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$50,000 in medical expenses, and the city is saying, “Yes, it’s the officer’s fault. But you can’t sue. Nyah nyah.” Ridiculous. He ran a stop sign without his sirens or lights on. It was not even a real emergency call — he was being called to assist in a vehicle search.Daniel Powell, the only right thing to do is to resign. You’re a piece of shit for acting above the law, hurting a couple, and then hiding behind the law after the fact. HYPOCRITE!
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All this whining about female circumcision (which is very valid whining), but none about male circumcision. It is not natural to cut parts of your body off [and don’t say umbilical cord!]. Especially when the only reason is religious.
And no, it’s not about sanitation either. That would be like cutting the tips of your toes off to make it easier to clean between them.
Did you know you lose nerve endings when you’re circumcised, so sex doesn’t feel as good? Whether you know it or not, your enjoyment has been reduced by ritualistic genital mutilation. It’s wrong for women, and it’s just as wrong for men.Nice to see someone standing up for this. I’d like to see the practice outlawed. No matter how you try to frame it, any circumcision is non-consensual genital mutilation.
November 2009
Monthly Archive
November 30, 2009
November 29, 2009
November 29, 2009
JOURNAL: CONCERT: They Might Be Giants @ 9:30 Club (20091128)
Posted by Claire CJS under Audio, Carolyn, Clio, Concerts, Journal, Media, Music, People, Reviews1 Comment
We went Saturday. It was good, but not as good as last year’s show.
My description of the concert is posted HERE.
Some pictures are posted HERE.
To see every concert I’ve ever been to, go to my List Of All Concerts page.
Also, check out my songkick profile, which is a site devoted to cataloging what concerts one has gone to. (more…)
November 29, 2009
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I have personally been charged with not having my registration while holding it in my hand with the officer looking at it, because I didn’t get it out fast enough. Had to make a trip to the courthouse to annul the charges.
So it’s no surprise that other piggies can act like thugs when people don’t get their license out fast enough.
This officer handcuffed a 79yo woman, kicked her to the ground, dragged her across gravel, kneed her in the chest, threw her in his police car. She was so injured she had to be carried to the police station, processed, then sent to the hospital to be treated for injuries to her hed, neck, chest, back, and arms.
Can we say police state? Of course false charges of resisting arrest were given, and of course those charges were dropped.
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The [now dead] dog’s owners are vehemently denying that they praised the pig who shot their dog. Wrong address? Oops! We get to shoot your dog! My aren’t we brave??? Pigs.
Let’s hope for a lawsuit. -
If only my PC was in the same room as my PS2/Rock Band setup and my guitars. This could be quite fun. Drums through my stereo could actually keep up with the volume of my guitar amps.
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I’m sure this guy deserved a painful cancer death. Funny that he didn’t use faith healing for himself. Hypocrite!
How many other people died because they put faith in his voodoo faith healing, rather than using this thing called SCIENCE that we use to treat our afflictions?
If I was god, he would serve some time in hell. 30 days for every day of life he tricked someone into losing with his bullshit faith healing.
“Where’s your God now?” Haha.
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The next mod will be a firmware that passes Microsoft’s security check. In the arms race of people vs corporations, the people typically win. Prohibitions are hard to pull off, even with hardware.
Pirates don’t have to stick discs in. Those who pay, do. Isn’t it lovely paying money to do more work to pay your games? Even if you don’t consider money, pirates almost always get a better deal than people who actually own stuff.
November 28, 2009
RANTS: MOVIES: Why it’s stupid to hate movies for having time travel paradoxes
Posted by Claire CJS under Clio, Media, Movies, People, Rants[2] Comments
Well, first and foremost the obvious reason is: It’s a movie. If you want to get pedantic on paradoxes, then you may as well kiss almost every time travel movie ever goodbye.
But here’s my real explanation:
I don’t even consider such situations paradoxes. Time is a river. Sometimes that river is diverted (time travel/alternate realities). If you add a specific amount of energy to the water (say with an electric pump, which would be analogous to the actions a time traveler uses to affect the past), you can divert a river so that it flows upstream and runs back into itself, affecting itself earlier in the stream and changing the ultimate outcome.
Eventually this will create a backlog of water, as the river is now carrying its normal load, plus what you pumped upstream. This backlog will overpower the energy required to divert it back, and it will no longer be able to all be diverted back. This is analogous to the self-correcting aspect of time. Another analogy: Eventually the diversion mechanisms (the electric pump, if you will) will erode away due to affects of time and mechanical failure, leaving no trace that it ever happened in the first place. But the flow of the river (time) was changed nonetheless — even though the original cause is no longer visible.
Eventually we will have a river that looks the same as it did before it was ever affected by the water pump (time travel). Time (and the river) has corrected itself, and events that “cannot” happen have happened in such a way so as to affect things, but as to leave no direct evidence. Corrective alternate realities only exist until the corrections are made in the past. But the system was affected, and is not the same as it would have been without the original diversion.
[A CGI animation custom-made for me would really help explain this!]
One example is the movie Timecrimes .. After everything happened in this movie, the paradoxical timeline actually no longer exists. How did he go back if he was never there in the first place? Because he did. And then he didn’t, because the timeline was fixed. But anyone sitting outside the timeline — say, in the 5th dimension — would have been able to watch these events occur. But only while they were happening. Timecrimes is not paradoxical at all; people who look at it that way are thinking [at least] one dimension lower than they should be.
My brain hurts. (more…)
November 28, 2009
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Shannyn Sossamon & Pink as people named Victoria & Carolyn?? (Vicky is Carolyn's sister's name.)
And they get lost in the Parisian catacombs? And absinthe is involved?
This sounds awful but we can't resist and will probably end up enjoying it. -
This is the most compelling case for life on Mars that I have ever heard.
The funny thing is, this is simply using new technology to analyze a previously-analyzed meteorite in such a way as to discredit past skeptic hypothesis.
Bill Clinton, then the US President, said of the research in 1997: “It speaks of the possibility of life. If this discovery is confirmed, it will surely be one of the most stunning insights into our Universe that science has ever uncovered. Its implications are as far-reaching and awe-inspiring as can be imagined.”
And now that research has reached fruition. And 2 other meteorites from Mars seem to have identical findings.
Funny that we send rovers to find life, yet there is apparently some evidence right here on earth! It's pretty amazing that an asteroid hit Mars so hard that Mars rocks fell on earth. The solar system is a dirty place.
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Of course, douchebag Vermont attorney general J.J. Tyzbir says: ". “We believe Mr. Fairbrother was actually trying to evade the officers and was resisting them and was noncompliant. But whenever you go to trial, you risk not getting a favorable outcome. This was, frankly, a business decision.”"
Let's see — they found him flailing under a truck, NOT driving, with his medication laying nearby on the ground. Gee, what does that seem to imply? A reason to taser someone?
Trooper Hugh O'Donnell is a scumbag who should be in jail for assault. Preferably a rapey jail.
This is another example where tasers don't save lives. There's no fucking way they would have shot the guy, pre-taser. So the idea that the establishment set forth that tasers will save lives, and wont be used as torture/compliance devices, has been proven bullshit, over and over and over again.
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Gee, maybe if religion was really about good, this money would go to poor people who have nowhere else to turn to. Instead, it's basically going to the moral equivalent of a KKK rally. Anyone who contributes money to the Catholic church is contributing money towards hate and cover up child abuse. The good does NOT outweigh the evil. People don't need a fucking sky fairy to do good.
If they are using money for political purposes, they should lose their tax-exempt status. Fucking cult based on 2000-year-old unsubstantiated scribbles. Losers!
Someone needs to make a picture of Jesus sucking God's dick. Or Bishop Richard J. Malone. I wonder if he'll be caught blowing some guy in a bathroom someday.
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I tend to think it's really "centuries" or "millenia", but decades is still pretty bad. If anyone things the good spread by Catholicism outweighs all the bad done them — Here's one of my MANY points about how religion makes the world worse.
Only a virus of illogical thinking could perpetuate undetected crimes at this level for so long.
Hell, they paid for insurance to cover up the lawsuits — back in 1987, before they ever reported a *single* incident to police, which did not happen in 1995. And it still took another 14 yrs for them to release their files! They sued to try to not release their evidence! Sued to hide raping children!
Even the devout Catholic police who had child molesting reported to them would not submit reports to the police, but to the church. Total abuse of authority and negligence as an officer of the law.
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This comic pretty aptly describes how I feel about self-censorship in the name of "oh no some future employer might see this and then I will be harder to hire wah wah".
November 28, 2009
VIDEO: MOVIES: REVIEW: College (2008)
Posted by Claire CJS under Carolyn, Clio, Media, Movies, People, Reviews, Video[2] Comments
[IMDB link] [Netflix link] With a title like College (tho that has been used in movies before, but not since the 1970s) it’s kind of hard to avoid watching this. We love college party movies.
PEOPLE: Directed by Deb Hagan (her first full film), written by a couple unknown actors (one played a clerk in what may be my favorite action movie ever: Crank). Starring a bunch of nobodies…
QUIRKS: Your standard college party movie — except that the main characters were highschoolers visiting a college. This one possibly gains the distinction of having the most on screen minutes AT a party out of many of these, as well as having the least well-known names attached to it.
And possibly the coolest fictional-party-that-would-never-happen-in-real-life that we’ve ever seen in any movie!
VISUALS: Well, there ARE some attractive ladies in this movie. But it doesn’t center on that as much. You wont see naked chicks walking around inexplicably like in Sex Drive.
MORALS: It’s better to be yourself, than someone else. Oh, and frat boys are douchebags.
BAD STUFF: A lot of people said this was full of gross-out humor and a really poor movie, and that the fat kid would never, ever get laid with a girl like that. Who cares? It’s a frickin’ fiction movie. The gross-out humor wasn’t constant like some of the naysayers said. Yet they did manage to make BOTH of us gag at points. (Making Carolyn gag == easy. Making Clint gag == hard.) This was actually a good thing in my book; you’re supposed to gross your viewers out at least once in any college comedy.
CONCLUSION: After having such incredibly low expectations based on everyone’s comments, I was very very pleasantly surprised. I probably liked this more than Carolyn. Gave it 3/5 stars on netflix, and 6 on IMDB (would have given a 6.5, tempted to give it a 7). I consider this a bit better than our average “generic pass”. Not as good as Sex Drive; more comparable to Van Wilder 2 (which shared some similarities). This movie could be best described as Superbad meets Van Wilder 2/Revenge Of The Nerds.
RECOMMENDATION: If you like college comedies somewhat unconditionally, don’t believe the anti-hype. This is as good as any of those kinds of movies. One might argue they’re all the same movie anyway; you either like it or you don’t. I did.
SIMILAR MOVIES: Superbad. Revenge Of The Nerds. National Lampoon’s Van Wilder 2: The Rise Of Taj. All somewhat similar to this. Superbad because of the highschool “bros” trying to get the girls (Morris is as clueless as McLovin). Revenge Of The Nerds becuase of the douchey fraternity trying to oppress everyone else. And Van Wilder 2 for similar reasons: A snobby frat that sucks oppressing a few people who might not belong there as much. (more…)
November 27, 2009
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And why was he so mad? Because he felt the 3yo kid was endangered. But hey, he had character witnesses, and served in the military, so let’s have him just serve 120 days for shooting someone in the fucking had.
Charles Diaz would be a murderer if that cyclist wasn’t wearing a helmet. So he’s basically a failed murderer. Real smoothe, asshole.
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Damn! RSS mininova seraches were the best way to automatically find out when new albums by artists one likes came out. (And often there before official release.)So the MAFIAA has managed to effectively kill the soul of the largest torrent indexing site in the world. The battle is won, after 5 yrs, but the war is unwinnable. Prohibition doesn’t work.
- Just go to Monova instead. After all, Mininova was just what happened after Suprnova was taken down. Now it’s Monova.
- Prohibition doesn’t work. And the internet has more hiding places than real life [which can’t be encrypted]
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But this never happened when people made Bush a monkey. Google is hiding behind the race card to play the hypocritical censorship card.
Don’t you dare say anything about our savior Obama! And you can only make white people into monkeys, NOT black people! Whether making monkeys out of people is acceptable or not depends on their race. Liberals don’t seem to understand that affirmative action, too, is racist. Anytime 2 races are treated differently because of their race, it’s racism. Whether you do it to discriminate like a prejudiced asshole, or whether you do it to help like a bleeding heart liberal, it’s wrong both ways. Race should be completely ignored (more or less: Celebrate our differences), not perpetuated with bullshit decisions like this.
November 26, 2009
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So when Obama said change, he meant change for the worse, huh?
It's bad enough that he's invoked state secrets at a greater level than bush, and punched a hole in the Freedom Of Information Act, but now he's asking judges to take away our privacy?
This must be those activist judges :)
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So now we have bad-cop asshole-felons working for the police? amazing. Last I checked, a sane policy was that people with records could not work for the police in any capacity. This guy shot an unarmed teenager in the back.
Oh wait — this is Maricopa County, with dickhead sheriff Joe Arpaio. Now things are beginning to make sense.
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A long read. I admit, I haven't read this myself. But this seems like a great weapon to hurl at theists who think they know how the universe operates based on their own observations.
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Wikileaks is publishing over half a million intercepts of pager messages sent in the US on 911 (9/11/2001).
Apparently these were obtained from some sort of organized collection effort. Perhaps a leaked NSA database? Who knows. But it's neat that these exist.
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Wowie.
November 26, 2009
VIDEO: MOVIES: REVIEW: Terminator 4 aka Terminator: Salvation (2009)
Posted by Claire CJS under Carolyn, Clio, Media, Movies, People, Reviews, VideoLeave a Comment
[IMDB link] [Netflix link] [Ian’s DCIst review]
UNCOMFORTABLE PLOT SUMMARY (inspired by this): [highlight for spoilers]→ Murderer sacrifices self to help save humanity. (Okay, not a very good one, sorry.)
PEOPLE: Directed by McG (Charlie’s Angels). With Christian Bale (Batman from The Dark Knight/Batman Begins, American Psycho), Sam Worthington (Avatar), Moon Bloodgood (why have I heard of her?), Anton Yelchin (Checkov from the 2009 Star Trek) as a younger Kyle Reese, Bryce Dallas Howard (Gwen Stacy from Spider-Man 3, Lady In The Water, The Village), Michael Ironside, and a small role by Helena Bonham Carter (Harry Potter, Sweeney Todd, Corpse Bride).
QUIRKS: The first Terminator movie to completely take place in the post-apocalyptic wasteland hinted at by previous Terminator movies.
VISUALS: Great futuristic robot battles. Reminds me of The Matrix meets Transformers meets Mad Max.
MORALS: It is our hearts that make us human. Kind of a corny moral.
BAD STUFF: Every Terminator movie has been pretty action-focused, but this one has even more action and less story than the previous three.
CONCLUSION: Although this is perhaps the worst of the 4 Terminator movies… It’s about friggin’ time that one take place completely in the future. Cool robot battles; lots of action. This was still a really good action flick — and I’m hoping for a Terminator 5 in the future. The story’s not over until Skynet’s destroyed.
RATINGS:
Clint: Netflix: 4/5 stars. IMDB: 8/10.
Carolyn: Netflix: 4/5 stars. IMDB: 8/10.
The native public rating for this movie is Netflix: 3.7/5 stars (4.0/5 stars for people who rate like me), IMDB: 6.9/10.
RECOMMENDATION: All 4 Terminator movies are worth watching. This one is no exception.
MOVIE QUOTE: John Connor: I knew it. I knew it was coming. But this is not the future my mother warned me about. And in this future, I don’t know if we can win this war. This is John Connor.
FRIENDS’ RATINGS: Ian didn’t like it (see review link at top). I agree with some of his criticisms, but not with the opinion that they made the movie bad. (more…)
November 25, 2009
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Wowie.
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ABUSE OF AUTHORITY: Conviction for battery of police officer stands even if officer acted unlawfullyYup. Police can run roughshod and disobey the law. If you resist, this court has ruled you are still guilty even if the officer is acting illegally.
I guess if an officer came to illegally beat you to death, and you fought back — you'd be guilty.
Sounds like a lose-lose situation if a cop decides to act illegally on you.
go justice! (sarcasm)
Officer Gary Post: Fuck you. You've taken away freedom in the name of your own power-hungry illegal actions. I wish cancer on you. Now.
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Yes. We love war more than the vast majority of countries on our nation. We have killed more civilians than any other army since WW2, and we're the only one who's ever used nukes — despite all the whining about Al Queda suitcase nukes and Iran having nuclear capability.
The real warmongers are US. And most landmine victims are children.
This must be some of that Nobel Peace Prize-award-earning CHANNNNNGGGGEEE that the Obamans preach about. They definitely were very vocal when the Bush Administration didn't sign on to various treaties — but will they speak up now?
Oh, and the countries that are sharing our stance? China, India, Pakistan, Myanmar, and Russia. Not exactly a huge list of peaceful, sane countries I'd like to live in.
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Like. Inevitable. Dinosaurs must die.
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Funny thing is — as soon as a trial date was set, DC caved and simply settled, because they knew they'd lose in court. A rare victory for the people (and their lawyers).
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Atlanta police raided a gay bar. Nobody was arrested, but EVERY SINGLE PATRON — 62 in total — had to basically lay face down in beer while being illegally detained and having anti-gay slurs hurled at them.
As usual, fuck the south.
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Wow. Utterly ridiculous. A felony? So they want him to lose his voting privileges for not doing the police's job for them?
First off, this crowd was a bunch of children.
Second off, it's not anyone's job to do the police's crowd control. Our taxes pay for that.
Thirdly, I just see a bunch of idiotic kids. Hello, first amendment? We're allowed to peacefully assemble. Sure, some people were hospitalized with minor injuries, and things got crazy — but last I checked collective punishment isn't only immoral – it's against the Geneva Convention. (And since we are in a permanent state of war, the convention applies to all of us.) Arguably this is the weakest of my 5 points.
Fourthly, he DID tweet to not come at SOME point.
Fifthly, this is a freedom of speech issue as well. We cannot be forced to be mouthpieces for the govenrment or the police. Wow. Major civil rights violation on multiple fronts. Let's hope the police lose a bunch of lawsuit money.
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A movie by Vernon Chapman, one of the creators of PFFR (Wonder Showzen, Xavier:Renegade Angel, Delocated) who is also a South Park producer and the voice of Towelie.
What did he do? He used custom porn producers who produce any fantasy you send them for a fee. He gave ridiculous "fantasies", and presents the 4 movies they made for him back to the audience for a laugh.
"The first begins with three black actors talking around a table moments before the Atom Bomb is about to drop. One of the ladies goes into the shower and pours a jar of ‘neglected children’s tears’ over herself in an erotic manner. Read into this what you will… She goes on to give birth to a piece of raw meat that she breastfeeds."
Yes. I'd love to get a hold of this!! SOMEONE PLEASE TELL ME WHERE I CAN GET THIS!
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Anything to help produce more energy is a good thing. We might really need this in 15 yrs. Jets need fuel, last I checked.
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Children + Fear = dumbing down of society.
How about some facts?1) Only 45 children are kidnapped and murdered every year.
2) Children as young as 10 are now placed on sex offender lists, where they are later assumed to be pedophiles and rapists.
3) Sex offender recidivism is between 2% and 10% over 15 years.
4) 87%-96% of sex crimes are committed by someone NOT on a sex offender registry. Can we say false sense of security?
5) The vast majority of sex offenders have only 1 victim.
6) Even some of the original lobbyists of these offender lists have now admitted they go to far.
7) Religion causes people to lose rationality. Christians getting together and deciding what is unforgiveable? Not Christ-like at all.A man used the Maine registry to execute 2 registrants – one was a 19yo who had consensual sex with a 16yo. Gee, "maybe" I did that with Carolyn for 2 months before she turned 17.
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If a religion wants our tax dollars, then they should not be tax exempt. But to have my taxes pay for fucking prayers? Ridiculous. What are we, a voodoo state?
As far as I am concerned, my opinion is that Prue Lewis is a fucking fraud trying to embezzle our tax dollars. Pay to pray?!?!
Guess who supports this? John Kerry. Another reason I'm glad I didn't vote for him. We also recently had a couple charged for not giving their child proper chemotherapy. So we're supposed to fund religious negligence that endangers people [and children] with our tax dollars? HELL NO.
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The right to privacy doesn't exist in the UK anymore, nor does the right to remain silent. Having been officially judged as no threat to national security, this schizophrenic is still sentenced to a year for not handing over his encryption keys to the police.
Your thoughts are private. But if you dare put them into a computer, the government wants them on record. This is wrong. And using terrorism as an excuse to remove freedom is LETTING THE TERRORISTS WIN. They can't kill us all. All they can do is take away our rights. Bin Laden was very successful with this, and in general Al Queda's real damage is not the lives lost, but the freedom lost.
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Typical government idiocy. Spend $2.3B of our tax dollars and don't even create a backup network.
Networks need backups.
I remember when Virginia Tech got its entire external internet through ONE Spring link. I told the Network Operations Center multiple times over the years that this was a bad idea, and it gave me outages. Finally the whole internet at Virginia Tech was down for a long time (24 hours?), and they made a deal for a 2nd peer. DUHHHH.
If a university isn't smart enough, our government isn't either. But with that much money going around, they should be paying experts to do the right thing. That's not what happened here.
November 23, 2009
COMEDY: PICTURES: Sniper crowbar, don’t have sex with horses
Posted by Claire CJS under Comedy, Media, Pictures[2] Comments
November 23, 2009
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Counterpoints are always interesting. We should not ignore China’s cultural legacy concerning soy.
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A funny clip by a BBC show showing how peculiar it would be if we did things in real life like we do on Facebook.
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In the spirit of “Shining” and “Scary Mary” :)
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In general, signs point to no. People convince themselves certain formats are better — but in blind tests, they can’t even pick their own format. As usual, my conclusion is that versatility is the most important thing.
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Yet another amazing example — and yet there are still people who agree with the officer on this!
He has since been suspended. Not for the incident, but because he didn’t have the taser camera on/attached at the time, and was supposed to be recording that.
It’s amazing that child abuse is legal when an officer does it. I’d love to see how the police would react to a mother tasing her child. It’s never okay. If douchebag Officer Dustin Bradshaw can’t arrest a 10-year-old girl, he should go be a rent-a-cop at a mall instead. He has no business being an officer. What a pussy.
This is apparently the same department that tased a 16-year-old for refusing to comply with orders. He fell off a 30 foot overpass and had broken his neck. Sounds like great training they have there [/sarcasm].
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As usual, another informative list from Cracked.com, peppered with hilarious comedy. But there’s truth in this.
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Anyone who thinks that lawsuits should have limits lower than the amount to care for someone’s malpractice-related injury for the rest of their life should consider what life might be like as some of these people. Would you cut your penis off for $10M? No? The maybe you should be able to sue for that much!
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Scientology is a dangerous cult that must be destroyed. Hail Xenu!
Wow — Scientologists call non-Scientologists “wogs”. Reminds me of “muggles” from Harry Potter…
November 22, 2009
JOURNAL: YARD SALES: 20091121: 2009 Expedition #12
Posted by Claire CJS under Carolyn, Clio, Hobbies & Activities, People, Yard SalesLeave a Comment
Yard saleing season is over, yet Carolyn said she’d seen a sign on a local road indicating a sale today. Rousing out of bed past 11AM, we figured this would give us an excuse to get in a car, thereby making a taco bell breakfast trip more worth the effort. Turns out the idiots with the sign didn’t even have the sale their sign was advertising, but we ran into another.
Total spent $2.00 plus ~$0 gas (we were already going to Taco Bell) for a total of $2.00. We bought 1 item – for an estimated value of $28, leading to a profit of $26. We only spent about 10 minutes detouring to the yardsale, so technically we made $156/hr as a couple or $78/hr per person. And to earn $26 after taxes you’d really have to earn ~$37; money saved (by not having to spend it) is actually worth more than we realize when the government’s cut is taken into consideration.
$2.00 – Vick’s vaporizer made to put Vick’s VapoRub (VapoSteam) into the air. A $48 product, but it’s sold on sale for $28. 
Click here for other Yard Sale-related postings. (more…)
November 22, 2009
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Wow. Just when you thought the snobby elitism of Apple's corporate culture couldn't get any higher, you find out they are voiding people's warranties and hiding behind OSHA as a fake reason to.
Hate to break the news to the anti-smoking crowd, but second hand cigarette smoke is NOT an OSHA violation.
"Field studies of environmental tobacco smoke indicate that under normal conditions, the components in tobacco smoke are diluted below existing Permissible Exposure Levels (PELS.) as referenced in the Air Contaminant Standard (29 CFR 1910.1000)…It would be very rare to find a workplace with so much smoking that any individual PEL would be exceeded."
-Letter From Greg Watchman, Acting Ass't Sec'y, OSHA, To Leroy J Pletten, PHD, July 8, 1997Certainly not the "thirdhand" smoke that would be in someone's laptop. What B.S., Apple. Your hardware already costs more, so now you're going to try to reduce costs by screwing your customers. Real nice.
Next up? Cat owners!
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"Finger Prince? I don't think so." -Animaniacs
"Another head? What would I need 3 of them for?" -Barney Rubble -
Because of course students should pay for their own, and nobody else should contribute. That would be socialism! Oh no! Much better that the poor are made to be dumber in the name of our overly-capitalist-worshiping ideals.
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Fuck that. Just because you speak Chinese doesn't mean your search results should be censored. And fuck Microsoft for going along with that.
The greed of capitalism combined with the non-humanity of corporations means that profit == oppression in many situations — and this is one of them.
November 22, 2009
VIDEO: MOVIES: REVIEW: Willow (1988)
Posted by Claire CJS under Carolyn, Clio, Media, Movies, People, Reviews, Video[5] Comments
[IMDB link] [Netflix link] Carolyn HAD rated this 2 stars on Netflix and didn’t remember it from being a kid. I *think* I may have seen it, but absolutely NOTHING in it rang a bell, so I COULD be wrong. Parthena said it was one of her fave movies as a kid, so she got to watch it with us.
LIMERICK REVIEW: There once was a fantasy called Willow.
A baby found floating in a river — D’oh!
Keeping it alive was a pain.
To the queen, it was a bane.
A sorceress is quite a formidable foe.
HAIKU REVIEW: Willow’s a midget?!?!?!
The things you forget with age!
Nice to revisit.
PEOPLE: Directed by Ron Howard (the narrator from Arrested Development!), written by George Lucas and Bob Dolman. Val Kilmer certainly makes the ladies happy, but he was still better in Real Genius. Did you know Joanne Whalley (Sorsha) was a groupee in the Pink Floyd movie? Her career is still going, but I don’t think she’s done anything as well-known as Willow since then. Nor has she ever looked as good, judging by her IMDB pictures. Maybe that’s why Val Kilmer divorced her? (OHHH, I totally went there.)
The baby (Ruth/Kate Greenfield) was actually the best baby actor I’ve ever seen–which really just means they spent many hours photographing it until it did the right things. And they were never in a movie again… And little people. Tons of little people, and some of the standard familiar faces. This is the most little people in any movie since The Wizard Of Oz, and they had to advertise nationally to get that many. (Some trivia: At a party, I once saw a little person smoking pot, asked around, and she was friends of some friends and had been an Ewok in Star Wars episode 6: Return Of The Jedi. So I’ve seen an Ewok smoke pot! Who else can brag about this?)
QUIRKS: Most of your standard fantasy movie tropes apply here. Formulaic to a tee; yet exceeding expectations and out-doing many of the similar movies that came out in the early 80s. More of these quirks are discussed in the “SIMILAR MOVIES” section below, where I compare it to Lord Of The Rings.
There are two Wilhelm Screams in this movie.
And some mis-treatment of babies.. always a plus. lol
And some comic relief from the 2 “very tiny” people, the Smurf-sized “brownies”. They really reminded me of the worms from Worms 3-D (the X-box version, not the PS2 version).
VISUALS: The fantasy world here is much richer than most 1980s fantasy movies. Closer to the caliber of the Lord Of The Rings movies in terms of having a rich world filled with many different kinds of creatures. Special effects have come a long way since then, but they still did a good job.
MORALS: Even reluctant tiny people can be heroes. But we all knew this when we read Lord Of The Rings…
BAD STUFF: The only thing bad about it is that it was kind of “generic” in the sense of following many established tropes for Fantasy movies. But this movie didn’t win out (versus the others) in uniqueness of ideas, it won out by executing these ideas in a better way. It doesn’t get boring like Legend. Solutions to problems are, as usual, “conveniently convenient”, but not as badly as in other movies.
CONCLUSION: I think by re-watching it I bumped it up from 3 stars to 4 stars on Netflix, and up to 7/10 on IMDB. After seeing so many sub-par fantasy movies like Legend and Krull … It’s nice to see one that is better than a “generic pass”.
RECOMMENDATION: Fantasy lovers and 80s movie lovers should definitely watch (or re-watch) this.
SIMILAR MOVIES: Lord Of The Rings!!! I was cracking jokes the whole time about how ever character was almost directly analogous to a character in Lord Of The Rings. The Nelwyns are the hobbits. Willow is Frodo. The baby is the ring. Bad people in horses come after them like the Nazgul. A “fellowship” is formed. Cherlindrea is “Galadriel” and gives “Frodo” (Willow) a magic wand instead of a strand of her hair, and then gets really creepy just like Galadriel talking about how horrible she could be if she had the ring. The Brownies are the “elves”, only 2 inches tall but still able to take you via bow & arrow in the middle of the forest. The “orcs” are simply a human army. Val Kilmer/Madmartigan is Aragorn. Bavmorda may as well be Sauron (and didn’t land another movie role for 12 years, until she was “The Queens” in Monarch). Nockmaar may as well have been Mordor; Tir Asleen may as well have been Minas Tirith. And there’s even a dragon, like in The Hobbit.
It is also of course somewhat similar to a lot of the 80s fantasy movies that came out, like Krull, Legend, The NeverEnding Story, or Labyrinth. And has parallels to Star Wars as well.
MOVIE QUOTE: Cherlindrea: Elora Danan must survive. She must fulfill her destiny and bring about the downfall of Queen Bavmorda. Her powers are growing like an evil plague. Unless she is stopped, Bavmorda will control the lives of your village, your children, everyone. All creatures of good heart need your help, Willow. The choice is yours.
COINCIDENCES: Supergirl, Willow. 2 1980’s movies in a row with love potions.
FRIENDS’ RATINGS: Christie and Chris H/Lisa loved it. Ian & Tatiana really liked it. Christian H & Jordan & Benj liked it. Chris Z didn’t like it. Becky hated it. (more…)
November 21, 2009
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Whaaaat? Apple fanboys told me that if I bought an Apple, all my problems would vanish. It would never crash, it would mow my lawn, and it would cure my dog’s cancer. But the reality is: Apple laptops are only the 4th best. And people herd to them like sheep because they respond to B.S. marketing rather than actual data. Of course, as Ian pointed out, 3 other brands are selling better, so aren’t those people even bigger sheep? That could very well be, but Windows users aren’t typically as brand-loyal to specific hardware brands as Apple users. After all, during the evolution of Windows, many hardware manufacturers have risen and fallen. So I tend to think of these people as less sheep, and more aimless wanderers — zombies or fools, if you will. Which I find slightly preferable to sheep. The real people who get my respect are those who spec out individual parts and build their own machines. However, I’m not sure how one would do this with a laptop…
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Hahahaha. Too bad the format for the page requires waiting for each click, though. Made me not look at them all.
November 20, 2009
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A remix of the “drunk guy spends 5 minutes trying to find beer” video, done as a video game. Having seen the first video, this is the most hilarious shit I’ve seen all week!
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Why haven’t I heard of this? Mark Hamill, Kevin Michael Richardson, Tim Curry, Andy Dick, Maurice LaMarche, Jeff Bennett, Conan O’Brien, David Duchovny as… TINY JESUS? Fuck, I have to see this.
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This goes into why Obama’s Health Care reforms are pretty much meaningless. Democrats are in bed with big business–just like Republicans. Reform is an illusion so that 2-party people can wave flags for their team, while ignoring the fact that even after these reforms, we’ll still have one of the most ass-backward systems in the world.Step 1:Aim low.
Step 2:Gut the public option.
Step 3:Pack it with loopholes.
Step 4:Provide no leadership.
Step 5:Blow the math.Obama only supports a single-payer system if he were “starting over”, but wont now because it would “disrupt” the insurance industry. Oh, Poor poor wittle insurance industry! I guess commerce is more important to health–even to the idol-worshiped Obama. “The president and the Democrats decided not to press for the only plan that makes sense for everyone, in order to preserve an industry that is not only cruel and stupid and dysfunctional, but through its rank inefficiency has necessitated the very reforms now being debated”
(tags: politics ObamaAdministration medical health healthCare healthCareReform patients insurance hospitals government NancyPelosi MaxBaucus TedKennedy BarackObama Congress legal legislation SenateFinanceCommittee Democrats Republicans PublicOption corporations GroupOfSix singlePayerSystem LynnWoolsey MargaretFlowers protesters PharmaceuticalResearchAndManufacturersOfAmerica Obamacare ProgressiveCaucus BlueDogs BusinessAsUsual WorstOfBothWorlds capitalism loopholes HR3200 WalMart Medicare Medicaid FreeChoiceAct employerMandate UniversalHealthCare socializedMedicine RollingStone MattTaibbi editorial news articles)
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A text transcript of the craziness that ensued during the original Church Of The SubGenius “X-Day 1”, in 1998. But then it was later determined that the year was NOT 1998 (perhaps it was upside-down, and really 8661), since the saucers did not come.
Would have loved to have been there! But X-Day is still happening and we’ll be there this upcoming summer. -
I didn’t even know what a “stick bomb” was. It’s like dominoes, only with more chaos. MOAR CHAOOOOSSSS!!!!!!!!!!
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I had to save this link, because MULTIPLE times I’ve brought this book up in conversation but not been able to remember what it is called. Hilarious stuff.My favorite is the Wilford Brimley letter, but the first review reminded me of my OTHER favorite part:
“One of his letters is to the m&m company, in which he complains that their slogan “Melts in your mouth, but not in your hands” is discriminatory and insensitive to those who don’t have one or more hands. He then goes on to explain how he lost his arms in an encounter with a grizzly bear, and suggests that they change their slogan to “Melts in your mouth but not in your hand(s) (if you have any).””
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I agree.How about addressing renewable energy now, rather than playing the rationing game with people?
I don’t want crooked people at the power company to be able to tell their burglar associates when my wife & I are out of the house by looking at electricity consumption graphs.
Such breaches of privacy DO occur… More often than people realize.
This also makes marijuana grow houses more likely to be discovered… Which is a bad thing to anyone who is against prohibition of victimless crimes.
Getting warrants for excessive electricity use is routine in USA (see links in comments).
The road to hell is paved with good intentions, and this is an example. In the name of the environment, we’re going to sacrifice our privacy. Bad.
Someone commented that our only choice is to remain Luddites, or join the Hive Mind. Hell, I’d rather sacrifice electricity entirely than join any fucking hive mind. We’re not goddamned insects.
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Am I dick for the fact that the first thought that comes to mind is, “Saddam Hussein gave free college to whoever wanted. It was state sponsored.” These riots are a result of our anti-socialist obsession with capitalism and everyone being responsible for only themselves. A real society would freely educate its citizens SO THEY AREN’T SO FUCKING STUPID. After all, that’s why we have public K-12. But why does it stop there? Sure, private schools are always better, but the rich who can afford them can afford higher taxes too.So now we have riots over inflation and tuition.
I recall reading something that in 1970, a college degree meant you’d make 50% more. By 1995, a college degree meant you’d only make 15% more. Meanwhile, the cost in inflation-adjusted dollars had tripled.
It’s almost like there’s no ROI on college investment. It’s no wonder people get fucking pissed when it goes up 32% in 1 year. And this is in Beverly Hills! Imagine how bad actual poor people must feel.
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The corporations ARE our government. (That’s actually one of the signs of facism.) Here’s another example. According to the article, this guy played an instrumental role in introducing genetically modified milk and known carcinogens into the U.S. food supply.
What a great adviser for the fDA!
November 19, 2009
JOURNAL: COMPUTER: Got my flickr account fixed.
Posted by Claire CJS under Clio, Computer, Journal, Media, People, Pictures1 Comment
Jesus, that was a pain. I noticed a bunch of my wordpress flickr-embedded videos were no longer working — such as my awesome post of my college video experiments — despite me following embed instructions.
1) I sent notes to WordPress support, who basically told me it was Flickr‘s problem. I was pretty damn convinced they were wrong, as I had changed nothing on my side. They kindly investigated further at my behest, and it turns out that Flickr had set my account to not be in public searches — which had the undocumented side-effect of making my embedded videos no longer worked.
2) I had to send a note to Flickr‘s help. I then waited 5 business days after they said to wait 3 business days — they had escalated my issue up the chain, according to them — and sent another email, which was also ignored. Finally on day 6 I opened up a 2nd ticket with reference to my 1st ticket, and was rewarded with a prompt response a couple hours later:
[Flickr Case 1368805] Other issues
Hello,
I have classified your account as “public”/”safe”.
Regards,
-Terrence
What?!?! My account wasn’t “public”/”safe”???? Greeeeat.
By examining random photos from my FlickR, I see that most do not have the “hide from public searches” checkbox checked anymore! Yay! But does this mean that the pictures *I really want hidden* are no longer checked? I don’t know! I had tried to avoid the wrath of various corporate entities by hiding selected photos that are otherwise public.
Anyway, I always thought my stats were pretty good… But I had noticed a dropoff to about 2500-5000 views a day, whereas in the past I got closer to 7500. However, despite being hidden from public searches, I still got a lot of referral traffic from both Flickr and Yahoo Photos [Yahoo owns flickr], so it seems like “hide from public seraches” still leaves you open to plenty of other referral methods. Anyway, hopefully these stats improve now that my account is no longer censored:
And yes, it bugs me to be a paying user and to be censored. But if I were to make my own photo album off of flickr, nobody would view it. Sort of how my blog gets read through Facebook a lot, but hardly anyone actually goes to it directly. People need to get over their technical laziness. Our technical laziness funnels us into social sites like Facebook, YouTube, and Flickr — thereby putting us under the umbrella of corporate and community censorship. If only we could all just run our own stuff on our own hardware, nobody could censor us! But it would be much harder for us to all stay together. Maybe that is an issue that Web 3.0 will address. . .
(more…)
November 19, 2009
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More hate in the name of God. Why join an organization that discriminates based on 2,000 year old texts? Catholocism is a far greater threat to humanity and freedom than homosexuality.
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Yup, another scientific study [linked to by the article] showing the anti-cancer effects of THC, the main ingredient in marijuana.
You think the pharmaceutical industry wants people growing their own medicine? Synthetic marinol pills cost $600/month. Non-synthetic THC grows like, well…. A weed. The establishment does not want natural medicine, but how much longer can they ignore the mounting scientific pro-pot evidence that keeps coming out?
Even the AMA has finally changed their position.
How many have died over the establishment's resistance to even studying marijuana? This study came from Thailand, not USA…
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I think he handled it pretty well, actually. No taser or nothin. He didn't even shoot or beat the cat. :)
Claire's blog 