So on Deadspin this morning, I saw a link to MSNBC from last night saying that the Suns and Heat were talking a Marion for Shaq deal and I immediately thought ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?!?!!? Look, I know some of these Western Conference teams feel they have to respond in some way to the Lakers getting Gasol (and, admittedly, they should be a little worried given how he played last night against the Nets - then again, it was the Nets), but it would help to make deals that make sense. John Hollinger (should be free Insider shit) does a pretty good job of breaking down why this is the stupidest trade the Suns could make: he’s older, out of shape, doesn’t fit in with an up tempo style, has gotten lazy on defense, will complain more about his role on the team than Marion, and generally is probably the worst player for any type of fast break game. Hell, he doesn’t even rebound as much as Marion. And on top of this all, HE’S INJURED!

A larger point though, if you’re gonna let Marion go, or if management truly feels that his attitude is detrimental to the team, that’s all fine and good, but get a player who fits the system and, dare I say, is of equal value. Shaq is far below value for Marion especially considering everything the Suns do offensively. I’d have to think there are other teams out there that are interested. Maybe you don’t get a big man, which for some reason the Suns seem to be looking for (after trading a perfectly serviceable one - Thomas - this offseason). Marion for Kirlenko (sp? don’t feel like checking) especially since he’s come back to form this season or maybe some of Portland’s young pieces along with Pryzbilla (not as likely a trade given that Pryzbilla is sort of Portland’s only five at the moment and Portland’s on a roll) or maybe Jersey’s wings or if the Mavs are looking to shake things up maybe something down there could be worked out or if you have to go to the Eastern Conference then, let’s see, maybe to the Pacers for Danny Granger or if you want an injured O’Neal, Jermaine even fits better, or shit, I guess my point here is that there’s gotta be other teams out there willing to consider Marion deals. But if the Suns are only looking for 7 foot, 300+ center then I guess they only have one place to go.

More from Deadspin in the grand search for answers on this one.

Well, I have no idea what it’s electronic power is (the usual measure for a monitor), but I do know that it can take a crossbow shot to its face and not even get scratched. In fact, it bent back the arrow.

Proof that once is never enough, even when it comes to spending time behind bars, this man got arrested for his thirteenth (13!) DWI. My god, man. With all those fines and everything you could probably afford a private driver by now.

Okay, this is just too awesome not to pass along. My score was 26.  And the return of the bitches tag!

Okay, after checking the news this morning, my planned (wait, these are planned?) blog entry has a little bit of a different twist on it, but I’m going to go ahead with it anyway. Yesterday, the New York Sun reported on a conservative Princeton student who was beaten for his views and sent death threats and the likes. It has come out now that he faked the entire thing and had been sending himself the emails and apparently beat himself senseless (the insanity of this is beyond me). But my point isn’t so much about the beating itself, but the fact that after the initial incident, the New York Sun ran the story of the student’s beating on the front page while the New York Times didn’t carry it anywhere in its paper (in hindsight now this seems like a smart thing).

At the time, my boss (a fairly conservative man himself) scoffed at this and blamed it on the Times liberal ways. While the Times certainly has more leftish tidings than the Sun, I wouldn’t necessarily call it a liberal paper especially in the media environment of today. Or at least not leftish enough to completely ignore an attack on a student just because of his conservative view point. Apparently, that is what happened (or maybe they had inside information that it was a hoax - who knows), but this got me thinking about where liberals actually get their news. Sure, plenty read the Times, but the Times is also one of the papers largely responsible for blowing up the Wen Ho Lee case and that was not very liberal of them at all. (I suppose I should note here that I’m using the terms “liberal” and “conservative” very loosely here.)

This is where comedic news sources like The Onion and the Daily Show come in. There have been all sorts of studies done on the amount of people who get their news via the Daily Show and their relative knowledge leve, as well as figures pointing to the fact that the Daily Show has more viewers than most “real” news shows (interesting and perhaps disconcerting). Point being though, these shows (Colbert Report, Daily Show) and The Onion definitely pander to the liberal audiences though they are somewhat unbiased in their bashing of political parties and policies. This is perhaps where the liberals are going for their news in a media environment where people sometimes ask “What Liberal Media?”. (SO MANY LINKS!!)

Perhaps this all links back to post modern theory (Ha! You knew this was coming didn’t you?). News shows themselves have become shows. It’s meant to give the illusion of reporting and unbiased news (WE REPORT YOU DECIDE, YOU GIVE US TEN MINUTES WE’LL GIVE YOU THE WORLD) and all that mumbo jumbo, but it’s all, pardon the Italian, merda di cavallo. So in a world that is entirely an illusion, is the illusion that admits its an illusion more real? Is reporting that admits its a farce and a comedy of errors more full of truthiness? Well that is the question. (I am unsure whether I actually fully addressed my liberal news angle on this, but Phuket).

Curt Schilling is a huge computer buff/nerd as you may well know. He runs a blog and plays lots of MMORPG (I’m unsure exactly what the breakdown of that is, something like massive online role plyaing game). One of these such games is World of Warcraft. And apparently this is his World of Warcraft character. My man loves his fantasy games.

I guess those four days off between starts gives Schilling the time he needs to get his character to level 70. Ah, the life of a major league pitcher. Oh yeah, this guy is making 8 million dollars next season not including incentive packages.

I believe I’ve mentioned before that many of the articles I forward along to you are sent to me by my mother. She has the time to peruse the New York Times and BBC and the like and sends along things she thinks I’ll find interesting (Note: I probably have the time to do this too, but instead fill my hours with TV, video games, and staring at some social networking site or another). This article on a woman who’s stalking Raymond Chandler - it’s okay, it’s for a book! - is no exception. My mother forwarded it along to me and for any Chandler lover like myself, it’s an interesting preview of a book that I may end up reading. The book’s about a novelist’s travels through LA stalking Chandler and his wife’s spirit. It’s nonfiction so far as I can tell, and looks interesting.

What this made me think of however is the purpose of this blog (what, you thought it was just a collection of links from my mother and ramblings about the New York Knicks?) - mostly because my opinions are very important and you should care about them. Anyway, this got me thinking about the lengths people go to get inspired, the places they’re willing to travel to write. I understand that this author, Judith Freeman, has a very personal journey to go through in order to, shall I say, exercise the demon of Chandler that dwells within her. I can understand that (one day I may have to do that with Raymond Carver), but it’s amazing the lengths she’s willing to go to do so. The synopsis describes the work almost as if it was a pained, frantic journey. This is my type of writing. It gives the idea and the feeling that a life is enough inspiration. While Freeman is inspired by a life that’s not really her own, it’s still just a life and she incorporates it with her own crazy journey. It’s the idea that you just need to get out there and live in order to get what you need to write. It does annoy me a little that she had to create such an extravagant tale or mystique in order to be inspired, but this is less about inspiration and more about exercising her demons as I said before (or so it seems - remember, I enjoy blanket statements about things I do not know anything about). But more than anything, I like that she’s out there writing the good write. Out there being key.
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I feel the need to promote my family for a second here. My cousin was featured in a sketch comedy video of sorts. He’s not one of the comedians, but he plays the straight man to their comedy duo. He’s the one with the dark hair and beard who says he saw them on Valentine’s day.

Funny.

A video from a Japanese quiz show that answers the question if the world’s fastest walker is being chased by samurai, does he walk or run away?

So I was doing my regular toiling through the day reloading Deadspin about 4 times a minute when they put up a clip of Jimmy Kimmel dissing Joe Theismann a little bit on Monday Night Football. Now as you’re all probably aware, after a YouTube clip is done it brings up a little menu of related clips. On this menu, I found this clip of Kimmel going off on the Gawker editor. I found it a rather odd clip first off because it seems that Jimmy Kimmel is hosting Larry King Live on CNN, and second, because they absolutely shit on Gawker for being slanderous and libelous and alerting people to where celebs are or some such. I was really confused. Don’t these people understand the nature of blogs? It’s all untrue. We’re allowed to say whatever we want here. It’s the mass opinion given a somewhat pointless voice. Sure Gawker should be held more accountable given their large readership and the fact they’re a corporation that has supposedly conquered all media, but in the end it is still in the format of a blog and thus should be held to somewhat bloggish standards.

So once again, this is a blogger blogging about blog’s blogging rights.

UPDATE: I guess today’s the day I learn more about Gawker, but here’s an article in New York Magazine that discusses one journalists experience with being mentioned in Gawker. I should note that I do believe in what I said up above (that blogs like Gawker in a sense have a different code of ethics) but there should also be some decorum (I guess that’s the right word) surrounding the site. I don’t know where the line should drawn and maybe I only will once I get written up somewhere (yeah, a.k.a. never) or get blasted for writing about someone else (once again, this means never).