Wednesday Warbles

There's a lot going on in the news today, but I want to start with a story that ran right here in the good ol' Register this morning. Basically, the point of the whole thing is that there have been about 90,000 sex offenders on MySpace.

About 50,000 of these people were removed from the site over the last two years, but 40,000 remain. Because of this, Attorney General Blumenthal, who is on a committee about social networking sites, says, "For there to be double the number that existed there six months ago is a powerfully damning statistic."

Is it though? Don't get me wrong, there's nothing OK about committing a sex crime. Nothing at all. But I'm not exactly sure why it's wrong for a convicted sex offender who did his or her time to have a MySpace account. This seems to me like Blumenthal and company playing to the fears of ignorant people. Either that, or he's ignorant himself.

First of all, everyone's profile on all social networking sites should be viewable to friends only. Secondly, if your teen can somehow be lured to meet a stranger that they met through one of these sites, then maybe we need to teach them better.

Look, for someone to use any social networking site to be a sex predator, then that's wrong. But we as parents (well, not me since I have no babies) need to educate our children about talking to strangers, in person or online.

When I was a kid, people were always concerned about a stranger stopping his or her car, offering children candy and luring them into the automobile. Nobody tried to make sex offenders not drive then. Or not buy candy. My parents just told me what to do in that situation and that was it.

That's all I really have to say about this, but, come on, are commissions like Blumenthal's really what we want to spend our money on in this economy? A commission that studies social networking sites? Really? Give me a break. There's nothing worse than politicians who play on our fears ...

Here's a story on this year's "American Idol," which I only include for the lovely photo that accompanies it.

Is this the way we want to spend our time? Again: Really? Did anybody have this problem purchasing Springsteen tickets for the Hartford show?

If I was running the MLB Network, I would hire Bob Costas just to shut him up about his thoughts on baseball. I've read "Fair Ball," and to call it purist drivel is an understatement. Nobody should ever try to convince me that the designated hitter and the wild card aren't good things. I will yell at you. I don't want to see a pitcher who hasn't faced real pitching since high school try to hit. Where is the strategy in deciding how the pitcher can best make an out? And I certainly don't want to go back to two divisions. Dumb.

This isn't a big deal: I am sure the women of the world will still go wild at Joe Francis' house.

Pardon my French, but this story pisses me off. You won't find me siding with big business very much, but pushing back the DTV transition is just dumb. We've known about this for more than two years. It was coming. You should have done something about it. If you use rabbit ears or a house antenna, pay the $40 and get on with your life. You've had years to save up. And when did television become a right?

With all the furor around because people are finding out that, gasp, Springsteen's halftime show was prerecorded minus The Boss' vocals, here's a most-definitely live take on "The River," one of my favorite tunes from the man. And check out that shirt and bandana.