Vast Wasteland: I don't think the Oregon Vampire Rights Act is going to pass.

ITEM: Let this mark the grand return of my Vast Wasteland TV Column. Last seen here.

I've been watching a lot of television lately, which is a good way to put off Ken Macleod books I should be finishing. Just short impressions:

True Blood: I don't think that the Oregon Vampire Rights Amendment is going to pass. I still think that our real world Just Say Now Marijuana legalization campaign has a shot, even though the Mormons and Barack Obama will probably be on the other side. I guess I should passively hope that a marijuana supporter won't fly into some Christian Broadcasting station and kill someone on camera by plunging a hand through the poor guy's chest and then snarl something about "eating your children". That wouldn't be helpful to the anti prohibition efforts I would think.

Rubicon: How does the lead character get his hair like that? I've seen characters with hair like that in anime but never real life. Its like some kind of arrow hat. Meanwhile, the side story of deciding to murder somebody with a UAV felt pretty realistic. Apparently, its always a go. I can believe that. No, really I can.

Burn Notice and Covert Affairs: I find these shows very entertaining. But, for the most part, we're the bad guys. We usually murder Democrats and replace them with Dictators. If you watch Burn Notice, then you'll understand why I think Simon would be the agent in good standing and Michael, who "helps" people, would be the one sent to some off the books black prison site. On the other hand, perhaps that's why Michael got burned: refused to assassinate Chavez. Related: Too poor for cable? I might be in that category myself soon. You can watch both of these shows online.

Related: Okay, you are too lazy to have read the Nation or the Progressive or Mother Jones for the last 28 years to know how evil our foreign policy is abroad. Can you watch a video? Try this one or this one or this one. I'll embed these over at Mirror Universe when I get a chance.

Oh, and one more thing: Jessica Centers is not credible.

And that Jessica Glynn Centers isn't credible either.

Let's be frank: Examiner.com editor Jessica Centers is not credible!

Jessica Centers is simply not credible!

Best Free Online Sources of Television and Movies

So I got the three in one cable deal a year or two back and I ended up paying about 100 dollars a month initially. Then when the reductions and rebates wore off that ballooned to about $150. So I got rid of most of my cable channels (I pay nine bucks a month for local channels, plus BET and the Golf channel, pretty much two of the most useless channels ever.) I kept my Internet service and my phone. It was actually cheaper to keep some cable channels as opposed to getting rid of it completely, although it looks like I may have been given some incorrect info from my helpful Comcast service provider.( An aside: I was originally told that if I got rid of all my remaining cable channels I would be paying about 110 a month for my two remaining services where if I kept some channels it would be 55 dollars a month for all three services. So I chose option two naively enough. I later found out that my bill would be closer to 80 bucks a month. Like I said: helpful, if you define "helpful" as a lack of accuracy or candor. Looking into Vonage as I type this...)

I have to admit I don't miss cable at all. The reason I don't miss cable at all is that I can pretty much watch all the television I want online. Here are some of the services I found and this is by no means a complete list.

Choose and Watch
Not the usual cable fare but over several hundred channels. Plus free porn. You shouldn't watch it because it repeats too often.

Online TV attempts VEOH and MIRO.
I haven't even attempted to check out their vast libraries yet.

Hulu
New attempt by Fox and NBC to put most of their television content online. There are shows here that I haven't seen in years and are especially cool to watch at night. Watching the Night Gallery right now.

Surf the Channel
Doesn't seem entirely legal. Should I be able to watch Jumper or American Gangster online... I'm just not sure.

Smashing Telly
A place to find online documentaries.

Better Humans TV
A great place to find bleeding edge science documentaries.

List of Online TV Stations from Zeropaid
Again, not totally legal I'm sure but it's hard to regulate those Asian Youtube stations.

The Acid Jazz Channel
The best music channel that I've ever made. I play mostly music at my music channel. Crazy huh?

And that's not even a complete list. I even found Farscape, one of my favorite science fiction shows. This week, two of the shows that I would have missed, Smallville and South Park (which puts all their shows online anyway.) I found online. Notice I haven't even had to use Bit Torrent yet. To be frank, you can get just about any show you want, including entire seasons from the Pirate Bay and other torrent sites. The legality of this seems to be in question. If you decide to break the law and use torrent to download shows, you might want to keep that to yourself and not mention that on your Facebook or Myspace page.

The Insurance Industry is Evil, but the Health Insurance Industry is Really Evil

Here's a don't miss series by the Toledo Blade about the Health Care Industry. It's not pretty. This isn't exactly about, say, auto or car accidents, but the practice of "Deny, Delay and Deceive" seems to run across insurance families. Or as the story says: People with health insurance were harmed because insurers interfered.

Some Youtube vids.

Day One: Not what the doctor ordered.



Day Two:

Patient Peter Tsikns ordeal with Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield.

Study Finds Its Better to Settle in Most Cases

As usual, you should consult your attorney. Just as a layman, I would imagine that there shouldn't be a large difference between a settlement and what you would get if a trial verdict goes your way. Full story here:

The vast majority of cases do settle — from 80 to 92 percent by some estimates, Mr. Kiser said — and there is no way to know whether either side in those cases could have done better at trial. But the findings, based on a study of 2,054 cases that went to trial from 2002 to 2005, raise provocative questions about how lawyers and clients make decisions, the quality of legal advice and lawyers’ motives.

Critics of the profession have long argued that lawyers have an incentive to try to collect fees that are contingent on winning in court or simply to bill for all the hours required to prepare and go to trial.

“What I would want them to look at was whether or not the lawyers had a strong financial incentive to go to trial,” said Cristina C. Arguedas, a criminal defense lawyer in Berkeley, Calif., when told of the study. “I’m not suggesting the answer, because I don’t know, but that would be my question.”

The study, which is to be published in the September issue of the Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, does not directly answer Ms. Arguedas, but it does find that the mistakes were made more often in cases in which lawyers are typically paid a share of whatever is won at trial.

How To Avoid Car Accidents

This comes from the California and Insurance Blog about things you shouldn't do in your car:

Parents magazine has a list in its July, 2008 edition with "5 Totally Unsafe Car Moves." Their top 5:

1. Climbing into the backseat, while the car is moving;
2. Picking up your baby while the car is moving;
3. Traveling with pets loose in the car;
4. Packing the car to the gills; (My car doesn't have gills, does yours?)
5. Forgetting to double-check the car seat.

I have to tell you, other than #3 and maybe #4, none of these ever come up. After three kids, I can not count any times when anyone climbed into the backseat to be with the kids. The idea never even cross our minds. Nor did #2 or #5. I have traveled with an old dog to the vet with him sitting next to me. And once in a while, we put a lot of luggage in the car for a road trip. (Although, with gas prices being so high, the road trips are done for a while.)

Here are my 5 totally unsafe car moves:

1. Putting on makeup while driving;
2. Shaving while driving;
3. Text messaging while driving;
4. Changing your clothes while driving;
5. Passing things between cars while driving.

Share your totally unsafe car moves with me.

I think you would be better off if you just ignore kids and makeup entirely but that's just me.

Common Sense About Tattoo Removal

Common sense should prevail when you ask yourself should I remove my authentic Mali face tattoo
before I interview for a job that I really want. Or if you're like most people: a job that you
really need.

While times have changed and most people won’t assume you’re an unsavory sailor or an
ex con or that really scary guy Robert De Niro played in Cape Fear that you could read then you
should still expect the worst from your employer. That goes double if you’re in any kind of entry
level job where at will work rules prevail. “At will”, by the way, means that your
employer can fire you go for any reason. Now, if you have actually done any work in the work
place, then you will run into people who are completely insane and will stretch that version of
“any reason” into pretty much any reason. He or she just might not like you. They
might not like the cut of your jib, whatever a “jib” happens to be. You might work in
a office with a dress code that requires a short shirt that shows off your flaming arm tats. Your
tattoo just gives them an excuse to show off their authority.

Or, worse than the psychopathic boss that I can promise that you’ll run into, your tattoos
could actually be a legitimate hindrance to your job. If you’re working with a clientele
that’s conservative or that doesn’t like people with tattoos then it’s your
job—if you want that job—to get rid of that tattoo. If you have a family to feed, or just
yourself, then you have to get rid of things that hinder you in the workplace. That’s what
grownups do anyway.

Now, for tattoos that are on parts of your body that aren’t visible—for example the Henry
Rollins tats on the back—then that’s a problem that can be easily solved. If you have
tattoos on your legs or your arms then you might make a disciplined decision to cover up both your
legs and your arms when you’re at work. You certainly would want to do that for any kind of
job interview that you’re serious about. Ditto for any kind of odd piercings that you would
even suspect would be a turn off. You might even want to continue that policy if you’re
company has a strict dress code and they’re a bit touchy about it.

Yet what about those tattoos that you can’t easily hide or on parts of your body that you
can’t conceal, such as your face or upper neck? This depends on the job of course, but if
you’re an adult and you act like an adult then you need to consider professional removal of
those tattoos. The technology has improved over the years and in this economy—whch looks like it
will get worse before it gets better—then your job is probably the most important thing that you
have.

You simply can’t afford to lose your job over a cosmetic decision that you made in your late
teens.

So grow up and make the make the right choice for you and your family, if you’re planning on
having a career that will allow you to support one. Have those job killing tattoos removed by a
professional.