Genius In a Box

"You think you are so smart just because you can read."

Chocolate Bunny Torture

There are some nice horror movie type effects as chocolate bunnies are attacked with iron, heat lamp and hair dryer.

Old Computer Tech Keeps Working

Here is an slashdot discussion and article about how "obsolete" technology is still in use and still being made. Last year I read a book that covered the same tropic, The Shock of The Old. Last week when I was Future Shop I noticed that cash registers had CRT displays from the mid 80's.

Check out the argruments and make your own.

Accents in Movies and Other Places

In a thread on AH.com about the Modern Bundeswehr ending up in 1941 Germany there is this back and forth about accents.

CDurham

There's also subterfuge, if they play their cards right, they could pretend to be from a NAZI victorious Germany.

(over radio)
"This is General Hans from the (etc.) Panzer Division to Herr Furher, I invite you to come see zee wunder weapons that you and your successors are responsible for in the Great German Reich of the 21st Century!"

(to troops)

"Ok, now remember, wait until he is in the middle of the camp, THEN we strike"

Zyzzyva

In the Nazi future, Germans speak with a German accent even when they're speaking German...

Tourists and Luggage

I often don't know where my luggage is. That what being a tourist is all about.

Twoflower, Discworld's first tourist
who has an advantage of luggage made
from sapient pear wood.

Far Side Cartoon and Variant

The Far Side Original


Hindu variant posted by M3Essential on b3ta.com comics challenge.

Workout Kittens

Joe Veitch is an animator and musician. This recent ad seems to be ripping off the LOLcat phenomenon. However if you look at some of his earlier work and ads you discover he was was using this style well before every bulletin board was overrun with photoshopped images of kittens and bad spelling. You can fund more animations and songs at his blog Rathergood. Be warned there are number of songs that are definitely NSFW, stay away from anything to do the Royal Family or donkeys. There many other fine songs of his like, First Drink of the Day (mentioned on this blog nearly 3 years ago), Ninja Kitten or Looking for My Leopard.

Seeding The Beer Clouds

Tooheys, an Aussies brewery, previous made a commercial where a tongue left the body to go on a beer run. Here an entire city works to brew beer in the sky.

The Dreamer

A Cure for Bad TV Ads

At the website for The Bessies, a Canadian TV Ad Award, another TV ad stereotype is whacked.

Tourist Guide To Ankh Morpork

Produced in conjunction with the new Disc World movie by Sky TV is a number of spots highlighting the tourist potential of Disc World. These short films are done in industrial film style with stiff acting, poor camera work and ham handed editing.

Very funny.

Obama or Dr Who SuperVillain you Decide

In Dr Who S03E12 the Doctor, Martha Jones and Captain Jack are discussing the electoral appeal of John Saxon, AKA the Master. What follows is is an examination of the the appeal of charismatic politicians who speak their empty words perfectly.

Martha Jones

I was going to vote for him.

The Doctor

Really?

Martha Jones

It was before I even met you and I liked him.

Captain Jack

Me too.

The Doctor

Why do you say that? What was his policy? what did he stand for?

Martha Jones

I don't know he always sounded good. Like you could trust him. Just nice. He spoke about, I can't even remember but it was good. Just the sound of his voice.

More Analysis Of The Evil Music Industry

Here is some analysis of the how little money musicians ever get from their "best selling" records. It is part of collection from a punk zine about the Major Record Labels, and their jackals, published a decade ago. It was mentioned in the comments of a Ted Rall cartoon. The editorial cartoon posits a future where every body will have non playing jobs and be forced to subsist by selling t shirts, one of few things bands can ever make money on.

The Virtues of Engagement

In our modern world we can all have amusement, engagement, information and enlightenment with ever leaving our personal computers. Here is a blogpost, Turn Off That Nintendo, from Denmark on the virtues of political engagement beyond the occasional election.

Weird Stick Figure Animation

Real Book from an Alternate Time Line

Real book that you can buy for as low as 8 cents from Amazon. The reader reviews are split with 33 giving it 5 stars and 53 giving it 1 star. Here is snippet from one positive reviewer, an Alice from Wonderland; "Finally! A book that proves the existence of an alternate universe". And less joyous response from a less fictional reader; "I think that "delusional" is too kind here".

Keep Crazy Cultists out of Government

On Paul Krugman's Blog there is this offhand comment about Alan Greenspan by dartagnan:

Re Greenspan: What this country needs is a constitutional amendment specifying that no one who has read Ayn Rand’s novels can be chairman of the Federal Reserve Board.

I would say it is more than exposing yourself to kooky ideas it is the tendency to embrace the conspiracy theories as one's life's truth. There are certain ideologies that do more than imply but insist that their adherents should be trusted with nothing more dangerous than a limp strand of pasta. This in some ways goes beyond the principal of freedom of belief. The other half of which does not protect you from people who think you are complete nut job for holding such fantasies. You can believe what you want but you cannot insist on anybody's respect you for your "sincere deeply held personal beliefs".

Math and El Presidente Bush Joke

From Tony on a Ted Rall comment thread for Overhead Hilarity.

Condi is briefing the President: "Yesterday, 3 Brazilian soldiers were killed."

"Oh no!" exclaims Bush. "That's terrible!"

His staff sits stunned at this display of emotion, nervously watching as the President sits, head in hands.

Finally, the President looks up and asks, "How many is in a brazillion?"

Radical Groups Help Structure the Lives of Criminals

Farrakhan has provided a framework of discipline that has made respectable citizens of angry young men. And we should be grateful that they are on the corner selling fruit and not ravaging our communities with crime.

Andrew Young on On Point Mar 19, 2007
starting at 00:26:30

Andrew Young gives reasons to excuse the violent and extremist Nation of Islam because somehow it provides "discipline" to those who would otherwise end up gangs. What he is forgetting that bow ties are just another type of gang color for a group that was founded by an ex-con, is embraced by ex-cons and whose most famous member, Malcolm X, joined from prison. Just another violent gang no matter how much surface respectability spiffy bow ties gives its members.

See also details surrounding the murder of Chauncey Bailey, an Oakland newspaper editor investigating a Nation of Islam business.

BS Artist

Manure is an art and I considered myself an accomplished artist.

Failed lawyer and farmer John Adams
in John Adams (HBO)

Chicken Models

Here is an ad for a chicken company that is a riff on the famous Dove ad, Evolution.

Surfing, Moby Dick, Horses and Guinness

I Was Told, We'd Cruise the Seas for American Gold

I was watching episode 1 of HBO Sam Adams at end of which, at the end of a public meeting in a church, there is and odd blood thirsty nautical hymn. As a counterpoint to this rebel history is Stan Rogers and his merry crew singing Barrett's Privateers.

The Grab and Maul Soft on Treason

In today's Globe and Mail is this very sensitive story on the Riel Rebellion that begins.

It's the site of a pivotal moment in Canadian history, where Louis Riel's provisional government launched the Red River Resistance of 1869 and where Riel ordered the execution of Thomas Scott the next year.

It wasn't "resistance" but a traitorous revolt against Canada. Riel was justly hung as a traitor who took arms against the state, the "armed resistance". Thomas Scott wasn't "executed", that implied some lawful authority, but was lynched by Riel's Metis junta. When many have a misplaced romantic notions about "rebels" let us the remember the unhappy fate of countries with eternal revolutions.

Don't Look Down

On the Paul Krugman board a quidley gives a cartoon analogy to the US current financial mess.

On the subject of economics metaphors and creative destruction, as a non-economist, I've been toying with a series of metaphors for our situation based on what I've read on Prof. Krugman's blog site:

Risky consumers = Wile E. Coyote.

Neocons & supporting corporate culture = The Acme Company

Economic prosperity / capitalist success in the view of Coyote & Acme = Road Runner

Deregulation of known good economic practices = Acme's product line

Bear Sterns, Carlyle Group, etc. = woodsheds full of explosive Acme products

Public scrutiny = a lit match

Insolvency = an explosion which has caused an enormous rock to fall from a precipice

Fed reinforcement of Bear Sterns, etc. = a small, salmon-colored umbrella braced against the coming rock

Bottom falling out of the market = the rock arriving and knocking the Coyote through the floor of an outcropping and into midair

Falling = falling

Market crash = hitting the ground with a white puff

Actual economic prosperity = a large pizza.

Now, if only a massive accounting of The Acme Company was somehow involved in all of this…

The Urge To Kill

The urge to kill is too strong.

Cult of Skaro Dalek Foot Solider

Black Empowerment Philosophy Much Like That of Evil Sci-Fi Monsters

I want to run this city what ever it takes. By any means necessary.

Dalek Stooge Mr Diagoras in Dr Who S03E04

You think like a Dalek

Dalek Caan in Dr Who S03E04

Where To Have Restful Employment

You want to sleep. Join the fire brigade.

DCI Gene Hunt

Amnesia

Amnesia? Pssh. I think I would remember having amnesia.

Buck B. Katt.

Make Your Own Climate and Planet

This image is taken from Geoff Allan Eddy's website, in a section called Create an Earthlike Planet. The best article of which is the Climate Cookbook. There are numerous other links to other imaginary planets and worlds and the technical means to construct them.

The New Romans

Here is a comparison between the history of Rome and that the US. After a point it wanders in to some goofy future history, still worth a read. In one the footnotes there is examination about how the Romans liked things legal and constitutionally even when slipping into empire.

The major accomplishment of Augustus was to organize the Roman government in such a way as to make monarchy palatable to such diehard republicans as the Romans. He couldn't just declare himself king. That would be political suicide. Imagine the outcry -- even among capital-R Republicans -- if George W. Bush held a coronation with a crown and purple robe in the Lincoln Memorial.

Magic Moving Graphs

Gapminder is group that has developed software tools for analyzing statistics over time. The result is often a general convergence. The video is a talk by the Swede behind Gapminder.

From Child Nerd to Adult Loner

Martin was a shy awkward child who will never fulfill his promise to become a weird unloved adult.

Principal Seymour Skinner eulogizing
Martin Prince in Simpsons S19E14

Food Good

Dinnertime, the prefect break between work and drunk.

Homer Simpson in Simpsons S19E14

Everybody's Inner Desire to be a Serial Murderer

Hacking up a stranger that I can understand.

Charlie Broker giving free rein
to all our homicidal fantasies

Charlie Brooker's Pessimism

"Real Life" is a knobbly old mess full of graft and tedium and unexpected kicks to the nuts, spiritually speaking.

Charlie Brooker discusing "tv" reality.

The Secret History of Clouds

Pointless Accuracy

...his scientific sense of pedantry, meaning he was unable to prevent himself from reflexively correcting Wilkinson even when the correction was also not relevant to the answer.

Thande in
A Man OF His Time: TABAEv2 Volume 2

Men Highly "regarding" Women

Yesterday at about 1:30 pm I was passing thorough the Bloor / Yonge station. There was information picket by Campaign Life. The guys from Campaign Life, only guys were cross section of Toronto, young, old, white, black, tall, short. However in the group at the southbound Yonge track there was not a single woman. Just angry and insecure guys.

Chad Builds New Moat

The government is digging a 10-foot-deep trench around the capital, Ndjamena, to prevent a repeat of an attack last month, when rebels in pickup trucks rolled in and fought two days of heavy battles. The ditch will all but encircle the city, slicing through neighborhoods and forcing vehicles to pass through fortified gateways, a security official said. The remaining trees that line the avenues of central Ndjamena are being felled. Residents say the rebels used trees knocked down by rocket-propelled grenades and cannon fire to block roads during the fighting.

(from the New York Times)

We can laugh however there is still a use for moats in this day and age, as tank traps.

Discover Your Inner Superhero

(from adfreak)

New Name for Mr. IAmADinnerJacket

Johnny Leisure Suit

Jon Stewart

The Policeman's Definition of National Security

If the government is keeping secrets it is probably for our own bloody good.

DCI Gene Hunt

More Gene Hunt "Humour"

How many birds does it take to change a light bulb?

2

1 to run around screaming.
1 to shag the electrician.

The Rarified Legal System

Coroners are like judges. They don't breath human air and never ever explain.

DCI Gene Hunt

Education Surveys And Stupid Historical Errors

I read an alarming story in Slate magazine, What High Schoolers Don't Know, about how today's students are morons who know nothing about literature and history. Then I looked at the questions and realized the people who created the survey are also idiots.

The question that riled me was this:

The first permanent English Colony in North America was

1. Salem, Massachusetts
2. Jamestown, Virgina
3. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
4. Providence, Rhode Island

The answer given is Jamestown. The real answer is St John's Newfoundland. The comments for the article are bitter and pedantic in the good sense obsessing over small points of error, (like I am doing now). However the point is that school history is not meant to teach anything but the prevailing civic ideology. Later the same survey shows that students who had more educated parents were more likely answer the questions correctly.

The Austrian Simpson Humour

On Alternativehistory.com there is this exchange in the entry Austria: Never Forget Thy Past.

paxau:

"mmm Hapsburgs"

Analytical Engine:

Scottish not that Celtic

I hope this isn't built on assumptions of Scotland being special though. Scotland is really just the Anglo-Saxon kingdom which escaped unification and has a bunch of foreign mountain men in its north.

Leej in Alterntivehistory.com thread
The Failure of England.

Prussia vs Austria

"I think Austria is a lovely little country. It's like visiting Germany, except without all those damn Prussians everywhere."

- Winston Churchill Prime Minister
of Great Britain (1940 - 1953)

Bathroom Humour and Birds

On Comics Curmudgeon there is much comment about this cartoon. Skullturf Q. Beavispants (real user name) chimes in with this tidbit of bathroom humour.

That Shoe reminds me of a joke.

Two friends are hanging out in the yard on a summer day.

Without warning, out of somewhere up in the sky, a bird takes a crap on one of them.

The poor, crapped-upon soul starts to complain and swear: “Of all the rotten luck…” and so forth.

Their friend immediately gets up and starts to head inside the house.

“Where are you going?” asks the bird-crap recipient.

“To get some toilet paper” is the reply.

“Oh, don’t bother, the bird’s probably really far away by now.

The Drains of Canada

The BLDGBLOG has an interview with urban spelunker Michael Cook. Read the interview then go to Michael blog Vanishing Point and look at sewers.

The Empty Suit

In a slashdot discussion about the fashion faux pas of the IT crowd, Gaffes Keeping Geeks Out of the Board Room. Simon Brooke has this comment on our besuited masters.

But as a quick aside, the business suit is worn these days by lawyers, politicians, salesmen and the financial services industry - in other words, it's the uniform of the professionally dishonest. Is that really how you want people to see you?

Bush as Zaphod Beeblebrox

In a discussion about the effect of Douglas Adams not dying there is this tidbit of political comment on the appeal of charismatic morons.

alt_historian
...Although I can't see that he would ever make Zaphod such a total idiot as in the film. There's no way anyone who acts that stupid gets to be Galactic President, no matter how charming they might be...
...

Nietzsche
But Bush got to be President of the United States..

(Un)Acceptable Racist Humour and Beer Sales

Stuff White People Like is a new blog that focuses on sociology of mainly white urban professionals in North America. Some observations are rude, some insightful some both. Here is one entry, Microbreweries. However a recent Report on Business article, What Happened to Blue?, highlights that decline of Labatt Blue as a brand. The change is not that the big brewers are selling less but they are promoting and selling and promoting horrible American "beer", (Srooc and Dub) rather than passable Canadian beer like Blue and Canadian, see below. Mass market beer isn't being outsold by microbrews but by mass market Yank "beer"

2000 MARKET SHARE

Molson Canadian: 11-12%

Labatt Blue: 10-11%

Budweiser: 8%

Coors Light: 7-8%

TOTAL FOR BREWERS

Labatt: 47%

Molson: 47%

2008 MARKET SHARE

Budweiser: 12%

Coors Light: 10-11%

Molson Canadian: 8-10%

Labatt Blue: 5-7%

TOTAL FOR BREWERS

Labatt: 43%

Molson: 41%

*Ranges based on industry observers' estimates and company information

Shifting ad budgets

	2003	2006	%
	($million)	($million)	change
Budweiser	8.6	11.9	38
Labatt Blue	7.2	7.7	7
Coors Light	8	9.6	20
Molson Canadian	6	9.3	55

Barbarians at The Gates

Fjordman is Norwegian writer of jeremiads. Here is his reaction to book review in The New Yorker of God's Crucible, a book about a barbarian invasion. He is less sanguine about civilizing benefit of slavery. Below is except from his article.

Contrast this with modern times, when southeast Europe (the Balkans) is Europe's number one trouble spot. So is the original seat of the first Indian civilization, in Pakistan and Kashmir. The Greater Middle East thus went from being a global center of civilization to being a global center of anti-civilization. This change largely coincided with the Islamization of the region.

New Super Villain Base North of Norway

Svalbard Global Seed Bank.

More reports from National Geographic and a plan of the base.

What is going on here?

"if you can't trust your shadowy overlords to keep a secret..."

Diebold Accidentally Leaks Results Of 2008 Election Early

(from The Onion)

Free Market Fundamentalism

Monetarism -like Marxism- far from offering policy makers essential truths about the economy drove them further away from what was really happening. It made government policy dependent upon a metaphysical concept-the money supply...

Mark Mazower in The Dark Continent.

Seas of Slaughter

The above map is from a new report from documenting the decline of the seas. Here is the article in Science. Here is a discussion on NPR about the report. Sea of Slaughter is a book by Farley Mowat about the destruction of marine resources in the Maritimes.

You May Mujahideen if

YOU MAY BE Mujahideen IF

1. You refine heroin for a living, but you have a moral objection to beer.

2. You own a $3,000 machine gun and $5,000 rocket launcher, but you can't afford shoes.

3. You have more wives than teeth.

4. You wipe your butt with your bare left hand, but consider bacon "unclean."

5. You think vests come in two styles: bullet-proof and suicide.

6. You can't think of anyone you HAVEN'T declared Jihad against.

7. You consider television dangerous, but routinely carry explosives in your clothing.

8. You were amazed to discover that cell phones have uses other than setting off roadside bombs.

9. You've ever uttered the phrase, "I love what you've done with your cave."

10. You have nothing against women and think every man should own at least one.

11. You bathe at least monthly whether necessary or not.

12. You've ever had a crush on your neighbor's goat.

Oh, I'm sorry. Did I insult you?

A Mujahideen is a moslem who has religious reasons to murder you.

Freedom, Responsibility and Film Violence

With freedom comes responsibility.

With freedom comes irresponsibility.

Movie critic Mark Harris talking about movie violence
and censorship on NPR.

Mr Glasses - Architect

The Modernism movement wanted buildings to be machines for living. Unfortunately we humans are not merely cogs building should be built for us not the other way around. Here is a fictionalized version of Philip Johnson as Mr Glasses.

The Tragedy of Homer Simpson

When You have to Define it As Such, It is Gone

In the past week I have heard this same phrasing from Hillary Clinton and Roger Clemens:

I was a friend of [insert name] before this and I will be a friend of [insert name] after this over.

Sure.

Rolemodels or Lack Thereof

Probable non-recreational drug user and professional ball handler Clemens was testifying at the US congress. It appears that he was injected with banned performance enhancing drugs. He is supposed to be a role model. Not really, the only types that grow up with pro athletes as role models are aspiring pro athletes themselves. In the same way aspiring drug lords consider drug lords, real or fictional, as their role models. Charles Barkley, he of the $10 million gambling loses, said it best, athletes are not role models.

Stickfigures of the World Unite

From Romph.

Come In / Go Away

Ambigram from The Party Never Stops.

Is Parenthood Worth It

From monster.com comes this bleak ad that asks the existential question "are you doing anything to justify the blood, treasure and tears invested in your birth and childhood?"

Political Debate Reformulated as Oscar debate

I have also seen the difference between Hilliary Rodham Clinton and Barak Hussein Obama done like PC/Mac ads.

(from cartoon brew)

B School for the Mediocre Monkey

All I want out of life is to be a monkey of moderate intelligence who wears a suit. That's why I've decided to transfer to business school.

Gunter, one time monkey genius in Futurama S02E02

University Education

Please Fry I don't how to teach I am a professor.

Professor Hubert J. Farnsworth in Futurama S02E02

Three Little Pigs Retold as 9/11

First The wolf blew down the house of straw.

Second the wolf blew down the house of sticks.

Then he tried and failed to blow down the house of bricks. So he flew an airplane into it and blamed the Jews.

Joke by Pat Condell in his video reacting to
the Archbishop of Canterbury's appeasement.

Titanic as Disney Crap

Hillary Hatred

A NY Times blogger has posted an article about Hillary Clinton hatred, All You Need is Hate. What is as interesting as his article is in comments. Some of the Hillary haters are rabid right wingers but many others are Democrats. Slate Magazine has compared Hilliary Clinton to the character Tracy Flick from the movie Election. It is suggested that Hillary hatred is one things propelling the candidacy of Obama. But I generally consider excessive charisma a negative sign in a politician, such popularity easily allows incompetents to be elected. After George Bush do the Americans really need another coke snorting ivy league glad hander. As if the ability to have beer somebody indicates that a pol has technical and moral qualities for high office.

Luka from the comments in All you Need Is Hate boils the argument this way.

Shouldn’t competence be a major reason to elect someone in office? This nation had 7 years of a cool dude with grand visions, that seemed soo compassionate and friendly. We need to sober up. We need a hard-working realist to clean up the mess.

TV Characters Bigger than Most Movies

Not that C.J. Cregg or Vern Schillinger are small achievements, by any means.

Television Without Pity reviewing overlooked
Oscar prospects from the movie Juno.

Oscar Peterson Overview and Interview

I did not enjoy the Oscar Peterson tribute broadcast on CBC last month. I thought there was too much talking, too little music and what music there was was banal. The concert should have also included, in closing one of his solo recordings. The only performance that was excellent and a fitting tribute to Oscar Peterson's life and work is this by Herbie Hancock, who steps back, slows down, plays a lot less notes and breaks convention to make this jazz piano piece sound like something yesterday or 200 years ago. The BBC 3 program Jazz Library looks at Oscar Peterson's body of work this week. You have a 160 hours to hear it.

The Unsuccessful Judas Uses a Camera Phone

The History of F1, Shell & Ferrari

Periodic Table of Visualization

Visual-Literacy.org has put together this periodic table of visualizing information. The periodic table progresses from simple charts to complex metaphoric illustrations. Well worth a look.

Personality Quiz Matches You with African Thugs-in-Chief

Here is a personality quiz to match you with the African dictator most like you. The behavior or misbehavior of African dictators suggests maybe decolonization was not a wholly good thing. Africa was fully colonized by European powers for less than 100 years, Moslem powers had their own slave trading stations, like Zanzibar, on Africa's east coast for much longer, but it is European colonialism that is usually reviled. However in the last decades of colonialism European powers spent more on their colonies then the colonies provided. Colonies were a status symbol not a profit center, Kaiser Wilhelm II wanted colonies despite them being a drain. In contrast foreign aid can never replace the subsidy that late stage colonialism was but it does makes government the only font of wealth and power, see post election violence in Kenya.

I took the test and ended with Robert Mugabe, a "man" currently running his country into the ground with his racist policies and economic mismanagement. Zimbabweans are worse off now then when they were as Rhodesians when Mugabe and his thugs were attempting to overthrow Ian Smith. The difference is that Mugabe's living standards are higher. "Liberation" has mainly impoverished African countries while enriching their new and mostly incompetent rulers.

(from World History Blog)

Which African dictator are you? created with QuizFarm.com

You scored as Robert Mugabe You are Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe. First and only president ruling still to this day? Robert Mugabe 50% Joseph Mobutu 30% Sani Abacha 30% Charles Taylor 20% Jean-Bedel Bokassa 10% Muammar Gaddafi 10% Idi Amin 0%

Death of a Communist Hitman 40 Years Ago

40 years ago a leader of a Viet Cong assassination squad, Nguyễn Văn Lém, was summarily executed by the police General Nguyễn Ngọc Loan during the height of the Tet Offensive. We forget at our peril the Vietnam war wasn't a "war of liberation" but a war of conquest by Communists. The VC getting whacked was found over several dozen bound and executed policemen. During the battle for Hue the VC and North Vietnam forces used the same plan to exterminate real and potential enemies like policemen, teachers, clergy and civil servants and their families who would serve as a nucleus for opposition to communist rule, see the Chekist. These tactics were also used by the Khmer Rouge when they conquered Cambodia.

On NPR they discussed they this image as depicting inhumanity of war rather than as a commie terrorist, not guerrilla, getting his just desserts.

Reasons Not to Trust Experts

Following a link from Andart I came across this futurism blog Accelerating the Future. This is very different than the retro futurism of Paleo-Future. Here is a long list of quotes illustrating Clarke's 3 Laws of technology especially the first law:

When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.

Good Cop, Baby Cop

The Landlord

Will Farrel is shaken down for big bills by a very small property owner.

The Zombie-American

It is hard to live when you are roting corpse. Watch this inspiration film, in 3 parts.

Creepy Body Modifications as Advertising

A Lift from Newsphoto Yesterday

Nailing Jesus

Don't Pin this on Christ, he has enough nails in him.

Greggory House, House S01E10

Sometimes even Pilots are Afraid of Flying

(from the Globe and Mail)

Co-pilot shackled to seat after outburst

TU THANH HA AND BRODIE FENLON

From Wednesday's Globe and Mail

January 29, 2008 at 10:38 PM EST

Yelling, crying and invoking God, the co-pilot of an Air Canada flight from Toronto to London had to be forcibly removed from the cockpit of his jetliner after suffering an emotional collapse as the plane flew over the Atlantic.

Shackled by the wrists and ankles, the shoeless first officer had to be restrained by crew members with the help of a traveller who was a member of the Canadian Forces.

Left alone in the cockpit, the captain cut short the journey of Flight AC 848 by diverting to Ireland's Shannon airport.

Meanwhile, the first officer was crying and screaming as he was cuffed on a free seat, said a Toronto-area man whose wife was sitting nearby.

“It was a bit of a traumatic experience” for the woman, who was travelling with a toddler, her husband said last night.

The co-pilot was taken by ambulance to a psychiatric ward after the plane and its 146 passengers landed on Monday morning.

“At no time was safety compromised,” Air Canada spokeswoman Isabelle Arthur said.

It was the second time an Air Canada flight ended prematurely in recent days. This month, a jetliner carrying 83 passengers from Victoria to Toronto made an emergency landing in Calgary after turbulence threw it out of control.

It was also a reminder of the 1999 EgyptAir flight that plunged into the Atlantic. Black-box recordings raised speculations that the crash occurred because co-pilot Gameel Al-Batouti was suicidal.

Pilots don't automatically undergo psychiatric assessments when they have their medical checkups, a federal official said yesterday.

The doctors who do the checkups are general practitioners approved by Transport Canada, said Transport Canada spokeswoman Lucie Vignola.

A psychiatric evaluation is not done unless the GP decides a pilot needs to see a specialist, she said.

Commercial pilots undergo medical checkups every year, every six months if they are over 40, said Captain Andy Wilson, president of the Air Canada Pilots Association.

At Air Canada, pilots are checked by company doctors, he said.

After his co-pilot's removal, regulations would have required the captain to don his oxygen mask and land at “the nearest suitable aerodrome,” said Yvan-Miville Deschênes, a former flight controller.

“It's standard procedure. When there's only one person left in the cockpit, he puts on an oxygen mask in case the cabin depressurizes,” he said. “Continuing to London would have been a security breach.”

Passenger Sean Finucane told CBC News that the co-pilot, who said “he just wanted to talk to God,” was yelling loudly but didn't sound intoxicated.

“When they tried to put his shoes on later, for example, he swore and threatened people. … He was swearing and asking for God, and was very, very distressed.”

His account matched those in the Irish Independent and in the online forum flyertalk.com.

The Independent said the co-pilot, who was “acting in a peculiar manner and was talking loudly to himself,” was held down by the crew and by a member of the Canadian Forces.

“It was quite an experience! He was being restrained in 12A and the entire mini-cabin could hear the whole thing. Not for delicate ears,” a writer posted on flyertalk.com.

“The soldier and the doctors [who were passengers] were great.”

The writer added that the flight crew was “calm and professional throughout.” The pilots' union also commended the crew for its handling of the incident.

AC 848 was supposed to land around 8:25 a.m. at London's Heathrow Airport. However, an hour before arrival, controllers at Shannon Airport were told the flight was diverted “because of illness with a crew member,” said spokesman Eugene Pratt.

An employee at Ennis General Hospital, near Shannon, said the crew member was taken to the acute psychiatric care unit.

Passengers were given 15 euros for food but were kept at the airport, said the man whose spouse sat near the cuffed co-pilot.

“My wife was stranded there with a baby. They wouldn't even allow her to take the stroller off the plane.”

In the afternoon, a crew from London picked up the passengers, who arrived at Heathrow eight hours late.

Killing Humans is Normal

Just because a robot wants to kill humans that makes him a "radical".

Bender in Futurama S01E05

Should Good Juice Cost an Arm and a Leg

Report From the Hell Hole of Iraq

Here and here are 2 reports from a blogger in Iraq. Below is snippet.

Q: Why is every Muslim Middle Eastern country characterized by either rigid oppression or chaotic violence?

A: The coercive use of violence is the only way to ensure Muslims in the Middle East will live up to any obligations, including basic social order and function. Middle East countries where chaos currently reigns, like Palestine, Iraq, and Afghanistan, are merely examples of what Muslims are like without coercion.

Shame Cultures and Guilt Cultures

Here is an overview of the difference between shame and guilt cultures, from the blog Dr Sanity.

Self Improvement a Mug's Game

Isn't it time you gave up all hope of improving yourself in any way.

Motivational Speaker Bender in
Futurama S05E16

Hows to be an Anti Imperialist and For Tyrants at the Same Time

Self hating westerners often find it as easy to condemn their own societies while ignoring the crimes of non-western societies. This leads to odd situations like leftist secular types who read The Guardian defending a repressive theocratic regime like Iran. The below, by Damntheral, is from a discussion thread commenting on an article about repressive clothing laws in Iran.


HOW TO ANSWER AN ARTICLE ON HUMAN RIGHTS ABUSE ON CIF - a quick how-to.

1) Check if the article is about Israel - if not, got to 2. If it is, go nuts with disapproval, use hyperbole, and wish for the disappearance of that country. If the writer is from that country, shout at them as if they support the abuse even though they are highlighting it in the first place. Explain how Israel is a puppet of the US anyway. Don't be scared of getting carried away: remember, you can't be anti-semitic, you're left-wing! Keywords: genocidal, neocon.

2) Check if the country is the US or the UK - if not, go to 3. If it is, go nuts with disapproval, huff and puff as though you are the last person standing between the world and totalitarianism. Explain how the US is a puppet of Israel anyway. Keywords: lapdog, orwellian, neocon.

3) Does that country have links, however tenuous and interested with the US/UK? If not, go to 4. If it does, go nuts with disapproval, huff and puff and explain that the entire regime is entirely the fault of the US/UK as though its inhabitants are sub-human beings with no moral capacity. Hey don't worry: you can't be racist, you're left-wing! Keywords: neocon, lapdog, puppet, neocon.

4) Take a deep breath: this is the big one. The author of the piece (and anyone agreeing with them) is a toxic neo-con warmongering zionist neo-con warmonger (if white) or a toxic neo-con warmongering Uncle Tom/coconut/quisling neo-con warmonger (all other options) and needs to be exposed as such. Make this dirty, make this personal, repeat yourself a lot. Anything goes frankly, slander, insinuation, insults. Remember: you are not fighting for the honour of Musharaf/Putin/Ahmadinejad/Chavez/Hu Jintao/al-Bashir or obscure militiamen and warlords and defending murder, torture and rape, even though to the untrained eye you are, what you are really doing is well you are one of the good guys anyway so that's OK. Bring up things happening on other continents, half a century ago, one century ago, four centuries ago, on another planet or in an alternate reality if you must so long as points 1, 2 or 3 can apply to those. The other guy inversely is not allowed to do this so bring up the timing of their piece. Bring up their background. Bring up oil. Bring up the absence of oil. Bring up conspiracy theories. Keywords: neocon, warmonger, what about, neocon, islamophobia, empire, neocon, discursive machine of hegemony, neocon.

5) go home regretting a bit that the likes of Ceaucescu, Pol Pot and Milosevic are no longer around to be whatabouted, but console yourself by thinking that now at least there are suicide bombers.

6) avoid mirrors.

HELPFUL TIP: if you know absolutely nothing about the country in question and no one else has commented yet, a handy solution is to look at the victims instead. Are the victims Muslims? If so 3 probably applies. However keep in mind that Serbs and other Muslims are exceptionally allowed to kill Muslims and anyway it never happens ever so go to 4 instead or just ask what the point of the article is, and if someone answers call them boring.

Subway Protocol

Memories flooded back when she sat down, of countless Tube journeys like this, avoiding everyone’s gaze, the enforced frigid politeness that people adopted as the alternative to going insane due to being packed in, just like those films about traveling to Mars.

Thande in his
Man Of His Time: TABAEv2 Volume 2.

Couch Potatoes Aren't True Patriots

How to Become A Spy

Too smart to remain in the Army, too…limited to grasp the real danger of his work...

Character description of a
failed commando turned spook
in Chris's Long Hard Road.

How Cheney Can't be Darth Vader

On Paul Krugman's blog there is a long discussion about which senior members of the Star Wars evil empire equate to the Bush League government of the US. The general agreement is that Cheney despite his outfit above can't be compared to Cheney because "Darth Vader once served in the military". Read more for joyous bile.

As to Bush a couple of years ago Ted Rall compared him unfavourable with Osama and Hitler.

Ultra Violent Anime Rugrat

The line from Journalista is the the comic book artist Kiyohiko Azuma was channeling Mickey Spillane when he drew this.