The Hardee’s Six Dollar Burger

While the world – from Haiti to Africa – was rocked by food riots last month, U.S. consumers can still waddle into a Hardees or Carl Jr. fast food restaurant and order a Monster Thickburger – a half a pound of beef, cheese, bacon, pickles, and catsup for six bucks. The Monster Thickburger tips the scales at more than 1,200 calories and contains 72 grams of fat (more than 110 percent of the recommended daily amount of fat). Probably enough food to feed a Haiti orphanage for a week.

Rambo on a Walker

Sylvester Stallone is back for a fourth “Rambo” movie. The movies comes on the heels of Stallone filming a 6^th edition of the “Rocky” franchise. What’s next the second installment of “Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot”?

Bling H20

Twenty-seven percent of people living in developing countries do not have access to potable water – so let’s talk about Bling H20, one of the most expensive bottled waters in the world. A 750 ml bottle of Bling costs between 40 and 60 bucks and has been a favorite among Hollywood types for its frosted glass bottle sealed with a cork. Bling boasts a 9-step purification process for the water it pulls from Dandridge, Tennessee. Whatever happened to tap water?

Grand Theft Auto IV

Video gamers love this GTA 4 for its realism and action. Yet only a few courageous people have the nerve to condemn a game that has players pretending to be a sociopathic killer who murders innocent bystanders, slaughters drug dealers, shoots police officers, and rapes, tortures, and murders prostitutes. Most reviewers are as cowardly as Michael Malone on ABC News who admits that the game is horribly violent, but comes up with these nuggets:

“My younger son Tim ordered it with his own money, so it is officially his (yeah, parents, go ahead and try to ban it -- your kids have probably already seen the entire game, without you knowing it, via YouTube screen grabs).”

“Tim has already managed on two separate days to get himself into that bloody-eyed, stiff-legged zombie state that comes from staring at a TV screen too long with an Xbox 360 controller in your hand. I've already taken the game away from him twice -- that's in two days, mind you -- and made him do his homework, eat, sleep, breathe, etc.”

Pathetic how Malone rationalizes his poor parenting by claiming that no parents will be able to keep their children from X-rated video games. With logic like that why prevent children from pornography, cigarettes, and illegal drugs? Because, you know, they’ll get it at school anyway. Clearly, parents like Malone need a visit from the Department of Social Services.

The National Debt

As of last week, the national debt was $9,361,455,462,861.20 (that’s $9 trillion dollars). The average citizen’s share of this debt is about $30,800. On top of this, U.S. consumer debt rose more than $15 billion in March to more than $2.5 trillion (mostly credit card debt).

Four Dollars for a Gallon of Gas

Do we really need to say more? It’s gotten so bad that the Associated Press is reporting that more people are running out of gas on the highways because they can no longer afford to fill up their vehicles. Instead people are putting in a quarter or half a tank and trying to make the gas stretch. Hard to do when nearly a third of the cars on the highway are trucks and SUVs.

Teenagers Can’t and Don’t Read

Reading aptitude among high school students continues to plummet – despite all the crowing about how technology is helping education. Less than one-third of 13-year-olds are daily readers – a 14 percent decline from 20 years ago, according to the National Endowment for the Arts. This, of course, is wreaking havoc for business owners. Nearly two-thirds of employers rank reading comprehension as “very important” for high school graduates, but only 38 percent of businesses consider high school students deficient in this skill. We continue to fall behind in reading – as a result U.S. 15-year-olds rank 15^th among 31 industrialized nations in reading scores (Poland and Korea rank higher).

Perez Hilton

The celebrity gossip blog rakes in about $500,000 to $800,000 a year. Is that where we’ve come as a society? A guy who writes about celebrity drug busts and hook-ups is a millionaire?

Read our essay on being addicted to convenience

Unintentionally Gay Moments in Cinema

Labels: Culture, Education, Parody, Politics

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