Heisman House Bottom of the Barrel absolute nothingness

The "joke" of this ad is that all the former Heisman trophy winners (including Tim Tebow, who has NOTHING but time)  some beer company could get to appear in an ad show up for a reunion and sit down to a banquet- only to suddenly revert to stupid little boys and engage in a food fight.  All of this is supposed to be LOL HYSTERICAL and I guess it is, if you are anything like most of the YouTube commentators.

Personally, I don't get it- but that's pretty much par for the course as far as I'm concerned.  I am forever being subjected to ads I know are meant to be funny in some way but which just leave me disgusted, sad or - at best- indifferent.  Why would anyone think that watching middle-aged men pretending to throw food at eachother is funny?  Why would anyone be inspired to buy beer by watching this ad?  Does it make anyone thirsty?  What the hell?

(I guess the "funny" is supposed to be in the idea that decades after these guys left college and did or did not have successful NFL careers, they still carry their old collegiate rivalries deep inside and really can't stand to be with eachother because they didn't all get athletic scholarships to the same school?  In other words, because they are still trapped in their lost childhoods?  Um, LOL?)

Anyway, that's all I've got for this bit of garbage, except to give another shout-out to the YouTube commentators who just got so much joy out of this 61 seconds of infantile crap.  You guys are real winners.  The future of our country you are.  Go get 'em in 2018- climb every mountain, test-drive every truck, go to every backyard barbecue and play every video game.  Just don't vote, ok?  No voting next year- voting is stupid and lame and something Social Justice Warriors do and it doesn't even involve throwing food most of the time.  It's totally not for you.  Trust me.

Ending the year on a low (bank) note.*

First, this guy's "passionate dream" has "always been" to "build the world's biggest store to display and sell bank notes to collectors."  What, really? So when this guy was a little kid, he dreamed of creating a store consisting of currency under glass that collectors would look at and buy- no wait, the BIGGEST such store?  Did he even know that there were such stores, or how big they were?  Did he imagine that 99 percent of his income would come from online sales- meaning that people who want to buy currency would be purchasing it based on images on a screen and NOT the actual stuff?

Where did this guy grow up- I've never even seen such a store, but twenty years ago this guy was dreaming of having the biggest one?

Second, I can see foreign currency collecting as being a pretty cool hobby, but only if one actually picks up that currency in the actual country it's used.  Otherwise, this looks a lot like sending away for postcards from exotic locations.  Kind of pathetic. 

Third,  I'm sorry, but I find it hard to believe that this guy's "passionate dream" wasn't to eat a McDonald's at least two meals a day, and that he managed to achieve that dream at least five years ago.  Maybe you should use some of that money for a good life coach and a gym membership, buddy.

Yes, I went there.  I'm not very nice.

*And no, puns are not my thing. 

In the next scene she surrounds that Lexus with her spinneretes.

So the spoiled little girl in this ad grew up to wear the exact same clothes and have the exact same attitude toward material goods- they are what embody the Christmas season and, no doubt, her life in general.

And the guy in this ad never fails to be amused at the fact that the little girl he bought is always appreciative of the toys he purchases for her- the house, the security, the car.....trophy wives are just the very best.  So easy to please, as long as you've got the money.

Meanwhile, I'll repeat what several YouTube posters have pointed out- holy crap, this woman's arms must be five feet long.  Is she an alien from the planet of Trophy Wives, or what?

Nissan makes my day-glo green backpack a total waste of money

Every one of these ubiquitous Star Wars/Nissan crossover crap commercials have the same thing in common- that it's perfectly ok to drive while distracted by your juvenile daydreams, even through construction sites, as long as you are driving a Nissan and remember to enable the Let Us Do Your Driving For You Because You Are Too Damned Irresponsible collision detection system.  Hell in this ad, the "student driver" is so damned freaked out at the site of a few orange cones that she has to be reminded by her father to turn the actual driving over to her car before she indulges in her stupid panic attack and slips into her Safe Space, where she isn't responsible for maneuvering heavy machinery but instead has been whisked away to a magical fairy land of Imperial Walkers and Storm Troopers.

Great message, Nissan.  I'll keep it in mind the next time I have to jump out of the way of one of your damn cars because it's being "driven" by someone who bought in to the idea that it's the perfect vehicle for someone who just wants to get from Point A to Point B without putting down the phone or delaying the Walter Mitty episodes until they AREN'T behind the wheel any longer.

Don't you just mean "stay a kid," Belk?

I guess we're supposed to be surprised when the "kids" in this ad turn out to be "adults" who are just ACTING like kids.  We aren't, because adults acting like kids is pretty much the standard in American television commercials.

I mean, we've got "adults" gushing over cars like they are candy.  We've got them fantasizing about jewelry and cell phones and trucks they don't have any actual use for but Look How Pretty and They'll Make My Life Worthwhile.  Hell, this season we've got Lexus commercials which actually PORTRAY grown-ups as children as they prance and dance and have orgasms over LookAtMeMobiles.  So when we are shown children swooning over Shiny Stuff and living in a fantasy world of tinsel and lights, we are supposed to appreciate the "oh guess what they're adults" punchine? 

Really? I just ASSUMED these were adults.  After all, commercials showing kids acting like kids are pretty rare.  Generally, kids in commercials act the way we used to think adults are supposed to act.  That's kind of the joke.  Adults acting like kids?  That's the norm.  Try again, Belk.

(Oh, and "Belk?"  What the hell is THAT all about?)

More First World Problems, by Land Rover!

Everything isn't quite perfect for the daughter in this family- she really wants a White Christmas.  Well, that's understandable.  Lots of kids want a White Christmas.  Pretty much all of them who don't live in a Northern climate zone just learn to deal with it.

But this kid, who lives in the middle of the desert with her parents and their three Land Rovers, isn't like most of the others.  While she sleeps, her daddy carries her to the back seat of one of the family's Land Rovers and drives to their summer home in the mountains where there IS snow.  Everything must be Just Right for the little princess, and that's possible because this family has a summer home in the mountains.

And since that summer home in the mountains is within easy driving distance from the winter home in the desert, it's kind of hard to understand why they didn't just plan on spending Christmas there anyway.  Maybe daughter was perfectly happy decorating a cactus and looking forward to getting a Land Rover Of Her Very Own someday until the very last minute?  Maybe daughter figured out that using her pouty face and acting like she's at least five years younger than she actually is will get daddy to melt (again) and get her what she really really wants which is to spend Christmas week skiing with her friends at the resort near the Summer Home?

Well, at least they aren't Cleveland Browns fans....

So the point of this ad is that this stupid family is totally obsessed with the Atlanta Falcons to the point of dressing in Falcons jerseys, giving eachother Falcons-themed gifts for Christmas, and even wearing Falcons gear for the family portrait.  Mom's closet looks like she wears absolutely nothing BUT Falcons stuff.  Except....

Turns out that Mom is a "closet" (get it?) Russell Wilson fan, so I guess she roots for the Seahawks in the deep recesses of her heart.  Or maybe she just roots for Wilson the player and doesn't care what team he plays for.  Either way, this is the joke of the ad.  I guess.  I don't know.  The YouTube commenters think it's hysterical and even make it a point to let us know that they get why it's funny, etc. etc.  Because YouTube commenters are very, very stupid.

I'll just point out that this entire family, INCLUDING mom whether she loves the Seahawks or just Russell Wilson, must really, REALLY hate the New England Patriots.  Hey family- how did you like last year's Superbowl?  Hey Mom- how did you like Superbowl 49?  I thought they were both great, myself.

More "Real People Begging for TV Facetime" ads from Chevy? Merry Christmas, I guess.

The "Real People, Not Actors" gang reach a new level in butt-kissing in this ad, and considering what we've seen in the past I wasn't sure that was even possible.  One woman can't even let the spokeschoad get through his first sentence without an admiring gasp, and the rest chime in right on cue with their moans of approval as they stand a respectable distance from the Glowing Wonder which is whatever piece of overpriced junk Chevy is peddling with these played-out trashy ads these days.

Hey, Chevy People- nobody believes your lame attempts to convince us that you are stunned by the sales pitch of the spokeschoad.  And we don't need to be told you're "Not Actors" and are just sad losers who desperately want to be actors.

Hey, Chevy- enough, already.  These ads are already among the very hated on television.  Nobody believes them, nobody finds them convincing, nobody wants to see them anymore.  We just want to slap the non-actors for selling their souls so cheaply and punch that idiot Chevy whore in the face for showing up on our televisions way too often.  Move on.  Please.

Yoplait Moms have massive chips on their shoulders*

"Look at me?  That means you dissaprove."

"Glance at me?  That means you are trying to pretend I don't exist.  You're hateful."

"Don't look at me at all?  You can't ignore me.  I'm here anyway, and you WILL acknowledge my existance.  I am woman, hear me roar, etc."

Oh, and I am going to drink wine whether you like it or not- and don't tell me you don't give a flying damn either way, because no way that's an option.  You notice everything about me- what I drink, what I wear (don't criticize my dress- it's how I got that guy to nail me so I could become TrophyWife No. 2) and everything else about me that I just KNOW you and everyone else are totally obsessed with because I'm Really That Important In Your Universe."

And finally- I'm raising my little girl to eat this yogurt, and I don't give a damn if you dissaprove which of course you do because Reasons.  I told you to stop pretending you don't care!  Stop acting as if this means nothing to you!  YOU HAVE A PROBLEM AND I CAN TELL AND YOU CAN'T PRETEND YOU DON'T DAMMIT!  MY LIFE HAS MEANING TO TOTAL STRANGERS!"

If this is what it means to be a Mom in America these days, well....wow.  That's really sad.

*And now someone is going to find this blog and use it as proof that women are being "judged" everywhere, all the time, by everyone.  Sigh.

"My perfect life is exactly 1% more perfect- let me do my Lexus dance!"

The "adult" that this kid turns into at the 15-second mark is quite literally worshipping at the shrine of a Lexus LookatMeMobile.  Judging from his reaction to getting a car he is clearly capable of buying himself at any time- after all, didn't TrophyWife buy it for him out of family funds?- I just have to wonder- what was his reaction when he learned that TrophyWife was pregnant, or when the doctor told him that she had given birth to a healthy baby girl?  Was it anything even CLOSE to his reaction when he discovered that his family was $50,000 poorer because his wife had given in to his dream of adding a luxury automobile to what was already a fantasy life?

Just asking.  Doesn't look like this Eurotrash creep has his priorities straight, but that's just me.

I just want to punch this guy in the face

The doofus in this commercial takes a call from mom and tells her that while he's cut back on his spending, he's still having a hard time paying his bills.  He says this in a defeated, deflated voice which suggests to me that he's kind of hoping Mommy comes to the rescue with her checkbook.  Again.

Instead, Mommy tells Not Ready To Be Out of The House Yet loser son "I know someone you should talk to."  It's a bankruptcy attorney. 

So we've gone from "I'm having a hard time paying all these bills" to "you should declare bankruptcy" in 2.5 seconds flat.  I hope Beverly or whatever this attorney's name is suggests that Doofus just admits that he can't afford his own place and should move back in with Mommy until he gets his finances in order rather than royally screw up his credit rating for the next decade with a "oh heck budgeting is too much of a pain" bankruptcy, but I kind of doubt that's going to happen because Mommy and Beverly both seem to think that filing for bankruptcy is a Magic Bullet which solves every problem.

Personally, Doofus, I think that sweater is the root of all your problems.  I don't care if Mommy did make it for you special.  Stop wearing that thing.  It's dragging you down.  And stop whining to Mommy about your money problems.  You're really depressing me.

Holy Crap, Jaguar!!

"Why are there so many miles on it?"

Are you F---NG SERIOUS, WOMAN???

It's an F---NG JAGUAR!!  It's a 2018 F--NG JAGUAR!!  And when your husband hands you the keys and you start it up with a push of an F--ng BUTTON, your only response is "why are there so many miles on it???" 

And take a look at that odometer.  There are LESS THAN A THOUSAND MILES ON THIS CAR.  That's "So Many" miles to you?  Could you be just a little more spoiled rotten?

And what's YOUR deal, buddy?  You've handed your trophy wife and the mother of your children the keys to a F---NG JAGUAR and when she responds not with "Oh My Gosh thank you sooooo much I'm so glad I sold myself to YOU" but with "why are there so many miles on it?" your immediate reaction is not to take the keys and return it to the dealership for a refund but to hem and haw with a sheepish look on your face?  What did you ask TrophyWife to give you for Christmas?  Let me guess- it's something you were born with, but surrendered to her quite some time ago, perhaps?

Are you F---NG KIDDING ME???

There's really no room for anyone else in this Cadillac Commerical anyway

And to think, for all those years I thought that the song "One is the Loneliest Number" by the Three Dog Night was about the desperate sadness that goes along with being alone.  I remember listening a bit further and learning that "two can be as sad as one" when the relationship is sterile and devoid of love...or, at least, that's what I thought it meant.

Thanks to the magic of tv commercials, I now know that I've been wrong for forty years, and it turns out that the song was about how awesome it was to be Number One in your own heart, and that the best way to achieve this feeling is to be a status-absorbed douchenozzle with a stereotypical engineering job in a cliche'd all-glass office who drives a Cadillac. 

Boy, is my face red.  Oh wait, that's not embarressment.  More like rage.

Eventually, all of the songs we grew up with will be whored out to big corporations to be used in advertisements.  "But that's not something that I'm looking forward to"-- Ringo Starr, Photograph

You don't have DirecTV? So you LIKE being eaten by fire ants?

Remember when cable was the greatest thing ever, and if you didn't have it that meant you had a big piece of metal on your roof and snow on your screen and your life wasn't worth living?

Well, I woke up today and found out that cable was the equivalent of wet grocery bags, banging my head into a turnstile and pouring hot coffee all over myself.  In other words, what used to be the greatest thing ever is now absolute torture and if you don't have DirecTV you must enjoy torture.  I'm guessing you're probably also a Commie who Wants the Terrorists to Win and doesn't Support the Troops.

So I guess I have to be like the guy with the extremely punchable face at the beginning of this ad- you know, the guy who looks like he's about to settle down for 26 hours or so of binge viewing with his awesome new best friend, his DirecTV setup- or the people who like things that pretty much everyone finds annoying, slightly painful, or potentially deadly.  Let me think about it, DirecTV.

(Oh and BTW, please don't read the YouTube comments.  Even sadder than usual.)

Not surprised that comments are disabled for these Apple Commercials...

I mean, when you combine the horrible non-soundtrack with that little brat laying on the grass with a $2000 piece of technology responding to his mom with "what's a computer?" in a zombie monotone, I can totally understand why Apple doesn't want to hear what anyone has to say about this hideous nugget of dreck.

"What's a computer?"  It's that thing you're casually risking destroying because Hey It's Not Your Money and the stores have plenty of them.  "Where do you want to go?"  Well, I can tell you where I want all of the people involved in this commercial to go.  I won't say where that is, because it really doesn't fit into the holiday spirit.



The most aggravating thing about this pretentious pile of time-wasting dumb is that you just know the people who created it broke into tears and gave eachother high-fives when they saw the finished product.  Never mind that the product being sold is pretty much the ultimate in self-indulgent conspicious consumption.  This thing is made by Asian children who whose only relationship with the product will involve putting it together so that it can be sold to spoiled rotten First Worlders like the horrible people in this ad.  Who will then proceed to prance around as if it provided some level of significant meaning to their lives and isn't going to be replaced by a Much Better Update in six months.

F-- you, Apple.

Everything Wrong With Prager U's "The Progressive Income Tax: A Tale of Three Brothers," Epilogue

First, let me start this conclusion by admitting that yes, the title of this series is meant to be total clickbait.  I might have included "Spoilers (Duh)" but maybe that's copyrighted.  Anyway, I justify this by pointing out that this blog is not monetized so it really doesn't matter how many people read it as far as ad revenue is concerned, since there's no ad revenue.

Ok, so here's what's missing in Mr Prager's Tale of Why Requiring People to Pay Their Fair Share is Bad, Wrong, Communistic and Helps the Terrorists Win.  Harry and his wife sock away large amounts of money in two ways- by purchasing a house far below what they could actually afford, and by totally neglecting their children.

I'm absolutely serious about that second point.  To make the brothers completely equal in every way except what Prager considers their "work ethic," he has them all married and with two children.  But while Harry worked sixty hours a week and his wife also worked full-time, Tom worked "only" forty hours per week while his wife worked ten hours, and Dick worked only 20 hours per week and his wife worked at home (she didn't "not work," you jagoff Prager.  Stay-at-Home Moms work.  They just don't get paid.)  Sorry, Harry and Wife- all the money in the world won't add another minute to the day.  Every extra hour you spent working was time you didn't spend with your kids.

So Tom and his wife decided live a normal, 21st century middle-class American life which involved a double-income household but also time to raise their children, who grew up to appreciate a life which balances work with leisure and does not put a massive premium on constant work and hoarding money.  Dick's kids were raised by both parents and learned that doing without all the material possessions their relatives and friends had was well worth it because Mom and Dad are kind of priceless commodities.  Harry's kids were raised by daycares or, more likely, Dick's wife down the street, whom they learned to address as their "other mom" and Dick and his wife as their "real parents" - the ones who got them to soccer practice, gave them good advice on love and relationships, and essentially served as their role models while their biological parents spent all their time in the mad pursuit of wealth.  On the rare times they ate dinner with those biological parents, they defended Dad's "deadbeat" brothers against the Libertarian ravings of the money-grubbers they happend to share a house with (sometimes.)  They often envied Dick's and Tom's children- sure, they didn't have a lot of "stuff," but they weren't latchkey kids.

(And Dick and Tom seemed to be in much happier relationships, too- Harry and his wife don't spend a lot of time together, what with Harry's sixty-hours-per-week schedule and Mom's full-time job, sometimes it's just a hurried few words at breakfast and a short argument before passing out in front of Netflix at night.  But check out that stock portfolio!)

So congratulations, Harry and Wife- you lived the dream.  You died with the money, despite our Terribly Unfair Tax System Which is Designed to Rob You and Reward Deadbeats.  I bet your gravestones are more ornate than those of Dick and Tom.  But I wonder if your kids remember to come to the funeral.

Everything Wrong With Prager U's "The Progressive Income Tax: A Tale of Three Brothers," Part III

Ok, so despite a wide income disparity between the brothers, they've all decided to buy equally-priced homes on the same private street.  Whatever.  Let's move on.

One day, the three brothers decide that for the sake of security, etc. they are going to pool their resources to build a fricking palace gate seperating their suburban estates from the rest of the world (the video puts it differently, but that's about it.)  They figure the landscaping, gate, moatwork WTF EVER I ALREADY HATE THIS FAMILY will cost $30,000.  Harry says the cost should be divided evenly, but the other brothers object- Harry has more money, well, shouldn't he pay more?

The first thing that bugs me is that the work has already been done before they figured out how it would be paid for.  I'd expect this from lazy slacktards like Tom and Dick, but not Looking to the Future Hard-Working Harry!  Why wasn't this planned out beforehand?  Who put down the deposit for the landscaping, paving and other work?  I hate plotholes!

You see, if the question of payment had come up during the PLANNING phase, Tom and Dick could have said something like "it may not be 'fair' for us to ask you to pay more than us, Harry, but here's how we see it- for Tom, $10,000 represents about 35% of his total annual income.  For me, it represents about 12% of our total annual income.  For you, it represents about 7% of your family's annual income.  So it's a much larger investment for us than it is for you, yet your benefit will be the same as ours.  So from our point of view, you should pay more because you can.  But if you and Dennis Prager don't agree, there's an even simpler answer- Tom and I and can't afford to invest in these improvements.  So if you want them done, you'll either have to take more of the burden on yourself, or wait until we can contribute more.  Sorry."

This isn't rocket science, is it, Mr. Prager? Do you offer science at Prager U?

Instead, Harry takes the opportunity to lecture his brothers and suggest that being asked to pay more because he can afford to would be "penalizing" his and his wife's hard work.  And now the straw men are really unleashed as the brothers have it out in the middle of the street.

Tom says "Harry, you and your wife can work as hard as you want, but my wife and I want to enjoy ourselves now, not 25 years from now."  Obviously Tom is supposed to be a bad guy here- a "live for today, let society pay our bills" immoral lazy twat with his hand out all the time.  When Harry replies "fine, but why should I have to pay for that?" Tom plays the "because we're brothers" card, clearly not understanding that while blood is thicker than water, it's the thickness of the wallet that matters most in the real world.

Dick steps in and basically endorses the Progressive Income Tax formula as a solution to their problem.  For a moment, Dick is the Voice of Reason here.  But only for a moment, because Dennis Prager is by no means a fan of the Progressive Income Tax.  So he has Tom jump in with an enormous Straw Man "let's do it like the Feds who like to give freebees to deadbeats like me I don't pay taxes at all so I should get these improvements for free" speech worthy of the Republican National Convention when there are no microphones around.  Dick KNOWS this isn't fair but he likes it anyway because it reduces his share while putting a much larger burden on his Evil Capitalist Swine brother Harry.  And so the Class Struggle is explained- the middle class is conned into joining with the poor to fight a war against the thrifty, hardworking rich.  There's another freaking minute and a half to this ad but I'm not even going to finish it- instead I'll sum up this monstrosity in Part IV.

Everything Wrong with Prager U's "The Progressive Income Tax: A Tale of Three Brothers," Part II

Ok, so we've got the triplet Class brothers who are all carpenters with wives and two kids and make $25 per hour. At this point in the video, they start acting like human beings who aren't following a script and begin to make actual choices:

"Tom chose to work 20 hours per week,  Dick worked 40 hours per week, and Harry worked 60 hours per week."  Harry's wife also worked full-time outside the house, contributing $50,000 to the family income.  Dick's wife worked part-time selling Real Estate and brought in $25,000, while Tom's wife didn't bring in any income (the video actually says "Tom's wife did not work," but this is contradicted by the previous information which included that each family has two children.   I think the narrator meant to say "was not paid for the work she did," unless Prager U. teaches it's "students" that being a parent is not work?

"Tom and Dick spent all of their family income, since they paid into Social Security they figured they didn't need to save...." Wait a minute.  Did they spend all their family income because they thought saving was unnecessary due to the future availability of Social Security, or because given their slack attitudes toward labor (Dick only worked 40 hours a week- what was he doing with all that spare time?) the act of living absorbed their incomes?  We aren't told- it's too important to get to "Harry and his wife, however, over many years, had put away money each month and invested it in stocks and bonds."

Again, wait a minute- Harry and his wife make a lot more money than Tom and Dick, so they have excess funds they can invest.  I get it.  But is it automatically virtuous to invest that money in stocks and bonds?  What if Harry and wife had reached 65 in 2008, when the stock market lost half it's value?  How smart would all their investing have been then?  And again, we still haven't been told if Tom and Dick aren't saving because they don't want to, or because they can't.

Man, I was right to break this up.  This IS going to be a long discussion....

"Here's how it worked out.  Tom made $25,000 per year.  Dick and his wife made $75,000.  And Harry and his wife, $150,000. "  We can tell by the numbers that Harry and his wife are the heroes of this little shpeal already, can't we?  But it's about to get more complicated.

"When a new housing development opened up in their community, the brothers decided to buy equally-priced homes on the same private street."

 Ok, we've just gone off the rails, Prager U.  For this to be true, one of two things had to happen.  Either Tom lied on his mortage application and told the bank that he made a lot more money than he actually does, or Harry and his wife decided that despite their big incomes and savings they'd buy an extremely modest home so they could live near Harry's deadbeat brothers and their pathetic, low-achieving wives.  I don't know, maybe it's the second option and Harry and Wife value that Feeling of Superiority over Relatives more than living in a house they've earned through hard work and savings.  This is definitely a logic speed bump, and I don't know how you're going to rescue yourselves from this, Prager U.  But we'll have to pick this up in Part III.

Everything Wrong With Prager U's "The Progressive Income Tax: A Tale of Three Brothers," Part I

For those of you who don't know- in other words, you hit "Skip Ad" as soon as possible when you saw these ubiquitious valentines to Libertarianism pop up- Dennis Prager is a right-wing talk show host who, when not bashing intellectualism and sneering at the idea that a college education is of any actual value, pretends to be a university professor who knows how to use Prexi on YouTube.  When he isn't blathering nonsense into a microphone, he's blathering nonsense along with whizzing graphics and infantile cartoon characters using equally infantile straw man arguments against Socialism, Atheism, and...well, that's about it, actually.

These stupid chapters all fall under the banner of "Prager U," which is even less of a university than Trump University and even less of a learning opportunity than Prager is a teacher.  I guess this is Prager's "answer" to the "wasted money" represented by college- "see, I'm just a jackass radio yakker and I know more stuff than your elitist university professors, you whiny know-it-all millenials.  Check this out, my intern did the graphics!"

Anyway, I didn't want to spend this entire blog post explaining and bashing the concept of Prager U, which is nothing more than Dennis Prager's ego showing up again and again to interrupt my viewing.  I wanted to focus on this particular chapter, in which Prager condescendingly tries to "explain" to us why the concept of "class" is bad and wrong and that if we don't have money it's because we're just lazy and made bad choices like deciding not to work ourselves to death and actually raise our kids and find value in things other than money.

I realized about two minutes in that this was going to take some time, and I'd have to break it up into episodes to avoid this post being several pages long.  So I hope you don't mind that this looks more like a long-winded project than the usual "I hate this Commerical here's why" schtick.  My intention is to look at key points in Prager's little "you make choices and live with them you whiny schmucks" rant and give my own interpretation of what is going on.  When I'm done, I'll post the entire thing on successive days.   Ok, here we go with the opening:

Tom, Dick and Harry Class are triplets who were all raised in the same home with the same family- ok, we get it, Prager is going to show that they all had exactly the same advantages, so we can't blame or credit environment.  This is pounded into us early on; Prager is very concerned we are going to notice something "special" about one of the Class brothers right away.  Nope.  Same skills, Same IQ, "same opportunities."  They are basically clones following the same script.  Fine.

Each of the brothers got married and had two children.  They were all carpenters making $25 per hour.  And it's at this point that their lives begin to diverge, because they had "different priorities."

Ok, that's where I'll leave off for now.  Part II follows tomorrow.  Arent' we all curious to find what happens to the Class brothers when they stop being exactly the same person and start making choices?  I know I am!

She traded down. We get it, Taco Bell

So let's analyze this one to find what Taco Bell really thinks of it's demographic, shall we?

Cute girlfriend is out for a walk with her man-child new boyfriend, who is clearly a lot more into eating crap with both hands than being with her or taking care of himself.  They bump into her ex, who is a non-Taco Bell-eating, healthy fitness-oriented guy who, from his reaction to seeing a former girlfriend, has moved on and hasn't given her a second thought.

At this point, I assume that Ex Girlfriend wants very badly to show well to Ex Boyfriend, but since New Boyfriend is already Not Tall, Not Athletic and eating Taco Bell with both hands, the odds are pretty heavily stacked against her.  Still, if New Boyfriend can just manage to be coherent and sociable for a few seconds, this might not turn out too badly.

Instead, New Boyfriend inexplicably believes that Ex Boyfriend wants some kind of physical contact with him, and he's got his hands full of carbs and grease, so he gives him a chest bump.  This comes off as unbelievably stupid and embaressing to everyone involved, and has probably ended his relationship with New Girlfriend, though that's going to have to take place off screen, because Ex Girlfriend still needs to make the best of the situation until Ex Boyfriend is gone.

Ex Girlfriend links her arm with Soon to Be Latest Ex Boyfriend and rather defensively moves on- as I implied, she can't break up with this clueless slob on the spot, otherwise hunky Ex Boyfriend jogs away the victor of the moment.  She must pretend that they are still a couple for at least a few more seconds, or until Ex Boyfriend is out of earshot.

But please, tell me that inside of three minutes this girl- who can clearly do much better- has dumped her latest mistake's sorry ass right there in the park.  Please tell me she isn't this desperate for a guy to hook arms with just in case she runs into Jogger Ex.  Please tell me she isn't THAT sad.

Masterpass shows how much Joe Montana likes money

I guess I'm supposed to know who the woman is in this commercial too, but I don't and I'm perfectly ok if no one wants to enlighten me.  It's Kat something, I know that.  Don't care.

The point of this movie is that the target audience is composed of mouth-breathers who are likely to forget the product being sold unless it's hammered into their skulls repeatedly over the course of thirty seconds but who really like anything that involves using their phones.  I doubt that there's any sensible reason for Joe Montana, who hasn't thrown a football professionally in 23 years (yes, that makes me feel very old) and is therefore pretty much an unperson for that target audience, to be here.  But whatever- hey everybody look, here's an old guy who played in the NFL a quarter of a century ago but can still be triggered to throw fragile decorations across the room by repeating a word!  Funny, right?  Right?

Oh by the way, before all this BS with Montana and Kat Whoever, we see a young woman totally flummoxed at witnessing the customer in front of her use her phone to pay for something.  Holy crap Mastercard, I grew up with phones attached to the walls by cords and I get the concept of paying bills with them by flashing the screen over a card reader.  We're supposed to buy the idea that some Millenial is astonished by this sorcery?  Seriously?

And one more thing- would the woman using "Masterpass" really respond to "what is that?" with "Masterpass?"  Not "I'm using my phone to pay my bill?"  Are people now programmed to provide free advertising to strangers?  That's almost as dumb as the Doddering Old Money-Grubbing Quarterback with One Less Ring than Tom Brady making a fool of himself crap that follows.  Almost.

Amazon Prime's mastery of laziness, incompetence, cluelessness....and a bonus dig at the U.S. Postal "Service"

Or "one week in the life...."

Exactly one week ago, I ordered something on Amazon Prime.  It "arrived" on Tuesday....somewhere.  The delivery guy put it on a porch and took a picture of the box on the porch and sent it to me, which was great except I did not recognize the porch.  Which means that rather than bring the package to the residence of the person who actually ordered it the delivery guy, apparently tired of driving around with said package, decided to randomly drop it off at a random porch somewhere.  And then take a photo of it and send it to me- "look, here's that stuff you ordered.  Try to guess where I left it.  It's kind of a game!"

On Thursday I spent thirty minutes maneuvering through Amazon's maze of circular "orders" options until finally coming across a chat opportunity.  Within a few minutes the problem was resolved in the form of an apology and promise of a replacement for the lost item.  To make it more likely I actually received the item, I asked Amazon to send it to my place of work, where there's pretty much always someone to sign for it and which is not likely to be mistaken for a random porch somewhere.

Well, today I check my Amazon Orders page and find that the package has been "Delivered"--- to the school--- which is closed---- because it's SATURDAY.  Did the driver, finding a closed, empty building, just leave the package by the door and move on?  Don't know for sure- I haven't received a photograph.  I can't go to the school to check for my package, and I'm hoping that the "delivered" notice actually means "attempted delivery," but I guess I'll find out on Monday.

Meanwhile, a few minutes ago I got home from the store to find an "Unsuccessful Delivery" notice from the Post Office for ANOTHER order I made on Amazon this week.  This one was brought by the US Postal "Service," which has this bizarre habit of randomly deciding that certain packages must be signed for while others can be just left by the door.  Since I can't get to the Post Office during the times it's open I'm probably not going to be able to secure this package, either.

Isn't ordering stuff magical, kids?

This IS the 21st Century, right?

So this ad wasn't produced by Chrome?

If I missed something, please let me know what it was, because all I get from this ad is "Firefox sucked because it was too slow, but we fixed it and now it's not as slow anymore."  And to let us know how slow Firefox was, we are shown a girl attempting to drag a refrigerator down the street with her bike.

I have to admit, I don't see "man our product was a piece of junk" ads very often.  But again, maybe I'm missing something?