Friday, November 30, 2007

Wha?


Well this is embarrassing, I went to change the header for AWL and I couldn't get anything larger than a thumbnail to show up. I unchecked "shrink to fit" and got it a bit bigger, but still, it's not right. I'll have to fix it later, as there are owls out there that need harassment.

***Update: Nothing is fixed at Blogger yet. I got the header to work by posting it at Image Shack. That works but it's a pain to change images and, if my memory serves me, some image hosts will delete your stuff just to test their delete button. I've finished the American Gothic (Rage) painting but I don't want to replace it until this site gets right. I've been doing lots of paint, just fooling around. Here's one I won't cry if it gets lost- Rage Biscuits:



Surge Must Really be Working


This morning I read some HuffiPo weenie saying that Murtha's statement that the surge is working was too nuanced for conservatives to understand, and it made me a bit nostalgic. Remember the (Kerry) nuanced days? I remember being happy back then that the L's were settling for thinking of themselves as better nuance detectors: it gave them a tiny feeling of superiority, and ego boost, that I think is the core of why they're liberals in the first place. It kept them off the streets so to speak.

Anyway, the Huffist's point was that there is still an Iraqi political problem, and you conservatives don't know that, despite good D's like Murtha telling you with their nuance. Me, I'm just happy we have guys like this to entertain us.

Others will just turn nasty as it sinks in that some things are going right in Iraq:



I have to wonder if she went home thinking that she had struck a blow for the cause. One day: "What did you do in the revolution, grandma?"
"I called the President a monkey."

Talk Talk Talk

Here's a scientific study that may not be so bad:

Women may have a reputation as the chattier gender, but research into the matter shows that men may actually be a little more talkative than women—though it all depends on the situation....

....One clear point that emerged from all the studies was that the type of activity people were engaged in influenced how much they talked.

"So even though on the average we're finding a slight trend toward men being more talkative than women, we found larger differences when you looked at particular situations," Leaper said.
As a man, (and actually, as a lumberjack, which, really, counts as something like one and a half men) I can accept these findings. That is assuming you count the total number of words. For instance, in some situations, I'll repeat "yes dear" over and over.... whereas in other situations, I'll often say things like: "the light is red!" or "that was our exit," and "that's what your turn signal is for." Often followed up by: "please stop hitting me," and prayers of thanksgiving at having arrived at our destination more or less safely. So, yes, in some situations, men are more talkative than women.

Thursday, November 29, 2007

I Like Fish




Santa's Going to Get Me!



Here's a been-there-done-that. Not sure if this is the one I ran across a few years back but it's got some great scared-of-santa pictures. I don't know why we always assume that children will be delighted by Santa, or clowns, or giant Mouses. "Come on Timmy, we want to get a picture of you sitting on the monster's lap."

Ron Who?



So it's clear now why such a lovely woman picked Dennis Kucinich: she likes her men wild and crazy:

"I'm thinking about Ron Paul" as a running mate, Kucinich told a crowd of about 70 supporters at a house party here, one of numerous stops throughout New Hampshire over the Thanksgiving weekend.
I'll bet you anything he's got a switch in his pocket that makes that bow tie spin.

Nick Nolte, American Bigfoot

Tim Blair dug up this old movie poster from a time when gas was 19 cents a gallon, and wondered what a modern "hard driving" movie would be like.
Well, first, Nick Nolte would be in it. He'd be a retired oil company exec with a love for making carbon. His rival would be a Green Peace Dweeb, who thinks the earth is fragile.


Nick (duhhh) gets the girl.

Wednesday, November 28, 2007

Human Magnet


Where'd did spoons go?

AFP

AFP puts all the words into one sentence:

LONDON (AFP) - A 91-year-old great-great-grandmother was reunited with a daughter she gave up for adoption towards the end of World War II at a pub in western England on Tuesday.
Written by the same guys who write tree manuals.

Tuesday, November 27, 2007

A Question They're Asking in Paris Right Now



SFW but check volume

William Blake


It's William Blake's birthday today, so I thought it appropriate:

Energy is an eternal delight, and he who desires, but acts not, breeds pestilence.
-William Blake
What's that mean? No need to go elsewhere for literary interpretations: it means drill in ANWR!

No need to thank me.

Teddy Writes


Here's one that won't be on my wish list:

WASHINGTON - Senator Edward M. Kennedy has agreed to a multimillion dollar deal with Hachette Book Group USA to pen his memoirs, giving the veteran Massachusetts lawmaker a forum for his own perspective on a life and career that has been examined by others in countless books and articles, negotiators of the deal confirmed yesterday.

Neither Kennedy's office nor the publishing house would reveal the size of the package, but a publishing figure familiar with the deal said Kennedy's payment was one of the largest in history, eclipsing the $8 million given to New York Senator Hillary Clinton....
Sure it will eclipse Clinton's deal, her books don't have outdoor adventure.


Monday, November 26, 2007

Largest Flag

Easily a world record:

MASADA, Israel (AP) — The record for the world's largest flag now belongs to an Israeli banner produced by a Filipino evangelical Christian.

The huge blue and white flag, measuring 2,165 feet long and 330 feet wide and weighing 5.7 tons, breaks the record for the world's largest, according to the Israeli Ministry of Tourism.

The flag was unfurled Sunday beneath the ancient Jewish desert fortress of Masada. Representatives of the Guinness Book of Records measured the flag and later confirmed the record.


And before the Guinness folks could get on their plane, along comes another record: Palestinians with some of the largest matches ever seen:


As It Should Be


Nice to see things like this:

“Redacted" - which “could be the worst movie I've ever seen," said critic Michael Medved -took in just $25,628 in its opening weekend in 15 theaters, which means roughly 3,000 people saw it in the entire country. “This, despite an A-list director, a huge wave of publicity, high praise in the Times, The New Yorker, left-leaning sites like Salon, etc.

And You Thought I Was Bad


You should read them all, Worst Analogies Ever Written in a High School Essay:

From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you're on vacation in another city and "Jeopardy" comes on at 7 p.m. instead of 7:30.
-- Roy Ashley, Washington

Another Buffalo Heist

Who am I to doubt the man's story?

Dr. Abdul Manan, a surgeon at the Nishtar hospital in Multan, points to an x-ray of a glass bottle lodged in a man's lower abdomen November 21, 2007. A 60-year-old man came to the hospital to have the Pepsi bottle removed, which he said armed thieves had inserted in his anus before robbing him of two buffalos, Manan said. REUTERS/Asim Tanveer (PAKISTAN)
I can imagine it happening that way, I suppose. I mean, the stolen buffaloes are a darned nice touch, if it's not true. Another possibility: the guy bets his buffaloes on a pair of kings, the other guy shows trip 7's so the old man, knowing the wife will kill him, thinks a bit...... "quick, somebody get me a Pepsi bottle."

Friday, November 23, 2007

Not Funny

Desperate measures: Toni Vernelli was steralised at
age 27 to reduce her carbon footprint

Well, bless her pointy little head. Have you heard about these ecochondriacs announcing that they're being sterilized because having kids would be too much of a strain on the earth? I want to say, "good, less of that kind of fool has to be a good thing." But this is serious business. And getting permanent birth control is a serious mistake.

I know this because I was a seriously stupid kid in the 1970's and I got a vasectomy for exactly the same reasons. And the same people, Malthusians, were promoting it then. They even subsidized it. A vasectomy cost me $100.00, the difference was paid by (other) well meaning liberals. The same people were completely covering the cost of vasectomies in India, and giving each recipient a transistor radio for his trouble. Why was this so important? Because the world wouldn't make it to the year 2000 otherwise. At the time nobody thought to ask why these ideas hadn't proved true since Thomas Malthus first expressed them in 1798.

Like I said, the vasectomy was cheap and easy, only hurt moderately, and was done with good intentions. Later, when I realized my pointy headed mistake, the reversal of it was hugely expensive, monstrously painful, enormously painful, very uncomfortable, and the smartest thing I've ever done. (and side note: it hurt)

So, if you, or anyone you know, is considering this; consider that Malthus, and all the many Neo-Malthusians since, have been wrong. And also consider that tied tubes and vasectomies are not always reversible.

Thursday, November 22, 2007

Then There's This


em·pa·thy [em-puh-thee]
–noun
1. the intellectual identification with or vicarious experiencing of the feelings, thoughts, or attitudes of another.


In a Nutshell


Michelle Malkin asked for posters in response to Arianna Huffington's anti-republican poster campaign. Here's mine, though I should note that the words and images (excepting Harry) are taken frhttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gifom The Advisor, a semimonthly publication of the Multi-National Security Transition Command – Iraq. You can get on the mailing list by sending a request to:

pao@iraq.centcom.mil

It's a great resource for news of what is really happening in Iraq.

***Update: another one-



Sticky Notes has more.

***Also: "Nancy the Mangler" should have gone in this post-



Wednesday, November 21, 2007

Did Someone Say Tee?

I'm not saying for sure that there will be a AWL t-shirt, but if there is, it'll look something like this. Mainly it will depend on how Cafe Press puts the images on the shirt. If it's that thick iron-on rubberized stuff then I don't think this much area would work. Like Rage Boy, I hate t-shirts that don't breathe. Hate um.


Rageboy Runs Out of Things to Rage About


Clicked over to e-Claire today and saw an old friend: Rage Boy (aka Shakeel Ahmad Bhat). Yeah! She had an image I hadn't seen before, and a link to a story about the excitable youth. The story was something of a let-down. They quoted blog comments as though they represented mainstream thought. Something about us hating the guy. Myself, I mainly just made fun of him, but if you want to find hate on the internet, it will be there. Look it up: there are those who hate napkins, clothespins, everything.

But the good news is: there were two new images there for photoshoppers to fiddle with. I know it will keep me busy for a month. Speaking of which:





Happy Thanksgiving




Happy T-day everyone. Hope the Great Turkey brings you
everything you want, and that the TSA personnel are gentle.


Edged out Rosie


NRO pointed to this little device which ranks your blog on the reading level required. I suppose there are probably penalties if you're caught reading a blog above your station in life, but that's what anonymous proxies are for.

OK, I'll admit I'm a little disappointed at AWL-Jack's rank. We came in at "undergrad". Probably because I sometimes defenestrate conventional grammar. (and maybe tying up presidential candidates costs a grade or two)


But is the little device accurate? OK lets calibrate it on the low end. Rosie gets:

Hmmmmm. May be reading a little high. OK, how about The Huffington Post?


Yesssss, and (spikes the ball). Ariana can take a little ribbing but I expect I'll get another "U R stinko" e-mail from Rosie.

***Update: (with a hat-tip to our commander in chief) Lumberjacks sometimes is:



Tuesday, November 20, 2007

Wish I'd Thought of This


Diary of a writer on strike

sent in by Sto

Where In the World?



Here's a fun one. Click on where you think the cities are. I amazed myself with some of my clicks... that means LUCK is a factor. Well, punk, do you feel lucky?

via Plime

Stem Cells

Actually the story came out a few days ago. I wanted to post then but I was waiting to see what the MSM had to say. I guess it took a few days to fact check this one. (editors thinking 'no, say it's not true' and probably conducting a secret funeral for the notion that conservatives just hated Michael J Fox, and Christopher Reeves...) Anyway, three days later they have the story:

Two teams of scientists are reporting today that they turned human skin cells into what appear to be embryonic stem cells without having to make or destroy an embryo — a feat that could quell the ethical debate troubling the field....

Researchers and ethicists not involved in the findings say the work should reshape the stem cell field. At some time in the near future, they said, today’s debate over whether it is morally acceptable to create and destroy human embryos to obtain stem cells should be moot.

“Everyone was waiting for this day to come,” said the Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, director of education at the National Catholic Bioethics Center. “You should have a solution here that will address the moral objections that have been percolating for years,” he added.
Most likely, Nancy Pelosi has been crying for days. Ted Kennedy apparently has started drinking, and there are reports that Hillary Clinton is getting irritable and short-tempered with her staff. So they've either read the news, and are depressed by it; or, it's a typical Tuesday for the Democrats.

Don't Play With Your Food



and there's more


Monday, November 19, 2007

Lil' Girl, Big Voice




Cut from Star King #38 featuring 15 year old singer (she is actually only 14 but they took her korean age which +1), Charice Pempengco from the Philippines belting out "And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going".

Sunday, November 18, 2007

The Writers Strike Continues


So here's an un-aired clip from the good old days. (while the producers look for someone else with the skill to write: "...and Jack emerges from the explosion, the terrorists jump into waiting helicopters and make their getaway...")


They Get Paid for This?

Thank goodness people this dumb aren't involved in anything important like computer-modeling the climate. Oh wait, they are:

Researchers who studied the impact of initials found that baseballs players whose first or last name starts with the letter K, which signifies a strikeout, tended to strike out more often than other players.

And students whose names start with the letters C or D, which denote mediocre marks in some grading systems, did not perform as well as other pupils with different initials.

"Just having the right initial doesn't spontaneously make you a better baseball player, but it can spontaneously make you a slightly worse baseball player," said Leif Nelson, of the University of California, San Diego....

"These are domains where people really, really focus on top performance and still this unconscious desire to match their initial seems to be undermining their performance," Nelson explained in an interview.
There it is. The only question now is: Is Leif Nelson a loonie because of the 'L' of his first name, or is he a nitwit because of the 'N' of his last name.

Saturday, November 17, 2007

Lions for Lambs



The A.V. Club has a great review of Robert Redford's antiwar movie:

Director-producer-star Robert Redford continues his slow descent into irrelevance with Lions For Lambs, a hopelessly stilted political drama that plays like U.S. News & World Report: The Movie. Redford's latest middlebrow muddle is so hopelessly talky, mannered, stagy, overwritten, and didactic that it's hard to believe Aaron Sorkin isn't somehow involved. Michael Peña and Derek Luke play noble working-class soldiers pinned down in Afghanistan, but otherwise, Lambs is devoted almost entirely to interminable, flatly filmed conversations about Important Issues. Not since My Dinner With Andre has a film wandered so far from the old cinematic dictum "show, don't tell."
Of course Mr. Redford lectures. It comes from the liberal conviction that they're the intellectual elite, and we're the dull-normals who need to be spoon fed 'enlightenment'. Odd then, that they're the camp that entertains silly ideas like: 9-11 was an inside job, we went into Iraq to make money for Halliburton, Hugo Chavez is a great leader, and Ché was a hero.

Go figure.

Friday, November 16, 2007

Ouchie

Here's one that will make you squirm in your chair: a Hillary nut-cracker.

h/t Dallas.

Sending a Message


Austin Bay does:

A U.S. AIR BASE IN SOUTHWEST ASIA. -- Today, I put a note on a bomb. To be specific, I took a jet black marking pen and inscribed a 500-pound Joint Direct Attack Munition — JDAM, in the jargon.

Perhaps putting a note on a bomb strikes some as either romantic, foolish or vicious — or a combination of the three. The act certainly has shades, colors and dollops of all these characteristics, and a harsh dash of steeling sentimentalism...

The Dissident Frogman


Hey! the man who put Mickey Mouse ears on Ché is celebrating year five of blogging by crunching some Gore numbers and having a drink.

Technical Difficulties




***Update: As if proof were needed that I read too many Photoshop tutorials:





The Debates

I caught most of the D debate and from what I saw, I could have missed it all without, um, missing anything. One thing of note, when asked if she would support merit based teacher pay, Hillary wouldn't say yes, but she did say we should get rid of the bad ones. (Hello, Hillary? Teacher's union on line one) I don't know if she accidentally said it, or if she'll backtrack on it, but her union overlords won't be happy with that.

One other thing, MM has a clip of Dennis Kucinich trying to get Wolf to call on him, and it looks like he's over eager or something. That really wasn't the case. Wolf had said he was going to ask each candidate about Pakistan, and he went right down the line, but stopped at Kucinich. Insert short person joke here.

Most of it was blaming Bush, and proposing magic. Asked, anyone of the candidates could tell you that all we have to do is fix Iraq then leave. I think it was Obama who said something like, "I would work out a stable government with concessions from the Sunni, Shia and Kurds, which is what we're not doing." Well that's what we have been doing since day one. And I doubt Obama could do any better. Then he would leave the country with a combination of Arab peace keepers and UN troops. Fine. There are several neighboring countries who would love to get their troops into Iraq, but good luck with the UN.

So that's it, magic compromise, magic UN cooperation, magic fixing of schools, borders, and the children, always the children. Oh, and Bush bad. It was like the simplest TV sitcoms, you know how it's going to play out but you watch anyway.

-Oh, and remember the Obama "invade Pakistan" gaffe? He did a finesse on that; on the Pakistan question, he said he would send troops in after the bad guys in the mountains between the border of Pakistan and Afghanistan. Must be some pretty thin mountains.

Thursday, November 15, 2007

Oddity



Here's something odd. I was working on a military installation and found this stone in some recently disturbed soil. Looks to be a headstone from a man who died, or was born in 1904, and who was married to a woman named Bertha. It looks to be a military type headstone because it is only an inch or so thick. Even searching with the county and/or city name, this isn't enough information to track down the grave.

Now beyond the question of whether or not I'm working on top of, or next to, a forgotten graveyard, I'd like to find the origin of this stone just to make it right for the deceased; who, you know, left this world thinking that the rest of us would have the common courtesy not to be parking trucks on their final remains.

So I've got two paths to try: One, to see if this installation has a chaplain, and ask him if he knows of any old graveyards on the grounds. Or two, dig around a little and see if I can find any other pieces of stone. The problem with that is that I might find parts of Bertha as well, and I'm not really up for that. Also, they make bombs at this installation and our government has been known to bury unused bombs when they're no longer needed. So it looks like I'll go the chaplain route. Maybe I can get him, or her, interested in solving this and get out of it completely.

It's a head scratcher though.

Sharia Law

Some people aren't like us:

A court in the ultra-conservative kingdom of Saudi Arabia is punishing a female victim of gang rape with 200 lashes and six months in jail, a newspaper reported on Thursday.

The 19-year-old woman -- whose six armed attackers have been sentenced to jail terms -- was initially ordered to undergo 90 lashes for "being in the car of an unrelated male at the time of the rape," the Arab News reported.

But in a new verdict issued after Saudi Arabia's Higher Judicial Council ordered a retrial, the court in the eastern town of Al-Qatif more than doubled the number of lashes to 200.
Even more odd than the punishment for being a female rape victim was the punishment given her attackers. They got no lashes, and one-to-five year jail terms. Later protests changed this to two-to-nine years, but still no lashes. I imagine the judges are hoping their errant boys will serve the minimum number of days in jail.

But they'll have this woman horribly punished for having the audacity to leave the house. Some people aren't even remotely like us.

Wednesday, November 14, 2007

Taking the High Road


Did you hear the clip of McCain yesterday? In it, a supporter uses derogatory language to describe Mrs. Clinton and the candidate defends Senator Clinton. Good show, I say, we should always take the high road whenever possible.

But it seems CNN didn't think McCain went far enough:

The campaign laments that CNN portrayed the event as though McCain did not defend Clinton forcefully enough. The senator, in the short video clip, expressed his respect for the former first lady.

“The CNN Network, affectionately known as the Clinton News Network, has stooped to an all-time low and is gratuitously attacking John McCain for not sufficiently defending Hillary Clinton enough when a South Carolina voter used the 'B' word to describe her when John McCain stopped into a luncheon yesterday at the Trinity restaurant in Hilton Head, S.C.,” Davis said in his e-mail.
Isn't that just the way it goes with the liberal media? You do the right thing and they blame you for not doing more.

Oh, which reminds me, speaking of high roadedness, this Obama/Clinton tied thing seems to be getting out of hand:






Still Tied


I always imagined the campaign trail was like this: all the candidates playing tricks on each other, tying each other up, say, because one of them is a woman who everyone is picking on just because she plans to ruin health care and raise taxes.


You know, just good natured fun.

Tuesday, November 13, 2007

Obama, Clinton Virtually Tied


That was the headline, "Obama, Clinton Virtually Tied" and of course I was sooo happy to be home again, where Photoshop is.


OK, no need to tell me I've mixed up "literally" and "virtually" again. I like it better my way. Oh, and be thankful I didn't post my first photoshop of this one.

Back Home Again


And I'm busy endangering the owls that got dangerously close to prospering while I was gone.

So while I catch up, here's a fun place to shop. Turn your sound down if you're in an office.

Sunday, November 11, 2007

Some Days the Bear Eats You

What fun. The plane breaks, so after waiting on the runway for two hours, one of us snaps. It's a lady's voice coming from the front of the plane and she's gone full blown nutso. The kind of nuts that, if it was a man, you'd put up your guard because the mayhem was right around the corner. All we could do was hope that the stewardess had some sort of crisis training. Only, ooops! it was the stewardess that had lost control, and she reached the spluttering point, spitting out syllables so fast that none of them had even a chance of coming together with another and forming any kind of coherent thought. At one point I thought she was trying to say something like "finding the biscuit bastard the damdamdamdam," but who knows?

I know what got to her. I had even commented on it before it happened, because back when I was flying all the time, I had seen it several times. When the first announcement came that we might be out here awhile, I said to the kid, "watch, now we're going to go all Lord of the Flies." And sure enough, when things don't go as planned, the passengers for some reason toss the rule book out onto the runway. They started standing in the aisle. One lady put her foot up on the armrest. People were milling around, ignoring the stewardesses, talking loud, and pulling their stowed luggage. And most likely some very important businessman demanded to be let off the plane. Thing is, he picked the wrong stewardess. And, being the straw that broke the camel's back, was rewarded with insane cackling jibber-jabber.

Shortly thereafter, we taxied back to the gate and were shuffled off to comped hotels, in order to get up tomorrow at 4:30 AM and take highly inappropriate flights to unwanted cities with hopes of connecting to other overbooked flights that might get us home. What airline gave me this chorizo grande? I won't name them, first because even this hassle is better than flying with a broken hydraulic line, ans second because I don't want US Airways' lawyers sending me letters.


Saturday, November 10, 2007

Jimmy Plinks a Cat

Jimmy Carter "accidentally" shot his sister-in-law's cat, apparently:

Lamentably, I killed your cat while trying just to sting it. It was crouched, as usual, under one of our bird feeders & I fired from some distance with bird shot. It may ease your grief somewhat to know that the cat was buried properly with a prayer & that I’ll be glad to get you another of your choice.
The "another of your choice" gets me. Her choice? Her choice is you didn't shoot her cat Jimmy.

Friday, November 09, 2007

News


I know Nick Nolte and, believe me, you're no Nick Nolte.


"I'm ready for my close-up Mr. DeMille"

NASA



Spent the day yesterday touring Kennedy Space Center. And I have to say, it's changed a bunch since I was there a dozen years ago. You can easily spend all day there.


And here's secret I probably shouldn't put on the internet: Go to the Imax theater and wait until they tell you to put on your 'glasses of the future', then slip out the back....


and ignore the warnings .....


You will find the actual set where they filmed the "moon landings". Yup, the whole thing was an elaborate hoax. Don't believe me? Get one of the tour guides away from the crowds and ask, "It was much cheaper to do it this way," they'll tell you.

Thursday, November 08, 2007

A Little Late


I know it's a little late but here's some safety nostalgia for you. Seems that we had just tons and tons to fear way back when. Nowadays it's just ninjas you have to fear, oh, and pirates, and the air, and I suppose the water too, and fools in search of martyrdom, and.....

via the Secret Fun Blog, which also has scans of some of those old, cheap, extremely flammable, Halloween costumes.

Wednesday, November 07, 2007

Heroes?


I'm on John Edwards mailing list. [obviously he's a fan] But he surprised me with his latest campaign ploy. It's "Heroes of One America". Great, I thought, he's going to honor the troops, or fire-fighters, or some other deserving group. So I clicked on over to find.... it's whoever wants to nominate themselves and upload their picture. There's a donation involved as well, but isn't that just special? We have found the real heroes and they are us. Requirement? Ability to upload and a desire to feel good about yourself. Sounds like he's found his base.

Darn Not Having Photoshop Handy


Another one that cries out for Photoshop.... Can you see it: put one of those baby-seal-clubbers in the top left quarter of the image, club poised, scanning the sand for any signs of life.... title it "Oh, the Banananity" or something.

The "MSM"

Michelle Malkin points to her NY Post column today. I believe she's hit the nail on the head, read um both.

You don’t have to be a Harvard University re searcher to figure out that the media is infected with liberal bias - or to realize that some left-wing journalists will use any means necessary to create ideological narratives that fit their worldview.

The Rathergate debacle at CBS News - in which faked National Guard memos were used to smear President Bush - was an extreme example. But if you look closely, you’ll find everyday examples of Serious Journalists manufacturing the news and concocting social crises. Amazingly, they always manage to make conservatives look racist, intolerant and evil. Funny how that works…
And me stuck in Lizard Land without Photoshop. My urge is to illustrate the "Primetime Live" (in the NYP article) story of "public displays of affection on a park bench". Course, it's just as well that I can't do it. That would have been a tough one to keep the PG-13 rating on.

Tuesday, November 06, 2007

Strike Effecting Blogs


Yikes, the editors must be on strike two!
Just a programming note.. I'm going to Florida tonight. Be back Sunday night, but until then, blogging may be intermittent. Right, like I won't be able to find the intraweb tubes down there. Fact is, if I hadn't mentioned it, nobody would have noticed the difference.

Yeah, but if I hadn't mentioned it, nobody would have know about me hob-knobbing with Mickey and the Goofman. Good news: whoopie! Bad news: favorite ax has to go in the checked baggage.

Unpeach!


OK, we'll forgive Kucinich for not knowing that impeachment requires a crime, his wife must be a terrible distraction. But I'll remind him that Dick Cheney wasn't the Lone Ranger:

"One way or the other, we are determined to deny Iraq the capacity to develop weapons of mass destruction and the missiles to deliver them. That is our bottom line."

President Clinton, Feb. 4, 1998.


"If Saddam rejects peace and we have to use force, our purpose is clear. We want to seriously diminish the threat posed by Iraq's weapons of mass destruction program."

President Clinton, Feb. 17, 1998.


"Iraq is a long way from [here], but what happens there matters a great deal here. For the risks that the leaders of a rogue state will use nuclear, chemical or biological weapons against us or our allies is the greatest security threat we face."

Madeline Albright, Feb 18, 1998.


"He will use those weapons of mass destruction again, as he has ten times since 1983."

Sandy Berger, Clinton National Security Adviser, Feb, 18, 1998


"[W]e urge you, after consulting with Congress, and consistent with the U.S. Constitution and laws, to take necessary actions (including, if appropriate, air and missile strikes on suspect Iraqi sites) to respond effectively to the threat posed by Iraq's refusal to end its weapons of mass destruction programs."

Letter to President Clinton, signed by Sens. Carl Levin, Tom Daschle, John
Kerry, and others Oct. 9, 1998.


"Saddam Hussein has been engaged in the development of weapons of mass destruction technology which is a threat to countries in the region and he has made a mockery of the weapons inspection process."

Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D, CA), Dec. 16, 1998.


"Hussein has ... chosen to spend his money on building weapons of mass destruction and palaces for his cronies."


Madeline Albright, Clinton Secretary of State, Nov. 10, 1999.


"There is no doubt that . Saddam Hussein has reinvigorated his weapons programs. Reports indicate that biological, chemical and nuclear programs continue apace and may be back to pre-Gulf War status. In addition, Saddam continues to redefine delivery systems and is doubtless using the cover of a licit missile program to develop longer-range missiles that will threaten the United States and our allies."

Letter to President Bush, Signed by Sen. Bob Graham (D, FL,) and others,
Dec, 5, 2001.


"We begin with the common belief that Saddam Hussein is a tyrant and a threat to the peace and stability of the region. He has ignored the mandate of the United Nations and is building weapons of mass destruction and the means of delivering them."

Sen. Carl Levin (d, MI), Sept. 19, 2002.


"We know that he has stored secret supplies of biological and chemical weapons throughout his country."

Al Gore, Sept. 23, 2002.


"Iraq's search for weapons of mass destruction has proven impossible to deter and we should assume that it will continue for as long as Saddam is in power."

Al Gore, Sept. 23, 2002.


"We have known for many years that Saddam Hussein is seing and developing weapons of mass destruction."

Sen. Ted Kennedy (D, MA), Sept. 27, 2002.


"The last UN weapons inspectors left Iraq in October1998. We are confident that Saddam Hussein retains some stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons, and that he has since embarked on a crash course to build up his chemical and biological warfare capabilities. Intelligence reports indicate that he is seeking nuclear weapons..."

Sen. Robert Byrd (D, WV), Oct. 3, 2002.


"I will be voting to give the President of the United States the authority to use force — if necessary — to disarm Saddam Hussein because I believe that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a real and grave threat to our security."

Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA), Oct. 9, 2002.


"There is unmistakable evidence that Saddam Hussein is working aggressively to develop nuclear weapons and will likely have nuclear weapons within the next five years . We also should remember we have alway s underestimated the progress Saddam has made in development of weapons of mass destruction."

Sen. Jay Rockerfeller (D, WV), Oct 10, 2002,


"He has systematically violated, over the course of the past 11 years, every significant UN resolution that has demanded that he disarm and destroy his chemical and biological weapons, and any nuclear capacity. This he has refused to do."

Rep. Henry Waxman (D, CA), Oct. 10, 2002.


"In the four years since the inspectors left, intelligence reports show that Saddam Hussein has worked to rebuild his chemical and biological weapons stock, his missile delivery capability, and his nuclear program.
He has also given aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including al Qaeda members. It is clear, however, that if left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will continue to increase his capacity to wage biological and chemical warfare, and will keep trying to develop nuclear weapons."

Sen. Hillary Clinton (D, NY), Oct 10, 2002


"We are in possession of what I think to be compelling evidence that Saddam Hussein has, and has had for a number of years, a developing capacity for the production and storage of weapons of mass
destruction. "[W]ithout question, we need to disarm Saddam Hussein. He is a brutal, murderous dictator, leading an oppressive regime ... He presents a particularly grievous threat because he is so consistently prone to miscalculation. And now he has continued deceit and his consistent grasp for weapons of mass destruction ... So the threat of Saddam Hussein with weapons of mass destruction is real ...

Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA), Jan. 23. 2003.


***Update:

"During the subsequent vote, Republicans were far along toward helping kill the resolution when they began switching their "yes" votes to "no's," clearly hoping for a public debate that would have showcased the Democrats' most vocal lefties.
Uh-huh, the R's have access to the world wide tubes too, and no doubt have seen the Snopes page too.

It's Official



In an attempt to set a new worlds record, Jackie Bibby spent 45 minutes in bathtub with 87 rattlesnakes. He was successful, shattering his previous record of stupidest-person-on-the-planet.

Friday, November 02, 2007

Cubicle Antics




h/t: Plime

More on Gore's Urban Legend


You should read all of this:

I've had a lot of fun recently with my tiny (and unofficial) slice of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize awarded to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). But, though I was one of thousands of IPCC participants, I don't think I will add "0.0001 Nobel Laureate" to my resume.

The other half of the prize was awarded to former Vice President Al Gore, whose carbon footprint would stomp my neighborhood flat. But that's another story.Large icebergs in the Weddell Sea, Antarctica. Winter sea ice around the continent set a record maximum last month.

Both halves of the award honor promoting the message that Earth's temperature is rising due to human-based emissions of greenhouse gases. The Nobel committee praises Mr. Gore and the IPCC for alerting us to a potential catastrophe and for spurring us to a carbonless economy.

I'm sure the majority (but not all) of my IPCC colleagues cringe when I say this, but I see neither the developing catastrophe nor the smoking gun proving that human activity is to blame for most of the warming we see. Rather, I see a reliance on climate models (useful but never "proof") and the coincidence that changes in carbon dioxide and global temperatures have loose similarity over time.....


Corn Bread



Remember the school cafeteria corn bread of your youth? I remember it mainly as something to fill a kid's stomach, nothing fancy, just kidfodder. Which is why I was so surprised by what is being offered in restaurants these days. It's sweet, has a finer texture, nothing at all like the institutional bricks of my youth. (in fact, my first encounter gave me a scare - I found myself at the table, chewing this sweet new-style bread and for a moment thought, "dear God, I've had a stroke, I'm sitting here eating dessert and I don't even remember having dinner.")

Anyway, I found out the the secret to this fancy corn-bread-nouveau: You just substitute cake mix for the flour in a regular corn bread recipe. I tried it last night and was pretty happy with the result. I tried a half cake mix/half corn meal ratio and the taste was great, though more grainy than the usual restaurant iteration. Which is good: the graininess reminded me of the Texas school system bricks of my youth, which, if you let them dry out for a few days, could be used like sandpaper blocks, and would smooth out Bondo better than any abrasive offered by 3M.

So if you ever feel adventuresome, and like me, suspect that we don't already have too much sugar in our diets, give it a try.

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