Is TV saturated with drug commercials?

Here I am sitting down to watch a bit of the telly and withinthe first hour of the program that I am watching, the wife and I are harassed by an inordinate amount of drug commercials.  I am not talking about the simple over-the-counter drugs like Tylenol or Advil, but hardcore pharmaceutical-grade prescription drugs (in certain circles of our society, the good stuff). 

Everyone out there know what I am talking about?  Right, you’ve seen the Flonase Bee or the older gentleman talking about how the quality of his sex life has improved with a little blue pill?  If not, maybe these names ring a bell – Vioxx, Levitra, Nexium, Detrol, Procrit, Ambien, Cialis,Viagra, etc.  

The drug industry is a multi-billion dollar industry.  I guess I would like to know why they are hocking their products like candy on TV.  Do companies like Pfizer and Merck really need to advertise on TV?  Aren’t they making making enough money and satisfying their stockholders?  Do these companies really expect the average Joe to say “yeah, that drug sounds wonderful, let me call my doctor and get a bottle or two.” 

Come on, when did the average Joe become medical doctors.  Was that an extracurricular course in high school that I missed?  I can just image the doctor’s face when Mr. Average Joe strolls into his office for an appointment requesting one of these drugs before the exam has even started.  You can see the doctors jaw hit the floor and the realization in his/her eyes that eight years of medical school along with $100,000 of tuition has now become worthless. 

 

So, instead of wasting million dollars on advertising to the average Joe about symptoms that I’d swear are so obscure that if I did not know better sound made up, focus the advertising dollars toward hospitals, doctors, health companies, and pharmacy.  If anything, it will be one less annoying commercial to pollute our air waves.  Also, it would take the practice of medicine out the average Joe’s hands and place it back into the hands of the professionals.

BSG Finale Explodes with Questions about the Final Five Cylons

Well BSG fans, it is official –
Tyrol, Tigh, Foster, and Anders are part of the Final Five Cylons.  Even though I blogged a few days ago with spoilers about who would be these Cylons, I still had a hard time believing that these four are part of the “Five,” especially Tigh and Anders. 

 

Frack, Tigh has a history in the Colonial Fleet for almost 40 years!  Anders ran the resistance on Caprica.  Along with their history, both men sacrificed so much in the name freedom from the oppressive Cylons:  Tigh –  an eye and his wife; Anders – his friends and his wife (Starbuck).  So I keeping asking myself if this for real?!?  I still can’t believe it and am finding this cliffhanger of all a hard one to swallow. 

Heck, doesn’t Tigh have a personal history with Adama?   Of all the people who could have assassinated Adama, the Cylons picked Sharon.  Why not Tigh?  He was XO and long-time confidant of Adama.  And Anders, why didn’t he deliver Starbuck back to the fertility clinic on Caprica on multiple occasions?  These questions are just a few that need to be solidly answered for me to believe these guys are Cylons. 

 

Okay, as I write this, something else came to me.  Chief Tyrol cannot be a Cylon either.  He has a child.  Yeah, he had a child with Cally.  Is that child half-Cylon and a second “Messiah?”  No, it couldn’t be, could it?  God having two children?   That does not follow the mythology of Earth’s Judeo-Christian religion.  Chief did have those dreams when he thought he was a Cylon.  Plus, he had extensive knowledge of the Eye of Jupiter.  If I look at those two events, yeah he could be a Cylon.  But, I keep coming back to the point that the Chief has a child.  That’s the question I need answered before I believe the Chief is in the “Five.”

 

Okay, one left – Foster.  I have no questions or arguments, she is a Cylon. 

 

As I look back at Sunday’s episode, I would have to say as a cliffhanger it ranks up there with the mother of all TV cliffhangers, “Who Shot J.R.?” 

 

So, now I’m on a quest to seek out answers to these and other questions from the finale.   In my search for answers; I stumbled across an interview with Ron Moore in the  Pittsburgh Post-Gazette by Rob Owen.  In this interview, Moore confirms the four we saw last night are truly Cylons and that more surprise are in place for Season Four.  So, I guess it is true and my quest is now done.  But no!  I need more. 

 

 

Are the writers going to deal with Chief baby?  Ron Moore states a convincing “yes.”  What about the fifth Cylon?  Is it Starbuck, the President or someone else entirely different?  Well, when Moore was asked this all he would say is “I think so.”  What kind of answer is that?  “I think so.”  Frak, Moore is killing me. 

 

I guess I will have to wait for next season for the answers to my questions and the main question on everyone’s mind – will the Fourth Season be it and will they find Earth?   All I will tell you is that Ron Moore on several occasions has stated that he will not end the series on a cliffhanger and plans on producing a satisfactory ending everyone will enjoy. 

 

However, he will not state yet if this is the end.  If I was betting man, I would say it would be.  With 22 episodes ordered and a movie to air before the beginning of the fourth season demonstrates to me that an enormous amount of network commitment to the show is being utilized in a short timeframe.  So it is coming to end.  Frak!!!  What theories do have about the Cylons?