So Long Led Zep Coaster

This Hard Rock Park saga just keeps getting weirder and weirder. First the $400m. venture in Myrtle Beach goes belly up after a few months, largely due to being unable to attract enough visitors — that and ignoring the “rock” part of their marketing scheme, I’d say.

Then a handful of a Disney vets buy the thing out of bankruptcy for $25m. and immediately set about getting rid of the “rock” elements and turning it into just another amusement park.

New kiddie rides have been purchased and are to be installed before the Memorial Day re-launch. The Moody Blues Nights in White Satin funhouse house was nixed immediately as “too dark,” and now comes word that the Hard Rock Park name is out — along with the Led Zeppelin and Eagles roller coasters.

Good luck re-purposing the Zeppelin coaster, guys. Everything from the cars to the music to the ride shed was purpose-built for the Led connection. Zeppelin logos and icons are all over the place. Is it really cheaper to rip all that out and replace it than try to find a licensing deal that’ll work?

Make no mistake, there is the guts of a great coaster still there — fast and quick, and surprising. It should have a long working life no matter what you call it.

But what made the coaster special was that You neeeeeeeed looooovvvvvvvvaaaaaa… scream the cars blasted into your brain just as you plunged down to meet your rock n roll destiny.

Of course, I just pointed and laughed at the Eagles coaster. It will not be missed.

Pat McCrory: Making Up More Crap

Have to double-back to something Mayor Pat said last week lest it go down the memory-hole.

Remember how during the transit-tax repeal Pat was all “Save the Buses!” Repeal would stop the buses cold, Pat said repeatedly. Why CATS might not even have the $800K required for paratransit — the absolute height of agit-prop from the Uptown crowd.

Yet with federal stimulus money now at question Pat reverts to “Screw the Buses! Use it for Trains!”

CATS wants to use $20m. in federal money to upfit its bus garage, McCrory wants to throw the money at one of the damn local train schemes aching for money that CATS and the city do not have.

I guarantee if you waved a magic wand and the transit-tax were at question again Pat would instantly jump to “Save the Buses!” mode and not think twice about. You see, he is different than you and me. He is a Leader. And Leaders get to make crap up.

TGIF Grab Bag-O-Fun

Been a long, long week. What’s say we cap it off with a few more dings off the old noggin?

• If there is a hypocrite Hall of Fame the NCAA was long ago inducted. Ty Lawson goes to a casino in Detroit, the host city for the NCAA’s Final Four chosen in part because of the nightlife the casinos bring dead Motown, wins a few bucks and NCAA prez Myles Brand intones that that activity is “highly discouraged.” What a tool.
• About the 90-mph CMPD fatal wreck. We sure we have all the facts? Chief Rodney Monroe has already spoken out of turn on CMPD siren policy, getting it flat wrong, and the Uptown paper had to run a correction making clear that the officer was not “clocked” going 90. Where are the dash-cam tapes and radio transmissions? Stay tuned.
• Let’s be honest, it seems like open season Uptown on young, clean-cut white guys who walk the streets alone.
• Gee, wouldn’t have been nice to have this kinda reporting on his stint at the NY Fed before Tim “I Can Fire You” Geithner was given command of the economy?
• Really, really long but cool break-down of the New World of Journalism, including examples of bloggers doing investigative reporting.

Tapping out for now.

State Whores Out for Miley Cyrus Movie

Perfect. Makes you want to bang your head on the ground.

Lawmakers in Raleigh are rushing into a tax subsidy bidding war in order to make sure a new Miley Cyrus movie gets made in Wilmington, as opposed to Georgia. The current 15 percent tax credit for filmmakers would get bumped to 25 percent should legislation introduced in the General Assembly pass.

Check out how state Rep. Pryor Gibson describes the situation:

“You get all this money, all this income and tax money and retail purchases and you get to send them home,” Gibson said of movie production. “It’s like having relatives come to visit you with lots of money to spend and going home with nothing left in their pockets.”

Just shoot me. I cannot take anymore.

Update: Here, let’s pile on. The director of Miley’s current movie says “there is no way this girl shouldn’t be ranked with Shirley Temple or Judy Garland.”