Once again, the influence of Jose el Retardo flexes its muscle, and giants fall: first we took the military to task and triumphed magnificently (click here to read up), and now we reap the benefits of coming out from behind an iron curtain of fear when we snatched (sexy word alert) the magnanimous mask from Steve Jobs smarmy, lying face (read the original article here).

What’s happening, you ask? This morning our editorial staff was tipped off by our good friends over at the Medium Happiness headquarters about an article coming out in none other than WIRED magazine decrying Steve Jobs as an evil genius, and shedding even more light on his less-than-revolutionary business practices. Check out some of this goodness by clicking here.

You have to wonder if someone over at Wired is a loyal follower of Jose el Retardo. If so, fantastic; the more, the merrier on this crazy roller-coaster ride we like to call THE TRUTH.

Just to give you a tidbit of what was uncovered by Wired Magazine when Job’s veil of bullshit was torn:

Everybody is familiar with Google’s famous catchphrase, “Don’t be evil.” It has become a shorthand mission statement for Silicon Valley, encompassing a variety of ideals that — proponents say — are good for business and good for the world: Embrace open platforms. Trust decisions to the wisdom of crowds. Treat your employees like gods.

It’s ironic, then, that one of the Valley’s most successful companies ignored all of these tenets. Google and Apple may have a friendly relationship — Google CEO Eric Schmidt sits on Apple’s board, after all — but by Google’s definition, Apple is irredeemably evil, behaving more like an old-fashioned industrial titan than a different-thinking business of the future. Apple operates with a level of secrecy that makes Thomas Pynchon look like Paris Hilton. It locks consumers into a proprietary ecosystem. And as for treating employees like gods? Yeah, Apple doesn’t do that either.

Looks like another untouchable is beginning to crumble under the weight of the entire Retardo staff’s mighty disdain.

Rarely do we here in the editorial bunkers of Jose el Retardo beat a dead horse, but in the case of Stephen the Demon Dubner, we are making an exception. So today, we are mining the customer reviews of Amazon.com in search of people’s real feelings about this behemoth of American literature.

It’s no surprise to find that a lot of people aren’t at all interested in the blather contained betwixt the pages of Freakonomics (I refer to the crappy book, not the stupid site that I’m not even going to include a link to). Says cavywrangler of California:

This is the most over-hyped book I can remember reading…[it tries] to make some point that is beaten to death…snore.

Goosecat of Portland, OR, in his review titled Correlation doesn’t mean causation, reports:

I was expecting this book to be completely different. It has nothing to do with economics at all…many of these correlations could lead to dangerous misinterpretation…simply not all that interesting.

Theodore O’Neill of New York, NY laments:

If you wish to remain illiterate about statistics, but gain trivial information for your next cocktail party, go ahead and buy the book.

George Mitchell of Oakland, CA bemoans:

I’m baffled at how this book is a bestseller. I’m embarrassed my boss gave it to me.

M.L. Coffina of Brooklyn, NY cries aghast:

I find the inclusion of the NY Times Magazine quotes that begin each chapter with praise for the author to be both annoying and pretentious.

But the most enlightening review comes from a customer ironically named CoolerHeads, who, in the review entitled Hype-onomics, sputters incredulously:

this has got to be the most self-congratulatory book ever. It’s about a brilliant “noetic butterfly” (really, that’s the smooch the author gives the economist) who shocks the establlishment, and the brilliant journalist who gains his trust and respect, and then the brilliant journalist quotes his own brilliant articles about the brilliant economist and calls that a book. It’s a little insulting how we’re supposed to be blown away by these mavericks.

What is there to be learned by all of this? Nothing, really—except that books about economics can be dull, and, in the wrong hands (hint hint, DOUCHE DUBNER), devilishly dangerous.

PS, dear readers, do you like my portrait of this fool? Click it to enlarge and see all the watery/vinegary details. Do you have a drawing you’ve made of the Demon Stephen Dubner? Click here and send it in!

Today, dear readers, the entire staff here at Jose el Retardo have suffered a bitter slap to the face: after many months of faithful attention to the blog Freakonomics.com, I have been told by one of the authors of the site to DROP DEAD.

It begins simply. Morning. Travel. Coffee. A day unusually unfettered with the many trivial bondages (sexy word alert) that usually exert themselves upon me in the early hours of the day. My feet propped on my desk nonchalantly, I breathe in the rich aroma of my French Roast—just a touch of skim added, which is something new for this man of black coffee—and I contemplate my life through a lens less tainted from the haze of frantic cacophony. Maybe I’ll get things right this time, I tell myself. Today feels like the kind of day that a man can turn to his favor; can take the spare moment to find the bit of enrichment that tips the scale, finally. Yes. Why not me?

So I pop open my internet browser, and I check the ole’ Google Reader, just to see if any of my regular iHaunts (I am coining a phrase as we speak, people) have anything new to spout. As usual, there are about 50 new posts on Freakonomics, so I begin to sift through it all, looking for anything interesting. Finding nothing truly fantastic, I settled for the mildly appealing. I read. I was not moved, per se, but I was engaged, and so decided to leave some comments behind. I often participate in the comment side of the blog world when I have the time, because hey, that’s one of the perks that make it more interesting than standard print—not to mention that I like to speak my opinion regardless of whether or not anyone is actually listening to what I have to say. I guess the fact that I slave my days away in a cubicle at the offices of Jose el Retardo is proof enough of that.

Great. I learn a few things, I speak my mind a touch, and now time to work. My comments haven’t appeared on the Freakonomics site yet, but I’m sure it will only take time. I know that the guys over there must have a rod shoved pretty fucking far up their tight, over-educated ASSES, because they reserve the right to approve EVERY GODDAMNED COMMENT that passes through their precious opinion page. Whatever, it’s their prerogative, they can do what they want to do, cause what they’re doing, they do for you. Sing.

HOWEVER, soon enough I receive in my inbox an email from none other than the so very important and so deeply intellectual Stephen J. Dubner, co-author of Freakonomics. Hey, wow, I think. Maybe he saw my url in my comments and wants to congratulate me on my hard work, and to let me know that if I just hang in there, I’m gonna break through, that I’ll see the dollars and cents eventually because my kind of writing is BOUND to find an audience. Maybe he’ll even get some of his own friends to see and love my site! Maybe this is the breakthrough I needed! Holy shit.

I tremble slightly as I open the email.

Stephen J. Dubner has written to me:

why are you spamming freakonomics.com? i sure would like it if you stopped

Huh. Even though I am alone at my desk, I feel slightly awkward, as if I just insulted half the table at a dinner party but I’m not sure what it was I said to cause the hurt. And then, as I usually do, I become immediately indignant. What the fuck? What did I do wrong? Nothing! Well, hell. I don’t have to take that from him. I write back:

I was simply reading your site and leaving comments. I don’t usually have the time in the morning to leave the comments, but today I did. I have enjoyed your blog in the past, sent my own readers your way when something really caught my eye, and have a subscription to your feed. I’m not sure how any of this amounts to spamming, but rest assured, it will all cease today.

I waited for his reply, knowing that this alone would surely cause him to apologize and approve my comments and let us all get on with being humans on this god-forsaken earth.

And reply Stephen J. Dubner, friend to the literate, does:

if i am mistaken, forgive me. but if you don’t know the difference between a comment and spam, then it’s on you. but, back to no. 1, if i am mistaken, forgive me.

best, sjd

Oh dear Lord. No. Come ON. Are you KIDDING me, dude?!? Is that the best you can come up with? Dear reader, I implore you, have you ever heard such a back-handed apology in your life? Basically, the guy said this: “Hey, sorry about that—unless I’m right, which I am, so fuck you, you fucking dickweed. Otherwise, sorry, and fuck off”.

I mean, who IS this rat bastard Stephen J. Dubner from Freakonmics anyway? He writes a couple of books that I am willing to bet a thousand of my hard-earned dollars that less than one-sixteenth of you have read, writes some articles here and there, has a blog—and like, really, who DOESN’T have a fucking blog these days—and he’s so good he can just shit on a regular reader like this? Well, so freaking SORRY, Lord Stephen. Forgive me for wasting your precious time. I responded:

The only thing I can think of is that I used my url as my signature (a very common practice, as I’m sure you know), which, in all actuality, makes me far more answerable for my comments than the people who simply sign off with an anonymous handle. It allowed you to reach me and question my actions, no? Aside from this far-from-abnormal behavior, I cannot see how my four comments to your site were any more or less useless than any of the countless others.

The blogging community depends on us reading each other’s work. If you feel you are above this ethic, then maybe you should stick to “straight” journalism and leave the blogging to those of us who have an interest in each other.

As of this moment I’ve heard nothing back, but either way I’m done reading Freakonomics.com. The rest of you can return, if you feel like shitting on me even more than Lord Stephen the Demon has already done. Whatever. Fuck you, Stephen J. Dubner, the consummate douche.

For some time now, I have suspected human beings of making far too big of deal of their position on this planet, and of placing far too much stock in their own abilities. There’s no doubt we can kill things better than any other animal, and this, more than anything else, explains our huge numbers on the earth (although ants far outnumber humans). But just how intellectually or emotionally superior are we?

Along these lines, today I noticed another interesting blog entry from the good people at Freakonomics describing the mosquitofish’s ability to count—almost as well as some humans. You can read the post by clicking here. Not surprisingly, there have been previous studies that show how monkeys can perform math, but seeing a study demonstrating such ability in stupid fish is downright hysterical. What I like about this is that, in my mind anyway, it kind of deflates the whole notion that many people have about human intelligence and how beautifully unique it is.

Math is such a sacred field. For much of history, men in funny jackets have pointed to math and said, “See?” And we have said, “Oooooo…” And then we head off for home, slip off our shoes, pour a brandy, and watch Wheel of Fortune. But why do we hold math in such esteem? A fucking FISH can do it. Sure, it’s important to learn, and everyone should at least know the basics before being allowed to perform even the most menial labor, but does it really make us special? Yes, we delve into it much more deeply than a monkey can be bothered to do, but then again, it isn’t the monkeys who are in danger of blowing up the fucking world on a daily basis. Here is a great example of what we do with math:

In another article from the New York Times website, I read about a monkey’s ability to become wrapped up in rationalizations. Before discovering this article, if a person would have asked me what, in my opinion, defined the human mind, I would have said it was the ability to lie to oneself about nearly everything that goes on around them, and how this makes our existence on this miserable rock tolerable. But shit jack, even the monkeys are creeping up on the ability to ruin one’s own life. Wasn’t THAT what made us human?

I think in the long run, we’re going to find out that many of the things we thought were distinctive to humans—emotional and intellectual—are actually shared to some extent by nearly every other being in the universe—including the ability to fuck everything up.

Earlier in the year we here at Jose el Retardo expressed our sincere disappointment in the United States military for not having the foresight to make real laser beams with scary colors and crazy “pew pew” sounds that would make a person shit their pants before being completely evaporated in a puff of fine, red mist (click here to check out this fine piece of blogtation). We stand by this concern; I feel it’s legitimate, and would like to add another point to this already lucid op-ed piece by saying that one of the best ways for any government agency to gain public support is to wow the ever-loving shit out of us with big, shiny, dangerous devices that do crazy-ass things in crazy-ass ways. Let me stress that simply making bigger, louder explosions that blow the limbs off of innocent children is NOT a means to this end, but simply distasteful, and makes us all very, very angry.

There is a point to all of this blathering, faithful reader. I am delirious with pride to announce that the military has heard the insistent call of Jose el Retardo; they have seen the unremitting desire for civic pride that rang so true in your succinct and astute comments. Because of our united cries for technical satisfaction, finally, the armed services have decided to wow us. Behold the weird insect/dog/deer creepy thing:

Is that fucking CRAZY, or what? The beauty of this is that it works on two levels: firstly, if you cover a ginormous version of this mechanical monster with funky hair and spikes and other assorted scary shit and mount a big ass, acid goo gun on the top and send it over the hill and through the smoke…friend, our enemies will literally shit their fucking pants. Add to the mix a big, glowing set of red, blinking, sensor thingies and evil, ragged pinchers, and there’s probably a fairly decent chance that a shot need never be fired.

Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, make a small version, cover it in friendly, smooth plastic and give it huge, pouting eyes, and you have a fantastic, all-around house helper. I could totally see myself snagging a beer from an Igloo brand cooler mounted on the back of such a cute, rugged item. Envision a whole new industry created from the possible attachments: vacuum cleaners, bed makers, dog walkers, child playmates, home entertainment systems of infinite varieties, pest control (I would love a mouse-shooting laser beam—how cool would THAT be?), general cleaning, gardening and weed pulling, laundry folding, cat training, Frisbee fetching…the list goes on and on, people. Endless possibilities bring bottomless joy. Can you feel the satisfaction as you send your killer bugbot out to dispatch a feckless burglar?

This is our moment of triumph. Revel in it, but not for too long. It is only with constant diligence that we can win that battle against the lethargic leanings of bureaucratic behemoths.

I have been perusing a crazy blog lately that most of you have probably seen and spent a large amount of time reading (http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.wordpress.com), and through it I stumbled upon an article from the New York Times website about young, affluent urbanites going out to farms and getting elbow deep in pig shit in order to show the rest of us how we might make a better world. Here is the link to the Times article: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/16/fashion/16farmer.html?scp=1&sq=Trucker+Hat&st=nyt

I suppose I should give credit to people who put their money where their mouths are and do the dirty work they always felt was so noble—but I just can’t seem to rise above. When I hear about Williamsburg hipsters, who were raised on the east side of Manhattan, heading upstate to start their own organic produce farms, it makes my eye twitch. Have they any idea how badly the kids who were raised on small, struggling farms throughout the country want to get out? I know, I know, it’s their prerogative to choose such a difficult life, and their reasons for doing so are none of my business—but every single one of these crunchy ass-breaths in this article struck out to raise “organic” produce and livestock, which they will in turn sell back to the wealthy people in the urban centers they just left behind. Lower income households certainly can’t afford the kinds of prices necessary for the ex-cool kids to live in adequate quarters while “living off the land”—and here is where the whole idea of nobility starts to fall apart.

These people have the skills that so many others desire in order to live a more promising life. But they would rather move to the sticks and take jobs away from others that lack the ability or the means to find better. It is all enough to drive me freaking bugshit, and then I read a quote like this, and my blood boils in my veins:

The Billyburg scene has changed, said Annaliese Griffin, who contributes to a blog called Grocery Guy. “Having a cool cheese in your fridge has taken the place of knowing what the cool band is, or even of playing in that band,” she said. “Our rock stars are ricotta makers.”

Holy crap. Well, Annaliese, let me guarantee you this: somewhere out there a poor farmer’s son could care less about fucking goat cheese and would so love to go see a rock star one day. Can he have your old record collection, Annaliese? You PIG.

Soon enough all these new hippies will get tired of getting up at 5 AM every day, working their asses off until they feel like dropping in their well-heeled tracks, and then they will head back to the city to start up research firms, just like the old hippies did.

Even after many swore they witnessed his death, Jabba the Hutt has recently resurfaced on popular New York City local news station NY1. What is even more shocking than this nearly Christ-like resurrection is the connection Mr. Hutt—last seen being blown to bits aboard his own private hover-barge on desert planet Tatooine—apparently holds to presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton’s campaign staff. It is unclear if, or by how much, this information will hinder Clinton’s aspirations to the nation’s highest office.

Staff artists here at Jose el Retardo have created a depiction of what Jabba might look like without his ill-fitting suit, seen left. Authorities are urging witnesses to report any sightings immediately, as Mr. Hutt is an alleged felon with allegations of racketeering that spread across several decades as well as galaxies, and is suspected of maintaining many of his old crime syndicate connections.

The New York City Police Department are also on the look out for the annoying, little, cackling thing that always hung around Jabba’s tail—whom many have claimed to have spotted frequenting the Clinton’s Chappaqua, NY home in recent months.

The interviewer Wilford Brimley has been released from police custody, but has been ordered to remain within New York City limits pending more questioning.

A friend and co-worker by the name of Josh (who will probably get quite upset to see that I’ve listed him as a friend, but he can go straight to hell if he doesn’t like it) recently sent me the following video about a little, non-lethal heat beam being developed by the military to safely disperse unruly crowds, create new sex fetishes, and heat 7-11 breakfast sandwiches from 50 feet away (more below).

When the hell is the military going to get serious? Non-lethal? Who gives a good god-damn!? The last I heard, we have a perfectly good, non-lethal method for breaking up angry teenagers brazenly throwing bottles at pasty college history professors—it’s called a fire hose, my friends. We’ve been using them for many years to great effect.

Listen up, you lazy good-for-nothing punk-asses down at the Pentagon wasting my hard earned dimes on this petty bullshit, and get it straight: this is not what we hired you to do. We the people, in order form a more perfectly lean, mean, ass-kicking machine, would like for you to start—today if possible—developing a crazy-ass beam that will KILL people, please. Hell, I can burn people! I don’t need you for that! Give me a match and some lighter fluid in a squeeze bottle and I’ll be all over that shit, brother. How about a REAL laser beam (a visible beam if possible—the only way your gonna scare a mother-fucker is to let him see what you’re packing; make it all eerie and green-ish blue and have it make a ‘pew pew’ noise) that, upon contact with a human body or other structure or object, blows it right the fuck up? Or even better, disintegrates the bastard all together in a puff of red mist. No muss, no fuss, no clean-up. Fire it once on the unsuspecting masses, and I guarantee you that you will not have another crowd control issue ever again.

Come on, General. You cats are failing on all fronts. We simply don’t get anything good out of you anymore. I think the last time you impressed anybody was the tank—but that was like in 1911 and it was made by the Germans. Stealth bombers? Please. It’s an airplane, pure and simple. Where are the hover cars? Where’s the warp drives? Super-human strength suits? Anti-gravity paint?

Heat ray? Get serious. If you’d like to know what you should be concocting in your secret mountain laboratories, all you have to do is pop some freaking pop corn, huddle the kiddies around, and watch some Star Wars, my man. Do you see the big beams that drop dudes mid-sprint and destroy whole planets? That’s what we’re looking for. Land speeders. Floating cities. Robots. Where’s my protocol droid, General?! WHERE IS IT?!

Oh well. Maybe next time. Anyway, thanks for the big, dumb, rolling microwave, I guess. The next time I have the munchies, I’ll grab a Hot Pocket and start a riot.

I have said for years that nothing good can come from consuming diet sodas. And although my friends like to smile and nod, while looking at each other out of the corner of their traitorous eyes (what, did you think I didn’t see, you lousy bastards?), and humor me like I’m some kind of freaking mental case, I present to you a list of articles that you should all pay some attention to before it’s too late. There’s still time:

1. Study: Artificial Sweetener Breaks Connection between Sweet Taste, Calories

2. Aspartame Side Effects

3. Artificial Sweeteners May Damage Diet Efforts

4. Is Artificial Sweetener Destroying Your Health?

5. Aspartame (Nutrasweet) Toxicity Information Center

Look, there is tons of this stuff all over the internet, people. You don’t need me to look it up for you. And yes, I know that much of this stuff is contradicted by other reports, and the argument can go on ad-nauseum. However, I think it’s safe to say that we all know of one sweetener that absolutely will NOT cause cancer and other assorted bedlams: SUGAR. Delicious, pure, kissed by God cane sugar, people. From Hawaii. Growing in the sun.

When will people get it through their fat heads?

January 7’s Business Week has a very percolating article regarding a certain type of medication called “statins,” which are used to lower cholesterol levels in people who have proven themselves unable to find a treadmill.

The main thrust (sexy word alert) of the article ascertains that these stratospherically high-selling drugs do very little to actually help prevent heart attacks in people; actually only benefiting 1 in 100 of the poor slobs that have been taking these drugs—in some cases for five years or longer. Yes, these people have been told to pop an expensive, side effect-rich pill everyday for the rest of their sad lives when in fact, like always, diet and exercise would have been a much more effective form of treatment. From the Business Week article:

What would work better? Perhaps urging people to switch to a Mediterranean diet or simply to eat more fish. In several studies, both lifestyle changes brought greater declines in heart attacks than statins, though the trials were too small to be completely persuasive. Being physically fit is also important. “The things that really work are lifestyle, exercise, diet, and weight reduction,” says UCLA’s Hoffman. “They still have a big NNT, but the cost is much less than drugs and they have benefits for quality of life.”

So why—in the face of evidence that not only makes perfect common sense, but also adds weight to an argument that many doctors have been trying to press upon their legions of fat, greasy, American patients for decades—do so many physicians exalt the use of a worthless product? Because of the money, stupid! Surprised? Again, from Business Week:

Drugmakers, however, do make sure that the researchers and doctors who extol the benefits of medications are well compensated. “It’s almost impossible to find someone who believes strongly in statins who does not get a lot of money from industry,” says Dr. Rodney A. Hayward, professor of internal medicine at the University of Michigan Medical School.

So where are we going with all of this? As it turns out, LDL cholesterol, or BAD cholesterol, might not be the killer we have all made it out to be. The article has quite a bit to say on this subject, but it boils down to:

Add it all together, and “current evidence supports ignoring LDL cholesterol altogether,” says the University of Michigan’s Hayward.

As always, everything in moderation, people. If someone is telling us that there is one clear cut answer, and that they are one of the only providers of that answer, AND the answer is gonna cost us a lot of dough, then warning bells should be going off in our collective heads. I propose that doctors be forced to post in plain site, in their waiting rooms, all the companies they are currently getting paid to endorse. Other people have to do it, right? Don’t we have the right to know? Why should my well-being be placed at risk just because some asshole with a medical degree needs to make his boat payment?

There’s nothing else for it, friends. Have an egg or two, and then do some push ups. That’s the way it’s always been.