4.30.2008

Speaking Of Warplanes/Transformers

At least the F-35 program is going pretty much as planned. The Air Force (fuckstains that they are), Navy, and Marines all need this fighter. The Marine V/STOL version is shown here.

It's not just a warplane, it's a transformer! And I like how, after the fart-faced Air Force changed the name of the F-22 to the Raptor, the military decided to name this fighter the Lightning II (the F-22s original, and much cooler, name).

I would say kinder things about the Air Force had the retards in charge chosen the best warplane instead of the F-22: the YF-23 Black Widow II.

V-22s Over Iraq


The aircraft/transformer that the Navy and Marines have fought so hard to keep alive has been deployed in Iraq. I have mixed feelings about this thing: they need it, but it's got a lot to prove after all of those crashes and design problems.

Of course, this wouldn't have happened if the military had insisted on a competitive fly-before-buy program like it has for so many warplanes and even some ships.

I'm nervously optimistic. But if the Navy and Marines are to engage in amphibious assaults from 20+ miles out, helicopters won't cut it. Bringing capital ships, many with thousands of sailors and marines aboard, closer to hostile shores is indisputably more dangerous than any V-22 problems.

And an amphibious assault capability matters. We'll never do a D-day-type invasion again; but amphibious assault fleets regularly prevent crises, rescue American and allied citizens, and provide (armed) humanitarian relief. Even Europe has grown to accept this, with many of its major nations building ships to this end.

Now if we can just get that damned EFV to work...

"A Blood Libel On Western Civilization"

When talking about the creationists to people who don’t follow these controversies closely, I have found that the hardest thing to get across is the shifty, low-cunning aspect of the whole modern creationist enterprise.
I haven't posted anything on the creationist Expelled movie, mostly because the whole thing bores me really. The movie presents no new arguments (no surprise); and that creationists can be a bunch of deceitful, amoral hypocrites is century-old, arguably millennia-old, news.

However, I gleefully post this link to John Derbyshire's deliciously vicious National Review...uh, review..of the movie, since it's a conservative harshly criticizing the movie. It's unique so far of all of the reviews I've read, as Derbyshire points out that Ben Stein is betraying the Western Civilization Stein seems to think scientists (ie, liberals) are destroying. Best part (emphasis mine):
And now here is Ben Stein, sneering and scoffing at Darwin, a man who spent decades observing and pondering the natural world — that world Stein glimpses through the window of his automobile now and then, when he’s not chattering into his cell phone. Stein claims to be doing it in the name of an alternative theory of the origin of species: Yet no such alternative theory has ever been presented, nor is one presented in the movie, nor even hinted at. There is only a gaggle of fools and fraudsters, gaping and pointing like Apaches on seeing their first locomotive: “Look! It moves! There must be a ghost inside making it move!
All of the arguments made in Expelled are debunked here, should you want to take a look. I find it telling that my local theater only showed it for a week. Bring it home, Derbyshire...
Which other of our civilizational achievements would you like to sneer at? What else from what Waugh called “the work of centuries” would you like to “abandon … for sentimental qualms”? You call yourself a conservative? Feugh!

4.26.2008

Soldiers Should Fire Their Rifles, Not Their Guns

A group of evangelical buttinskies are pushing their particular dislikes on our troops: they don't want grown men fighting in a war to be able to read Playboy. This from the right wing that "supports our troops" and wants them to "fight for freedom." Apparently, freedom does not include cranking one out to hot, naked models. Their arguments are typical of their ilk: we don't like it, so it's immoral and harmful, so it should be banned.

Of course, porn has always been a stranger to the US military...


Does this not sound like the machinations of bitchy, overbearing, super-pious, nosy cunts angry that other people get to have fun looking at nice tits? Best quote of the article:
"Here’s a radical idea: maybe those who wear the uniform and put their lives on the line for their country should be able to read whatever they want."
And I think it's time to bring up my list of things men and women 18-to-20 years of age can and can't do in the military:

Can
  • Run billion-dollar ships
  • Land multi-million dollar aircraft on billion-dollar ships
  • Determine whether someone should be shot
  • Shoot those deserving people
  • Drive multi-million dollar vehicles capable of leveling small towns
  • Fly multi-million dollar aircraft capable of leveling small countries
  • Steer multi-million dollar submarines capable of leveling small continents
  • Target and fire apocalyptic weaponry
  • Repair gravely injured people
  • Get killed, usually in a terrible manner

Can't

One Of My Favorite Videos

I posted one of my favorite videos*, Mr. Bungle's Pink Cigarette, over at the other blog. If you haven't seen it, it's worth a watch.


*those things that used to be on the MTV back when we all used to watch it

I Must See This Sickness

Apparently, this French film (the English title is Inside) is total gross-out. Buzz at CampBlood reviews it here; another great review here.

4.24.2008

THIS makes the Cold War well worth the effort

Y'all may have seen it, but just in case:

The Leningrad Cowboys & Red Army Choir sing, Sweet Home Alabama

4.17.2008

Wee!!!


Would someone please tell this asshole that it's 2008...CE? And that his slip is showing?

4.16.2008

A Worthy Cause

Uwe Boll has said that if this campaign for stopping his unwatchable, blasphemous movies reaches 1 million signatures, he'll retire. I signed; it's over 200,000 now.

Although it is taking away good material from the next MST3K incarnation...

4.11.2008

Olbermann Gets It Right Defending Atheism

Such A Great Band


If you still haven't checked out Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, why not?

Satan's Fossil Found: Proof Of Creationism

A fossil snake was found with limbs. Evolution is clearly false, since the bible describes Satan as a serpent with limbs. Science has thus found Satan's fossil! Hurray Magic Jesus! Except Yahweh took away the serpent's limbs in Genesis, as punishment for its deceit (and that occurred before death). And Satan is still alive. So how did science find this fossil?

Ah, so what, this proves creationism!

Take that, transitional-fossil lovers! No one will ever find an "alleged" transitional fossil, like one connecting lizards to snakes! Science has now found absolute proof of that the bible is true! Satan's fossil was found, but not really, but sort-of, but...Jesus is Lord!

The bible is such a great science book...How could one doubt it?

Living Well Is The Best Revenge

From R.E.M.'s new album; I couldn't agree more:
All your sad and lost apostles hum my name and flare their nostrils
Choking on the bones you toss to them
Well I'm not one to sit and spin
'Cause living well's the best revenge
Baby, I am calling you on that
It's such a great album if you're a homo or homo-sympathetic. And what a great "FUCK YOU!" to the religious right.

Because R2-D2 Is My Favorite Star Wars Character


This Disney-Pixar movie looks great, and seems to wallow in R2-D2 love! Click on the pic to watch the previews.

One nation under Allah in Minnesota PUBLIC school

Metro charter school accused of teaching Islam

A Star Tribune newspaper column has prompted a state investigation into a charter school. A substitute teacher said a school in Inver Grove Heights is blurring the line of separation of church and state.

Being a charter school Tarek ibn Ziyad Academy, or TIZA, is supported by tax dollars. The teacher told 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS the presence of religion she observed at the school took her by surprise.

TIZA Executive Director Azad Zaman insisted the school follows with state and federal laws.

"TIZA does not endorse any religion," he said.
[No, it just practices it]

However, TIZA Academy is sponsored by Islamic Relief USA, based in California.

The questions came after substitute teacher Amanda Getz taught at TIZA last month and told the Star Tribune about things she observed that day that shocked her.

"I've been in a lot of schools and I've never been in a school where they had washing rituals, or they had prayer, or where they had a room where you had to take your shoes off," Getz said.

"It is most likely that this substitute teacher was sadly mistaken," said Zaman.
[My Weasel-Word-O-Meter just went off the scale]

He said the school follows state and federal guidelines when it comes to religion.

"We're required under the federal guidelines to allow students to pray when they wish to do so. And as Muslim students, they're allowed to pray around 1:30 p.m., so we allow them to do that," Zaman explained.
[So where are YOUR school's prayer rugs, Eugenius?!? Can you get Department of Education funding?!?]

The State Department of Education said they would conduct more site visits and write to the State Department to find out more about the school’s sponsor.

TIZA requires all students to learn Arabic as a second language English.

State law requires the school to fly an American flag during school hours, however no flag flies outside of TIZA Academy.

Zaman told 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS he didn’t know how to work the flagpole.
[Don't get me started]

Minnesota madrasa

Minnesota publicly-funded madrasa doesn't fly the American flag

Tarek ibn Zayed Academy, which receives public funds but has been accused of being an Islamic school, doesn't endorse any religion -- so says its Executive Director. Got it. But it just happens that the Executive Director and everyone else involved with this school is an adherent of a supremacist creed that disdains national allegiances, preaching that one owes no loyalty to the state, especially to the infidel state, but only to the global community of believers. Now of course, maybe the Exec Dir and his staff and all the students reject those elements of their religion, and are fervently patriotic and loyal citizens of the United States, firm believers in the Bill of Rights who -- by an amazing coincidence -- just can't figure out how to work the flagpole.

I'm sure there are already many defenders of this school who are ready to believe just that.

4.08.2008

Because I so love you all:

loudQuietloud - Documentary of The Pixies Reunion Tour 2004
The first 5 minutes and the DVD and a trailer:



Where was I?

Pegged My Geek-O-Meter

I saw this bumper sticker on my way out this morning and tried to take a picture of it.


It reads: gorram = frell x frack^2. Only in a NASA engineering town...

I want one.

4.06.2008

Resquiat in Pace



Charlton Heston 1924-2008

A fond farewell to a man whose life's work has given me so many hours of enjoyment I cannot count them.

Statement by the Family of Charlton Heston

IMDb

USA Today: Charlton Heston's
epic acting style defined an era

Charlton Heston: Google News





Finally, An Album Written For Me


Equation:
old-school R.E.M. idioms + new-school hip punk (ex, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, The Kills, The Liars, etc) + awesome rock-n-roll "Frank Black" rowdy guitar + angry homo lyrics = too close to home
I wept, I rocked, I did both again...sometimes at the same time

Finally, an album too me for me.

4.05.2008

REM

So. Central Rain

1984 Concert Videos
The submitter has put up dozens.

Almost everything after 1988 I can take or leave, but when we were young, so were they.

REM On Stephen Colbert

Hilarious.