A Carrier By Any Other Name

The Hyuga is the largest warship built by Japan since World War 2. Since the Japanese constitution forbids their navy from building aircraft carriers, the warship is classified as a "helicopter destroyer."
It's a carrier. Three are planned.

Yeah Japan! While this class may not support V/STOL fighters (yet), the rumor is that adding that capability will be next. And though Japan's neighbors may be hesitant to celebrate the return of true Japanese naval air capabilities, helicopter carriers are very useful in anti-submarine, anti-piracy, and peacekeeping/humanitarian relief efforts.

For example, we just deployed the USS Boxer off the coast of Somalia (with a full complement of Marines). It will take over as the flagship for the anti-piracy fleet there.

Via LGF

Texas School Board Chairman Endorses Book Calling Pro-Evolution Parents 'Monsters'

We’ve had several posts about the chairman of the Texas State Board of Education, Don McLeroy, a dentist and young earth creationist who is doing his best to drag science education in Texas back into the Dark Ages, with help from the deceptive propagandists at the Discovery Institute. In an especially Orwellian touch, they’re calling this effort “academic freedom.”

Posse Comitatus no more?

Jiminy Cricket. We can't have this.
Raw Story - Army probes domestic use of troops in Alabama
CNSNews.com - Army Investigating How and Why Troops Were Sent Into Alabama Town After Murder Spree
USA Today - Who sent soldiers into an Alabama town last week?

The French Are Making The Best Horror Movies

Here's one I have to see: Ils. I love me some home invasion flicks.

Happy Birthday, Our First Atheist President

My favorite Madison quotes:

• In no instance have... the churches been guardians of the liberties of the people.
• In Republics, the great danger is, that the majority may not sufficiently respect the rights of the minority.
• Learned Institutions ought to be favorite objects with every free people. They throw that light over the public mind which is the best security against crafty and dangerous encroachments on the public liberty.
• Religion flourishes in greater purity, without than with the aid of Government.
• Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise, every expanded prospect.
• The capacity of the female mind for studies of the highest order cannot be doubted, having been sufficiently illustrated by its works of genius, of erudition, and of science.
• The diversity in the faculties of men, from which the rights of property originate, is not less an insuperable obstacle to an uniformity of interests. The protection of these faculties is the first object of government.
• The executive has no right, in any case, to decide the question, whether there is or is not cause for declaring war.
• The number, the industry, and the morality of the priesthood, and the devotion of the people have been manifestly increased by the total separation of the church from the state.
• The purpose of separation of church and state is to keep forever from these shores the ceaseless strife that has soaked the soil of Europe with blood for centuries.
• Union of religious sentiments begets a surprising confidence.

And finally:

• The means of defense against foreign danger historically have become the instruments of tyranny at home.

He wouldn't make it past the primaries today...

Go Global Warming!

Maine and Vermont are inching closer to join Connecticut and Massachusetts in legalizing gay marriage.

Why are all the warm, sunny places populated by superstitious retards?

Happy birthday, Mr. Madison

James Madison
"Father of the Constitution"

Born: March 16, 1751, in Port Conway, Virginia
Died: June 28, 1836, at Montpelier, Virginia

Fonts, Fonts, Fonts

From Smashing Magazine: 40 typography-related blogs

Hired - Part 2

Why don't they look?

Hired!



Last Clear Chance



Posture Pals



X Marks the Spot

AKA: Waterbears

Tardigrades In Space (TARDIS)

Tardigrades In Space or "TARDIS" is the first research project to evaluate the ability of tardigrades to survive under open space conditions. TARDIS is one of the projects within the Biopan-6 research platform provided by European Space Agency (ESA), and will be sent into space with the russian FOTON-M3 mission.

Tardigrades Goldstein Lab, UNC, Chapel Hill

Scott Tenerman Must Die

Man I love this show:
The Ten Most Controversial South Park Episodes

The Republican Party Is Dead, And Rush Is Eating Its Carcass

Newt Gingrich has proposed that the state give money to teenagers not to get pregnant.

In other news, the Democratic president has proposed reforms that would curtail earmarks, a wise (conservative?) fiscal policy that Republicans just didn't get around to during the last 8 years.

And constitution-humping drug-addled gasbag Rush Limbaugh thinks that the "inalienable" rights of "life," "liberty," "freedom (?)," and "the pursuit of happiness" granted by our "creator" is written in the preamble of the constitution! Funny that he constantly pushes that foreign citizens don't necessarily have rights, and can therefore be detained and tortured, but somehow can say "inalienable" without choking on it. Then again, many of us believe that Rush lost his gag reflex in the 80's...

Colbert addresses Rush with his usual absurd/acerbic wit:

The Colbert ReportMon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Tip/Wag - Rush Limbaugh

Colbert Report Full Episodes
Political Humor

Rap Battle
NASA Name Contest

Iron Chef Cora Is Double Pregnant

Not only is alpha lesbo Iron Chef Cat Cora pregnant, but so is her partner.

I would love to hear what their kitchen is stocked with...

One of my favorite local plants

Corallorhiza maculata, Spotted Coralroot

This orchid is a myco-heterotroph; it lacks chlorophyll and gets food by parasitizing the mycelium of fungi in the family Russulaceae.