My wife is a huge fan of MTV’s reality shows. I hate them, but can’t convince her they actually suck the brains right out of her head. Since she continues to watch them, I have come up with games to keep my mind functioning while they are on. My favorite game is to try and catch the brief glimpses of pixelated content to see the body part, or trademarked logo they’re attempting to obscure.

The fine folks at Ironic Sans have made my game a little harder. Now, it might not be a pixelated logo at all. It might be clothes from the pre-pixelated reality TV line.

This has to be one of the funniest things I have seen in a long time.

I’m hoping someone out there can help me with some free legal advice. This will not be relied upon in court, it’s just a question that’s been kicking around in my head. What legally constitutes an endorsement?

If I bought t-shirts, and emblazoned them with my logo, does that constitute an endorsement of Haynes?

If I provide podcasts through my blog, and link to ipodder to provide a convenience for my readers (both of you) would that constitute an endorsement?

If I host a contest, and offer to give away a huge jar of M&Ms to the winner, does that count?

This comes up entirely too often in the realm of political content and the web. Every job I have had, from the state party in New Mexico to the campaign and the RNC has eventually involved me in a conversation about endorsement. I guarantee it came up with the Kerry team in ’04. When they linked to Kos, and Kos advocated for the killing of security personnel, someone in Kerry’s camp believed that link was an endorsement, and they withdrew it.

In the commercial realm, it seems the tolerance level is much higher. If phone companies can advertise on a website that features upskirt videos of Chilean Schoolgirls, there is clearly no concern that their ad constitutes an endorsement by the company of porn – they’re simply trying to reach customers.

In politics especially, I think the concept of endorsement is significantly overthought. Every link is analyzed with an eye toward the future – will it come back to harm us?

So I am hoping that someone – anyone – can tell me whether there is an actual legal threshold. Come on… Throw a brother a bone… Leave a comment, or use the Contact Me link to send me a note…

The Democrats “Real Security” plan was released today. It makes me laugh because of its reliance on the same failed policies and dumb ideas the Democrats have been pushing for years. I think some of it was even lifted verbatim from John Kerry’s ’04 campaign web site.

Double the size of our Special Forces, increase our human intelligence capabilities, and ensure our intelligence is free from political pressure.

Unfortunately, when Kerry suggested that, those in charge of our special forces said you can’t double the size without reducing the quality or effectiveness. So I guess that’s out…

Achieve energy independence for America by 2020 by eliminating reliance on oil from the Middle East and other unstable regions of the world.

In other words, we’ll completely revamp our economic infrastructure (which relies on oil) in 14 years. I can see that happening, can’t you? That’s going to be about as effective as the War on Poverty has been since they launched the Great Society programs 40 years ago.

Increase production of alternate fuels from America’s heartland including bio-fuels, geothermal, clean coal, fuel cells, solar and wind; promote hybrid and flex fuel vehicle technology and manufacturing; enhance energy efficiency and conservation incentives.

Of course they leave out the cleanest, and most effective way to reduce fossil fuel consumption for power generation – nuclear. It’s amazing how the Democrat quest to pursue “sound science” stops short of embracing nuclear power. Even their socialist friends in France get about 80% of their power from nuclear, but that’s not enough to convince our lefty friends.

Wind, the favorite alternative fuel of the lefty set, according to the Department of Energy could produce, at best, 20% of our nation’s energy needs through the 18,000 square miles they’ve identified as good sites for wind farms. That assumes wind speeds will rise and fall with consumption and we will not have periods of light wind and heavy consumption. If we do, we’re screwed.

In addition, each tower requires a hole between 7 and 30 feet deep, more than 40 feet wide, and filled with steel and concrete. The devastating environmental impact of that much concrete and steel being pumped into the ground is staggering. It’s like urban construction spread out all over our open spaces.

For every megawatt generated, wind energy also requires 60 or more acres of land, so fulfilling the 20% of our current need (157,580 MW is 20% of our total consumption) with wind energy would require 9,454,800 acres of land (a space about the size of New Jersey, Rhode Island, and Connecticut combined).

At any rate, you get the point. Their “new” plan is nothing but rehashed versions of previously rejected ideas. I could beat this dead horse some more, but it’s not worth my time to write or your time to read. If you want the long version, just read every word written in opposition to every Democrat idea poised in the last two decades and you’ve got it.

The second, and hopefully last, installment of Basic Instinct comes out this weekend. The working title was Basic Instinct 2: Risk Addiction. Like the title says, I’m a bit more risk averse.

When Sharon Stone was 34, she was hot. Guys would go see an otherwise awful movie to see her goodies. I don’t know a single guy who would have seen the first flick if the word of mouth about Stone’s cooch-baring appearance in the police station hadn’t convinced them to do it.

Today, she’s almost 50. I can honestly say I have no interest at all in seeing her goodies now. Judging by the collection of c-list talent that stars in the movie with Stone, it’s apparent not many other people feel differently. Nobody wants to be a part of this train wreck. This movie is the equivalent of a rock star’s fifteenth farewell tour.

Stone said in an interview that this would be her last opportunity to do something like this. God willing, we’ll realize the dream of time travel between now and Friday and can stop this movie from happening…

If you’re a fan of urban landscape, here’s an interesting little site for you. It’s a list of the Top 15 skylines around the world.

For those who inadvertantly found this page while looking for information about the car built and sold by Nissan, I offer my apologies and this link.