Posted 12/23/2012 10:37:00 AM by Douglas

What a strange piece on the political and cultural discourse in this country:

Unfortunately for our country, the Bloomberg versus LaPierre contrast is basically all of American politics today. Our society is divided between an ascendant center-left that’s far too confident in its own rigor and righteousness and a conservatism that’s marched into an ideological cul-de-sac and is currently battering its head against the wall.

Even funnier coming from The New York Times.

Posted 11/11/2012 07:48:00 PM by Douglas

What a great video! I hope they show this at the recruiting stops around Johnson Space Center. NASA has done a LOT to get engineers working in the oil and gas industry. Like laying off thousands of them:

Posted 9/18/2012 08:34:00 PM by Douglas

This is what America was up to 150 years ago: The bloodiest day in American History. And here are some stirring pictures from the day. I liked this quote about Brady's photography:

“Mr. Brady has done something to bring home to us the terrible reality and earnestness of war,” a reporter for[sic] the New York Times wrote after a visit to Brady’s studio. “If he has not brought bodies and laid them in our door-yards and along streets, he has done something very like it.”

Posted 9/13/2012 05:36:00 PM by Douglas

It’s good to see the last space shuttle getting some air-time before it gets mothballed out in L.A., but this is a bit ridiculous.

After taking off from the former shuttle landing strip Monday morning, Endeavour and its carrier jet will fly low over Kennedy and the beaches of Cape Canaveral, then head west toward NASA points along the Gulf of Mexico. The pair will swoop over Stennis Space Center in Mississippi and Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans, where the shuttle booster rockets were made.

Next stop: Ellington Field near NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston.

Endeavour will remain at Ellington until Wednesday morning so space center employees can see the shuttle up close. Houston had bid for a shuttle; the loss still nags many there. NASA chose New York City as the winner for the shuttle prototype Enterprise, which was relinquished by the Smithsonian to make room for Discovery.

After leaving Houston on Wednesday, Endeavour will stop for fuel at Biggs Army Airfield in El Paso, Texas, and then perform a low flyover of the White Sands Test Facility in New Mexico, which served for decades as an emergency shuttle landing site. Then it will head to NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base in California, another old shuttle touchdown venue.

On Thursday, Endeavour will fly to Northern California, home to Ames Research Center in Mountain View. NASA plans low-level flights over San Francisco, Sacramento and other major cities before heading to Los Angeles and a late-morning arrival at Los Angeles International Airport.

NASA was mum Thursday regarding the exact times of all these flyovers for security reasons. Officials warned that the weather needed to cooperate to allow for such a full and busy schedule.

Did you catch that? After that rather lengthy description of the shuttle’s whereabouts, all for the express purpose of public visibility, NASA claims it can’t tell the exact times, because of security. Doesn’t that kind of defeat the purpose? As well as coming pretty close to becoming a scene in Airplane!

Ted Striker: My orders came through. My squadron ships out tomorrow. We're bombing the storage depots at Daiquiri at 1800 hours. We're coming in from the north, below their radar.
Elaine Dickinson: When will you be back?
Ted Striker: I can't tell you that. It's classified.

It’s just that silly. They approve:

Labels: Airplane

Posted 9/13/2012 05:08:00 PM by Douglas

Some headlines are supposed to sound like good news, but you just know that they aren’t. “Rectal probes get 0.2mm smaller!” or “IRS sending out lavender scented audits this fall” all sound like good ideas that just aren’t. Enter the Fed and their shenanigans from today:

Fed unveils bold, open-ended steps to aid economy

FINALLY! After TARP, and the Stimulus, and the Detroit bailout, you would think that the printing presses at the Fed have printed just about all the phony fiat currency that the system can support. Well you’d be wrong:

As part of its bold and open-ended plan, the Fed said it would spend $40 billion a month to buy mortgage bonds to make home buying more affordable. That will be the third round of bond-buying in an effort to spur the economy, and the Fed left open the possibility of taking other steps to encourage borrowing and financial risk-taking.

This has relatively nothing to do with making homes more affordable, but have you ever noticed that when the government tries to make something “affordable” (college tuition, healthcare, homes), that’s when the price goes through the freakin’ roof. Why is that? Anyway. . .

Some economists suggested that the Fed might continue to buy $40 billion a month in mortgage bonds for up to three years. That’s how long some expect it will take for the unemployment rate to dip below 7 percent, toward a ‘‘normal’’ rate of 6 percent or less.

If the new bond buying lasts three years, Ashworth said it would add about $1.4 trillion to the Fed’s purchases. That would be close to the $1.7 trillion the Fed spent in its first round of bond buying, which began in November 2008 and ran until March 2010.

The Fed’s second bond-buying program totaled $600 billion. It ran from November 2010 through June 2011.

OK, Fed, last chance. I know you think there is a magical amount of gasoline you can pour on that fire to put it out. Every time you think that you’ve got the right amount, but every time you’re wrong, and you need more Keynesian gasoline to put out the fire. Maybe this time will do it. Thankfully, no one in America is paying attention. Otherwise, there’d be blood in the streets.

Posted 8/28/2012 02:06:00 PM by Douglas

The reason the obituaries in The London Telegraph changed the way obituaries were written: this guy:

But above all the credit for coming up with a page upon which so many people wish to appear, even if they know they will never see the result themselves, must lie with former Telegraph staffer Hugh Massingberd. He entirely recast the paper’s obituaries in 1986, championing the illuminating anecdote over the dusty details of the curriculum vitae. His insatiable thirst for the Wodehousian character sketch, underpinned by what his own obituary (he died in 2007) described as an “encyclopedic knowledge”, has been the model for each of his successors.

His obit here.

Labels: Telegraph Obits

Posted 7/27/2012 05:37:00 PM by Douglas

It’s lovely to see when the compassionate side of the political spectrum takes the high road, isn’t it?

"We're taking bets (place yours in the comments section below) on how long it will take Sen. Grassley to succumb to heart disease, diabetes, cancer, or some other meat-related disease," the post said.

New flash, grass munchers: this isn’t a zero-sum game. Just because you chose not to eat meat and live longer, pointless lives, does NOT mean that meat eaters are doing so because they want to die early. they want to die early because they’re just so tired of listening to you whine. OK, my burger is killing the planet, I know. . .can I just eat it and peace and not listen to your mono-tone drivel for a few minutes? But it gets better:

"One simple way to reduce your environmental impact while dining at our cafeterias is to participate in the "Meatless Monday" initiative," the USDA newsletter said. "This international effort, as the name implies, encourages people not to eat meat on Mondays.

"How will going meatless one day of the week help the environment? The production of meat, especially beef (and dairy as well), has a large environmental impact. According to the U.N., animal agriculture is a major source of greenhouse gases and climate change. It also wastes resources."

Here’s another New flash: The absolute best way to “reduce your environmental impact?” They only way that’s really effective, actually: KILL YOURSELF. Your very existence on this planet, even if you sustain yourself in a 4X10 foot veal pen and eat nothing but soy slurry and bathe in your own urine, guess what? By your definition, THE PLANET IS BETTER OFF WITHOUT YOU. So why wait?

Posted 6/24/2012 05:20:00 PM by Douglas

This video is GENIUS! What a perfect solution to the problems of the planet: Launching French people towards the sun. If only we’d had this technology 300 years ago:

Posted 6/21/2012 05:30:00 PM by Douglas

It's not that I don't think this is a good idea, I'll admit, it's a pretty clever toothbrush. I have no idea what the "Red dot design" awards are, but something tells me they're setting the bar incredibly low if a toothbrush with a spigot is winning:

Posted 5/21/2012 05:47:00 PM by Douglas

Awesome time-lapse video of the eclipse this weekend. Too bad they didn't know the eclipse was coming with enough time for them to clean their lens. I always wanted to know what pac-man looked like through a microscope from my 10th grade biology lab.

Posted 5/21/2012 05:44:00 PM by Douglas

I'm always amazed at what gets printed in the Amarillo Globe-News. You wouldn't expect to find such a fire and brimstone ranting to make it into a major newspaper. Who am I kidding, the AGN isn't a major newspaper. Exhibit A:

Biblical prophecies reveal the Antichrist is going be a Muslim from the Middle East, Christ will ride on the clouds into Egypt, Turkey will invade Israel and the United States will be victorious in the fight against the Antichrist, \Batshit Crazy/ told a crowd of about 120 Friday.

The self-described former terrorist and Islam-to-Christianity convert spoke in Lubbock at a special insight rally

[Note: The name \Batshit Crazy/ was used to curb this moronathon's google traffic.]

Ok, fine, some kook reads the Bible after napping by an improperly vented gas heater. . . this is nothing new. The rivers will run red with the blood of those that don't properly sort their laundry, or whatever minutia you're splitting from the unquestioned word of God (that was written and edited by men, oh by the way). So what can we expect this time around? Hit me with some crazy:

She invited \Batshit Crazy/, she said, “because \Batshit Crazy/ teaches (and) confirms with the Scriptures that God is going to judge the Middle East, and America is going to be saved. Our oil is going to gush. Our gas is going to gush. He is going to remove people who have the control, and we’ll be the largest oil and gas producers in the world — based on what the Bible says.”

Hear that folks? Might want to buy your Halliburton stock now and avoid the rush.

Posted 5/10/2012 06:34:00 PM by Douglas

So President Obama has come out publicly with a tacit approval of gay marriage. Ok, this shouldn't really surprise anyone, but what's remarkable isn't that he did it, but rather how he did it. Is it not clear to anyone paying attention that this is an election year ploy for media attention? Personally, I can't wait for flag burning to rear its ugly head in the public discourse, but it's only May, and a long time 'till November. So let's look at what he actually said:

President Barack Obama, who said in the past that his views on gay marriage were 'evolving,' said today he thinks same-sex couples should be able to get married. But he also said that gay marriage is an issue for states to decide. Currently, there isn't any federal action in the works to make gay marriage legal. NBC's Chuck Todd reports.

Well that's just great, isn't it? Can't you already hear the MSNBC/FoxNews drums starting to beat? "FINALLY, equality for all," vs. "He's destroying OUR values." Well, no.

I'm sure I'm not the ONLY one in America that thinks it's HILARIOUS that he thinks this is a "State's Rights" issue. Really? Same-sex couples should be allowed to get married, yet only if the state they live in agrees with it? Wow, what a declaration. Compare that to the FEDERAL mandate of the FEDERAL drug war, busting down doors all over the country because someone's neighbor thought they were smoking weed. Or even worse, Obamacare, which he declared was a "right of every American citizen," as he spent every ounce of political capital of his first term to pass. Does he think gay people are this stupid, too, to not see through this political rhetoric? THIS DOESN'T HELP THEM. It's cool and all that Barry can go hang out and raise money with Clooney and other Hollywood liberals that already agree with him, but this does absolutely nothing to the comitted gay couple that seeks a legal union.

The beauty in this statement is that he knows it has about as much momentum as a Denny's waitress telling you she likes pie. So the smart move, on his part at least, is to let the FoxNews/Republican (do we need to differentiate them anymore?) spin machine collapse on itself on this one. Because when it does, it's going to come out that Mitt's grandfather was a polygamist. Hard to defend the sanctity of marriage when you have nine grandmothers, and really, isn't this all about taking down Mitt?

But the point, if I have one, is that marriage may, in fact, be a timeless unification of a man and a woman in the eyes of God. But the State of South Carolina doesn't give a shit about that, and over 50% of American marriages end in divorce, so there's something a LOT less Holy about all this straight marriage talk in that light. If you stand up before your friends, family and God and swear to be with this person "'till death do us part," and you file divorce papers because she deleted all your shows from the DVR, it really takes a LOT less possibility of Steve and Larry's marriage ruining the country, doesn't it? I say let them get married (AND divorced) and see how Larry feels about losing half HIS shit and paying alimony to Steve. What's good for the goose is good for the. . uh, goose?

But the other aspect of this debate is that gay marriage is going to somehow "open the floodgates" to people being allowed to marry animals or buildings. To that I say SO WHAT? Other than the wedding night between the dude and the goat, does anyone feel sorry for the goat? Looking at the legal aspect of marriage again, it's largely a way to account for (and disburse) property. So what about all the crazy people that have left their wealth to their cats? Were they "married" to the cats? Legally, they might as well have been, but honestly, do you really care if some crazy chick marries a cat?

I know I don't, and if you do, you should proably find anything that is a better use of your time. Might I suggest lawn darts?

Also, this random, disjoined post is a reminder to me why I don't blog anymore.

Posted 4/27/2012 05:49:00 PM by Douglas

Do we need more than the headline on this one:

Strippers say accused pimp 'Jell-O' is innocent

Oh, Jell-O, didn't you learn anything from Santa Clause? Even he stopped after 3 HOs. . .

Posted 4/25/2012 05:51:00 PM by Douglas

P.J. O'Rourke just keeps getting better and better the older and drunker he gets. Enter this round of making fun of the adult man-child that sill wears shorts.

When I board an airplane these days, all the middle-aged men are dressed like me—when I was an 8-year-old. They’re in shorts and T-shirts. And it’s not just on airplanes. It’s in business offices, teachers’ lounges, and churches.

Yeah, there's really no reason for a grown man to dress like Dennis the Menace. His last line nails it:

And (we’re not getting younger) you can’t go to the grave wearing shorts and a T-shirt, either. The one place where a dress code reliably obtains is among morticians. You will be wearing a suit when you’re dead.

If your family and friends have never seen you in a suit before, there’s a chance that you’ll be mistaken for the funeral director. You really don’t want people leaning over your casket, asking, “How much is this costing us?”

Time to put on some big-boy pants!

Labels: P.J. O'Rourke

Posted 4/21/2012 02:45:00 PM by Douglas

Why is it that when the federal government steps in to make something more affordable, the price ends up going through the roof? This guy takes a shot at housing and college education, but I think you could throw health care in there, too. So why not use it to drive up the price of illegal drugs?

That got me thinking, what would the government do if it wanted to price most consumers out of the market? What would it take for government to make cocaine prohibitively expensive for most people?

It's not as silly as it sounds to anyone paying attention to the drug war, and I'm sure the usual chorus of anti-drug people would flip out, but what's really funny is that most people that currently use illegal drugs would hate for their drugs to become legal. It would make it immensely more difficult to get.

Posted 4/10/2012 05:12:00 PM by Douglas

My dog has no nose!

How does it smell?

TERRIBLE!

Posted 4/10/2012 05:10:00 PM by Douglas

Here's an interesting twist to free speech: NOT forcing workers to pay union dues violates the union's free speech:

Attorneys for the International Union of Operating Engineers Local 150 argue in a court brief that Indiana's new law, which allows workers to not pay union dues even if a union bargains on their behalf, interferes with the union's free speech rights and "impinges on this fundamental right of union membership."

I'm not 100% sure this argument didn't come from our friends at The Onion.

Posted 3/28/2012 05:06:00 PM by Douglas

I'm so tired of hearing about "pink slime" I could throw up. But as opposed to adding to the hysteria, I would just like to add a few salient points about the status of the meat processing industry in our country and meat that it provides. First off, it's not perfect, and it's looking to maximize profits. This shouldn't be news to most rationally thinking adults, but that's certainly not the country we live in, either. Enter this limey twit and his introduction to the term "pink slime" in this video that would have made Goebbels proud in the level of overly emotionalized misinformation it contains.

Can we get one thing straight? We don't buy meat from a man whose first name we know. . . that carves off a steak from a cow we raised from a calf. OK, some people still do, but that's not the rest of the 98% of us. We buy processed meat slathered in chemicals, wrapped in cellophane and if we're lucky, refrigerated. You could make the argument, as so many others have in the past, that we shouldn't eat meat, and that may be true, but that doesn't change the fact that those of us in first world countries do choose to eat meat. So you're going to be stuck with the 'left overs' of the dis-assembly line of a bovine carcass at some point and the decision of what to do with it.

We've seen in recent weeks numerous grocery stores, school cafeterias and yes, even fast food burger joints vow to give up their "pink slime" component of their burgers. Why? Because it's bad meat, or because of bad PR?

Well the enormous beef producing state of Texas isn't going to take this laying down over a salad, and the Houston Chronicle's liberal wing of the Hearst corporation isn't going to miss any opportunity to make fun of Perry like a petulant Sophomore mocking the principal:

Gov. Rick Perry is defending so-called “pink slime” in a statement issued in conjunction with Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad, Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback, Nebraska Gov. Dave Heineman and South Dakota Lt. Gov. Matt Michels (on behalf of South Dakota Gov. Dennis Daugaard, who’s on a trade mission to China).

Their statement says that the “lean, finely textured beef is a safe, nutritious product that is backed by sound science.”

Here’s how the AP describes the produce, nicknamed pink slime: “The lower-cost ingredient is made from fatty bits of meat left over from other cuts. The bits are heated and spun to remove most of the fat. The lean mix then is compressed into blocks for use in ground meat. The product is exposed to ammonium hydroxide gas to kill bacteria, such as E. coli and salmonella.”

Well ok, you lost me at "ammonia", but go on to read Perry's statement:

Lean, finely textured beef is a safe, nutritious product that is backed by sound science. It is unfortunate when inaccurate information causes an unnecessary panic among consumers.

It's just hard for me to imagine anyone that would turn their nose up at this and still eat what their supermarket calls "ground beef." Is there really a difference? People buying ground beef don't think this is some "good" cut of beef they decided to grind up into patties, do they? Ground beef is, and always will be, "what's left." That doesn't make it bad. That doesn't make it good, either; it just depends what you do with it.

In the time it took me to write that sentence, Oscar Mayer just sold another four tons of bologna, which was, the last time I checked, pink and comprised of what some might consider 'meat.'

Am I the only one that wonders if these same moms that cry so loud against "pink slime" in their children's cafeteria food are the same moms that give their kids a bologna & cheese sandwich when they get home from school? Can we focus on some real problems in the meat packing industry instead of some overly sensationalized topic by some limey twit that's trying to drum up ratings for his crappy cable show?

Posted 3/17/2012 09:18:00 PM by Douglas

Remember when America was the bastion of technology for the world? That was fun, wasn't it? Anyway, here's a great video of the brief but exciting life of a Space Shuttle solid rocket booster. 400 seconds of pure hell:



"Enhanced" sound should say "completely made up" sound. . .

Posted 3/15/2012 03:44:00 PM by Douglas

The Federal government is spending $54 million of your dollars over the next 12 weeks to get people to quit smoking. This might be a good idea if the tobacco companies weren't spending $27 million a day to get you to start.

An anti-smoking advocate praised the new effort.

"The campaign is long overdue," said Matthew Myers, president of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids.

"The scientific evidence is clear that highly charged ads depicting the health effects of smoking are among the most cost-effective ways to reduce tobacco use and reduce the number of kids who start to smoke," he said.

The CDC estimates that because of these ads, 500,000 people will try to stop smoking and about 50,000 will succeed.

That's good and all, and in a perfect work this wouldn't be so silly. But it gets dumber. How much does the Federal government spend each year on growing tobacco? Only $194 million in 2010.

Posted 3/11/2012 08:30:00 PM by Douglas

Holy crap, yo I think I broke my dick. Let this be a lesson to those that only thought they broke their dick, and let's give it up for Jaci, shall we?

Posted 3/04/2012 02:38:00 PM by Douglas

Buzludzha, Bulgaria. What a fascinating monument to a failed ideology.

Posted 3/03/2012 08:01:00 PM by Douglas

See, TxDOT can move an historic bridge, when they want to. Just not this one.

Posted 2/22/2012 05:52:00 PM by Douglas

NASA's got problems, and no center is feeling it as bad as KSC. What to do with all that launch hardware we don't need anymore?

“I have a lot of facilities that we, NASA, no longer need,” said Robert Cabana, Kennedy’s director and a four-time space shuttle flier. “I don’t have the money to maintain them, I don’t have the money to tear them down. They’re just going to sit and rot.”

Wow, what a lovely sentiment. What a fine coda to the greatest technological accomplishment in the history of the planet. Could it get worse? Sure it could:

To accommodate the rocket, workers have already torn down the big gray tower on one of the two space shuttle launch pads. Cabana said NASA recouped $621,000 from selling miles of copper wire stripped out of the 25-story structure.

Awesome! NASA's selling off parts of the launch center for scrap! How perfect!

Posted 2/22/2012 05:43:00 PM by Douglas

Fans, or should I say ex-fans of the band Sugarland were told that they were partially at fault for being under a stage that collapsed during a concert last year. Ex-fans because they're either no longer fond of Sugarland or they're dead.

Calling the powerful winds that toppled the stage on Aug. 13 an "act of God," Sugarland's attorneys said fair officials and Mid-America Sound Corp. were responsible for the stage setup, and that the fans voluntarily assumed risk by attending the show.

Huh? It's tragic that so many people were hurt and killed, and it's sad that the band is being sued because the event and the venue were mismanaged. But how is it the people's fault? I realize that every person is infinitely more responsible for their own well being than Sugarland is, but what "assumed risk" are they talking about? Is each person at the concert expected to review the structural drawings of the stage and calculate the wind loading to ensure it's stable?

"Some or all of the plaintiffs' claimed injuries resulted from their own fault," according to the band's response. Sugarland attorney James H. Milstone did not immediately respond to a phone call seeking comment Tuesday.

So let me get this straight: There was an unexpected storm that blew over the stage, and the band's stance is "you should have known better and left?" Wow, what balls. If they had any sense at all, they would not be in Indiana in the first place, much less a Sugarland concert.

So I guess what Sugarland is really saying is that they need smarter fans. Or at least some that can run faster.

Posted 2/11/2012 02:38:00 PM by Douglas

Politicans should stay out of debates about Super Bowl commercials. I saw the one with Clint Eastwood for Chrysler and didn't think much of it. Actually, the only think I did think of was it made me wonder what's worse: A film made by Clint Eastwood in this century, or any vehicle made by the Chrysler company, ever, but that's a debate for another day. No, this debate comes from political strategists and canned ham Karl Rove. He says it's a pep talk for Obama's re-election.

The leadership of auto companies feel they need to do something to repay their political patronage. It is a sign of what happens when you have Chicago-style politics, and the president of the United States and his political minions using our tax dollars to buy corporate advertising.

I think he's starting to believe his own bullshit. You could just as easily hear Clint say they need to change leadership, but that wouldn't fit in with Karl's squealing about the Democratic boogeyman he sees lurking in every corner. Someone needs to remind him who authored Detroit's bailout to GM and Chrysler. Hint: you used to work for him.

Posted 2/11/2012 02:32:00 PM by Douglas

I thought this birth control controversy was made up from the beginning. Glad someone finally got down to the root of the problem.

It's not about "access" and it's not about "insurance." It's because Americans, when paying even modest co-payments, choose to spend their money on other things. They prefer a new iPod to a "wellness visit" to the doctor. As the HHS unwittingly admits: "Often because of cost, Americans used preventive services at about half the recommended rate."

Remember, we're supposed to be worrying about skyrocketing health-care expenses. Doubling the number of wellness visits and free pills sounds great, but who's going to pay for it? There is a liberal dream that by mandating coverage the government can make something free.

"Access" is political double-speak for "getting someone else to pay for it." P.J. O'Rourke said it best during the Hillary-care debate back in the 90s: "if you think health care is expensive now, just wait 'till it's free."

Posted 2/04/2012 02:17:00 PM by Douglas

Texas is one of 49 states that allow you to carry a concealed weapon in public (suck it, Illinois), and I've thought for a long time that they are pretty silly. If you have a gun in your pocket and whip it out while, or hopefully before, someone goes nuts in the Luby's, no one is going to charge you for carrying a gun illegally. And if you just keep it in your pocket, no one is going to care because no one will find out. Obviously, if you pull it out and start shooting at people, you'll go to jail anyway, and NOT for breaking the concealed weapon law. Turns out it's illegal to shoot at people.

So I've never understood the rationale behind being able to "opt-out" of the concealed carry law. In Texas, as in most states, businesses and public places can effectively opt-out of the law that allows permitted gun owners from carrying concealed weapons on their premises simply by posting an appropriate sign. So what happens, then, if someone is otherwise legally carrying a concealed weapon, but enters a place with such a sign posted, and then shoots a guy with a shotgun pointed at a convenience store clerk? Spoiler alert: he's a hero.

The Aldi customer who shot an armed robber in the store Monday won't face any criminal charges, prosecutors confirmed Friday.

The customer, Nazir Al-Mujaahid of Milwaukee, held a news conference to discuss the incident. Al-Mujaahid, 35, called it nothing to brag about, but that "sometimes you have to do what you have to do."

Al-Mujaahid said he and his wife stopped at the store, at N. 76th St. and W. Villard Ave., for some last-minute dinner items. They'd never shopped at the store before, he said.

He said they had just walked in when he noticed the suspect approach the cashiers holding up a shotgun with the stock cut off and a bag, demanding money in a very agitated way. Fearing for the safety of himself, his wife and others in the store, he said, he unholstered his semi-automatic 9mm handgun, cocked it and kept it down at his side as he motioned another customer behind the robber to move away.

When the robber turned the shotgun toward him, Al-Mujaahid said, he fired six or seven shots from about 20 feet away. He said he hit the suspect in the leg and forehead. The robber then dropped the shotgun and bag, and fled the store. Police arrested a suspect and an accomplice later. They had not been formally charged as of Friday morning.

Sometimes you have to do what you have to do. I'm sure the owner of the store is sorry he put that sign up. . .AND glad this guy ignored it. Wait, he hit the guy seven times from 20 feet away, in the leg and the forehead, and he fled the store? Am I missing something here? Also, here's the part everyone that puts up one of those signs should read:

He said he did not notice the sign at Aldi prohibiting weapons in the store, and that if he had, he would have gone elsewhere. He said since he began to carry a concealed gun, he has stopped from going into other businesses where he did see the sign.

Think for a minute what kind of gun-toting person is going to be deterred by a sternly worded sign. Choose wisely.

Posted 2/04/2012 02:14:00 PM by Douglas

Some people watch the Super Bowl for the most exciting football game of the year. Others claim they watch it for the commercials. Still others watch it for its arcane numbering scheme. Well that may soon change.

The NFL is four years away from its 50th Super Bowl, which means it is already trying to plan around a peculiar self-inflicted marketing nuisance: How can the world's most powerful sports league get around putting a big, fat "L" on hundreds of thousands of souvenir T-shirts?

But come 2016, the Roman numeral for Super Bowl L happens to be the lone letter that most connotes losing.

"Wouldn't that be a nice time to switch over to Arabic numerals?" said Bob Dorfman, the executive creative director for Baker Street Advertising.

This enormous American sporting event is the only spectacle of its kind that takes its nomenclature from the ancient Romans. Former NFL commissioner Pete Rozelle never could have imagined the behemoth that is the modern NFL when he resorted to these numerals in 1971 for Super Bowl V. Back then, they helped distinguish between the different calendar years of the regular season and the Super Bowl while adding an air of grandiosity to the fledgling championship.

It's funny to think of the Super Bowl as "fledgling."

Posted 2/04/2012 02:10:00 PM by Douglas

Presidential politics is decisive enough, do you have to throw Jesus out there, too?

Obama said that as a person who has been "extraordinarily blessed," he is willing to give up some of the tax breaks he enjoys because doing so makes economic, and religious sense.

"For me as a Christian, it also coincides with Jesus's teaching that for unto whom much is given, much shall be required," Obama said, quoting the Gospel of Luke.

Come on, Barry. We know your ego is bigger than deduction, but haven't you ever noticed that people really don't listen much to those that claim to know what Jesus "really" meant?

Posted 2/04/2012 02:05:00 PM by Douglas

How adorable. Kids from the concrete empire want to know what Texas is like when you venture more than 100 yards from the offramp so bad, they take a class about it.

On-screen, in the opening scene of The Last Picture Show, the wind whistled through a lonesome streetscape, empty of everything save dust and desolation. As a teenage boy peered through the splintered windshield of a rusty pick-up, an unmistakable voice wailed on the radio.

"I remember this song coming from my brother's Philco radio. That's Hank Williams - the real Hank Williams - singing Why don't you love me like you used to? ," said Young, as the camera panned to reveal a deserted main street seemingly set in the middle of nowhere. "It really captures that country up there. What never stops is the wind."

The students in Young's "Texas Crossroads" course gazed silently at the cinematic imagining of Texas as a place of thwarted dreams and forlorn horizons. The week before, they had viewed a completely different portrayal of the Lone Star State: a scene from the 1956 epic Giant, which paints Texas as the "mighty colossus of the southwest, a land of infinite variety and violent contrasts."

In classrooms from Huntsville to Houston, Abilene to Austin, students are alternately studying, skewering and celebrating the enduring notion of the Lone Star State as a land of mythic proportions and mighty individualists.

Another Sam Houston class, "Texas History 398," deconstructs the concept of "Texceptionalism." A Rice University course, "Kickin' It in Small Town Texas," explores the cultural nuances of life "beyond the hedges."

Geez, what a bunch of pussies. There's more to Texas than watching Giant or The Last Pictures Show. Get your nose out of your own latte art and go try some BBQ in Lockhart, catfish in Alto, or even the Dairy Queen in Chillicothe. You can't get a degree in life experience.

Posted 2/04/2012 01:56:00 PM by Douglas

Sandra Day O'Connor is funny:

At the black-tie steak-and-lobster Alfalfa Club dinner Saturday among political and business elites in Washington, she said that of two GOP presidential candidates, "one is a practicing polygamist, and he's not even the Mormon,"

Ha! But come on, Sandy, Newt divorced his high school geometry teacher he was married to to marry the mistress with which he was cheating on her. All of this was before he married the mistress he was cheating with while he was married to her.

Posted 1/28/2012 05:17:00 PM by Douglas

Stats for the I-40 drug busts are out for 2011. Drum roll, please:

Department of Public Safety Trooper Gabriel Medrano on Friday released the total amounts of contraband DPS officials seized in the agency’s Amarillo division in 2011.

Medrano said he was unable to provide totals for 2010.

• U.S. currency: $4,169,638
  
• Marijuana: 7,011 pounds
• Cocaine: 685 pounds
• Methamphetamine: 92 pounds
• Codeine: 55,991 grams
• Heroin: 53,956 grams
• Total estimated drug value: $45,733,060

Wow. Three and a half tons of weed? Does the DPS think that there's anyone in the country that actually wanted it that didn't get it? How the fuck do they get out of bed in the morning?

Also, do they get bonus points for the "estimated drug value" pushing upwards of $50 million? We all know the only way they can capitalize on that value, right? Is anyone going to be surprised to find their confiscated products back on the streets?

"Legalizing" drugs is no more of an endorsement of using these horrible substances than making gambling legal: the state shouldn't care if you do it, but instead of spending billions to prevent it, how 'bout they regulate the shit out of it and MAKE money off of taxing it, instead of spending $20 Billion a year in a futile attempt to stop it.

Labels: I-40 Drug Bust

Posted 1/22/2012 03:39:00 PM by Douglas

"You won't have to rely on a healthy body image or self respect anymore!" This is pretty funny. And true.

Fotoshop by Adobé from Jesse Rosten on Vimeo.

Posted 1/20/2012 06:57:00 PM by Douglas

Timpani!!!!



That sound must mean there's something important that follows. Well, too bad, chumps, because nothing important is following that important sounding drum roll. This post is, however, set to commemorate a very special milestone in the blog's history, and no, it's not watching the After School Special, Story of a Teenage Alcoholic. But I digress.

This is post number 5,000 here at crap blog. I was hoping I could somehow make that correspond to the 10 year anniversary (which is in April) or the 100,000 hit (which will be never), so I could avoid doing this three times. But since I can't, here it is, in all it's grandiose opulence. I would have NEVER thought you people (you know who you are) would have ever given me the microscopic bit of encouragement to continue this shit train 5,000 times over a decade, but here we are.

I'd like to take a moment to thank "long time reader" (you know who you are) for all the links, criticisms, and words of encouragement through the years.

So where is this all going? No where. And fast. Stay tuned.

Labels: pointless milestone

Posted 1/20/2012 05:44:00 PM by Douglas

The problem with a very successful business model is that eventually other people want in on your action and the public gets tired of paying you to see you get richer. Enter Hollywood, who, for about 100 years now has been surprising even themselves at how much money they can extract from the public. Well the internet came along and threw a HUGE kink in their supply chain. Now when you hear a catchy tune on the radio, you don't have to go shell out $17 for one decent song and nine tracks of filler on a crappy CD (the studio should be shot for selling a CD with only 10 tracks on it, too, but that's another rant that luckily we don't have to deal with anymore). You don't have to spend $12 a seat at that over-hyped movie that's out now, just to find out they put the two funny bits in the commercial.

So, equating every downloaded song or movie to a lost sale (which is absolute horse shit), the RIAA and MPAA have strong-armed the Department of Justice to force the hand of the elite New Zealand police to shut down one of the internet's biggest source of shared online content, MegaUpload.I don't quite understand why the Department of Justice has a case when a kid in Singapore uploads an episode of Newhart to a server in Hong Kong and another kid in Denmark downloads it because he doesn't know who Suzanne Pleshette is, but that's hardly the point. They're desperate to stop the downloading, and they'll do anything to get these sites shut down, even temporarily. So what did MegaUpload do, anyway?

In other words, the company is being faulted for not monitoring what each of its users did on its service, not inspecting content as it was being uploaded for copyright violations, and not combing through its servers for infringing material. But that's inconsistent with the rulings from several federal courts, which have held that online companies have no duty to police their services to prevent infringements or detect them after they occur. Instead, it's up to copyright owners to alert them to infringing files, at least until a company has been found liable and ordered to stop the piracy.

Wow, they didn't monitor ALL their user's content. I'm sure that's a first. Is there a reason this raid came on the day after the SOPA/PIPA blackout day? Seems like they know this law is going to fail, and this is their one chance to make a stand. Well kudos to you, Hollywood lobbyists. You've stopped media being downloaded from the internet just like the DEA has stopped the influx of illegal drugs into the country. Which is to say, not at all. You just make yourself look more desperate when you coerce another sovereign nation into using Pablo Escobar techniques to apprehend him:

Dotcom, the megamind behind Megaupload, was arrested yesterday in New Zealand, his panic-room door busted down by officials, who found the hacker clinging to a sawed-off shotgun.

Wow. I had no idea the police had guns in New Zealand, much less eccentric overweight millionaires. Who knew?

Look, I don't know what the answer is, but artists need to be paid for their work. I have a couple of DVDs and CDs that I've paid over $100 for. I've also got some 99¢ disks that don't even make good coasters (damn hole in the middle). I don't know how to make the 'honor system' work for media consumption now that the internet has made downloading so easy, but Hollywood has to stop thinking they're back in the day when they can keep churning out crap and we'll keep buying it because we have no choice. Because now we do.

Posted 1/19/2012 05:17:00 PM by Douglas

Presidential politics always makes for strange bedfellows, but you never know how strange 'till you get closer to the elections. Yeah, I know that Newt's second ex-wife made a "big" announcement today that he wanted, what they call nowadays, an "open" marriage. He wanted to be a swinger. . . . as in, to swing! Maybe I've seen Raising Arizona one too many times. Who am I kidding, I've seen it 100 too many times, but that's not important right now, neither is Newt's swinging. No, what's remarkable about that lede is that the new one, mistress #2 was presumably willing to go along with it. After all, he converted from Baptist to Catholic when he married her. As Redd Foxx said, "Now you know that's some mean pussy to make a man change gods." But again, I digress.

The interesting part about how much Newt loves the country is wife #1. It was his high school geometry teacher. That's just weird.

In 1962, he married Jackie Battley, his former high school geometry teacher, when he was 19 years old and she was 26.

I'm sure he denies it, but the rumor mill is full of those that say the romance began while he was still a student. Even if that never happened, marrying your math teacher that's seven years older than you when you're 19 is a little too Mary Kay Letourneau to be considered presidential.

But the real January surprise came from the Santorum camp. After a little googling, and some hand sanitizer, you can find some interesting nuggets of fun on his wife, the one and only Mrs. Rick Santorum. Turns out, Mr. "I'm so pro-life I'll kill you's" wife had a relationship with a ob/gyn 40 some odd her senior. That's not too weird, in the general scheme of things, and I'm reticent to label him an "abortionist," in that as an ob/gyn, the procedure is medical and not always political. So you should give him the benefit of the doubt on that one. No, the weird part is that as an ob/gyn, he delivered her.

The wife of fiercely pro-life presidential hopeful Rick Santorum had a six-year love affair with an abortion doctor, 40 years her senior - who, incredibly, delivered her as a baby - it has emerged.

That's just wacky. How does that even come up? That's gotta be one awkward question to break the ice with.

Posted 1/15/2012 04:31:00 PM by Douglas

I don't quite understand marathons, but there were two of them in Houston this weekend, one was the annual Houston Marathon, and the other was the trials for the 2012 U.S. Olympic team. The winner of the Olympic marathon had a time of 2:09:08, while the guy that won the non-Olympic marathon the next day had a time of 2:06:51. So why isn't THAT guy on the Olympic team?

Labels: Marathons

Posted 1/15/2012 04:22:00 PM by Douglas

Hollywood could not have devised a more scary way to die than becoming a fungus zombie.

The fungus attacks the ants on two fronts. Firstly by using the ant as a walking food source, and secondly by damaging muscle and the ant’s central nervous system, resulting in zombie walking and the death bite, which place the ant in the cool damp understory. Together these provide the perfect environment for fungal growth and reproduction. This behavior of infected ants is essentially an extended phenotype of the fungus (fungal behaviour through the ant’s body) as non-infected ants never behave in this way.

Has anyone seen a Kardashian eating a salad at solar noon?

Posted 1/15/2012 04:16:00 PM by Douglas

A cruise has always sounded like staying at a bad hotel you can't leave. But at least it won't sink.

A senior crew member on the luxury Italian cruise liner that capsized in the Mediterranean was dramatically airlifted to safety today as it emerged divers have discovered two more bodies.

Cabin service director Manrico Giampedroni, 57, was discovered in one of the Costa Concordia's restaurants which was semi-submerged with water. Italian news reports say he stayed behind to help passengers into the lifeboats but as the vessel listed he fell and broke his leg.

He said of the two day long ordeal: 'I never lost hope of being saved. It was a 36-hour nightmare'.

This afternoon the Italian coastguard said the bodies of two elderly men were found in a submerged restaurant, taking the death toll to five. Two French passengers and a Peruvian crew member were confirmed dead yesterday.

Late last night two 29-year-old newlyweds were plucked alive from the wreckage. The couple from South Korea had been on their honeymoon when they became stranded two decks below rescuers who eventually heard their screams.

More than 4,000 people were evacuated when the ship ran aground off the coast of Tuscany on Friday night. Eleven passengers and six crew are still missing.

Hope they enjoyed the buffet!

Posted 1/14/2012 05:04:00 PM by Douglas

For the longest time, I thought that rotten corn was the most disgusting thing you could eat. Boy, was I wrong:

Derived from Pecorino, casu marzu goes beyond typical fermentation to a stage most would consider decomposition, brought about by the digestive action of the larvae of the cheese fly Piophila casei. These larvae are deliberately introduced to the cheese, promoting an advanced level of fermentation and breaking down of the cheese's fats. The texture of the cheese becomes very soft, with some liquid (called lagrima, from Latin for "tears") seeping out. The larvae themselves appear as translucent white worms, about 8 millimetres (0.3 in) long.[1] When disturbed, the larvae can launch themselves for distances up to 15 centimetres (6 in). Some people clear the larvae from the cheese before consuming while others do not.

And "other's" are stupid. These aren't the only tears falling on this disgusting dish, either.

Posted 1/13/2012 05:30:00 PM by Douglas

Incredible Rube Goldberg page turner:

Posted 1/13/2012 05:22:00 PM by Douglas

The cease fire in the Cola-Wars is long over, yet the good guys lost an important skirmish today in the tiny town of Dublin, Texas. Long before the anti-hfcs movement took hold, one lone Dr. Pepper bottler stilled used pure cane sure in their Dr. Pepper, and they carved out quite niche market in their town of less than 3,000 people. But apparently their internet sales got them too much attention. So much so, it got the attention of their parent company, who took a lamentable, if not predictable plan of action: They sued to shut down the oldest Dr. Pepper bottler in the world.

Dr Pepper Snapple Group, which owns Dr Pepper, sued the plant in June, saying Dublin Dr Pepper was diluting the Dr Pepper brand and hijacking sales from other Dr Pepper bottlers, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Diluting the brand? Consider this: The Dublin bottler had sales of $7 million a year. Dr Pepper Snapple Group had sales of $5.6 billion in 2010. And, the Journal reported, Dublin Dr Pepper makes up less than 1% of Dr Pepper's annual U.S. volume.

Yeah, that sounds about right. Unleash a public relations nightmare because a historic family owned business is cutting in to 0.01% of your annual sales.

They say they'll keep making cane sugar Dr Pepper elsewhere, which is good, I guess, since it tastes so much better. But I'm sure I share the sentiment of the unemployed Dublin residents who don't understand why they couldn't continue doing what they've done for the past 120 years. Hopefully there'll be enough public backlash from this that they'll open up the Dublin plant again. Dr Pepper/Snapple would pay damages if they had any balls.

Posted 1/05/2012 09:22:00 PM by Douglas

54 people injured in a 79 car pileup as people in South East Texas drove into smoke and fog earlier this morning. Here's the interesting part:

What was reported as a wreck at 5:36 a.m. actually involved more than 50 vehicles in a series of accidents along the eastbound lanes of the highway west of the Taylors Bayou bridge in the area of the Veolia Processing Plant, Department of Public Safety troopers said.

Troopers Candace Evans and David Crawford said prior to the collisions, the eastbound traffic appeared to be moving at about 70 mph despite heavy fog and limited visibility. Drivers going in the other direction apparently were moving more slowly and cautiously, they added.

Acadian Ambulance reported taking 37 people from accident scene, while several other patients were transported by Air Rescue and Hermann Life Flight. Other medical transport vehicles came from Southeast Texas, Winnie-Stowell and Anahuac EMS organizations, Acadian personnel said.

So, people drive into zero visibility conditions, some slow down and others don't, resulting in mass hysteria. Yet a helicopter pilot, undoubtedly observing proper IFR procedures was able to land and get them out and to the hospital without running into anyone. How's that for having the proper training when you need it?

It's very difficult to drive IFR. Maybe there needs to be an app for your phone that can squawk the tower.

Posted 1/01/2012 01:25:00 PM by Douglas

Funny Facebook posts. I like the one about Rebecca Black's song being about the Kennedy assassination. Turns out, the guy driving JFK's limo was named Greer, not Kickin. Turns out, some people think he was the trigger man. Which would make him the guy with the biggest balls in the world.

Posted 1/01/2012 01:19:00 PM by Douglas

The ever effective "war on drugs" has got a new metric to gauge its success. Nevermind the fact that every human being in this country is no more than three phone calls from having any illegal drug delivered right to them, the DEA in all its wisdom has found a new indicator of success: Dead children.

U.S. and Mexican officials say the grotesque violence is a symptom the cartels have been wounded by police and soldiers. “It may seem contradictory, but the unfortunate level of violence is a sign of success in the fight against drugs,” said Michele Leonhart, head of the Drug Enforcement Administration. The cartels “are like caged animals, attacking one another,” she added.

Makes sense. Dead people is a good indication that we're winning the "War on Terror," too, and it's being brought to you by the same people.

Posted 1/01/2012 01:06:00 PM by Douglas

For this year's "celebratory gunfire" story, we had to go all the way out to Los Angeles.

A man inside his home in South Los Angeles was injured by celebratory gunfire that came through his roof on New Year's Eve.

Authorities said around midnight, the victim was sitting in a back room in his house in the 600 block of East 113th Street when he was hit in the leg from a falling bullet. The bullet entered through the roof and grazed the man's leg.

No shooter has been found, and no suspect information was available.

Tragic, yet stupid. I bet it livened up Dick Clark's Rockin' New Year's Eve. Wait, it was already 3a.m. on the east coast. By that time, Dick was already back in his cryogenic chamber.