Behold the awesome:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JMRMW1FXSHw
Doesn’t make a lick of sense, but damn.
Jun 202010
Jun 192010
Now this is either sheer awesomeness, or sheer dumbassery. It’s getting so I can’t tell the difference anymore.
HMV have withdrawn ‘Anyone But England’ banners from its Scottish stores after complaints to police that they were inciting racial hatred.
The high street chain put up large window displays and stocked T-shirts featuring the slogan ‘ABE’ in the run-up to the World Cup.
However, they were besieged by calls from angry members of the public and the Campaign for an English Parliament (CEP) made a complaint to police in Fife that the company were inciting racial hatred.
In short: HMV (which I gather is a clothing store-chain) carried clothes that root *against* England in the World Cup (that exceedingly dull sporting event that’s currently going on in South Africa)… and some group of yahoos made a case that this was “inciting racial hatred.”
Snerk.
“Racist?” This is as hilarious as when the French government tried to protect their business relationships with Saddam Hussein back in 2003, the American people did their traditional French-bashing (“Freedom Fries.” Gah.), and the claim was made that it was “racist.” As if in this day and age “English” or “French” are distinct races. Line up a group of ten Frenchmen, ten Englishmen and ten Scotsmen, have them wear identical outfits, cover up any relevant tattoos and have them keep their yaps shut, and I dare anyone to reliably sort them into their “races.”
I’ve seen a whole lot of American sports fans rooting *against* traditional rivals. And while I couldn’t care less about professional sports (oh, gee, what better way to blow a few hundred bucks than watching millionaires play a chldish game), I shudder to imagine what chaos would be unleashed if American sports were to be infected by the “race card”-playing jackholes. Oh, wait… something like this, I imagine.
Jun 192010
Here’s the final layout for the Titan IIIM with the MOL payload. The Titan IIIM was, as might be surmised, a derivative of the Titan IIIC, with a stretched core and seven-segment (as opposed to five-segment) solid rocket boosters. While the Titan IIIM was not built, the seven-segment UA-1207 boosters were built and saw service on the Titan IV.
Irritatingly, I’ve never found an equivalent Titan IIIC/Dyna Soar drawing of equivalent quality, even though this drawing just isn’t that spectacular itself.
Jun 182010
Republican Cliff Stearns of Florida grilled BP’s Tony Hayward yesterday and made an utter ass of himself.
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/6/18/hawyard_testimony
REP. CLIFF STEARNS: The people of Florida, when I talk to them and they say there’s oil spilling on the coast, would it be appropriate to say that it’s because of BP’s reckless behavior? Yes or no?
TONY HAYWARD: It is a consequence of a big accident.
REP. CLIFF STEARNS: No, yes or no? Reckless behavior or not?
TONY HAYWARD: There is no evidence of reckless behavior.
REP. CLIFF STEARNS: So, you’re standing here, you’re saying here today that BP had no reckless behavior? That’s your position. Yes?
TONY HAYWARD: There is no evidence of reckless behavior.
REP. CLIFF STEARNS: No, yes or no? You’re saying BP has had no reckless behavior, is what you’re saying to us.
TONY HAYWARD: I have seen no evidence of reckless behavior.
REP. CLIFF STEARNS: OK. So you’re on record saying there’s been no reckless behavior. Has anyone in BP been fired because of this incident? Anybody?
TONY HAYWARD: Not—
REP. CLIFF STEARNS: Yes or no?
TONY HAYWARD: No, so far.
REP. CLIFF STEARNS: No people have been fired. So, your captain of the ship runs into New Orleans, spews all this oil, causes all this damage, from Alabama, Mississippi, Florida, Louisiana, and no one’s been fired?
TONY HAYWARD: Our investigation is ongoing.
REP. CLIFF STEARNS: So, let’s say the investigation goes for three years. Does that mean you wouldn’t fire anybody?
TONY HAYWARD: As the investigation draws conclusions, we will take the necessary action.
It’s not a good thing to outright *lie* in such a public forum with the cameras running. While Hayward seems to have been kind of a dumbass with respect to PR, note that in this exchange at least he couched his answers in very reasonable and respectable terms. He never said that there was no recklessness, just that he hasn’t seen *evidence* of recklessness. But Stearns outright lied and claimed that Hayward had said something quite different.
This exchange is reason number four bagrillion why federal officeholders need to be term limited… preferably to a single term. This hearing is not meant to accomplish a damn thing except to give these political yahoos a soapbox to stand on and blart, in the hopes that they’ll blart something that’ll make the electorate think that they are jsut neato keen and should be re-elected.
Jun 182010
Now this is just silly. As I posted before, sometimes Hollywood makes some ethnically odd casting choices. And sometimes it makes vaguely accurate casting choices, and people go bonkers for the wrong reasons. Take, for example, the casting of Angelina Jolie as Egyptian queen Cleopatra. Someone just had to go nuts:
Race row erupts over casting of Angelina Jolie as Cleopatra
An Essence Magazine online story asks, ‘Another White Actress to Play Cleopatra?’
‘Honestly, I don’t care how full Angelina Jolie’s lips are, how many African children she adopts, or how bronzed her skin will become for the film, I firmly believe this role should have gone to a black woman.’
What, really?
Sigh.
OK, history lesson time. Cleopatra may have been queen of Egypt, but there are two good reasons why that does not automatically equate to “black woman:”
1) The Egyptians weren’t “black.” They were Egyptians. Here is how Egyptians of the time saw four distinct ethnic groups… Syrians, Nubians, Libyans and Egyptians:
Notice how the Egpytians are quite distinct from the blacks (and the “white” Libyans and Syrians)
2) Rather importantly… Cleopatra WASN’T EVEN EGYPTIAN. Ethnically, she was Macedonian Greek. She was the last of the Ptolemaic dynasty, the hereditary descendants of the Greek (under Alexander) conquerers of Egypt. Can Jolie pass for Greek? Yeah, I imagine so.
Cleopatra apparently looked like this, based on a sculpture that was made during her lifetime:
And a coin minted in her lifetime:
Not the blackest woman I’ve ever seen.
So, if it’s not historically accurate for Cleopatra top be portrayed by a black woman, why are certain individuals so determined that she should be?
And here’s a link to the actual “Essense” commentary. While lip service is paid to the fact that Cleopatra was ethnically Greek (while at the same time doubting it), the primary arguement is that Cleopatra was “an African queen.” Like that means a damned thing.
What an African woman may look like:
Jun 172010
There is blame enough to go around when it comes to Obama’s Katrina. But as aggressively incompetant as the Obama regime has been in handling this (really, they could have done far better by doing *nothing*), BP has been running one of the worst corporate PR campaigns in recent history. Case in point:
Reporters clash with Coast Guard, BP security
Be sure to watch the video, starring a security guard who I suspect dreams of one day joining a SWAT team so he can kick some families door in and shoot their dog.
Jun 172010
No further hard data than just the image. Note the vaguely Dyna Soar-like spaceplane near the top, with the shoulder mounted wing that is sure to make re-entry entertaining. Note also the *thing* in the lower right… the central body looks like some sort of fusion-ship, but it has large “wings” of curved panels that are probably meant to represent a solar-thermal energy system. If it’s a ship, as opposed to a power station, you’d think there’d be some way to gimbal the “wings” so that they could stay face-on to the sun while the thrust vector of the propulsion system (perhaps ion engines) points wherever it needs to.
Jun 172010
Yesterday my house was set upon by a flock of birds of a species I’m unfamiliar with, and have never seen here before. Normally I get starlings that set up shop under the eaves and make one hell of a racket, but these guys are new. They seem to get a kick out of just hanging onto the sides of the logs, but then flock around you if you wander outside near them.
And in case there was any question about whether or not these birds serve some useful purpose…
Jun 172010
The key catalyst for rising anti-Obama sentiment in the UK has been his disastrous handling of the BP issue, and his relentless desire to crush Britain’s biggest company. There is no doubting BP’s responsibility over the Gulf oil disaster, and it is right that the firm is being held to account for its failures. But the brutal, almost sadistic trashing of BP by the imperious Obama administration, which has helped wipe out about half its value, threatens its very future, as well as the pensions of 18 million British people and the jobs of 29,000 Americans. There is now the very real danger of the bankrupting of a great British enterprise, and the prospect even of a Chinese or Russian takeover.
Awesome. When it comes to “restoring Americas standing in the world,” heckuva job, Barky.
Jun 162010
Some relatively random photos, taken yesterday and today.
More iridescent clouds:
Scruffy and Mark. It may seem unlikely, but there was an actual staredown… Scruffy looking nonchalant on the high ground of the deck, Mark squinty-eyed and angry hiding in the grass.
The sky this AM:
Between Tremonton and Logan yesterday:
And part of the storm that went through yesterday:
