Hold the Meat: Former Subway Icon Jared Fogle to Cop to Child Porn Charges

The other shoe has now dropped for the longtime pitchman of the Subway sandwich empire. Jared Fogle, the creepy little hustler whose bespectacled face had become synonymous with one of America’s top fast food chains, has reportedly copped a deal with prosecutors to plead guilty on child pornography charges. Mr. Fogle’s fall from grace has been astonishingly rapid with the corporation severing ties with a man who they had invested millions in and were on the brink of featuring in a new advertising campaign that would tout the ubiquitous Jared as a family man.

CNN reports on the latest chapter in the Fogle fiasco in the story “Jared Fogle expected to plead guilty to child porn charges, sources say”:

Former Subway pitchman Jared Fogle is expected to plead guilty to charges related to possession of child pornography, two law enforcement officials told CNN on Tuesday.

The sandwich chain suspended its relationship with Fogle earlier this year after investigators raided his Indiana home.

The raid came more than two months after Russell C. Taylor, the executive director of the Jared Foundation, was arrested in Indianapolis on federal child pornography charges.

Contacted Tuesday by CNN, Taylor's attorney declined to comment on the development. Attempts to contact Fogle's attorney, Ron Elberger, were not immediately successful, although he did tell CNN affiliate WXIN that he had no comment.

Subway tweeted that it no longer has a relationship with Fogle.

While Fogle will now be dealing with his mounting legal problems – and possibly marital ones too since he has been outed as a sex pervert – heads may roll at Subway which went all-in with Jared and never suspected that he had a dark side. They not only featured the dude in a large amount of their TV ad spots but he also popped up on the NFL postgame shows as well as made tours across the country to make promotional appearances - now they have been forced to flush him down the memory hole. It all began to fall apart though after his home was raided last month in connection to a child porn investigation involving the former head of his Jared Foundation and has been going downhill for the celebrity sandwich shill ever since.

There is no word on whether Fogle will be subject to incarceration at this time but if he does go to jail he will be spending a lot of time there without his pants on as he will need to appeal to an entirely new audience.

Woman Beating Sports Thug Ray Rice Wins NFL Appeal Case

It is a lamentable fact of modern American society that professional sports figures are elevated to role models with youth. This is especially so with the evolution of major sports leagues into global marketing colossuses whose merchandising money dwarfs that of revenue generated by the actual“games”.  Professional athletes have been embraced as idols going back to the pre-television era and the likes of Babe Ruth, Jim Thorpe and others so living vicariously through them is not a new phenomenon by any stretch of the imagination. Sports however do mirror society and the times in which we live so the dismal character of many pro players are a given. Look at O.J. Simpson aka "the Juice". Was there ever an example of such a turnabout for a transcendent celebrity athlete who was adored and revered until he butchered his wife and got away with it?

2014 has been chock full of examples of fallen stars and one that has drawn more than his share of national media attention is former Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice. Rice drew cries of outrage after the release of a security camera video showing him brutally knocking out his then fiancee Janay Palmer in a hotel elevator. The NFL, which has invested a ton of marketing dough into appealing to women – as evidenced by their cynical, pink-festooned annual exploitation of breast cancer – so such an act of domestic violence was a public relations nightmare. The overbearing ass that is NFL commissioner Roger Goodell immediately flew into action to apply the necessary damage control and dropped the hammer on the woman beating thug Rice.

Rice was quickly dumped by the Ravens and  became a pariah to the extent that he was removed from the mega-popular Madden 2015 video game. Additional incidents involving domestic violence followed the Rice video and included Minnesota Vikings star Adrian Peterson as well as Carolina Panthers defensive end Greg Hardy, both of whom were dealt with harshly by the league.  Rice’s fall from grace going from the starting running back of the 2012 Super Bowl champs to a reviled and despised figure wasn’t of Orenthal like proportions but sent shockwaves through the sporting world nonetheless.

Well Ray Rice, domestic abuser, spouse pounder and high profile thug is about to get another chance because he just won his appeal and is eligible for reinstatement. According to a Reuters story, “Former Ravens running back Ray Rice wins appeal, is eligible for NFL”:

Former Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice has won an appeal of his indefinite suspension for domestic violence and is now eligible to sign with any National Football League team, the league said on Friday.

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell suspended Rice, 27, in July for two games for punching his then-fiancee Janay Palmer unconscious during an altercation at an Atlantic City, New Jersey, casino in February.

But after elevator security video surfaced in September of Rice's one-punch knockout, the Baltimore Ravens released the three-time Pro Bowler, and his $35 million contract, and the NFL suspended him indefinitely.

The hearing officer in the appeal this month concluded that Rice did not mislead Goodell when he disciplined Rice the first time and therefore the commissioner acted arbitrarily in imposing a second, harsher punishment based on the same incident and known facts.

"I do not doubt that viewing the video in September evoked horror in commissioner Goodell as it did with the public. But this does not change the fact that Rice did not lie or mislead the NFL at the June 16 meeting," former U.S. District Court Judge Barbara Jones said.

Rice said in a statement on Friday that he made "an inexcusable mistake." He said he accepts responsibility and will work to improve himself as a husband while giving back to the community.

With the playoffs rapidly approaching and a high number of running backs having been injured this year it is a near certainty that some team will sign Rice soon. It will not be the Baltimore Ravens though considering the mass public exorcism that culminated in an official team sponsored "Ray Rice jersey exchange" , but when the stakes are high and there is money to be made morality and principle go out the window. That is just the way we roll in America these days in a bizarre land of collapsing values, greed and terminal dumbness where celebrity is by far the most valuable coin of the realm.

Provided that Rice can keep his wife-beating in house and away from those prying security cameras he may even become a role model again with a whole new line of new team apparel on the shelves just in time for Christmas.

Bio-Engineered Penis Transplants: A Coming Growth Industry

In what could be the growth industry of the future, scientists are close to finalizing development of penises grown in laboratories. The breakthrough is the culmination of years of studies on the penises of rabbits and after receiving FDA approval human testing will commence.

According to a story reported by The Guardian entitled “Scientists ready to test lab-grown penises on men” I excerpt the following:

Penises grown in laboratories could soon be tested on men by scientists developing technology to help people with congenital abnormalities, or who have undergone surgery for aggressive cancer or suffered traumatic injury.

Researchers at the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, are assessing engineered penises for safety, function and durability. They hope to receive approval from the US Food and Drug Administration and to move to human testing within five years.

Professor Anthony Atala, director of the institute, oversaw the team's successful engineering of penises for rabbits in 2008. "The rabbit studies were very encouraging," he said, "but to get approval for humans we need all the safety and quality assurance data, we need to show that the materials aren't toxic, and we have to spell out the manufacturing process, step by step."

The penises would be grown using a patient's own cells to avoid the high risk of immunological rejection after organ transplantation from another individual. Cells taken from the remainder of the patient's penis would be grown in culture for four to six weeks.

Opponents of wasteful government spending on frivolous medical studies should note that according to the Guardian story that the program was underwritten by the military, specifically The Armed Forces Institute of Regenerative Medicine or AFIRM. The purpose would be to deal with injuries to sexual organs incurred on the battlefields such as in the looming generations long war against extremist Islam that is in the early stages now in the Middle East. While anything that restores a degree of normalcy to the maimed members of America’s armed forces is a good thing it will soon expand into the domestic market where there is much money to be made.

Once the capability of creating new, bigger and better penises has been perfected, the market will literally explode as men with small dicks and lots of money will be lining up for replacements of their original equipment. By the time that this procedure is fully tested, tweaked and becomes widely available there will be companies and individuals who are going to grow extremely wealthy from it.

American Gun Culture: Rambo Wanna Be Kills Cop and Flees into Mountains

During the ongoing decline of America there is never any shortage of tales of people and institutions doing crazy things and there is a doozy from Pennsylvania.  The bizarre story of one Eric Frein, who is described as an "anti- law enforcement survivalist" ambushed and murdered a Pennsylvania State Trooper and wounded another before melting away into the woods of the Pocono mountains. Frein, according to an acquaintance is possibly reenacting the movie "Rambo: First Blood" in his psychotic fantasy.  He is just another American who has become unable to separate the difference between TV, movies, violent video games and reality as the lurch towards economic, social and moral collapse continues.

According to a story from the website of a local paper, The News Eagle which is entitled "Details revealed on State police crime scene":

As was widely reported, Frein was charged on Tuesday as the suspect wanted for the murder of Corporal Bryon Dickson and attempted murder of Trooper Alex Douglass outside the Troop R, Blooming Grove barracks of the PA State Police. The manhunt for Frein continued into Thursday.

According to the affidavit, on Friday, Sept. 12, Cpl. Bryon Dickson was working the 3 p.m.- 11 p.m. shift and was in full uniform. At approximately 10:50 p.m., Cpl. Dickson was exiting the front door of the Blooming Grove station towards his vehicle which was parked in front of the station. As he exited the door, he immediately dropped to the ground, where he remained motionless.

These actions were observed on the station surveillance system.

About five minutes previously, PCO (Police Communications Officer, a civilian employee) Nicole Palmer arrived at the station to start her shift. She entered the front door and was on her way to the communication room. She said she observed Cpl. Dickson walk through the lobby towards the front door.

"Palmer states that she heard a noise which she related sounded like a firecracker," the affidavit reads. Looking out a window she saw Cpl. Dickson on the ground. She went outside and approached him, asking him what had happened. Cpl. Dickson was still alive; he informed her that he had been shot and needed help.

While attending to him, another shot was fired in the direction of the front entrance. Palmer saw a cloud of white residue on the lobby floor. She went back in to try and call 9-1-1 but was not successful. Shewent back to Cpl. Dickson; he asked her to get him inside but she was not able. She went back in to call for assistance.

Trooper Alex Douglass, also in full uniform, was just arriving for the 11 p.m.- 7 a.m. shift. Walking to the entrance, Tpr. Douglass saw Cpl. Dickson on the ground, who laid motionless. Douglass looked towards the station lobby, and immediately fell to the ground.

Tpr. Douglass was able to crawl into the lobby. Trooper William Fells, who was inside, retrieved Tpr, Douglass and brought him into the secure part of the station.

Video surveillance indicates there were four shots, which took about 90 seconds.

Members of the State Police Patrol Unit attempted to rescue Cpl. Dickson. Using a marked patrol SUV as a shield, they began to render medical assistance to Cpl. Dickson. He was subsequently declared deceased at the scene by the Pike County Coroner's Office.

A massive police manhunt is currently under way for the shooter and I can pretty much guarantee that this is not going to end like it did in the movie. Frein has an obvious vendetta against law-enforcement and a history of anti-government and anti-police postings on the internet. Pennsylvania State Police have stated that the Frein has a "personal battle with law enforcement".

Now I am sure that there will be those whose knee-jerk reaction to this story will be to conflate legitimate critics of the American police state to being the equivalent of the nutball Frein. There will also be those who will point to this as justification for the militarizing of the police under the 1033 Program - because Hell,  if that police barracks would have just had an MRAP none of this would have happened. 

Nothing could be farther from that truth though and such comparisons only serve to normalize an obvious lunatic who is obsessed with movie violence and has run amok. The real truth is that there are legitimate concerns about the American police state. This is particularly evident with the rise in incidents of brutality, depravity and dog shootings as well as the ongoing militarization of local police. In a way Frein may be a symptom of that very problem in that the rise of the police state only reinforces the existing pathology within such extremists.

My standard disclaimer is that when you live in a culture with the worship of guns borders on that of a religion is that you should never be surprised whenever there is an incident of a deranged individual using a gun to kill others. 

Living in the USA baby! 

The United States of Greedy Bastards

One has to wonder whether old Sam Walton is rolling over in his grave today given the tarnishing the brand of his legacy, Wal-Mart by his heirs, their crappy management team and ongoing dismal public relations. The bruises from the scrums in the Black Thursday/Friday moshs pit are days from healing yet the chain has become the avatar of all that has gone wrong with American capitalism in the era of greed. The internet and You Tube are chock full of tales, pictures and videos of unruly shoppers run amok and it seems like the worst are the ones that were taken in various national Wal-Mart stores. I have run across more than one in which the chronicler of the marauding hordes was the one who was ejected from the premises, cast out as a heretic while the assailants behind the bargain day bashing were allowed to stay and buy more Chinese made crap lest the greatest shopping day of 2013 suffer any diminished profits.

Black Friday has become more of a national embarrassment each year, this year finally the last lines were crossed when the the big box stores and other retailers defiled Thanksgiving Day.

I have seen many comparisons between the hordes that descended on Wal-Mart and Target and a zombie apocalypse along the lines of the AMC television series The Walking Dead and they are spot on. We are not yet to the point where there are drunken hooligans ripping the entrails out of any what stand in their way between the $98 HDTV doorbusters special at Wally World and the checkout line but there is that certain dead-eyed, relentless glare of the undead evident in many of the You Tube videos but they move much faster.

It would likely pain the dearly departed Mr. Walton to see this today in the global retailer that bears his family name. Not that Sam wasn't a union hating big businessman (I have seen few who weren't) but there was a certain type of pride that comes from building a business from scratch the traditional American way rather than in just inheriting it and trashing the brand in the name of obscene profits. Engaging in foreign bribery, hell that's just the way that we roll anymore in America and the country's largest employer is like others using the practices to grease the rails for incursions into non-domestic markets. Lying, cheating and bribery have become the tools to succeed in American business, if you really have the political juice one can likely even procure NSA surveillance information on your competitors. It used to be that unscrupulous business practices were a scarlet letter of shame but have come to merit exalted status for job destroying CEO's who then have hagiographies churned out by the state-corporate media that encourage even more to adopt that type of behavior.

In the race to the bottom line it is the American worker and economy as a whole that get trampled. Even before the implosion of the housing bubble and the worthless derivative toilet paper that it was converted to - and subsequently reflated by a 2009 change in the mark to market accounting rules and then purchased by the Federal Reserve it was the plague of offshoring jobs that was setting us all up for the big fall. While Americans spent the early part of the century cowering after the September 11, 2001 attacks and the corrupt government's ongoing demagoguery and fear mongering for political gain the looting spree began as jobs were sent to India and other countries offering fewer regulations and a cheaper workforce, it was the greatest act of labor arbitrage in history and those jobs are never coming back. The waves of downsizings, restructurings and jettisoning of 'human capital' cut a swath through the American work force and as a result drove many who once had decent jobs into low-paying, thankless retail and service jobs - a good many at Wal-Mart. I wonder how Sam would have felt about that as it used to be that when he was alive the stores not only stocked a lot more products but they were festooned in red, white and blue and "Buy American" signs but this was back when we still actually had a domestic manufacturing base.

Wal-Mart was targeted by labor protests this weekend as well over their lousy pay and dismal work conditions. They really do treat their employees like crap but I find it hard to come down on big blue smiley when many others do exactly the same and worse at least at Wal-Mart there are such heartwarming gestures to the poorly paid that some stores held food donation drives for employees. Fast food goliath McDonalds has come under some criticism for it's McResource line that offers their serfs such sage advise as returning or selling their holiday gifts for extra money, breaking their food into smaller pieces to not feel hungry and to even get advice on how to apply for food stamps from the federal government. In fact both Wal-Mart and McDonalds employees are some of the biggest recipients of government aid it really speaks volumes to how low that we have fallen when two of American's most recognized global corporations are getting such attention for all of the worst reasons.  

While I am a libertarian (although one who has progressive leanings)  I have somewhat conflicting feelings over the role of unions that with truly free markets and a real version of capitalism where the best succeed and the worst allowed to fail, so totally unlike our ongoing government's bestowing of special treatment on zombie banks and too big to fails that are an abomination in that when the entire system has failed perhaps this time the protesters have it right. In the end all that matters is the the pigs can keep eating and the Obama administration continues to fill the trough to overflowing with the endless Wall Street bailouts while giving nothing to Main Street save a corporate scam of a health insurance reform plan. Talk about loosing the vampires to feed.

With the latest wave of reports on sales including this one from Bloomberg that retailers saw a drop in sales on actual Black Friday with the turkey day openings but in an ominous sign for the greedy bastards more people are choosing to just avoid the melees altogether. Amazon online sales were well up this year as the more sane shoppers just did their shopping from home therefore avoiding being mugged under the flourescent lights. The expansion into Thanksgiving did score a hit though with the more hard core types responding positively, nothing like a post-feast rampage to work off some of those calories. It is a dead certainty that given the enthusiastic response that big blue smiley and others will open even earlier come next Thanksgiving as the corporate state continues to wage war on family tradition.

Black Friday Devours Thanksgiving

I wonder what the over/under Vegas betting line is on people who will be trampled to death this coming Black Thursday-Friday weekend is? The biggest and baddest shopping day of the year for maxed-out and busted-down Americans has now been extended into Thanksgiving Day itself so we could be hearing the stories before the turkey gravy has had adequate time to congeal. On a positive note it offers an exit strategy from having to deal with those annoying relatives that one must tolerate for the holidays, when Uncle Dan has become heavily intoxicated and is ranting about Obama the Muslim, the “queers” getting married and America going to hell over legalized pot. Why hang around when you can go and mingle with even bigger assholes down at your friendly local big box retail outlet? As it sits right now Black Friday has officially jumped the shark with the bleed over into Thanksgiving as well as all of the “fun” of anticipating the deals being spoiled. Most of the big retailers have already released their ads and the deals are not what they once were.

Wal-Mart, the emporium of the burgeoining underclass opens at 6 on turkey day, there are such deals as a $98 thirty-two inch LED HDTV, a $38 Blu-Ray player and $299 iPad mini’s with a $100 gift card that you can use to buy even more Chinese made junk in the store. The variation of the normal retail bait and switch is Big Smiley’s 1 hour in stock guarantee on these and other coveted sale items. Guaranteed along with the inevitable deep discounts on movies, video games etc to generate a violent stampede through the big box store that will demolish all in it’s wake as it roars into the electronics department, normally located in the back of the store. The big day is always good for at least one horrendous incident at Wally World whether it be a stomping as the doors are thrown open or some poor old lady betting sucked under by a mob destroying the discount DVD displays. It should be mandatory for every Wal-Mart Super Store to have paramedics circling the building in the event that a victim is in need of immediate evacuation. I always get a kick out of the pictorial features of The People of Wal-Mart and just taking a gander at the dregs of humanity on display should have any sane person wanting to stay the hell away.

There will be early openings at Target, Best Buy, Toys R Us, Kohls, and the list is growing but none are as shameless as K-Mart though which has drawn criticism for plans to open at 6 in the morning on Thanksgiving Day and stay open for 41 hours straight.  It is not only dishonorable to family unity but is nothing less than sheer unadulterated greed, the real losers being the poor, forlorn employees who not only are unable to spend the day with their family but have to man the frontlines when the hooligans are unleashed - their employer could at least provide them with store colored riot gear. Plumbing the bottom of the barrel though is Macy’s who gussied up their 8 pm opening with the hogwash that the deals would begin “after families across the country have finished their holiday meals and celebrations”. My God where has the humility gone? The greedy bastards have been taking a ding in sales as the  government barometer of “consumer confidence” has taken a tumble so they are all in on Thanksgiving openings. What’s next in this soul less husk of a country, post-Christmas clearing sales at 11:59 on December 24th? What a disgusting orgy of consumerism, the Fox-o-sphere and crazy religious freaks constantly wail that the dirty liberals have “taken the Christ out of Christmas” but fail to hold retail giants to the same standards. That is a story for another time though.

There are those who bemoan the destruction of the American family and you can put down Black Friday’s absorbtion of Thanksgiving as Exhibit A on the list of culprits.  We really have so little time as it is and should honor tradition and spend the holidays with loved (and loathed) ones, after all they are family.  While I thankfully don’t have an obnoxious drunken “Uncle Dan” to tolerate during the annual pig-out feast I do have the misfortune of having to deal with my chronically bitching Jewish mother in law, a woman whose guiding philosophy of life is that everyone exists solely to kiss her big ass and once you get that straight well just sit back and enjoy the sweet potato pie. I also have a bigoted stepfather from some ass backwards Louisiana town down behind the cornbread curtain who could do everyone a favor and just find a local klavern hall to hang out in with others who share his views.  I am very thankful that  I don’t have to deal with him on turkey day but like the proverbial “jelly of the month club” he is the gift that keeps on giving come Christmas. While they are both annoying pains in the ass they are after all family,  the ones that people should be spending the holidays with instead of throwing down with total strangers in a scrum at the big box outlet. Sometimes it is best to just follow Bluto Blutarsky’s advice by drinking heavily.