i think i'll have to watch cnn a bit more now

the creator of SHE WHO MUST BE OBEYED

john mortimer, has passed. i don't know if you've ever read rumpole but you should. rumpole (of course it was really mortimer) was smart, funny, witty, a curmudgeon and someone i would want to share a beverage with


John Mortimer, barrister and creator of Rumpole, is dead

By Helen T. Verongos
Published: January 16, 2009

John Mortimer, barrister, author, playwright and creator of Horace Rumpole, the cunning defender of the British criminal classes, has died, said his publisher at Viking, Tony Lacey. He was 85.

Mortimer created the character Rumpole of the Bailey, an endearing and enduring relic of the British legal system who became a television hero of the courtroom comedy.

To read Rumpole, or watch the episodes, is to enter not only Rumpole's stuffy flat or crowded legal chambers, but also to feel the itch of his yellowing court wig and the flapping of his disheveled, cigar-ash-dusted courtroom gown. Rumpole spends his days quoting Keats and his nights quaffing claret at Pommeroy's wine bar, putting off the time that he must return to his wife, Hilda, more commonly known as She Who Must Be Obeyed.

Using his wit and low-comedy distractions, Rumpole sees that justice is done, more often than not by outsmarting the "old sweethearts" and "old darlings" of the bench and revealing the inner good - or at least integrity and inconsistency - of the accused, including clans like the Timsons, whose crimes have kept generations of police officers busy.........

(hat tip to madame arcati
The death of John Mortimer


picture: the author John Mortimer in 1996. (Eric Draper/AP Photo)

i LOVE LOVE LOVE this song

so much. i have it on my mp3 player (NOT an ipod. i refuse) way more than once and way more than just this record version.

so i HAD to share it
at any rate, on boing boing today. i saw it in reference to another posting:

Rudy Rucker's trip to New York City

Posted by Mark Frauenfelder,
On his blog, Rudy Rucker writes about his recent visit to New York City. In addition to the many nice photographs he took, he included this old YouTube clip of Camper Van Beethoven's video, "Take the Skinheads Bowling," because he saw the band with his daughter Georgia, while he was there. (Georgia was the designer of The Happy Mutant Handbook.) .............

dog cat and rat

i LOVE that dude!

sully's family (bein' all proud and what not)

and HUMBLE too ya know!

the more i hear abut him, the more of a hero i really do think he is. man, i don't fly (well) and i'm warning you now, if you ever see me in an airport line, ask if you can cut ahead of me. you DO NOT want to be in back of me while i attempt to get through the metal detector (it DOESN'T WORK). i have to be wanded (and sometimes more).

BUT

i'd fly with sully ANY day-um day
Pilot's wife: 'We are very proud of him'
Praise pours in for Sullenberger after he safely lands plane in Hudson River
msnbc.com staff and news service reports
NEW YORK - The wife of the cool-headed pilot who safely landed a crippled jetliner in the Hudson River said Friday she was stunned to hear about the ordeal from her husband after it was all over.

"Suffice to say, it was a shock, like it was to everyone," Lorrie Sullenberger said. ...

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

can you imagine

having HIS job? wicked cool!

i didn't like him BEFORE i knew

he said these f**ked up things. oh my good goddess this man is a wad

he's channeling his lil' friend jesus along with his OTHER lil' friends hitler and mao

"whatever it takes god"

Follow Jesus Like Nazis Followed Hitler, Rick Warren Tells Stadium Crowd

Bruce Wilson

Posted January 15, 2009 | 05:17 PM

[source of Rick Warren speech audio clips used in video above: Saddleback Church website ]

On April 17, 2005, at the southern California Anaheim Angels sports stadium thirty thousand Saddleback Church members, more than ever gathered in one spot, assembled to celebrate Saddleback's 25th anniversary and listened as Rick Warren announced his vision for the next 25 years of the church: the P.E.A.C.E. Plan. [Digg this story]

Towards the close of his nearly one hour speech, Pastor Warren asked his followers to be as committed to Jesus as the young Nazi men and women who spelled out in mass formation with their bodies the words "Hitler, we are yours," in 1939 at the Munich Stadium, were committed to the Führer of the Third Reich, a major instigator of a World War that claimed 55 million lives. Rick Warren has exhorted Christians towards Nazi-like dedication in at least several public speeches and also during a one hour video recording of a talk by Warren, explaining his P.E.A.C.E. Plan, that is currently hosted on the official P.E.A.C.E. Plan website (see 'video page', "The Global P.E.A.C.E. Plan"). A version of the anecdote can also be found on page 357 of Rick Warren's 1995 book The Purpose Driven Church, which sold over one million copies..........

i just want to send a shout out

to the pilot (Chesley B. Sullenberger III,) and crew of the us airways jet that landed in the hudson yesterday. wow.

a shout out to the passengers as well. from accounts i've read, they helped each other and made sure all were safe

and another shout out to the boats that came VERY quickly to the aid of that downed plane as well as ALL of the rescue personnel.

it was freezing cold in the northeast yesterday. all i kept thinking about were all of those people in the water.

thank the goddess no lives were lost

All 155 Escape Jet’s Plunge Into Hudson
By ROBERT D. McFADDEN
A US Airways jetliner with 155 people aboard lost power in both engines, possibly from striking birds, after taking off from La Guardia Airport on Thursday afternoon. The pilot ditched in the icy Hudson River and all on board were rescued by a flotilla of converging ferries and emergency boats, the authorities said. What might have been a catastrophe in New York — one that evoked the feel if not the scale of the Sept. 11 attack — was averted by a pilot’s quick thinking and deft maneuvers, and by the nearness of rescue boats, a combination that witnesses and officials called miraculous.

As stunned witnesses watched from high-rise buildings on both banks, the Airbus A320, which had risen to 3,200 feet over the Bronx and banked left, came downriver, its fuselage lower than many apartment terraces and windows, in a carefully executed touchdown shortly after 3:30 p.m. that sent up huge plumes of water at midstream, between West 48th Street in Manhattan and Weehawken, N.J. ...........

photo:

Passengers stood on the wings as they awaited rescue.

Photo: Gary Hershorn/Reuters

photo:

The scene in the Hudson River.

Photo: Josh Haner/The New York Times

unlike da liebs

i KNOW what a pdf is (Lieberman doesn’t know what a PDF is?, hat tip to colin mcenroe for that one. i would have NEVER known that about da liebs otherwise)

but this isn't really about da liebs (steamin' pile o' shite that he is). it's about ANOTHER giant steamin' pile o' shite (well two of 'em; king george and kbr)

a handful of men get brought to trial for (allegedly) killing civilians in iraq. what about all of the (alleged) rapes and OTHER (alleged) murders and (alleged) corruption and (alleged) horrid operational procedures?

hmmmmmmmmm

we'll never know. the big boyz at the top are NEVER going to be held accountable. only a few lowly pawns get thrown under the bus (to appease the masses ?????????????? well I'M NOT appeased)

ACLU: 'Secret courts' conceal fraud by military contractors
Muriel Kane
A law originally intended to encourage whistleblowers may have been used by the Bush Justice Department to cover up allegations of fraud by contractors such as Halliburton spin-off KBR.

In 2007, David Rose's "The People vs. the Profiteers" described a "scandal of epic proportions" involving the alleged suppression of dozens of lawsuits against KBR for alleged massive fraud in Iraq.

Those and similar charges are the basis for a complaint (pdf) filed on Thursday by the American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Virginia, which alleges that secrecy provisions added to the False Claims Act (FCA) in 1986 have been used to keep complaints under seal indefinitely and gag whistleblowers who might otherwise speak out.
.......................

this is NOT sfw

but one can't help but smile though



(found via boing boing)

thursday humor

(but it's real)
Prostitute-loving Senator questions Hillary's ethics
John Aravosis (DC) ·
Louisiana-Republican family-values prostitute-paying married Senator David Vitter, a man who brings new meaning to the phrase "stimulus package," had the audacity to question Hillary's and Bill's ethics today during Hillary's confirmation hearings..........

a fitting (almost) last lunch

for the giant tub o' guts* and the clowner-in-chief

sort of makes my hackles stand on end (not sort of, it DOES make them stand on end)

Bush hosted Limbaugh for private birthday lunch yesterday.»

Yesterday, a fill-in host for Rush Limbaugh told listeners that Limbaugh had traveled to Washington, DC for a “secret meeting” and dropped several hints the meeting would be with Obama. When news broke that Obama was to dine last night with several prominent conservatives, speculation swirled that Limbaugh would be there. Today, however, Limbaugh revealed that he actually traveled to Washington for a private lunch with President Bush at which Bush surprised Limbaugh with a birthday cake:

LIMBAUGH: With 10 minutes left in lunch the door opens and the stewards walk in, three stewards, walk in with a little chocolate birthday cake. … And there’s a little chocolate microphone on the plate with the chocolate birthday cake. And my mouth falls open and I’m just in stunned disbelief.........

*i, in no way shape or form am making fun of large people. i am NOT of the skinny persuasion. i AM making fun of giant blow-hard tub o' guts(es) such as flush limburger though

this cost us an additional

TEN MILLION DOLLARS

we should DEMAND five million each from king george and the big dick. no, make that ten million each - to cover punitive damages

it's like our country has money to burn or something, isn't it?

Missing White House E-Mails Traced, Justice Aide Says
By R. Jeffrey Smith
Washington Post Staff Writer
A Justice Department lawyer told a federal judge yesterday that the Bush administration will meet its legal requirement to transfer e-mails to the National Archives after spending more than $10 million to locate 14 million e-mails reported missing four years ago from White House computer files.

Civil division trial lawyer Helen H. Hong made the disclosure at a court hearing provoked by a 2007 lawsuit filed by outside groups to ensure that politically significant records created by the White House are not destroyed or removed before President Bush leaves office at noon on Tuesday. She said the department plans to argue in a court filing this week that the administration's successful recent search renders the lawsuit moot. ..........

he is just un effing believable

he is clueless. i used to vacillate between thinking he was stupid and a puppet of others (read: the big dick) OR that he was brilliant and he simply didn't care.

i think it's a some of one and some of the other. he is stupid as shite AND HE FUCKING DOESN'T CARE. he JUST DOESN'T GET IT

the following is king george chattin' it up with that goof ball larry king on tuesday night

Bush low point: 'Being called a racist'

..............“In fact, the truth of the matter is the response was pretty darn quick,” Bush said, “if you think about the fact that the Coast Guard and a lot of brave kids were pulling 30,000 people off of roofs as soon as the storm passed, as soon as they found people on those roofs.”

King then pointed out that a lot of mistakes were made in the days following the hurricane, to which Bush responded: “Well, yes, at all levels of government, absolutely.”

“No question,” the president added. “And that’s a good thing about government. By the way, we have had, that I know of, sitting right here, eight hurricanes, major hurricanes, and seven and a half were dealt with the way everybody expected them to be dealt with.

The Mississippi part of Katrina was dealt with well, even though it was a really horrible hurricane.”

“My brother was governor of Florida, and seven major hurricanes hit there. And the response was always pretty good. It's the response out of New Orleans and Louisiana which was not as good as we would have liked.”.........

we knew you weren't a number

i LOVED the prisoner. i LOVED patrick mcgoohan



patrick mcgoohan

Actor who turned down the roles of James Bond and The Saint to find fame instead as the anonymous Number Six in The Prisoner.

Patrick McGoohan, who died on January 13 aged 80, starred in two of the most memorable British television series of the 1960s, Danger Man and The Prisoner.

If Danger Man was somewhat typical of 1960s espionage drama and derring-do, The Prisoner was a more cerebral affair in which McGoohan played a character known only as Number Six. The series, which was made in Britain and drew on elements of science fiction, concerned a former spy who was incarcerated in a small enclave called The Village. Attempts to escape were consistently frustrated by the mysterious Number One. It was McGoohan himself who came up with the idea for the show, and he himself directed several episodes. Indeed, many aspects of the series were based on his own life: for example, the birth date of Number Six, revealed in one episode, was the same as his own.

Patrick McGoohan was born in the Queens district of New York on March 19 1928, the son of Irish Roman Catholics who three years earlier had emigrated to the United States. The family returned to Ireland when Patrick was an infant, but their attempts to make a living on the land proved fruitless, and in 1938 they decided to move to Britain..........

one of my all time favorite pieces of music

lakme the flower duet

i have so much to say, but

i'm afraid of how far i'll go

what i WILL say is, no innocent deserves to die. radicals of ALL religions (christians included) don't belong on this earth. bullies of ANY nation or ethnic group or religion do not belong on this earth.

i am literally sick.
(however, i DO love what max blumenthal said to the woman who said she saw a picture of a father slashing his daughter's face for a religious holiday)





Pro-Israel Rally Attended by Big-Time NY Dems Descends into Calls for 'Wiping Out' Palestinians
By Max Blumenthal, AlterNet
On January 11, an estimated 10,000 people rallied in front of the Israeli consulate in midtown New York in support of Israel’s attack on the Gaza Strip. The rally, which was organized by UJA-Federation of New York and the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York in cooperation with the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, featured speeches by New York’s most senior lawmakers. While the crowd was riled to righteous anger by speeches about Hamas evildoers, the event was a festive affair that began and ended with singing and joyous dancing.

Sen. Chuck Schumer highlighted Israel’s supposed humanitarian methods of warfare by pointing to its text messaging of certain Gaza Strip residents urging them to vacate their homes before Israeli forces bombed them. “What other country would do that?” Schumer shouted from the podium. Gov. David Paterson appeared on stage wearing one of the red hats distributed to demonstrators as symbols of the red alerts some residents of Israel endure when Palestinian groups fire rockets their way. Paterson cited the many Qasam rockets that have fallen on Israel as a justification for the country’s operations in Gaza, a military assault that has resulted in over 800 casualties and thousands of injuries............

they want biblical law here

instead of our constitution. that would mean stoning people to death for 'crimes' such as adultry, homosexuality, dishonoring your father or mother OR BEING A WITCH (uh oh, someone could be in BIG BIG BIG trouble with THAT ).

they think stem cell research is the devil's work (while i think it saves lives)

the 'they' in this case are a small number of christian taliban members. one of them happens to be a reclusive kazillionaire

THEY are the evil ones. doesn't the bible ALSO say, judge not others lest ye be judged? i believe it do (be do be do)!



Exposed: Prop. 8 part of 'Christian Taliban's' move to make Bible the law
Muriel Kane
The Protect Marriage Coalition, which led the fight to pass an anti-gay marriage initiative in California, is now suing to shield its financial records from public scrutiny.

The lawsuit claims that donors to Protect Marriage and a second group involved in the suit have received threatening phone calls and emails. It asks for existing donation lists to be removed from the California secretary of state's website and also seeks to have both plaintiffs and all similar groups be exempted in the future from ever having to file donation disclosure reports on this or any similar campaigns.

Although public access advocates believe this sweeping demand for donor anonymity has little chance of success, it does point up the secretive and even conspiratorial nature of much right-wing political activity in California.......

............Ahmanson is a Christian Reconstructionist, a devout follower of the late R.J. Rushdoony, who advocated the replacement of the U.S. Constitution with the most extreme precepts of the Old Testament, including the execution -- preferably by stoning -- of homosexuals, adulterers, witches, blasphemers, and disobedient children..............

sweet wishes

a short film by mark ryden and marion peck
Posted by David Pescovitz,

that was posted a few months ago in boing boing. i only now came across it because they have a new article up on mark ryden which linked back to the video above.
strange strange strange and VERY frightening yet VERY compelling

Mark Ryden in Tokyo, preview

hmmmm

are we shocked and/or surprised? goddess no!

i'd be shocked and surprised if someone was actually PUNISHED for this or for ANY effing illegal, immoral or evil thing this administration is responsible for

Study Finds Ideology Fueled Justice Dept. Hirings
By Carrie Johnson
Washington Post Staff Writer

Ideological considerations permeated the hiring process at the Justice Department's civil rights division, where a politically appointed official sought to hire "real Americans" and Republicans for career posts and prominent case assignments, according to a long awaited report released this morning by the department's inspector general.

The extensive study of hiring practices between 2001 and 2007 concluded that a former department official improperly weeded out candidates based on their perceived ties to liberal organizations. Two other senior managers failed to oversee the process, authorities said.

The key official, former Deputy Assistant Attorney General Bradley Schlozman, favored employees who shared his political views and derided others as "libs" and "pinkos," the report said. .....

like i keep saying OVER AND OVER AND OVER

the good ol' white boy network just keeps getting richer and richer

they fiddle while rome burns

Watchdog: Bush ex-officials used leverage in private sector
By Greg Gordon | McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON — Shortly after leaving his job as U.S. energy secretary in early 2005, Spencer Abraham took a $60,000-a-year post as a director of Occidental Petroleum, which soon became the first firm in 20 years to ship oil to the U.S. from Libya.

Former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge accepted director's fees and consulting work from several firms seeking contracts with his old agency.

Tommy Thompson, the former secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, has consulted, lobbied or worked as an employee for 42 companies since leaving office in January 2005.

All told, 17 of 24 former Bush Cabinet members have taken positions with at least 119 companies, including 65 firms that lobby the government and 40 that lobby the agencies they headed, a liberal-leaning watchdog group said in a report Monday.

Melanie Sloan, the executive director of the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, said that the group's six-month investigation "has shown that most of these former Bush administration officials have cannily leveraged their time spent in the public sector'' and "made a mint on the backs of American taxpayers."

"It may be legal, but it is certainly not honorable," she said..........

love ya tina!

this is a REAL video

but both boing boing and i think it's wicked funny. i think it DOES have something to do with the narrator's so very 1970s television cop show serious voice. no?

the beast names

the 50 most LOATHSOME people in america, 2008

it's a MUST read.

i'm not one for suspense. here's NUMBER ONE (like you couldn't have guessed). and my goddess isn't that one of THE best illustrations you have EVER seen?

................1. Sarah Palin

Charges: If you want to know why the rest of the world is scared of Americans, consider the fact that after two terms of disastrous rule by a small-minded ignoramus, 46% of us apparently thought the problem was that he wasn’t quite stupid enough. Palin’s unending emissions of baffling, evasive incoherence should have disqualified her for any position that involved a desk, let alone placing her one erratic heartbeat from the presidency. The press strained mightily to feign respect for her, praising a debate performance that involved no debate, calling her a “great speaker” when her only speech was primarily a litany of insults to city-dwellers, echoing bogus sexism charges when a male Palin would have been boiled alive for the Couric interview alone, and lionizing her as she used her baby as a Pro-life stage prop before crowds who cooed when they should have been hurling polonium-tipped javelins. In the end, Palin had the beneficial effect of splitting her party between her admirers and people who can read.

Exhibit A: Waving her embryo-loving credentials, in the form of her Down syndrome baby, at "But ultimately what the bailout does is help those who are concerned about the healthcare reform that is needed to help shore up our economy."

Sentence: Hand-to-hand combat with Vladimir Putin and a pack of wolves............

Written by Allan Uthman & Ian Murphy
with contributions from John Dolan, Eileen Jones, Alexander Zaitchik, & IOZ.
Illustrations by Ian Murphy.

speaks for itself

i DO want to say the insane-inator has the fucking gall to say he's sorry about some shite. hmmmm sorry about sending 4,000 plus american women and men to their deaths in iraq (for NO reason other than to line the pockets of the good ol' boy network)? nope, not sorry about that.sorry for injuries to tens of thousands of american men and women who were sent into iraq and wounded? nope, not sorry about that. sorry for the innocent iraqis that were killed, wounded and/or displaced? nope, not sorry for that. sorry for escorting our country in serious financial ruin? nope, not sorry about that. sorry for brownie and the lack of care for natural disaster victims (katrina and more)? nope, not sorry about that.

he's fucking sorry about a FUCKING BANNER. not people losing their jobs, people without housing, people without insurance, genocides in foreign lands, lack of education. no, HE'S FUCKING SORRY ABOUT A FUCKING BANNER


White House: Increase in terror attacks since 9/11 a success

Eric Brewer
One of the many sad ironies of the Bush era that is rapidly and mercifully drawing to a close is that after the president created a “central front in the war on terror” by invading Iraq, the amount of “terrorism” in the world skyrocketed. I call it the Bush Bubble:



At first, the administration seemed a little embarrassed by this result, and it engaged in various attempts, which I’ve documented over the years and summarized here, at disguising the increase. Interestingly, the public face for many of those shenanigans was John Brennan, formerly head of the National Counterterrorism Center and currently Obama’s transition intelligence adviser and pick for the newly created position of deputy national security adviser for counterterrorism. ..............

this is good!

cool!

12 moving building facades

(ht to: dark roasted blend)


"Vertical Canal consists of tens of thousands of clear plastic elements that tilt in the wind and reveal patterns of turbulence. These patterns of turbulence, which are normally invisible, are extremely interesting sculpturally. "

if it was a movie it would be funny

but it's NOT a movie and it's NOT funny. everyone i've talked to is thinking they may be laid off. i'm thinking i might be laid off. there have been NO formal announcements at work yet, but times are tight (i work for a financial institution/insurance company and NO NOT AIG or any others that were in trouble. as the biz goes, the company i work for is quite sound but STILL, we ARE in a recession). it's scary out there for ALL of us. businesses closing left and right. and who is to blame? you know who, KING GEORGE AND HIS MERRY BAND OF PRANKSTERS

White House: We Never Said We Weren’t In A Recession»

Thursday, the White House acknowledged for the first time that the U.S. was in a recession. “Obviously, the NBER came out and said that we are in a recession,” Press Secretary Dana Perino said. Even though the National Bureau of Economic Research announced Monday that the U.S. was in a recession that had started in Dec. 2007, the White House was still refusing to use the word as late as Wednesday.

Yesterday, when a reporter remarked that the White House had been denying the recession for months, spokesman Scott Stanzel interrupted her to insist the Bush administration had never done so:

QUESTION: The President finally said, first time at a podium, that we are in a recession. This administration had been saying for months, from the very beginning of 2008, that we weren’t. Who –

STANZEL: No, that’s not correct. That –

joe the

plumber asswipe.

i am trying NOT to post anything more on him or sarevil. it's HARD NOT TO THOUGH. this i couldn't pass up. the man has a brain the size of a pea (and i'm being generous here)


'Joe the Plumber' says journalists should be 'abolished' from war coverage
Nick Cargo
On Sunday, conservative media barnacle and McCain campaign relic Samuel "Joe" Wurzelbacher took time out of his new job as a war correspondent for Pajamas TV to tell the very people who were filming him that they shouldn't be allowed to cover war:

"I'll be honest with you: I don't think journalists should be anywhere allowed war. (sic) I mean, you guys report where our troops are at. You report what's happening day to day. You make a big deal out of it. I think it's asinine. You know, I liked back in World War I and World War II when you'd go to the theater and you'd see your troops on, you know, the screen and everyone would be real excited and happy for 'em.
............

oh come on now

his fuck-up-ed-ness goes WELL beyond the fiscal. it goes straight to the soul. he and his band of merry thugs have NO souls. not only did they sell (out) our country they tore up and spit on the constitution AND all it stood for. we have become the savages and torturers. anything goes. that is NOT what america should be. i hope and pray we can come back once again to what we used to be and CAN be

(oh and i think the following article IS TOO SOFT ON 'EM)

Economy Made Few Gains in Bush Years
Eight-Year Period Is Weakest in Decades
By Neil Irwin and Dan Eggen
Washington Post Staff Writers

President Bush has presided over the weakest eight-year span for the U.S. economy in decades, according to an analysis of key data, and economists across the ideological spectrum increasingly view his two terms as a time of little progress on the nation's thorniest fiscal challenges.

The number of jobs in the nation increased by about 2 percent during Bush's tenure, the most tepid growth over any eight-year span since data collection began seven decades ago. Gross domestic product, a broad measure of economic output, grew at the slowest pace for a period of that length since the Truman administration. And Americans' incomes grew more slowly than in any presidency since the 1960s, other than that of Bush's father.

Bush and his aides are quick to point out that they oversaw 52 straight months of job growth in the middle of this decade, and that the economy expanded at a steady clip from 2003 to 2007. But economists, including some former advisers to Bush, say it increasingly looks as if the nation's economic expansion was driven to a large degree by the interrelated booms in the housing market, consumer spending and financial markets. Those booms, which the Bush administration encouraged with the idea of an "ownership society," have proved unsustainable...........

a plea!

send us your socks!!! from the mythbusters

ok, i personally think is this one of THE best myths (although i don't think it's a myth at all, it's REAL) they could test!

Did your grandma or Aunt Betty give you some horrible socks for the holidays that you'd like to get rid of? Well, the search to re-gift is OVER! Send them to us!

We're currently working on busting a myth about socks in a washing machine and we NEED some socks for the experiment!

here's the video plea for SOCKS

found via geekdad blog on wired

jill scott

(h/t to feministing)

saw this on

boing boing and wanted to post it. it IS the stuff of nightmares. suspension bridge in japan

at least he's not OUR prince harry

one would think he would have learned after the nazi uniform fiasco. but i guess not. like i said, the good news is he's NOT ours. the bad news is, he DOES belong to another country that's our bud. seems like he's his father's son after all



'Our little Paki friend': Harry in race row after his 'offensive' remarks are caught on camera
By Daniel Boffey

Prince Harry has apologised after he was caught on video using the word 'Paki' to describe another Army officer.

In a statement from St James's Palace he said that he had used the term without malice.

However, Tory leader David Cameron has said the Prince's comments were 'completely unacceptable' and added that it was right for him to apologise. .........

..............

This is not the first time that 24-year-old Prince Harry has found himself mired in controversy.

Just four years ago the young Prince was forced to make a humiliating apology after pictures emerged of him dressed as a Nazi officer at a
fancy -dress party.

Harry, then 20, was on his gap year before joining Sandhurst to train as a British Army officer when he appeared before 250 fellow guests wearing a shirt and trousers resembling the desert uniform of Rommel's Afrika Korps.

On his shirt collar was a badge of the German Wehrmacht. His left sleeve bore a red armband emblazoned with a swastika.

Publicity surrounding his behaviour was said to have encouraged racist attacks on the Jewish community...................

but we DON'T torture

bbc video at the link below

Former guard on Guantanamo 'torture'

A former guard at the US detention centre at Guantanamo Bay has spoken in his first television interview about the brutality he witnessed to inmates.

Chris Arendt told the BBC what he saw amounted to ''torture'' and that some of his fellow guards were so violent as to be ''psychotic.''............

Ex-gitmo guard who saw 'torture' calls co-workers 'psychotic'
Jeremy Gantz
As the Guantanamo Bay detention center reached its seventh birthday this week, a U.S. veteran said he witnessed cell beatings, forced head shavings and interrogation tactics--including sleep deprivation, floor shackles and loud music--while guarding detainees there.

"It's torture," Chris Arendt, who worked at Guantanamo when he was 19, told the BBC in this video. "It's a means of extracting information that I didn't even believe these people probably had. It's a means of making their lives more miserable."

Arendt, who joined the U.S. military when he was 17, testified at the Winter Soldier Hearings in Washington D.C. last March.

Wearing an Iraq Veterans Against the War sweatshirt, Arendt told the BBC that many people he worked with at the camp thought of their Guantanamo posting as "vacation."

"...This was the opportunity that they'd always wanted, to be violent and awful people...because they are genuinely pyschotic. And for others, it's just a job," Arendt said............

for those of you that continue to insist

king george and his band of merry thugs is fighting the great fight on the 'war on terror' (which is THE lousiest name they could have picked mind you. it's incites our 'enemies' is the ONLY thing it does), here's how they're fighting it (by selling weapons to iran and goddess only knows where else)

Iran Using Fronts to Get Bomb Parts From U.S.
By Joby Warrick
Washington Post Staff Writer
The Iranian businessman was looking for high-quality American electronics, but he had to act stealthily: The special parts he coveted were denied to Iranians, especially those seeking to make roadside bombs to kill U.S. troops in Iraq.

With a few e-mails, the problem was solved. A friendly Malaysian importer would buy the parts from a company in Linden, N.J., and forward them to Iran. All that was left was coming up with a fake name for the invoice. Perhaps a Malaysian engineering school? "Of course, you can use any other company as end-user that you think is better than this," the Iranian businessman, Ahmad Rahzad, wrote in an e-mail dated March 8, 2007.

The ruse succeeded in delivering nine sensors called inclinometers to Iran, the first of several such shipments that year and the latest example of what U.S. officials and weapons experts describe as Iran's skillful flouting of export laws intended to stop lethal technology from reaching the Islamic republic. ...........