Is Vince McMahon out of touch?

[VIDEO] I have always been a mark for the World Wrestling Federation - oh I mean WWE. I truly admire Vince McMahon who had led the former WWF to great heights since he purchased his dad's company in the early 1980s. He truly had an entrepreneurial approach to the business and brought it to the next level where wrestling is mainstream.

I saw a podcast McMahon did with one of his former top guys - one Stone Cold Steve Austin - and he tried to differentiate pro-wrestling from what he does. As he stated himself professional wrestling was what his dad Vincent J. McMahon had done back when it was the World Wide Wrestling Federation. Instead, Vince McMahon does sports entertainment and McMahon has over a 30 year record of success in that space even if he does have some periods of concern as we're seeing now.

I've been following wrestling news primarily through YouTube channels such as Wrestlelamia as you see above and WrestleTalk and they often talk about the declining ratings of WWE programming. Even now while I still tune in faithfully largely finding myself tuning out programming at home more focused on my PC or even the social network apps on my smartphone. There are some entertaining segments on the program and there are segments I could be very happy without.

BTW, since I never really talked about it the Saudi Arabian PPV SuperShow Down it seems for most fans was a disappointment. There were a few good matches from the show, however, I chose to skip the Goldberg v. Undertaker match which has many fans saying that it's time for both of those legends to hang it up. Even I bought into the hype of the Undertaker hanging it up. Yet I wouldn't mind seeing Goldberg one more time however many fans just are ready for both to enjoy their retirements and no more big money for just one more match. Also remember WWE does have an agreement with Saudi Arabia for other shows for a good period of time and the Saudi family who rules that kingdom has money to burn (and reportedly for one more match from the late Ultimate Warrior).

So anyway some people see this year's SuperShow Down as symptomatic of what's wrong with WWE programming this year. Perhaps the decline occurred as soon as the McMahon family eliminated general managers from their two marquee brands. Who knows, but perhaps things are a bit stale and as WWE had some over the years its time to revamp the programming. I'd be excited for some reinvigorating entertainment from the largest pro-wrestling/sports entertainment company in the world!

Old TV against stereotypes

[VIDEO] Wednesday I was watching the classic western programs you would find on Me-TV. Big Valley, Gunsmoke, Bonanza, and The Rifleman. On this particular afternoon an episode of The Rifleman caught my eye.

The episode is question is entitled "The Indian" and features Michael Ansara - who played a Klingon in Star Trek -  as an Apache US Marshal who as the story progresses arouses the suspicion of the people in North Folk. Ansara's character Sam Buckhart was about to be the subject of a lynch mob if it wasn't for the quick action of the title character Chuck Connors' Lucas McCain.

We see the issue of racism or prejudice as shared in the context of a western show. Westerns weren't always about the cavalry chasing the Indians or cowboys/ranchers fighting the Indians. In that 1959 episode of The Rifleman a minority in the fictional town of North Folk was able to convince most of this lynch mob that it wasn't worth it to go up against some of their own people and an Apache US Marshal.

It lead me to a conclusion about so-called Hollywood activism. It seemed at one point the liberals of the 1950s and 1960s were on the right side of history. For example even though I may know Charlton Heston as a leader of the National Rifle Association - and may well consider him a right-winger - he was at the March on Washington.

The Civil Rights movement, was truly a necessary movement in the history of a country. Unless you accepted some of the injustices that lead to the boycotts and the marching how could anyone be opposed to any American seeking equal rights or even equal opportunity?

How can anyone be opposed to insuring that everyone has equal opportunity to a good education in a public or private school? How can anyone accept that a certain segment of the population had to be subjugated to a more favored segment of the population? If all men - well all people - are created equal how can we accept this?

Perhaps now the issues aren't much different. The issue may be less race/ethnicity than perhaps income. I hope I can be a rich man one day, but at this point that ship seems to have sailed. I'd be more than satisfied to at least eke out a middle-class lifestyle and I believe that should be relatively easy to attain.

Either way I can't say how this episode was received in the late 1950s other than perhaps most TV viewers of that time saw it as just another western TV episode. Westerns often did involve interactions between for example American Indians - or if you prefer Native Americans - and their interactions with European Americans. So who knows if episodes such as this made an impacts on their audiences.

Unfortunately the pendulum has swung directly in the opposite direction. My only concept of 21st Century Hollywood liberal activism is seen on FOX News. Perhaps today it's hard to do an episode about being fair to a person of a different ethnicity to whoever is the prevailing majority. Just as easily as we want to talk about fair play perhaps today's Hollywood activists are shoving their own agenda down the throats of the public.

I could ask if middle America thinks that Hollywood is out of touch with regular everyday Americans? As a person far removed from Hollywood and maybe even middle America I'm a long way from answering this question.

It just recently occurred to me that Hollywood has always had activists in some form whether they're the actors, directors, producers, or even writers. They created works of art perhaps showing how we can be fair to be people of different ethnicities. How it's certainly wrong to treat different people with outright scorn and disrespect.

Perhaps one day Hollywood will be on the same side of the issue of the day with most Americans. Perhaps one day taking a stand will not be equated with badmouthing other Americans - especially the ones that patronize your products.

5 reasons iPhone still beats Android

The debate continues iPhone vs. Android devices over at The Daily Dot. Lots of good points, but I usually just pick a phone and I'm done. I recognize that every person has their reasons for choosing a particular device. People are rabid about Apple devices and people are rabid about Android devices.

And you know no one ever asks about a Windows phone device. :(

Megan McArdle: Part-Time Workers Deserve the Shift, Not the Shaft

To start this piece from Bloomberg's Megan McArdle isn't dismissive of low-wage retail jobs. Indeed the argument here is that right now it's difficult to find a full-time job to make a decent income. Another argument is mandating how much a business should pay their employees could cause more harm than good.

Conclusion: "Ultimately, this comes back to the weak job market. As long as the demand for low-skilled labor significantly lags the supply, workers will continue to struggle. Unfortunately, legislators can’t mandate a strong labor market. So we’re apt to end up mandating more labor market rigidity instead."

Via Instapundit!

You Should Quit Your Soul-Sucking Miserable Job

Heh, I can sure relate to this article. If you don't like where you are perhaps it's time to let go of that job that isn't working out and go where you are appreciated. See what's out there and hopefully evaluate whether or not they're right for you. That is where I am now.

Daily Princetonian: Many people shouldn't go to college

Found this over at Instapundit with the quote: "So you've heard it from me, you've heard it from Barack Obama, and now it's the Daily Princetonian"

I'm assuming that the Daily Princetonian is a student newspaper and this column was written by a religion major. So therefore was it a matter of time before a college student or college newspaper write such an opinion. Some of the arguments here make sense:

Policymakers and university administrators have admirably worked to expand access to college over the past several decades. In terms of enrollment rates, their efforts have been successful — matriculation increased by thirty seven percent between 2000 and 2010. So, the good news is that we’re getting young adults on campus. But we are profoundly failing them as a country after that; America’s graduation rate sits at an abysmal 53 percent, including community colleges. This disparity betrays a critical disconnect, one not discussed often enough — that a large swath of those lured to college should never have attended.

Seemingly insurmountable odds work against the typical young American. A college graduate today has to contend with an average of nearly $30,000 in student loan debt. The overall jobless rate for those between sixteen and twenty four is fifteen percent, more than double the national average. That said, the reality is that a large number of college students have no business being at four year universities.

American culture aggressively pushes the college experience and dismisses skeptics as snobs. Master plumbers, for example, make roughly between $50,000 — approximately the national average — and $80,000 a year. So why is it considered so wrong to encourage people to pursue the profession, or another like it, instead of a college degree? One path all but ensures a life in the middle class; for far too many, the other only guarantees crushing debt and no degree.

Therefore those who are in college now, probably weren't ready or qualified for college. This is something you'd really have to want in the first place, expectation or no expectation. And you can't expect everyone else to take care of it for you, if you have no skin in the game anyway.

Of course skin in the game for me would mean cash money, if one is lucky no loans at all! Perhaps some grants and scholarships, but nothing would beat a part-time job while you're in school. Especially if you can't afford to go on your own.

McArdle: Why Your Little Alma Mater May Go Extinct

If you read Instapundit you see a lot of posts about the "higher education bubble". In one recent post he found another example which explains that admissions as some schools are more selective and college enrollment has decline thanks to the job market & cost of tuition. He goes on to explain an unfortunate side effect to the changing higher education environment:

Many of the hard-hit schools seem to be historically black colleges. Here in Washington, for instance, Howard University is in the middle of a bruising board fight, thanks in part to falling enrollments. Renee Higginbotham-Brooks, vice chairwoman of the board of trustees, prophesied that "Howard will not be here in three years if we don't make some crucial decisions now." This strikes me as unlikely -- Howard was founded by a congressional grant after the Civil War, and I doubt that Congress will let it go under. But the threat is undoubtedly real for other historically black schools.

The concentration of enrollment declines among the schools that serve poor and minority communities raises some uncomfortable questions. On a positive note, this may mean that kids have access to a better class of school. On the other hand, it may mean that the schools best equipped to serve those kids fold, leaving nothing in their place. While I'm on the record as saying that we should probably send fewer kids to college, this isn't the way that I wanted to accomplish that. Rather, I wanted us to stop relying on rank credentialism, and to think harder about viable alternatives for kids who may not be academically inclined.

So to illustrate what's happening to the not so big name schools of academia the author points out an historically Black college such as Howard U.

I'm a long way from evaluating how Universities are doing, but I can only talk about myself. I don't regret getting a degree what I do regret is not being more academically inclined not just when I got to school but before I graduated from high school. My background was a long way from being a serious student.

So anyway there are a number of things to consider. What kind of students do universities want? What alternatives are available for high school seniors who don't seem inclined to go to college? What should we expect from a university other than allowing access to a university education and/or a degree?