The American
The American Restaurant is about to celebrate 40 years of being Kansas City’s Five-Star restaurant. I’ve stopped there several times but I still can’t find the drive-thru.
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Tough choice at the movie theater. Do I pay $7.50 to see Captain America or do I pay $1.50 to see Captain Mexico?
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Original art by Mark Valentine
What if you had an employee that drove customers away?
And what if that employee kept new customers from coming in? What if that employee also had access to your bank account and made decisions that hurt your bottom line?
Kansas City taxpayers have all of that in the Kansas City School District.
Families with school age children move to the suburbs if they can afford to. They want to get their kids into an accredited school system. The growth of these surrounding little towns is not due to the allure of living on a cul-de-sac. It’s the schools.
If you relocate to Kansas City, you can find beautiful stately homes for bargain prices. But if you have children, you will chose to live in a cookie cutter suburb in a house that looks like all the rest because of the schools.
The Kansas City School District made the news twice this month and the common theme of each story was mismanagement. Continue reading
This just in from former Kansas City Star columnist Steve Penn…
In addition to promoting his book about former Kansas City Black Panthers leader Pete O’Neal – Case for a Pardon – “I’m bringing in the National Alumnae Association of the Black Panther party in October,” Penn says. “I’ll be the host with Charlotte O’Neal – she’s married to Pete ‘Neal. Continue reading
Believe it or not, it’s been 10 years since iconic, local audio store Brandsmart bit the dust…
And 10 years as well since local furniture powerhouse Benchmark put its spanking new, mega complex near 119th and I-35 up for sale.
Think about it just 10 years.
Of course as a matter of sheer coincidence Brandsmart and Benchmark competitor Nebraska Furniture Mart celebrated it’s 10th birthday here just last year. In other words, it only to Nebraska a year, give-or-take, to snuff both of KC’s top retailers. Continue reading
Pardon me while I share a bit of, “What CNN Sacrificed for Missing Plane Ratings”
First what I wrote last week:
“With CNN’s ratings reportedly up some 86 percent, the only thing that doesn’t seem odd, mysterious or suspicious is the reason the news network has all but ignored 90-plus percent of the world news it regularly covers to air out-there speculation and rumors about the missing flight. Especially given that the actual amount of news to report has been essentially slim to none.”
Now let’s take a look at what TV news monitor Andrew Tyndall had to say in a Hollywood Reporter column headlined as quoted in my lead above.
“Wall-to-wall coverage, ridiculous theories: An analysis on how Jeff Zucker replaced news with the “pseudo-fictions of reality TV.” Continue reading
MLK & Coretta
Talk about paradoxes…
On April 4, 1968 civil rights leader Martin Luther King was assassinated at the age of 39 on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, as his horrified mistress remained inside his room. Since that day the resume of the man we’ve sainted with a national holiday has been scrubbed clean, Hallmark-carded and buried in an ocean of idolization and denial.
Why do we do this?
Is it merely out of our desire for perpetual protection of perceived perfection? Continue reading
Game on…
Looks like former Kansas City Star columnist Steve Penn will be going forward after all with his defamation lawsuit against the newspaper. Penn was axed in July of 2011 for allegedly quoting from news releases without attribution.
According to a 2012 story by Poynter Institute reporter Andrew Beaujon, “Penn maintains that copying from press releases was always OK at the Star and his firing resulted from management’s failure to make it clear that there’d been a shift in policy. ‘Acting pursuant to his training and to widespread practice at the newspaper, he would occasionally use in his general interest column press releases which described upcoming community events.
‘In fact, Plaintiff’s experience and training at the Star was that such attribution was not required. … Nevertheless, one of those supervisors apparently objected to the widespread practice and without informing Plaintiff that it should no longer be followed, decided to “make an example” of Plaintiff and push for his firing.’ ”
However, just when everything was ready to explode in the courtroom last November, Penn’s lawyer moved for a Voluntary Dismissal Without Prejudice when the mother of a witness “critical” to his case – a prominent PR expert – fell ill and was unable to testify at the last minute. Continue reading
Never mind the fact that, as I write this, it’s in the mid-30s outside, with a wind that makes it feel positively Arctic…
Forget that the Royals are 0-2 on the season, with gut-wrenching losses that came in the ninth inning or later. Let’s pretend that the bullpen—something that was widely regarded as the team’s greatest asset—cost the team each time, and that the offense looked flatter than a European model’s ass. (So, you know, no different than last season’s offense.)
None of that matters because it’s only two games, an infinitesimal percentage of the season, and even better, it’s Opening Day at the K. Continue reading
Some would argue that CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER doesn’t stack up to Marvel Studio’s original 2011 movie…
Then again everyone has an opinion.
For my money it comes mighty close and plays well beyond its fanboy base.
Make no mistake, the storyline here is a bit complex and sometimes hard to follow as Chris Evans‘ Steve Rogers/Captain America is now living quietly in Washington D.C. trying to adjust to the modern world.
But when a S.H.I.E.L.D. colleague comes under attack, Rogers becomes embroiled in a web of intrigue that threatens to put the world at risk. Continue reading
Steve Rose
One of the most well known uses of allegory is by the Greek philosopher Plato, who meant it to illustrate the limited understanding we have of life’s events given our narrow perspective. He gave the example of people chained to the walls of a cave their entire lives. Since there is a fire at the entrance of the cave, it blocks their view to the outside. All they can see are the shadows cast on the back wall of their cave by objects passing in front of the fire. They don’t see the reality, but only the shadows.
When it comes to understanding state and local politics, most people here in Kansas City are like those prisoners in a cave. They have a wide range of sources of information and commentary on national and international events and issues. On television, you can watch CNN, MSNBC, or Fox or any of the Big Four broadcast networks. In print media, you have a variety of magazines and newspapers, with ones to meet every point of view. Now, of course, you also have the Internet; with an almost infinite choice of websites, blogs, or online columns. Finally, there is Amazon and Barnes & Noble, as well as independent bookstores like Fairway’s Rainy Day Books or Kansas City’s Prospero’s, which offer an endless bounty of new books on economics, politics, history, and sociology.
However, when it comes to state and local matters, most of the time you’re pretty much stuck with the Kansas City Star as your only source of information and opinion. (The former Sun newspapers were simply an echo of the Establishment platitudes of the Grand Avenue Oligarchy, otherwise known as the KC Star. This is confirmed by the ease with which former Sun publisher, Steve Rose, slid over into writing a column for the Star after the Sun ceased publication. Citizen Rose, of course, was crying all the way to the bank, having sold the money-losing Sun papers to the unsuspecting new owners for a king’s ransom, based on the alluring demographics of JoCo, despite precious few actual paying subscribers.) Continue reading
I was in Memphis visiting The King when the devil died…
Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka hate monger Fred Phelps, that is. So I didn’t get to “experience” much of the hoopla that went down in Phelps’ wake – or at his wake – but a check of the church’s website proved telling.
These guys love to dish it out, but they totally can’t take it.
“The world-wide media has been in a frenzy during the last few days, gleefully anticipating the death of Fred Waldron Phelps Sr.,” the church’s blog begins. “It has been an unprecedented, hypocritical, vitriolic explosion of words. Do they vainly hope for the death of his body? People die – that is the way of all flesh.”
There’s more. Continue reading
You know, if the shoe fits…
The Kansas City Star had an interesting piece Sunday about Internet trolls and “sadists. It was titled, “New research finds that many Internet trolls are ‘everyday sadists’ who feed on suffering.”
After I read it, all I could think about was finally, the insanity of vile, evil, anonymous, fake-name comments has come to the surface. Turns out a Canadian research team has been mulling over the data from these commenters who regularly attack individuals who write stories or make the Facebook posts, with little to no comment about the story itself.
Sound familiar? Continue reading
“And USA Today – for the younger people – is some sort of website that’s printed out on large paper”
—- Bill Maher
I was talking to a senior Kansas City Star staffer yesterday about the uncertain future of newspapers when they reminded me of how vinyl records and typewriters have come back in recent years. The idea being that, like that New York Times TV ad, it can be hip for a handsomely-attired, 30-something dude to be seen with an actual newspaper instead of lockstepping it with the laptop and iPad lemmings.
Interesting concept, except the so-called revival of turntable owners is infinitesimally small compared to the number of folks enjoying their music digitally.
And of course, there’s the Green Factor – something Paul Wilson dismisses and disdains as merely politically correct (news flash!). Not to mention the expense and time delay of gathering, editing and publishing the news then delivering it to somebody’s office or driveway.
Pony Express, anyone?
Which brings me to my retro habit of pouring through the Kansas City Star newspaper each day. Continue reading
At some point being the kid of somebody famous ceases to matter much…
One would think, anyway. Because the kid’s career either takes off or it doesn’t. And I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that at age 44, comedian Richard Pryor‘s daughter Rain is hardly a household word.
Just saying.
That said, the singer / comic with an ultra short resume – most of her seven awards were bestowed upon her by the NAACP and minor entertainment or literary organizations – almost landed a gig here with Stanford’s Comedy Club. Continue reading
Note to naysayers…
If the movie industry is in trouble you sure couldn’t tell at last week’s huge international CinemaCon convention in Las Vegas.
Not only did this year’s annual exhibitor-distributor love fest break all previous attendance records, the convention’s accompanying mega-size trade show was completely sold out.
So what’s it all mean?
A renewed confidence in not only America’s, but the world’s growing appetite for the movie going experience.
To that end theater exhibitors the world over are updating their cinemas with the latest in digital-visual and sound delivery systems, more luxurious and upscale in-theater offerings and a renewed concentration on NEW theater construction.
And Kansas City is a good example of this resurgence. Continue reading
The Royals lost their season opener 4-3 in walk-off fashion. It was nice to get my first cry of the baseball season out of the way during the month of March for a change.
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Johnson County was ranked the healthiest county in Kansas. Apparently, 3-year-olds with cell phones are as fit as can be.
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All eyes are on Starlight Theatre following a coup last year…
A questionable coup that sent the capable Denton Yockey packing. Yockey was the successor to Bob Rohlf, the dude who teamed with former Kansas City Chiefs head guy Jack Steadman to save the iconic outdoor theater and preserve a Kansas City institution.
Among other issues, insiders say Starlight’s difficult-to-get-along-with board wanted more concerts to go with the five live theater events Starlight puts on every summer.
Mission accomplished on the concerts…
However all eyes are on fixed the bread and butter musicals Yockey reportedly booked prior to his departure. Continue reading
Buy ziagen and Generic Abacavir tablets online for hiv. Available without prior prescription. Continue reading
Sporting Kansas City traveled to the Mile High City Saturday for an afternoon game against the Colorado Rapids.
And it was a game that turned out to be the most entertaining of the young season, though the first half was forgettable as the two squads went to the locker room at the half locked at 0-0.
The second period was a different story with 5 goals scored between the two squads.
That includes a stoppage time, 92nd minute winner from sub Dom Dwyer that he absolutely crushed into the top netting over the head of Colorado keeper John Berner. Continue reading
Pardon me while I stand in (ever briefly) for the missing in action Paul Wilson…
Remember him? The writer dude who likes to mix it up with that Harley character in the comments section, and who fancies himself as some sorta kinder, gentler, more erudite Craig Glazer. You know, a “well coiffed scribe.”
Anyway, if Wilson were able to dig his you-know-what out of the vacation dust, undoubtedly he would have something to say about the month long overload and overkill by CNN covering Malaysian Flight 370. Frankly, I shudder to even mention it, given the ridiculous amount of practicality news-free coverage this story has gotten.
However, I think we’re beginning to see a bit of light at the end of the tunnel. Continue reading
