Comments on The Morning News

The cell phone ban is news too.

ha and completely fucked is completely fucked.

Darcy Burner's house was burned this morning. Damn that sucks.

@1) That's sorta news. It's been in the headlines for the past week, so I didn't post it.

@3) That does suck. It also happened after I posted, so thanks for the update.

There will be no SAG strike. They need 75% approval from membership to authorize a walk-out, and except for a plurality of "Members First" fanatics in L.A., nobody else wants one.

At worst, if SAG leadership rejects the AMPTP "last, best, final" offer, producers will then be able to continue to work under their proposed terms, rather than under an extension to the current contract, which will put the union in the untenable position of either caving in to producers' demands outright, or go through the embarrassing process of requesting strike authorization they know at this point they can't secure anyway.

SAG has placed all its eggs in one basket by seeking to derail the AFTRA "Exhibit A" ratification vote, which is currently underway. When that contract is approved by members on July 8th (which I believe it will be - by an overwhelming majority), SAG will have painted itself into a corner it can't get out of: Guild leaders won't be able to force producers back to the table to renegotiate the AFTRA contract for the terms they prefer; they'll have squandered both their opportunity to negotiate an equitable contract, along with whatever shred of credibility they may still possess with a significant number of their members outside of L.A.; and they'll have clear evidence the 40,000 members who belong to both unions won't support a strike authorization, which means they'll have lost the only remaining lever they had left to use against the producers.

They are, in short, completely and royally fucked.

Comte is right, even if you really haven't talked much about the fact it is illegal to drive while talking or texting on a cell phone - an act that DOUBLES (minimum) or QUADRUPLES (maximum) your likelihood of running down small children in school zones with your "kid-friendly" SUV.

That said, Bush is still planning the invasion of Iran instead of Zimbabwe, and Senator McSame is helping.

If school zones are so dangerous, we probably shouldn't be allowing small children to run around in them, then.