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Saturday, August 18, 2012

Air France passengers 'asked to chip in for fuel' after Syrian diversion

Syrian authorities refused credit card payment to refuel the aircraft.

Here's Your Chance To Kill Osama Bin Laden Yourself, for $325

Quite a bargain.  For only $325 and a trip to Minnesota, you can join an elite team of Navy SEALs for a day and tell all your buddies that you were the one who killed the al-Qaeda leader.

My Boyfriend Got His Ex Pregnant with a Turkey Baster

Jerry Springer, call your office.

Gary Kasparov: When Putin's Thugs Came for Me

I was dragged away Friday by a group of police—in fact carried away with one on each arm and leg.

And this: Mr. Putin could not care less about winning public-relations battles in the Western press, or about fighting them at all.

The discovery of a winning strategy for Prisoner's Dilemma is forcing game theorists to rethink their discipline

Their conclusion? Winning isn't everything.

via Geekpress.

Spider with claws. Creepy.

First newly discovered spider family discovered in North America since 1890.

The History of Surfing

For at least 3,000 years, seafaring Polynesians who settled the many islands in the Pacific Ocean have been surfing.

LBJ liked to piss on his bodyguards

LBJ: The President Who Marked His Territory

Real-life meth dealer named Walter White arrested by Alabama police

Life imitates Breaking Bad.

Food-borne illnesses and reusable grocery bags

Health Costs of Plastic Grocery Bag Bans. Maybe it’s actually a good idea to dispose of the materials with which we transport our raw foods.

British schools drop Holocaust from history lessons so as not to offend Muslims

I should say "continue to drop..." since this has been going on for a while:

Comments and links regarding the long list of politically correct changes that gradually are bringing hundreds of British primary and secondary education into conformity with Islamic Sharia law.

In London, 85 of 90 schools have implemented “no pork” policies, and the trend is toward fully Halal.

Teachers are required to teach ‘key Muslim contributions such as Algebra and the number zero’ in math and science courses, even though the concept of zero originated in India.

Muslim leaders are demanding that Islamic preachers be sent to every school in Scotland to teach children about Islam.

Friday, August 17, 2012

Hillary turned down VP slot … two weeks ago?

Hot Air calls it too good to check: the presumed 2016 frontrunner wants to maintain her distance from the campaign.

Obama Edits Official State Department Documents to Tout Himself

Links and comments at Heritage: The State Department has recently ended its long-running series of Background Notes, which were analytical, objective histories of other countries. In their place, new “Fact Sheets” now tout Obama’s policies and actions toward each nation. No more historical context, no recounting of complex and long-standing issues in the country. Just cut to the chase—that is, the time when the current Administration came to power.

And this: 4,100-word Bush document, chock full of facts and figures helpful in analyzing the country and its importance to the U.S., never once mentions the name of any U.S. President. The 300-word section on U.S.–Brazil relations takes up about 7 percent of the document.

Conversely, fully 70 percent (830 words) of the new 1,200 word Brazil Fact Sheet, which is focused exclusively on U.S. relations with Brazil, discusses President Obama either directly by name (twice!) or in the context of the plethora of programs his Administration has launched with Brazil, including a shared “commitment to combat discrimination based on race, gender, ethnicity, or lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) status; to advance gender equality; a bilateral instrument that targets racism; support for HIV/AIDS prevention, promotion of clean energy technologies in Brazil, and mitigation of climate change.”

Remember when he was inserting himself into the biographies of past presidents?

Thursday, August 16, 2012

Israeli sperm banks find quality is plummeting (plus bonus Monty Python)

Sperm quality is down everywhere, but Israel is worse off than other developed countries. Theories about why vary from cellphones in pockets to estrogen in milk or water.

However, as Monty Python told us, Every Sperm is Sacred.

Pink Floyd: The Missing Piano - Wish You Were Here

The story of how the remix puts back in the piano missing from the original.
via NewsAlert.

MSNBC's Toure: Romney Engaged in 'Niggerization' of Obama

Watering down racism to the point where anything qualifies: Apparently "angry" is one of those dog-whistle words.

What exactly did Romney do to earn this reprehensible slur? He said that Obama, whose campaign has already called Romney a racist, a sexist, a felon, and a murderer, should “take [his] campaign of division and anger and hate back to Chicago.”

Hot diggity dog: Obama has no intention of getting rid of Biden

That village in Delaware isn't getting its idiot back yet.

Big Brother: Privacy and the rapid rise of license plate readers

Long, worthwhile article at Ars Technica:  Largely unregulated, cameras now collect millions of travel records every day.

Surprise: No Criminal Case Is Likely in Loss at MF Global

Great news: Prominent Dem and Obama bundler John Corzine probably won’t be prosecuted for $1B+ disappearance of customer funds.
via HotAir:  Imagine that: Prosecutors can’t build a case against a guy who simply doesn’t know where $1.2 billion of his clients money is, but who also managed to raise $500,000 for Obama.

Forbes: GM is heading for bankruptcy again

Not before the election, but soon.

via Dr. Zero, who has excellent comments, including "The exact degree to which the rest of us got soaked so Obama could give GM to his union allies changes constantly as the value of the stock held by We the People fluctuates.  You don’t remember being asked if you would like to become a GM stockholder and willingly accept massive losses to protect highly compensated union jobs, do you?"

Can't wait til he applies the GM model to every industry.

Cow week: Welsh cattle kill dog walking women

Today's installment in Boing Boing's answer to Discovery's Shark Week.

Previous posts:

Bull gores man, follows him until certain he is dead.

Cows kill 27 times more people than sharks do.

And here's Popular Mechanics' cow attack survival guide.

400 chairs arranged into a sine wave


Even better than the picnic table stackers in Spokane.

Thursday links

Gallery: Small Dogs Dressed As Napoleon.

Drunk man falls asleep in a dumpster, gets picked up, compacted twice.

25 European castles you can stay in.

A brief history of the lawnmower.

Weird Animal Defense Mechanisms.

A furred animal shakes itself dry at a characteristic frequency. This video documents the physics of it, in slow motion accompanied by music. 

Giant catfish burgles couple's home

Xu Xianmin and his wife claim the fish sneaked into their home when their backs were turned.

Dishonorable Disclosure - National Security should be above politics

Obama admin turned bin Laden kill into an Intelligence disaster.  Powerline has comments and links.


Usain Bolt's UK Tax Lesson

"As soon as the law changes I'll be here all the time." Punitive tax policy had kept the world's fastest man from competing in Blighty for the past three years.

via Lucianne.

Wednesday, August 15, 2012

Gov. Jan Brewer issues executive order in defiance of president’s Deferred Action program

preventing state from issuing ID/driver's licenses to people who receive deferred immigration action.

Philip K. Dick's Robotic Resurrection

How to Build an Android

Mutant butterflies a result of Fukushima nuclear disaster

Some of the butterflies had abnormalities in their legs, antennae, and abdomens, and dents in their eyes, broken or wrinkled wings, changes in wing size, color pattern changes, and spots disappearing or increasing.

Serial 'picnic table stacker' on the loose in Spokane park

Seems to me that if someone put them together, you shouldn't need a crane to dismantle it...

Shooting at Family Research Council headquarters

Sparce details, at Legal Insurrection.

Prince Philip taken to hospital

BBC: "precautionary measure".

PA Judge refuses to block voter ID law

Victory against fraud.

Cow Week: Bull gores man, follows him until certain he is dead

The second installment in BoingBoing's answer to Discovery's Shark Week.

Previous post:

Cows kill 27 times more people than sharks do.

So BoingBoing is having Cow Week to balance out Shark Week on Discovery.

And here's Popular Mechanics' cow attack survival guide.

Must read: Paradigm shift: Why Iran now NEEDS the bomb

J.E. Dyer on the shifted and shifting balance of power in the Middle East, and with Russia and China.

Tuesday, August 14, 2012

How Paperbacks Transformed the Way Americans Read

Half a century before e-books turned publishing upside down, a different format threatened to destroy the industry.

Record-Breaking Python Found In Everglades With 87 Eggs Inside

Researchers with the U.S. Geological Survey captured a state record-breaking Burmese python that was not only a whopping 17 feet and 7 inches long, but carrying an also-record-breaking 87 eggs. 

I'm apparently the only one appalled that they killed it.

More on the Akula (Russian submarine) in the Gulf of Mexico

J.E. Dyer has some comments and analysis.

Earlier post here.

The Obamacare Quagmire

Complexity and flawed design - the nightmare of implementation.

via Instapundit.

WaPo Poll on voter ID - 74% in favor

Which should be obvious.

Biden: Romney's going to "put y’all back in chains"

Anyone else hear a dog whistle?

Russian submarine operated undetected in the Gulf of Mexico for several weeks

Growing military assertiveness by Moscow and deficiencies in U.S. anti-submarine warfare capabilities.

Will Your Doctor Quit? Obamacare Foretells Mass Exodus From Patient Care

83 percent of physicians surveyed are thinking of quitting because of Obamacare, and 90 percent feel that the U.S. health care system is now heading in the wrong direction.

Many doctors are quietly thinking about "exit strategies" to leave clinical practice if ObamaCare is not repealed.

via @PaulHsieh

Ponnuru: Women, Men, and Paychecks

Don’t Blame Discrimination for Gender Wage Gap.

Video: Daddy Skills, A Rap Music Video About The Adventures of Fatherhood

This is from 2012, from a father of two young boys and triplet toddlers:



 Daddy Skills, A Rap Music Video About The Adventures of Fatherhood:


Reminds me of those Swagger Wagon commercials.  Via Laughing Squid.

Diaper smells: why my baby is less disgusting than yours

The 'plasticity of disgust' - consistent with underarm research which found that we prefer our own odors.

Cows kill 27 times more people than sharks do

So BoingBoing is having Cow Week to balance out Shark Week on Discovery.

And here's Popular Mechanics' cow attack survival guide.

Obama's Strange Dependence on Valerie Jarrett

Interesting insights at American Thinker.

Ill. state workers forced to attend Pelosi, Jesse Jackson Jr. event on taxpayer dime

Details at Daily Caller.

Monday, August 13, 2012

Mission Creep Leads TSA to Racially Profile in Pursuit of Non-Terrorists to Arrest

The TSA has no business looking for drugs, outstanding arrest warrants, or immigration problems unless it has serious reason to believe that the person involved poses a serious threat to air safety. If it is going to serve as an extension of every other sort of law enforcement, then its searches should be subject to the same requirements for probable cause.

Video: Lifelike talking-points robot doesn’t like being reminded that Ryan’s Medicare plan won’t affect seniors

Surprisingly persistent Wolf Blitzer with Debbie WS.

How Harry Reid has been pulling strings for Chinese solar energy company

Dirty Harry’s Clean Energy Cronyism

Overregulation: The problem we can’t outproduce

The excellent J.E. Dyer: most new jobs – about 70% — have always been created by small businesses in America, and those small businesses are being steamrolled by regulation.  Regulation is having a serious impact even on big business, and all its costs are passed on to the customer.  “Business” doesn’t pay for anything; you pay for it all.  If you don’t, the business isn’t viable, and you don’t have those big, clean grocery stores with thousands of products, or gas stations charging competitive prices on every corner.  Either you pay all the costs of regulation, or the product isn’t available.

And this: We get used to regulation.  It deters new hires, it puts small firms out of business, it makes everything cost more for us and reduces all our options and opportunities – but it operates by stealth, and most of us don’t even know it’s affecting us.

Recipe for ice cubes

Recipe for ice cubes.  The comments are especially good.

via Geekpress.

Chad Johnson cut by Dolphins following arrest

For domestic abuse.  Miami took a chance on him with a no-risk, incentive-laden contract. By cutting him before the season, the Dolphins don’t owe him a dime.

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/08/13/2948989/chad-johnson-cut-by-miami-dolphins.html#storylink=cpy

Monday links

100 Greatest Maniacal Movie Laughs.

The Bohr-Einstein Debates, With Dog Puppets.

The Nutmeg Wars.

Undead Disney Princesses: Snow White, Ariel &  Cinderella as Zombies.

Back To The Future II Hoverboard Test Footage.

10 of the Most Impressive Old Aqueducts.

Sunday, August 12, 2012

Defense cuts will define VA in November

Virginia, with its many defense contractors and military installations, fares worst of all under the cuts, with $9.8 billion and more than 122,000 private-sector jobs on the line.

Darrell Issa to Sue Eric Holder Monday

Fast and Furious.

Aleppo is becoming Syria's Stalingrad

"We are prepared to see the city destroyed before we give it up."

NASA’s James Hansen is just wrong: Proof that there is no increased drought in the USA tied to temperature

Anthony Watts has lots of data and good explanations.

The Federal Government's War On Medical Innovation

Increasing taxes and regulations will hamper innovation and cost American lives.

The science of "gaydar".

(or lack thereof).

via Geekpress.

Olympic Physics: Diving and the Moment of Inertia

Wired, with video demo.

Dave Barry: It is time for the purest Olympic sport

Agility, balance, grace and the ability to twirl a ribbon while wearing vast quantities of makeup.

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/08/12/2946514/dave-barry-it-is-time-for-the.html#morer#storylink=cpy

Romney-Ryan Looking For A Fight On The Issues

Substance-driven race? Maybe.

"A running mate who is more presidential than the incumbent."

Lowry at NRO: Just the ticket.

The end of the NFL?

Comments on George Will's column on NFL injuries.

I agree with this: There have been some serious advances in football equipment over the years, but many of them are largely sledgehammer fixes to problems requiring tweezers. It seems to me that player equipment could be made more protective from high momentum impact damage without turning it into a spacesuit unsuitable for game day. Let’s not give up on the greatest game in America. Let’s get some top minds to work on making it safer while retaining the legendary character of it that we know and love.

Yesterday was Presidential Joke Day

19 Presidential Jokes.

100 Greatest Maniacal Movie Laughs

Mwahaha.

A man can never have too much red wine, too many books, or too much ammunition

Kipling quote du jour.

The Ryan schools Obama on healthcare video

Hiding Spending Doesn't Reduce Spending.

How the Ryan Medicare plan really works

Yuval Levin at NRO.

Stranded jet-skier saunters through JFK safeguards

He effortlessly overcame the Port Authority’s $100 million, supposedly state-of-the-art security system at JFK Airport — walking undetected across two runways and into a terminal.

via Instapundit.

Detailed scientific explanation of the “wizarding gene” in Harry Potter

Geneticist takes on why the wizarding gene isn't always dominant - dominance does not explain muggle-borns, squibs, or the steady inheritance pattern of magical abilities; but I got your back.  Magical ability could be explained by a single autosomal dominant gene if it is caused by an expansion of trinucleotide repeats with non-Mendelian ratios of inheritance.

via io9.

Germany Has "Reached Its Limit" On Greek Aid

Zerohedge: and reiterated the double-whammy that the ESM should NOT receive a banking license and that the ECB should NOT act as "money printing press in disguise" by extending emergency loans and bypassing EFSF/ESM.

Incredible X-Ray Photography by Nick Veasey

X-ray composite photos of everyday objects.

Small plane crashes, occupants record it from within the plane

Cockpit and the backseat recordings.

Ryan Will Allow Republican Ticket To Make Moral Case For Capitalism

You have to make your own moral case for free enterprise, right from the beginning. No data, no appeals to stats from the Congressional Budget Office. You can bring that stuff in later. When you first open your mouth, it better be to say what’s written on your heart about the country you love and the system that makes us strong and free.

Spengler: Reassuring Romney

If Americans are having a hard time believing in themselves, they know that Mitt Romney believes in them — and it is an authentic, deeply held, lifelong belief. He believes in them concretely, in their businesses and schools and churches, not in the abstract. And that’s exactly what this country needs: a president who can sell the idea of America back to its original owners, the American people.

Porn Star Ron Jeremy Endorses Obama

Presidential endorsements are coming fast and furious, per Yid With Lid.