Rant #1,425: Kid Stars

Children who star in movies and television shows have been around for ages.

The first kids star that I could recall was Jackie Coogan, who was a huge star in silent movies.

He was abused, his money stolen, and because of him, laws were put into effect that protect young actors from this type of situation, to a certain extent.

His success begat a group of kids who became stars because they were used by Hollywood in strange and mysterious ways, not just starring in films and later, TV productions, and also on records, but as cogs in a production machine, and some of these kids got eaten up by the whole thing.

You had the kids in the Our Gang comedies, and later, you had stars like Judy Garland, Roddy McDowall, Elizabeth Tayor, and even later Annette Funicello, Jerry Mathers, Tony Dow, Kurt Russell, Ronny and Clint Howard, Angela Cartwright, Billy Mumy, Jay North, Micky Dolenz ... the list goes on and on and on.

Later, Gary Coleman, Todd Bridges, Dana Plato, and even later, the Olsen twins, Miley Cyrus and Justin Bieber.

As much product as Hollywood churns out, there is a need for the latest kid star to fill a role prescribed for them.

A lot of these kids make it big, and have sustainable careers that last literally a lifetime.

Then you have the kids who simply do their thing and fade away, away from the spotlight but intact.

And then you have those who had a lot foisted on their shoulders at a very young age, and when out of the spotlight, they are unable to handle the pressures of everyday life.

Such might be the story of Sawyer Sweeten, one of the Barone boys on "Everybody Loves Raymond," who apparently took his own life at the age of 19.

Further investigation is needed, but apparently Sweeten offed himself.

As you know, I have vehemently said that people who want to commit suicide are selfish, foisting their problems on others when they perish. I said that about Robin Williams, and I am going to say the same thing about Sweeten.

But when those doing the offing are so young, I have to cringe a bit.

The show he was on, and was actually just a minor character of, has been off the air for years, but it will be forever shown in reruns.

By the end of the show's run, Sweeten was probably barely old enough to realize that he was at least a minor cog in one of the most popular shows of its generation.

Nobody knows what goes on in the psyche of anybody that commits suicide, and when a teenager commits suicide--and that goes for any teen who does this to themselves--you really have to wonder.

He is not the first kid star to struggle after initial success. Rusty Hamer of "Make Room For Daddy" fame was another kid star who committed suicide, and there are others in that category, too.

Paul Peterson, a former kid star himself from "The Donna Reed Show," had his own problems in adjusting to life when stardom was no longer his, and he went through his own hard times.

He fought those demons, and out of it came an organization called "A Minor Consideration," which helps former child stars adjust to life after all the glitz and glamor fades.

Along with other child stars who have made the adjustment, including Jeannie Russell of "Dennis the Menace" fame, he has helped countless kids who are without direction after their fame fades.

He helped Jay North, also of "Dennis the Menace" fame, to turn around his life, but alas, he can't help everyone in this situation.

Sweeten, who comes from a family of child stars, somehow fell through the cracks.

Look, like anything else, some kids can handle it, some cannot. It's just that these kids are so high profile that it really tears your heart out when things like this happen.

Condolences to the Sweeten family, but let's be honest about it, living is part of life. You have to be able to adjust, whether you are a child star or just your average, everyday kid. People, whether they are child stars or not, have responsibilities to their families, their friends, and to themselves, and when suicides happen, somehow, someway, everything fails to help, at least in the minds of those doing this to themselves.

Who knows what went through Sweeten's mind when he did this to himself? We will never know, but it is a real shame ...

And at only 19 years old, the same age as my son.

Speak to you again on Monday.

Classic Rant #75 (August 27, 2009): Argentina Hanky Panky Puts Governor In Hot Seat

Two months after admitting to an affair with a woman from Argentina, South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford said "folks who were never fans" won't remove him from his elected office early--and this includes jabs from his lieutenant governor, Andre Bauer, who said the state cannot solve critical problems with Sanford at the helm.

Bauer called for Sanford to step down, while the impeachment process was being discussed by South Carolina lawmakers.

I guess the lessons learned by Ted Kennedy were not learned by Mark Sanford.

But then again, I am not so sure that Kennedy learned them either.

OK, we know that many marriages end in divorce. My first marriage did, and I rebounded, got married again, and all is well in my house.

Well, all is not well in the Sanford house. His marriage was breaking up, and he decided to have an affair with some hot tamale in Argentina, of all places. Couldn't he find a similar "shoulder to cry on" in his own state? That wouldn't have made it any better, but at least he wouldn't have to use government funds to get to his lover's place of destination like he supposedly did in traveling abroad.

No, Sanford can't perform his functions as state governor under these circumstance, and no, Kennedy could not perform his functions as a senator when he left the scene of his accident in Chappaquiddick decades ago. Kennedy got away with it, but that was 40 years ago, when the Kennedy name was akin to god (see my earlier rant, and yes, the lower case "g" was intended).

No, the Sanford name means nothing to anybody outside of his state, and in these times, when every move made by public people is micro-reported by the media, he can't--and rightfully won't--get away with this. He will have to step down, or he will be removed.

Times have changed a lot in the past 50 years. Do you think Ted's older brothers, John and Robert, would have been able to get away with all of the things that they reportedly did while serving our country if they did it today? I doubt it, and I doubt that Ted would walk away from his indiscretions virtually scott-free today, either.

Sanford is another one of these politicians who believe they are way above the law. In the past, they were. However, in today's open society, where news flows on the Internet in milliseconds, this just isn't so anymore. No, the days of the Strom Thurmonds of the political arena are over, and for that, we can be thankful.

Sanford is a goner, and everyone in his state, and around the country, should rejoice.

He is an idiot, and he got caught literally with his pants down.

He should put his pants back on, pack his bags with his other clothes, and get the heck out of the governor's living quarters, and do it fast, lest the media find out more about this dummy and his dalliances.

Rant #1,424: News Crush

I am a male heterosexual, and a bit of a male chauvinist, and I am proud of those attributes I possess.

Even in today's world, where people like me are totally looked down upon, well, I am what I am.

And yes, even at nearly 58 years old, I have crushes on those of the female persuasion.

No, I would not act out on those crushes.

I am married to the greatest wife a guy could have, but my wife knows about my crushes, too, and she goes with them, to a certain extent.

I don't throw them into her face all the time, but she knows about who I like, and she knows about who I love: I love her, love her dearly, and I find her the most beautiful woman in the world; but from afar, I admire the beauty of some others.

In New York, I have to say that we are blessed with having some of the best looking female newscasters in the world working here, at least on the female side.

They are eye candy, especially early in the morning, like around now, and I am sure they were hired as much for their looks as they were for their news chops, although I doubt few would admit that in this PC world.

One of these is Kaity Tong. She has been on Channel 11 here, WPIX, for several years, but she started out elsewhere, and over the past 30 or so years, she has gotten to be probably one of the top five most beautiful female newscasters in New York.

I don't know if she has grown into her own body during the past 30 years or not, or perhaps she has had some "work" done, if you get my drift, but the woman is absolutely gorgeous, perpetuated by the fact that she wears about the tightest outfits allowable on TV newscasts.

She is also prone to wear leather when she is doing the newscasts, and has worn see-through outfits too.

And it isn't just me who has noticed.

Look up Kaity Tong on the Internet, on YouTube and through your favorite search engine, and you will find that I, evidently, am not the only one who has noticed. There are sites and posts and videos of her in action, and the male population--and probably a lot of the female population, too--has taken notice.

Just take a look at this video I have posted. Evidently, I am not the only one who has noticed her.

Tong is a professional newscaster, has won many awards for her work, but I have to say that she is one good looking lady--and she is 67 years old!

That's right. This is no spring chicken. She has been around the block a few times. But she is no 20-something year old, no 30 year old, not even in her 40s or 50s.

I could have sworn she was my age or even a little bit younger, but no, she is nearly 10 years older than I am!

At one time, women of this age were looked at as being over the hill, past their time, not worth looking at. But let me tell you, things have changed, and this woman epitomizes that change.

She has become one of TV's local hotties, and I bet she is not only the best looking one on the list, she is also the oldest one on that list.

But so be it.

In a world where the PC Police rule, I have no problem saying that I admire this woman for her beauty. Yes, her talent comes second to me; if she were reading the New York City phone book I think I would listen to her in rapt attention.

Here's to Kaity, here's to women of that age who are still hot, and here is to women everywhere ...

Us guys love you for what you are, and if isn't PC, who cares?

Classic Rant #74 (August 26, 2009): Ted Kennedy, R.I.P.

I was never a fan of Ted Kennedy. I thought of the three brothers that entered politics (less the older brother, who was a war casualty), in my mind, he was the lamest, and perhaps the most deceitful of the bunch. His liberal politics played havoc with his more-than-immense lifestyle of a playboy tripping Washington during the 1960s and early 1970s.

But you have to hand it to him. He carried the torch of "America's First Family" for decades after the assassinations of his brothers, and even after his own personal tragedies, some of which were brought on by himself.

I guess you have to go back to the touchpoint of his life, one that he would truly wish hadn't happened. His dalliance with Mary Jo Kopechne--and her subsequent death--put a major blemish on Kennedy's life. I truly believe he would have been our President in the 1970s if this incident hadn't happened, but it did, with the 40th anniversary last month. I believe it dogged him the rest of his life.

He had lots of anguish to bear beyond that unfortunate incident. His own transgressions, his wife's alcoholism, his son's cancer, his nephew's rape trial ... it really never stopped for him, although in his later years, he was looked upon by some as something of an elder statesman.

His life was cut short by a terrible disease, but he fought on, with bandages on his head and vigor inside of him.

I will give him that. He was a true fighter. His kind is pretty much gone now.

I know the media will play up his death, going overboard to salute him as a humanitarian. I mean, it's politically correct to do this--look at how you can't say a bad thing about Michael Jackson now, for fear of people dumping on you--but it's really not necessary. He was an enormous talent who had many, many failings that often overshadowed who he was and what he did.

And yes, he got away with stuff (see above) because he was a Kennedy. Let's be honest about that point. He was a Kennedy--American royalty, if you will--and he did things that would have landed others in, let's say, a bad place. But he was a Kennedy, and you can't do things to a Kennedy that you can do to others. Those that would refute this can only go back to the Kopechne incident to see how being a Kennedy helped him ride out this incident, at least legally.

I don't think the Kennedy name has the same luster now, but back 40 years ago, being a Kennedy was like being a god (lower-case "g" intended).

But again, he was a fighter, a true American original. You can't take that away from him (or his brothers, who also had their own lapses in sensibility).

No, I never liked Ted Kennedy, but I respected him. May he rest in peace.

Rant #1,423: My Favorite Time of Year

This is supposedly my favorite time of the year, but you wouldn't know it, by the level of allergy suffering I am going through right now.

Normally, this time of year is tops with me.

We move from winter into spring, which means we can put away the snow shovels and the heavier clothing and get into the warmer weather.

It's not that I mind the cooler weather--I really don't--but I do mind the snow.

I have hated snow since I became an adult and had to shovel it.

Baseball also begins now, and even though I am not too enthralled by the Yankees' chances in 2015, at least the season is upon us.

So now, the warmer weather is here, my birthday is right around the corner--I just love having birthdays--and I can look forward to an even warmer summer.

But this year, April signifies not only the busting out of spring, but seemingly the busting out of everything that ails me allergy-wise.

Hay fever, the garbage coming down from the trees, pollen, the air--everything is bothering me now, but I don't have to tell any allergy sufferers out there about what it is to suffer from this malady.

It is a curse.

It impacts your very being, makes you feel not sick, but lousy all the time, and really makes the day longer than it really is.

Yesterday was excruciating, in particular in the morning.

Before I wrote this column, I got dressed, and shaved.

Since I could not see clearly out of one eye, I was shaving with basically one eye working correctly.

Ever shave with one eye? It ain't pretty.

My eyes did not become manageable until I was up for about two and a half hours, and even then, it was pretty bad the entire day.

Today is better, but my eyes continue to bother me, although not as much as yesterday.

My right eye was swollen yesterday from all the pollen around. It probably still is today--I haven't checked it in the mirror yet--but at least I can see out of it right now.

I continue to get allergy shots each month, and they do help to a certain extent.

But I think this season is going to be really bad, since it started off bad, so I am prepared for the worst.

I have allergies year-round, but I do experience spikes during certain times of the year, including right now.

Having allergies is a curse that I would wish on no one. Happily, my kids don't have it, although I think my son may be a borderline case, as he gets stuffed ears as opposed to the symptoms I have, but he doesn't get them often. My daughter, from what I understand, doesn't really suffer at all from this, thank goodness.

My wife has bad sinuses--which is a curse unto itself--and my mother does show symptoms from time to time. My father doesn't suffer from this at all, and I don't think my sister does, either.

Why I got stuck with this is anyone's guess, but I did, and I have learned to live with it.

But for my supposed favorite time of year, I am suffering a bit, which makes me understandably unhappy, but what can I do?

I just have to grin and bear it, get my allergy shots, and see what happens.

Onward and upward I say, and move on.

Classic Rant #73 (August 25, 2009): The "N" Word Means "No" In My House (and Car)

Am I out of touch with what is going on or what?

My son’s 14th birthday was on Sunday, and we had some of his friends over to watch the Pay-Per-View WWE Summerslam Wrestling event. One of his best friends slept over that night.

The next day, after work, I had to take my son’s friend home. It is about 20 miles away, and being that it was rush hour, it took some time to get him back to his house.

My son got an iPod Touch for his birthday. It is a pretty nifty little device, but the niftiness of the gadget led me to think that I must be behind the times.

I don’t like my son to put certain rap music on his iPod; the vile, disgusting, curse-laden stuff really gets my dander up. But, like most kids his age, he is going to find a way to do it anyway, and I discovered this as he played a “song” (I use that term advisedly) for him and his friend to listen to.

Well, the song used one curse word after another (from what I could understand), and the tune, by a black artist, used the “N” word pretty regularly.

When I heard the “N” word, I told my son to shut the thing off. I felt bad for his friend, who happens to be black, and who was listening to this trash.

Well, you know what the kid told me? When I said I didn’t want to hear this trash and the “N” word in the car, he said to me, “It doesn’t matter.”

I replied, “Yes it does,” and I said that word was vile for not only blacks, but for people of any skin color, and it was not a word I allowed in our home or in the car.

The kids moved onto another song without even flinching.

I don’t know, am I out of the loop? And a black kid is saying this to me yet? I know the saying, “Sticks and stones will break my bones, but words will never hurt me” might come into play here, but I don’t know, I think that word is one that should be removed from our language.

I mean, growing up in a black area, I heard the word plenty too, and I heard it plenty from blacks themselves. Back then, the word was pretty much a “touchstone” for a lot of verbal drivel, but today, I think the word has become so commonplace in some rap music that it has become part of our collective culture.

I don’t know, I think that’s not a good thing.

I know, some artists use it to show that they are immune to its connotations. But when it becomes part of our cultural verbiage, I think, as a parent, I have to draw the line.

Another word in a similar situation in today’s world is pimp. If the kids knew what the word represented, maybe they wouldn’t use it like they do. Or maybe they would.

But again, I don’t care about the media. These are words that should be expunged from our language, as are many other terms that represent such human negatives that I won’t repeat them here in any form.

And I am not talking about curses, because we all use them and they will never go away. I am talking about words and phrases that humiliate people of all races and ethnic backgrounds, and have been used against blacks, Jews, Asians and others for decades.

There is no use for these words in our language, and I wish the kids of today understood what these words meant, and stopped using them themselves—and took to task those who did use them.

Rant #1,422: Job Action

My allergies are haywire today. I can barely see what I am typing.

I have a full day of work in front of me, and I am looking at several hours before my eyes get back to some semblance of normalcy, so today is a good day to really Rant and Rave, so be prepared.

My son is 19 years old. He is normal in every way, other than the fact that he has a learning disability and ADD.

These are minor items to some people, I would imagine, but to him, they are major obstacles to overcome.

He is out of work. I just read that more than 15 percent of the disabled population is out of work, and like most unemployment statistics, the number is probably five to 10 percent higher, once you count people who are off the unemployment rolls or those, like my son, who aren't counted yet.

He is ready, willing and able to work. He can do just about anything, with guidance, which will be provided by the agency that supposedly overlooks his well being. They will provide a job coach when he gets employed, and that person will see to it that my son understands what he has to do and does it the right way.

This kid has done everything he can do to find a job. He has made out applications, both physically and online, he has gone to places looking for work, he has gone to job fairs, and he has come up with nothing.

So what does he do? He sits at home on the computer all day, speaking to people he should not be speaking to, he causes commotions at home, and he is not only depressed, but he is depressing myself and my wife, both of whom have run out of ways to get him out of the house and help him become a viable member of society.

Again, we do not blame him for his plight. This guy has done everything to look for a job, and I mean everything.

He is currently in a program to help him become employed. He has been in the program for a while, has had the requisite interviews, but still, he is weeks away from starting anything, and it is part time to boot.

As part of this program, he probably will not start work until June at the earliest.

Right now, he has been out of work for eight months.

With my wife and my few contacts, nothing has led to employment.

My son is a good kid, and he so wants to work that it hurts when I know all he is doing is sitting home and doing next to nothing.

I don't even know who to blame anymore, if there even is any blame to assign to anyone or any agency.

I had to fight to get him into various federal programs, because it is very difficult for a white male kid from a middle class family to qualify for these programs, and no, I am not crying crocodile tears about this.

When you have an administration that bends over backwards for illegal aliens, but forgets about its own disabled populace, you know that you are going to run into brick walls, and that is what I did in trying to get him the aid that he needs and deserves.

But that being said, it took months, and he now has what he needs, but the waiting game is unbelieveable for these things, and that is what we do; my wife and I wait, and we hope for the best.

But we are out of ideas. We have tried to keep him going with whatever wherewithall we have available, but it is very difficult to constantly motivate someone who is not in school and out of work for the period of time he has been in this situation.

He is on the computer all day--that is, when he gets up, at between 2 p.m. and 3 p.m. each day--and he doesn't go to sleep until one or two in the morning, but we have found that the time isn't totally wasted, and it does have some benefits.

His vocabulary has improved, his interest in his world has improved. I do see a dramatic change from when he was in school. Certainly, his four years of high school were very disappointing, because I don't think he progressed at all under that structured educational environment.

And coming at the beginning of Common Core, he doesn't even have a diploma to show he did what he had to do to graduate. He only has a certificate to show how hard he worked during those four years, just as hard, if not harder, than those who moved onto college.

So in conclusion, I hvae a 19 year old son who wants to work, but cannot because no one will give him a chance.

Any ideas? I would appreciate anything you have to say.

My wife and I are at our wits end, and I think my son is, too.