Commercial time

I’ve been subject to a couple of interesting commercials recently. Mainly coming from the Kansas lottery who have come up with a brand new scheme to separate citizens from their wallets. First of all, I am a firm believer that state lotteries are simply a tax on people who are bad at math. It’s a less than zero sum game, there is no strategy involved, and all it does is sell false hope. Sure, you can make the argument that it provides entertainment and a ray of light into humanity’s otherwise bleak lives but after watching C-SPAN I have no desire to receive either entertainment or inspiration from my elected officials.

The new Kansas lottery commercial focuses on the fact that they are now online. Yes, I can now legally gamble without having to leave my living room. Even better I have twenty action filled games to choose from. Which is interesting because that implies that there is some level of strategy or skilled involved in the games. There’s a slight problem with that since it is actually illegal for lotteries to be anything but random. If not it is unfair, it’s a game of skill, and it has to be regulated differently (this is why for a while you actually couldn’t play blackjack on Illinois riverboats since with skilled play you could actually make a profit). It just bothers me that we are making it easier and easier for people to waste money on lotteries and that we go to the point of actually promoting it. You know, when we don’t promote that maybe it’s not a good idea to be fifty grand in debt just out of college. That sort of thing.

In a good sign, I actually saw a McDonald’s commercial that was encouraging me to drink water. Yes, I can’t believe it either. Sure, we are a long way away from Shamrock Shake season but this was a pretty socially conscious commercial. Grimace must be rolling over in his grave over this one. (By the way, what the hell was Grimace? I mean, Mayor McCheese was a chesseburger. The Hamburglar was obsessive compulsive. The Chicken McNuggets were, well, anthropomorphic McNuggets who probably unleashed high pitched screams as they were lowered into boiling oil. But what the hell was Grimace? A purple blob representing cholesterol?) Still, I’m happy to see that we might be slowly moving away from the super size for everyone society.

Otherwise today has just been a quiet holiday. Went out, did a little shopping, and finally cleaned my apartment. Did try to watch a little daytime television, just to see what is out there. I feel bad for kids growing up today. I mean, sure they have three hundred channel cable systems but they really can’t experience the joy of daytime television. I mean, back in my day we watched The Brady Bunch (which taught me that in retrospect my family was normal), The Monkees (which made me a music fan), Gilligan’s Island (which taught me to go for the down to earth girl over the actress), and Emergency (because any show that centered around firefighters was cool). Plus, we had real game shows. Now all you get is Jerry Springer and Judge Judy. I’m sorry, future leaders of this great country, we have let you down in the mindless entertainment department.