Category: Uncategorized

This farce has gone on long enough. The damage this mayor is doing goes beyond Detroit, affecting the reputation and stature of the entire state. Governor Granholm, remove the mayor now.

Mr. White, testified that he suffered a fractured hip after being shoved into his partner by Mr. Kilpatrick, who played football in college. Mr. White also said that Mr. Kilpatrick, who is black, had criticized his partner for working on the case and told her that as a black woman, “You shouldn’t even be riding in a car with a guy named White.”

Notice that this is in the New York Times. We’re a laughing stock. The time has come to end this parade of arrogance.

Detroit Mayor Charged With Assaulting Officer – NYTimes.com.

Phil Plait, the force behind Bad Astronomy, has accepted the position of President of the JREF Board of Directors, taking over for its namesake James Randi. Randi will continue and chairman of the board.

Good to see that the debunking of the foolish will continue for many years to come (psychics, paranormal communication, and moon hoaxers beware). If you think you actually are a psychic or some such nonesense, prove it and a million bucks are yours.

Randi’s big shoes to Phil | Bad Astronomy | Discover Magazine.

As if the JC Penny’s ad featuing the total composting of The Breakfast Club wasn’t enough for you, the newest rumor has it that Judd Apatow and crew (Seth Rogen, etc..) might remake Ghostbusters.

Can an actual remake of The Breakfast Club be far behind? Come on John Hughes, give Uwe Boll and call!

Seriously, this is what Rupert Murdoch is going to do to the Wall Street Journal?

But in a nation in which 66% of the voting-age population is overweight and 32% is obese, could Sen. Obama’s skinniness be a liability? Despite his visits to waffle houses, ice-cream parlors and greasy-spoon diners around the country, his slim physique just might have some Americans wondering whether he is truly like them.

…

“I won’t vote for any beanpole guy,” another Clinton supporter wrote last week on a Yahoo politics message board.

What? WHAT?! This cannot be in the (formerly) well-respected Wall Street Journal. This cannot be an actual issue in the election for the President of the United States. Shame on Amy Chozick, shame on the WSJ for running this yellow journalism. And shame on us for ever allowing something like this to get traction.

If you think this is anywhere near to being a consideration for who you should vote for, you’re an idiot. Sure, you should consider the health of the candidate, but make it real health concerns, not someone’s height. If anything, maybe we shouldn’t vote for the guy who would become the oldest sitting President, if elected. Maybe the WSJ’s efforts would have been better spent talking about potential Vice Presidential candidates.

Better yet, let’s weigh the candidates on issues, ask them the hard questions (and demand answers), pin them down on positions we’ve allowed them to squirm away from with double-speak.

But this kind of crap is beneath the WSJ. Or, at least it was until Murdoch and Co. took over. It appears now, voters will have to wade through another Fox News-like medium to get to real stories.

Update: It just gets better and better. The “source” for the earth-shattering story about whether Obama is too fit to be elected? A Yahoo message board response (Google cache of the thread). Read the non-cached version for the deserved mockery and derision that follows.

Too Fit to Be President? – WSJ.com.

So, seems that, after using them as an example of a bad idea, Delicious went and fixed themselves up with a new website design. And it’s great! Very clean, very functional, and no more idiotic URL. Well done, Yahoo, well done.

Mad Men, which just started its second season on AMC recently, is fantastic television. This is a show I wanted so much to dislike, but couldn’t. The characters are awful people; the men ogle the women, the women demur and scheme, the office is a cesspool of lies, sex, and politics.

It’s great television, in other words. You cheer as the cheating husband finds the solution to his problem, allowing millions of additional sales for a cigarette company. You sigh in defeat as the good secretary succumbs to the lying bachelor on his wedding weekend. And, most importantly, you can’t wait to watch the next episode.

As I said, season 2 just got started, but I will try my hardest to wait until the DVDs come out. I’m 3 episodes away from the end of season 1 and I can’t imagine having to wait a whole week to know what comes next.

Curmudgeon mode, Engage!

I’m a big gadget/Web/Internet/wasting time fan, but the latest waste of time just made me laugh today. It’s called firefly. Firefly (sorry, firef.ly; did no one learn from del.ici.ous, wait, deli.cio.us, damn it del.icio.us?) is a service that lets you add (sigh) live chat to your web site. Really. Live chat. You know, for all those deep, moderated discussions taking place on the Web.

Firefly runs on Flash and a Javascript library (as far as I can tell), that lets anyone on your site chat with the other people on your site. I don’t know if someone on the homepage is chatting with someone on a sub-page, but really, who cares? This only works when a couple of things are in alignment: you have sufficient traffic and people want to talk about what you’re writing about.

Those two things also basically guarentee that you will have a high Internet troll quotient. And now, he’s a real-time, unmoderated, permanently S3-stored troll. It’s also next to impossible reference another chatter to, yah know, have a conversation.

It’s a cute toy, but that’s all it will be. Om Malik is saying it’s in Alpha on HuffPo; I’d love to hear how they’re dealing with political Internet trolls over there.

This is satire. It’s also ham-fisted (thanks J–) and stupid for a cover, but satire nonetheless. If When you encounter someone who thinks it’s prescient or insightful or whatever, you have my permission to smack them upside their idiotic skull*. ‘Grats to the New Yorker for the best attention whoring of the election season so far.

* Note, my permission doesn’t mean crap in any court, workplace, or household, including my own.

Already more than halfway through this list; picked up Slaughterhouse 5 at a booksale this weekend for $.50.

32 Sci-Fi Novels You Should Read | How To Split An Atom

However, unlike any marriages on my list, the real, legal and actual same-sex marriages in California are in danger of being destroyed by people who aren’t actually in them. There is no initiative on the California November ballot to “protect” marriage from already-married Creed fans or Pepsi drinkers. There will be one to “protect” marriage from already-married same-sex couples.

Which is to say: Isn’t it funny how some people are going so far out of their way to destroy marriages they say they don’t believe actually exist.

Well, now, that’s an interesting little quandary. Click through to read the entire article; it’s funny and brilliant. This whole “gay marriage” thing is completely out of control; can we just, for once, let it go and let people get on with losing half their crap, no matter who they’re splitting their assets with?

Note to heteros: homosexuals entering into a legally binding contract in no way diminishes the validity or meaning of your legally binding contract. Moaning about “gay marriage” demeaning the “sanctity” of marriage as a whole is like saying that, because gays are allowed to have a mortgage, your mortgage is of less value (try and sell that one to the bank). Down with gay mortgages!

This post brought to you by a double entendre, more than a few Beavis and Butthead-style giggles, and the letter “V”. Oh, and Creed sucks ass. Oh, I almost forgot. Search Google for “gay marriage california” (or click here, yah lazy bum). Rainbow sidebars!

Also, anyone who even starts a refutation which invokes religion or wingnut rhetoric will be either a) mocked mercilessly or b) have their comment deleted; depends how frisky I’m feeling.

Whatever » Dude, I Totally Unmarried You Just Now