Thursday's Name that B-Movie quiz is up over in Spudville.
Guess them all, and win a prize!
Maybe.
Whoring myself
Reason #1,382,964 Why Bill O’Reilly Should Never Be President
On the prisoners at Gitmo:
I don’t give them any protection. I don’t feel sorry for them. In fact, I probably would have ordered their execution if I had the power…
Crooks and Liars has the video.
Man, I hate that guy.
(P.S. Of the more than 500 foreign detainees held at the prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, only four have been accused of any crime.)
Tasty Treat
Asshat.org.
Just keep refreshing until you are either crying so hard that your body is contorting itself into the fetal position, or laughing so hard that you’ve wet yourself and need to go clean up, you filthy thing.
(Hat tip to 12th Harmonic, via Spontaneous Arising.)
Question of the Day
What's your favorite quote and why?
There are so many to chose from, mountains of them that I love, and many better than this one, but I'm quite fond of the following:
When they bury me in a church and chuck earth on my grave, I'd like the words "Well, at least he tried" engraved on my tombstone.
-- Morrissey, Melody Maker, 1987
Who’s giving aid to the enemy?
Gordon’s got the answer. *
(Hint: It’s not liberals.)
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* You may have to scroll up or down the page a little. It's the post called "Oh Fucking Swell..." Fixer - enable post pages! :-)
If This Is True…
…it sucks:
The New York Post reports that [Comedy Central's wildly popular "Chappelle's Show"], which has been on indefinite hold since its star and creator, Dave Chappelle, abruptly left for South Africa in April, is unlikely to ever resume production. Charlie Murphy, brother of Eddie and a close collaborator of Chappelle's, tells the paper, "I don't think Dave is going to do anymore ... We shot about eight shows for the third season, and they're hilarious. They'll be released on DVD, I'm sure. But that's it." What about the higher-ups at Comedy Central? They haven't a clue. Comedy Central's president, Doug Herzog, told reporters recently, "The ball's in Dave's court. If you see him, tell him to phone home.”I’m sad, bitches!
Theoretically Speaking
Over at the hottest blog on the internets, John Howard’s got a great rant on Bush’s remarks about intelligent design.
Of course some tool had to immediately pollute the comments thread with the usual garbage:
Evolution can't be proven...I’m really just so fucking tired of dimwitted intelligent design aficionados conflating “theory” with “scientific theory” that I could puke—so tired of it, in fact, that the irony of such confusion, the existence of which might not exist if people had actually paid attention in the very science classes they now want to dilute with unscientific information, doesn’t even bring a bitter grin to my face anymore. So let’s get this cleared up once and for all, shall we?
Quote: "Evolution is a scientific theory..."
A 'theory' is merely an assumption based on limited information or knowledge; in other words, it's strictly speculation.
In layman’s terms, if something is said to be "just a theory," it usually means that it is a mere guess, or is unproved. It might even lack credibility. But in scientific terms, a theory implies that something has been proven and is generally accepted as being true.Ergo, when something is described as a scientific theory, it is automatically imbued with the presumption of a certain level of demonstrable proof. Scientific theories are, by definition, not speculative, nor are they based on limited information or knowledge.
[...]
[A scientific theory] is an explanation of a set of related observations or events based upon proven hypotheses and verified multiple times by detached groups of researchers. One scientist cannot create a theory; he can only create a hypothesis.
Attempting to play some semantic game of “gotcha” with thinking people by noting that evolution is “just a theory” only makes you look stupid—not to mention direly in need of a remedial course on the basics of the scientific method. Morons.
Foolish Plan
I’m moving part of an earlier post back up to the top for awhile, because I feel like it’s really important but getting overlooked a bit (which is my own fault for dumping it into one post with that exceedingly annoying Boy Scout stuff), and I’ve added a little additional commentary about why I think it’s so important.
--------------------
In yet another questionable recruiting scheme, the military is now offering to let recruits fulfill part of their military obligations by serving in the Peace Corps. The program, proposed by John McCain and Evan Bayh, went into effect three years ago as part of 306-page defense budget bill, and—here’s the kicker—the Peace Corps didn’t even know about it until after it became law.
Big Problem #1: A big part of what protects the 7,733 Peace Corps workers spread across 73 countries is the clear delineation between the Peace Corps and the US military. Publicizing such an agreement between the two, particularly at a time when the US military is actively involved in a foreign occupation, could raise suspicions of existing Peace Corps workers, potentially putting them in danger.
Big Problem #2: There’s no guarantee that recruits who enlist with the promise of fulfilling part of their service obligation with the Peace Corps will actually be given that opportunity. The Peace Corps will require enlistees to apply to their program just like any other potential Corps volunteer. To put that into perspective, the Corps already receives three times the number of applications as they have open slots. Until the Republican-controlled Congress decides to provide more funding to the Corps, they cannot open their ranks to a greater number of volunteers. So basically, the military is using an unfunded program to try to attract new recruits, when they have just as slim a chance of getting into the Peace Corps as they would if they skipped military enlistment altogether and just applied to the Corps on their own.
Very, very dodgy stuff.
--------------------
Anyone who’s angry about the outing of Valerie Plame, the country being led to war on a pack of lies, or the ever-worsening reputation of America (and Americans) abroad ought to be angry about this as well. And here’s why…
The administration made a grave error in using the bad information about a uranium purchase in the president’s state of the union address. When Joe Wilson, who had personally debunked that information, called them out on their folly, they were left with a political problem, and to solve it—and prevent other potential critics from getting so uppity—they sought swift retribution, and lashed out at Wilson by leaking the identity of his wife, covert CIA operative Valerie Plame. Her life, her work, and her associates were put into jeopardy for no other reason than the administration had a goal it wanted to accomplish—punishing a war critic, her husband—and that short-term political goal was more important than the lives and work of Plame and her associates. Now, the military is having a recruiting problem, attributable, once again, to administration folly—this time, asking the US military to put their lives on the line for a war that was not of last resort—and to solve that problem as quickly as possible, it’s potentially endangering the lives of active Peace Corps volunteers, for whom the clear delineation between the Peace Corps and the military (and/or CIA) provides a not insignificant level of protection. In either case, to solve one problem of the administration’s making, lives of those who get in the way by a stroke of misfortune, are given little consideration, in spite of their good work.
And should we not be outraged that after the administration sent the troops into harm’s way on nothing but lies, the military now seeks to entice and cajole additional bodies for the war of the neocons’ making with more lies? The military is promising things to potential recruits that it can’t possibly guarantee, for the reasons mentioned above. Do they even mention, I wonder, that the Peace Corps only accepts US citizens? There are plenty of enlistees who aren’t citizens. Do they mention, I wonder, that there is no existing program for soldiers to automatically transfer into the Peace Corps? That they will be required to submit an application and have no greater or lesser chance of admittance than any other applicant? That the Peace Corps does not have the funding to increase its number of volunteers any time in the immediate future? What, exactly, is this promise worth to soldiers, in reality? Much less than it’s worth to military recruiters, it seems.
Finally, because the Peace Corps has so stringently resisted associations with other forms of foreign service, its volunteers were afforded a level of trust that allowed them relationships with native populations across the globe that an occupying military force, for example, would not so easily attain. Blurring the line between the two may well compromise the ability of Corps volunteers to engage in this kind of interaction, which, in the end, hurts America—because they are each ambassadors for our country. Just as the steady decrease in international student enrollment at our universities will inevitably stem the tide of what amounts to an unintentional yet highly successful method of diplomacy, casting a pall of suspicion on Corps volunteers could have the same effect. Many people around the world do Americans the honor of regarding them differently—more positively—than they regard the American government and its military. We threaten that carefully drawn distinction when any American serving abroad can easily be misconstrued as an agent of the military.
This is a foolish plan. And like many of this administration’s foolish plans, we may all suffer for it.
Weird
This sounds like the opening scene of a James Bond movie:
Top cloning experts from Britain, South Korea and the United States working on ways to use stem cells to treat incurable diseases gathered here to kick-off a week-long secret experiment.Imagine if these guys walk out of their super duper top secret underground laboratory with a greater knowledge of stem cells, bringing them one step closer to curing diseases like Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s; how thrilling!
The scientists were led by South Korea's Hwang Woo-Suk, Gerald Schatten of the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, and the creator of the cloned sheep Dolly, Professor Ian Wilmut of Scotland's Roslin Institute.
They would not say what the experiment would be about, but said it was expected to be over early next week.
On the other hand, I swear to god if they emerge with a Mini-Me for George Bush, I’m going to be really pissed.
The Week In Iraq (So Far)
A roadside bomb blast killed 14 Marines and a civilian interpreter Wednesday as they rode in a vehicle near Haditha, Iraq, U.S. military officials said.In good news:
[…]
On Monday, six Marine sniper team members were killed in a firefight near the same city and a Marine was killed in nearby Hit. Twenty-one Marines have been killed in the region in three days. The number of U.S. troops killed in the Iraq war stands at 1,820, according to U.S. military reports.
[…]
U.S. freelance journalist Steven Vincent was found shot to death in the southern Iraqi city of Basra early Wednesday, officials said.
A Basra police official said Vincent and his female interpreter, Nuriya Tiays, had been abducted about 12:30 a.m. (4:30 p.m. Tuesday) in the Ashar area of central Basra.
Vincent's body was found about a 10-minute drive from the place where he and Tiays were kidnapped, the official said. Tiays was shot in the chest and was being treated in a hospital.
[…]
Two Iraqi police officers were assassinated within 12 hours of each other in Baghdad, police said Wednesday.
[…]
A suicide car bomber attacked a U.S. military convoy Tuesday as it traveled through an underpass beneath al-Tahrir Square in Baghdad, wounding 29 people, Iraqi police said. Fifteen vehicles were destroyed.
In Baquba, about 30 miles north of Baghdad, police said gunmen killed a Diyala province Health Ministry official and his driver Tuesday near Diyala Medical College.
[…]
Also in Baquba, a bomb attack on a police convoy killed a police officer and a child Tuesday, police said. Seven police and a civilian were wounded.
Iraqi police have captured a top commander of Ansar al-Sunna, a terrorist group blamed for last year's suicide bombing at a U.S. military mess hall in Mosul that killed 22 people, including 14 U.S. troops.
Suspicious of Ohio
BradBlog has screenshots of WCPO.com's Special Election Results page from throughout last night. What I find curious is that at 10:40pm, with 88% of precincts having reported, it was 50/50, which is how it was trending for most of the evening. In the subsequent 22 minutes, the remaining 12% of precincts reported, resulting in such a significant surge by Schmidt, that she won by 4%.
Shaker and Julien’s List contributor Holly points us to this story in which it is reported:
After all six other counties in the district had completed their ballot counts in what was a low-turnout election, Schmidt’s home county, Clermont, had reported a little more than half of its precincts.Does that final surge just seem coincidental because Schmidt’s home county was the last to report its final results, or were their results deliberately delayed to provide just such an explanation for a late surge in case one had to be fabricated?
“I have no idea what is going on over there,” said Hamilton County Board of Elections chairman Tim Burke. “I don’t know what their problem is.”
I hate asking questions that like, because it just doesn’t make me feel all that good. In fact, it leaves me feeling pretty icky.
Green for the Dark One
The Dark Wraith is having a fund-raiser.
He's been indispensable with The Blog Scream and helping promote the Big Brass Alliance. He's also just a damn good writer.
If you can afford it, click over and send him a little do-re-me. If anything, you can purchase one of his snarky bumper stickers.
Can't think of a song cross-post)
Bait and Switch
In yet another questionable recruiting scheme, the military is now offering to let recruits fulfill part of their military obligations by serving in the Peace Corps. The program, proposed by John McCain and Evan Bayh, went into effect three years ago as part of 306-page defense budget bill, and—here’s the kicker—the Peace Corps didn’t even know about it until after it became law.
Big Problem #1: A big part of what protects the 7,733 Peace Corps workers spread across 73 countries is the clear delineation between the Peace Corps and the US military. Publicizing such an agreement between the two, particularly at a time when the US military is actively involved in a foreign occupation, could raise suspicions of existing Peace Corps workers, potentially putting them in danger.
Big Problem #2: There’s no guarantee that recruits who enlist with the promise of fulfilling part of their service obligation with the Peace Corps will actually be given that opportunity. The Peace Corps will require enlistees to apply to their program just like any other potential Corps volunteer. To put that into perspective, the Corps already receives three times the number of applications as they have open slots. Until the Republican-controlled Congress decides to provide more funding to the Corps, they cannot open their ranks to a greater number of volunteers. So basically, the military is using an unfunded program to try to attract new recruits, when they have just as slim a chance of getting into the Peace Corps as they would if they skipped military enlistment altogether and just applied to the Corps on their own.
Very, very dodgy stuff.
Tangentially, we have the case of the Bush Youth (hat tip Spontaneous Arising).
Before you tell me if I’m just getting wacky with the Nazi references, please note that I'm referencing the history of engaging youth as part of a strategy of permanent warfare, rather than a more general comparison, and also take a gander at the following image and read the following excerpt and see if you don’t feel a little bit of squishy discomfort deep down inside.
President George W. Bush delivered a pep talk on Sunday to thousands of Boy Scouts, urging them not to waver after four tragic deaths and a rash of heat-related illnesses* cast a pall over their camping "Jamboree."
[…]
Men in black "Army" T-shirts coached young boys to chant "OO-rah" like soldiers. A giant "ARMY" hot-air balloon bobbed overhead.
Bush said the Boy Scouts "understand that freedom must be defended," and touted what he called the "armies of liberation." The Army has fallen behind its recruiting goals amid the Iraq war.
"When you follow your conscience and the ideals you've sworn as a Scout, there is no limit to what you can achieve for our country," Bush told the crowd, which chanted "USA, USA."
The jamboree, which was held at the US Army’s Fort AP Hill, seems disturbingly close to an extremely early military recruitment rally to this old cynic.
---------------
* Btw, in case you hadn’t heard, those “heat-related illnesses,” which affected over 300 Scouts, were caused by their waiting in the blazing sun for hours for the arrival of President Prick, who didn’t show up until four days later.)
Ohio Special Election
Damn, it is a horserace:
Schmidt: 24,527 votes (49%)
Hackett: 25,920 votes (51%)
Music, Music, Music
I was pseudo-tageed by Paul to do this meme, so off we go…
“List ten songs that you are currently digging ... it doesn't matter what genre they are from, whether they have words, or even if they're no good, but they must be songs you're really enjoying right now. Post these instructions, the artists, and the ten songs in your blog. Then tag five other people to see what they're listening to.”
1. Teenage Dad on His Estate by Morrissey: Oh, like the first song was really going to be by anyone else; you’re just lucky all 10 aren’t Moz tracks! This is a really interesting tune about a white collar worker, about whom Moz sings: “You defer to the views of the television news / Let someone else do / Your thinking for you. / Yet you still buy a daily newspaper / And you find everything there / But the news. / And still you look down on the teenage dad / On his estate” (estate referring to the equivalent of a British housing project). In the end, the truth comes out: “He’s poor / But he’s happier than you.” It’s a great song.
2. Sit Down by James: The Best of James is in the car rotation. I once noted that this song is probably the most appropriate theme song for Shakespeare’s Sister (definitely more so than the song from which it takes its name), and it also remains one of my favorite songs generally.
3. All These Things That I’ve Done by The Killers: The entire Hot Fuss album has been listened to an outrageous amount of times, with various songs being my favorite at various times. At the moment, I’ve loving this one, which also happens to feature the great line, “I got soul, but I'm not a soldier.”
4. This Is The Last Time by Keane: Every song on Hopes and Fears is better than the last, but this is a particular favorite.
5. Jesusland by Ben Folds: Another one with just great lyrics: “Down the tracks / Beautiful McMansions on a hill / That overlook a highway / With riverboat casinos and you still / Have yet to see a soul / Jesusland.”
6. No One Can Hold a Candle to You by Morrissey: Okay, so he had to start the second half of the list, too. One of his best B-sides ever. The lyrics are here, because I couldn’t resist blogging them.
7. Origin of Love from the Hedwig and the Angry Inch soundtrack: I just watched this movie again recently, and my favorite song (out of a collection of stellar tracks) is Origin of Love, which recounts Aristophanes’ explanation of the origin of love as recounted in Plato’s Symposium, of which I have always been particularly fond.
8. The Ballad of Maxwell Demon from the Velvet Goldmine soundtrack: Another film I watched again not too long ago. This song was written by Craig Wedren of Shudder to Think, one of my favorite bands. It’s a great song in its own right, but also quite an accomplishment as he managed to create a track that sounded like it could have been yanked straight from a 70s-era Bowie album, but nonetheless doesn’t sound blandly derivative of Bowie’s work.
9. Yellow by Coldplay: Parachutes happens to be in the car rotation, too, at the moment, and I love this song, even though it’s overplayed to infinity and used to make me cry when Mr. Shakes and I were stuck 4,000 miles apart.
10. I Like You by Morrissey: Like he wasn’t going to make another appearance. This song pretty much sums up how I feel about everyone who’s dear to me, and, depending on about whom I’m thinking any given day, can be imbued with all sorts of meaningful and/or funny nuance. “No one I ever knew / Or have spoken to resembles you / This is good or bad / All depending on my general mood / Why do you think I let you get away / With the things you say to me? / Could it be I like you?... You’re not right in the head / And nor am I / And this is why / This is why I like you.”
As for tagging 5 people, I won’t, because I always get groans when I tag people. (Yeah, I’m talking to you, Mannion and John Howard.) But, if anyone should want to pick up this meme, please feel free, and send me a link to your list.
Random Blog Notes
Adam Keller asked if I knew how the special election in Ohio is going. No news yet from any of the wires, aside from the fact that our little Dem Vet is apparently giving the GOP hag a run for her money in a highly Republican district (but take that with a grain of salt; the media prefers a horse race). Atrios notes that results should be available here and here soon after the polls close at 7:30EST.
Also, Tart's post about Bush's jackhole endorsement of intelligent design is part of a blog round-up at Pharyngula, so if you'd like to see what else people are saying about it, check it out. PZ's done a bang-up job of collecting all these posts.
Goober
So I go outside to have a smoke, and I see my favorite little squirrel hanging out. As I do whenever I see him, I start making strange little noises, which always prompts him to run toward me, then stop, sit up, and flick his tail, and wait until I start talking to him again, when he’ll start hopping closer. We have these chats a few times a week.
Today, after he’d run away, I noticed there was a woman sitting at a picnic table across the parking lot, looking at me like I was a complete nutzoid. She was talking on her cell phone, and now that my ears weren’t filled with the sounds of my own squirrel-talkin’, I could hear her saying, “This girl is a freak.”
I guess I’m lucky I wasn’t doing what I usually do on my smoke breaks, which is fart like the winner of a chili-eating contest at the Texas State Fair.
Supporting the Troops
A U.S. Soldier in Iraq has been demoted and fined for a blog post. Story here.
PHOENIX - An Arizona National Guardsman serving in Iraq has been demoted for posting classified information on his Internet Web log, an Army official said Monday.
Leonard Clark, 40, was demoted from specialist to private first class and fined $1,640, said Col. Bill Buckner, a spokesman for the Multi-National Corps-Iraq.
Soldiers in Iraq are allowed to maintain blogs or Web sites but cannot post information about Army operations or movements. They also are barred from posting information about the death of a soldier whose family hasn't yet been notified.
"The intent of the policy is not to violate soldiers' rights, but to safeguard soldiers," Buckner said. Blogs are "a growing phenomenon, I guess. It's something a lot of people do and has some uses."
Buckner said he didn't know what kind of classified information Clark had posted.
Fair enough, I guess. You don't want a soldier posting information about Army operations that may put fellow soldiers in danger.
Then there's this link to a blog about Clark.
This is the site admin…
Leonard is worried because of the current press on this matter. He has continued to follow the gag order. He is worried for the safety of his family. He can not speak on this matter due to an order. He was told his charges would not be released from the military. He made no comment to the press on the matter of the charges, but some how the charges got out, after the military said they wouldn’t. He can not defend his side while on active duty and as a proud soldier that will continue to follow the order of the gag.
But bear in mind, you are only getting one side of the information… the military’s. He has been asked not to comment, and is doing so. Please understand that he is worried about folks back at home smearing his name. When he is done with active duty, the story (from his side) will come out.
note: Leonard does not post anymore to this site. This is maintained still by the site admin. Leonard has no offical association to this site.
--snip--
(Glendale, AZ) An Arizona National Guardsman with a webblog critical of US efforts in Iraq has come under investigation. Specialist Leonard Clark is a member of the Arizona National Guard’s 860th Military Police Company. He’s forty years old with a daughter and wife in Glendale. While deployed in Iraq, Clark has been speaking out against the war and recently announced his intentions to run for office.
(bolds mine)
So... protecting other soldiers, or silencing a critic?
Everything's been removed, and he's keeping quiet...
(The cross-post is blue, and there's nothing I can do...)
