Kennedy and Burris aside, Stuart Smalley will be there. With the help of this new Democratic wave, there to regulate big business out of this Great Recession. Until then, there is always more comedy, like the arrest of Bernie "Made Off" Madoff. The Wall Street roller and former Nasdaq chairman, was busted for operating a pyramid-like Ponzi scheme, costing unsuspecting investors a total of 50 billion dollars.
Among the financial victims, Eliot Spitzer, and French money manager, Thierry de la Villehuchet, who lost 1.6 billion dollars and later committed suicide. Maybe in that context Spitzer's year wasn't all bad. Besides, Spitz only figuratively shot himself in the foot, Plaxixo Burress, last seen hauling in the winning Super Bowl touchdown, did so literally while at a Manhattan night club. Despite the loss of Plax, the Giants ended '08 the same way they started, as the NFL's top team. Whether or not being the best during the regular season carries them through the playoffs and into the '09 Superbowl...
Either way, the Jints are still light years ahead of the Jets who in the span of 5 months proved to be a year late in trading for Brett Favre, a year early in letting go of Chad Pennington, and a year early in firing Eric Mangini, thus not landing Bill Cowher who is still enjoying his sabbatical at CBS. At least the Jets, unlike the Mets, didn't lose any money to Arthur Bernie Ponzarelli.
Yes, even NY Mets owner, Fred Wilpon fell victim to the Ponz. Swallowed up like a late September Phillies pennant rush. At least after embarrassingly inept back-to-back tumbles to our foul mouthed neighbors to the south, Wilpon will have (thanks to the tax payers of New York and Citigroup) a brand new stadium to choke to the Phillies at next season.
Actually Citi, who's paying 25 million dollars a year for the stadium's naming rights (despite having to lay off 50,000 workers) might not be giving anything to the Mets. That money just might be some of the bailout loot loaned to our government by China. Merrill Lynch Vice President, Peter Krauss, took some of his Chinese/bailout cut (25 million dollars worth, or a year's worth of Mets naming rights) for a down payment on a 37 million dollar pad at 720 Park Avenue. Despite the address, the building is actually on 70th and Park in case anyone is in the nabe for a visit. With all this Chinese/bailout paper floating around, it's almost fitting that the Mets new billion dollar stadium is only blocks away from New York's largest Asian population.
The Mets used some of their tax payer green in signing K-Rod, thus squashing any rumors that they had wild young righty hurler, Muntadhar al Zaidi, on their radar. Zaidi, who despite having plenty of zip in his arm, needs work on his control before being considered a legite closer. Not to be outdone, the Yankees went on the biggest spending spree in sports history. After asking the city for close to 400 million extra dollars in tax exempt bonds for their own new crib, the Yanks spent slightly over that same amount on All-Stars, CC Sabathia, Mark Teixeira, and AJ Burnett. This plea for tax payer help also came after Indians fan Dennis Kucinich brought an investigation centered on illegal tax deals over the land given to the NY Yankees for their new 1.5 billion dollar stadium, known to some as, the House that Bloomie built. And by "Bloomie" we mean New York's tax payers.
The Ponz struck Hollywood too, with Steven Spielberg being his biggest vic. Again, however, things are never too bad (de la Villehuchet's early termination aside) when already at the top. Spielberg's latest Indiana Jones sequel scored over 300 million dollars domestically alone. And although 2008 marked the death of the indie sub-divisions, Hollywood reeled in near record profits. Ironman, Hancock, and particularly the late Heath Ledger's Dark Knight all proved that there is always enough scratch around to make a blockbuster. With expensive entertainment becoming less of an option for many, the masses have shown that they will always be there for these same blockbusters.
Not so surprisingly four of the ten biggest box earners this year were animations. The basic "cute children's story covered with hidden politically correct adult messages and a few double entendre laced one-liners" formula has proven to be a sure proof way of packing theaters with people of all ages for over a decade now. Still, it does make us miss the days of Fritz the Cat. Somehow, we just don't see Fritz ever taking the next step to financial windfall by entertaining the easily entertained suburbanites who flock to Broadway to catch Beauty and the Beast, the Lion King, and now the latest cartoon/musical adaptation, Shrek.
Despite the demise of the subdivisions, Hollywood still managed to put out some solid efforts. Milk, Doubt,The Reader, Grand Torino and Frost/Nixon combined to make 2008 one of indie-wood's best in years. Truer independents like The Visitor and Frozen River had a tougher time as the biggest true indie box office winner was Kirk (originally known as Jason Seaver's fast talking kid, but long since, Born Again) Cameron's Fireproof, which made close to 3 times more than Bill Maher's Religulous. Maybe change isn't quite here just yet.
The final days of 2008 brought some familiarity back to the international scene. True, Somali pirates roaming the high seas and taking Middle Eastern oil tankers as their booty, ba-ba-ba-booty, is a new twist on things. Brooklyn Atlantic has a long history of not only being pro-pirate, but also being pro-Beastie Boy references as well. But as India (in response to the Muslim terrorist attacks which drowned the streets of Mumbai in blood) and Pakistan (in response to India's response) race their respective troops to their tumultuous border, and as Israel re-invades Gaza, killing hundreds of civilians but not stopping the rocket launchers which supposedly threaten the Jewish state's very existence, we do understand that change has a way to go indeed.
Which brings us back to 1969. We hope that 2008 is not the definitive year that 1969 was, but instead one of the earlier years. One of those years which gets the ball rolling. Rolling so fast that decades from now people will wonder how and when (unless they're reading this site and see that it officially began on the night of the Iowa primaries) it all started. For now however, we'll just be grateful for the extraordinary first steps which did occur this year while looking forward to January 20th, 2009. If that day in DC (and the days after that one) can bring even a fraction of the change which was dreamed about on that cold night in Iowa, we'll happily take it. For now.*
