Loveliness

Ladies and gentlemen, Lovely Professional University:

The Lovely Group is a widely recognized corporate house of the northern region of India whose name is strongly associated with quality delivery in each enterprise undertaken by it. Needless to say it has achieved resounding success in all its ventures including professional education. The brand ‘Lovely’ symbolizes excellence and instills faith and confidence among millions of people in India and abroad since 1961. ‘Lovely’ has come to represent initiative, reliability, transparency & professionalism of high order.

This is a legitimate institution.

You may find less satisfaction, however, at the Hilarious Institute of Clinical Technology.

Also:



Further:



Okay then!

List of Cats with Fraudulent Diplomas

Via Boing Boing, this.

Our Greatest Issue EVER!

What was that? HARLAN ELLISON?



Oh, so he didn't quite write it...



And he didn't letter it.

Compare and Contrast

Not-Yet-Advanced Patriarchy-Blaming

Girl trouble!



Naturally it turns out that Valkyrie was really The Enchantress enchantressing the aggrieved ladies into whupping Avenger ass. They eventually see the light:



Ha ha. Wench. Written by a man of course.

Bipartisan Means an Equal Proportion of Doctors and Mental Patients

Our man Burt pulling a Broder:

So far, as bi-partisanship is concerned, the Republicans have been banished to Washington’s equivalent of Siberia. These days, bi-partisanship simply means that David Axelrod and Rahm Emanuel are in agreement.

Hands up everyone who believes Burt wants to be bipartisan with Hitler Stalin Obinladen?

There is one promise, however, that Obama has kept. He vowed transparency, and anyone who can’t plainly see what the rock star and his left-wing groupies (Axelrod, Emanuel, Jeff Jones, Valerie Jarrett, Cass Sunstein, Anita Dunn) are up to is simply spending too much time watching “American Idol” and college football.

The inclusion of Sunstein on the list is still awfully amusing, though Rahm should be as much of a giggle.

The White Man

From What is the What, which has few if any Tasmanian prison camps thus far, but more African refugee camps. About the same proportion of violence slavery and genocide.

Updated!

Playing doctor:

-Now we'll play hide and seek, Agar said. -First, you have to find something that I hid here. Agar pointed to her chest. I took in a quick breath. Even thinking of it now, I cannot believe it happened, that I was chosen for these experiments! But this happened, exactly as I say it did, and next she said the words that I still hear today, when I close my eyes and lay my head to rest.
-You have to look for it. With your hand.
I glanced to the other girls for help. They nodded at me. They were all in on this! I felt as able to put my hand under her shirt as I might make fire from earwax.

Did You Know?

Bubba Gets All the Breaks

I can't think why m- er, Bubba's name ended up on some sort of list of people who are capable of thinking serious things about serious stuff, but to whoever helped that idiot wind up on the lovely and talented Ayesha Mirza's list some thanks are owed.

Not exactly sure what to do here: on the one hand, I like freebies, so I should update my name. On the other, I think I'm incapable of doing a review of any worth on this issue, so I'd want to step lightly in refusal - not that a response is expected. If possible I'd pass on the opportunity to somebody else.

Talk to the Hand

Others will, I am sure, say funnier things about the Big Hollywood Sesame Street Freakout, but

A. I wanted to be the first to say "Talk to the hand."
B. The most entertaining part is that the freakout appears to be over the proper form a joke should take, not that it was made.

Look:

Last week, in a re-broadcast of an episode that originally aired two years ago, Oscar starts his own news network, GNN (Grouchy News Network). An irate viewer calls in to berate him that the news is not grouchy enough:

“I am changing the channel. From now on I am watching ‘Pox’ News. Now there is a trashy news show.”

"HA! Here is the smear!" you say, outraged that Sesame Street would make a joke no four-year-old will give a shit about. But wait!

Later in the episode, Anderson Cooper from 4th place CNN, guest stars as a reporter for GNN. He interacts with “Walter Cranky” and “Dan Rather-Not” — Muppets representing real-life liberal news personalities — and they talk about “Meredith Beware-a” and “Diane Spoiler.” But no affectionate nicknames for Fox News personalities; no Spill O’Reilly or Brittle Hume — nope, and the only disparaging characterization of real-world news is reserved for Fox: Fox is a POX. It is trashy. They didn’t even attempt to try “MessyNBC.”

Now Sesame Street is in trouble for not making the appropriate kind of fun of figures on Fox, also a move doomed to be missed by even the most attentive tot.

At some point a photoshop is warranted I guess. Imagine one of these with limbless or headless bleeding muppets according to your preference.

Harry Shearer

Le Show is pretty funny this week.

An Eye-Catching Headline

"Restless Vagina Syndrome": Big Pharma's Newest Fake Disease
By Terry J. Allen, In These Times. Posted November 3, 2009.

The pharmaceutical industry wants you to think that if you don't have sex like a porn star, you're in need of their drugs.

I believe I am now a science blogger or something.

Discoveries

Found that while hoping that whiny college professor Mike Adams had some embarrassing video.

Anyway, now you know: vitamin D prevents the flu and H1N1 was invented by the military to kill Mexicans. Also herbal medicine is entirely without a profit motive. And vaccines don't work and so forth.

I bring you the best out of love.

Nerd Alert

The first comic book tribute to John Barth ever? The only? The most reprehensible? November 1970.

The Talent Pool

Matthew Yglesisiieisiseisidsis has a map that reveals some crazy racism evident in the most recent presidential election. Beneath that, this:

There are plenty of white men with progressive views, but in general the majority of white men are not progressive and the majority of progressives are not white men. Drawing from the relatively small pool of white male progressives means drawing from a shallow talent pool.

Republicans have the advantage of drawing white males from a far larger talent pool which is why the Republican nomination was contested by luminaries John McCain Mike Huckabee Rudy Giuliani Mitt Romney Sam Brownback Tom Tancredo Jim Gilmore* Duncan Hunter Ron Paul Fred Thompson and Tommy Thompson.

*I remember nothing at all about Jim Gilmore.

Chance of a Fix?

Ha Ha!

Via Julia at the Voice, an interview with Mikhael Gorbachev:

By the way, in 1987, after my first visit to the United States, Vice President Bush accompanied me to the airport, and told me: "Reagan is a conservative. An extreme conservative. All the blockheads and dummies are for him, and when he says that something is necessary, they trust him. But if some Democrat had proposed what Reagan did, with you, they might not have trusted him."

Ha ha ha! Not news, but fun, and of course GHWB was never a true conservative et cetera.

News from an Australian Paper But It's Really US News and I Didn't Notice

Peeing Forever

Will the pluuuuuurp never cease?

Pissing on Jesus: Hollywood Hates Us Exhibit 11,567
by John Nolte

“Larry David would never do this to Muslims. He doesn’t have the guts.”

That’s missing the point.

Hypocrisy or a fear of how some wacko extremist might react has nothing to do with this. Hollywood constantly singles out Christians for cruel ridicule and the worst kind of stereotyping for one simple reason…

They hate us.

They hate our guts.

There’s nothing more complicated to this question than that.

As usual, the punchline is self-supplied:

Anger puts cruel thoughts in your head. Hate’s the fuel required to take you across the finish line.

Further own-goalage comes via our watchman Burt Prelutsky. Who is watching the watchman? Me:

A while ago, I wrote a piece titled “Blowing the Whistle on Waxman.” In case you missed it, I explained that Henry Waxman and I had been friends beginning almost 50 years ago at UCLA.

That piece was a "When I knew the guy he did THIS! HA!" kind of thing. Turns out Henry wrote back, and Burt quotes him:

“As I recall our poker friendship, you used to keep a card with every cent I ever lost to you to be sure you were paid. When you sent out a letter pleading for your friends to help you out at a difficult financial time in your life, you promised that you would repay every cent. I sent you $100. I never asked you for the money, nor have you offered to repay it. I did not want to embarrass you then or now. But since you have no hesitation to try to publicly hold me up to scorn, I see no reason not to ask you to repay your debt to me. I would like to use that money to donate to the ACLU or some other group that will defend your rights, along with everyone else, to free speech and other Constitutional protections. Sincerely, Henry Waxman.”

Naturally there's some kooky ranting about ACORN surrounding this stuff, but one would think that for a conservative allowing yourself to be portrayed as a begging welcher is a no-no. (Can't imagine why Townhall dropped him.) Burt differs on what the card was really for - he sez Waxman was unreliable at paying back money - but says he'll pay Waxman back.

It's so sad.

The Tempest-Tossed Teapot

Realism in War

Big wimps such as myself do not like to hear things like this:

"I'm not some peacenik, pot-smoking hippie who wants everyone to be in love," Hoh said. Although he said his time in Zabul was the "second-best job I've ever had," his dominant experience is from the Marines, where many of his closest friends still serve.

"There are plenty of dudes who need to be killed," he said of al-Qaeda and the Taliban. "I was never more happy than when our Iraq team whacked a bunch of guys."

Who is this bloodthirsty monster? This guy:

When Matthew Hoh joined the Foreign Service early this year, he was exactly the kind of smart civil-military hybrid the administration was looking for to help expand its development efforts in Afghanistan.

A former Marine Corps captain with combat experience in Iraq, Hoh had also served in uniform at the Pentagon, and as a civilian in Iraq and at the State Department. By July, he was the senior U.S. civilian in Zabul province, a Taliban hotbed.

But last month, in a move that has sent ripples all the way to the White House, Hoh, 36, became the first U.S. official known to resign in protest over the Afghan war, which he had come to believe simply fueled the insurgency.

Let me allow here that I do not know if Hoh is an expert or a loon. But look at this:

This week, Hoh is scheduled to meet with Vice President Biden's foreign policy adviser, Antony Blinken, at Blinken's invitation. If the United States is to remain in Afghanistan, Hoh said, he would advise a reduction in combat forces.

Shouldn't a Serious Administration be smearing this guy as an attention-loving faggot by now instead of listening to him?

SCANDAL CONSUMES THE OBAMA WHITE HOUSE

RED FUCKIN' ALERT!!!

Michelle Obama has done wonders for raising social consciousness for responsible eating with her efforts to launch a White House garden and her support of a farmer's market near home, but she lost the high road a bit when, as PD's Lynn Sweet reported this weekend, the Obamas' dog, Bo, got a "doghouse cake made out of veal" for his birthday earlier this month.

A Tragedy

For some reason I don't visit The Onion much these days. All that gravitas goes to your head.

Man Dies After Secret 4-Year Battle With Gorilla
October 26, 2009 | Issue 45•44

ROANOKE, VA—Local claims adjuster David Seaborne, a devoted husband and father of three, died Tuesday at the age of 37 following a long and painful personal battle with a 512-pound eastern lowland gorilla.

My Beloved Cunt Would Be Shocked

This is an outrage!

“First let me state that I’ve been a fan of “Curb Your Enthusiasm” for many years and, even though Larry David is a liberal, I generally enjoy the writing and Larry’s antics. However, this time what I saw made me feel a little sick, extremely disappointed and a bit angry as well. I will never watch the show again as I have lost all respect and feelings of good will for Mr. David.

“Did you happen to see the episode to which I refer? Assuming you did not catch the episode, briefly stated: Larry pisses on the face of a painting of Jesus Christ, followed by mocking of Christians who believe the piss drop on the face of Jesus is a tear, thus they’ve witnessed a miracle. I wonder how many other viewers, Christian and non Christian, are similarly shocked and disgusted? Of course, the hypocrisy is that Mr. David would never exhibit such gross contempt for any other religion, especially Islam.

This isn't an outrage!



UPDATED FOR CATHOLICS!

Who could have imagined that Bill Donohoe would weigh in on this pressing issue?

The Legacy

Via TPM, George W. Bush:

His most memorable story, one after another said, was about Barney, his Scottie:

Mindful of his new neighbors, who have had to endure as many as 650 people a day gawking at his new house in a cul-de-sac, Bush said he took Barney for a neighborhood stroll with "plastic bag on his hand" to scoop poop. That was a moment, he said, when he realized "Man, my life has changed!"

Also:

In the crowd of real estate agents in suits, housewives in jeans, students and senior citizens, Chris Clarke, 25, a salesman from Dallas, stood at the back. Like many people, he said that other speakers were better -- Colin Powell was his favorite -- but he thought Bush was good. In fact, he said, it could turn out that Bush may be more suited to motivational speaking than being president. He said when Bush misspeaks, it sounds "incompetent if you are president. But here it can be inspiring. It makes him seem like a regular guy, no better than me."

The Irrational Actor

Rich Germans have too much money:

A group of rich Germans has launched a petition calling for the government to make wealthy people pay higher taxes.

The group say they have more money than they need, and the extra revenue could fund economic and social programmes to aid Germany's economic recovery.

Waiting to see if that one's a hoax, but the Germans have a thing for perversity.

The Brave Iconoclast

Greg Gutfeld sees some journalism school kids use Fox News as a punchline in a rap:

So, no surprise: the student raps benign pap that his professors and like-minded dorm-rats would applaud – from railing against complacency, to never losing touch with “his humanity.” But I’ll repeat the part the kid really wanted them to hear:

“There’s no need to hear crazy, or create a false sense of parity, like Fox News and Hannity.”

And that’s the big point: That when applying for a job, the student knows to regurgitate the shared assumptions of the elitists around him. In short, if you bash Fox News, you might land an unpaid internship at Mother Jones.

Thus sayeth the rebel Gutfeld, in defiance of what the editorial line at Big Hollywood and, um, Fox would have him say.

That Seems Like a Lotta Work

Wheat-crushing is more fun than digging:

Scientists investigating a large crater in a field in northern Latvia, believed to have been caused by a meteorite, now suspect it was a hoax.

Check out the picture at the link. It was a big job.

JS-Kit FTW

Some of the sites I visit use JS-Kit's replacement comment system for old Haloscan stuff. It's pure shit that doesn't behave in helpful or expected ways EXCEPT in comments to Dave Brockington's piece on the BBC and fascist Nick Griffin.

The Hummer Aesthetic

Big Hollywood calls out stupid celebrities for being stupid environmentalists. For instance, some stupid celebrities are trying to use less water. Stupid celebrities.

CALIFORNIA HAS ALL THE WATER IT NEEDS.

The mighty LA River:

Yamaha Electric Scooters

More or less dignified than the Segway?

The Company You Keep

Via Brendan, Instaputz:

Apparently, former Times reporter Judith Miller wasn't sufficiently embarrassed by her keynote appearance at the Pajamas Media launch party.

For unfathomable reasons, the Pulitzer winner consented to an interview by Bill Whittle on PJTV -- a low-rent operation with an audience perhaps in the millions thousands hundreds. (PJTV refuses to divulge traffic stats.)

Bill Whittle's greatest triumph was proving that Vulcans should not be allowed to be starship captains.

A Cheap Joke

This following one's filed away for a rainy day. Mr. Krauthammer's face is a little too misshapen to make it work.



The whole scene:

No Silver Lining

Andy McCarthy:

What they're trying to establish is the power to control compensation levels, period. In fact, more and more Democrats are making the insane argument that doing this, and much, much more, is within Congress's purportedly limitless constitutional power to "promote the general welfare." This is really scary stuff, and I'm afraid I don't see a silver lining.

I'm gonna plagiarize Mark Levin here. Mark has been recounting how, when FDR foisted social security on the country, his administration told the public it was an insurance program.

Good fucking god this man is right. There was no upside to Social Security at all.

True Rebellion

Greg Gutfeld keepin' it realistic:

See, when I arrived at Berkeley as a freshman some 25 years ago, the city not only helped to transform my political self, but reinforced a cynicism already brewing inside me concerning the meaning of true rebellion.

[...]

And so in 1983, I realized that a true rebel blends in, embraces discipline, hard work, and clean pants. I joined a fraternity. I cut off my long crazy mop of hair. I started tanning – I am not sure why, but it seemed the opposite of heroin chic. I also took up the banjo, just to keep it real.

God damn him, I'll bet he saved money too.

Get Thee To A Mummery!

The comments of Myles SG are a delight.

Attention Hippies

Thank you Google Translate.

Important!

The whole of a very important news item at Big Hollywood!



In comments:



Let us compare and contrast the urgency of this item with, say, the story of a woman whose employer confined her to a shipping container after a rape:

Q and A with David Rohde

I'm impressed by the number of comments in this Q and A that take issue with the idea that former Taliban hostage Mr. Rohde made an effort to find out more about the place where American blood is being spilled.

Come ON!

Some prize committee guys are jerks:

Only three years after it was set up the Ibrahim Prize for Achievement in African Leadership — the brain child of Mo Ibrahim, the Sudanese-born mobile phone tycoon — has apparently run out of suitable candidates.

AHEM SIRS!

Incremental Progress is Still Progress

Via Mr. Atrios, progress:

The Obama administration will not seek to arrest medical marijuana users and suppliers as long as they conform to state laws, under new policy guidelines to be sent to federal prosecutors today.

Third Hottest

The FAQ is funny.

Great Presidential Drunks

Kevin McCullough's working the Rush beat, as am I:

President Barack Obama, who has a tendency to stick himself into the middle of racially biased conflicts that are of essentially no importance, owes that courtesy to one that captured national headlines for nearly a week. In understanding the vital importance of genuine issues of equality in a post racial (a.k.a. "Obamian") age, he owes it to the NFL, DeMaurice Smith, Donovan McNabb, Jennifer Lopez, Serena Williams, Fergie, and Ja Rule to invite them, along with Rush Limbaugh, to come enjoy a beer on the White House lawn with he and that Vice President of his.

That's a lotta drinkin', all to resolve, um, what problem?

Also, once it is revealed that the primary force behind the attack on Rush Limbaugh was in fact a former Obama campaign aide, and now high ranking official with the NFL Player's Association named DeMaurice Smith, the President would necessarily be forced to disassociate himself from him a la William Ayers and Jeremiah Wright.

Also! Eric Holder was lurking in the coffee shop. Okay, on to the issue:

But one topic of conversation that would actually be helpful to everyone watching, for no doubt CNN and MSNBC would provide non-stop coverage (or make it up out of thin air) of it (or make it up out of thin air) as the most important event in human history, would be: "Why are openly racist, divisive, and vulgar people allowed to be owners in the NFL, while one other man who has no history of racism whatsoever is prevented from it?"

That is a very good question if asked in some alternate reality regarding the NFL shunning Jesus.

The rest of the column is about how Kevin McCullough is deaf.

Regardless of the foregoing, the PRESIDENT HAS DECIDED HOW FOOTBALL WILL BE. Salaam, gentlemen.

Bumper Sticker Idea

KEEP THE RAMS RUSH-FREE

Taqwacore

Guy writes book about fantasy punk Islam and punk Islam is created.



More videos.

Others Imagine They Are Napoleon

Big Hollywood touts a video:

Dear Friends — Take a few moments and look at this video. The gentleman is Dr. Bob Basso, a friend of mine, and he is Thomas Paine. His first videos, which ran over a year ago, took on viral proportions. His “voice in the wilderness” is responsible for the Tea Party movement across the country and has inspired talk show hosts and millions of Americans, no matter their political affiliation.

This man is crazy.

The Sad Saga of Denouncing Boy

When Butt Collides With Hurt

The world's tiniest penis violin screeches away:

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: By the way, the Miami Dolphins have a new owner, a new limited partner owner. Her name is Fergie, [Stacy Ann Ferguson] and she is in a popular group called the Black Eyed Peas. The leader of that group is "will.i.am." [William James Adams, Jr.] Here's a little audio clip from the music of the Black Eyed Peas, which will now be featured prominently as owners of the National Football League's Miami Dolphins.

WILL.I.AM: (song "My Humps") (crowd noise) What you gon' do with all that junk? All that junk inside that trunk?

FERGIE: I'm a g-g-get you drunk, get you to love drunk off my hump. My hump, my hump, my hump. My hump, my hump. My lovely lady lumps. Check it out! I drive these brothers crazy. I do it on the daily. They treat me really nicely, and buy me all these ices.

RUSH: Fergie, new limited partner owner of the Miami Dolphins, of the National Football League.

END TRANSCRIPT

The Obvious

Our lad Jonah:

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Load Up [Jonah Goldberg]

The Superhero Supply store is up and running.

10/14 03:00 PMShare

Image hiked from this impassioned defence of Matter Eater Lad. Oh, and some embarrassing screencap of Jonah.

Forgive the rushed Photoshopping, I'm still blaming the graphics card for everything.

Outrageous!

A rich round of cackles from me:

After nearly two weeks of fabricated anti-Rush Limbaugh smears from the news media, what kind of scrutiny can be expected now that trashy pop tramp Fergie has also indicated an interest in bidding for a NFL team?

Oh hoho. Ah hahahahaha.

More:

Hey, why shouldn't Fergie pass the NFL's political litmus test? As an outspoken Obama supporter who appeared at his nomination acceptance speech in Denver last year, she's got the credentials they're looking for (even if parents are horrified). She also visited with the man whose oratory skills she finds "amazing" at the White House earlier this year.

Never mind the fact that she sings about "her humps" or chats about wild sex and drug sprees in her past, it's about the integrity of the game, right? Of course, it's Fergalicious!

So, to get things straight here, the knock on Fergie is that she has DONE DRUGS and HAD SEX.

Hee hee hee.

Diplomacy: Pretty Cool

Mind you, he doesn't have a military force handy any more:

Former U.S. President George W. Bush says multilateral diplomacy is the key to resolving the standoff over North Korea's nuclear program.

Astute!

Not to argue the numbers, because I don't know them well, but this is not the USA RAH RAH! that it hopes to be:

WE HAVE LONGER AVERAGE LIFE-SPANS DESPITE HAVING A FATTER POPULATION WITH A MUCH HIGHER % OF BLACKS - WHO DIE YOUNG (AGE 70 YEARS ON AVERAGE); IF THE USA HAD THE SAME % OF BLACKS AS THE EU THEN OUR LIFE EXPECTANCY WOULD BE 81 YEARS.

It is, however, in all caps, which makes it authoritative. Also RELIABLE, as RELIAPUNDIT would have it.

My friends, Republicans want to split your spine SOONER.



The instrumental break at 1:38 makes me LOL. Seriously.

Fragmentizing
Chop the bodies
Hatchet wielding
The spine splitting will never end!

Girl Bands With Boy Drummers

Welcome to Girl Pundit! A site that is powered by ambitious conservative women who are savvy entrepreneurs, creative designers, gifted writers and so forth. Jedediah and Dawn are two such women! As are these gentlemen:

LEAD CONTRIBUTORS:

Jack Cashill is an independent writer and producer [...]

Dr. Brian Russell is a licensed psychologist, licensed attorney, lecturer, writer [...]

Kevin Price is Host of the Price of Business, the longest running show on AM 650 [...]

Dr. Dave writes satire, snark, and insantiy from the gutter [...]

GO GIRLS!

Albert Ayler - Summertime

SubScene

I moaned about the English adaptation of Kiki's Delivery Service a while ago.

Turns out there's a site that hosts subtitle files for movies. Rename the subtitle file to match your movie file (except for filetype) and there's a good chance your movie player of choice on your computer will be able to figure it all out.

Note that I am an elitist Mac user with Firefox and ad-blocking and forced single-window mode and script-blocking and so forth: seems like the kinda site a Windows and IE user should expect to find a bunch of irritating pop-ups and porn ads on.

Extremists

Jonah writes in defense of Glenn Beck:

If you think it's racist to oppose Obama's health care reform efforts, it goes without saying that you'll think Beck is an extremist. This is what liberals always say about popular right-wingers, including Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan and William F. Buckley.

Hmm, Barry Goldwater ran against the Civil Rights Act, Ronald Reagan started his campaign in Philadelphia Mississippi running on the Southern Strategy, and William F. Buckley wrote some famously racist things.

Now, what Jonah's probably meaning here is that those three were also called "extremists" as Beck is, rather than "racists" as they all seem to be, but it's not hard to imagine the "extremist" set containing the "racist" set these days, and Jonah once again farts away his own argument.

Also:

Not only is Beck good at that, he actually gets people to read serious books in ways Buckley never could. Why defenestrate him from the house of conservatism merely to preserve the rarefied air?

A Moses Pitcher

Plans afoot:

20th Century Fox has made a preemptive acquisition of a pitch to tell the story of Moses in "300" style.

One of the few things my mom ever said that I wished I could have unheard was this, of Charlton Heston: "I just love to see that man sweat!"

Advantages of Children

The lovely daughter needs a little help, and one of her helpers is a Portuguese native - also a Spanish speaker - and when the two are killing time, they play with YouTube.

This means an inevitable dose of Xuxa.



Minor Chopperization:

Worried

Freedom

Thank god that dreadful socialist didn't ruin the freedom of Honduras to freely prohibit free speech.

New media measures take effect in Honduras
By FREDDY CUEVAS (AP) – 42 minutes ago

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras — Honduras' interim leaders put in place new rules Saturday that threaten broadasters with closure for airing reports that "attack national security," further restricting media freedom following the closure of two opposition stations.

Gee Whiz

Time to say "Good for Hillary."

Smart boss too, though lacking in specifics somewhat.

Heading from reasonable to stupid fucking asswipe, here is idiot Thon Friedman:

[...]

All that said, I hope Mr. Obama will take this instinct a step further when he travels to Oslo on Dec. 10 for the peace prize ceremony. Here is the speech I hope he will give:

[...]

I will accept this award on behalf of the American men and women who are still on patrol today in Iraq, helping to protect Baghdad’s fledgling government as it tries to organize the rarest of things in that country and that region — another free and fair election.

[...]

But have no doubt, those are the exception. If you want to see the true essence of America, visit any U.S. military outpost in Iraq or Afghanistan. You will meet young men and women of every race and religion who work together as one, far from their families, motivated chiefly by their mission to keep the peace and expand the borders of freedom.

SUCK ON THIS, NOBEL POOS PRIZE!!!

What's With This?

Updatiness:

This is the sort of thing I was thinking... Why, um, blow these folks off so brusquely?

Also:

The organizers were rating the march a success, saying that at least 150,000 people had attended, though the authorities gave no official estimate of the crowd size.

Heh heh.

To Love and Be Loved

By Frank Sinatra.

Who Is the Most Persecuted Person in the History of the World?

A billionaire who has sex with young girls:

Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi has described himself as the most persecuted person "in the entire history of the world".

Mr Berlusconi also said he was "the best prime minister we can find today".

In an impassioned statement, he then mistakenly told reporters he had spent millions of euros on "judges", before correcting himself to say "lawyers".

Best prime minister if best=funniest, sure.

A Great Picture

Viscount Monckton delivers the usual crazy lecture, fortunately looking not at all like a bug-eyed loon. Props to Gerry Kahrmann, Photographer of the Day. The article is not at all kind. Check out the comments.

Nutpicking

Burt Prelutsky has a new column up. I hadn't really noticed the recent "Burt's Eye View" thing, which is sad as it has to stand as the clearest and purest comedic work I have yet encountered by the man, if not the most original. But anyway:

For instance, if you think that Jesse Jackson is an extortionist; that Al Sharpton is a con man; that Louis Farrakhan, Jeremiah Wright and Van Jones are three of a kind; and that the Black Congressional Caucus, ACORN, the SEIU, the Black Panthers, Eric Holder and Barack Hussein Obama, present a clear and present danger to our Republic, you are what passes for a racist in 2009.

Let's be fair here: belief in all these things may not mean you are a racist, but it certainly means you're a nut.

In comments:



I had forgotten Preston Brooks.

Preston Smith Brooks (August 5, 1819 – January 27, 1857) was a Democratic Congressman from South Carolina, known for physically beating Senator Charles Sumner on the floor of the United States Senate. His first cousin, Matthew Butler, was a Confederate general.

My General Ignorance

Who knew?

The oblast forms the westernmost part of the Russian Federation, but it has no land connection to the rest of Russia. Since the fall of the Soviet Union it has been an exclave of Russia surrounded by Lithuania, Poland, and the Baltic Sea. Borderless travel to the main part of Russia is only possible by sea or air. This political isolation became more pronounced when Lithuania and Poland both became members of the European Union and NATO, and entered the Schengen Zone, which means that the oblast is surrounded by the territories of these organizations as well.

[...]

During World War II the Soviet Red Army entered the eastern-most tip of East Prussia on August 29, 1944 near Goldap and Nemmersdorf. Evidence of the massacre committed by the Soviet troops in the East Prussian village of Nemmersdorf spread panic in the province and urged a mass flight westward. However, in spite of this, the Nazis kept East Prussia's civil population firmly at home by threat of a death-penalty for 'cowardly deserting'. As evacuation was only allowed at the very last moment, many were unable to escape — overrun by Soviet units or caught at home. They were killed by the Soviet army^{[citation needed]}, as well as by the severe frost.

More than two million people were evacuated, many of them via the Baltic Sea. The remaining population was deported after the war ended and the area was repopulated primarily by the Russians and, to a lesser extent, by the Ukrainians and Belarusians.

An entire German city emptied and repopulated, now an outpost of empire.

Lullabyes

A Book I Am Reading

It is Gould's Book of Fish.

I was quite prepared to type that even without my Google Book theft tool.

First Above Equals

Awesome:

Many Italians still forgive [Silvio Berlusconi] his perma-tan, hair transplants and platform shoes, even his notorious gaffes, ranging from telling victims of the earthquake in Abruzzo in April to imagine they were “on a camping holiday” to describing President Obama — twice — as “tanned”.

But the Constitutional Court’s ruling may mark the beginning of the end. It is the second time that he has tried to give himself immunity — the last was in 2004 — and the second time he has been rebuffed. His lawyers’ argument this week that he was “first above equals” served only to show that the law was made to protect him.

Interesting

Where's Iranian nuclear scientist Shahram Amiri?

Iran today accused the US of being behind the disappearance of an one of its nuclear scientists in Saudi Arabia and called into question a uranium deal agreed in principle in Geneva last week.

Shahram Amiri vanished during a religious pilgrimage to the Saudi kingdom in May. Tehran has previously complained to the Saudi authorities but not commented on Amiri's profession.

Two Metaphors Noted

Chris Burgard:

The fear is now on the other foot.

Also:

The sleeper has awakened and she sees the man behind the curtain.

Nuts

Telepathic Ed has a request:

I toured the South Carolina Statehouse a few months before the Confederate Battle Flag which Flew Over It Since 1962 was Taken Down in July, 2000. You can See Holes in the Sides of the Statehouse from Union Cannon Fire, It was Small but Pretty Neat. I was Looking All Over in the Various Shops around There, and It's Close to the University of South Carolina, for a T-Shirt with the Confederate Battle Flag on It. I had a Great-Great Grandfather, a Polk from Polk Country Tennessee, who was a Rebel and Was in a Prisoner-of-War Camp (Gramps fought for the South, his Brother fought for the North). My Family has Emotional Equity involved in This Flag and I Thought that I Could Wear the Battle Flag T-Shirt maybe 3 Times a Year as a Historical Reference. I Couldn't Find It Anywhere and I Really Did Look. The Manager of One Store Said We Used to Sell a Lot of Them but Today They'd Tear It Off You. Nobody's Going to Tear it Off Me. Previously I had Looked All Over in Other Likely Locations and Hadn't Found One. Now, I Want You People to Send Me One, Over the Past Year Tens of Thousands of You, the Biggest Names in the Country Amongst You, Have Been Reading My Blog and I Still Have No Official Followers, Your Cowardice and Ingratitude Cuts Into Me, That I Have to Associate With People Such as Yourselves. You Can At Least Perform This Trifle.

I really wonder about that guy and what exactly he's doing, yet I can't bring myself to say "Hey Ed, you might want to be a little less crazy there" or "Ed, I enjoy some of the stuff you write but for possibly creepy reasons" or "Ed your pinky is so fucking muscular it just can't stay off the shift key" or something.

The Town of the 100 First Things

From the D. A. Tsenov Academy of Economics:

Svishtov is the town of the 100 first things (PDF link). Here are some of the most important ones:

The first donation to school purposes was made in 1812 by Phillip Sakelarievich, who was born in Svishtov, but was trading in Vienna;

Svishtov is the first town liberated from the Turkish yoke and the first civil administration is established here as well;

The first in Bulgaria high-school of trade was found in Svishtov thanks to the donation of Dimitar Hadzhivasilev from Svishtov and built by the Austrian architect Paul Brant, like the high school in Vienna;

The history of the choral singing starts from Svishtov. The first Bulgarian choir was set up in Svishtov in 1868;

The first Bulgarian cultural house was found in Svishtov with the act of donation of Kiril D. Avramov;

Svishtov is the native town of the author of the first printed book in modern Bulgarian language - Philip Stanislavov; the author of the Bulgarian anthem – Tsvetan Radoslavov; the great writer Aleko Konstantinov.

It may be that your town is The Town of the 101 First Things.

FAIL

Greg Gutfeld:

So while chuckleheads like Jesse Jackson and Senator Roland Burris hilariously blame George Bush for Chicago losing the 2016 Olympics, whiny columnists like Mike Lupica are up in arms that conservatives might be gloating over President Obama’s big screw-up. Apparently laughing at all this is somehow anti-American, because Obama is our President, and he was doing this for all of us.

You know… kind of like when Bush was trying win a war in Iraq – and all those left wingers stood behind him.

It's just like that, because war is hilarious and very much like a sporting event.

I Feel I Should Apologize

Sorry.



Face me evil bastards, smell the hate of angels
Glory, pride and bloodshed
Cowards and beholders, rapers of my wisdom
Mix of dust and bones
Go back to your abyss, Algalord will not fall
But your heads will soon roll
Taste the blade of heroes, fury of the thunder
Hit my golden shield

So we'll fight against the wind for the glory of the kings
To defeat the evil enemies
And we'll ride with our lord for the power and the throne
In the name of holy thunderforce

Arwald and Aresius with the Nordic warrior
On their way to Hargor
Chaos and oblivion, turmoil and disorder
Will have now their name
The last fallen heroes will defeat your forces
Thousands spirits calling
On the furthest mountain I will see your fire
Quenched by holy frost!

--

A friend of mine said Rhapsody were a cross of everything that's great about metal and everything that's great about Jim Steinman.

Adjust your greatness calibrators accordingly, but I am amused. The funny accent helps a lot.

Work Would Be More Fun...

...if the pain was shared equally.

Thinking... Thinking...

Roger L. Simon:

Has there been a worse president in our lifetime than Barack Obama?

Updatedness:

This:



Requires this:

Will Obama Respond?

Look:

Violence mars ‘Atlanta Housewives’ show. Will Obama respond?
By Patrik Jonsson | 10.03.09

Calls for President Obama to respond to black-on-black violence are seeping into the edges of popular culture.

The Friday night bar-fight death of Ashley “A.J.” Jewell, the fiancé of one of Bravo’s “Atlanta Housewives,” may add fuel to those calls, especially as Mr. Jewell is likely to posthumously appear on the wildly popular reality TV show in coming weeks.

I am getting tired of waiting.

WILL OBAMA RESPOND?



WILL OBAMA RESPOND?



WILL OBAMA RESPOND?

Kid Stuff

Thing 1:

Below is a clip from Kiki's Delivery Service, a pretty sweet movie about a witch going off on her own at 13 for a traditional first crack at an independent livelihood. Disney's got the rights to it and decided upon some adaptation. Count the subtitles vs. what's said.



It really is a lovely and sweet movie, but the English version has Phil Hartman as a yappy cat and the space to just look at the pictures and figure it out is gone. Subtitles for a non-yappy version absent from the DVD I rented. Fuck you Disney. (You know, if I was a Disney attorney I might have "fuck you Disney" as a web alert.)

Thing 2:

Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs is entertaining and silly fun. I laughed. SEEN IN GLORIOUS 2D. This guy at the New York Post begs to differ: glasses don't turn him on and I don't know what the fuck he's talking about with the global warming bullshit.

Thing 3:

Some heartless individual informed the little one that flowers die in the fall.

The 28 Exclamation Points

Alvaro Alvillar is excited:

There Is a New Movement…
by Alvaro Alvillar

…and it is us!

What follows is just kooky, but it's a naïve and wonderful kind of kooky. It starts off with a pull-the-other-one list:

We are proud! We are united! We are loyal! We are kind and giving! We are decent! We are diverse! We are always seeking to improve ourselves and lift others! We are always the first ones to show up in time of need-anywhere in the world! We are the most powerful country in the world-but we are not bullies! We are family! We are friends and neighbors! We are Americans and we are without a doubt the best example of a free people the world has ever seen-period.

The seen-period is far less confusing than the invisible-period. But really: isn't the teabagger point that they don't want to share with - searching for a euphemism here - diverse populations? And isn't that kinda the opposite of - well whatever, Alvaro's the Gumpiest of the Big Hollywood regulars so let's move on.

We are ready to let our voices be heard-loud and clear! We are going to show up whenever and wherever we are called to defend ourselves. We are going to defend all patriotic Americans against slander and libel, in and out of court with both our presence and our pocketbooks.

Teabagger Legal Corps reporting for duty! Lead us to the nattily-attired pretend pimp!

We are going to show up in unprecedented numbers and vote out the garbage, both left and right, that claim to represent us but prove otherwise-time and time again.

Hm. Unprecedented numbers? Might want to get that one right the first time...

But on to the end.

Whatever the color of our skin, whether we are religious or not, rich or poor, old or young-we are united against all those who would come between us, our families, our constitutional rights and our God given freedoms The call to stand up and be counted has been answered and everyday, our numbers swell and the more the radicals push-the faster and stronger we respond!

Big tent. In your pants.

Go Over There

One large laff to be had, possibly more.

Throwing It All Away

This is pretty sad:

American Police Force spokeswoman fears for safety; attorney, subcontractor step back
By TOM LUTEY Billings Gazette | Posted: Saturday, October 3, 2009 8:15 am

BILLINGS - A sobbing spokeswoman for the secretive company occupying the Hardin jail welcomed an investigation by Montana's attorney general Friday and expressed concerns for her own safety amid rumors about the company.

Betsy Shay had quit her newspaper job for APF work.

I wonder what percentage of con there was vs. her previous job sucking really bad. Now that she's a company official she presumably has to answer to the law as much as she can.

Dear iTunes Developers

I do not watch a god-damned thing in iTunes.

Olympics

They suck: it's an excuse to churn money around that winds up in the hands of developers and screws poor people out of places to live.

Hooray for Chicago for avoiding the most overrated party on Earth.

Update for the sake of pissiness:

Those Salt Lake City Olympics were a bullshit project too.

Fun With Google Translate

Honest Question

Jonah Goldberg goes all Comic Book Guy:

Either you are with me, or you are my enemy!” shouted a young Darth Vader in 2005’s Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, one of the execrable prequels to the original films by George Lucas. In response to this all-or-nothing provocation, a disgusted Obi-Wan Kenobi replies, “Only a Sith deals in absolutes!”

Siths are Jedi Knights who have given themselves over to the Dark Side by embracing the evil emotions of anger, envy, and revenge. Readers of Commentary can be forgiven for neither knowing nor caring about this. But it is worth noting that for millions of Star Wars enthusiasts, it was very serious stuff indeed. Lucas revived, if not reinvented, the entire genre of science fiction in the 1970s by embracing bold and mythic depictions of good and evil and the heroic battle of the former against the latter. For decades, the established premise of the Star Wars franchise was that the universe is divided into the Dark Side and the Light Side of the “Force.” Jedi Knights—champions of all that is noble and virtuous—were warned never to give in, even a little, to the Dark Side, lest they lose their souls. If all that is not about “absolutes,” then what on earth (or in a galaxy far, far away) is? And Lucas threw it all away to get in a dig at George W. Bush.

Apart from Lucas not throwing it all away to get in a dig at Bush - look under C for capitalism - was it really interpreted or intended as a dig at Bush or just a piece-of-shit cliché in a piece-of-shit movie?

The rest of the article's about Battlestar Galactica and how cool it was when he liked it and how uncool it was when he didn't.

Both Your Houses

Ned Rice is miffed that Hollywood liberals ripped off Crystal Lee Sutton:

Crystal Lee Sutton, 68, died a couple of weeks ago of brain cancer. You might know her better by her Hollywood name: Norma Rae. Crystal’s life story was the inspiration for the 1979 Sally Field blockbuster that grossed $22 million (in 1979 dollars), four Oscar nominations, and two Oscars including Best Actress for the aforementioned Ms. Field. Norma Rae’s character is #15 on the American Film Institute’s list of all-time greatest screen heroes; Norma Rae is rated 16th of their “100 Most Inspiring Movies of All Time.” Given all this you probably think that Crystal Lee Sutton died in relative comfort, content with her life’s work and unencumbered by material concerns such as medical bills. Well, guess again.

That's capitalism for you.

You Already Know This

Sensible people read Whiskey Fire, so you all know that The Washington Post has a pundit contest going.

Key rule:

Entries will be judged on the basis of style, intelligence and freshness of argument, but not on whether Post editors agree or disagree with your point of view.