In Memoriam: Buddy Hackett, the King of the Catskills
Ah, the hot, sweaty days of July are upon us (Australian readers: please substitute “crisply cold yet mild days of July”), and everyone and everything is in slowdown mode. Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos are bored with counting their money, so Corbis is suing Amazon for unauthorized sale of pictures from the Corbis archive by Amazon auction customers, and Amazon is going to sink low enough to find cover under the DMCA. My hometown team’s trouble with fans out of the stands is now over, considering the two players the Sox traded for yesterday; Carl Everett can beat the shit out of them, and Robbie Alomar will contribute the spit. The Wimbledon women follow their seedings like ducklings their mother, while the men will get a first-time Grand Slam champion (naturally, Tim Henman is giving the Brits their annual tease, but the draw has stuck us with the real final being the upcoming semi between Roddick and Federer).
Ah, it’s yet another wonderful day full of nothing. So let’s just do it…
THE PIMP SECTION
Poffel, when he gets older, will be happy to remember the day he was able to come in threes.
Brown has a wonderful SNME from 1986 retrospective.
THE AP WIRES ARE BURNING UP AGAIN…
Seven in 10 people in a poll say the Bush administration implied that Iraq and its leader Saddam Hussein were involved in the Sept. 11 attacks against the United States. And a majority, 52 percent, say they believe the United States has found clear evidence in Iraq that Saddam was working closely with the al-Qaeda terrorist organization.
Oh, boy, time to firm up the emigration plans again. To the non-US guys: Look, my chances of getting a residence permit are nil without a job. So someone set me up.
The number that believes this country has found weapons of mass destruction is 23 percent, down from 34 percent in May, according to a poll conducted by the Program on International Policy Attitudes at the University of Maryland…The number who want the United Nations to take a leadership role in Iraq has grown from 50 percent in April to 64 percent now.
Hold off on that. There may be hope.
And then there’s CNN’s poll…
Or this CNN poll (thanks, Zach)
Okay, I’ll stay put for now. But I reserve the right to change my mind.
SMACKDOWN SOMEWHAT SPOILED
Okay, Hogan’s gone for certain. Vince blows off the Mister America angle in one of the easiest and most effective ways possible. A rare sign of intelligence and on-feet thinking by WWE Creative. Hey, I give them credit when credit’s due, which isn’t often.
Hmmm, a backstage skit involving Brock Lesnar, Kurt Angle, cookies, and milk…oh, this can’t be a good sign.
John Cena’s promo on Billy Gunn is said to be a thing of beauty and joy forever. In fact, looking over the spoilers, it may be the one thing to watch the show for this week. Okay, there’s another Haas/Benjamin versus Eddie/Tajiri match, but still…
Has Linda Miles finally found the man of her dreams? Is he a Canadian with zero personality and the greatest pack of wrestling skills on the planet? Tune in to find out!
YOU’RE A MORON: SOMEONE HASN’T GOT THE MEMO
EzEricT420247 (there’s so many levels of AOL lameness in that handle alone that it’s tough to parse) chimes in with this shit:
What ego games does “Flex” have?
Ask Booker and Jericho what ego games Flex does. He’ll kill other people’s heat simply in order to make himself look better. No one in the last four years has come out of a program with Flex looking stronger than when they went in, not even Lesnar, not even Hogan. He has the ability to destroy pushes with promos alone. He doesn’t need to lace them up. I, for one, will never, EVER forget August 9th, 1999, and my thoughts afterward: “Jericho left WCW to play his bitch?”.
Ask yourself this: if he wasn’t out for himself and himself alone, how come he didn’t ask “creative” to turn him heel after WM18?
He’s funny,
That’s your opinion, and I’m the one with the column, so I’m right.
he’s entertaining,
Again, that’s your opinion, and I’m the one with the column, so I’m right.
and he jobs.
When it’s in his best interests to do so, and even then he makes sure that either the job is returned ASAP or that there’s no damage to his status.
He’s jobbed to Brock before he was big,
Wrong. Lesnar came in with a monster push, and Flex had to go and do a movie. Good timing, nothing more.
he’s jobbed to Billy Gunn,
Also the beneficiary of a monster push at the time.
he’s jobbed to X-Pac (I think),
Not after he became popular, he didn’t.
he’s jobbed to Al Snow,
As part of an angle involving Mick Foley, who was, yes, the beneficiary of a monster push at the time.
so what’s so egotistical about The Rock?
Are you really that insensate? Even people on the opposite side of me in this agree that the cocksucker’s one of the biggest egotists in wrestling, and he’s destroyed more quality pushes in the last four years than even Trip. It was only with the Booker program that people started to recognize what I knew three and a half years ago: the guy’s a cancer.
Your entire argument is based on the fact that he jobs? That is the worst possible excuse you could possibly give. Look at who he jobs to, when he does it, and under what circumstances he does it. Then you’ll realize that he is taking no chances and no risks when he jobs. He comes out with the same amount of heat as he did when he went in; actually, more, because he’s sucked the heat from every pore of his opponent. Jobbing is supposed to help the person being jobbed to. No job Flex has done in the last four years has done that.
Now go back to your bed in the Clueless Ward and don’t write me again.
MAILBAG!
The Pride of Dartmouth His Own Self, Elliot Olshansky, has some stuff about Maven to bring up:
As for RAW, well, what am I supposed to say? Oh, yeah, what’s the point of using Foley to help get Maven and Orton over, then turning around and jobbing Maven to Rico the next week? Couldn’t someone else have been used in that slot? Maybe the Fat Samoan who DIDN’T get fired could do a one-night face turn, loses, and goes off to Smackdown to team/feud with Rikishi (tell me you don’t see THAT coming a mile away). Everyone always talks about how the WWE will move heaven and earth to get its homegrown talent over, and you don’t get more homegrown than Maven (unless, of course, you meet up with RVD after the show). So what gives? He has a good look, good music, nice babyface backstory, and Al Snow presumably did a good job teaching the kid to wrestle. Oh, well, I guess there’s a standing rule on RAW that anyone with the last name “Huffman” has to endure the constant frustration of ALMOST getting the push you want/need, only for it to be pulled out from under you a week or two later.
I was wondering about this myself. I think that all of the TE people are in a bad position when it comes to the backstage politicians. Nidia, Gayda, and Miles have all been pushed into valet roles and Matthews is on the mic, which makes life a lot easier on them when it comes to their image backstage. However, Maven and Harvard are in a nasty spot. You know that there are some influential people backstage who still have it in for them for not “paying their dues”, even after they effectively did, and under some very trying circumstances. That being said, Maven should be Heat fodder. I don’t think he’s got the in-ring and SE talent to hang on Raw, which Harvard definitely has. Harvard is definitely being kept down. Maven might be at the upper limit of his talent.
Lots of observations from Regular Andrew Ormberg:
OK, the thing that bugged me the most about Raw was during the Steiner/Stacy vs Test/Y2J match, JR was saying that Stacy is better off with Scott Steiner because he’s a gentleman! WTF!!! And then he said it LATER ON. So Scott “Freakzilla” Steiner, the Big Bad Booty Daddy who will make you scream a second time if you whisper something complimentary…is The Perfect Gentleman? I almost laughed my own anus clear off when JR said that. Because in a battle between Steiner and The Test Character, it’s pretty much like decided between an arrow thru your brain or a soldering iron up your ass.
Not to mention the fact that My Beautiful and Beloved herself gave reasons for being attracted to Big Sump Pump that had nothing to do with being a gentleman. Lips, hips, and larger-than-Jericho appendage, if memory serves. I don’t remember her talking about candlelit gourmet dinners, moonlight walks, or even holding the door open for her.
It’s so incredibly sad how JR has fallen. It seems he gave the iota of talent he has left to Lawler, who actually made some humorous and insightful commentary. Not a LOT, but compared to “PUPPIES! PUPPIES! WHOO-HOO!” it was pretty good. I think we can officially declare Ross past Shillvone-bad, and is now “Mark Madden after the first show when he was OK” bad.
I try not to think about Ross anymore. It’s just way too depressing. I wonder if he realizes how much of an embarassment he’s become…actually, I think he has, but there’s no way for him to exit to his corporate position gracefully without a successor on tap. Damn you, Kevin Dunn, for blocking Bisch from getting Schiavone on board. People bitch about him all the time, but the circumstances in WWE would be different (or if he started pulling the same shit again, it would have been done as a work-shoot involving Bisch), and back in the day, Fat Tony was one of the best.
I’m also disappointed in the announce team for not mentioning that Gail Kim now joins Christian as the only 2 people in WWF/E history to win a title in their debut match. (Christian w/the light-heavy strap). This makes her the first woman and Asian, but she’s only the second Canadian.
I was going to mention the whole Christian thing myself, but I forgot exactly which belt he won, the LHW or the Euro, and I was pretty firm that it was the Euro. So, I saved myself a little egg on the ol’ kisser there.
I’m with Scott- Gail is dull. But so was Victoria when she debuted as Molly’s galpal. Some awesome facials (expressions, you perv) and tAtU music later- BOOM.
What Gail Kim needs is an entrance. The video’s decent, but she needs a darkened arena and pyro to go along with it. Play up the whole Trinity thing rather than just “oh, gee, aren’t we hip” oblique references.
If Mount Perpetually Over was in Canada, Bret would own a mansion on the summit. He had an extended heel and face run, so he qualifies regardless- so sez I. Much as I hate him, HBK does too. Warrior? I’ll attribute that to the loss of Katharine the Great. Dusty does deserve it- he was getting good reactions at WCW’s end too.
But, Andrew, what about Bret’s WCW run? It was a complete disaster from start to finish, but people at the Summit of Mount Perpetually Over overcome stuff like that. Bret couldn’t. He was getting zero reaction for a long time. What he tried to do is passively use his status as a “legend” to engender reaction instead of trying to engage the audience like he used to. He had a seat and forfeited it. As for Warrior…he may be a nitwit (and as Jonathan Lipinski points out, a speaker at this year’s Young America’s Foundation National Conservative Student Conference), but the guy’s learned a key lesson: he’s never stuck around long enough for familiarity to breed contempt, therefore, whenever he makes his once-every-half-decade appearance with whomever’s stupid enough to pay him, he gets roof-shattering pops.
(Also, a lot of people nailed me for not putting Randy Orton on the up-and-comer list. That’s because, to me, Randy Orton is not an up-and-comer, he’s an here-and-nower, and he’s well on his way to that status.)
I found the Rico antics hilarious! The gimmick is dead from last week anyways, might as well “gay it up.” Great facials from Maven (and this time I’m not meaning expressions), making it a fun few minutes. And Jackie didn’t blow any of her spots!
A lot of people have been calling Rico’s gimmick dead. I don’t think it’s dead just yet. There are ways they could go with it that would give it a little more life. They’ve got a workable template in Adrian Street and a living example of how to alter something like this in any direction they want to in Goldust. The overt swanning about, though, that’s too much. They have to have Rico be combative in using his opponents’ doubts on sexuality against them. He has to be portrayed as a master tactician, not Queen of the May.
Cpl. Tye Hackman, USMC, asks me for a favor:
From a Marine to a Soldier, I need your help. Please do something about Scooter’s attitude. I can’t take it anymore. I absolutely enjoyed Raw tonight, watching it with a fellow Marine who doesn’t surf the dirt sheets and we had a blast marking out. HHH giving RVD a hellacious DDT on the entrance ramp to get the duke made my night, but I jump online to browse Keith’s thoughts on the show and it totally bums me out. As you’re my last glimmer of hope here at 411mania, I beg you to straighten out Scooter. Go haze him or something. Have him dig a nice big fighting hole so he can bury every one of his god forsaken rants in it. At the very least, take some cheap shots at him just for my personal pleasure. I know I could just stop reading his columns, but Marines tend not to retreat. Service rivalry aside, help a brutha out. Take care.
Tye, you really don’t want to extend that old stereotype about the Marines being the dumbest of the branches, do you? Jeez, you’re asking the one person on this site more negative than Keith to tell him to tone it down? I wish I could stop him, Ty, if only for your sake, but he’s become The Rational Alternative To Me here, and I don’t deal in hypocrisy.
Memo to HabBeeb13: I don’t care what Austin’s “done for us”. It pales before the fact that he left WWE high and dry twice because he got whiny, that’s he’s a mean drunk, and that he beats women. Add that to the fact that he now can’t perform worth one shit in the ring and isn’t entertaining in the least. Get rid of him.
Memo to Jeff Wise: I have no idea if Vince ever asked Steph to give head to a wrestler about to sign in order to seal the deal. I wouldn’t put it past either of them, but this seems like one of those image-enhancement stories that they themselves would put out there on the rumor mill.
Ben Falk asks a couple of things relating to topics I’ve gone over before:
I am a longtime reader of the column and unfortunately my first email is a plea for help. I know you are not my company tech guy,
No, I’m better, because I 1) actually know my shit and 2) give you information about certain things that the company tech guy sure as hell won’t.
but you mentioned an IE booster in your column today and I was curious to know what it was.
IE Booster is a set of extensions for Internet Explorer that give you additional high-level options to your right mouse button clicks (one of those options, as I said yesterday, is a direct link to Alexa’s rankings; another is automatic creation of [a href=] links for hyperlinking shit in this column).
You can grab a copy of IE Booster over at FOSI‘s main mirror.
The past week or so, I have been getting nailed with pop-ups, even when my explorer is not open. Many of these pop-ups are labeled IE.
That’s because a lot of pop-ups just open IE windows and don’t have a specific name to the window. Nothing to worry about. As for your other problem, read on…
Since this is my work computer and not my home computer, I am trying to eliminate this problem rather quickly.
Just be happy it’s not porn, okay?
Other ads are for things like AOL and Verizon.
They’re big ol’ hoes, aren’t they?
I know you have mentioned pop up blockers before, but do you know of one that would stop pop-ups even with Microsoft Explorer closed?
Yes. Specifically, Pop-Up Stopper Professional. However, check with your employer’s policy about installing pirated software on the company’s machines before…hey, you never know. The last job let me put eight large worth of ill-gotten gains on my system.
ed2K hash
(If you just need pop-up blocking on a browser-only basis and you’re stuck with IE (in other words, no Mozilla, Opera, or Safari for your Macolytes), the newest beta of the Google Toolbar provides pop-up blocking.)
I have even tried deleting files that have been placed on my c drive, but cannot seem to fix the problem. If you can help, I would really appreciate it.
Okay, here’s the skinny: you have spyware installed on your system. I can’t tell you what type because there are dozens of programs that cause pop-up windows to manifest themselves without benefit of browser being active. So, here’s what to do:
1) Download Spybot and Ad-Aware. Install both, and update them.
2) Have the programs scan your system. I recommend using Spybot first, then Ad-Aware. Both tend to catch different things. Eliminate everything in red that they find, and they will find something in your case (don’t go manually removing files unless you ABSOLUTELY know what you’re doing). You may have to reboot your system afterward.
2a) While you’re at it, use Spybot’s “Immunize” function. It will protect you against some malicious ActiveX controls.
3) After rebooting, rescan your system. If entries are still showing up, you have something persistent. In that case, I recommend you head over to the SpywareInfo Support Forums. They have a little program available called HijackThis! that will tell you certain settings about your browser, and the guys and gals over there will ask you to run it, tell them your results, and interpret them.
4) After your system is clean, get SpywareBlaster and SpywareGuard. They’ll help protect you from future infestations.
And not just Ben. There are still loads of you out there with spyware-infested systems, and in this day and age, you can’t afford to go around without a little protection from nuisances. So what are you waiting for?
Well, I’m not going to wait for anything else. If you’re in the US, play it safe this weekend vis-a-vis the fireworks, and I’ll see you next Tuesday.
About Eric Szulczewski
