Fact: Robots will one day rule the world.

Call me crazy, but I know what I'm talking about. About a month ago I purchased the robot vacuum "Roomba", and in that short period of time I've seen signs of impending doom.

Sure, they may seem helpful, even friendly, but I've caught my Roomba, with its green glowing "eyes", scoping out my home as it supposedly innocently cleans up after me. The Roomba moves and resembles a horseshoe crab, sans tail, spinning and scooping up dust and dirt and crumbs and dog hair. For those of you who are familiar with Roomba, they have a distinct language of beeps and buzzes, reminiscent of R2D2. I've never done it, but I bet if you get two Roomba's into a room together, they'll beep and buzz to each other all day. It seriously is a language. In fact, I think Roomba's run the customer and tech support systems at iRobot the makers of Roomba, Scooba, etc. That is not a bold faced assertion of fact. Yesterday I was on the phone with tech support, troubleshooting my Roomba's failure to charge on it's homebase, and I described the "happy noise" - when it turns on and starts, and its "sad noise" when it's battery dies. Well the Roomba on the other line was able to make those noises perfectly. I almost peed my pants.

What's more Roombas are being pitted against one another in a battle to the death. They call it a Roomba cockfight. I contend the organizers of these fights are the cocks. Really, who needs to TRAIN these robots to fight. They are evolving. Adding weapons. Here's an idea. For the next season of 24, Jack Bauer has to come out of retirement because an army of iRobot terrorists have taken his daughter captive. He must work with the Chinese and the Russians to defeat these Robot Terrorists. The only problem is, CTU has been using Roombas and Scoobas to keep its floors shiny and spot free. They have all the information they need...Throw in some dramatic music and some bad acting and BOOM, season 7 is in the books. Put season 6 on DVD and get to work Fox. Call it science fiction, but its all too real to me.

Tale of the Tape: Chuck Norris v. Jack Bauer

I fear for my life for even raising this as a topic of debate. By the time this hits the blog-o-sphere, I'll already be dead.

Television regularly falls victim to the perils of bad spin-off shows and/or crossovers. But here I am proposing the ULTIMATE CROSSOVER. Any show starring Chuck Norris, crossed with 24, but done in 12 hours. (Lets call it 24 half hour episodes, no need to be greedy). Here's the rub, they both play good guys and I'm not looking for another poor attempt at turning the Konami Double Dragon Nintendo game into a live action show.

So here's how it goes down. (Cue dramatic music) Jack Bauer's mission takes him to Texas, accidentally crossing into Native American land. Boom, Chuck Norris's jurisdiction. Only problem is, it's the Native American's that have the "bomb" (or biological weapon, or secret to the end of the world, etc.). Chuck Norris (In his Walker, Texas Ranger "costume" or maybe his Delta Force outfit), a blood brother with a Native American chief, must weigh his loyalties: the oath he swore in blood, or the one he swore on the bible (to defend the country). Ultimately he decides that, in the same way Paul Walker let Vin Diesel go at the end of The Fast and the Furious, that he must find a way to do both. Only thing standing in his way...Jack Bauer. Let the games begin.

If and when Chuck and Jack meet face to face, my guess is it will probably look like a less "dancy" version of Patrick Swayze's big fight at the end of Roadhouse. No guns, no knives, only gut wrenching, throat-ripping-out, hand to hand combat. Lets look at the:

TALE OF THE TAPE: Norris v. Bauer

Height/Weight
Let's assume that stature can be ignored in this bout. I'm not in the mood to look it up.
Advantage: ME

Weapon of Choice
Chucky: Chuck Norris is currently suing NBC, claiming Law and Order are trademarked names for his left and right legs. The roundhouse is devestating. I heard he unleashed it accidentally and levelled a small village in Mbati...while still in Texas.
Bauer: Gun or Pretty much anything he can get his hands on. Some people see the glass as half full. Others see it as half empty. Jack Bauer see the glass as a deadly weapon.
Advantage: Norris

Most Ridiculous Kill
Chucky: Honestly, I don't think he ever "kills" anyone intentionally. Sure he induces car crashes, followed by a comically large explosion, which I can assume kills the passenger, and I assume his roundhouse is deadly, but I don't recall him ever using it to its full capability. Oswald shot, Chuck Norris met all three bullets with his beard, deflecting them. JFK's head exploded out of sheer amazement.
Bauer: Too many choose. I'm going to have to go with the one where he bit a terrorists carotid artery, immediately killing him. Jack Bauer could strangle you with a cordless phone.
Advantage: Bauer

Witness Interrogation Technique
Chucky: No one withholds information from Chuck Norris. Criminals just open up when faced with his stunning beard and ruggish good looks. Chuck Norris doesn't read books. He stares them down until he gets the information he wants.
Bauer: Pain. Lots of it. Maybe drugs. They say torture is the sincerest form of flattery. Jack is overcomplimentary. Jack Bauer once forgot where he put his keys. He then spent the next half-hour torturing himself until he gave up the location of the keys.
Advantage: Even

Personal Weaknesses
Chucky: has a soft spot for Native American Tribes, protecting their land, resources, etc. Generally doing so means that something is going to explode in a massive fireball. Who knew a horse drawn buggy could explode with such gusto. Chuck Norris' tears cure cancer. Too bad he has never cried.

Bauer: Family/Relationships. It's fairly standard that if you are friends with Jack, at some point you will be either, killed or tortured. Generally this leads to a lot of terrorist deaths. Jack Bauer definitely loves his daughter; he wouldn't let anyone else who made that many stupid decisions live.

Advantage: Norris

Support Team:

Chucky: his deputy Texas ranger. I don't know his name. It doesn't really matter.

Bauer: Jack killed the lead of his support team in order to protect a terrorist. A nuke went off shortly afterwards. Jack needs no support team.

Advantage: Bauer

Well as it turns out we have a 2-2 tie. This is as easy as predicting Golden State beating Dallas. If we were basing this on beard factor a la Baron Davis, then Chuck will get the W. Time for me to go into hiding.

As I conclude this post, I find out there is a Jack vs. Chuck website. Well done.

Fact: 24 Even Makes Republicans Cringe

As many of you may have noted by my esteemed colleague's constant (not-so) subtle jabs, I am a card carrying Republican and damn proud of it. More specifically, I am a consequentialist libertarian; just for the record. I dislike democrats, mostly extreme liberals (and also extreme conservatives) who make shit up and argue from the bottom of their bleeding hearts, albeit without any facts to back them up. Maybe I'll send them the link to this site as my community service for the decade. But even more-so, I despise the dip shits who use their celebrity to spout off absurd theories and bash our country even though our "greed ridden" society has created them and given them the platform to let stupidity flow like piss on your roommate's car at the end of a drunken night. It's called capitalism you communists, if you like Canada's "national health care" system, go up there and wait a year for an appendectomy, that's one less year we have to see your face. If you like Cuba's amazing government, hell, why not take a parlay with their health care as well, (ok but seriously let's clarify the links to those last two amazing assholes) then go learn to love Castro or die. Sounds a bit like New Hampshire actually, and who doesn't like New Hampshire?


The preceding rant was brought to you by Jack Bauer, who is actually the emperor of the United States. What's that? The US is a democracy? We don't have an emperor? Better go into witness protection because Jack Bauer just uploaded your address into his PDA and is coming to torture and kill you for questioning the legitimacy of his throne. You have 10 minutes . . . that's not true, grab a last meal because Jack Bauer invented witness protection, basically, you're fucked. Anyway, not that you'll be around to read it, this post is hopefully one of a weekly installment pointing out the absurdities of each week of 24. (Yes, it is the absurdities that makes it enjoyable, but honestly, it hurts sometimes).

*****Spoiler Alert***** (as noted, we don't care)

This week was a lesson in how government does not even come close to functioning. VP Noah Daniels (problem 1a, who votes for the ticket with a candidate named Noah on it?) has decided to become a Democrat and pretend the Constitution says whatever supports his ideas. Therefore, within the 25th Amendment, the inability of the president to discharge the duties of his office apparently means that taking the position he has taken all season is a sign of disability or conflict of interest, and a disagreement over policy might lead to that. (The scary thing is that this might actually be a plausible argument, proving once again that reality is sometimes more absurd than fiction). Going further, there are more power shifts in 20 minutes than probably happen within a full term in Washington. Nuke them, wait don't, yes do it, wait no, hang on maybe we will, no definitely not Palmer wins . . . oh no wait Palmer has decided to nuke them going against everything he stands for. Nice. Roller coaster effects like this tend to cause some nausea. Fortunately, Tom Lennox has seen situations worse than this, like when he facilitated the return of Vigo the Carpathian.

The second problem with this episode is the fact that Grendenko, in a display of manliness like no other, cuts off his arm with an axe (which just happened to be in the boathouse), then gave up the one guy who can probably help him escape, then dies under the pier because the asshole has been bleeding profusely for 20 minutes. Does this make any sense? I mean we know he's out for himself, but you would think that would include something minor like, I don't know, living?

from this: to this!? . . . really?

Finally, besides the fact that merely waking Wayne Palmer up from a coma has made him fully functional, Milo kills me. Honestly, this is the most unbelievable part of this show (no it's not Jack knowing how to fly everything from a plane, to a drone, to a really big kite). Really producers? This computer geek really goes from fighting some dude for Chloe to pulling ass like Nadia? Really? REALLY? This is the guy that is almost brought to tears by Morris and after taking one bullet he's Jack's protege? Really? I think not.

Warning: TV Show Spoiler

There was an article that Bill "The Sports Guy" Simmons wrote a while ago in which he attempted to bitch out the readers that had given him a hard time about spoiling the ending of a recent episode of "24". In the end he was put in his place since some of the people complaining were in fact troops overseas and he realized that he was kind of a dick about it. The only reason I'm reminded of this is because the most recent episode of "24" was completely audacious and I can't get the thoughts of incredulity over it to leave my head.

Before I delve into the episode, I just want to point out that I don't care if you didn't see it. It's unfortunate that you're going to find out this way, but tough shit. (This goes for you too, soldiers. In all seriousness, we here at AoF thank you for your service, for we would never change places, but you should really get some DVR up in that piece, fuck body armor).

In an effort to keep this post relatively short, I'm gonna hit two areas. One: Mrs. Logan is clearly fucking insane. She's a pointless character and whoever the actress is who plays her (I believe she used to be on Designing Women, Delta Burke and Annie Potts could be the bread and I would be the meat in that delicious sandwich) must have absolutely no career to be subjecting herself to randomly flying off the handle in the middle of an uncontrollable world crisis to the point where she stabs and kills the President. A little bit much.

Secondly, I love the Vice President's agenda. He was in office for roughly 3 minutes and 28 seconds before he called for a nuclear war. There's no way you could convince me that could happen, even with an obvious sinister plot that he's gotta be involved in. Something just tells me that this is probably how the real life cabinet works. There has to be at least one person in Bush's cabinet (maybe him, but I doubt it) that is constantly making wild calls for nuclear war. Probably once a week the rest of the cabinet has to shout this guy down.

Alright, that's enough for now. I have much more, but there are more pressing things to take care of. Namely, now that I picked Texas in the final game and they shit the bed, I need to make my RACKetology picks, which I can't do worse in.