Kobe Bryant's divorce and the fall of "The Black Mamba"...

*Disclaimer-please be advised that we here at 'Busting Chops" are not casting aspersions on Vanessa Bryant for the hell of it. She is, arguably, one of the hottest broads we've ever seen married to any pro athlete (if you doubt this, please refer to the reality TV series called "Basketball Wives". Nowhere except on the barren sand dunes of the Serengeti will you ever see such a miserable collection of cloven-hoofed Wildebeests in all your life).

The girl is an incredible-looking young lady, and for the life of me I do not understand why she never made it into our "Babe of the Week" series. Maybe it's because she's so abhorrently despicable. Still in all are merely speaking the truth about her situation as we see it.

Kobe's wife Vanessa Bryant is filing divorce papers in L.A. County District Court. Citing the usual bullshit excuse of "irreconcilable differences", she is in the process of backing up the Brink's truck and making out with not only half his net worth and one (at the very least) of his mansions, but is claiming spousal AND child support. Bryant is on the hook to keep her in the elevated lifestyle she's accustomed to until she remarries, which will only happen once Kobe retires and no longer commands a 25-plus million dollar a year NBA contract.

It won't matter by then, because she would have successfully milked every dime she could out of her 10-year marriage to one of basketball's biggest and most relentless pricks. Suddenly, all those millions he's earned over the course of his career don't seem sufficient to placate the bottomless greed of this abominable cunt of a woman. The madness never ends!!!

But this isn't all her doing. Kobe created this monster a looooong time ago. Bryant, who was 20 at the time he married this two-bit video hoochie, thought it was a good idea to estrange himself from his family and marry this little twat while she was still in high school. The relationship caused such a distraction whenever he came to pick her up after school that the administration decided it would be best for her to spend her senior year at home. None of Kobe's family members or teammates were invited to attend the ceremony, and neither did he go to his parents seeking advice about such a life-altering event. He will be regretting this act of hubris very shortly, when the presiding judge rules on the allocation of assets.

He was so in love with this skank that he decided against a pre-nup in a state (California) that is infamous for it's brutal divorce settlements. There is a chance she winds up with more money than he, even though Kobe was the one who earned it all. Not that he'll be in the poor house by any stretch of the imagination (a guy who gets picked up and dropped off from work in a helicopter isn't going to be applying for a Section-8 rent subsidy voucher anytime soon) but he is going to be taken to the cleaners so hard he should hire George Jefferson as his legal counsel.

There have been a myriad of tales depicting Vanessa as an entitled, spoiled brat with delusions of grandeur. But when store clerks in Beverly Hills rant how she is one of the most obnoxious customers they've ever had to deal with in a place that counts snotty, entitled, and insecure celebrities as it's core clientele, these comments really stand out. "Do you know who I am?" she allegedly screamed at one hapless store clerk who happened not to have recognized the then recently wedded wife of Kobe Bryant. How the fuck were they supposed to know who this dumb bitch was? Had she ever done anything to warrant fame besides deepthroating cocks backstage at rap video shoots?

I find it distressing how people who become wealthy and famous-especially ones like Vanessa, who fell into her situation solely on the merits of having fucked someone's brains out-act like such ginormous pricks to anyone they feel are beneath them. Once you hit the lottery in whatever form, whether it's through birth, inheritance, marriage or hard work, aren't you supposed to be happier than the rest of the schlemiels who live from paycheck to paycheck? Do they really have to go around rubbing it in people's faces that they have it better than them in such a graceless fashion?

Here's the thing about money-financial windfalls amongst family members from humble backgrounds usually cause rifts that tear the fabric of said relationships apart. Vanessa's step-father and mother, who were happily married until she married Kobe, divorced over this very reason. Her ex-stepfather was quoted as saying the thing that ruined his marriage was he could not compete with the gifts Kobe and Vanessa were lavishing on his wife, leaving him emasculated and out in the cold. Kobe should have been aware of this, but apparently didn't care. This same disease has infected his current relationship, and here is where he could have used a bit of the fatherly advice he blatantly shunned during his courtship of Vanessa.

Don't get me wrong-I don't feel sorry for Kobe Bryant one bit. He exhibited a narcissistic mean streak that belied his exalted station in life when he raped that female hotel employee in Colorado. That incident wasn't about sex, it was about power, and exerting exerting it over someone he felt entitled to humiliate, not only because of who HE was but because of who SHE wasn't. And damn if the bitch wasn't grateful for having the great Kobe Bryant's dick up her ass. She was a nobody, and he wanted to remind her of it regardless of how googly-eyed she was in his presence. So whatever Vanessa morphed into after their marriage, she learned it from him. And what does it say about their relationship that Kobe had to run out and buy her a $4 million dollar multi-karat ring just to appease her ego after he got hit with rape charges?

Then there was the issue with their Peruvian housekeeper, who dropped her lawsuit alleging abuse at the hands of Vanessa when the matter was settled out of court. Here is a little snippet of one of the allegations made by ex-housekeeper Maria Jimenez-

"Jimenez also alleges that Vanessa Bryant screamed at her for putting a $690 blouse in the washing machine, and demanded that Jimenez put her hand in a bag of dog feces to retrieve the price tag for the blouse. Jimenez refused and said she would quit, but Vanessa Bryant allegedly demanded that she pay for the blouse first, the suit states. Jimenez says she stayed on the job to work off the cost of the blouse."

Ah, the lifestyles of the rich and famous. By the way, here is a video Vanessa appeared in before she struck paydirt, just so you can get a taste of what she was like when Kobe met her. She is the one in the tight, glittery outfit who mouths some of the words Snoop Dogg rhymes while provocatively gesticulating in the Chevy convertible.

Goodnight and good luck, Kobe. No high-priced attorney is going to save you from the rape of your assets you will be subjected to by your former darling sweetheart of an ex-wife. Happy New Year, asshole!!!

NBA News and Notes...

Now that the lockout is over, after the pathetic machinations of the bumbling David Stern/Billy Williams/Derek Fisher "trifecta of stupid" almost plunged the league into a year-long lockout after its' most successful season in years, it seems as if we have some issues to address going forward-

1) Chris Paul mentioning the storied "history" of the L.A. Clippers franchise was as over the top as it was patently untrue. Chris, I understand you're happy to get out of New Orleans, but you're layin' the disingenuous hyperbole a bit too thick there, buddy. The Clippers HAVE no storied history, unless having exactly two winning seasons in the last twenty years counts for something. Paul must also keep in mind he's playing for an Donald Sterling, an owner whose infamous for sitting on the sidelines while heckling HIS OWN PLAYERS.

And he's racist on top of that. He has a history of being sued by tenants of some of his real estate properties, and the comments attributed to him about them over the years are straight out of Bull Connor's Alabama. Sterling is an absolute riot. I'll give anyone 2 to 1 odds that both Chris Paul AND Blake Griffin are outta there in two years. This is the Clippers we're talking about, and they are doomed to fuck things up. But they can have fun now as they are on the upside and the Lakers are going in the exact opposite direction.

2) The biggest move that will affect The Lakers this year won't be the decimation of their entire front line to make room for Dwight Howard. Sure, Howard will help, but giving away a versatile big man like Lamar Odom for nothing is something that will come back to haunt them. Now they have aging, demoralized Pau Gasol and the increasingly irrelevant Andrew Bynam, who is basically a slow-burn version of Greg Oden. Bynam will play all 66 games this year in the truncated span of 120 days injury-free like I'll replace Hugh Hefner at the mansion. Not happening.

No, the biggest move that will resonate in Lakerland is Kobe Bryant's impending divorce from his wife Vanessa. Bryant, who's played through some serious distractions before during his rape trial in Colorado (settled out of court, so the consensus is "Yes, he was guilty"), can summon his laser-like focus like no other. But this is different. This newest fiasco involves the deterioration of his home life, which will not only cost him his family but tons of money. TONS. The Colorado incident happened when he was a younger man, and he is an old 36 this year at a time when the team will be depending on his diminishing skills more than ever. If he was the Kobe of yesteryear, I wouldn't bet against him. But the combination of father time, aching knees, impending trade rumors involving their two other best players and the divorce will be too much for even the Black Mamba himself to overcome. Welcome to the beginning of the end for the Lakers as they are currently constructed. Stay tuned. It's going to get ugly.

And Dwight Howard will not make the situation any better, because they still desperately need a point guard and have no bench whatsoever. Besides, is Howard so desperate to get out of Orlando he is willing to throw more of his formative years down the drain playing second fiddle to an aging nutbox in Kobe Bryant and guards Derek Fisher and Steve Blake, the worst backcourt tandem since Sacco and Vanzetti? I see the Oklahoma Thunder running these cats out of the gym. If the Lakers see a light at the end of the tunnel, it's the Thunder coming at them like a runaway train. As an aside, their second unit consists of the artist formerly known as Ron Artest...and four white guys. I rest my case.

3) The Knicks mightily overpaid for Tyson Chandler, both in money and in years. They are stuck with him until 2015. Giving up Chauncey Billups was a good move, because he is no longer "Mr. Big Shot". They have a serviceable front line, but Stoudemire's knees will have to hold up (highly unlikely) and Carmelo Anthony is going to have to play some semblance of defense, another improbability that may see the Knicks bounced out of the NBA Playoffs again in the first round.

Then you have their "point guard by committee" situation with an overwhelmed Tony Douglas, a clearly running-on-fumes Mike Bibby, who left his best years back in Sacramento 8 years ago, and Baron Davis, who will miss at least one month due to a back ailment he conveniently forgot to address during the NBA's protracted summer vacation. They inexplicably went after shooting guard Jamal Crawford, as if they need another chucker who refuses to play defense. Remember, Crawford was the guy Lance Stephenson scored 40-plus points on in a summer league tournament. Lance was FIFTEEN YEARS OLD at the time, and Crawford already a seasoned professional.

You'll be surprised by who I mention here as a possible fit for the Knicks backcourt-Sebastian Telfair. Yes, he is undersized, cannot shoot and is for all intent and purposes an NBA drifter destined to forever sit on the bench of whatever team needs to fill a roster spot. But he is fast, can handle the ball better than most and his mentality is pass-first. He has been in the league seven years, but four of those don't really count because he should have been in college. His knees and back aren't messed up and he still has remnants of the youthful bounce in his stride that has abandoned aging veterans Bibby and Davis years ago.

A player like Telfair is what this run-and-gun team needs, because there is no way Chris Paul or Deron Williams will sign with a team that can't sign them to a max contract. All that talk about these guys wanting to play for a championship is all well and good, but not too many of these cats are willing to leave millions of dollars on the table just to play in New York. If this were true, why have the Knicks NEVER been able to attract any All-Star caliber free agents until recently?

The last time the Knicks won a championship, John Shaft was trolling the gritty streets of Harlem and Frank Lucas was wearing his matching chinchilla coat/fur hat to Madison Square Garden prize fights. That is a long time to be irrelevant. Sure, those Patrick Ewing-led teams of the 1990's put up a good fight, but Patrick never got to play with another All-Star caliber player the whole time he was in New York.

But they do get style points for finally putting an end to the Eddy Curry Era, and that right there is reason enough to give owner James Dolan a pass for doubling ticket prices from one day to the next. There are plenty of New Yorkers who can afford it in a town where some Eurotrash Russian mail-order whore recently purchased an apartment for $88 million dollars with daddy's Russian trust fund cash so she can have a place to crash during college semesters.

4) We don't need any more evidence to affirm the obvious-what the league needs more than anything else is contraction. New Orleans, Sacramento, Minnesota, and Charlotte are bogus, irrelevant franchises that have to go. Here is why-

A) The grand city of New Orleans rallies around five things-police corruption, political scandals, hedonism, entrenched poverty, and the Saints. And don't blame Hurricane Katrina for the lack of support. The hurricane washed away a large majority of poor folks in places like the Ninth Ward who cannot afford to go to any type of anything, much less an NBA basketball team. The Hornets don't need to relocate to a larger market-they need to be scrapped because they suck.

B) The Maloof Brothers, the Las Vegas casino owners who were awash in cash only a few years ago, are now crying poor, hijacking the municipality of Sacramento to build them a new stadium or they'll leave. Not happening. They've been irrelevant for so long the league forgot to include their games during the initial first draft of the season schedule. DeMarcus Cousins and Tyreke Evans are two me-first dickheads who will do nothing to make people forget the guard/center tandem of Magic and Kareem, so forget about them. We can't wait for the San Andreas Fault to unleash it's fury and wash half of California into the sea. The Kings need to go RIGHT NOW.

C) Michael Jordan has been an unmitigated disaster as a husband, golfer, general manager and now owner of the woe begotten Charlotte whatever-the-fuck they're called. One of the best players to ever walk the Earth is responsible for two of the worst first-round draft picks in NBA history-Qwame Brown and Adam Morrison. He was also one of the owners vociferously fighting for a basketball-related revenue split with the players of 47%. As if this hard-line stance is going to win him any favors with potential free agents down the road. He could have had the commissioner set his team's player split of BRI set at 4.7%, and the Bobcats would STILL lose money. That's because they suck, and will continue to suck until Jordan either leaves or the team is shut down, preferably both. There is better basketball in the state of North Carolina on the college level, so the Bobcats are doomed and deserve to get whacked.

D) Minnesota just signed another point guard, JJ Barea, for $19 million over four years. They drafted three in the first round a couple of years ago, and are married to Ricky Rubio, who plays well only on Youtube España. This is a perfect example of what is really hurting small-market teams; dumb-ass owners and general managers. Minnesota is so stupid they have their best player, Kevin Love, on the trading block. And for what, to rebuild? Isn't a 20-something, overachieving rebounding machine supposed to be the type of player you build a franchise around? Not in Minnesota, whose starting five this year will consist of five point guards, all under 6'3".

*The Toronto Raptors get honorable mention here, but they are so irrelevant I heard the US is planning to invade Canada just to keep them from playing any more games.

5) If there is any evidence that Danny Ainge is one of the worst GM's in the league, just look at what he's done ever since the Celtics won the title and you'll realize if it wasn't for the team and the coach he has now, he'd be doing play-by-play commentary on ESPN and playing golf with Charles Barkley. Having to be subjected to that man's horrible swing is enough for anyone to want to check out and go straight to Hell, but Ainge has earned a spot right next to Sir Charles on the putting green for his abominable moves.

Forget about the deals he pulled off to bring in Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen. The Garnett deal was the doing of Kevin McKale in his attempt to rebuild a franchise going nowhere with Garnett at center. Allen was thrown at them by a desperate Seattle team looking to rebuild and unload his mammoth contract. Going forward, they had no use for an aging shooting guard who played absolutely no defense whatsoever. His metamorphosis was due to three things-his commitment to physical fitness during the off-season, Doc Rivers' emphasis on team defense, and having Pierce and Garnett on hand to put a foot up anyone's ass that wasn't on the same page.

Having gone to two straight NBA Finals with basically the same crew intact, Ainge decides to get cute. First, he trades big man Kendrick Perkins, who if he hadn't gotten hurt during the Finals in 2009, the Celtics would have won another title. He tries to replace Perkins with the biggest array of cast-offs and bums this side of the Bowery. Jermaine O'Neil, always a favorite of mine, is woefully past his prime. He's so past his sell-by date his fumes are running on fumes. Shaquille O'Neil was a joke with no punchline ever since he decided he was too cool to stay his fat ass in shape, which is the main reason he was shuttled out of Los Angeles. Neither player could fill the shoes of Perkins, who this year has come back in the best shape of his career and will thankfully miss the decline of the Celtics as teams like Miami and Chicago run roughshod over what was once a proud franchise.

Ainge then trades the combo of Glen "Big Baby" Davis and Nate Robinson. These two guys are professional basketball oddities would have ended as journeymen if not for the roles they played while at Boston. Both these guys are high-energy characters who play with passion and feed off the cheers of the crowd. They gave the Celts a much needed boost while the starters rested. They too are gone. And now, one of their supposed key players, Jeff Green, is out for the season due to a heart ailment.

And Ainge had the audacity to put Rajon Rondo, their best player, on the trading block recently, hoping to land Chris Paul, which in perspective is even more stupid than anything Ainge has ever done as a GM. Paul is a great player but has a bad knee which can go any minute now. Rondo has no knee issues, was the main reason they won a championship in 2008 and last year played through extraordinary pain when his elbow was bent in what motorcycle riders call "an angle of no return" during a freak accident on the court. He's been through the wars with these guys and never has received the full credit he deserves. There would be no "Big Three" without Rajon Rondo. And this is the thanks he gets. Don't get rid of Rondo-get rid of Ainge. HE'S the one who sucks.

The Final Word on Hero Worship...

"Faith is the surrender of the mind; it's the surrender of reason, it's the surrender of the only thing that makes us different from other mammals. It's our need to believe, and to surrender our skepticism and our reason, our yearning to discard that and put all our trust or faith in someone or something, that is the sinister thing to me. Of all the supposed virtues, faith must be the most overrated."-Christopher Hitchens

The above quote by the recently departed Hitchens, noted author, social critic and infamous contrarian, says it all about the worship and unquestioning loyalty that envelops your average major college football program. Penn State suffered an inordinate amount of this due to the all-encompassing aura of ex-football coach Joe Paterno, who sucked the air out of the Penn State campus for over 45 years until he was given the bum's rush for not only failing to report Sandusky to the authorities but also for exhibiting monumental hubris when the situation called for exactly the opposite.

This isn't exclusive to sausage factories like Penn State. It happens at places like Duke University, where basketball coach Mike Krzyzewski is deified and worshiped like a Greek God. The fanbases of these programs are nothing but cults driven by a snide, cynical clique of worshipers who brook no criticism and resoundingly defend their programs at all costs. One must have faith, and being a true believer is the cost of admission, to the detriment of one's individual sense of self. Any rational sense of right and wrong goes out the window when defending "the program". Just ask ex-Ohio State football coach Jim Tressel.

You see the worst of it with assholes like Bobby Knight, but he is merely a symptom of a much greater disease. Sportscaster Dick Vitale, who has spent a lifetime licking the boots of coaches from his pulpit as a college basketball commentator, recently stated that Indiana University should erect a statue for Knight because of all he's done for the school. Vitale seems to have either forgotten or blatantly disregards the reasons why Bobby Knight was fired in the first place. During a public gathering almost 30 years ago, we have a very astute and pragmatic assessment of coach Knight's influence on the most talented player to ever play at Indiana, Isiah Thomas-



Notice how Knight is glaring at Thomas. Underneath the forced smile, you can literally feel the visceral, scalding-hot fury emanating from his eyes. And you have to love the way Thomas turned his head and glared right back at coach Knight as if to say, "Yup. I'm sayin' this because it's true, and you know it, motherfucker". Whatever his motivations, Isiah was right. What could any coach teach such a talented player besides swearing, cursing and variations of the word "cunt"? Absolutely nothing. Thomas was at Indiana University long enough to win a championship for Knight, not the other way around. But coach Knight is the one that receives most if not all of the credit.

The type of misguided hero worship we've seen at Penn State invariably and inevitably leads to monsters like Jerry Sandusky feeling they can act with impunity. Sandusky, who was affiliated with Penn State in an important enough capacity to profit from it's notoriety, had acquired the desired amount of clout where he was able to pull children out of class in the middle of a school day to molest them right on the premises. And no one at this school batted an eye.

The poisonous affects of this is evident every day on college campuses all over the country. Entitled jocks walking around saying and doing anything they want-never going to class, always having someone else do their homework, and screwing every girl in sight. One minute they're living in abject poverty, the next they are driving fancy cars, rocking mad jewelery and shopping at Lord & Taylor. Girls losing their self-respect just to be close to these low-IQ, overgrown pituitary cases. Boosters paying tons and tons of money for exclusive "access" to the programs. Everything corrupt you can possibly think of goes on in this environment. And the average student, who goes to college for an education, is supposed to make what, exactly, of all this madness swirling around them?

What lessons are we to learn from all this? What is most disheartening is some of the people who Sandusky actually helped find themselves feeling sorry-not for the victims of his heinous crimes, but for the program and for themselves. They feel good ol' coach let 'em down, and now what blue-chip steroid freak is going to want to play for their illustrious alma mater? Who's going to uphold the traditions that resound from sea to shining sea?

Let's attempt to recalibrate our priorities and realize this ain't about the disenchanted ex-players of Penn State who feel disappointed their gridiron heroes let them down. It's about the victims whose lives have been scarred forever, and it's about the obscene and undeserved hero worship of coaches like Paterno. Coaches should stay away from any grandiose and overreaching status of power and respect that is out of proportion to their chosen profession. They should coach and nothing more.

If you need some hulking, yellow-toothed greaseball like Jerry Sandusky to teach you life lessons, you are not fit to wear the jockstrap necessary to protect your testicles from the kick in the nuts you deserve for worshiping people like him. The reasons why this system is out of whack begins with the screwed-up priorities of fans and the over-reliance of sports to fill the empty void that exists in the
personal lives of the fools you see in the stands every Saturday with their school colors painted on their torsos.

The overriding issue is the average fan's need to be a part of something "bigger than themselves". This is cult-speak, except these cults don't need to recruit. They have a built-in fanbase of worshipers, groupies and boosters who pass on the love of their teams from one generation to the next. Their particular allegiance becomes the defining characteristic in their lives. I can't possibly think of anything more corrosive to a person's sense of self-worth than this. Which is exactly the type of environment makes the Sanduskys of the world possible.

Jerry Sandusky and the Penn State Football Scandal Pt. III...

In the third and final installemtn of our groundbreaking investigative series on the Penn State football scandal, we finally get to the man in the middle of this shitstorm, Jerry Sandusky. We are going to cut through the clutter, hoopla and hyperbole and head straight to the facts, which, gruesome as they are, must be told.

First off, Sandusky gets arrested and makes bail. Aided in his quest to raise funds are former Penn State alumni who send him money for his defense. Now, I understand all about standing by your friends, but even friendship has it's limits, and charges of pedophilia fall into this category. That didn't stop these asshole from stepping up and helping Sandusky remain free. And it doesn't matter whether it's a dollar or $5,000. Any amount is too much. Then come the revelations in a bizarre and self-destructive interview with Bob Costas where Sandusky admits to showering with young boys and engaging them in "HORESPLAY", that vague, undefined term that can mean anything from slapping someone with a towel on the backside to, in Sandusky parlance, repeated anal rape of 10-year old boys.

So for the sake of clarity, we need to define this term for the court of public opinion. From the research done by our crack staff here at "Busting Chops", if horseplay doesn't involve an actual horse, it can only mean one other thing-rape. I had a friend who engaged in horseplay all the time. In fact, it was her passion. Know why? BECAUSE SHE WAS AN EQUESTRIAN!!! That's hoseplay, not what Sandusky was doing!!! Now, before you ask what type of idiot would agree to an interview on national television, keep in mind Sandusky wasn't actually in the studio. He was interviewed by phone and his lawyer was the one sitting next to Costas, as we were subjected to what for all intent and purposes was some of the most damning testimony we've heard to date.

Just picture this-a grown man, an older gentleman if you will, showering with a 10-year old boy BY THEMSELVES. Some of the "horseplay" involved both of them skating from side to side, naked, genitalia and butt cheeks flailing all over the place. The inappropriateness of this type of activity beggars belief. What sort of lawyer would agree to have their client admit to something like this? The type of lawyer who impregnates one of his clients, then a 17-year old girl and marries her to quell public sentiment going against him.

When Bob Costas asked Sandusky's lawyer Joseph Amedola  if he would trust Sandusky with his own children, he said "Yes" with a straight face.What the fuck.

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Jerry Sandusky and the Penn State Football Scandal Pt. II...

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Jerry Sandusky and the Penn State Football Scandal Pt. I...

Well, what can I add to this quagmire of bullshit that is the Penn State Football scandal that hasn't been said already? Plenty, as a matter of fact. Here goes-

We are going to begin this three part investigative series with a close look at Queen Bee "Joe Pa" Paterno. Yes, he of the paternal nickname, always there for his flock of nimrod steroid freaks in their time of need with sage advice and a firm grip on the type of family-oriented values cherished by the "real" Americans that inhabit the euphemistic world of "Middle America". Middle America, that vast intellectual and sartorial wasteland that exists between the liberal, left-wing, pot-smoking East and West coasts exemplified by New York City and Los Angeles respectively. Middle America, where flannel is a fashion statement. Where plastic forks, spoons and paper plates are considered silverware. Middle America, where Spam and Chef Boyardi beef pillows (ravioli to you and me) is considered fine dining.

This is supposed to be where small-town family values and personal integrity are of such importance that jive-ass politicians pander to these assholes as if the rest of us are nothing more than heathenish baboons who do nothing but gang-bang, have out-of-wedlock children while intermingling with drug dealers, disease-ridden prostitutes and all manner of human garbage. Middle America is where you'll find the strict moral codes and rock-solid integrity that define this country. Nothing but honest-to-goodness, wholesome Americans, by golly. And if you think otherwise you'd be darn tootin'.

Rural Pennsylvania isn't exactly where I would recommend sending young men and women to receive a college education. The reasoning behind attaining a degree is to expand one's intellectual horizons through a combination of classroom study, research, lectures and interaction with fellow students from diverse backgrounds. But Penn State is a football factory masquerading as an academic institution, renown more for it's party school atmosphere and athletic programs than anything remotely resembling academia. Penn State is where the beer flows from the kegs of Anheuser-Busch straight into the gullets of its' brain dead student body. In many state universities perpetual toxic inebriation is a major. For the students at Penn State it qualifies as a double-major.

On any given weeknight most if not all the dorms on the venerable Penn State campus reek of beer farts and vomit from underage, lard-ass redneck losers who can't get laid because-you guessed it-most of the cute girls are getting fucked by the football players. The rest are standing in line waiting their turn (if you think I'm joking, then you've never been to one of these schools). These young ladies are pretty much your standard, run-of-the-mill white trash hoochies who've been administering blowjobs to jocks since they were in the seventh grade. Think I'm kidding? The most prevalent sexually transmitted diseases in suburban high schools among young girls are syphilis and gonorrhea...of the throat.

By the time they get to college, they would have honed their craft to the point that drinking beer, smoking pot and blowing football players is all they're good at. And what better place to accomplish these feats of daring-do while earning a sham of a degree than at an academic shithole like Penn State, where no one gives a fuck as long as Paterno gets his beloved Nittany Lions into a high-ranking bowl game every year?

Paterno was, for at least the last 15-20 years, a football coach like I'm the head of Virgin Airlines. This is a man who doesn't know where he is half the fucking time due to a case of undiagnosed dementia that belies his hyper-aggressive sense of entitlement. This is the only reason I can come up with for his abhorrent and clearly irrational behavior following the Sandusky revelations, which lead to his rightful dismissal. But his behavior isn't the result of some mental disorder. It's the result of being treated like a deity who always thought he was bigger than the school.

In fact, he thought he WAS the school, and the thinking around the intellectually hermetically sealed world of the Athletic Office was the place would crumble to the ground if "Joe Fucking Pa" wasn't running out of the tunnel on his reconstructed hip replacements with his team every Saturday. Let's be real-he hasn't coached in years, letting his assistants do the heavy lifting of running the program while he sits in a booth high above the field trying not to choke on his false teeth as he nods in and out of consciousness during practices and games like a heroin addict. 

During the time Penn State football fell into a bit of disarray during the early 2000's, the school realized it needed to recruit more athletically talented players, players who  usually aren't what one would call model citizens. This of course lead to more on-campus rioting and general mayhem on the part of the players during their off-time, when students are usually either in class, sleeping, or shitting all over themselves from a night of epic alcohol poisoning. Paterno continuously interfered with school officials whose job it was to look into violations of the school code of conduct, bullying his way through the process while gaining favorable sentences for his athletes, who almost always wound up receiving  lighter sentences than your average Penn State dickwad undergrad. Ah, those small-town values...rock solid and a shining example of virtuousness that is the envy of all the land.

Wanna know how big Paterno's juevos are? A few years ago, when it was way past uncomfortably obvious that this dickhead had to go once and for all, the school administration asked him to graciously step down for the sake of the program and he told the school President "No"-and wasn't fired. Can you imagine the balls on this fucking guy? They make the boulder that chased Indiana Jones through the Temple of Doom look like marbles.

This was during a time when Penn States' biggest highlight was Paterno running off the field in the middle of a game because his diarrhea was so egregious his bowels were going to explode all over the gridiron like a Hydrogen bomb. The lenses of his glasses are so thick he's been advised by NASA not to look directly into a solar eclipse for fear the reflection from his manhole-sized spectacles would knock both the sun and the moon completely out of orbit.

And while we're at it, let's also take into account his disgusting man-boobs-those sagging, drooping bags of octogenarian flab that are so hideous they leave even me at a loss for superlatives. You can actually see the silhouette of his Frisbee-sized nipples through his dingy, Chunky Soup-stained team-issue sweatshirt whenever he appears on camera. They are a monstrosity that insults even the lowbrow sensitivities of a rural bumble-fuck campus like University Park.

When the Sandusky storm was brewing over campus, the student body decided to hold a candlelight vigil-not for this beast's victims, but for Paterno. I wondered if Sandusky had actually victimized Joe Pa, such was the pity party thrown for this clearly out-of-touch jackass who again showed mammoth-sized testicles when he told school administrators when HE was going to step down. This graceless goon didn't show any type of contrition or remorse for the victims until he was told to by one of his PR hacks. It turned out to be too little too late for this career football neanderthal, and now he's gone down in a flame of infamy that will forever sully any good he's done while employed at Penn State. Only Bobby Knight's departure from Indiana University rivals Paterno's ignominious exit from the school he basically put on the map.

And that's just too fucking bad. Good-bye and good riddance, you piece of shit. You went from head coach of a powerhouse football program beloved the world over to drooling all over your Bingo card at the nearest retirement home in record time. You deserve nothing less. Let's have a moment of silence-not for Paterno, but for the hapless victims of Jerry Sandusky. Paterno can eat my ass for all I care. I hope he gets sued so fucking hard he won't have enough money left over to pay for his badly needed mastectomies. Maybe he can raise the funds by soliciting money from the same douchebags that sent Sandusky cash to help pay for his defense.

Babes of the Week for October 21, 2011 is...

We are doing something different this week. I usually post photos and a mini-biography of one stunning and beautiful woman, but today I will be featuring three Latina artists that I've recently discovered and find interesting enough to present here on "Busting Chops".

1)Ana Tijoux

A recent episode of "Breaking Bad" featured a song by Ana that immediately stuck in my head. It was so cool it piqued my interest in the artist. Her parents were Chilean expats who fled to France due to the political oppression and state-sponsored terrorism of dictator Augusto Pinoche (yes, Muammar Gaddafi was a worse dresser as far as despots go, but Pinoche wasn't far behind with his ridiculous uniforms that made him look like the Latin American version of Captain Crunch, complete with sashes that made him look like a cross-dressing, geriatric home coming queen).

Her parents moved back to Chile when homeboy broke out, and she began her career rapping in French and then Spanish with a group called Makiza in the late 1990's. She is now a solo act and her album "1977" has garnered very good critical reviews.

Tijoux is the first Chilean artist to have been nominated for a Grammy award. Her music is definitely worth checking out, so for the uninitiated, here is a taste-




2) Liliana Saumet

Liliana is the vocalist for the group Bomba Estéreo, a band from Bogotá, Colombia. They play a self-described styled called "Electro Vacilón", an interesting blend of electronic music, Cumbia and Latin hip hop-

Here is their hit single from the album "Blow Up"-



3) Julieta Venegas

Julieta is an American-born singer/songwrtier of Mexican descent who performs in Spanish. Not only does she loook mahvelous, dahling-absolutely mahvelous!!!, she is also a wonderfully talented artist. March 2006 saw her blow up with the release of the album "Limon y Sal", which sold 100,00 copies in just one week in Mexico. Latin artists are discovering that they do not have to sing in English to find success, nor do they have to copy the style of your typical North American pop hoochie to make it big in the music business.

Here is a song from the multi-million selling album called "Eres Para Mi", with Ana Tijoux, making a guest vocalist appearance-

Film Recommendation of the Week...

Tape
Release date November 2, 2001.
Running time 1 hour 26 minutes.

This independent film works well as a three-person, one act play. It is engaging, interesting and very well-acted. Two high school buddies meet up in Michigan. Vince, the hard-partying slacker and sometimes volunteer fireman (played with slithering, greasy brilliance by Ethan Hawke) is in town to support his buddy on his entry into the Lansing Film Festival, but with a catch. He just so happens to be in pursuit of a confession from Jon (played by the ever-reliable Robert Sean Leonard), who allegedly raped an ex-girlfriend of his back in the day.

Amy (Uma Thurman) also happens to be in town, and just so happens to be an assistant district attorney. She joins in the psychological mind-fuck and plays along in this game long enough to fuck both characters in the end. Great flick and is highly recommended.

Babe of the Week for October 14, 2011 is...

Lauren Caitlin Upton!!!

Ah, Lauren-you stoopid good-loooking, you!!! You shot to national prominence for displaying stupidity beyond the call of duty in 2007. While running for the Miss Teen USA pageant you were tripped up by a question that no one in their right mind should ask a beauty contestant. Here is the clip just in case any of you out there forgot-



It's alright, because she managed to bounce back from this to become...I don't really know. All I know is her youtube video became an overnight sensation, garnering over 51 million hits. That's people from all over the world, even ones who don't have maps!!! Regardless of what she's doing now, she loooks mahvelous, dahling-absolutely mahvelous!!!

I would personally like to thank the good state of South Carolina, where they make their inbred, white trash look sooooooooo good!!! Here is Lauren right after the Miss Teen Universe debacle, making an epic comeback on the "Today" show-



People reading this need to understand how seriously fine this woman is. She is 5'9" tall barefoot, which means in heels she towers over most of us, and that is a good thing. If you have the opportunity (and the luck, which is required in mass quantities unless you are a celebrity, a big-time jock or have tons of Mexican narco-trafficker money lying around your house) to lasso a woman like this to be your girl, make sure you parade her around for all to see, because no one will believe you otherwise.

AY, MAMI!!!

Must-See TV...

1) The HBO series Boardwalk Empire is heating up big-time after three episodes. Not only that, it has been renewed for a third season. That is great news. Will Enoch "Nucky" Thompson hold on to power in Atlantic City now that The Commodore has decided to rally the troops and give him the bum's rush via a Federal election-rigging indictment and a hostile takeover of his bootlegging network? Inquiring minds want to know...




2) AMC's Breaking Bad keeps getting better and better. This season ended last Sunday with a literal "bang" and will continue for one more season next year. If anyone missed it you can catch it on reruns or download from any site that has it.  I for one am happy to see Gus get his comeuppance-he was truly one of the biggest and most bizarre creeps ever to have been showcased in a serial drama, played with icy aplomb by Giancarlo Esposito. I'm glad he's gone, but the question remains-now that the meth lab has been effectively put out of commission, who will Walt and Jesse cook for now that the Juarez cartel has been killed off and they have no connections to move the drugs if they begin cooking again?




3) Season Two of AMC's The Walking Dead kicks off this coming Sunday. There is a lot of buzz about this coming season, and the cast have all said that it will be more exciting and riveting than the first year. From the trailer it seems as if they are correct. After the Atlanta CDC (Center for Disease Control) blew up once the one remaining doctor realized he could not come up with a cure for the virus that has decimated all of mankind, the gang are back on the road and have no idea where they're headed or when there will be even a small respite from the incessant running from the marauding hordes of undead who have destroyed civilization as we know it.

Film Recommendation of the Week...

Taxi To The Dark Side
Release date April 30, 2007.
Running time 1 hour 46 minutes.

If you're wondering how the Bush administration sold it's soul to the Devil and compromised everything the United States is supposed to stand for, this is a documentary that must not be missed. The premise begins with an Afghan taxi driver who is taken into custody by US armed forces and dies in custody. The autopsy ruled that he was a victim of homicide, and is seemingly ignored.

What was the US policy on torture? Who was getting arrested and why? What intelligence were the arresting officials acting on when making arrests? What is the difference between a POW and an "enemy combatant" in regards to the Geneva Convention? All of these questions and more are answered by this brilliantly researched film by master documentary film maker Alex Gibney.

The reprehensible acts at Abu Ghraib had a precedent, and that was the goings on at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan, where taxi driver Dilawar was taken and turned up dead five days later at the hands of his captors, leaving behind a young daughter and wife. Was anyone made to pay for this crime? You'll be disappointed with the results of the investigation and the people who literally got away with murder.

Here is a write-up on the arrest of Dilawar with his arrest photo (from The Washington Post)-

In 2002, a young Afghan taxi driver named Dilawar, who'd never spent a night away from his dusty little village, got lost in the fog of war and took a wrong turn into an abyss from which he would never return. It was a detention center at Bagram Air Base, where he was grilled on suspicion of being a Taliban fighter. Military interrogators hung him from a cage in chains, kept him up all night and kicked him senseless, turning his legs into pulp.

He lasted only five days. The Army initially attributed his death to natural causes, even though coroners had ruled it a homicide. Low-level soldiers were punished. It turned out that Dilawar (who, like many Afghans, used only one name) was not an enemy fighter, had no terrorist connections and had committed no crime at all.

Babe of the Week for October 7, 2011 is...

Camila Pitanga!!!

Here is another beautiful babe from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil!!! She is a former fashion model who parlayed her incredible looks into an acting career. I first saw her in a Brazilian movie whose title escapes me right now simply because the second she flashed onto the screen I forgot what the movie was all about.

As you can see, she looks mahvelous, dahling-absolutely mahvelous!!! So next time you are looking for a decent foreign flick to rent, look up Camila and check her out-you will NOT be disappointed!!!

Feel free to thank me for scouring the universe for the finest broads you've probably never heard of. Your welcome.

The End of an A-Rod...

There are two glaring issues the New York Yankees must address going forward-overpaying for talent and a sense of entitlement that success in the post-season is their birthright. Both they and the Red Sox proved that spending more than any other team in the majors does NOT guarantee anything except an immense amount of criticism if they fall short, and a jaded response if they DO win.

Here is the gigantic albatross hanging around the neck of the Yankees-the contracts of their star players. Rodriguez is owed $143 million dollars over the next six years. Jeter is owed $51 million over three years with a (get this) player option for a fourth year at $8 million that goes down to $3 mil if he decides not to re-sign, which works out to potentially $60 mil for 4 years. The Yankees can afford it, but one can only say this for so long. Without the rampant steroid use that was par for the course, the players signing contracts of 6 years or longer are getting paid for increasingly diminishing production. Just because a team can afford to overpay players doesn't mean it makes proper business sense.

Now they have C.C. Sabathia, arguably one of the best pitchers in the game, signed to a 7-year, $161 million dollar contract with an opt-out clause after three, meaning this season he is pretty much a free agent all over again and will be looking for either the same years at more money or the same money with more years added on. So far the Yankees owe Sabathia $92 million over the next four years. At age 31, do the Yankees really want to throw more money at this guy or worse, add more years to his contract just to keep him?

Sabathia's not exactly a slave to off-season conditioning and regardless of how tall he is, all that excess lard will become a hindrance the older he gets. And as we've seen lately, baseball players do not age gracefully. Their performance usually takes a precipitous fall sometime in their early to mid thirties and then the free-fall is quick and irreversible, which is what we are witnessing from Alex Rodriguez.

A-Rod is a player from the infamous Steroids Era in baseball. All the other prime movers have either retired (Bonds, Sosa, McGuire) or have been marginalized out of existence (Manny Ramirez, Roger Clemens). All have had their legacies tarnished seemingly beyond repair, but it is A-Rod who plays on. We will no longer see the A-Rod of old. Gone are the 50-home run, 130-plus RBI seasons. Gone are all those towering home runs. Gone is his bat speed. All he has left is a guaranteed contract that is more a lottery payout than a salary.

So when people make the argument that steroids don't help you hit a baseball, check out the stats from Rodriguez's 2007 season as opposed to what he's done the last couple of years. I'll gladly tell you to go and fuck yourself if you think 'roids hasn't played a tremendous part in A-Rod's career, because now that he's presumably off the juice, he's just another aging athlete with little left in that depleted steroid tank of his. And don't expect him to rebound next year either, unless he sends his cousin back to the DR to get him some more primobolan.

Striking out against the Red Sox in the playoffs back in the days, proof that ain't a damn thing changed-

Here are the pertinent details-putting aside his performance in the 2009 MLB Playoffs, Rodriguez has batted .222 and hit 4 homers in 38 playoff games. That is absolutely pedestrian in the rarefied world of baseball's elite. This year, he had only two hits in 18 plate appearances (both singles) in game 4's 10-1 rout of the Detroit Tigers. But in the crucial game 5, he strikes out with the bases loaded with the score 3-2, which is how the game ended.

There are no more excuses. He has had his time in pinstripes to carve out his legacy as one of the best players to ever stick a needle full of 'roids in his ass. He hit 54 homers in 2007. From then on, it's been 35, 30, 30, and this year 16. Six-fucking-teen. Games played-again, in 2007, 158. This year? A grand total of 99. What about total hits, you ask? In 2007, he had 183 hits. This year it was 103. Come on, man. What the fuck is this fucking guy getting paid for?

The Yankees extended A-Rod's contract when he opted out of his previous deal and gave him 4 more years than any other team would have given him. They were willing to pay him even more money per year than that idiot owner from Texas gave him when he first signed him to the 10-year, 252 million dollar contract that changed the face of modern-day sports forever. The Yankees are counting on A-Rod to break the home run record while helping to put more World Series banners up during the length of his current deal. That plan isn't looking too good right now.

Fans will point to the abysmal pitching staff. To that I respond sarcastically with these three words-The Philadelphia Phillies. They had arguably the best starting rotation in either league and got bounced in the first round by a St. Louis team that was submerged in the standings deeper than Captain Nemo not too long ago. Why did they collapse? Because their number 4, 5 and 6 hitters didn't hit, that's why. And as much as baseball pundits will have you think that good pitching will always beat good hitting, you need to score runs to win.

As for the injuries, I find it a bit ironic that once his steroid use became public knowledge and his buffoon of a cousin (who A-Rod so elegantly threw under the bus as nothing more than an inconsequential flunky) was ousted from the Yankee clubhouse, he can't stay healthy. Maybe, just maybe, all those steroids were the reason why he was so good in the first place. He has been rumored to have been on a regimen ever since high school, let's not forget. So...no more Primobolan, no more production. All while the injuries pile up and the stats go south.

Since no other club in their right mind (especially given the economic climate we're currently in, where though the poor are getting hosed the rich are the ones whining and bitching up a storm) would trade for A-Rod because of his monstrous contract and diminished offensive skills, the Yankees are stuck with him. What to do now? I'm glad it's not for me to decide, that's for sure.

The Yankees are stuck with the last remaining relic of the Steroids Era, a bloated dinosaur whose clubhouse nickname is "bitch titties" due to the effects the 'roids  had on his physique. They'll have to keep paying more and more money for ever-diminishing production over the next six years, when he turns 42. He may eventually limp into the career home run record, but it will not be the parade Mark McGuire and Sammy Sosa experienced. My guess is the Yankees will be relieved given that if and when he reaches that milestone, they would be that much closer to striking his contract off the books.

How did this one get past me?

Sometime in May of this year Sebastian Telfair's little brother, Ethan, who plays guard for the Lincoln High School Railsplitters, was arrested. The Brooklyn District Attorney’s office said it was charging Telfair with criminal possession of a weapon in the second degree and bribery in the third degree, both felony charges. He was arrested not while running around with gang bangers, but with a couple of members of his own basketball team. Police found three loaded hand guns in an open backpack in a courtyard behind the O'Dwyer Gardens Houses on West 33rd St. near Surf Ave. in Brooklyn with the culprits somewhere in the vicinity and acting suspiciously.

When taken in to the 60th Precinct, Telfair made a bad situation worse by allegedly offering one of the officers a bribe in exchange for letting him go, which if true, makes it seem that he was indeed involved in this sordid mess. These are the details we have so far. I scoured the internet and various newspapers and the incident has been kept very low-key considering the players involved and the history of the Telfair family and their apparent love of guns.

Let's get to the facts-Ethan Telfair plays for the same coach, Dwayne "Tiny" Morton, who cascaded onto the scene during his tenure as Sebastian Telfair's high school coach during what was a whirlwind tour of egomania and unfettered greed by all involved. Sebastian's senior year was eloquently captured in the documentary "Through the Fire", where little brother Ethan was seen as a nine-year old prospect who would assume the mantle of "Coney Island's Next Basketball King". Except that it didn't happen. Ethan is a 5'10" junior who averaged a whopping 1.8 points and 1.6 assists in very limited playing time last season for the PSAL Brooklyn AA regular-season champions. The Railsplitters won the borough crown and reached the PSAL Class AA title game, where they lost to rival Boys & Girls High School.

At this stage of the game both Sebastian and cousin Stephon Marbury were already players who garnered national attention through their participation in various cutthroat AAU summer leagues. Ethan has not. There hasn't been any breakout performances on any stage for him, no cover stories in magazines like SLAM! or Sports Illustrated, just mediocrity as a role player on a very good NYC public high school team. But this isn't what irks me about the situation. What should concern everyone involved is how Ethan Telfair found himself anywhere near a bag full of guns in a Coney Island housing project in the first place.

This raises some very basic questions about wealth, fame, and the self-destructive hold street culture has over inner-city families. First of all, Ethan should be living in some leafy suburb surrounded by trees and cul-de-sacs. Instead, he is still in the same ghetto-ass apartment his family swore they would leave the second Sebastian was drafted into the NBA in the summer of 2004. Armed with a shiny new multi-million dollar sneaker deal and on the verge of becoming the 13th overall pick by Portland, Sebastian finally hit the big-time. So why did his family stay in Brooklyn?

There are better places to live in the borough. Why stay in the very place where during Sebastian's senior year a couple of cats were gunned down practically on the Telfair's doorstep? Is the intoxicating smell of urine, fecal matter and weed whenever they open their front door so transfixing that they just can't live without it? Can they not live without being within sight of ghetto losers with nothing to do with their lives but cause trouble until they either get shot or arrested?

Ethan spent his freshman year at a boarding school in Albany, New York but decided it wasn't for him. I have no idea what he missed about being in Brooklyn, but one can assume it wasn't the broken crack vials and used condoms that one encounters upon entering the staircase of his building. Or the graffiti that greets you when you enter the lobby imploring all and sundry to "suck my fucking dick".

If it was to play for Morton at Lincoln High due to the strong bond between the coach and the family, fair enough. But the family has enough money to move elsewhere, given the fact that a stray bullet shot in "da 'hood" rarely finds its' intended mark. It's always an innocent bystander or a person misidentified as the actual target who gets it. So why take the risk?

It also needs to be said that during Telfair's senior year at Lincoln, he had an older brother who was jailed on homicide charges. He was released when no one came forward to identify the actual shooter. His father also did time years ago for manslaughter, again for using s gun to settle a dispute. And Sebastian himself has been plagued by misfortunes due to carrying weapons, once while attempting to board a team plane and another time when he was caught speeding in the Bronx where officers found a pistol in the car.

Unless Ethan gets taller, finds a jump shot (something that has eluded older brother Sebastian for all of his seven years in the NBA) and miraculously steals playing time from the much more heralded Isaiah Whitehead (a 6'4" sophomore who is looking to be the next Coney Island prospect to garner big-time publicity) this kid is shooting towards basketball irrelevance faster than you can say "you have the right to remain silent".