Saturday Morning PSA of The Week: Littering never had such a catchy jingle before!

Today's public service announcements are all information and no imagination--but yesteryear's? Those were full of drama, plot lines, and cameos from B-grade celebrities, all wedged into one minute of absolute fantasticness.

Consider this a trip back in time to when PSAs were sometimes worth watching more than the Saturday morning cartoons.


Today:  You don't even want to know what Mississippi's roads look like by comparison.





Random Thoughts and Questions:
1.)  Wait--did the song just start out by calling me trash??
2.)  You really have to commend the state of Tennessee for admitting a sizable portion of its population is trash. That takes some guts.
3.)  I think I'm more impressed that this convertible can hold that much garbage. That's a testament to some quality leg room right there.
4.)  Is this a PSA about littering or the lack of state police oversight on Tennessee highways?
5.)  Don't we all really want to know who cleaned up all the trash after they filmed this? Like a gusty breeze didn't come around and send thousands of pieces of "fake" litter off into becoming "real" litter.

Taylor Swift gives the shaft to a school of deaf kids.

For weeks now, Taylor Swift has been holding a contest among schools--all schools--for her to hold a concert.

During the entire duration of the contest, the Horace Mann School for the Deaf led in total votes. Sure, this was largely created out of a groundswell of funny-ha-ha people at Reddit and 4Chan. But a contest is a contest, and the Horace Mann School won the contest going away. Even the principal at Horace Mann said he was happy to have Taylor visit and play a concert at his school.

Well, Taylor doesn't find it funny, nor does she like deaf children apparently, because she's shafting the Horace Mann School and visiting the runner-up school, Harvey Mudd College.

Mind you, the rules don't state where the votes must come from. Nowhere does it say the votes must come from the school itself. Hence, this is where the groundswell for Horace Mann comes in.

Oh, don't worry though--Taylor sees a PR nightmare way before you do, so she's donating $50,000 cash and $10,000 in musical instruments to the Horace Mann School in hopes you don't hate her for ignoring special needs kids.

$10,000 in musical instruments to deaf kids. That's like giving blind people an array of Rembrandts to look at and claiming you're dedicated to those with a lack of sight.




Oh, in case you're wondering how fair Harvey Mudd College's voting was--the school has 771 full-time students, yet somehow generated tens of thousands of votes that were all on the up-and-up according to Swift's management team. Riiiiight.

Taylor Swift is holding a competition for a concert at a school, and the deaf kids are in the lead.

Taylor Swift--through promotions with various companies and blah blah blah--has a competition where people can vote for which school in the United States she'll visit to play a concert.

The Horace Mann School for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing in Allston, MA, is currently in the lead. And leading by a marathon, too. UCLA is in second place, naturally. You can't deny the power of the Horace Mann School.

4Chan and Reddit folks are the amazing geniuses behind this, voting enough times to make sure Taylor has a captive audience.

On the plus side, Horace Mann is only a few minute jaunt from Taylor's stalking of the Kennedy family down in Hyannisport, so that works out nicely.

Maybe John Denver can get a jet plane named after him instead.

College professor JP McDaniels really loves her '70s folk singers, because she's collected over 2,300 signatures to name the eastern slope peak of Mt. Sopris in Colorado after John Denver. Naturally.

Her reasoning? He loved Colorado, he donated land to environmentalist causes, and his "Rocky Mountain High" was a really killer track. But I think she's really pushing the environmentalist angle mostly.

Folks in Colorado aren't as eager to jump on board with this idea, though, saying that pop culture has no place in naming mountains. That and, admittedly, they're not sure how they feel still about Oh, God.

Plato = top 40 radio gold, baby!

You can't read some of the classical Greek philosophers and not immediately imagine Socrates breaking into some hip-hop rhythms, or maybe someone hitting the country music circuit. "Achy Breaky Heart"? That has Aristotle written all over it.

That's why it comes not a moment too soon to see some of Plato's work inspire some top 40 music.

It's popularly believed that Mumford & Sons latest single, "The Cave," is a cover version of Plato's "Allegory of the Cave."



Uhhhh, sure. Why not? I always love a good cover song. Plato is going to love the royalty checks that come in from this.

Prospective chapter 17 of new history books: Kenny Rogers Roasters: The Tragedy

I've often wondered how long I had to wait until a school textbook would tell me what a cultural juggernaut Kenny Rogers was. Now, I need wonder no longer.

Thankfully, the Texas State Board of Education feels the same way. They've recommended inserting into textbooks the influence of country music as a nationally important cultural movement. Likewise, they've recommended eliminating hip-hop as any sort of influence altogether, as well as minimizing Latino cultural impact references altogether.

Potential Texas tourism slogan:

Xenophobia: It's not a town in Texas. It's a state of mind!

It seems the the Texas State Board of Education is undergoing massive changes with what they require in textbooks. Apparently, they also purchase a disproportionately large number of textbooks. This, in turn, leads to states like Oregon and Vermont--the respective capitals of patchouli and trail mix consumption--to buy the same textbooks that Texas deems appropriate. Some estimates say that 80% of all textbooks are based off what the Texas State Board of Education recommends. Lucky for us, the board doesn't stop at country music influence. Let us count the ways:

1.) Joseph McCarthy? He's a swell guy now.

Doesn't this look like the face of an angel? He was. This photo is of Joseph McCarthy. He was the senator from Wisconsin in the 1950s who went on a tear to rid America of Communists, and tried limiting the civil liberties of Americans as a result. In the process, he ruined the lives of countless innocent people. Thanks to the Texas Board of Education, Joe is going to get a new leash on life as a hero who kept the Soviet Russians quaking in their boots--all while doing a spot-on impersonation of an older Eddie Munster. Thank goodness. I, for one, believe we can never have enough alcoholic, mildly racist, Chicken Littles for our children to look up to.

2.) Thomas Jefferson? Just between you and me, James Madison was the real brains amongst the founding fathers.

Thomas Jefferson has always been trumpeted as one of the great intellectual minds of American history. Good thing the Texas Board of Education is going to put such nonsense aside. This is because Jefferson is largely attributed to being the root of the American separation of church and state. See? He was a hippy radical--the Abbie Hoffman of 1776.

Who will be taught in his place? St. Thomas Aquinas, John Calvin, and conservative British jurist William Blackstone. Really. Logically, it's always best to replace an American with three non-Americans when teaching American history.

3. Words: you say "tomato," I say you're misrepresenting the produce aisle with your ideology.

The Texas Board of Education is eliminating the words students use. Gone are words like "imperialism" when referencing America's rise to power. "Imperialism" only brings up images of Darth Vader and emphysema, which no one likes to think about. Instead, "expansionism" will replace it. You know--expanding, like a waist line. It's a much more tender image. Full bellies and all.

Likewise, gone is the dirty, filthy word "capitalism" from textbooks--which, undoubtedly, sounds greedy. Michael Douglas in Wall Street kind of greedy. Now it's replaced with "free market." Anything with the word "free" in front of it is supposed to be inspirational. It conjures images of Uncle Sam with a bald eagle on his shoulder eating apple pie while he drives a Ford pickup. "Free market" also sounds selfless, as if you're handing out free merchandise to everyone. That's a win-win for everyone.

4.) Affirmative action is now a negative action.

And so is Title IX, which allowed women equal rights in the classroom and in school athletic programs. Texas will require students to be taught that "unintended consequences" occurred once affirmative action and Title IX went into effect. I bet. Like women playing sports. Pssh. What good ever came of that? Venus and Serena Williams? What'd they ever do?

All I know is that Title IX never influenced country music to make Kenny Rogers the king of country music and haphazard plastic surgery. And now that the Texas State Board of Education has decided as such, my dream of finally understanding what a juggernaut he was can finally come true.