Wednesday, August 06, 2003

Tin Foil Hats. Check out this article on rumors and conspiracy theories that Iraqis are spreading about US troops. "With those glasses, he can definitely see through women's clothes," said the engineering student, Samer Hamid. "It makes me angry. We are afraid to take our families out... [Right-Thinking from the Left Coast] 10:41:42 PM    comment []

Governor Terminator.  Looks like the campaign posters are already made up.  I thought he wasn't running!? [Right-Thinking from the Left Coast] 10:27:28 PM    comment []

Essay: This shit never dies. [Scripting News] For those of you who read the article at the above link and have no idea what RSS is, I will try to make it as simple as I can.  Actually it is very simple and thats the beauty of it.  Since I started this web site (I detest the word blog ... I'm from the old school) I have been asked "LP where do you find all that stuff?"  I get it from 44 different web sites and I never visit a single one of them on the web.  It all comes to me when I sit down at the computer everyday.  Everything that has been added to each of those web sites since I last sat at the computer is just sitting there waiting for me.  If it hasn't been too long since the last session I can click through all the changes in a matter of minutes.  As I click through all the new additions if I see a title that catches my eye I can pull it up and read it instantly.  If its something I think someone else who visits my site might be interested in I just click POST and it magically appears on my page.  And you thought I was putting a lot of work into this.  If this was work would I be doing it?(LP)  9:57:52 PM    comment []

And He's Out. The world's lesbian Nazi biker nuns who cheat on their hermaphrodite drug-addicted welfare-receiving half-brothers can breathe a collective sigh of relief. Talk-show host Jerry Springer announced Wednesday he would not run for the U.S. Senate seat currently held by Sen. George Voinovich, R-Ohio. Springer, who has hosted the trash-talking "Jerry Springer Show" for the last 13 years, said that he could not reach voters because of his links to the program. "For me to be heard, I could no longer be doing the show. There has to be separation between the show and my entrance into politics in the elective arena," Springer told reporters at a press conference. "That separation obviously has not taken place and certainly would not take place in time for this election." It's a shame that a man who so perfectly personifies the goals and ideals of the Democrats has decided not to enter politics. [Right-Thinking from the Left Coast] 9:28:49 PM    comment []

'Democracy' in Reuterville[Wall Street Journal] Reuters, the anti-American "news" service, won't call Osama bin Laden a terrorist, at least without scare quotes. But it does think North Korea is a democracy. "N. Korea Hails 100 Percent Poll Support for Leader" reads the headline on a ludicrous dispatch: North Korea said on Monday that polls in which voters gave leader Kim Jong-il 100 percent support showed the communist state was "firm as a rock" in the face of economic woes and isolation over its nuclear ambitions. The 61-year-old Kim was one of 687 deputies elected unopposed on Sunday for seats in North Korea's rubber-stamp legislature, the Supreme People's Assembly. North Korea's official KCNA news agency quoted the Central Election Committee as saying turnout was 99.9 percent of registered voters and that 100 percent of the votes were cast for the sole candidates. Well, a quarter of a cheer to Reuters for its one bow to reality, the phrase rubber-stamp legislature. But if Reuterville's denizens used scare quotes to reflect reality rather than to obscure it, here's how they might have written the preceding three paragraphs: North Korea said on Monday that "polls" in which "voters" gave "leader" Kim Jong-il 100 percent "support" showed the communist state was "firm as a rock" in the face of economic woes and isolation over its nuclear ambitions. The 61-year-old Kim was one of 687 deputies "elected" unopposed on Sunday for seats in North Korea's rubber-stamp "legislature," the Supreme People's Assembly. North Korea's official KCNA "news" agency quoted the Central "Election" Committee as saying turnout was 99.9 percent of registered "voters" and that 100 percent of the "votes" were cast for the sole "candidates." Incidentally, this dispatch is datelined Seoul. If North Korea is such a democracy, how come Reuters can't even get a correspondent inside the country? 5:01:23 PM    comment []

Non-Fat Half-Caf Triple Shot Grande. When they're not protesting something, speaking up for vermin who piss and shit in the street, or staging some kind of masturbatory performance art, San Francisco's unemployed left-wing morons pull stunts like this. Police are investigating a coordinated attack on at least 17 Starbucks outlets in downtown San Francisco. The vandals spread... [Right-Thinking from the Left Coast] 2:29:15 PM    comment []

All They Can Manage. There's a great op-ed on the Jakarta hotel bombing in today's NY Post. YESTERDAY, terrorists exploded a car bomb at the J.W. Marriott hotel in Jakarta. At least 13 people died; over a hundred were injured. It was another failure for the terrorists. Behind the breathless 24/7 reports and the images of burned cars and blown-out windows, the encouraging fact is that the bombing in Indonesia was the best the terrorists could do: They can't defeat America, so they killed some folks having lunch. The terrorists dream of destroying the United States and bringing down Western civilization, of purifying their own societies and imposing their degenerate version of Islam on all of humankind. So they marshal their resources - and blow up a hotel lobby. [Right-Thinking from the Left Coast] 2:24:01 PM    comment []

From: Instapundit.com THE STAR TRIBUNE'S PAUL MCENROE, back from Iraq, says that the BBC's bias was evident: CP: What about the foreign coverage? Was it more objective? McEnroe: I don't know. I thought the BBC was completely biased. Three days into the war, they were calling everything a quagmire, and reporting that everything was bogged down. I thought, "Boy, you're really jumping the gun here." There hadn't even been a week's worth of war and they were already coming to a conclusion. That didn't strike me as very professional. He's not crazy about Fox or CNN, either. UPDATE: Here's more on the BBC: The BBC's Andrew Gilligan quoted a source--who turned out to be the scientist David Kelly--as criticizing the government. Kelly later refuted how his comments had been portrayed by Mr. Gilligan to a parliamentary committee. Then Kelly committed suicide. Now the BBC has to either admit that it misquoted a mourned scientist or call him a liar. That's the scandal in a nutshell. What led to it is the BBC's all-out campaign to validate its world view. Because the mass graves and accounts of torture by Saddam's regime are too real, the BBC has grabbed onto the fact that WMDs have not yet been found to justify its animosity toward the liberation of Iraq. And this animus sprang from the consensus that the West is always wrong. . . . This is not hyperbole. The BBC can be a formidable foe. It has, in its own words, "the most widely watched national news bulletins in the UK." Thus when the BBC decides to manufacture a story, or ignore another, it forms reality for millions in Britain and world-wide. Yes, and that's why it matters, even to us Americans. Or, perhaps, especially to us Americans, given that anti-Americanism is the state religion of the BBC. 2:19:25 PM    comment []

More Scheer (LA Times) myth-spreading  [From: spinsanity.org] In his column last week, Los Angeles Times columnist Robert Scheer, who created the myth that the Bush administration gave $43 million to the Taliban after misreading a New York Times story, spreads two more falsehoods now working their way through the media.[spinsanity.com] I've heard people say "I get all I need to know from the LA Times"!  Looks like their getting something alright!(LP) 2:06:44 PM    comment []

Is the Howard Dean campaign spamming people?    This post suggests so, and seems to have pretty strong evidence. The Dean campaign has been praised for being quite Internet-savvy as political campaigns go -- it seems that they may have gotten a little too savvy (and not savvy enough). [The Volokh Conspiracy] 1:36:09 PM    comment []

New angle on the great Linux Feud........ SCOs stock is zoooooming.  There's money in them thar copyrights.  I don't think most people understand the situation.  SCO isn't going after the small fry that uses Linux because they don't have any money.  They are going to start hammering businesses that would be happier paying $100,000 k in licensing fees rather than paying $100,000 k in lawyers fees, audit costs, and turmoil/confusion.  I've seen this in action and it works. [John Robb's Weblog] 1:21:47 PM    comment []

Anarchist hives: you have nothing to lose but your royal jelly!. "Anarchist bees" are rare genetic mutants that lay eggs even if they're not the queen, and do not destroy the eggs of other anarchist non-queens. Through selective breeding, it is possible to create queenless "anarchist hives" where the sisters do it for themselves. Naturally anarchic hives contain a few dozen laying workers, and seem to function well. But by selective breeding, Oldroyd and his colleagues have got the egg-layers up to about 40% of the workforce. In these hives, breeding workers neglect their chores and the hives become decadent to the point of collapse2. "They can barely feed themselves, and they do weird things like trying to raise queens out of male larvae," Oldroyd says. These selectively bred anarchist hives have some other odd features. Normal workers transplanted into them may start laying, which suggests that the queen's pheromones are weaker than normal. Most strangely, taking the queen out of an anarchic colony - which triggers worker egg-laying in normal hives - causes anarchic workers' eggs to lose their deceptive properties. They are eaten if transplanted into a normal hive, says Oldroyd. Link Discuss (via Interconnected) [Boing Boing Blog] 1:04:38 PM    comment []

Photoblog of extreme medical images. I know, Fark Fark Fark. Look, I don't know much about this photoblog -- who's behind it? are they collecting found photos, or are they a medical student/professional? if so, what the f*ck are they doing blogging snapshots of people's living guts in the operating room? -- but it appears to be a photoblog dedicated to "pukeorama ubergraphic" medical snapshots, according to esteemed grossout connoisseur Susannah. Discuss [Boing Boing Blog] 12:59:31 PM    comment []

Orwell's Warning The BBC is blind to its own biases.  "Though its best programming in non-political areas is distinguished, sadly it has become the greatest menace facing the country it was founded to serve and inform." [Wall Street Journal] 11:31:07 AM    comment []

Red Hat files suit against SCO [CNETNews.com] So all these little companies sue the crap out of each other till nothing is left but scattered pieces along the side of the road.  Uncle Bill comes along, picks up the pieces, sticks them in his bag, throws the bag over his shoulder and walks down the road whistling.  How much is a company like Red Hat worth?  Would that be pocket change for Uncle Bill?  Think about it! 11:18:03 AM    comment []

The 100 Worst “Groaners” A “groaner” is a hackneyed, overblown, stuffy or just plain silly cliché that turns up time after time in news scripts. Groaners show laziness on the part of writers, disrespect for the folks watching, and a general contempt for lively English. Here are some of the worst offenders. You’ll recognize them immediately, so get ready to groan!   [Newswriting.com] 8:19:49 AM    comment []

And you were worried about Microsoft! Krispy Kreme continues quest for world domination with first European location. 6:54:53 AM    comment []

Lopsided Webcam A-7 static display at Lemoore Naval Air Station California.  This is one of the piles of scrap metal I helped keep in the air for 20 years. 2:54:59 AM    comment []