Rant #26: Give Me Back Our Old Newspaper Format, Please!

On Long Island, the only daily, mass circulation newspaper to serve the populace is known as Newsday.

I always thought it looked at itself as a better newspaper than the other major New York area tabloids: The Daily News and the Post, the two newspapers that are its prime competition. The New York Times really never entered into Newsday's equation, even though Newsday would have liked it too.

During the past two weeks, Newsday has radically changed the format of its newspaper. To me, it has made it more friendly for the 12-24 year old who doesn't generally read newspapers. It has slimmed down its size, trimmed the number of pages it produces, trimmed stories although it has increased its headlines, and generally, it has thrown out all that was good in its old format for something it considers entirely new. And, of course, it has jumped on the greening bandwagon as a more "environmentally friendly" publication.

Of course, what Newsday did not take into consideration was its readership. This now strange-looking newspaper has been taken to task by its readers in today's paper. Letters-To-The Editor writers have lambasted Newsday for ruining a good thing for something akin to The Wall Street Journal changing its format to look like the National Enquirer.

And readership is correct. The newspaper is harder to read, although it takes about two-thirds of the time to read it now. It looks plain weird, too.

The photo I have included is how Newsday once looked. I cannot find an image of how it looks now to show you the radical difference.

I applaud Newsday's higher ups for allowing the newspaper to print all of the negatives about the paper's format in the very pages that have undergone this radical transformation. However, is it just all hot air, or does Newsday plan on changing back to the old format, or at least tweaking what it has now?

I realize that a lot of newspapers are going the electronic route, and more and more papers are charging for electronic content. But one of my guilty pleasures (before, during and after my recent vision problems) is to sit down in the morning and read the newspaper. I don't need huge headlines followed by clipped stories in a totally unfriendly format.

Give me my old paper, please!

Rant #26: Hire My Daughter, Please

My daughter recently returned from school for the summer break. She goes to a SUNY school, and I am proud to say that she pulled in a near straight-A cume this past semester. She is doing very well in her studies, and hopes to teach elementary education when she graduates next year. She plans on taking a few courses this summer locally.

The problem is this: she cannot find a job. As everyone knows, the employment situation stinks right now, with the country going through a cycle of nearly double-digit unemployment. For teenagers and college kids, the rate is about double.

She has been just about everywhere--from fast food to Wal-Mart to camps and beyond--but so far nothing.

Does anybody know where she can go for a job? Again, she will be a senior at college in the fall, and will be returning to school in mid-August, so she needs the job roughly from mid-June to mid-August.

As a father, I am really powerless to do anything, but I think this is the least I can do for her.

Ranting and Raving On Twitter

Although I am not convinced (at least yet) that this is the greatest thing since sliced bread, I have joined Twitter.

So I guess I am going to tweet.

Am I a twit for joining up with this thing?

I don't know. Let's see what happens. Maybe it will increase traffic at this site.

http://twitter.com/

Rant #25: I Hate Ties

I hate to wear ties. To me, they are like modern equivalent of nooses around your neck.

However, I am required to wear a tie at work. The only thing that I have found that they are good for is to wipe off your glasses.

This morning, while eating my usual breakfast of Cheerios (really a store brand knockoff) and milk, I must have gotten some of the milk on my tie, because when I got to work, I noticed that there was a stain on my tie.

I tried to get rid of the stain with some water, but all that it did was to expand the stain. Now it really looks ridiculous!

How do you get a stain out of a tie? How do you wash a tie safely?

It just tells me that ties are a waste of time. They add nothing to what you are wearing, and who is to say that one who does not wear a tie is less professional looking than one who does?

Women are not required to wear ties, although I think they would look a lot nicer than men if they did wear ties.

My conclusion is that ties are a waste of time. Especially if they have a stain on them that you don't know how to remove.

Rant #24: Lebron's Exit Okay With Me

The Cleveland Cavaliers' Lebron James received a lot of flack for storming off the court after his team was eliminated from the National Basketball Association playoffs by the Orlando Magic the other night.

He was unhappy with both his and his team's performance, and he showed it by not shaking any of his opponents' hands and not having a news conference after the game. Some called him a cry baby, others said he was a sore loser.

He might be both, but you know what, I kind of agree with his attitude that he displayed after the game.

The Cavaliers were probably the NBA's best team during the regular season, and some experts predicted they had the talent to go all the way this year. Cleveland has not had a professional sports team win a championship for nearly 50 years, and this Cavaliers team was pegged to end that drought.

Well, they swept through their earlier playoff series, and then faced an Orlando team that, other than Dwight Howard, few people out of central Florida really know about.

Well, the Magic was another story, and whatever holes were to be found in the Cavaliers were not only found, but exploited by the Magic. Their lack of a real center was maximized by Howard, who confounded the Cavaliers from the opening tip in the first game to the final seconds of the finale.

James, as the Most Valuable Player in the league this year, couldn't carry his team to victory. The last game was truly hopeless, a blowout in every sense of the word.

Why should James be shaking hands and addressing media after such a game and such a season? He was angry and probably a bit embarrassed at his play, his team's play, and letting down Cleveland once again.

Again, this is not hockey, where players traditionally shake hands after a game after bashing heads for three periods. This is basketball, where these type of end-of-game greetings are really something new, something that has maybe started during the past five or six years or so with any regularity.

So give James a break. Do any of the sportswriters that chastised him for his behavior believe that if they were in James' place they would have acted differently?

I knock James frequently because I usually think he has a big mouth to go along with his enormous talent. However, this time, shutting his mouth has gotten him into trouble.

My question is, why all the fuss?

(And give the guy an extra break now--it has been announced that he had a benign growth removed from his jaw after the Cavaliers' playoff run ended.)

And my prediction for the finals: the Magic will beat the Lakers four games to three. I think Orlando is on a tremendous roll now, and they won't be easily stopped. Kobe Bryant and Co. will give it their all, but it isn't the Lakers' year this year. Earlier this year, I attended my first Magic game while on vacation in Florida. I was really impressed with everything surrounding the game and the team, and was especially impressed with Howard, who might be the best center in the game right now. This long-time Knicks fan continues to suffer with that team, but for one evening, I felt I was in the winner's circle once again.

Orlando in seven.

Rant #23: Same Sex Marriage Rubs Me the Wrong Way

I am not going to get into a religious discussion about this subject, nor am I going to get into the political ramifications of these type of marriages.

Let me just say that on a personal note, these type of marriages rub me the wrong way.

Marriage is an institution that has withstood the ages. Just in recent times, the function of "living together" could have destroyed traditional marriage, but it didn't.

Now we have people who claim that homosexual marriage should be as legal as heterosexual marriage.

Well, I disagree, because at least in my mind, these two marriages don't equate to the same thing.

Love is love, and I am certainly not going to argue that. But to put gay marriage on the same plane as straight marriages is missing the boat.

Marriage between a man and a woman is the ultimate sacred vow, to a commitment that is much more than a business arrangement, or a blending of two people into one union. This is a commitment that could produce offspring, if the man and woman want this.

I won't argue that gay unions are loveless; they are not. But the unique aspect of straight marriages--which is the possibility of bringing other human beings into this world--makes straight marriage the only real marriage in my mind.

Yes, a man and a woman can have children without the benefit of marriage. But at least the idea behind having children in a marriage--to provide a good home, education in a loving environment--is more apt to happen when there are offspring in a marriage--where there is male and female influence--than in a non-marriage situation. I am not saying that all offspring of non-marriages are screwed up, nor am I saying that traditional marriages always produce good citizens, but I think the possibilities of having both a mother and father--and husband and wife--in the same household adds to the positive possibilities.

If gays want to be together, civil unions are the way to go. And, of course, the government cannot tell you what to do in your own home (sort of), so if gays want to consider their unions marriage, that is fine with me--but they won't be legal.

I am sick and tired of the behavior of some of those who favor gay marriage, who literally stick their opinions down our throats. One such recent incident was the beauty queen who was chastised by a judge for saying that she was not in favor of these unions. If you have an opinion for this type of union, why can't someone else have a differing opinion?

And don't get me started about Hollywood, which has made "gay" a trend. I don't think you can become gay, it is something that is within you upon birth (I am, of course, not a doctor, and that is just an opinion).

Also, does anyone pay attention to what happens when this situation comes up for a vote? Look at California, what I thought to be as liberal a state as there is--they consistently vote this legalization down.

I once had a co-worker who said to me that gay unions will "eventually" be made legal, so why not go with it now? Well, I don't jump on bandwagons, and I don't think they will ever become fully legal, although I do believe that civil unions will become increasingly strong legally as time passes when gay marriage proposals get shot down.

Another person once asked me what I would do if my kids were gay--how would I handle the situation? Well, I know that I wouldn't abandon them at all. You can still love someone even if their situation is not one that you would have hoped for. And if they wanted to get "married," let them have love in their lives--but it won't be legal.

And to equate the same-sex marriage situation with the civil rights movement of the 1960s, as some have done--please!

The bottom line is that for what it is worth, I am not for legalized gay marriage. I don't want to equate what I have--and yes, I believe in it so strongly that I did it twice--with something else entirely.

Rant #22: Junk Culture's Breaking Me Down

Have you noticed that the craftsmanship of things that we use every day is not up to the standards set years ago?

We seem to be right in the middle of a "junk culture" revolution now. Everything we buy is doomed to failure at some point. It's like the say about baseball: "managers are hired to be fired." With the things we purchase, you can adapt that saying to "everything we use is bought to fall apart."

My wife bought me one of those small, digital cameras several months ago. It did everything I wanted it to do: it took digital movies, it took digital photos and it recorded sound. I only had the thing for less than six months when it broke on me during a baseball game my son and I attended this past Friday. I tried to get it working, but it was fruitless.

My son has Rock Band. He has had it for less than a year. He and his cousins were playing it this weekend. One cousin hit the drums, and one of the drums collapsed. I tried to fix it with duct tape, but to no avail.

Do you ever fix your TV, video recording unit, your camera anymore? Once things break, we trash them and buy new ones. I think this started with video recorders, where in the 1990s it started to cost more to fix them than buy a new one, so we just trashed them.

I remember the days when things lasted a long time, even with daily use; certainly, televisions fall into that category. A TV would last a generation, and if there happened to be any problems, you would call the TV man, he would come to your house, and he would fix it.

Today, computers are one of the biggest culprits. We use them every day, but I have found that after about four to five years of use, they pretty much die.

Cars also fall into that category. Once a car reaches its five-year birthday, it is pretty much all down hill.

I wish we could just trash this junk culture and get back to the time when things were made to last.