Barack Hussein Obama...cat hater

If I found it on the interwebs, it must be true.

Thanks always to the I Can Has Cheezburger empire, guaranteed to bring a smile to your face.

Merry Christmas from the Religion of Peace, Pt 3

Six people were wounded Saturday when a bomb went off in a church during Christmas mass on a southern Philippine island known as a hotbed of Islamic extremism, the military said.

Military spokesman Lieutenant Randolph Cabangbang said the Abu Sayyaf, a local Muslim militant group linked to the Al-Qaeda network, may have been behind the attack on the church in a police camp on Jolo island.

"There is a possibility that this could be the handiwork of the Abu Sayyaf because they have been perpetrating similar attacks against the Catholic Church" Cabangbang said.

"The explosion occurred at around 7:15 in the morning while the mass was going on. Six people were slightly wounded in the explosion," he said.

More at www.Breitbart.com

Merry Christmas from the Religion of Peace, Pt 2

A burqa-clad female suicide bomber in Pakistan lobbed hand grenades, then detonated her explosive belt among a crowd at an aid center in the town of Khar Saturday, killing at least 45 people in militants' latest strike against the authorities' control over the key tribal region bordering Afghanistan.

Merry Christmas from the Religion of Peace.

Read more at SF Gate.com

Rumors of my extinction are greatly exaggerated

Meet New Zealand's living fossil, the Tuatara, largely unchanged since before the time of the dinosaurs.

And mightily handsome to boot.

(h/t Boing Boing)

The Germans wore grey. You wore a blue dress that sang.

The Spanish barcode marketing company Macanudos has come up with an interesting way of simultaneously promoting two previously unrelated things: the art of flamenco, and bar codes.

They are embedding a flamenco dress with QR codes which, when scanned with your smartphone, will play one of nine flamenco palos.

The dress is being prepared for the International Tourism Trade Fair, to be held in Madrid in January 2011.

Details are sketchy. Flamenco is a powerful dance; if some pale lad gets too close to a QR-clad dancer with his iPhone, it could end badly for him. But flamenco truly is one of humanity's cultural treasures, and perhaps a digital dress will help introduce flamenco to the digital generation.

The QR codes are below. Go ahead, geek out, no one's looking.

Obama and Chavez are in sync on policy

It is said that there are no coincidences.

Earlier this month, Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Commissioner Michael Copps gave a speech at Columbia University in which he called for government to "build an information infrastructure that serves the needs of the people," in order to ensure that "all citizens have access to worthy media." (emphasis mine)

As part of his proposal, he advocated imposing a "public values test" on television and radio broadcasters, making their licenses contingent on meeting certain programming benchmarks, such as 25% local or independently produced programming during primetime.

This would be a roundabout way of accomplishing something that liberal media policy wonks want to do, but have been unsuccessful in doing: breaking the back of corporate media ownership.

Earlier this week, Commissioner Copps and his two Democrat colleagues on the FCC approved an Order establishing rules to govern the way traffic is managed on the internet. The two Republican Commissioners strongly dissented.

The FCC took this action despite being warned by the DC Circuit Court of Appeals that they lacked jurisdiction over the internet, despite being warned by Congress that they lacked authorization to police the internet, and despite the absence of any demonstrated market failure, anti-competitive behavior, or consumer harm that would justify government intervention.

In related news, earlier this week Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez imposed restrictions on radio, TV, and internet content in the name of promoting "social responsibility."

Publishers and website owners are now forbidden from conveying messages or images that, among other things, are disrespectful of public authorities, or that cause anxiety or unrest among the public.

There are no coincidences. If two events seem related, they are.

Oh Christmas Tree

It is not a Holiday Tree. It is a Christmas Tree.

As a Member of the Tribe, I appreciate that you try to spare my feelings and those of my fellow unbelievers during this very festive time. It is gracious of you to try to make us feel included in the festivities by papering over language that might otherwise appear to exclude us.

Now cut it out. The celebration of the miraculous birth of Jesus Christ is nearly upon you, be joyful!

I am not offended by the fact that you are celebrating a holiday and I am not. I'm probably still recovering from Eight Crazy Nights anyway, so please pass the eggnog.

But most importantly, and what makes me smile at every Christmas Tree I pass, is this:

A Christmas Tree on government property is the most powerful symbol of freedom the world has ever known.

A Christmas Tree symbolizes the deeply-held beliefs and traditions of the overwhelming majority of the American people. These beliefs exist independent of government influence, are not enforced by any law enforcement agency, and are wholly optional.

I could walk down the street with an electric Menorah on my head without jeopardizing my ability to work, vote, or own property. Someone might hand me a pamphlet, but no one is going to kick down my door.

In a government of, by, and for the People, I can reject the People's God and suffer absolutely no adverse consequences.

This is tremendous.

This is freedom.

This is America.

Merry Christmas.

Cross-posted at Right Klik.

Last-minute gift idea

Need a last-minute gift idea for a responsible homeowner?

Give them a lovely card inscribed with the following sentiment:

Out of respect and admiration for your tireless dedication to paying your mortgage, I called my Senator and urged him to vote against Joseph A. Smith, Obama's pick to head the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA).

As described previously, here and here, the Obama Administration is pressuring Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to reduce the principal on mortgages taken out by borrowers who are underwater but who can nevertheless afford their mortgage payments. The FHFA regulates Fannie and Freddie, and Joseph A. Smith seems inclined to require Fannie and Freddie to participate in Obama's jingle mail bailout. As such, he must not be allowed anywhere near FHFA.

Senator Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) recently said that allowing Fannie and Freddie to write down principal balances would amount to "redistribution from taxpayers in general to certain classes of homeowners."

Certain classes of homeowners who can still afford to make their mortgage payments.

Congressional Republicans have already caught a whiff of this nominee, but additional support always helps. A phone call or an email might help squelch Obama's latest effort to "spread the wealth," and I can't think of a nicer Christmas present.

Cross-posted at Right Klik.

O come, all ye with negative equity

The Obama administration has a great idea: they are going to prop up the housing market by pressuring Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to give people more house than they paid for.

The administration is afraid that people who have negative equity, i.e. they owe more than their houses are worth (also known as being "underwater"), will make the immoral but economically rational decision to stop paying their mortgages. Sometimes these underwater borrowers mail their house keys to their mortgage lenders, a practice so prevalent it has been given the name "jingle mail."

Under the administration's proposal, banks would receive a subsidy for reducing underwater borrowers' principal, and would then hand the loans off to FHA, putting the taxpayer on the hook in the event of default.

Bear in mind, underwater borrowers are not necessarily distressed borrowers. They can afford their mortgages, they just don't want to pay them anymore.

This proposal benefits a small subset of homeowners on the basis of their presumed imminent immoral behavior, creating an ethical death spiral at the expense of: people who aren't able to afford to buy houses; people who bought houses and paid off what they owed without government handouts; and people whose equity has dwindled as a result of the housing crisis, but who are still above water and therefore not eligible for Obama's jingle mail bailout.

Remarkably, at the same time that some in the Obama administration are talking about unprecedented aid to people who can afford to pay their mortgages, others are talking about taking away one of the last perks the middle class enjoys: the mortgage interest deduction.

Obama's deficit reduction commission has set its sights on the mortgage interest deduction, which will be worth approximately $131 billion in 2012. These are extraordinary times, they tell us. The scope of the deficit makes every government program and perk subject to elimination, they tell us.

Every program, that is, except for a jingle mail bailout for underwater borrowers who can afford to make their mortgage payments.

In my circle of friends and acquaintances, there are a number of people who have bought houses in the last few years. We're not flippers, we bought for the long term. Our equity has evaporated during the housing crisis, but we aren't going to stop paying our mortgages, despite the fact that no one is offering to write down our principal. And without exception, if we lose the mortgage interest deduction, we will lose our houses.

I've often wondered what it would take for me to don a mask and run through the streets breaking windows and setting cars on fire. The prospect of eliminating the mortgage interest deduction has me reaching for my lighter.

Pandora ate my homework

To recap, these are the functions the Pandora internet radio application will have access to if you install the Pandora application on your smartphone:

Full internet access, create bluetooth connections

Read contact data, add or modify calendar events and send email to guests

Phone calls: read phone state and identity

Modify global system settings, change wi-fi state, bluetooth administration, change network connectivity, prevent phone from sleeping.

That's right, an internet radio station wants to "read contact data, add or modify calendar events and send email to guests."

Look on the bright side: next time you forget something, blame it on Pandora.

"Hi, Boss. No of course I didn't forget our 2:00 meeting, must be that wacky Pandora app modifying my calendar events again!"

My radio station is stalking me

Pandora, the free internet-based radio station, is an interesting concept. Enter the names of a few artists that you like to listen to, and Pandora will craft a commercial-free personalized radio station just for you. In the alternative, you can listen to stations created by friends, or to genre stations.

Pandora is available as a smartphone app, and those of who are still on unlimited data plans can listen to our hearts content without paying a dime.

A little odd though, isn't it? Free music, unsupported by subscription fees or intrusive advertising?

This morning, I was reminded that there is no free lunch.

A Pandora software update was available, so I checked the details, and I was horrified. The update would allow Pandora to access my calendar, send emails to my contacts, and track the originating and destination locations of my phone calls. I verified the information that Pandora already has access to, and it includes reading my contact information and tracking my phone calls.

This is outrageous.

We expect, or should expect, any merchant we do business with to collect certain information about us. But why the hell does a radio station think it is entitled to know who my contacts are, or the location of people I talk to?

The quick and dirty answer is, people are entitled to whatever information we voluntarily give them, and I goofed by not paying closer attention to Pandora's privacy settings when I began using the app.

I've learned my lesson. I've deleted Pandora from my smartphone.

TSA misses another security breach

On the evening of November 15, residents on a quiet street in Milton, Massachusetts made a gruesome discovery: the body of a young man bearing signs of mutilation and massive head trauma.

Who was the young man, who were his killers, why would anyone do that to another human being and then leave him here, these questions and more gripped the Boston area.

There is a resolution of sorts, although it raises more questions than it answers.

The young man has been identified as a North Carolina teenager named Delvonte Tisdale, and investigators have concluded that he stowed away in the wheel well of a Boeing 737 bound from Charlotte to Boston and fell from the plane as the landing gear lowered during the plane's approach to Boston's Logan Airport.

The question now is, how was a teenager able to evade airport security in Charlotte, make it onto the tarmac, and climb up into the wheel well of an aircraft without anyone noticing?  This is yet another security breach that the TSA didn't catch.

While holiday travelers are having their genitalia groped by TSA employees, they might venture to ask if anyone in airline security has checked the wheel well of the plane they are about to board.

Merry Christmas from the Religion of Peace

Today, on a downtown Stockholm street teeming with Christmas shoppers, an adherent of the Religion of Peace tried to detonate a car bomb, but apparently only succeeded in blowing himself up.

On behalf of infidels everywhere, I graciously accept his death as a holiday gift. 

One down.

You and I just bought this guy a car

Earlier today, in a creepy San Francisco ceremony featuring a guy who dressed up as a polar bear and hugged people, Redwood City resident Olivier Chalouhi became the first person to own an all-electric Nissan Leaf.

He paid about $33,500, but with tax credits his final cost will be about $20,000.

In other words, you and I just bought this guy a car.

But there is some good news.  Chalouhi didn't trade in his SUV for a Leaf, he traded in his...bicycle.  So Chalouhi's purchase has deviated a bit from the Left's electric vehicle hymnal, in that his purchase of a Leaf actually increases emissions rather than decreases them, and increases the number of cars on the road.

Even though a Leaf runs on electricity, the production of that electricity generates emissions. Chalouhi lives in Redwood City, which means he is a customer of Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E), and PG&E's electricity sources are 14% renewable, 13% hydroelectric, 35% natural gas, 20% nuclear, and 15% "unspecified."

There are emissions associated with producing electricity from natural gas, but I'm grooving on the 20% nuclear.

So we helped subsidize this guy's purchase of a politically-correct, uber-Green Leaf, but it gets him off his bike and puts him behind the wheel.  In addition, 20% of the juice in his car is provided by politically-incorrect nuclear power.  And I'l betcha he travels farther afield in his Leaf than he did on his bike.

That can't be the result the environmentalists were hoping for.

Heh.

Olivier, drive it in good health.

California's train to nowhere

Thanks to the Obama administration's peevishness, California just got another $624 million in federal funds for its $4.2 billion Train to Nowhere.

Newly-elected Governors in Ohio and Wisconsin recognized that high speed rail (HSR) projects in their own states were a luxury their taxpayers could not afford, and asked the Department of Transportation for permission to reallocate the federal HSR funds they'd been awarded to other pressing transportation projects, such as roadway improvements.

In response, the Department of Transportation withdrew $1.2 billion in federal funds from Ohio and Wisconsin, and awarded $624 million of it to California's HSR project, popularly known as the Train to Nowhere.

California's HSR project is an ambitious plan to build a high speed connection between San Francisco in the north and Anaheim in the south.  The project is having difficulty getting off the ground due to: public opposition to the HSR route proposed on the Peninsula south of San Francisco: public opposition to HSR routes planned east of San Francisco; civil rights complaints by minority groups claiming they are being left out of the contracting process; ethics and conflict-of-interest violations by California HSR Board members; and no fewer than five separate analyses this year alone indicating that California's HSR project is based on inflated ridership estimates and a flawed financial model (see, e.g., the University of California, the Legislature's Peer Review Committee, the Legislative Analyst's Office, the State Auditor, and the State Inspector General.)  

Nonetheless, California's HSR Authority has soldiered on, and announced a plan to spend $4.2 billion in federal funds to build a 65 mile segment between two tiny San Joaquin Valley towns, Borden and Corcoran. This first segment will include tracks, platforms, and stations, but will not include locomotives or passenger cars, or the power source necessary to run any trains on the track. No passengers will be carried on this segment of the project until the rest of the project is built.

The HSR Authority's criteria for selecting to spend money on this lonely stretch of track?  They have a use-or-lose deadline by which they need to commit the money, there is little public opposition, and the track could conceivably be used by someone someday if the rest of the system is never built.

In other words, Obama's Department of Transportation has disregarded the real, immediate transportation needs of Ohio and Wisconsin in favor of a 65 mile long section of track in California that may not ever transport anyone anywhere.

Ladies and gentlemen, this is how your tax dollars are being spent in California.

Obama has already withdrawn $1.5 billion from California's 2011 HSR budget, but the remainder of the federal commitment needs to be withdrawn as well.  These large public works projects always unfold the same way: once they start building this boondoggle, taxpayers at the state and federal level will be required to contribute ever increasing amounts of money to support the project, on the grounds of not abandoning investments they've already made.  This obligation will continue in perpetuity, as every public transit system is California requires subsidies in order to operate, and the California HSR Authority's rosy ridership estimates have been thoroughly discredited.

Majority Leader-Elect Eric Cantor has launched a website called You Cut, where we are invited to nominate and vote on cuts in federal spending.  If there is any justice, California's High Speed Rail Boondoggle, it's Train to Nowhere, will make it to the top of the You Cut list.

Wait, what just happened?

This week, the Man Who Would Bring People Together alienated the Left by denying them the class war he'd promised during the campaign, and alienated the Center-Right by referring to principled opposition as hostage-taking; Bernie Sanders (Socialist-VT) went all Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, and Obama invoked the Wrath of Michelle before turning a press event over to former President Bill Clinton. 

I step away from Twitter and the blogs for a day, and Obama abdicates.  Holy mackerel.

Fool Britannia

Twenty-two years later, I remember their pictures on the front page of the newspaper, I remember the Scotsman who had a dead woman crash through the roof of his house still buckled into her seat.

According to the Guardian, we now know what we already suspected; al-Megrahi, the man who blew Pan Am Flight 103 out of the sky above Lockerbie, Scotland, was released in response to Libyan threats against the United Kingdom's commercial interests.

Some on the Left accuse the United States of fighting wars for oil. Well you know what? I'd rather be the country that goes in shooting than the country that protects its interests by giving in to thugs.

What the hell, maybe it's a good thing that Obama has been giving the Brits the cold shoulder, because they obviously can't be trusted.

Shame on Great Britain.