Heaps & Barrels: Edition 3

TOP OF THE HEAP

---

Runner-ups:

Drew Carey, new The Price Is Right host
OK, time to give Drew his due. He’s been the host of The Price Is Right for 4 months now, and the ratings have been the same as they were last year. His hosting style shows much more levity and looseness, somewhat of a contrast with Bob Barker’s automatic, polished style. I think he’s done about 50 out of 72 active pricing games, lots of Money Game, Any Number, and Plinko. He’ll be doing some nighttime shows starting in February, so check him out. TPIR is a much better show than Power of 10.

The Biggest Loser
Speaking of “game” shows, I’ve started watching The Biggest Loser and it’s amazing seeing people lose 40% of their body weight in eight months. This show is more worthwhile watching than Survivor or Big Brother. The contestants actually change their lives.

Neil Cavuto
Finally a voice of reason regarding the vote-buying scheme known as the $150 billion stimulus package. Cavuto, along with the Wall Street Journal, have rightly described the stimulus bill as a feel-good, do-nothing bill, which at best provides a one-year middle-class tax cut and at worst destroys the soul of the Republican party.
Top of the Top of the Heap:

Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona)
Give John McCain credit — he was literally written off as a serious contender 3-4 months ago, and now he could be a week away from being the Republican nominee. Now that he has won Florida’s primary, McCain has the momentum, the delegates, and the donations. Now that Giuliani appears ready to drop out, the Republican nomination is a two-man race between McCain and Mitt Romney. To be sure, Mike Huckabee will likely win 2 or 3 southern states next week, but McCain looks poised to take the larger states like New York and California.
The Republican base is dissatisfied with McCain’s liberal stance on tax and spending policy, but on the most important issue of our time, the War On Terror, McCain is unquestionably qualified to lead this country.
So far this election season, John McCain has emerged at the Top Of The Heap.

BOTTOM OF THE BARREL

---

Runner-ups:Bill Shipp
I’m starting to get tired of Bill Shipp’s bitter, hateful diatribes about anything regarding a conservative value or politician in the state of Georgia. It’s plainly obvious he feels the dividing point between Georgia being a top-notch, envy-of-the-U.S. state and becoming a racist, uneducated, and undesirable state is when Democrat Roy Barnes lost the governorship to Republican Sonny Perdue. Shipp doesn’t use much facts to back up either the status of Georgia during the Barnes’ administration vs. the status during Perdue’s tenure. It doesn’t matter; he’s become just a know-nothing bombthrower. I’d also like to know why Shipp is no longer on The Georgia Gang. Perhaps he can no longer debate his less-than-salient thoughts against Dick Williams and Martha Zoller.

Keith Olbermann
Does this guy ever stop lying? How bitter is Olby, losing in the ratings to Bill O’Reilly by 3-to-1? This weekend, even fellow lefty Howard Kurtz half-heartedly called out Olby for his obsessive personal attacks on Bill O’Reilly, Fox News, Rudy Giuliani, and George W. Bush. Olby is completely incapable of debating anyone leaning right-of-center politically, as evidenced by his guest on his opinion show. The most shameful act, however, is during coverage of the Republican primaries. During the various speeches, Olbermann laughs and makes snide jokes during these speeches. Completely disrespectful and out-of-line. Shame on MSNBC and the NBC News brand for allowing this to go on.

Gov. Kathleen Sebelius (D-Kansas)
How do you follow up an awful State of the Union speech by President Bush? A good strategy would be to offer a top-notch response, maybe something uplifting or appealing to the Democratic base. Instead, we were treated to a ghastly speech by Kathleen Sebelius, governor of Kansas. This poorly-rehearsed speech (as evidence by her poor TelePrompter reading) repeatedly contained the snide, condescending phrase “let’s get to work.” Probelm is, she offered nothing concrete to work on. The next day, she endorsed Barack Obama. My guess is she is “getting to work on” being picked for the VP slot.

John Gibson
Heath Ledger’s tragic (and apparently accidental) death at age 28 wasn’t a joking matter, but Gibby made quite a few awful jokes at Ledger’s expense on Gibby’s radio show. The jokes made the assumption that the drug overdose was an intentional suicide attempt, and portrayed Ledger as a drug abuse. Gibson’s lucky he didn’t get canned from both his radio show and his TV show.

Bottom of the Bottom of the Barrel:

Rudy Giuliani, (Former) Presidential candidate
It was just a month or two ago when Rudy Giuliani was considered a lock for the Republican nomination, having had a commanding lead over Mitt Romney and the rest of the Republican contenders. Something must have happened; I don’t know if Rudy got lazy, took for granted his considerable lead, made too many blunders, or was just outsmarted by Romney and John McCain and Mike Huckabee (?). At any rate, Giuliani has to be the biggest disappointment of the 2008 election cycle. In my opinion, he lost this election when he badly lost New Hampshire. Giuliani was then forced to play an all-or-nothing strategy in Florida, and as of the writing, Giuliani is fighting for 3rd place. Time’s up on Rudy’s bottom-of-the-barrel campaign, but he’s still a 9/11 hero.