Thursday, March 07, 2013

Bizarre Radio Stuff

Two things I've heard on the radio that are stunning:

First is Glenn Close doing some ad:
Have you ever cut off ties with a friend because she has cancer?
Or avoided someone with diabetes because you thought he was violent?
Welcome to the world of mental illness.

Say what?  Cut off somebody with cancer or diabetes because you think they're crazy?  OK, they must be trying to make a point that it's ridiculous to think of mental illness as any different than cancer or diabetes, but the ad never explains that.  It sounds like we should expect people with cancer or diabetes to be crazy.  What an awful, confusing ad.

The second is a little news item that keeps running about California's huge gasoline tax increase.  The reporter interviews some guy from the "Board of Equalization".  It was stunning when I first heard it, and I thought maybe I misheard.  But the little story ran multiple times, and that's definitely the name of the board.

Has nobody in California's state government ever read Ayn Rand?  Or did they name the board with the intention to rub it in the noses of Libertarians and Conservatives? 

For those who haven't read Atlas Shrugged, the "Board of Equalization" comes right off the pages of that book.  And let's just say that board was not a positive thing.

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