a partisan political agenda and to manipulate the American electorate.” The Committee’s findings are online.

 Finally, never were the Congressional findings overturned. Never!

PARAGRAPH TWO: Warren chooses to leave out a long list of corrupt Republican politicians.
Ah yes, a favorite “trick” of the far left as they chant, “Let’s not talk about what we are doing now, let’s talk about history.”

 There is a difference between the way Liberals handle scandals and the way Republicans do. Republicans force theirs out rather quickly. Democrats (same as liberals these days) obfuscate, cover-up and conceal. Vitter went immediately. Charlie Rangel did not and Maxine Waters continues in office. If one takes the time to investigate, there does appear to be a long list of Democrats currently sitting in jail or awaiting for corruption including a former Governor of Chicago, Mayor of New York, Mayor of DC, and the Dems former Vice Presidential Candidate. I’m not speaking of the one who jumped ship and supported a Republican candidate for President, but the one misusing campaign funds.

PARAGRAPH THREE: Social Security is not bankrupt; it is solvent until the mid 2030s

 Hummm, according to the Congressional Budget Office, the fund cannot meet it’s current obligations. According to its First Quarter Report, the 2011 Social Security Administration, without additional funds, cannot meet payments. In short, according to President Barack Obama recently, the government must borrow money to pay benefits. Is the President lying? The same was echoed on the House Floor by Nancy Pelosi and by Harry Reid this month, on Face the Nation.

 The problems began the first time when liberal Jimmy Carter got a Dem congress to pass a major FICA tax increase to save SS from collapse. Oh yes, Carter also became the President to “tax” social security benefits.

 The Congressional Budget Office released a report in July, 2010 on the condition of existing Social Security trust finds. There are two funds: Old Age Insurance and Disability Insurance.  Combined, they are called OASDI. The report clearly exhibits that the funds are bankrupt ( http://www.cbo.gov/budget/factsheets/2009c/oasdiTrustfund.pdf). KEEP IN MIND THAT FUTURE GROWTH IS NOT FACTORED IT, meaning it will all come due sooner than later. Only in liberal minds, is insolvency insolvency – when the borrowing stops.

 The accounting scam of the Social Security Trust Fund has worked politically for a generation. It is not just the voters who are fooled. The best and the brightest in the media have been taken in. Here is an exchange that took place on the PBS show, Nightly Business Report, on March 25, 2009.
GERSH: A negative cash flow does not mean Social Security is in crisis. The program has built up an enormous trust fund over two decades. Barbara Kennelly is president of the Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare. She says the trust fund is more than enough to cover any short-term financial hit.

BARBARA KENNELLY, PRES., NATIONAL COMMITTEE TO PRESERVE SOCIAL SECURITY & MEDICARE: The trustees look at it every single year, the report is going to come out at the end of this month. And you're going to still see that we can pay those benefits way out. Say it's not 2041, it's 2040 or 2039. But we have that money. There is $2.5 trillion in the trust fund for Social Security.

 No problem say the excuse maker! There is a $2.5 trillion asset base. The OASDI Trust Fund need only sell a few of these assets each year. The PBS interviewer was taken in  and the scam worked just as well yesterday as it does today. Remember she said: "We can pay those benefits way out." How?

 By selling trust fund assets.

 Well there is an old line from the financial world. "Sell!" "To whom?"

 To sell an asset, there must be a market. Here is the punch line, taken directly from the 2009 Report of the Trustees: "Status of the Social Security and Medicare Programs." (In a printout, this appears on page 4 of the report):
The Department of the Treasury invests program revenues in special non-marketable securities of the U.S. Government on which a market rate of interest is credited. The trust funds represent the accumulated value, including interest, of all prior program annual surpluses and deficits, and provide automatic authority to pay benefits.

What, exactly, are "non-marketable securities"? They are IOU's issued by the Treasury on behalf of the U.S. government. As I mentioned, these IOU's are not recorded in the government's on-budget account. The revenues that purchase these IOU's are.

 But wait! There's more! Pay attention to these words: "on which a market rate of interest is credited." The Treasury applies a market rate of interest to a non-marketable security. There is no such rate. The Treasury can make it up as it goes along.

 So, the trust funds are filled with assets: non-marketable IOU's from the government, issued to a government agency. The trust funds are treated as marketable assets. They are indeed marketable: to the Treasury. The bill is passed along to Congress whenever the trust fund sells any of these assets.

 There are lots and lots of these IOU's in the Social Security OASDI Trust Fund. No problem!

 Liberal policies led the the first downgrade in the United States history. In 3 years we spent more than this nation did in all its years combined. The market for our IOUs vanished Friday.

PARAGRAPH FOUR & FIVE: Lyndon Johnson's "war on poverty" was deemed a success until politician on both sides of the aisle began chipping away at it.

 Only in a liberal’s mind. I stick with the original stats from our census bureau. The poverty level today is 2% higher than it was before Johnson’s failed policies.

PARAGRAPH SIX: Class war fare started when the Republicans lowered the tax rate under Reagan to 35 %

 I do remember those years, yes indeedy. Tax rates were at 90% at the $250G and up brackets. I remember working from May to December in Carter’s 3rd year in office....for nothing.

 To the contrary, Carter was the worst president in modern history till Obama came along. Aside for Carter’s massive foreign policy failures (sound familiar), Carter’s policies produced the nations first great inflation rate (up to 17% at one scary point); high unemployment of 14% w/35% in Detroit; spiraling out of control interest rates of 22% and climbing. Home loses were even greater then that now (though Obama has caught up rapidly). The nation’s GDP was zip, much as now.

 Actually – were I a liberal I certainly wouldn’t use Carter as an example of statesmanship. I won’t even go into his fiasco in Korea, debacle with the Suez Cannel, Mid-eastern failures or his disaster giving rise to today’s Iran. Fortunately, we had President Reagan following who knew how to govern and did so.

PARAGRAPH EIGHT: GM is an American company.  The idea was to save the American auto industry. “Bush gave the TARP funds to the banks with no restrictions”

 No, the idea was to save the union’s pension funds. Simply follow the money. Where did it go? You have your answer.

 Ford did need the money and though my liberal collegue forgets, did apply for it along with other companies. When they saw the strings attached, the declined. Today, GM cannot repay its loans and contrary to spin, has not. Once more – follow the money. This government last year made loans to GM which used the money to partially repay the loans. Gosh – how complicated is that? It’s the old borrow from Peter to pay Paul scam. Then at the end of 2010, the government was “given” new stock in payment. The stock failed in its offering and Americans are stuck with billions of losses.

 Re: Bush – he’s not a conservative but enough of that. TARP is the only thing that has been repaid. We still should not have done it, but.

 By they way did I see “The Nation” pop up as a reference once again? Hey can I start quoting “National Review” as my source. They do use footnote?

PARAGRAPH NINE: Unions were in trouble because Wall Street tanked, taking Union investments with them.

 Not exactly the facts. Unions were already in trouble with their pension funds prior to 2008.  Organized crime dominated Teamsters through the 70s.  That’s what Hoffa was all about. They were forced into mergers  in recent years with a number of unions from other industries, including the Graphic Communications International Union,  the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employees, etc.

 IN 2006 S EIU members in Los Angeles were victimized by one of the most appalling cases of union corruption in recent history. Members saw their money illegally used to support the city council race of Martin Ludlow. Ludlow was sentenced for conspiracy to illegally funnel money from SEIU Local 99 to his campaign and ordered to pay $36,000 in restitution. Four of the last eight Teamsters union presidents WERE criminally indicted

 THE union, UNITE HERE was found guilty of invading employees’ privacy and ordered to pay $17 million for defaming medical professionals, and it has been sued by its own employees after the union slashed their staff’s key retirement benefit by 95%

 Union pension fund misuse was at the bottom of all the cases. However there is more:
 

• In June 2006, the National Labor Relations Board found that SEIU interfered with the free choice of employees by illegally making promises to wave initiation fees – much like the union accuses employers of making promises to employees during union drives.
• In June 2006, a federal judge ordered SEIU Local 1000 to pay $37,000 as punishment for failing to give members adequate information about how the union was spending employees’ agency fees (which are forced payments from employees who do not wish to union members).
• In 2007, members of the powerful Local 503 in Oregon began circulating a petition to recall the union’s president, who was seeking to collect more than $100,000 in back pay that most members think he didn’t earn.
• The Macon Telegraph reported that local SEIU officials lost control of their government-employee union after troubling questions were raised over $30,000 of cash withdrawals from the local’s bank account, lack of documentation for $90,000 in hotel, airline, food, telephone and other expenses, and $36,000 in vacation buyouts that were not authorized by the union’s board.
   

I could go on but space doesn’t permit.

 The stock market crashed because housing lenders were forced by a Democrat Congress to give loans to those who had no way to repay them. Under the leadership and guidance of Barney Frank and Chris Dodd untold sums of money went out the doors. The Freddie and Fannie Corps were in the back pockets of a Dem Congress. Dodd received  heavy preferential loans and did other congressional members for their loyal support to the future housing crisis.

 In 2005, President Bush pushed heavily to have congress reform Freddie and Fannie which were failing and stacking up loans. Frank and Dodd pushed back as did other corrupt Democrats like Maxine Waters and Charlie Rangel. Reform failed.

 Wall Street does not escape either. BUT KEEP IN MIND THAT WALL STREET IS NOT REPUBICAN AS RUMOR GOES, BUT HEAVILY DEMOCRAT. How to know? Follow the money. Pick your favorite Wall Street firm and go online and check their donation records.

 Wall Street greed did benefit from the Federal Loan guarantees and they have continued to do so under President Obama. Again – follow the money!

PARAGRAPH TEN (My buddy skips eleven) and TWELVE are about Acorn again (I covered them earlier) and that the upper ten percent don’t pay a fair share of taxes.

 Just how much is fair? How much?  Let’s see, the top 25% pay 85% of all taxes.  Hmmmm!

 The bottom 52% pay no tax at all!!!

 This is from last year’s IRS Report. I don’t know about you but it seems that it’s the bottom 52% that are not being fair at all. But wait – are the liberals complaining out of fairness or us it because those who pay no taxes are a major part of their tax base.

 Bruce writes: “The reason the bottom 50% of our country's wage earners don't pay taxes is because they are living in poverty.”

 Pretty bold statement my friend. I challenge you to prove it. Prove that we have 50% of the nation living in poverty.

 On the other hand, A NEW REPORT FROME THE IRS flatly states the based upon their analysis there are simply not enough rich to cover the deficit even if you confiscate everything they make for the foreseeable future.

 Here are the facts: A report from the Internal Revenue Service found that the rich — 8,274 people with incomes of $10 million per year or more — earned a total of $240 billion in 2009. Even of you confiscated every dime they earned, you would barely have enough money to cover government spending for 24 days. Interesting that it took a European paper to report what MSNBC, CBS and NBC would not. In fairness to CNN, ABC and FOX news, they did.

 The nation is in trouble when those who pay nothing can vote the pocket book of the earners. Such thinking and surrender of personal responsibility have led to where we are today. Under a far-far-left President and almost 8 years of a liberal congress, we are at the brink of financial destruction. As we can plain see from the weeks stock market disaster and Friday downgrading catastrophe, the Tea Party was right. There should have been no debt ceiling deal. There should have been cuts.

 If liberals begin taking even more money out of the economy through its spread the wealth Robin Hood taxes, the economy will collapse to zero. Then liberals will get their precious parity. There will be no difference between Rockefeller and the Bob Smith. They both will have zero. Trouble is, Smith never hired any one.

 Well – have to go. I must park my yacht in the Hamptons to avoid taxes, move my money to Europe to avoid paying anything, and simply falsify my returns to avoid...WAIT A MINUTE!  WHEW!! It’s not me. I’m relieved.

 No – why it’s John Kerry, General Electric, and Timothy Geitner.  Hey – they’re liberals and they run our government. Uh oh!  Now, I’m not relieved any longer.

   The arrest of 30 angry anti-capitalists from Art Uncut, the group who busted up a U2 concert at Glastonbury 2011 while toting a huge balloon insisting “U Pay Your Tax 2,” indicates that people are fed up with being dictated to by socialist-minded do-gooders who talk the talk but, in their own lives, refuse to walk the walk.

   The target of Uncut’s “Pay Up” irritation is U2’s lead singer Bono, a man who demands that international governments to support global aid organizations, but who allegedly refuses to contribute his share of the taxes needed to fund the good works he supports.

   With the help of rock stars and Hollywood collectivists, Marxist-minded politicians (translate Democrats) have hammered home the message that only by “sharing” can a person truly be caring.  Without realizing the ramifications of the share-the-wealth philosophy, those who’ve worked hard to portray capitalism as evil and promoted the merits of reordering the economic structure have invited the turmoil currently raining down upon their own heads. -- Warren Chaney

Warren does double duty today, offering us an article on the very early days of television. To read that article click here: MAGIC MANSION

Click on COMMENTS for another person's take on this ongoing political debate.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

TO READ PAST COMMENTS CLICK HERE:  COMMENTS  

TO MAKE A COMMENT CLICK HERE: Swapsale@aol.com

8-7-11

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GUEST EDITORIAL

Last week I sounded off about the economy.  When I was finished I said I'd print a rebuttal, if anyone was inclined to send me one.  To my delight, my old friend Dr. Warren Chaney has taken up the challenge.  So here goes: 

Another Look at the Economy
The Right Way

The argument that the current president and congress are bought and paid for by big business and the super-rich has some merit – but few real facts to support that contention. One can logically argue that Wall Street owns the Democrat Party since it is one of their biggest donors. Only the unions and the various Soros organizations have outsized them. However, some on Wall Street have donated to the Republican Party. Contrary to popular belief, the Republicans have not had as cozy a relationship (donations are public records and the previous statements can be verified). On the other hand, if one asks whether there is an “elite” power controlling the government the answer is, “Yes - there is!” However, it is a political elite and it exists on both sides of the political aisle. There is no evidence that the President and Congress are owned by special interests (unions, ACORN, oil, etc., but one can see that they accede to special interest demands.  Politicians do so because they want to stay in power. They want money. Politicians at all levels feel they must spend increasing sums of money in their quest for power.

Let us first consider the party that has been out of power in congress for eight years and out of power in the White House for the past three. Republicans saw their numbers dwindle when they took the road to easy spending without being checked. President Bush’s “No Child Left Behind” program was little different from those pandered by Democrats. Both cost money that the nation did not have. In the end, it failed as most government programs do. This is nothing new. Couple that with several in the party forced out of office for corruption, etc., and it leads to their defeat. Democrats are not helped with their former Vice Presidential candidate and Mayor of Chicago headed for jail. Add to that the corruption problems of Charlie Rangel, Roland Burris, Maxine Waters, Bill Richardson and just last week, Dem Congressman Wu. So one can see the massive corruption problem the nation faces. This is not the fault of those seeking special favors. It is the fault of those paid off by them. Ultimately, it is our fault in voting for them.

The problems do not end with corruption they begin with failed government programs. Think about it. Social Security – bankrupt; Medicare – bankrupt; HUD – bankrupt; Post Office – bankrupt; Treasury – near bankrupt; and the list can legitimately go on. All of this is presidential and congressional failure. Everyone knew of the problems, no one wanted to fix them. The current housing crisis can easily be placed at the feet of three politicians in congress who blocked attempted reform. The same goes for Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. Congressional and Presidential failures stretch back to our early history but let us consider some of the major ones of the past 60 years. Specifically, let’s examine some of those that got us into our financial disaster.

Presidential failure, Lyndon Johnson waged a so-called War on Poverty at the same time he was embroiling the nation in the Vietnam War. The first war was nothing more than the usual social engineering. Johnson began with a 1960 15% poverty level. At the last census, the nation’s poverty level stood at 16%.  In between billions upon billions were spent with the nation receiving nothing for it. Well that is not quite true.  According to DOE statistics, reading is down 40% from 1960 as is student memory, focus and concentration, and listening retention. What is the term we use? Oh yeah, “The dumbing down of America!”

Republicans paid the price for their spending spree…twice! They lost power after having it for such a short time. Next, they paid during the past election cycle as traditional Republicans were challenged and defeated by the highly demonized Tea Party. A full 25% of seated Republicans lost their seats to newcomers seeking real change. In the current budget battle, the newcomers refused to give in. Although they were a small majority, they changed the entire debate from spending to cutting. This next election will see further changes as other Republican seats are challenged.

Democrats on the other hand, have swung almost entirely to the left hence we are bombarded by class-warfare; tax the rich, big oil is the enemy, big business is sucking the blood out of America, etc. Blatant falsehoods become facts, name calling replaces specificity, and misrepresentation is at the forefront.

Let us face it. Who really believes the mantra that this has been another “summer of recovery”? Are you feeling recovered? This has to go down with the “Arab Spring” being a good thing as Egypt moves into the welcoming arms of the Muslim Brotherhood. It does make you wonder where the press is now. However – that is another story.

To be sure, favoritism is shown some companies and not others. General Motor’s received billions but Ford and America Toyota did not. GM’s legitimate stockholders and bondholders were screwed as the unions were given the company and the investors to “take a hike.” Likewise banks that would not take the stimulus bucks were forced to close their doors while those that did, received the big bucks from the failed stimulus package. In the end, Americans were shocked three months ago to discover that contrary to the current administration’s claims; the loans were not paid off at all. Topping it was the startling revelation that the Federal Reserve took much of the stimulus money and gave it to foreign banks to prop them up.

Unions were close to bankruptcy because their pension funds had been so abused and misused. Where criminal investigations should have been initiated, they were openly dropped. Money poured into the union coffers from the stimulus funds and the union leaders became the most frequent visitors to the White House (according to the published WH Visitor Log statistics).

Corrupt money sponges like ACORN, were permitted to reorganize and receive continuing funds. President Obama shut down drilling in the Gulf but gave billions of dollars of stimulus money to a South American country so that it could drill there. The biggest recipient of the nation’s largess was Obama’s friend, George Soros. His oil company became the primary beneficiary.  It appears that it is not only Republicans – that like big oil.

Sadly, the people deserving our support are not getting it. The new freshmen congressmen refused to budge and could not be bought off or corrupted by the “elite” Republican old guard. It is interesting that MSNBC was “shocked” that the usual “plum committee assignments” and benefits failed to bribe them.

The current so-called debt ceiling disaster is a fiasco. Because someone says he or she has a plan does not mean they have a plan. If there is a plan, we should be able to see it. Obama has no plan. Jay Carney under intense grilling by the press last week, admitted as much. The Senate has no plan; we can see that. The Reid plan is a piece of paper. One cannot read its details on line because they are not there. Three hours ago, Reid and his Democrats were filibustering their own bill. They emerged an hour ago to claim it is the Republicans doing the filibuster. Forget traditional definitions, everything is being made up on the fly.

What we are witnessing is congressional and presidential absurdity. One could not write a screenplay this silly. Until major changes are made, it will not bode well for this nation. Wednesday, Moody’s stated that none of the plans will stop a downgrade from the nation’s AAA rating. They stated that the U.S. must make major cuts or fast catastrophe.

The answer is not and never has been taxation. Our problem is not that we do not tax enough. It is that we spend far too much. The government could “take” all the money earned by the wealthy for the next twenty-years and it would not make a dent in the debt (according to the debt commission). What must be done is the following:


1.         Entitlement reform must be made immediately to include Medicare, Social Security, Welfare, etc.

2.         Shut down all bureaucratic departments that are proven failures including the Department of Education (Our school systems have failed under their ever-expanding guidance). Close down duplicate organizations and reduce administration of all remaining departments by 15%. (Not my suggestion by the way. It is the Presidential panels’ – the one this President chose to ignore).

3.         Close the tax loopholes so that companies like GE (a major Democrat contributor) can't escape without paying taxes (this money they closed down several US plants, moving them to China and putting 50,000 Americans out of work). Close the same loopholes that permit any of the wealthy to avoid paying anything.

4.         Restructure the tax system so that everybody that lives in the United States pays taxes. The bottom 52% of our nation, pay no taxes. The top 10% pay over a third and the top 25% pay over 80%. Whenever anyone is in a position to vote another’s money into his or her own pocket – that society cannot survive.

5.         Cut spending immediately to 2004 levels (Better yet to the Reagan years). The nation’s economic problem is not the wealthy nor is it Wall Street. The problem is unfettered spending. Our government is addicted. Under this administration, the debt limit has been raised three times and the current Administration and past congress tripled our national debut in one year. No spin will alter that. The stimulus has failed. Only the Administration continues to cling to that fable.

I am running out of space before addressing the financial disaster and special interests payoffs involved with the Obamacare scam. That must wait for another time. The same is true for a frank and factual discussion of this nations’ wars. We were in two, now we are in five. Permit me to close by saying that I am in agreement with Swapsale’s editorial about an elite controlling – we just disagree about who it is. My recommendation is that we all begin to question any political side that attacks the other but fails to specifically spell out what is wrong with that side’s proposals. I would also recommend that we collectively “turn on the media” and hold it accountable. Both are the “right” right things to do. -- Warren Chaney

Permit me a brief response:

PARAGRAPH ONE: ACORN is out of business because of phony right wing charges that were later disproved. The January 21, 2010 Supreme Court decision -- Citizens United vs. the FEC -- allows corporations to spend as much money as they want to control the political process and win elections.  On the state level ALEC ( http://www.thenation.com/article/161973/alec-exposed-koch-connection ) has big business actually telling legislators what bills to introduce (in return for a nice contribution to their campaign)  Does anyone really believe that big business isn't in control of our electoral system?

PARAGRAPH TWO: Warren chooses to leave out a long list of corrupt Republican politicians starting with Ted Stevens. And if it was hypocrites we were listing, such as family values pols like Senator David Vitter, the list would probably reach the moon.

PARAGRAPH THREE: Social Security is not bankrupt; it is solvent until the mid 2030s. And it is not an entitlement.  We paid into that fund. If there is a problem with SS it can be solved by raising the cap.  Right now you don't pay into it after you've made $106,000.  So most of us pay into it for the whole year while the super rich might only pay into it for a couple of months, days or even hours.  

PARAGRAPH FOUR: Lyndon Johnson's "war on poverty" was deemed a success until politician on both sides of the aisle began chipping away at it.  It should be noted that most of that chipping took place from Ronald Reagan onward. Regarding the public school system, it worked fine until funds were cut in an attempt to push private schools so the private sector and people like Neil Bush (W's brother) could make money off of them.

PARAGRAPH SIX: Class war fare started when the Republicans lowered the tax rate under Reagan to 35 % (so there was less money for such things as infrastructure, schools, hospitals and the like) and it continues to this day in Missouri, Wisconsin, Ohio (etc.) where unions are being dismantled.  It's the rich and powerful who are waging this class war and they are kicking our butts. Real earned income has declined over the last 35 years.  Now it takes two people in a family to maintain what one bread winner could contribute in the 50s, 60s and 70s.  Actually, as recent events demonstrate, even two people can't handle it now.

PARAGRAPH EIGHT: GM is an American company.  The idea was to save the American auto industry, not the Japanese auto industry which is doing fine, thank you.  Ford refused the money.  They didn't need it.  Bush gave the TARP funds to the banks with no restrictions.  That that worked well, didn't it? Also, it wasn't the Fed that gave the money to foreign banks, it was Goldman Sachs and the rest of those crooks who owed money to those foreign banks because of credit default swaps ( http://www.thenation.com/article/156995/great-squid-hunt-matt-taibbi ).

PARAGRAPH NINE: Unions were in trouble because Wall Street tanked, taking Union investments with them.

PARAGRAPH TEN: ACORN is out of business.  All they were guilty of is registering poor people to vote. Obama is currently giving out drilling permits in the Gulf of Mexico even though no new safety or oversight standards have been imposed.

PARAGRAPH TWELVE: We spend too much on the military industrial complex and too little on the people. True, you can't spend what you don't have but the reason we don't have it is because the top ten percent don't pay a fair share. Their taxes have never been lower.  In the 1950s the tax rate was 90% on people making over a million dollars and the economy was booming.  The reason the bottom 50% of our country's wage earners don't pay taxes is because they are living in poverty.

Well, that's a lot to consider.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

TO READ PAST COMMENTS CLICK HERE:  COMMENTS  

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7-31-11

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THE ECONOMY

I sent an email to a Tea Party friend of mine.  Here is a slightly edited version of it:

Be assured I am not defending Obama or the Democrats.  And I'm not sure why you are defending the Republicans.  They are both bought and paid for by big business and the super rich.  Nor do I think you have to worry about the masses voting themselves such largess as Alexander Tyler warned about.  For the past 35 years the vast majority of the money in this country has gone to the top ten percent, and most of that to the top 2 percent. The middle class has been eviscerated.  The economic elite is doing quite well, thank you.  What you are really seeing is the the theft of our country's wealth by the ruling class, not the working class.  The working class is getting screwed.  It's called "class warfare" and we are losing the war.

The Republican plan for Medicare (put forth by Paul Ryan) will turn Medicare into a voucher program. Under that system, if you get hit with a serious illness you will not have enough money to cover your costs. And good luck getting any coverage in the first place -- at our age what health insurance company would want us? 

Medicare is a program we have all paid into.  Like Social Security, it is not an entitlement.  It's our money (FICA) and they are taking it from us.  It's going to people like Bill McGuire, the head of United Health Care who pocketed 1.6 billion dollars when he retired after ten years with the company.  That's money he made by denying coverage  -- citing B.S. "previous conditions" and the like -- to people who were insured with United.  There's no telling how many avoidable deaths he's responsible for.

BTW, as regards the debt ceiling: much of the money Obama spent went to bailing out Wall Street which continues to give massive bonuses to their executives.  Obama, like Bush, gave the money with no strings attached.  That's a good reason to dislike Obama.  And Bush.  And all those corrupt politicians in Washington.

It will be interesting to see what Obama finally does with the debt ceiling.  I wouldn't be surprised if he caves in to the Republicans, as he did with health care reform and the Bush tax cuts.  If he does, it will mean that working class people will pay down the debt with no real help from the ruling class, despite the fact that they have been the only real beneficiaries of our economy. (FYI: real earned income has been in decline for average Americans since the early eighties.)

If anyone reading this disagrees with me I would love to hear from you. In fact I'll give you equal time.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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7-24-11

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OUT OF THE WOODS?

As mentioned last week, our computer crashed but, following digital bread crumbs, we think we are almost out of the woods.  We certainly hope that's the case. 

Assuming we are correct, this issue of Swapsale contains chapter two of my comic, Planet Patrol.  This is when (in my humble opinion) the story gets interesting.  It seems, things at the Martian ruins did not go as well as we might have supposed.  Poor Britt is about to get a very unpleasant surprise.  And we get to meet a new character as Britt encounters an old nemesis.  I think the story is interesting and funny. But be warned, the humor is very dark.

Now I've got to get back to cleaning out some files.  It seems I over loaded the program used to publish this site.  Apparently 26000 files is more than the system can handle.  Who knew?

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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7-17-11

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NEW HOME PAGE

I've been getting complaints about how long the home page was.  So, as you have no doubt discovered, I've made a change.  What was the home page is now (see listings on the left side of this page, second one down) Page One. Apparently the home page is supposed to be like the cover of a magazine or the opening of a front door.  (I like the magazine analogy since I kinda look at this site as a weekly magazine.)  Page One, of course, is as long as ever.

Let me know if this works for you.  I can always switch it back.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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6-25-11

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HAPPY FATHERS DAY

My father came to this country from Germany in the 1920s. His father back home owned a delicatessen so it was only natural that he found employment working in one here. He was still slicing baloney when I was born in Brooklyn in 1941 but by the time the war in Europe was winding down he had his own business: Trans-Oceanic. 

Here's how that came about: 

My dad and a coworker at the deli pooled their money to take out an ad in the Brooklyn Eagle. It offered to ship food packages to loved ones in war ravaged countries that were being liberated by the allies. The money started pouring in. Each time a country was liberated my dad and his partner would take out ads in papers in communities where those nationalities resided. In short order their business became so big that they began using Cunard Lines for shipping. We were rich.

My father repeated this process successfully until Germany was liberated. And while ads taken out in papers in German communities engendered the same response as the others had, this time my dad ran into a problem: The U.S. government would not let the ships leave the harbor. It turned out that there was something called the Morgenthau Plan which was designed to starve the German people down to 10% of their population. (If you look this up on Wikipedia you will get a very sanitized, revisionist version of this period in American history. Google it instead.)  As the food rotted in the harbor, my father and his partner, being honorable men, returned the money to the people who had paid for the packages. However, the IRS insisted that they still pay taxes on the money that had been paid to them. My dad was still being hounded by the IRS when I was in my teens.

Even so, my father remained an entrepreneur.  With his few remaining dollars he went to Germany where he made a deal on an invention called a Spirometer, a device designed to measure lung capacity. With that as the foundation, he started National Medial, Inc., a company that eventually branched out to include nebulizers and  vacuum pumps which he eventually engineered to perform at levels that had previously been thought unobtainable.  While that business never generated the money that his export business had, it was enough for us to live a comfortable middle class lifestyle.

Looking back on all that I realize I owe the old man a great debt, the main lesson being: Define your life in your own terms. I think I've done that.

Thanks, Dad.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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6-18-11

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ONE WORLD GOVERNMENT?

The World Trade Organization recently ruled against some U.S. labeling regulations for meat sold in supermarkets.  Since WTO laws supercede U.S. laws (by treaty) the American people will no longer be informed as to the country of origin when buying meat. This follows on the heels of another WTO decision making it illegal in the U.S. for tuna to be labeled "dolphin safe" even when dolphin safe methods are used to harvest the tuna. Both cases were the result of certain WTO member countries complaining that such labeling discriminated against them because, well, in the case of tuna, they didn't use dolphin safe methods (which might motivate people not to buy their product) and in the instance of meat labeling, some people might not want meat that came from Mexico, say, or Japan. Don't you want to know if the meat you're buying is from a country that has been contaminated by a massive nuclear meltdown? (Recent reports suggest the Japanese meltdown is already worse than Chernobyl and it's far from over.)

It's worth noting that the WTO decisions are made behind closed doors by a group of corporate CEOs. And they're made in favor of corporations over the needs of the people. Nothing about the process is democratic.  

For years people have been worried that the United Nations would lead to a one world government that would abrogate our constitution. In fact, the attack against our constitution is being waged by the WTO and no one seems to be paying attention.

You can get more information regarding the meat labeling here: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2726031/posts?page=5

And you can read about dolphin safe labeling here: http://climate-connections.org/2011/05/27/u-s-dolphin-safe-tuna-labeling-rule-deemed-a-wto-violation/

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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6-11-11

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THE ORIGIN OF PLANET PATROL

Back in 1986, working as a writer in the entertainment industry, I had an overall deal at 20th Century Fox studios.  My title was Producer and my job was to come up with concepts for TV shows.  One of those concepts was Planet Patrol, a kind of updated version of the 1950s TV show Space Patrol but with humor.  At the time Fox was in the process of creating the Fox network and they already had most of the shows for their introductory fall schedule.  For that reason and (I presume) others I never made the sale.  Later, after leaving Fox, I created a pilot episode for a show called WOOF at ABC which, though shot, was not picked up.  But all my attempts to sell Planet Patrol over the years fell on deaf ears. 

Then, in 1995, having started my own publishing company, I decided to produce Planet Patrol as a comic book, thinking maybe I could use it to interest someone in the project.  Alas, although the comic was sold in comic book shops across the country, the networks remained cool to the idea.  And that's pretty much where things have stayed.  

Still, Planet Patrol has always had a special place in my heart.  That's why I've recently brought it back as a feature on this site.  And now, I figure, since I'm publishing material that didn't make it into the original comic, why not offer site visitors the comic book itself with a story that hasn't been seen for many years.  You'll find the link to that offer at the bottom of this week's Planet Patrol episode.  

Meanwhile, here's the funny thing: as a result of putting this resurrected version of PP on this site, I've hooked up with another TV writer/producer, an Emmy winner, who thinks we might have a shot of turning it into a network TV show. You never know. 

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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5-28-11

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SUPERHERO MOVIES

I loved the first Christopher Reeve Superman movie.  I still think it stands as the single best movie of that genre ever made. And sure, the more recent Batman movie's are a lot better than the Tim Burton versions.  I also admit to liking the iron man films. But I don't really think Batman or Iron Man capture the magic of the first Superman film. Same for Spider-Man although I know a lot of folks liked those movies too.  

Now we have another spate of superhero films hitting the theaters.  Thor is already out, soon to be joined by X-Men, Green Lantern, and Captain America -- all second tier superhero characters, at least as far as I'm concerned. I doubt I'll be going to the theater for any of them, 3-D or not.  (I'll watch them on OnDemand.)

There is one upcoming film I'm anxious to see: Cowboys and Aliens.  It's not a superhero film but it speaks to the comic book geek in me.  I am, however, annoyed that ads for the movie, which wont be released until the end of July,  have already started popping up on my TV. I always try to get my postings for new movies up before they appear on TV but, given the advance push the studios are giving these films, that's getting harder and harder to do. I could have posted Cowboys and Aliens in the Movie trailer Theater this week but July 29 just seems like too much of an advance look.  Maybe I'm wrong.  Maybe I'll post it next week.  We'll see.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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5-21-11

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SOME SAD NEWS

I don't usually discuss personal stuff on this site but I'm making an exception today.  Two weekends ago our two dogs were killed by one or more mountain lions.  (We really do live on a mountain top that not overly built up.) We had two Silky terriers, Sammy and Baby.  As we would do every morning when we got up, we let them out into our fenced in backyard. Usually they would come back scratching at the door when they wanted to be let back in.  But on this day, after 45 minutes had passed, my wife went out back looking for them.  Here's where it gets really disturbing:  There was nothing to be found but a huge pool of blood and some large pad prints which we later identified as belonging to a mountain lion.  No dogs, no fur, nothing but the blood.

Some how the predator (or predators) had jumped the fence, gaining entrance to the backyard, killed our pets and made off with them without making a sound -- all while my wife and I were in an area of the house adjacent to the yard. Of course we were devastated.  We loved those dogs. We had them for many years. And we'll miss them.  We take solace in the fact that they were well treated and had a good life.  Still, it's deeply disturbing to lose a good pet -- especially in such a fashion.

I'm sorry to burden you with this but it just didn't seem right not to mention an even that impacted our family so deeply.

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5-14-11

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REGARDING THE GREEN HORNET

Okay, I know this is going to make novelist Wayne Greenough unhappy (see Comments Feb. 2011) but I finally watched the Green Hornet movie (it's now available on On Demand) and I have to admit that, for all of my complaining about Seth Rogen being cast as the masked avenger, I enjoyed it.  It was, for my money, a funny super hero movie. Of course, I would have enjoyed it more if it hadn't been called The Green Hornet -- the mythology that all of us cherished from childhood is violated from the very beginning of the film. In thinking about it, Rogen could have made pretty much the same movie without dipping into the Green Hornet franchise. After all, Batman has a car and a sidekick and Superman works at a newspaper.  I wish he'd called the film something else -- The Purple Prowler, maybe?

If you look back at all the superhero movies that have been made, how many haven't disappointed you?  In all honesty I can only site the first Christopher Reeve Superman movie and, pushing it a bit, the two Iron Man films.  Given that, I think Rogen's Green Hornet deserves a grudging thumbs up.  Sorry, Wayne.  

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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5-7-11

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MORE NAME DROPPING

I recently had the pleasure of meeting William H. Macy. The star of Fargo and whole lot of other really good movies, is currently getting glowing reviews for his portrayal of Frank Gallagher on the Showtime series Shameless. I recommend checking it out if you're not offended by nudity and strong language.  

As for my encounter with the star, I found him charming, relaxed and completely without guile.  I'm told that people who know him better than me would agree with that assessment.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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4-23-11

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TED STURGEON AND ME

I knew him.  I should have mentioned that last week when I posted the article on Ted.   Already a well established giant in the science fiction field, he did a book review column for a magazine I was editing at the time.  Although I can't say we were great friends, we did share a lunch or two and I remember at least one evening when he and his wonderful wife -- referred to in all our time together only as Lady Jane --  were at my house.   Ted was an incredibly nice and giving person.  The same can be said for his wife who was also a gifted psychic.  Honestly, I don't think I've ever met nicer people.

That's really all I want to say.  Ted's work speaks for itself.  But people are seldom praised just for being nice. 

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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4-16-11

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WHAT'S GOING ON HERE?

An article by Joseph Stiglitz in the May 2011 issue of Vanity Fair tells us everything we need to know.  Here's the opening pagagraph:

It’s no use pretending that what has obviously happened has not in fact happened. The upper 1 percent of Americans are now taking in nearly a quarter of the nation’s income every year. In terms of wealth rather than income, the top 1 percent control 40 percent. Their lot in life has improved considerably. Twenty-five years ago, the corresponding figures were 12 percent and 33 percent. One response might be to celebrate the ingenuity and drive that brought good fortune to these people, and to contend that a rising tide lifts all boats. That response would be misguided. While the top 1 percent have seen their incomes rise 18 percent over the past decade, those in the middle have actually seen their incomes fall. For men with only high-school degrees, the decline has been precipitous—12 percent in the last quarter-century alone. All the growth in recent decades—and more—has gone to those at the top. In terms of income equality, America lags behind any country in the old, ossified Europe that President George W. Bush used to deride. Among our closest counterparts are Russia with its oligarchs and Iran. While many of the old centers of inequality in Latin America, such as Brazil, have been striving in recent years, rather successfully, to improve the plight of the poor and reduce gaps in income, America has allowed inequality to grow.

Close the government down?  It's never been opened, at least not to do the work of its citizens.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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4-9-11

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OOPS!

In last week's editorial (scroll down) I posted a video that purported to be Ginger Rogers dancing at age 92.  Ginger Rogers actually died in 1995 at age 85.  The woman in the video appears to actually be Sarah Paddy Jones, the world's oldest salsa dancer at age 76.  That certainly makes more sense.  92 is  stretch.  Still, hats off to anyone who can go through the moves Ms. Jones does at 76.

Sorry about that mistake.  I should have been more careful.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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4-2-11

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GINGER ROGERS AT 92

You have to watch this entire video.  It's absolutely amazing:

I just hope I'm in such great shape when I'm 92.  What am I saying?   I couldn't do what she's doing now, even if I knew how to dance.  (It's illegal for me to dance in public in three states.)

Thanks to Ceil Andersen, wife of Andy Andersen (of Space Patrol Museum fame) for alerting me to this awesome video.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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3-26-11

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THE FUTURE OF NUCLEAR POWER

The problem in Japan is that the tsunami knocked out the back up generators which, in turn, prevented the plant operators from from getting water to the reactors.  Now they -- and indeed the rest of the world -- may have to deal with a series of nuclear meltdowns.  Most of the discussion I hear revolves around how no one could have foreseen that a tsunami might knock out the generators.  That strikes me as bull shit.  But here's something far worse that no one seems to have considered:  Scientist tell us we are approaching a solar maximum (a period of increased solar flares) that will be bigger than anything we've seen in possibly a hundred and fifty years.  And, they tell us, it could knock out the entire U.S. electrical grid for months if not years.  So my question is, what will happen to the 104 nuclear power plants in the U.S. should this occur?

The backup generators are short term solutions.  If the grid goes down everything in the U.S. will come to a stop including the shipment of fuel across country.  Think I'm wrong?  Here's what astro-physicist Michio Kaku has to say about the imminent solar flare activity:

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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3-19-11

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CITIZENS UNITED VS. THE FEC

I found the following video on YouTube.  It explains the recent Citizens United decision of the Supreme Court better than I can:

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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3-12-11

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TWO SUNS IN CHINA?

As I get older I become less certain about what constitutes reality.  Are UFOs real?  Big Foot?  Ghosts?  Did ancient aliens visit the earth thousands of years ago?  Were the Mayans right about the world ending in 2012?   Now we get this report from China:

'Two suns' spotted in China defy explanation

Weeks after a story shot across the Web claiming that the imminent explosion of a nearby star would result in the appearance of a second sun in the sky — a story that was later debunked — two suns were caught on camera yesterday in China. The suns — one fuzzy and orange, the other a crisp yellow orb — appeared side-by-side, one slightly higher than the other.

What's going on? Life's Little Mysteries, a sister site to Space.com, asked Jim Kaler, the University of Illinois astronomer who squelched the excitement over the aforementioned exploding Betelgeuse and who has written books on the day and night sky. The double sun image is an effect of optical refraction, Kaler said, but it's a "pretty darn rare" one, and one not fully explained by science.

MORE: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41927089/ns/technology_and_science-space/

Our ancesters would probably have taken the appearance of two suns in the sky as a sign of the apocalypse but we're too sophisticated for that.  Right?

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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3-5-11

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LOOKING BACK

My sister jokes that she peaked when she was 12.  We were latchkey kids in the early 1950s in New York City.  Back then you could take a safe, clean subway anywhere in the city for five cents.  I remember going to the Hayden planetarium, the Bronx zoo, the Botanical Gardens and even Coney Island with my cousin and sometimes my sister when I was nine years old.  It was a great time to be a kid.  It was how I learned to be independent.

http://www.pbase.com/doowopper/image/53270830

I wouldn't think it wise for a kid to do that now.  Times change and not always for the better.  

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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2-26-11

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WHY I SUPPORT THE WISCONSIN PROTESTERS

When Governor Scott Walker of Wisconsin got into power his state had a significant surplus.  But the first thing he did was give tax breaks to the super rich, thus creating a deficit.  His solution:  make working class people pay for it.  In the process he also decided to destroy the public sector unions -- with the exception of the police and firemen -- by taking back their long standing right to collective bargaining.  His actions have sparked massive protests which are even being supported by the Walker exempt police and fireman unions.  

I don't get it.  Why is it okay for the rich to get tax breaks when the rest of us have to pay?  Tax breaks do not generate jobs.  Just look back at the 1950s, 60s and 70s when the rich got taxed at 90% and then 70%.  Our economy was booming then because rich people and corporations, rather than take the hit, were incentivized to reinvest that money into the economy which, in turn, created jobs.   

As for unions, for all their short comings, they created the middle class.  Without unions to set the floor on wages, everyone else's wages will fall as well.  If Walker gets his way, union busting will spread to include both the public and private sector in all the remaining 49 states.  Before you know it we all will be back in the 1920s.  That can't be a good thing. 

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

PS: DO YOURSELF A FAVOR -- CHECK OUT THIS WEEK'S "COMMENTS."

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2-19-11

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MY MASTER WORK

Well, to be honest, it's not exactly as if there was a ground swell of support when I first published Britt Burton of the PLANET PATROL back in 2001 on my now defunct SundayComicsOnline website.  But of all the writing I've done for all the different venues I've worked in, this is my favorite creation.  True, it's a little on the dark side and, I suppose, not to every bodies tastes, but the mix of 1950s style sci-fi adventure with odd ball humor really appeals to me.  

Given the foregoing I've decided to bring ole Britt and his crew back in their most epic and sprawling saga.  It starts off a little slow and traditional but don't be fooled; by the time the story ends, Britt's world -- and maybe yours -- will be turned upside down.  Hopefully this time it'll garner a little more popular support.  If you like it let me know.  If you hate it, well, I'd like to hear from you too.

The comic starts next week but you can get a hint of what's to come by clicking here.

Finally,  I recommend clicking on the "Comments" section (see below) this week.  There's some real cool stuff there, especially if you're a Space Patrol fan.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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2-12-11

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NEW FEATURE

As you may have noticed, we are now linking directly to statues featuring comic book characters like Conan and Wonder Woman.  As with the all the comics and some of the DVDs featured on our Home Page, we get a small percentage of any sale made through us and you get a discount plus, of course, a great work of art.

Well, I guess you're not likely to see these statues in a fancy museum but I certainly consider them to be works of art.  Like the artist Robert Williams, someone I have a passing acquaintance with, I feel the art that comes from pop culture is every bit as valid as the stuff they hang in museums -- perhaps even more so.  When I was working with Andy Warhol many years ago I heard the story of how self described poet and Warhol hanger-on Gerard Malanga, stranded in Italy, squeegeed up a Warhol "original" in his hotel room which he sold for air fare back to the states.  Try doing that with original comic book art sometime.

Anyway, if you should have a mind to get one or more of these art pieces, we hope you'll order through us.  Every penny we make goes back into finding cool items that we offer to you for a nice discount.  In that regard, check out the Steampunk ray gun we have up for auction this week.  In mint condition it sells for $595.  We're offering it in near mint condition for an opening bid of $450.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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2-5-11

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PETE AND JIMMY AND THE RHYTHM KNIGHTS

Back in high school in Boonton, New Jersey, I was good friends with Jimmy Culleny and Pete Aceves.   Both of them learned to play guitars and the next thing I knew they had a record deal and were playing local gigs.  I became, well, I guess, a part of their entourage.

 (That's Jim on the extreme left and Peter on the extreme right.)  

For a kid growing up in Boonton in 1959 (without a shred of musical talent of his own), that was as good as it gets.  But we all graduated at the end of that year and Jim joined the Navy while Pete went on to college.  Six months later I was in the Air Force.  

Last week, while surfing the net I found one of the records they made on Youtube.  You can access it here.  You'll also find another cool song there: Without a Friend by the Strangers.  That one is also very rare.  Back in the 50s in Boonton you could only hear it on the black radio stations out of Newark.  Anyone remember Pat (The Cat) Kannell?  

While I was at it I also re-posted Blondie's Heart of Glass here. Great song, great recording artist.  Check it out before Youtube takes it down again.  And I reposted Earth Angel by the Penguins, the song that had every hip 13-year-old in Boonton running down to the record store.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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1-29-11

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WELCOME TO THE FUTURE

No matter which political party you consider, it seems the plan is to eliminate the middle class.  Wall street blows up the economy, we (the tax payers) bail them out, they make record profits and we, the average Joe pays the bill.  How do we pay for it?  They're talking about cutting Social Security, Medicare and Medicade.  They want to renege on retirement contracts that people were counting on for their old age.  Funding for schools, hospitals and roads has dried up in most states.  But they wont raise the tax rate on the rich or the cap on Social Security by even a few points. 

Here's what I know: the richest one-fifth own over four-fifths of our nations wealth.  According to Claude Fisher, writing for the Berkley Blog:  

The United States has the greatest inequality of income and wealth among affluent western nations. And that inequality has been increasing pretty steadily since about 1970 — more so than in other western nations – with a slowdown in the late 1990s and a few short-term fluctuations in wealth inequality due to swings in the stock market. This is pretty much understood by serious scholars (with a few outlying voices in dissent). It looks like Americans have been sensing rising inequality, too.  (http://blogs.berkeley.edu/2010/09/30/wealth-and-an-american-paradox/)

Statistics I've seen indicate you have a greater chance of achieving the American dream (transitioning from a lower to a higher income bracket) in Germany than you do here.  That's not the future I signed up for.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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1-22-11

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GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE? BAH!  HUMBUG!

I've lived in Southern California since 1978.  And I've lived in my current neighborhood for the last 13 years.  In all that time I've never seen anything like this.  Nor, apparently have any other residents I know, many of whom have lived here their entire lives.  Yet there I stood last weekend, in front of my home, in the middle of what I would describe as a snow storm.  

Meanwhile there are worldwide reports of birds falling from the sky and fish (and crabs) washing up on beaches.  The vast majority of scientists around the world tell us climate change is real and it's here now.  I can't disagree.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

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1-8-11

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EXPLAINING LENTICULAR 3-D

Basically, lenticular 3-D is a three dimensional image that does not require glasses to be viewed.  But how can I show that to you in a two dimensional format such as your computer screen?  Here's my attempt:

Okay, the image is still two dimensional but, thanks to it's movement, you can get an idea of it's 3-D nature.  Anyway, that's basically what you get with the Space Patrol Limited Edition DVD case created by Elliott Swanson.  He's a long time Space Patroller and my 3-D expert who, coincidentally, also supplied the above motion sample.  

On other matters, we are introducing a new radio show to our line-up: Lux Radio Theater.   You can access that here.

Finally, the FCC has just, in my opinion, gutted Net Neutrality.  I'll have more on that in the coming weeks.

From our Secret Mountain Top Retreat in Southern California, this is Bruce David signing off. 

TO READ PAST COMMENTS CLICK HERE:  COMMENTS  

TO MAKE A COMMENT CLICK HERE: Swapsale@aol.com

1-1-11

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