The Arkanssouri Blog.: 10/01/2006 - 11/01/2006

Tuesday, October 31, 2006

Seems to be a problem uploading pics today.

So the Xmas suggestions for 54 days out and 53 days out are here and here.

Gummint Cheese Halloween Doubleshot.

Why I don't rake leaves.


Trick or Treat!

Click pics to embiggen them.

Monday, October 30, 2006

55 Days 'til Xmas!

A 'toonist after my own heart.

Friday, October 27, 2006

More entangling tentacles.

Why is one of KY3 (the Springfield MO NBC affiliate) bloggers also blogging at Springfield 33 News (the ABC affiliate)?

I know CBS and FOX are in bed together in Springfield (watch the faces in the banners at the top of their websites; you'll see many are the same), but I always assumed that it was because Fox was a relatively new addition. But ABC and NBC have been around since the beginning.

Blogger seems to be down.

So here are the suggestions for Xmas gifts for today, Saturday, and Sunday.


No banners. No pop-ups. No kidding.
Make My Way your home on the Web - http://www.myway.com

Thursday, October 26, 2006

59 Days 'Til Xmas!

Wednesday, October 25, 2006

Rep. Barbara Cubin: When all else fails, threaten to assault the disabled.

[After a political debate]

[Libertarian candidate] Rankin, who has multiple sclerosis and uses an electric wheelchair, said that after the debate Sunday night Cubin "walked over to me and said, 'If you weren't sitting in that chair, I'd slap you across the face.' "


Apparently, if you can't win a debate rationally, Cubin believes the threat of violence is a legitimate tactic.

"Response Ad" to Dr. Michael J. Foxenstein is out.

See here.

You don't sacrifice one person for another. Even if they're dead, you don't do it without their permission. Abuse of a corpse, anyone? Anyone?

That's treading in mad scientist territory.

And you sure as hell don't link it with an unrelated topic such as cloning.

What would Alex P. Keaton do? He'd put out a response ad featuring an unborn child pleading with the viewer not to chop him up and use his parts to fix Michael J. Fox.


[H/T 2 Drudge.]

Contrary to popular bumper sticker opinion . . .

. . . maybe a lottery isn't a tax on people who are bad at math, but rather a subsidy for people who are good at math.

Mathematicians use probability theories to bag $13 Million lottery prize.

[H/T 2 Buzzpage.]

60 Days 'Til Xmas!

Tuesday, October 24, 2006

61 Days 'Til Xmas!

Cato: 'F' You, Nanny Huckabee!

Arkanssouri Politics League.

Think Front Page Sports FBPRO '96 Draft for Political Junkies.

Go here, sign up for a free account, then click "Join League," which will take you here. Then click on "If you are looking for a particular league click here to browse for it." Arkanssouri Politics League, right now, is on about page 4.

A little complicated to get there, I know. But the end result could be fun!

Monday, October 23, 2006

62 Days 'Til Xmas!

Sunday, October 22, 2006

63 Days 'Til Xmas!

Saturday, October 21, 2006

Sometimes you have to read the REALLY fine print.

My senior-citizen mother received an anti-Jim-Talent ad in the mail today. The front looks like a big oil barrel, with Jim Talent's face on it, and the assertion "While we pay at the pump Jim Talent voted to give oil companies $14 billion in tax breaks."

But it's the back that's most interesting. It has a supposed newspaper clipping with the headline "Exxon CEO's Pay Package Up 33% in '05." Almost all of the rest of the article is covered by two official looking supposed government forms.

It is these forms that you should examine closely, should you receive this mailing.

They try to show a paper trail between Jim Talent, Halliburton, and Exxon. They even highlight those areas with magnifying glasses and yellow highlighter.

But take a look at the rest of those forms. They don't seem to have anything to do with Jim Talent at all.

The one on the left is between Representative Chris Cannon, candidate for district 3 in Utah, and Representative Richard W. Pombo's "Pombo for Congress" (I can't quite make out the abbreviation; it's for either Georgia 11 or California 11) in Alexandria, Virginia.

The one on the right might have something to do with Jim Talent; one part is obscured by the magnifying glass. What you CAN read points to Lynn A. Westmoreland, candidate for Georgia (again or California) 3.

Did the Missouri State Democratic Committee fake these documents by plastering Jim Talent's name in their little "magnified" areas but forget to make the same changes to the rest of each document?

I tried to scan them and let you see them for yourself, but my computer siezed up on me in the middle of doing it. I'll try and get them scanned for you.

In the meantime, if you don't get one and want to see it, I have the one sent to my mother and would be happy to show it to you.

Crossposted over on Dick The Butcher...



Mike Huckabee and Holocaust Denial.

And the winner for "Lamest Excuse Ever" is . . . Nanny Huckabee!

"I have just come out of six weeks at a concentration camp held by the
Democrat Party of Arkansas in an undisclosed location, making a hostage tape,"
Huckabee said. "That's why I look that way."

...

Huckabee denied the comment was a reference to the Holocaust or a slight
against Jews.

...

"I never identified a particular kind of camp, and to make such a
far-reaching statement is laughable and is the type of allegation that makes
people cynical," he added.


The concentration camp comment wasn't about the Holocaust? So, what, it was about the Japanese camps during WWII? The Native Americans?

Whatever camps Nanny Huckabee was talking about, is there any way it was not using the suffering of people as fodder for humor? Sorry, Hucky, I don't find the pain of other people funny in the least.

The left would suggest . . .

. . . that taxpayers subsidize this man's mannequin fetish by providing him with all the mannequins he wants.

The sad thing is, that may well be cheaper than paying to provide him with psychiatric care or three squares and a cot in prison.

Hypothetical.

Suppose you want to shoot someone. Suppose they are holding a book that, for argument's sake, you know a bullet will not penetrate.

Suppose this book is a normal-sized book.

Will the book deter you?

If your target is holding it over his heart, wouldn't you shoot him in the head, and vice-versa?

The pen may be mightier than the sword, and the book may well be mightier than the bullet. But the body is bigger than the book.

Dumbasses.

[H/T 2 Buzzpage.]

64 Days 'Til Xmas!

Friday, October 20, 2006

Apparently, the right to choose goes only one way.

MO Judge orders woman not to get pregnant.

A judge is giving Mandy Nelson an unusual order -- don't get pregnant.

Nelson, who already has three children, was given probation by a judge
in a forgery case. But if Nelson wants to stay out of jail, she can't have
another baby out of wedlock.


Someone explain what having children has to do with forgery.

Andy Griffith, Enemy of The American Way.

Dude changes his name to Andy Griffith, runs for Sheriff.

Someone should tell this guy I would be LESS likely to vote for Andy Griffith, who is a fraud, an abuser of his influence, a racist, and (although I can't find the episode) a proponent of the government siezing people's homes!

Consensus comes around to my point of view.

Turns out, the NFL dirty bomb threat for this Sunday is a hoax.

I had this figured out within half an hour after the news broke on CNN, when I realized that the first letters of the target cities spelled out SHAM CON.

Myway email is down.

Hope nobody's trying to get me any urgent messages today.

65 Days 'Til Xmas!

Thursday, October 19, 2006

66 Days 'Til Xmas!

Wednesday, October 18, 2006

67 Days 'til Xmas!

Either Babs Bush is nursing a little crush on me . . .

... or this is the Misinterpretable Headline of the Day:

Ex-first lady urges support for Hutchison.

Come live with me, Babs, and be my blue-dress-wearing, draped-in-pearls love.

(Excuse me; I think I just threw up in my mouth a little.)

Vote for Lady Liberty!

Newsevenwonders.com is taking votes on what should the new Seven Wonders of The World be, out of a field of 21 choices (most of which, oddly, cannot be considered "new" by any stretch of the imagination.)

The Statue of Liberty is one of the choices.

Boldly vote, Libertarians!

Good dog.

You have to go read it for yourself. I can't even comment on it, it's so sad.

Tuesday, October 17, 2006

[Postdated] 68 Days 'til Xmas!

Here's my chance.

I've been waiting for the emergence of a new element for years now. Because I have the perfect name.

And, given the Russian-American makeup of the team that discovered it, it's even more perfect.

If they take my suggestion, I will be able to say:

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Aynrandium!

(Hey, it's way less lame than Californium or Einsteinium!)

Um, yes he did.

Take this excerpt from a CBN article on Tempting Faith (my emphasis in bold):


Even as the president's aides ridiculed evangelical leaders calling them
"nuts, goofey and out of control."

"Absolutely, you name the Christian leader, and I've heard them mocked
by serious people in serious places," said Kuo.

Kuo did not name names, but The White House is disputing reports that Bush advisor Karl Rove ever made such remarks.


Now take this excerpt from the 60 Minutes story:


Asked if that was really the attitude, Kuo tells Stahl, "Oh, absolutely. You name the important Christian leader and I have heard them mocked by serious
people in serious places."

Specifically, Kuo says people in the White House political affairs office referred to Pat Robertson as "insane," Jerry Falwell as "ridiculous," and that James Dobson "had to be controlled." And President Bush, he writes, talked about his compassion agenda, but never really fought for it.


Interestingly, Pat Robertson is a big muckety-muck at CBN. And his name was certainly named. Somehow, CBN failed to mention the characterization of Fatwa Patty in their story.

Anyone for a steaming pile of agenda?

While it seems to be true that Kuo did not specifically name the names of people who made the remarks, it is certainly also true that he did name the names of people whom the remarks were about.

Objects are not good or evil; they're just objects.

Fellow right-of-center types, take a look at the following passage:

Nancy Pelosi: When you think of the early pioneers that crossed the mountains, and lived in the plains, and buried their children in the middle of nowhere, I say to myself, "Man, I would never want to live like that." But I think those same pioneers might see the way we live right now and feel exactly
the same way.

Guns are a predator which lives in our homes. You don`t close the door to protect our families from guns. It comes to us everywhere: on TV, movies, video games, the Internet. It is everywhere, and it`s only going to get worse, as we`ll point out later in the week.


What's that, you say? You can't blame an object for the actions of a person misusing it? Objects have no inherent morality to them? They aren't mystical totems that drive normally innocent people to do unconscionable acts?

I agree.

Now take the above passage and replace the words "Nancy Pelosi" with "Glenn Beck" and the word "Guns" with "porn" or "internet porn," and you have the actual quote, from yesterday's show.

Objects are not magical, Glenn. Nor do they possess the capacity to be predators. Like a gun, porn*, if hidden away in the top of a closet, doesn't hurt anyone. And it won't, until someone makes the decision to misuse it.

Hell, you can even rent porn an apartment across from the women's dormitory at BYU, supply it with binoculars, rope, and GHB, and it STILL won't prey on anyone. It will just sit there, unless *you* pick it up.

In other words, porn doesn't molest people; people molest people.

Glenn continues with an anecdotal story that, if anything, disproves his point. It is about a couple in which the man is seduced by porn. His wife doesn't like it. And then, he chooses to stop. So much for porn controlling his mind. If porn is a predator in his house, it certainly isn't very good at it, because he got away.


*- Meaning porn featuring only consenting adults, of course.

What about 5000 checks for $.01 apiece?

KY3's broadcast version of this story included a couple who in protest tried to pay their pit bull indulgence with pennies. They were not allowed to do so, and then were ticketed for not paying the indulgence.

Apparently, paying with pennies is against the law.

I wonder, is the law penny-specific? Could they (assuming they have free checking) pay with 5000 one-cent checks? And wouldn't that be more of a headache for the Springfield bureaucrats than 5000 pennies? How about 1000 nickels? Or 995 nickels and 25 pennies?

Monday, October 16, 2006

[Postdated] 69 days 'til Xmas!

Note the absence of the word "fired" in the article.

One of Hillary's aides took a dirty, cheap shot at John McCain, referencing his time as a prisoner of war.

Her response?

Empty apology, yes. "Fired the aide," no.

I am certainly no fan of John McCain, but this aide's comment, and Hillary's response to it, are just pathetic.

Notable Passing.

CBGB, R.I.P.

If the Hard Rock Cafe is the Wal-Mart of rock and roll, CBGB was the corner bodega.

Sunday, October 15, 2006

[Postdated] 70 Days 'til Xmas!

Saturday, October 14, 2006

[Postdated] 71 Days 'til Xmas!

Friday, October 13, 2006

[Postdated] 72 Days 'til Xmas!

Another reason why the NEA should be abolished.

It funds things like What Poop Is.

[H/T 2 nbc6.net]

In Clintonspeak, it would be called "differently successful."

[More here.]

Thursday, October 12, 2006

(Postdated) 73 Days 'till Xmas!


Wednesday, October 11, 2006

Still the same old Substandard...

... "Abolishment?"

That's more clunky than "decider!"

Repeat after me, Substandard Editors . . . "Abolition."

Oh, and "Author to speak on how he gained identity"?

I imagined he gained identity just like most people did; when they wrote it on his birth certificate.

Arkansas gays and other supporters of equal protection under the law,

Mike Beebe is not your friend.

On the other hand, Jim Lendal, for a Greenie, makes more sense on such issues than either of the Pig Party candidates:

Repeal the Anti-Marriage Amendment.

Domestic Partners Bill - In 1999, I introduced a bill that would require health insurance coverage for domestic partners.

Foster care and adoption - Arkansas has thousands of children in the foster care system. It is wrong to deny them a home, simply because of discrimination.



(The Arkansas Libertarian Party doesn't appear to be fielding a candidate for governor.)

My tax dollars aren't being pissed down the drain, are they?

Thayer Bobcat football is so far 2-4 on the season. That's right; they lose twice as many games as they win.

Why are we wasting money on failure? Why don't we end the football program at Thayer and spend the money on something useful, like actual education?

MS blacks suppress white vote.

Reparations!

[H/T 2 Memeorandum.]

Mizzou Beat!

As of this writing, the University of Missouri, unlike Fired Up Missouri, is not a socialized condom utopia but it does name buildings after those who sought to purge the university of homosexuals, blogged about here.

The former is a good thing.

The latter will hopefully result in all alumni fundraising letters being returned to the university after being used to wipe the alumnus' ass.

Forgive the postdating.

My life's a little crazy now, and I want to make sure I get these Xmas suggestions in.

I should be back to something resembling normal on Monday.

What's the difference between "public" and "pubic"?

About 40 thou, it would seem.

[H/T 2 BuzzPage.]

74 Days 'til Xmas.

Tuesday, October 10, 2006

75 days 'til Xmas.

Monday, October 09, 2006

A little catchup.

Just wanted to let my minions know what's going on.

Thursday (I think) I developed severe acute neck pain. I had experienced symptoms of "a crick" in my neck for about a week and a half, but Thursday after a three-lap walk around the Warm Fork Park the pain magnified exponentially. Eventually at the doctor's office it got so bad I couldn't even move my eyes without intense pain rocketing up my neck into the back of my head.

The doctor thinks it's either a severe neck sprain, which should go away within a couple of weeks, or a ruptured disk in my neck, which wouldn't.

I am now on anti-inflammatory, muscle-relaxation, and pain medication (Darvoset) three times a day. I can now minimally function as long as I take the meds.

And I am again feeding my uncle's critters, so there's not much time for posting this week. I will probably be in Wednesday to post on Thayer Taxpayers' about whatever happens at the city council meeting Tuesday night and to make my football picks for the week.

North Korea getting nukes -- bad. Much worse than Mike Foley talking dirty to a 21-year-old guy.

The Cubs should grab Joe Torre.

Brian Vickers sucks major @$$. He may even suck more @$$ than Carl Edwards. Dale Jr. should assign Martin Truex Jr. and Paul Menard the job of taking out the #25 Chevy on the first lap of every race the rest of the season.

Kevin Harvick loses GM Goodwrench as his major sponsor at the end of the season. I hope that on the final race this year, to thank GM for their long sponsorship, he runs the Earnhardt paint scheme. After clearing it with Richard Childress, Teresa E and Dale Jr., of course, just as a matter of consideration.

Gotta go. The drugs are kicking in. Ooooooh. Pretty!


No banners. No pop-ups. No kidding.
Make My Way your home on the Web - http://www.myway.com

Thursday, October 05, 2006

"Anonymizer" now sucks major @$$.

My new anonymizer of choice is Anonymouse.

From our "Totally Useless Discovery" file . . .

. . . we find that the welfare schools are spending your money on suggesting experiments to find out things like this:

It might NOT be practical, but if you send popcorn kernels to 122-thousand feet above the earth, they will pop more efficiently and maybe even taste better.

Those are the findings by a group of students from Eastway Elementary in Columbus whose experiment, "Effect of Space Conditions on Popcorn," was among 20 U-S student proposals NASA selected in March.


I'll be sure to keep that in mind the next time I want to nuke a bag. Maybe I'll hitch a ride on Virgin Galactic beforehand and take the popcorn with me. Yeah, that's it. I'll spend a fortune and place myself and others at considerable risk just to make my popcorn fluffier. That's the ticket.

OR, I could do what normal, actual people do -- go to the movie theater and buy some!

Damn looters.

[H/T 2 brainhop.]

Worcester joins the Global War on Pearorism.

"Warning, Pears Falling."

Let me repeat that -- Warning, Pears Falling.

Like Lisa Simpson said of "Yahoo Serious Festival," I recognize those are words but together they don't make any sense.

What does a city do when presented with the danger of falling pears?

Pick all the pears and take them down to the local food pantry? No, no. That would make too much sense.

Cut down the pear trees and replace them with less dangerous ones? Nope, they don't do that either.

Instead, they do this:

A council has cordoned off pear trees in a public park over fears falling
fruit could land on someone's head.

Two black pear trees in Cripplegate Park in Worcester have been sealed
off with a safety barrier and tape and a sign warns people of falling fruit.


And why do they do this?

A city council spokesman said the precaution was cheaper than the potential legal cost if someone was hit on the head with a pear and sued.


Definitely one for Dick The Butcher.

Oh, and this next bit; this next bit is priceless:

"What we are interested in is to make sure young kids don't get frightened or hurt," he added.


Frightened by pears? Who gets frightened by pears? Let me guess -- people who live in a society that tries to insulate people from fear and pain.

I'm glad these dolts weren't around when Isaac Newton sat under the apple tree.

Warning, Pears Falling. Nope, it still doesn't make any sense.

Maybe a better sign would be "Safe From Pears Beneath The Watchful Eyes."

Or "If you walk under pear trees, the terrorists win."

Tuesday, October 03, 2006

MNF: Iggles 31, Pack 9.

One-Sentence Game Summary: The Iggles were better at matriculatin' the ball down the field.

Dusty out as Cubs GM.

My suggestion for his replacement?

Former Dallas Cowboys coach Jimmy Johnson.

No, seriously. Don't laugh. It's not a joke.

Much of Johnson's success comes from his meticulous obsession with, and exploitation of, the process. Remember Herschel Walker?

This could help the Cubs when it comes to trading up for better players.

"Significant Inaccuracies" = "Roger Should Sue The LA Times For Every Asset They Have."

Anyone who looks at Roger's rotunditude or Andy's wispiness can deduce they don't use steroids.

But, unfortunately, the allegation is out there and becomes part of the background noise of the collective consciousness.

Apparently, Glenn thought the story needed some spicing up.

From yesterday's Glenn Beck Show on CNN Headline News:

I also know that sometimes alcoholism is a symptom of something bigger.
Look at Mel Gibson with his anti-Semitism, Mark Foley with his boy love and our
good old friend George Michael, who, just this morning, took a nap at a
stoplight because he was full of weed and whiskey.


There's only one problem. There is no mention of whiskey in the articles on George Michael's episode.

Newsgoogles for the terms "'George Michael' whisky" and "'George Michael' whiskey" turn up nothing.

Apparently, alcoholic Glenn Beck had whiskey on his mind.

Because SURELY neither he nor the network would INVENT DETAILS to spice up a story!

Quote of the Day.

"I do not like your apple. It is all shrivelled, like Denny Hastert's winkie." -- John Hutchison, 10/02/06.

No, I'm not going to give you the context. Some things must be left to the imagination.

Monday, October 02, 2006

Calling all Missouri 3rd-Partiers!

David Catanese of KY3 (that's in Springfield, for those of you who don't know) asks if third-party candidates should have been allowed in the Senate election debates.

Go let him know what you think.

Maybe that's why Oprah likes them so much.

NBC's anti-male bias is showing.

Have you noticed how all their "To Catch A Predator" segments target only MEN?

Excerpts (my emphasis in bold):

By the time we finish broadcasting this latest series of “To Catch A Predator” investigations, 184 men will have been charged with crimes relating to soliciting a minor online for sex. What is starting to amaze me, though, is how many men continue to show up at our hidden camera houses who have seen our past investigations.

...

Here in Georgia, we find what we’ve found all over the country. The men who come to visit a minor for sex come from all walks of life.

There’s another first for us in this investigation as well. As you may have seen before, some of these guys admit to me they have heard of or seen portions of our programs.

...

It always amazes me how some of the men who come knocking on the door of our hidden camera houses act like they’ve developed real relationships with our decoys during their online chats.

...

Why do these guys still show up after so many high profile programs on predators? I think there are a couple of reasons. My sense is that many of these guys think their odds of getting caught are pretty slim.

...

Other men seem no longer able to control their compulsions.

...

Sometimes guys will start showing up all at once on a Friday afternoon and then there’ll be hours of no activity.

...

The whole team’s pretty weary at this point, but with the chat rooms working, there was again a steady stream of men heading in the door.


I sent them an email asking why they seek only to entrap MEN, not women, and why they want to create the impression that the only predators are male and only males are predators. We'll see if it's answered.

[Oprah's slobbering all over the news-manufacturing, male-entrapment segments is described here.]

Get the bastards, Roger!

I don't know if he did or if he didn't. His comparative rotunditude makes me think he didn't.

Frankly, I don't care either way.

MLB lost it's moral standing to criticize "performance enhancement" when it decided that pitchers undergoing Tommy John surgery, not to repair an injury, but to enhance their performance, is just par for the course.

If THEY don't get an asterisk, then Big Mac, Barry Bonds, and the rest of the [alleged] 'roid users sure as hell shouldn't get one either! ESPECIALLY those that [allegedly] 'roided up BEFORE MLB banned steroids.

And contrary to what the talking heads keep telling you, HGH is neither a drug nor a steroid. It is a hormone that occurs naturally in the body.

[H/T 2 Drudge.]

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