Friday Afternoon Fun

Via Chris, I found The Face Transformer, which allows you to input a picture and then see what you'd look like as another race, or the opposite sex, or at a different age, or as created by a famous artist, etc.

Here's the picture I used of myself:



And here's me as an Afro-Caribbean:



As an East Asian:



As a West Asian:



When I tell the program I'm really an Afro-Caribbean, it turns me
into the demon spawn of the Pillsbury Dough Boy and Nitta Sayuri.



As an old lady:



As a dude:



As a half-chimp:



As a Botticelli:



As a manga character:



As a drunk person:



Here's what I look like as a real drunk person:



Except I'm not a smoker anymore. Woot!

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Six more weeks of winter would be a bargain in comparison

Paging Bill Murray: Does anyone else find it distressingly ironic that the key findings of the National Intelligence Estimate came out on Groundhog Day?

Addendum: Jon Perr has the same uneasy feeling.

(Same cross-post, different day...)

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Friday Cat Blogging

Lazy time on the chaise.



Matilda: Queen of All She Surveys



Olivia: Cutest Flufflehead on the Planet

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Sully…

…why do you conspire to make me bananas?

As I've said before, Sully totally reminds me of someone with whom I'd be friends, someone with whom I'd constantly argue and to whom I'd extend (and from whom I'd receive) too little credit for being an intelligent person, because his (my) arguments made me (him) so infuriated. I would constantly wonder how he could be so clever about some things and so daft about others.

To be filed under Daft is his response to an atheist who explains that s/he finds meaning in "my own possibility and will to act in this world. I have the opportunity to interact with others and to create things. I have the chance to leave this world a bit better than when I came into it... for my children and for the rest of humanity. I don't do this because a particular flying spaghetti monster ordained that I do it and will punish me with his noodly appendage if I don't. I do it because I have the power and I believe that it is better for me if I help those around me. What else would give my life more meaning than that?"

Sully replied: "But why is that more meaningful than flying a plane into the World Trade Center?"

There are many things wrong with that response, not the least of which is its being so resolutely juvenile that my instinctual rejoinder is a desire to give him a noogie. I'll leave it to you to parse out in comments the myriad other reasons that was a very stupid reply, should you be so inclined. (Or you can swing by Evil Bender or Pharyngula, linked, above for their thoughts, too.)

I guess if that's the game we're playing, though, my question would be "Why isn't making the world a better place by my own definition more meaningful than murdering people in the name of God?" Laws and ethics notwithstanding, murdering a lot of people is meaningful, but so is, say, curing disease, which may fall under an atheist's definition of what s/he's done to leave the world a better place than s/he found it.

Who's deciding the answers to these questions about intrinsic meaning, anyway? How can we possible measure it, when we're talking not about what our lives mean to others, but what they mean to ourselves. Seems to me, it's really up to each of us to decide what gives our lives meaning, and to keep our fucking noses out of judging other people's definitions of the meaning of their lives.

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Wanted: manuscript submissions

Details: book is for children; must go against the scientific community; will give extra attention for ragging on how evil liberals are

No, really. In an email press release (not currently on their site), World Ahead Publishing is looking for just that. These are the people of the Help Mom! There Are Liberals Under My Bed. Here is what they say (emphasis mine):

Los Angeles, CA (Feb. 2, 2007) -- Following the announcement that Scholastic will publish a children’s book on global warming written by a liberal film maker, the conservative imprint World Ahead Publishing is extending an open call for manuscripts that will present children with a more balanced point-of-view on the controversial topic.

Earlier this week, Scholastic announced the acquisition of “The Down-to-Earth Guide to Global Warming,” a book the company bills as “the comprehensive resource young readers can look to for understanding why global warming happens and how we can work together to stop it.” The book is co-authored by Laurie David, the wife of comedian Larry David and the producer of Al Gore’s global warming documentary “An Inconvenient Truth.” It is scheduled for nationwide release in September.

David’s book comes on the heels of another global-warming-for-kids book published last year by the United Nations Environment Program. Entitled “Tore and the Town on Thin Ice,” the illustrated story features an Eskimo child who talks with the goddess Sedna, the self-proclaimed Mother of the Sea, who solicits the boy’s help to combat the global use of fossil fuels.

“Since Scholastic and the UN are publishing kid’s books that represent the liberal view on global warming, we’d like to give concerned parents an alternative,” says Eric M. Jackson, president of World Ahead Media. “Our company is calling on writers of children’s books to pick up their pens to support intellectual diversity. We’re inviting scientists, professionals and the public at large to submit thoughtful, well-documented manuscripts that present a balanced perspective on climate change.”

Jackson points out that recent studies by authors such as Fred Singer and Dennis Avery suggest that presently uncontrollable solar activity could be the source of rising temperatures on earth. If that is the case, then regulations to reduce fossil fuel consumption—a tactic generally advocated by liberals—might not only fail to stop global warming, but could also damage economic growth. This, in turn, could kill millions of people by making the third world more vulnerable to poverty and disease. Unfortunately this kind of nuanced, logical thinking, Jackson asserts, is seldom present in books written by liberal authors.

Oh that's not all. Jackson also has this to say:
“While some publishers like Scholastic are willing to market politically themed books directly at kids, we will limit the marketing of this book to parents,” adds Jackson. “World Ahead believes that parents should be the ones deciding how to present topics like this to their kids. And this book is for those parents who believe not just that the perspectives of Al Gore and Sedna the sea goddess aren't necessarily true, but that the issue has become totally agenda-driven.”
That's right. This guy is actually pissing on Scholastic for marketing "politically themed books" at kids. Um, one...hello the Help Mom! series? Two...global warming is a political theme? Only to conservatives.

If you would like to submit a manuscript (ha ha), email: climatebook@worldahead.com Here are the actual specs:
During the month of February 2007, World Ahead will accept proposals for manuscripts on the topic of global warming intended for children aged 6-10. Manuscripts should deal honestly with the subject, utilizing provable facts about the nature of our changing world while debunking the fabrications, hysteria and anti-growth agenda propagated by the far left.

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Sometimes You Hope Things Are Fake

This is one of those times.

Evan at PEEK has posted an incredibly disturbing video of three guys sitting around drinking beer. One of them was purportedly a guard at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, and the other two are questioning him about his experiences. The video was originally posted at YouTube and has been removed, and Evan reports that "According to IraqSlogger, an investigation into the validity of the obscured man's claims of torture, rape and abuse has begun. Though the Army's investigative affairs division isn't providing details they do say they're taking it 'seriously,' according to Christina Davidson's report, which goes on to point out that there have been a number of false claims of both soldier and insurgent atrocities." I hope it's a hoax and fear that it's not.

The worst part of the conversation is when the alleged former guard speaks to "the most fun thing" at Abu Ghraib: the women.

What was the most fun thing?

The most fun thing…? Um… Definitely the women.

[snip]

Girl, she was probably like 15 years old. Yeah, she was hot dude. The body on that girl, yeah, really tight. You know, hadn't been touched yet. She was fucking prime. So....

[jump cut edit]

One of the guys started pimping her out for 50 bucks a shot. I think at the end of the day, you know, he'd made like 500 bucks before she hung herself.

Really?

Yeah.

She hung herself? How's come she hung herself?

I don't know. She wasn't happy.

[snip]

In their culture, it's really shunned upon if you get raped. I guess she would have been stoned to death anyways by her people, you know. It's fucked up.

She was fucked anyway, I guess. In more ways than one.
When asked whether his commanding officer ever gave them any "shit" for the way they treated detainees, the alleged former guard replied, "Not until those pictures came out; then the biggest rule was no fucking cameras."

You know, I can't really imagine why someone would create something like this as a hoax. That doesn't mean anything in terms of its actual veracity; I just mean to say I can't empathize with the psyche that finds this kind of shit a goldmine of comedic material any more than I can with the psyche that engages in this behavior for real. So, even if it is a fake—still seriously fucked up.

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Highly Suspicious

Bears Deny Placing Snow, Fog Machines On Dolphin Stadium Sidelines:

MIAMI—The owners, coaching staff, and equipment managers of the Chicago Bears continue to vehemently deny ownership of the 12 commercial-grade snowmaking machines and six fog generators that somehow appeared on the sidelines of Dolphin Stadium late Tuesday. "I have never seen these machines before, nor has the Chicago Bears organization ever needed to use such things in the course of football operations, as our home stadium is usually well-supplied with both snow and fog," barely discernible Bears head coach Lovie Smith said while standing hip-deep in a snowdrift during his Wednesday-night press conference. "The point is they're here now and we'll just have to learn to live with it—football players, journalists, and prissy indoor-team members alike." Coach Smith went on to say that he would file a formal protest with the league to remove the domed roof that mysteriously appeared on the top of Dolphin Stadium Wednesday morning.
Heh heh heh.

The Onion rox. H/T Christopher.

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The Stink of Corruption? Of Desperation?

Or does it just plain stink?

The report's out, and it doesn't look good for any of us (bolds mine):

PARIS - Scientists from 113 countries issued a landmark report Friday saying they have little doubt global warming is caused by man, and predicting that hotter temperatures and rises in sea level will "continue for centuries" no matter how much humans control their pollution.

A top U.S. government scientist, Susan Solomon, said "there can be no question that the increase in greenhouse gases are dominated by human activities."

Environmental campaigners urged the United States and other industrial nations to significantly cut their emissions of greenhouse gases in response to the long-awaited report by Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

[...]

The 21-page report represents the most authoritative science on global warming as the panel comprises hundreds of scientists and representatives. It only addresses how and why the planet is warming, not what to do about it. Another report by the panel later this year will address the most effective measures for slowing global warming.

One of the authors, Kevin Trenberth, said scientists are worried that world leaders will take the message in the wrong way and throw up their hands. Instead, world leaders should to reduce emissions and adapt to a warmer world with wilder weather, he said.

"This is just not something you can stop. We're just going to have to live with it," said Trenberth, the director of climate analysis for the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo. "We're creating a different planet. If you were to come up back in 100 years time, we'll have a different climate."

The scientists said global warming was "very likely" caused by human activity, a phrase that translates to a more than 90 percent certainty that it is caused by man's burning of fossil fuels. That was the strongest conclusion to date, making it nearly impossible to say natural forces are to blame.

Of course, Bush, Lee Raymond, and their merry band aren't going to take this lying down. There's oil to be drilled; there's money to be made! Come on, we just invaded a country for this stuff; you're telling us we're going to have to cut back? But how to combat this kind of evidence?

Why, the Republican way, of course! Bribes, bribes, bribes!

Scientists Offered Cash to Dispute Climate Study
Scientists and economists have been offered $10,000 each by a lobby group funded by one of the world's largest oil companies to undermine a major climate change report due to be published today.

Letters sent by the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), an ExxonMobil-funded thinktank with close links to the Bush administration, offered the payments for articles that emphasise the shortcomings of a report from the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Travel expenses and additional payments were also offered.

[...]

The AEI has received more than $1.6m from ExxonMobil and more than 20 of its staff have worked as consultants to the Bush administration. Lee Raymond, a former head of ExxonMobil, is the vice-chairman of AEI's board of trustees.

Lee Raymond is quickly becoming The Person I Hate Most In The World. It's not enough for this man that his company has made record profits for years in a row, or that he received a $400 million retirement package, one of the largest in history. He won't be happy until the planet's drowning, and he has all the goddamn money. Our ultimate destruction as a species is probably going to be caused by greed.

Ben Stewart of Greenpeace said: "The AEI is more than just a thinktank, it functions as the Bush administration's intellectual Cosa Nostra. They are White House surrogates in the last throes of their campaign of climate change denial. They lost on the science; they lost on the moral case for action. All they've got left is a suitcase full of cash."

On Monday, another Exxon-funded organisation based in Canada will launch a review in London which casts doubt on the IPCC report. Among its authors are Tad Murty, a former scientist who believes human activity makes no contribution to global warming. Confirmed VIPs attending include Nigel Lawson and David Bellamy, who believes there is no link between burning fossil fuels and global warming.

And I'm sure both of them just received a big fat sack of cash.

Bush, Raymond, and the rest of these Global Warming deniers are literally bribing us to death.

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Min. Wage Bill Passes Senate

After Dems agreed to GOP's demands for attached tax breaks:

The Senate voted overwhelmingly yesterday to increase the federal minimum wage for the first time in nearly a decade, but added small-business tax breaks that are unacceptable to House leaders, preventing Democrats from claiming a quick victory on one of their top legislative priorities.

The Senate voted 94 to 3 in favor of the measure, which would raise the minimum wage to $7.25 an hour from $5.15 over two years.

To attract Republican support, Senate leaders agreed to extend tax credits and expand deductions for businesses that would be hit hardest by the minimum-wage increase. Those tax breaks, worth $8.3 billion over 10 years, are coupled with a proposal to raise taxes by a similar amount on corporations, their chief executives and other highly paid workers.
A proposal that will probably never go anywhere.

So what do you think? Should the Dems have refused to pass the bill with the tax cuts attached? Should they have made a big stink about how the GOP was holding the bill hostage until the GOP caved, even if that necessitated making minimum wage workers wait even longer for a raise? Or since they've waited since 1998 already, should the Dems have spent another couple of weeks exposing and undermining the GOP's tactics until they could have passed the bill without another corporate giveaway?

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Two-Minute Nostalgia Sublime

Who's the Boss?

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Question of the Day

What's either the best or worst experience you ever had with a teacher? (K-12)

I had my dad as a teacher my senior year of high school, which was pretty darn fun. Normally, students were prohibited from having their parents as teachers, but he was the only one teaching the honors section of econ, so we were given an exception. It was interesting to see my dad at work, for one thing (and he was a very good teacher; it's not easy to make learning how to do your taxes interesting, but he did), and it was hilarious to watch my classmates suddenly turn into complete weirdos. Instead of raising their hand and asking a question like they typically would, they'd whisper to me, "Ask your dad if he's going to give us homework tonight." So I'd just yell out, "Dad, Tim wants to know if you're going to give us homework tonight."

People always ask me if I called my dad Mr. _______ when I had him as a teacher. I so didn't. He was totally Dad. In fact, the rest of the class pretty much ended up calling him Dad, too, or "Melissa's Dad," as in, "Hey, Melissa's Dad—can I go to the bathroom?"

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I'll Be in the Salon

Actually, Glenn Greenwald will. He's moving.

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Q: What do Al Gore and Rush Limbaugh have in common?

A: Both nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize.*

*Except only one nomination was real. Guess which one?

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*snort*

NewMexiKen:

A linguistics professor was lecturing to his class one day. "In English," he said, "a double negative forms a positive. In some languages, though, such as Russian, a double negative is still a negative. However, there is no language wherein a double positive can form a negative."

A voice from the back of the room piped up, "Yeah, right."

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Feeling a Draft?

Seriously, was there anything in the SOTU that wasn't fabricated out of unicorn fluff and elf farts?

Iraq Escalation Could Be Twice as Large as Bush Claimed

A study released today by the Congressional Budget Office shows that the real troop increase associated with President Bush’s escalation policy could be as high as 48,000, more than double the 21,500 soldiers that Bush has claimed.

As DefenseTech notes, extra forces are expected because the combat units being sent into Iraq “need to be backed up by support troops, ‘including personnel to staff headquarters, serve as military police, and provide communications, contracting, engineering, intelligence, medical, and other services.’” The CBO’s low estimate envisions at least 15,000 additional support personnel. The alternative scenario “would require about 28,000 support troops in addition to the 20,000 combat troops.”

Add to that a price tag that could be five times the amount of the White House estimates, and we've got another big heapin' helpin' of nightmare fuel, served up by good 'ol Georgie.

I'm expecting this to become reality any day now.

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A Tale of Two Stories

One, an opinion piece.

All right, ladies, the gig is up. It’s time for all of us to get married, including you.

…Look, ladies, deciding not to marry for your own well-being is one thing, but it is we you’re not marrying in the process. Your decision is killing single men — literally.

Single men partake in more risky behavior than married men. We eat badly, smoke more, and avoid doctors’ offices. We die younger. And we’re far more likely to wake up in a pile of crumpled newspapers still clutching the tequila bottle we began sipping from two days before.
The other, a news item.

An Upper East Side man testified at his murder trial yesterday, describing what he saw as his wife’s decade-long mental breakdown and admitting that he grabbed a knife and stabbed her in the kitchen of their home.

…[S]he rebuffed his advances, even when he brought her flowers.

Although he cooked, she refused to pick up his plate after dinner, complaining, "I'm not your maid."

"I'm telling you, this was the house of hell," he said.
Sheelzebub and Jessica provide all the commentary you need. I just found it amusing that I read these stories almost back-to-back, and all I could think was, "Kill or be killed, bitchez."

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EQUUS

EQUUS is opening on February 27th (following previews starting on the 16th) at the at the Gielgud Theatre. Here is the website, if you're interested--not to mention in London. This play is drawing some controversy though. Why? Because of this:



Look familiar? I should say so, as that is Daniel Radcliffe--best known, so far, as Harry Potter. Radcliffe is branching out in his career, as actors do. He will be appearing nude in the play (more images available at the first link above). No big deal, right? He's just an actor. But, nooooooo, some parents apparently think Harry Potter can't be naked!. Nevermind the fact that a child shouldn't be going to EQUUS...

But parents are up in arms and are bombarding "Harry Potter" fansites with emails.

One reads, "We as parents feel Daniel should not appear nude. Our 9-year-old son looks up to him as a role model. We are very disappointed and will avoid the future movies he makes."


WTF? You people are just as stupid as that Laura Mallory person. His spokeswoman said that he won't abandon Harry but you people need to chill the fuck out (slight paraphrase).

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Top Design

Did anyone else watch the premiere of Top Design last night? It's like a mash-up of Project Runway and Top Chef, in which 12 interior designers compete against each other under the watchful eye of Todd Oldham. It wasn’t great, but it's watchable, and if you've got an interest in interior design—or tend to enjoy things like the inevitable epic battle brewing between 40-year-old Chicago queen John and 23-year-old New York queen Michael, who hated each other on sight and ended up partners for the first challenge—you could do lots worse than Top Design.


Aside from those two superstars, there wasn't much about which to write home—except that the mystery guest, around whose weird collection of five baubles the designers had to design a room, was Alexis Arquette. (Weirdly, the five items included a mannequin head, a disco ball lamp, and some other wacky shit, from which I guessed the mystery guest would be David Arquette—totally out of left field, yet so bizarrely close!) Alexis Arquette is, perhaps, the most well-known transgendered actress, so it was cool that she was on the show, anyway, but what I noticed was that none of the contestants were shown registering any alarm or bemusement, that all of them referred to her as a woman with no prompting, and that there was not the slightest hint that Arquette was there to be "weird" or "funny." One might reasonably suggest that anything undermining the uneventfulness of Arquette's visit was edited out—and I'd just note that, if that were the case, it's still notable. There wasn't a single second of the show where anyone watching at home who might have been snickering or sneering had anyone on the show with whom to identify. Well done, Bravo.

As an aside, Alexis Arquette has a brilliantly expressive face—and I defy any future guest on the show to register such perfect expressions of contentment or disgust at the rooms offered up by the designers.



A face that says: "I like this room."

(That was the winning design.)



A face that says: "You're fucking kidding me, right?"

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Diners to Bush: "WEV"

We get this funny little tidbit from Hughes For America. Seems Shrub made a surprise visit to a small diner in Peoria and got an unexpected reaction: silence.

Jan. 31, 2007 - On Tuesday, President Bush popped in for a surprise visit to the Sterling Family Restaurant, a homey diner in Peoria, Ill. It’s a scene that has been played out many times before by this White House and others: a president mingling among regular Americans, who, no matter what they might think of his policies, are usually humbled and shocked to see the leader of the free world standing 10 feet in front of them.

But on Tuesday, the surprise was on Bush. In town to deliver remarks on the economy, the president walked into the diner, where he was greeted with what can only be described as a sedate reception. No one rushed to shake his hand. There were no audible gasps or yelps of excitement that usually accompany visits like this. Last summer, a woman nearly fainted when Bush made an unscheduled visit for some donut holes at the legendary Lou Mitchell’s Restaurant in Chicago. In Peoria this week, many patrons found their pancakes more interesting. Except for the click of news cameras and the clang of a dish from the kitchen, the quiet was deafening.
He tried, though. He just plopped his ass down next to some people in a booth (can we say rude?) and approached others. This is par for the course:



Actual caption: President Bush greets patrons at the Sterling Family Restaurant in Peoria, Ill. Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2007. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)

Should say: Patron at Sterling Family Restaurant in Peroria, Ill. tells President Bush to get his grubby, lying hands off of him. Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2007. (AP Photo/Gerarld Herbert)

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Yay for Exxon!

Congratulations, guys:

Exxon Mobil Corp. Thursday reported the biggest annual profit on record for a U.S. corporation - earning more than $75,000 every minute of 2006 on the back of record oil prices.

The nation's biggest company posted net earnings of $39.5 billion on revenue of $377.6 billion last year, topping its previous profit record of $36.1 billion in 2005, which at the time was the largest for any U.S. company.
As Arlen points out, "[F]or the second year in a row, that best year ever was also the best year for any company in history." That's quite a record! Party on.

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