Conan: The Musical

Bring the hate, I can take it.

Wherein Headlines Tell a Story

Goodell speaks to NFL rookies about taking responsibility, honoring the game.

Lions president Tom Lewand apologizes after arrest for suspected drunken driving in Michigan.

Lions are cats, and cats are pets.

What? You didn't know that nature is populated only by various subspecies of the bunny genre?

That was close...

So Friday night in St. Cloud, brother Dave and I spent 3 hours listening to 80s radio, reminiscing about the good songs, mocking the bad ones, naming them and their artists all. Men, whether at work or without hats, went down without a fight. Sheena E, Janet Jackson, they were no match. The Beastie Boys could not frighten us, nor could Thomas Dolby blind us with science. Then a new challenger arose...

It was a song from Beverly Hills Cop, and the heat was on. We rifled frantically through our mental files, we visualized our album covers, all to no avail. Desperation set in, then despondence. Finally with 10 seconds left, Dave nailed it. Glen Frey, you insufferable punk, you three-hit wonder, we got you. WE GOT YOU!

Down down to Goblin Town

Ho, ho, my lad:

Sales of new U.S. single-family homes tumbled more than expected to a record low in May as the boost from a popular tax credit faded, according to a government report on Wednesday that added to worries of a slowing economic recovery.

Who could have ever expected that as soon as you stop paying people to buy houses, the number of houses purchased would fall to the lowest level since economists started measuring home sales in 1963*?  Of course, even the Keynesian clowns who promote such foolish ideas knew the number would drop - what "more than expected" means is that they misunderstood the true impact of their own acts.  They also misunderstood the housing numbers of the past two months, which - in making the small rises they did - confirmed their nigh-unshakable belief in a housing recovery.

In truth, those $8000 government checks simply caused a certain number of people to buy in March or April instead of May.  It did not create demand** so much as it pulled existing demand forward.  This is a thoroughly silly measurement anyway, which makes it perfect for Keynesian econometrics***. Not only do they measure the wrong things, they measure them incorrectly, fail to understand what they measure, and pursue policies that are self-destructive based on them. It's a good thing they are also incompetent at implementation, or we might be in real trouble.

* Certainly not I. But that's just the point, NO ONE knows what will happen as a result of Keynesian tinkering, as illustrated by the fact that nearly everything that's happened over the past 3 years has been "unexpected" by them. To me, that's an argument to not do it; to them, "Then let's try pushing this button" sounds like a pretty decent plan.

**How many houses can the average family live in, anyway?

*** Why is a high number of houses purchased "a good thing" and a low number not? Would America somehow be better or richer if every one of us bought and moved into a new house every year? Every month?

You keep using that word...

"Yes, my device may be a medieval, but it's for a medieval deed that has been around for decades"
-- Dr. Sonnet Ehlers, on her latex vagina dentata.

The only thing that would make that sentence more effective would be to throw in a 'literally' or two.

This isn't the tornado I just saw

But that's what it felt like.

So anyway, with 20 miles left in a 500-mile drive, off to the left of I35 this really pretty funnel dropped out of the cloud, only to be joined by a matching swirl rising up from the ground.  Then the rain hit, then the hail.  Thunder and lightning, too.  Oh, and did I mention I was driving in road construction as well?

Oh, to have $4

Pickin' on the Prez

One dear young lady wonders why I dislike Obama so. I don't, I have nothing against Obama except that I think his jumping on BP to show leadership without providing leadership is crass and unbecoming, and frankly, I'm embarrassed that my president is acting this way.

One CNBC story on an upcoming Obama/BP meeting nailed it: "Facing intense criticism that he has not shown enough personal leadership in the spill, Obama will seek to use his meeting with BP executives Wednesday and his Oval office speech to show that he is on top of the crisis."

He's not going to use the meeting to lead, but to try to convince the public that he has been leading the whole time - that was the theme behind his Today interview as well. The "intense criticism" hurts him because it is correct, and showboating in front of the cameras, swearing on TV, and crucifying BP will not change that. I realize that his political advisors are telling him that he needs to be seen providing leadership; I would counter that actual leadership seldom goes unseen.

If he wants to lead, then he should use what assets he has (and they are significant) to do something to stop the oil before it washes up on shore rather than repeatedly having his picture taken on a dirty beach.  Then he ought to be offering engineering assistance to BP rather than threatening them in the press every day. Third, if he ever wants BP to "pay dearly" then he needs to make damn sure that whatever happens, BP stays in business and has lots of profits that can be applied to the cleanup*.

In Obama's short-term obsession with polls and elections, he is all but ignoring the job he was hired to do.  And it annoys me so much because I've been in an office where that happened**, and it all fell apart like Obama's term is falling apart.  It's not only bad strategy and an incredible waste of potential, it is a disservice to the voters who hired you to manage the office. Do the job right and the polls will manage themselves.

* In short: be a tick, stop being a vampire.
** Obama is by no means alone here, it happens A LOT.

Geek it is.

And a hopeless one at that. It didn't take more than a week and I'm already on the project team of another mod. Won't need your voice for this one though, Jozum, or mine: as far as I can tell there will not be a guy in sight.

Maybe when it's all done I'll write about it... It may prove an interesting transition away from what the "brand" is right now. Maybe it'll fly, or maybe we'll lose our girliesex-seeking audience. I don't know enough yet to even speculate...

America Held Hostage: Day 53

Obama decides someone needs to bring down the corporations:

The Obama administration’s latest anti-BP volley is a call on the oil giant to pay up big time — not just for economic damages from the Gulf spill but also for lost wages of workers idled by the president’s drilling moratorium...

That is awesome.  Seriously. At least I'm in awe of its gargantuan idiocy.

"Mr. President, BP just spilled a bunch of oil in the gulf."

Obama: "That's bad, right? OK, no one else gets to drill there for... what's a good-sounding number? One? two? How about six? No one else gets to drill there for six months."

"Great, Mr. President, we've wanted that for a long time anyway. Next we have to think of something to do for all the people you just disemployed. Or they'll vote and complain and stuff."

Obama: "And we have no money, right? OK, let's make BP pay them for all the work I'm not going to let them do. That way in 5 months, their starving asses won't be turning up at a tea party or voting Republican. And find me another bad word to say on television. I'm tired of this Van Der Sloot punk getting all my press."

What's certainly going to happen is that the great Obama whipping boy is going to end up in bankruptcy, where a shell corporation with no assets of its own will nobly defend against the countless lawsuits that will arise from this. Juries will award $80 squillion in damages that will never be paid, and the government will clean up the mess using your tax dollars anyway, and the President will move on to the next crisis problem people blame him for not solving.

But hey, at least Obama is going to kick someone's ass in the meantime. That will be something to watch.

America Held Hostage*: Day 50

OK, so it's day 50 of that little leak in the Gulf, and now Obama is really, really, REALLY mad:

Responding to critics who say his response to the spill should be more engaged and forceful, Obama said: "I was down there a month ago, before most of these talking heads were even paying attention to the Gulf."

"And I don't sit around just talking to experts because this is a college seminar; we talk to these folks because they potentially have the best answers, so I know whose ass to kick**," he added.

This is truly an historic administration. The first president to say "ass" on TV***. After nearly two months of criticism of how aloof Obama has been, we're supposed to now believe that he's really so angry that he's willing to verbally go where no president has gone before? How cynically and transparently condescending. Even for him.

Meanwhile and far away, two headlines are ignored:

• Afghan War Now Country's Longest
• NATO suffers deadliest day this year in Afghanistan

Unlike the oil spill, His Asskickingness can actually do something about those - in fact, that's his job. I'm not surprised he's more interested in making history elsewhere.

* Actually, that's not fair to Carter, as Obama has managed to combine the inexperience and ineptitude of Carter with the arrogance and insularity of Bush.  It's really a master work, if you think about it.

** Can you see Obama actually trying to kick anyone's ass?  Seriously, he's like the son of Widow Hen from the old Foghorn Leghorn cartoons. I'd be scared if he threatened to re-wire the whole house to turn on the showers when you open the fridge. But fixin' to bring out the pimp hand? I think not.

*** Not the first president to BE one obviously, but the first to say it.

Why not be honest?

She's the grand liberal of the White House press corps*:

The grande dame of the Washington press corps put her foot in her mouth with an answer at the White House last week, suggesting Jews should "get the hell out of Palestine" and "go back home to Poland, Germany, America and everywhere else."

Am I the only person who thinks "suggesting" might not be the most accurate word for what she said?

But I'm not going to rip on Helen Thomas**, I was just struck by the thought of how often you can predict how a modern leftist comes down politically vis-a-vis Israel.

Personally, I don't care about Israel. Yes, I'm a Christian, and yes, I understand Bible prophecies in regards to Abraham. But the way I read the book, if THIS Israel is the gathering of God's chosen spoken of, then the US has no need to protect them; that's God's job and he says he will do it. If this Israel is not, then they are to me no different than Bulgaria or Congo or any other "other" country.

But I do note that unbridled hostility toward Israel and coddling of the Palestinians is often indicative of a serious if irrational leftern bent. Palestinians, radical Islamists that they generally are, are in no way "liberal" in the modern sense. It's not like they are Swedes or Dutch who just happen to live along the Mediterranean. To me, that means that liberalism does not prefer Palestine because they're liberal but primarily because liberals hate Israel. The enemy of my enemy and all that.

To me and my theology, I guess that is (weak) evidence that Israel really is the modern re-gathering of Jacob's children. But that doesn't change the fact that I prefer to leave God's work to him, and the American government's interests in North America.
* e.
** I try not to speak ill of the living dead.

Inverness update

This may be* the last Inverness update I'll provide, but I would be remiss if I did not say that I am thrilled with its reception thus far.

Since Thursday it has been downloaded 200 times and is already in the top 20% of all projects on the Bioware site (#333 of 1841 as measured by user-voted "popularity"). If it gets in the top 100, I'll probably pee myself.

Over at Dragon Age Nexus, in addition to 500 downloads and a couple of really good ideas for expansions, it's on course to be a file of the month, maybe THE file of the month.

But the funniest thing about publishing a mod is the offers you get to join or combine with other mods and groups. I did have one offer from a mod that produces girl-on-girl "action" scenes**, but the funniest ones so far have been the "Hey, would you like to join our modding group? It's only me so far..."

Rogue says that its success proves that I ought to get a job doing this full time. I'm a little reticent, if only because that would mean that it would be WORK.  My "Achievement Unlocked: Slacker" was hard-earned. I would hate to endanger it by producing these things for others on a schedule and a budget***.

* you hope, I'm sure.
** Not exactly my forte'.
*** Besides, if it was really that big a success, we wouldn't be talking about getting a job.

Why liberals are terrible engineers

Spike Lee says this situation absolutely requires a really futile and stupid gesture be done on somebody's part. And Obama's just the guy to do it:

"One time, go off!" director Spike Lee urged on CNN's "AC 360°." "If there's any one time to go off, this is it, because this is a disaster."

Lee's sentiment echoes the frustration of people who want to see Obama get loud, take charge and inspire them like he did during his presidential run.

There is a world of difference between a presidential campaign - which is run on money, caffiene, and emotion - and an engineering problem. There are enough engineer types here that I shan't condescend to explain the difference, which is so substantial that only journalists and liberals fail to see it. But I do think it's enlightening or at least worth mocking that "people" are "frustrated" that Obama hasn't yet doled out such a big slug of Hopenchange that BPs engineers couldn't help but plug that well. All problems are solvable, so long as somebody is standing behind you screaming, right?

But since it's solvable by Obama, and yet it's not solved, then it follows that the problem is not solved because Obama does not want it solved.  Proof positive that Barack Obama doesn't care about black people.

This is so wrong...

Don't get me wrong, I love chick metal bands, but the very thought of Eddie* with a little pink bow in his hair makes me feel all wiggly inside. And not in a good way.

*Not to be confused with Sarah Jessica Parker. Though it's not unheard of.

Physician, heal thyself