Wayfarer

Yeah, I'm going to miss this place and Paragon City.

Saw an interesting article in the Wall Street Journal. It says the bakers union blames the Teamsters for driving up costs of the delivery network to the point that the business became unprofitable. Consequently the bakers were willing to kill the company because they figure the Hostess brands are so valuable that someone will buy them and whoever does will also want to by the production facilities and will then rehire the bakers. The Teamsters, on the other hand, were willing to make concessions because they figure whoever buys the brand will not want the existing distribution network so they'll be gone.

Of course this could easily backfire on the bakers if whoever buys the brand decides they don't want to work with the people who are seen as having killed the company. New owners could expand their own exisiting production facilities or even open new production facilities in right-to-work states where they wouldn't have to deal with unions at all.

I didn't particularly want to get political but other people already had in this thread so I thought it was worth mentioning. Just like it's probably worth mentioning that Richard Gephardt was involved in Ripplewood coming in to Hostess and as part of that arrangement Gephardt's son was given a seat on the board of directors making $100,000.

I've already said, and I'll say it again, that the executives shouldn't have given themselves raises. However, things like the separate deliverymen for bread and cakes was in place long before Ripplewood got involved.

People like to ignore the fact that there's money and power in leading a union. Union leadership are just as drive by greed as everyone else. Hell, why do you think organized crime has taken such an interest in unions? Because they're worried about worker's rights?

Yes, you don't give yourself a raise while asking other people to take a pay cut. You also don't force a struggling company to retain redundant workers and engage in deliberate inefficiencies that drive up business costs just to line union pockets.

The evil private equity firm, Ripplewood Holdings, was founded by Timothy C. Collins, a major Democratic donor. Collins was looking to invest in troubled companies with union workers. Collins apparently thought if he could work with the unions to turn around a business as iconic as Hostess it could be a model for saving other businesses. Instead he failed to save Hostess and Ripplewood is expected to lose most of the $130 million they invested in Hostess. Ripplewood's lenders aren't expected to do any better. If these are "vulture capitalists" they aren't very good at it.

Management at Hostess was incompetent. They gave themselves huge pay raises at a time when they were asking workers to take a pay cut. They failed to adapt to the changing marketplace. They made a lot of mistakes.

At the same time the baker's union did things that made it hard to lower costs or improve efficiency. For example, the union required bread and cakes to be delivered by different people even when they were going to the same place. This was not a safety issue. Contrary to a Cyberpunk 2020 campaign I once played in Wonder Bread and Twinkies do not combine to form a highly volatile explosive compound capable of leveling a city block. This was a greed issue. Double the delivery men means double the dues paying union members.

In the last 10 years the baker's union has lost over 30,000 members as local after local has voted to decertify the union. Just to be clear, that means that a majority of union members if those locals voted to leave the union. Not surprising given that over 500 complaints have been filed against the union over their duty of fair representation. These are not the strong jawed champions of workers' rights that some people seem to think they are.

In short, there's a lot of blame to go around. Management was incompetent and did a lot of bad things but the union wasn't helping the situation either.

Personally I feel like NCIS has gone downhill since they ran off Donald Bellisario as showrunner. An appearance by River Song might actually make the show worth watching again.

I don't get BSODs. Often.

Just so long as Barnabus doesn't sparkle.

So Human Target's second season is over and I'm wondering what people thought of it. I know a number of us were pretty pumped at the beginning of the season but did that last?

In the end, I think adding Ilsa and Ames to the show was a mistake. I really don't see the guys putting up with the grief those two caused. Ilsa brought money and new toys but the guys were getting by alright without her. Why put up with her constant whining about the morality and legality of what they were doing?

And Ames? Really, dude? We're supposed to believe that Guerrero would tolerate her constant interference in his work?

I understand that the show's ratings have been less than stellar and its future is uncertain. I can't help but think the show would have been better off without the second season retooling.

I'm hoping that they don't intend to redeem Joshua in the end and have him continue on as a regular. We've seen him kill people including Detective Cho, mindwipe Daphne, and manipulate Katie's memories. About the only "redemption" I want to see from him is him heroically sacrificing his life to save Katie.

There are 5 more episodes in the season according to IMDb.com. I'm hoping they'll wind up the arc with Dr. King by then.

I figured it was only a matter of time before Daphne exhibited mind control abilities after we saw Joshua use them. She can probably wipe and rewrite people's memories as well. It will be interesting to see if she has also has telekinesis.

My impression is that they now live in an apartment but Vince still likes to visit their old house, where they no longer live, just because he has memories there. I know I still like to drive past the house I grew up in and my grandparents' house on occasion even though my grandparents passed away in the 80s and I haven't lived in my old house for 30 years and it was torn down long ago and the lot is now vacant.

I would think Dr. King already knew about Stephanie's powers anyway. Didn't the shapeshifter see her use superspeed?

I would suggest you browse the exhibits at Blacksuperhero.com. It covers not just heroes but villains as well.

Gotta cut them a little slack for the train given that everyone on it was in costume and there was at least one other person dressed as the Cape. But yeah, people in general on the show act like idiots. Of course people on most TV shows act like idiots so that's nothing new.