5.30.2009

Rush is off his meds again

Or maybe on. I don't know. I get confused.



The Republican Party is an oppressed minority.

[From GOP Acts Like Oppressed Minority]


Rainy day


Rainy day, originally uploaded by tedcompton.

Photo Finish Forever

Photo: Phil Compton

At Dubya's alma mater, 20 percent promise not to screw you over too much


“We want to stand up and recite something out loud with our class,” said Teal Carlock, who is graduating from Harvard and has accepted a job at Genentech.

[From A Promise to Be Ethical in an Era of Immorality - NYTimes.com]

That would be "The M.B.A. Oath" (no, really) that has graduating Harvard Business School students promising to "serve the greater good" – at least 180 of them, from a graduating class of 800. Business school graduates swearing to be ethical has been a "dramatic change," according to one Diana C. Robertson, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, the Times reports. No comments from Harvard faculty are recorded.



5.29.2009

Really, really bad news for Mike Greenman







And here's the beauty part...


The 2009 Mediterranean Cruise has a "sunny itinerary" perfect to brighten an otherwise gloomy time, the magazine's ad says. There are "exclusive cocktail receptions and smokers (featuring H. Upmann cigars), scintillating seminars and intimate dining with guest speakers."



Some of the guest speakers include Karl ("Permanent Majority") Rove, author Michael Novak, former U.N. ambassador John Bolton and ace political analyst Dick Morris, who appears fully recovered from that toe-sucking incident. Also on board will be columnists Tony Blankley, Cal Thomas and George Gilder....



...you pay them.



The cruise is conservatively priced as these things go, with 185-square-foot cabins for $5,000 a couple ($6,000 if you want a window, which you do).... The pricey suites, up to $14,000 per couple for one with a veranda, are still available.

[From Al Kamen - In the Loop: A Cruise in the Right Direction - washingtonpost.com]


US Airways Flight 1549: Anatomy of a Miracle

You probably think you've read and heard more than you want to know about Sully's brave ditching of the Airbus loaded with passengers into the Hudson River. But this article gives those of us who prefer our feet firmly on the ground, or floating gently across the waves, an insight into the dynamics of cruising above the clouds.



On the afternoon of last January 15, a flock of Canada geese flew about 3,000 feet above the Bronx in a loose echelon formation, tending to their own business as usual, with nothing special in mind....

[From US Airways Flight 1549: Anatomy of a Miracle | vanityfair.com]


5.28.2009

A little problem with C EA ANCE

Right by where I work, this afternoon, this. It's one of only three ways to cross the railroad tracks (the other two are over) north of Main Street.

Locking Horns

Photo: Phil Compton

5.27.2009

Ouch


MERIDEN, Conn. – An instructor at the Connecticut Police Academy has been charged with disorderly conduct after he allegedly responded literally to a co-worker's "bite me" remark.

[From Police: Conn. woman bitten after 'bite me' remark - Yahoo! News]


Back to the future


SEOUL (AFP) – North Korea said it was abandoning the truce that ended the Korean war and warned it could launch a military attack on the South, two days after testing an atomic bomb for the second time.

[From NKorea warns of attack, says truce no longer valid - Yahoo! News]


Reality jumps shark


US Energy Secretary Steven Chu said Tuesday the Obama administration wanted to paint roofs an energy-reflecting white, as he took part in a climate change symposium in London.

[From Raw Story » US energy chief: Paint roofs white to fight global warming]

It's over, dude - the end of practically everything.



Shoot the messenger, wackjob says


Rejecting the god of their fathers, the neo-pagans who dominate the media serve as lackeys at the terrorists’ bloody altar....



Although it seems unthinkable now, future wars may require censorship, news blackouts and, ultimately, military attacks on the partisan media.

[From The Journal of International Security Affairs | Wishful Thinking and Indecisive Wars]

(...and a lot of other really moronic things.)



5.26.2009

New on TV: Pain-in-the-ass cartoon liberals


The comedy here isn't character-driven so much as theme-driven -- relentlessly so...



There is a loose plot underneath all those p.c.-baiting jokes, formed around Helen's misguided desire to make her daughter, Bliss, talk to her openly about sex. Bliss responds by insisting on attending a creepy pro-abstinence father-daughter dance, where, in something closely resembling a wedding ceremony, fathers give their daughters "abstinence rings" symbolizing their virginity. Liberals may be unnervingly touchy-feely, Bliss learns, but conservatives can be downright twisted.

[From Mike Judge's pain-in-the-ass cartoon liberals | Salon Arts & Entertainment]


Lamps at noon


Lamps at noon, originally uploaded by tedcompton.

Lawdy Miss Clawdy...

And a whole bunch of top-20 hits from the mid-50's on in...



The MuSiC RooM

[From UpChUcKy.CoM]

Noted by our Midwest Bureau (and added to our Work Avoidance List for future reference).



Ya think?


It's a safe bet that terror suspects brought to this country wouldn't be assigned to spear litter in the median of I-95.

[From Commentary: Gitmo is a picnic compared to U.S. prisons | McClatchy]


Well, that's settled then


The “we report, you decide” network has already decided.



Sonia Sotomayor, President Barack Obama’s nominee to the Supreme Court, is the “most liberal” of any of his candidates and was chosen to “appease the far left.

[From Raw Story » Fox host: Obama picked Sotomayor to ‘appease the far left’]


Now you too can smell like a TV set


A Dubai fragrance company has signed a deal with Twentieth Century Fox to market a fragrance based on the popular Fox television series "24."



"Twentieth Century Fox L&M Europe has signed a deal with Dubai-based ScentStory FZE, to create a fragrance inspired by the television series "24" and the central character, Jack Bauer," a magazine reported Friday.

[From The Raw Story » What does torture smell like? Dubai company to market Jack Bauer fragrance]


Bunkhouse

Photo: Phil Compton

5.25.2009

Sincerity, thy name is Dubya


Of course, no matter what you think of the optics of golfing on Memorial Day, nothing Obama did today could beat George W. Bush's strange round of golf on Aug. 4, 2002. Unlike Obama, Bush brought the press pool out on the course with him. A suicide bomber had killed nine people overnight in Israel, and Bush wanted to make a statement about it. "I call upon all nations to do everything they can to stop these terrorist killers," he said. Then he turned away from the cameras and got down to business. "Thank you," Bush said. "Now watch this drive."



You, too, can watch that drive below...

[From A White House holiday - War Room - Salon.com]

–Paul Knue



Dispatches from the left coast


Photo: Lynn C.

American ingenuity

If we can turn the simple act of running into a megabazillion-dollar fashion industry we can certainly make a buck or two on the flu.



And Simon cheered...

Here's our girl Susan Boyle again, minus some of the charming innocence. But she still has those pipes.


–Paul Knue



Home from the sea


Home from the sea, originally uploaded by tedcompton.

5.24.2009

The case for "real work"


The current downturn is likely to pass eventually. But there are also systemic changes in the economy, arising from information technology, that have the surprising effect of making the manual trades — plumbing, electrical work, car repair — more attractive as careers.

[From The Case for Working With Your Hands - NYTimes.com]

“Any society that values its philosophers more than its plumbers will find that neither its ideas nor its pipes will hold water!”



–John Gardner


So's yer old man


It's increasingly obvious that Congress and the president (regardless of which party is in power) will deal with the political stink bomb of an aging society only if forced. And the most plausible means of compulsion would be for Social Security and Medicare to go bankrupt: trust funds run dry; promised benefits exceed dedicated payroll taxes. The sooner this happens, the better.

[From Why Social Security Should Go Broke Faster | Newsweek Voices - Robert J. Samuelson | Newsweek.com]

I'm not much appreciating being referred to as a stink bomb, although I'm thinking the timing's not too bad. As soon as my Federal stimulus arrives I can buy my pitchfork with that.