Bill Bennett, your hood pass is suspended.

I saw an article in the Washington Post today about John Roberts and his Chief Justice position being a job for life. I got to thinking that there are some others in the political establishment that have their jobs guaranteed: pundits. Political "experts." Gasbags for hire. People like William Bennett.

You all remember Bill Bennett. Got his start as one of Reagan's back-up singers in the 80's. Carved out a nice niche for himself as an authority on "Virtues." For a while, you might have thought he had a trademark on the word. That is, until he confessed to having lost millions of dollars through his gambling addiction. Sigh. You can't make this shit up.

Bennett made his media Acts of Contrition (fervent apologies on Meet the Press, et al), then was kind of quiet for a while. Until he came roaring back into the spotlight this week. On his radio show recently, during a discussion of the rate of abortions and the declining crime rate, Bennett crawled out on a rhetorical limb and sawed it out from under himself. To quote:

"If (reducing crime) were your only purpose,you could abort every black baby in this
country, and your crime rate would go down."
-see Media Matters

Now, I'm not going to suggest Bill Bennett is racist, but to paraphrase Jamie Foxx, his remarks are a little "race-ish." Only Blacks commit crimes, therefore the best way to reduce crime is genocide. Wow.

Why is anybody still listening to this guy?

Seriously, what does it take to get rid of these guys? I dared think that we were rid of Rush Limbaugh after his scandal. After all, he was just a drug addict that used prescriptions he scammed off of his maid. But here he still is, going strong and offending decent people two years on. I get the feeling that if one of these bozos were caught in a Tennessee motel room snorting coke off the back of an underaged goat, by the next weekend, he'd be sitting comfortably on Fox News Channel.

While you undergo your moments of ostracism, Bill (for Heaven's sake, even the White House came down on you), please consider maintaining what I consider to be a Virtue: silence.

What can Brown do for you?

Get off the federal payroll and get the hell out of our lives.

"Embattled" former FEMA head Michael Brown testified in front of Congress yesterday, and if anyone was feeling sorry for him being the President's Designated Fall Guy for the Katrina Fiasco, well, you would need to spend a little time with this guy. You'd be guaranteed to lose all sympathy for him.

"Brownie," as our ever-childish Chief Exec referred to him, flung mud and blame everywhere. The Louisiana state and locals, described as "dysfunctional." The Department of Homeland Security, who he said cut FEMA money and staff. Even to the White House, who he stated he kept apprised of Katrina's potentially ruinous landfall. For himself, he only desired pity. After all, he was expected to do a good job working with these handicaps, along with an uncharacteristically confrontational news media?

Now, I have never testified in a Congressional hearing. Hope to never have to. It can't be easy. Buttholes of all political stripes standing ready to rough you up to get a soundbite on that evening's news. But Brown's defensive posture was completely disingenuous. No, he wasn't over his head at FEMA. And that famous Today Show interview where he claimed to have no knowledge of conditions at the Superdome? Oh, then he "mis-spoke."

What we were seeing yesterday was classic tactics of the Bush Administration, enacted by someone without the mastery or backup of their normal practitioners. Brown's rhetorical approach was the same as, say, Donald Rumsfeld, in any random Pentagon briefing on the war: Be confrontational, shift blame, deny, deny, deny. But Brownie no longer has Bush's coattails to hide behind. And he lacked the unflappable, reptilian cool of Rumsfeld.

One would hope, when other Bush Administration cronies trot out the same gameplan in later hearings, people will remember the bad taste Michael Brown left in their mouth and react accordingly. But for now, we'll have to be content with the idea that not even Arabian horses are returning his calls this morning.

Oh, I forgot...

Movies? My wife and I used to see movies almost every week, but we've got a two-year-old now, so moviegoing is at a premium now. The last movie I saw was the Island. And I didn't see all of that, because a fire alarm was pulled at the theatre. And I can account for my whereabouts when the alarm was pulled. I'm innocent, I tell you!

My recent rentals from Netflix have been Hostage (generic Bruce Willis action, pure rental material), Beauty Shop (more rental material, if that), Layer Cake (well-shot, stylish British gangster stuff, still a rental), Lilya 4-Ever (one of the most depressing movies I've ever seen), and the first disc of the first season of Nip/Tuck (went out and bought the whole set afterward).

I'd like to see the 40-Year-Old Virgin, the Constant Gardener, and Serenity. Not likely to see all those. But apparently, I'm not the only one not seeing movies in a theatre this year.

Hi there.

My name is C. Mabry. And I'm having trouble starting this.

Should I give some particulars about myself? Maryland resident, husband, father, writer, government drone.

Should I hype my writing? Three and a half screenplays, a couple of TV and comic series pitches, a novel outline, most in the thriller/mystery genre. If anybody wants to discover me, I'm right here.

Should I list my TV appearances? A story on Washington, DC Channel 5's "Black News" in 1972 when the African play I appeared in at school was performed at the Smithsonian. An appearance on the (syndicated) "Weakest Link" game show in 2002, where I won $6000.

TV? The Daily Show, the new Battlestar Galactica, the Amazing Race, Lost, the Wire, CSI: the First One, and Aqua Teen Hunger Force.

Music? In my IRiver right now, there's Kanye West, Sia, Leela James, Jamie Lidell, Bloc Party, and Jeff Buckley. I've a few thousand more CDs where those came from.

Politics? I'm probably the most left wing person I know (you'll find out), but sometimes I'm not as left wing as I used to be.

Religion? None of your business. Or mine.

Anyway, I've been looking for a forum like this for a long time to express my ideas, rant, argue, whatever. I have a wide-ranging knowledge of pop culture, and I plan to cover the waterfront, as the song goes. Politics, showbiz, whatever gives me a literal or figurative headache.

Your feedback is, of course, welcome.