Making the best of a brutal situation?

I thank a guy I work with for directing me to this clip. After Sunday night's shift, I needed a diversion.

After watching Return to Paradise and Brokedown Palace on consecutive nights in the late 90s - yes, I admit it, I've seen these movies more than once - I did some research on Southeast Asian prison systems.

Here's a shock. They're brutal. But the judicial systems that lead them to the clink becomes a bit of a chess game. Knowing the system will randomly cherry-pick facts and cater to newspaper headlines, all the while trying to make a point, defendants generally bargain for the place of incarceration over relying on due process.

The location where this clip comes from is one of the better ones.

So relax. Enjoy. Know that these people have good lawyers.

Oh Shit! It's Mr. Creosote! Blame his friends.

This week's New England Journal of Medicine published a three decade-long study that finds one's social network of friends can have as much of an impact on one's weight gain as personal choice and individual restraint.

Conclusion: Dump your fatty friends. They're bad for your health.

Really, there's a lot to like in this study and may contribute to the dialogue in finding new and inventive ways to get people to put the fork down.

Everyone knows this, or at least sees ample (no pun intended) evidence to this fact.

As a waiter, the glut (pun intended) of evidence is intensified, as I see a sizable (I have more...) portion of the population on a nightly basis making food choices based on their's and their friend's impulses.

And as a former fatty, I understand, down to the excruciating minutiae, why one balloons up to maximum capacity. Food is good. Food is just reeaaalllly good.

But this study should probably be seen as an attachment to the greater scope and literature on understanding social networks in general. How friendships are formed and maintained; how friends can directly influence the behavior of each other; how seemingly innocuous daily choices made within a group framework has indirect, long-term consequences, both physically and psychologically. "My group of friends really love Chili's deep-fried Southwest sampler."

More to the point, the excess fat, in many cases, is merely a by-product of people hanging around other people similar to themselves; how identities within the group are formed and a pecking order created; how decisions with many are never individual, but something to be followed. "She's ordering dessert, why can't I?"

Most to the point, nothing happens in a vacuum. Individual choices are never entirely individual, but a personal outgrowth of our experience with the immediate world around us. Our friends/people around us have much more influence over that than broader concepts like 'societal norms' or 'cultural influences'.

In short, w/r/t the study, Well...No Shit friends have influence. This information is new?

Given this study, can someone sue their friends if they have a heart attack? Fit that into the cause célèbre of fixing health care.

Really, where was all this passion in '93 when the Democrats were actively trying to fix this ridiculousness?

How quick those stalwart principles change...

So Nike will now be pulling the impending release of Michael Vick's new shoe line, scheduled to be rolled out next week.

Early yesterday, Nike released a press statement detailing their plans to stand behind Michael Vick, saying every man is innocent until proven guilty. Their wording was dedicated, focused and confident.

Now, In 24 hours, the course has been completely reversed. In addition, Nike has pulled all videos featuring Vick on their website but are pulling the usual corporate bullshit of keeping everything muddled and hush-hush w/r/t their long-term association with Vick. They'll sit low. Ride it out. See if the storm passes.

In an equally disturbing manner, ESPN has changed their story headlines in their wire archives w/r/t the Vick issue as it relates to Nike. Nothing on their site relates to Nike standing behind Vick, as it did earlier yesterday. ESPN's cozy association with Nike invariably comes to mind. Ooooh, for a website snapshot!

Such is our age. And it's allowed.

In an effort to make things clear, all the evidence suggests Michael Vick is a brain-dead Neanderthal who needs to watch dogs fight to the death in order to get some kicks. As someone who enjoys, on a visceral level, the company of dogs over humans, hardly anything can bring me a deeper hatred for another human being more than this. In fact, I rarely will completely trust another human being if they don't like dogs (allergies aside). They're all weird!

With the timing of their reversal, it reminds me of Oprah saying on Larry King that she stands behind James Frey only to completely reverse her position hours later after others provided her with a ethical center.

In a world where ethics are only determined by the severity of the fallout, a corporation's or individual's transparency becomes all the more evident. Follow the developing story and the center becomes bare for all to see.

In short, just follow the sloppiness of it all.

I had a bit of a love affair with Nike shoes for a long time. With a size 13 foot, it was tough to find a shoe that fits, is durable and holds up to the elements as well as Nike shoes have for me. Their shoes became a bit verboten after this. With their capitulation and 'correction', I gave them another chance. As I said, it's tough to find good shoes. I admit the line.

If Vick continues to be a poster child for Nike after all this, I'm done. There. I said it. I'm getting all self-righteous...about shoes.

Dan Patrick jumping off the boo-yah train.

After two weeks of speculation and a mysterious absence from last Tuesday's show - the day the 'Big' announcement was supposed to happen - Dan Patrick just announced he will be leaving the boo-yah network on August 17 of this year to do...whatever.

Yawn.

Aside from my collective indifference to the speculation and announcement as in pertains directly to Patrick, I can only hope this deals a serious blow to the silliness that is ESPN.

Patrick's show is and has always been the definition of dull/boring/monotonous and, one of my favorite words, jejune. The show was always a case study on the stupidity that other people find funny. But with the addition of Keith Olbermann from 1pm to 2pm, the show became passable, mainly because Olbermann is and has always been smart, relevant and highly entertaining.

Keith's show, Countdown on MSNBC, is the best news show on television along with being the show that brought down Rumsfeld in a glorious diatribe that gave me a faint, glimmering hope for American politics (if you haven't watch this, do so!).

Dan Patrick isn't really the face of the network anymore. There has been a concerted effort on the part of ESPN to rein in the egos in order to keep the costs down when it comes to contract negotiations. But there is no denying the possible effect this will have. The last of the old guard is gone, leaving the Stuart Scotts of the world to man the ship. One can only hope someone will pony up the dough to present a challenge to what's become the Evil Empire of sports broadcasting. The time seems right.

I never really cared about ESPN as a presenter/business, it was annoying but not filthy evil, until I read stuff like this and this and this and this.

Throw on the fact that I am now supposed to give a shit about NASCAR, I can only hope ESPN begins to whither on the vine. I'm sure that will come to fruition like my prediction that hip-hop would only be a fad.