Buy Me Something!
May 16th, 2008 by Hazel Stone
Via Ahab, comes this bit of Holy Flurking Schmidt!
Screw the flying car, I want THIS.
Tags: buy me something!, shopping
Related Entries:
6 Comments | Posted in Ephemera
The Picador Project: Taking back our government, one city council at a time.
It’s the Only Way to Be Sure
May 15th, 2008 by Hazel Stone
It always vaguely surprises me when a celebrity appears to be paying attention:
”I don’t have a candidate I’m supporting and I’m certainly interested and excited by the hope that Barack Obama is inspiring,” he said, but went on to accuse him of a “phenomenally inhuman and unconstitutional” voting record.
Not that I’m accusing Sean Penn of a capability for actual reasoned discourse, but it is refreshing to see an avowed liberal who has not fallen completely into the Obamessiah’s thrall.
Natalie Portman, however, should plead youth and exhaustion and retire to her trailer:
Portman, 26, said she would not be endorsing Obama or his rival, Hillary Clinton, but added: “I think it’s a very exciting year for our politics, that for the first time in a while we have a choice of who we like better instead of who we hate least.”
No, dear, it’s the same as any other year. Either a Communist, a Socialist, or a Democrat with (likely) a Theocrat chaser? We should nuke the site from orbit.
(Via VP)
Tags: 2008 election, use your head
Related Entries:
5 Comments | Posted in Decision Eh
Ignorance, Bigotry and Racism, Oh My!
May 15th, 2008 by Hazel Stone
I am going to need a new desk. This one has a head-shaped dent in it.
A mural meant to bring people together is causing a rift in the Bastrop community.
The painting in question, a student project completed in 2003, adorns a wall in the corridor leading to the Bastrop High School gym. It depicts the sometimes unpleasant history of the town, showing scenes of a Mexican and Comanche raid and slaves working in a cotton field, as well as unifying visions of children of different ethnicities reaching out to one another.
..
Among the images on the mural are an Aztec sun, ancient Egypt’s King Tutankhamen, Buddha and Shiva, a Hindu deity, dancing on a demon of ignorance.
The stereotypical prayer-meeting-having homeschooling mom wants the (TEN THOUSAND DOLLAR) mural removed:
“When she showed it to me, I was like, ‘Oh my gosh,’ ” said Hansell, who added that the mural presents a new age idea of peace and unity that could be confusing to Christian students.
You just can’t make this stuff up. Keeping firmly in mind that I am a COMPLETE CYNIC when it comes to organized religion, and the destruction it has wrought across history, I just have to say, yes, I could see where ideas of peace and unity would be confusing to Christian students. Can’t have them thinking that everyone is equal, no matter if they pray to Buddha, Coyote or the stunted begonia on their front porch, because, as the pig says, some people are clearly more equal than others.
The extra-special-bonus comes at the end of that article, where we’re treated to a glimpse of the future:
As Mandi Colvin, a sophomore at Bastrop High, sees it: “It’s breaking the First Amendment. It needs to come down.”
Oh indeed? The mural is making laws that interfere with the free exercise of religion? Or it is making laws that infringe the freedom of speech and the press? Maybe it is limiting the right to peaceably assemble? Or limiting the right to petition the governemtn for a redress of grievances?
What? Murals can’t do those things? Amazing what you’re NOT learning in Civics class, isn’t it.
Tags: death of common sense, high-school
Related Entries:
Must’ve Been a Facial Hair Allergy
May 15th, 2008 by Hazel Stone
Hillary Clinton choked up Wednesday as she told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer that her daughter’s presence on the campaign trail had been one of the “most incredibly gratifying experiences of my life.”
It is possible the emotion is real and heartfelt. It is probable her “team” has advised her to show said emotion, to humanize her to the voting public, generate sympathy, etc. But for some of us, myself included, this propensity for bursting into tears is not a trait I want in my CINC. It’s not going to play in the sandy areas, y’knowwhamsayin’?
Tags: 2008 election
Related Entries:
1 Comment | Posted in Decision Eh
The Future
May 14th, 2008 by Hazel Stone
Remember this name: Moshe Kai Cavalin
Most ten year old boys are playing baseball, video games or just hanging out with friends, but, not Moshe. He’s cramming for final college exams.
…
Within a year, if he keeps up his grades and completes the rest of his requirements, he hopes to transfer from his two-year program at East Los Angeles College to a prestigious four-year school and study astrophysics.
One of his primary interests is “wormholes,” a hypothetical scientific phenomenon connected to Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity. It has been theorized that if such holes do exist in space, they could - in tandem with black holes - allow for the kind of space-age time travel seen in science fiction.
“Just like black holes, they suck in particulate objects, and also like black holes, they also travel at escape velocity, which is, the speed to get out of there is faster than the speed of light,” Cavalin says. “I’d like to prove that wormholes are really there and prove all the theories are correct.”
This kid is our Daniel Shipstone.
Tags: earn it
Related Entries:
2 Comments | Posted in Do It Yourself
Oil Flooding
May 14th, 2008 by Ted Bronson
One of the things about our government that really drives me bonkers is how little amendments get stuck onto otherwise unrelated bills. Take for example the bill S.2284 which has the purported purpose of reforming how Flood Insurance is managed. (For this discussion, I won’t go into my thoughts about the fed flood insurance program; neither you nor I have that much time.) But then comes along S.Amdt. 4720, which has absolutely nothing to do with flood insurance whatsoever.
Now S.Amdt. 4720 is a kind of important piece of legislation. It seems that it has enough importance to actually be it’s very own bill. It is the kind of thing that affects every single citizen of the United States, has immediate and long term ramifications, and is long overdue.
S.Amdt. 4720 is about opening up ANWR and coastal areas to petroleum producers. It was voted down. I would like for all of you to know exactly who voted for and against increasing our domestic oil production capabilities. I would like you to ask your Senators, your hirelings, why they decided not to approve it. Perhaps because they felt it was not appropriate to attach it to the Flood Ins. bill. Perhaps they thought it was a grandstand play that offended the sensibilities of their august Senate. Or perhaps they are just congenitally stupid and don’t realize that petroleum is the fuel of our American economy.
Either way, you should probably go ask. In case you don’t know how your particular hireling voted, this list is reprinted here via govtrack.us. (Thanks for the fine work you do over there.)
Tags: death of common sense
Related Entries:
Throwing Them Just Didn’t Work
May 14th, 2008 by Hazel Stone
From a Consumerist piece on a sploding firearm (and the manufacturer’s subsequent lack of concern) a bit of wisdom you lot probably already knew but I’m just now coming across:
…bullets kill people. Guns just get the bullets going really, really fast.
Struth.
(Via some dang comment somewhere on Weasel’s site…)
Tags: guns are good
Related Entries:
3 Comments | Posted in Ephemera
1. Trespass. 2. Duck Marine Fire. 3. ? 4. Profit!
May 14th, 2008 by Hazel Stone
Well, this is an all new level of stupid:
Hundreds of Marines were conducting a combat training mission in the Mojave Desert when an air patrol spotted something kicking up dust: A civilian pickup truck speeding across the barren landscape.
Behind the wheel was a suspected scrap metal thief who had been combing the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center for spent brass shell casings. His intrusion onto the base was the 12th time in six months that scavengers had inadvertently halted combat exercises.
…
After he was spotted by troops last December, the pickup truck driver barreled directly at a Marine, who fired five shots at the vehicle. The driver swerved, flipped over and spilled hundreds of dollars in collected metal. He was taken by helicopter to a hospital and later charged with attempted murder.
Seems it’d be far simpler to just get a damned job.
Tags: use your head
Related Entries:
5 Comments | Posted in Oddly Not Satire
The Case for Colombia
May 13th, 2008 by Ted Bronson
Free trade with our best ally in South America is, in caps, A GOOD THING. I can think of at least three reasons for that statement.
1) Free trade with Colombia opens up new and currently growing markets for American goods and services. This country has about 45 million or so people living within its borders. Living, working, raising their families, and planning for their futures, just like we do here in America. If the United States made it easier for goods and services to cross our borders, those 45 million people would be able to plan those futures with the inclusion of things and ideas that raised their standard of living while at the same time providing jobs to American workers to provide those things and ideas. Both sides win. Which leads to point two.
2) If the fathers of Colombia figured out that they could better provide for their families by entering into business deals with American companies, and do legitimate business without the need to strap on an AK just to go to the office, they certainly would. No father wants his business affairs to have the spectre of corrupt government officials (which are fewer every day), a communist revolution by terrorists (such as the DEAD Raul Reyes), or even a poor education for himself or his children to stand in the way. Honest capitalism is a wonderful device for stabilizing a region. These fathers will want to ensure that his children are ever better educated, that his government is even less corrupt, that the narco-terrorists lose ground. If the fathers of Colombia knew that his children could grow up healthy and educated and employed, they would better protect their daughters from the ills of the narcotic cartels, not sell them out for the afternoon for a Zippo lighter. If the fathers of Colombia knew that they had a chance to raise their sons to be honorable men, leaders in the community from force of mind rather than force of arms, they would better be able to resist the paths of corruption for themselves and guide their sons to the paths of honorable trades. If the fathers of Colombia knew that their wives and children had futures bright, rather than shadowed over by the black clouds of Chavez in Venezuela and the APRA Party in Peru, they would grasp it to their chests and stand in the streets to defend that future. Capitalism gives the fathers of Colombia a reason to want stability. want a legitimate voice in his government, and gives them hope that all they have worked for their entire lives will not disappear when they are gone, but rather pass on to the hands of their educated, healthy, and competent children and grandchildren. Which brings us finally to point three.
3) Given that the 45 million people of Colombia will benefit in untold ways, they will certainly want to preserve what they have gained economically. With unstable currencies and governments all around them, with FARC and Shining Path still operating and destabilizing the continent, and with leftist dictators as neighbors, the people of Colombia will have no choice but to stand in the face of the communist tide: to be a bulwark against the falling of dominoes as it were. In order for the Colombian people to achieve the first world standing they deserve, to have economic growth, and to become a true Nation, rather than lines on a map, they will have to form a society of fairness and equity, opportunity and law. They will need to have businesses in place to employ people; legitimate businesses that treat their employees as people, not chattels. (These they have, free trade with the U.S. will help increase the numbers and the quality.) They will need a government in place that is in actual fact a popular democracy or representative republic that listens to and answers to the will of the majority of the people, not just a powerful few. (They have that as well, and getting better with time. This also will improve with the influence of American capitalism, since no one wants to do business in a place where the law and the enforcers of the law are not trustworthy.) Perhaps this willingness to protect what is theirs would translate to true stability against the forces of the narcotics cartels, the communist neighbors, and the terrorist revolutionaries.
Those are just three reasons I came up with this morning, chatting with Jose and Guillermo at work this morning. They are both former citizens of Colombia, now US citizens.
Is it selling out to the Nortamericanos for Colombians to want a government of laws, not of men? No. Are we bribing them with shiny beads so we can take their resources and force them to fight the eventual proxy war with Hugo Chavez? No. Some American protectionists are even wondering what we get out of the deal; why should Americans work to help the economy of a South American country they will never visit nor do business with? The answer could be as simple as the Monroe Doctrine or as complex as any macro economics class you ever failed in college. But the truth is something simple and basic:
The people of Colombia are our friends in an unfriendly part of the world. The people of Colombia are, on the whole, smart, honest, hard working, religious, and decent. For people like that, for neighbors, you do what you can to help. The literal slavery some are held under is an abomination before Man, and economic prosperity that undermines the slave trade as well as the corrupt people who use slave labor will put an end to the practice. When a brother or a father or a mother has to stand in impotent rage because some drug kingpin has decided to take away their little girl, every human being alive should weep and cry out “NO! THE LINE IS HERE! NO MORE SHALL WE SUFFER THUS!” When honorable men like the two I work with, see that the future can be as bright back in their homeland as it is here, they want to be there to see it happen.
Tags: international, too damn vivid
Related Entries:
6 Comments | Posted in Capitalism
Imitation and Theft are Two Different Things
May 13th, 2008 by Hazel Stone
There is a know-nothing jackass out there on the abysmal Blogspot who is wholesale copy/pasting posts from other weblogs. Now, we certainly do not pretend this site is the new Messiah (that job is all wrapped up, no?), but it’s damned irritating when some little twit without two original thoughts to rub together misrepresents your work as their own.
But Hazel, you ask, what can you do? Well, Google, the entity who owns Blogger, provides a “how to make a DMCA complaint” page for our use. But do read the fine print:
Please note that a copy of each legal notice we receive is sent to a third-party partner for publication and annotation. As such, your letter (with your personal information removed) will be forwarded to Chilling Effects (http://www.chillingeffects.org) for publication. You can see an example of such a publication at http://www.chillingeffects.org/dmca512/notice.cgi?NoticeID=861. A link to your published letter will be displayed in Google’s search results in place of the removed content.
Do you get any say in the publication of your private correspondence with Google? Nope. If you send in the DMCA notice, they’re going to publish it. And saying you don’t want them to do so means exactly nothing.
Congratulations, Google. That’s quite the innovative way to cut down on the amount of paperwork with which your legal department has to deal. Because I am damned sure not sending in a complaint under these ludicrous circumstances. The plagiarist in question probably gets all of four visitors per day, and those are all him, desperately hoping someone has finally noticed his little site. I, personally, am content to allow him to remain in freakish obscurity…
Since I can’t, you know, challenge him to a duel.
UPDATE: Well, freakboy has decided to out himself by whinging on this very blog, so it might be a good idea for you fellow blogging folks to check and see how much of YOUR work they have likewise lifted from your sites. Not only is he sufficiently stupid as to copy/paste Robb’s entire post, but he was idiotic enough to allow a pingback, which is what tipped us off in the first place. He clearly doesn’t quite grasp this whole blogging thing, maybe we should take up a donation to buy him a ball. He can’t hurt himself with a ball, right?
Googlebomb: Plagiarist, plagiarism, plagiarizing. Plagiarist, plagiarism, plagiarizing. Plagiarist, plagiarism, plagiarizing. Plagiarist, plagiarism, plagiarizing.
Related Entries:
8 Comments | Posted in Hip Waders Required
We work for a living, this site is simply a labor of love. If you choose to support us with a small donation, we thank you most gratefully.
Reading List