Rabu, 20 Juli 2011

Awkward Review: A Great Series Premiere

Whatever is in the scripted water over at MTV, the folks there need to keep drinking. Between Teen Wolf and Awkward, I’m in love with this network for all the right reasons.
Awkward is perhaps the most aptly-titled show on television. Everything Jenna Hamilton goes through fits that word and I can’t help laughing and feeling second hand embarrassment right along with her.

Yes, Jenna dreams of being noticed in her high school and having a reputation. Of course, no one fantasizes about being known as the girl who tried to off herself (accidentally, of course). But with that unfortunate predicament comes a lot of heart and charm.

Much like How I Met Your Mother, most of the story is hilariously told through Jenna’s narration. Like most teenagers, Jenna doesn’t voice most of her concerns socially; it’s best left to the anonymity of the Internet and the privacy of her own room.
As a result, we’re treated to Jenna’s innermost sarcasm and insecurities. She gives a voice to what viewers are thinking, bonding us even more so to her character as we catch glimpses of a girl navigating through adolescence and into adulthood.
Then there's Jenna’s crush, Matty, the boy to whom she also loses her virginity. I really wasn’t feeling Matty in the beginning of the episode. He reminded me of Stifler from American Pie - having a sensitive side, but sometimes being a little too insensitive. Having seen the second installment, though, without giving anything away, I will say I like the path Matty by this time next week.
Then there’s Tamara, Jenna’s best friend, the girl we can rely on for awkward human. She sometimes feels like a living tabloid, making wildly inappropriate remarks and telling Jenna to do things like flashing certain body parts to the world. In other words, I basically love every sentence that comes out her mouth.
I don’t have very many concerns about the show and where it’s heading. The most pressing issue in the "pilot" was Jenna’s “bucket list” for standing out. It’s only one page, and granted, we don’t know what’s on it, but there can’t be very much. How long will it last and where do we go when it runs dry?
I could also nitpick Sadie and Valerie, the mean overweight cheerleader and Jenna’s school counselor, respectively. I found no redeeming qualities in Sadie whatsoever, she’s just a bully. I understand the need for a villain, but she’s manipulative and every bad thing that happens to her seems well deserved.
As for Valerie, she’s just wildly inappropriate for a school counselor. It’s funny and I love it, but I wish the adults on the show had a bit more of a grip on a reality.
Even so, Awkward is hilarious. I'm glad I didn't attend this high school, but I'm gonna enjoy watching the escapades of those who do.

Piers Morgan seeks apology over hacking claim

LOS ANGELES — Former tabloid editor Piers Morgan has demanded an apology from an MP who made claims about him admitting to phone hacking, at the London hearing which quizzed Rupert Murdoch.
In an angry on-air exchange, Morgan, who is now a celebrity interviewer for US television news network CNN, challenged Member of Parliament Louise Mensch to repeat her claim that he had "boasted" of phone hacking in a book about his tabloid editor days.
She declined to do so, saying she had been covered by parliamentary privilege -- which protects her from legal action for anything said inside parliament -- a protection which does not apply if she repeats the words elsewhere.
In the committee hearing which grilled Murdoch and his son James over the phone hacking scandal rocking the tycoon's media empire, Mensch said Morgan had boasted about using a phone hacking "little trick" to win a scoop of the year award.
"That is a former editor of the Daily Mirror being very open about his personal use of phone hacking," she said in the hearing.
But Morgan, a former editor of the Mirror and of Murdoch's now-shuttered News of the World, said he had never claimed to have used phone hacking himself in his 2005 book "The Insider: The Private Diaries of a Scandalous Decade."
"I'm amused by her cowardice in refusing to repeat that allegation now that shes not in parliament covered by privilege," Morgan said in the on-air exchange with Mensch, who was in London.
"She came out with an absolute blatant lie during those proceedings. At no stage in my book or indeed outside of my book have I ever boasted of using phone hacking for any stories."
And he added: "For the record, in my time at the Mirror and the News of the World I have never hacked a phone, told anybody to hack a phone or published any story based on the hacking of a phone."
In an increasingly tetchy exchange, during which Mensch said Morgan was a rich man and accused him of threatening her, the former newspaperman added: "I think you should apologize for being a liar."
He repeatedly bashed her for invoking parliamentary privilege and said Mensch should "show some balls" and repeat her claims outside the hearing.
Asking her to produce evidence to back her claim, he said: "If there is no evidence for that, are you going to publicly apologize to me, and to CNN right now for such an outrageous lie?"
"I feel no need whatsoever to apologize," said the lawmaker.

Can the 'Gang of Six' Be a Gang on Uniters on the Debt Debate?

GRETA VAN SUSTEREN, FOX NEWS HOST: Did you hear the other big news today? Republican Senator Tom Coburn is back. He just re-upped with the "Gang of Six" senators. Now, he ditched them in May, but now he is back with the "Gang." And hours ago, the "Gang" announced a new debt plan. But here's the hitch. Yesterday, Senator Coburn unveiled his own plan. And then there's Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell's plan. So which one of these plans is a sure fix? We asked Republican senator Tom Coburn.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
VAN SUSTEREN: Senator, nice to see you, sir.
SEN. TOM COBURN, R-OKLA.: Good to see you.
VAN SUSTEREN: All right, Senator, yesterday, the headlines were you had a $9 trillion plan. Today you've joined -- rejoined, I should say, the "Gang of Six," which is something less than $3.7 trillion. Can you tell me the difference between the two plans?
COBURN: Yes, about $5.3 trillion.
VAN SUSTEREN: I actually figured that...
COBURN: That's a...
VAN SUSTEREN: I knew as soon as I asked you, I was in trouble. But I mean, what...
COBURN: One fixes our complete problem. One actually gets us out of trouble as a country. The other moves us in the direction there. If you want us to be able to truly borrow money at the best rates of anybody in the world and you want to put our economy back where it needs to be, with a vibrant job-creating economy, then you would do this $9 trillion. That gets us out of the risk of default, gets us back growing, solves the problems, takes away the shackles we've put on our kids and grandkids.
But realistically, I wasn't going to get but maybe 10 or 12 votes for that. So what is that we could do that starts us down the process, that sends the signal to the international financial community that we understand we have a serious problem, we're trying to start fixing it?
VAN SUSTEREN: Here's the problem with the fix, the $3.7 trillion that you think can pass, as opposed to your $9 trillion plan that you say could fix the problem, is that let's say that it passed now. A year from now, couldn't Congress get together and the president and change things?
COBURN: Yes, but very difficult because the plan requires 67 votes to do that. I mean, with 67 votes, you always can change anything. You can change the Constitution, you can do anything with 67 votes. But 67 votes would be required to change it to spend more money, top change the cap. You could always change things. That's why, you know, my ideal thing would be "cut, cap and balance." We have a balanced budget amendment, now we're locked in forever. We have to live within the same confines that every other American and every other state, with the exception of one, has to live.
VAN SUSTEREN: Why isn't there an appetite to fix it once and for all? Because the American people are struggling. We realize even the -- the financial community is uncertain. Everybody's uncertain. The "cut, cap and balance" is one way to fix it permanently. We had the debt commission, the president's debt commission, the Bowles-Simpson. That was supposedly to fix it. Your $9 trillion is supposed to fix it. And now we're back to $3.7 trillion, and the "Gang of Six," which is just to sort of keep things going.
COBURN: Well, I think there's a deficit of courage and this dual-mindedness that people want to do what's best for the country as long as they can continue to do what's best for their political career. But when you put those two at opposition, and what happens is careers tend to win out. I mean, I can't say it any more frankly than that, and that's human nature. I understand it. But it's a shame.
And that's why republics die. You know, my whole goal would be that we would cheat history, that we would not go the way of every other republic in the world, which is get out of control on your fiscal matters and lose it. And that's why we need to get back to the $9 trillion.
But the fact is, is we have a significant thing coming up August 2nd. And we need to be about seeing -- about fixing that, or at least limiting the pain that the country going to have right now so that we can actually fix it later.
VAN SUSTEREN: How is it different, though, from, for instance, Senator McConnell one that got criticism from within his party -- he wanted to do a three-stage process, which was sort of kicking the can down the road is the phrase that's been used -- I mean, the "Gang of Six" is not a fix, it just sort of postpones...
COBURN: Oh, yes, but it's totally different than what Senator McConnell wants to do. Senator McConnell wants to -- no -- you know, wants to give the spending increases and allow the president, with a third of each body, to control that. And that is an answer. If that's what we have to get to, that's what we'll have to get to, if that's the only option we have, because we really can't let the country default.
I don't think we would default, particularly. But the politics around that are big. But this is significant. This -- $3.7 trillion is well over 40 percent of the way you have to get there to solve our problems. And the fact that you can do that in a bipartisan way shows the American people there is some common sense up here, there is some ability to give and take, and it starts us down the road.
The other side of your question is, is what would keep us from not changing that? We're going to have to change it because this is just 40 percent of the way. We're going to have to get the other 60 percent. So we're -- we're not going to be able to go back because the pressure's going to be us, like you see the pressure on Greece. It's not going to lighten up, it's going to get heavier.
VAN SUSTEREN: But you say that with the "Gang of Six" proposal, the $3.7 trillion, that the reason why we don't do the permanent fix is because of the lack of political courage. That's very disheartening, I think, to most of the American people to think that the people we sent to Washington lack the political courage to make the decisions that we really need to face at this time.
COBURN: Well, I think -- think about what I put in the $9 trillion dollars. You know, it's significant changes in the Pentagon, significant changes in terms of military -- retired military health care, significant changes to Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security. Social Security money stays over on the other side, but it actually fixes it. You know, how many people up here are going to embrace what I think we need to do? Not many. That's the problem.
VAN SUSTEREN: Is it just your opposing political party, or is it people within your own party?
COBURN: No, no. This -- it's a bipartisan problem. You know, look, one of the reasons I'm a term-limited member of Senate, self-imposed term limits, is because it gives me the ability to do what's right, not what is politically expedient. I'm -- you know, I'm not running for election again. I'm going to do what's best for the country, not what's best for Tom Coburn, not what's best for the Republican Party. I'm going to do what I think is best for the country.
And I think you have a lot of people who want to do that and at times do do that. But there's also a lot of times when we don't stand up and do what we need to because we're thinking about that next election and the interest groups that support us.
And the other interesting thing is, is the "Gang of Six" deal can be defeated if you let all the special interests that don't want anything to happen, happen. So what we have to have is we need people to stand up and say, We're going to fix it. The "gang of six" is better than nothing.
I'd rather have a $9 trillion solution. We can do that. That has a trillion dollars worth of new revenues to the federal government that come from eliminating tax expenditures and tax credits. So you know, I've looked at all areas of that, and I say, Here -- as a doctor, here's my prescription for fixing what's wrong with our country today, and it would. It'd actually lower our debt in 2021 to where it'd be about $12 trillion.
VAN SUSTEREN: Is it going to pass?
COBURN: The "Gang of Six" or mine?
VAN SUSTEREN: "Gang of Six."
COBURN: I think it has -- the only thing I know that has real potential right now. So my hope would be yes.
VAN SUSTEREN: Senator, thank you, sir.
COBURN: You're welcome. Good to talk with you.