Truth is Stranger than Fiction

And sometimes, it's more noir than fiction, too.




Woman's Body Found In Suitcase On SF Waterfront


SAN FRANCISCO -- A tourist walking along San Francisco’s scenic waterfront with his niece Tuesday made a shocking discovery on the rocks – a suitcase containing a young woman's body.



Lt. Mike Stasko, head of the San Francisco Police Department's homicide division, confirmed the discovery was being treated as a homicide or a questionable death.



“We have a body in a suitcase,” he told KTVU. “Right now, what we are doing is the body is being transported back to the medical examiner’s office....You never get used to something like this. Someone went ahead and … put the body in a suitcase and hoped that it was going to go down in the Bay.”


http://www.ktvu.com/news/23595753/detail.html

I'm kind of hesitant to admit it, but I'm more intrigued by this story than horrified. I really want to know the backstory and chain of events that led to this woman being stuffed in a samsonite and tossed off a bridge.

What I really want to do is write a series of detective novels and include this incident. You know how the more successful series are titled to revolve around a particular theme? I'd use airline travel terms as my hook: Early Departure, Terminal, Black Box, Missed Connection, etc.



This one would be called Carrion Luggage.

Jen, You Ignorant Slut

After years of speaking out about her son’s autism — and against childhood immunizations — Jenny McCarthy is reversing her position.

After years of speaking publicly about her belief that MMR shots (immunization for measles, mumps, and rubella) caused her son to suffer from autism, Jenny McCarthy now faces the reality that her 7-year-old son Evan — who no longer shows any signs of autism — may likely have lived with completely different illness.

A new article in Time Magazine — which Jenny was interviewed for — suggests Evan suffers from Landau-Kleffner syndrome, “a rare childhood neurological disorder that can also result in speech impairment and possible long-term neurological damage.”...

And though her son may never have had autism, Jenny insists, “I’ll continue to be the voice” of the disease.

(http://www.hollywoodlife.com/2010/02/26/jenny-mccarthy-says-her-son-evan-never-had-autism/)


I cannot adequately express how much this whore pisses me off.

How many children have suffered or died because their parents listened to this piece of ass instead of their doctors? Oh yeah, there's a website for that:

http://www.jennymccarthybodycount.com/Jenny_McCarthy_Body_Count/Home.html

The parents share the blame, of course, as do Jen's publishers, Oprah, the tabloids, and anyone else who gave her a platform to vomit up her ignorance. But Jen, who knew that she only had an opinion, and went forth as if she alone had figured it all out, bears the lyin' share of responsibility.

And what's this bullshit about "I'll continue to be the voice" of Autism? What makes you think for one goddamned minute that we - the parents of children who actually have Autism - want you to be our self-appointed spokeslut? You have already proven that you are completely unqualified to spout off about anything medical, unless it's the treatment of various STDs. What makes you think you are even remotely relevant to this issue? Your kid suffered from Landau-Kleffner syndrome and having a self-important bitch for a mother. And even when you were under the impression that he did have Autism, you chose to spout propaganda from a discredited, scientifically-unsound study, against all statistical evidence, with no medical training.

I only hope that you put forth as much effort in getting the news out about your change of heart as you did in your original swath of destruction. Try this: spread the word as much as you spread your legs; that should do it.

And for all you celebrity-worshippers: Having your vagina photographed only makes you an expert at having your vagina photographed. If you don't believe me, I refer you to the definitive study published by that Nobel-winning dream team: Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan, and Paris Hilton.

Election Dysfunction

I can't believe I haven't used that title until now.

All kinds of elections and votes last night. Caught a newscast from CNN on my way in to work this morning about various races, and noted two things.

One, their tagline now is “America’s most trusted news source.” Really? Every time the numbers come out, FOX has anywhere between three and five times the number of viewers as CNN. FOX also claims at least thirteen of the top fifteen news show slots every quarter. And according to advertising revenue, CNN is dead last in the primary 18-49 market. If they’re defining “America” as “people we employ,” maybe CNN has a claim, but otherwise…

The other thing was the newscaster using the term “controversial.” The lead-in to the story was “Maine voters passed two controversial referendums yesterday.”

One referendum was to allow the use of medical marijuana in the state. When approximately 80% of the respondents to an informal poll are in favor of legalizing pot, Liberals and Conservatives are telling the Feds they’re missing out on a huge revenue stream by ignoring it, and everyone is focused on medical care right now, this vote isn’t even a surprise, much less controversial.

The other was voting against legally recognizing gay marriage, previously passed by the Maine legislature. I’m not sure what’s so controversial about this, either. Gay marriage has been voted on thirty-one separate times, all across the country, and has been defeated every time. To me, that seems pretty clear that it’s a mainstream position. Maybe CNN is astounded by the fact that The People went against the mandates handed down by their legislators and exercised their right to smack them down with a big ol’ veto.

On another network, the Maine ban on gay marriage was mentioned briefly, and the commentator (from Politico.com, I believe) was asked if that reflected the opinions of the rest of the country. His dismissive reply was that Maine has always been “kind of odd, and fiercely independent.”

It’s been voted down thirty-one times, dink. That’s neither odd nor independent.

The newscaster asked another leading question: “Do you think this vote means the issue has been laid to rest?” My immediate reaction was: Fuck, no. The gay lobby will keep forcing vote after vote after vote until they get the results they want. They’re like that little kid who keeps shouting “Do over! Do over!” when they lose. I understand the dangers of the Tyranny of the Majority, but neither can 3% of the population force the remaining 97% into a mindset they don’t hold already.

Unless you get them stoned, first.

The Dead Pool

Ed McMahon

Farrah Fawcett

Michael Jackson

Billy Mays

Yet Amy Winehouse still lives.

I think the whole "shuffling off this mortal coil" system is broken, but I don't know who to complain to.

Got Swine Flu?

I was watching the news last night because Mrs. Cat had taken over the computer and I was too lazy to get up and change the channel after Castle went off (but the remote is way over therrrrrre!). The anchor droids were ecstatic because they’d managed to find some local connection to the Swine Flu brouhaha currently rooting through the airwaves, and got to show scary pictures of people coming into our airport wearing surgical masks.

We had the Closed Captioning on because the litter was asleep, and I noticed that whoever is in charge of it really wasn’t very good at keeping up. Since I know the vapid piles of clothing behind the anchor desk are just reading from a TelePrompTer, wouldn’t it make sense to load that script into a scroll across the bottom of the screen? Someone’s already typed it up once; why duplicate the effort? You might miss some “light-hearted banter” in between segments, but have you really missed anything?

Judge not...

So what I’m gathering from headlines on the fluffy entertainment sites is that Miss California was but one step away from being the next Miss USA, until she happened to voice an opinion that differed from a gay judge’s. Is that about right?

Let’s set aside the question of whether she was punished for her position on gay marriage. Let’s not worry if this marks the end of her pageant career. I think the most relevant question is:

Who the fuck decided that a gay man would make a good judge for a tits-n-ass contest?

When I heard that Perez Hilton was the judge in question, I immediately thought of this exchange from Kiss Kiss Bang Bang:

Harry Lockhart: So…still gay?
Gay Perry: Me? No. I’m knee-deep in pussy. I just like the name so much, I can’t get rid of it.

I don’t know who decided that gay men were the experts on all things feminine (though I suspect the Bravo Network had something to do with it), but when you really look at that assertion, it’s fucking ridiculous. If you want to attract a straight man, whose advice would you follow? Lance Bass’ or Salma Hayek’s?

Admittedly, gay men have an advantage when it comes to fashion, because they’re in key positions in that industry already. But fashion isn’t really for women, anyway. I know I’m not the first one to state that today’s models look more like adolescent boys than adult women. I know not to mix plaids with stripes, and to make sure the important bits are covered. After that, I don’t really give a shit.

I’ve also noticed that gay men to adopt the worst character traits of women, in that they tend to be shrill, cutting, and venomous (Perez has apparently shared his expert opinion on his blog that Miss California is a bitch). Is that who you want to be getting advice from on how to comport yourself?

So there you have it, gentle readers. Someone in their infinite wisdom decided that this young woman

should be judged by this sterling arbiter of good taste, healthy living, and fashion know-how

Six off the cuff

Pulls gun from garter and takes care of it

Mrs. Cat asks an interesting question: Can you think of any action film in which a woman does something incredibly dangerous to save the man she loves? When women wade into the fray, it’s usually to protect their children or the weak, or to fight for some cause or principle – and these are usually in Horrors or Dramas. Or it’s played for laughs in Comedies and Spoofs. As many movies as we’ve seen, we can’t think of a straight-up “Stand back, honey; let me handle this.” situation.

***

Hats off to stupid policies

The Pittsburg-area bank PNC has a new policy: customers must take off their hats, sunglasses and other items that might conceal their identity while inside its branches. Apparently, this is a growing trend for banks nationwide.

"Hopefully, [thieves] see that sign and will say they should go someplace else," said Margot Mohsberg, spokeswoman for the American Bankers Association.” Yeah, because people who have convinced themselves to commit a felony will be dissuaded by a laminated sign.

Bruce Spitzer, spokesman for the Massachusetts Bankers Association, said "We knew that implementing this would not solve all bank robberies. But it might prevent some.” Good thinking, Bruce. I bet if you restricted all transactions to the drive-up window, you’d cut them down even further. Once you start justifying actions with “It might prevent some (whatever)”, the line differentiating sound policy and absurdity disappears.

Now I want to rob a bank with a tree just to see the “No Trees” signs appear.

***

Challenging, but not…you know…challenging

I’m helping someone create a trivia game, and was chastised for asking too-difficult questions. Sorry, dude; I thought you wanted this to be kind of fun.

***

When verbification attacks

Shutterbugs have been hassled in Phoenix, AZ for taking pictures of downtown buildings. When asked which DHS statute they were violating (the “charge”), the helpful police officer told them to “Google it.”

***

Zero tolerance = zero intelligence

http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2009/04/sexting-hysteri.html

I’m thinking the whole “sexting” scare is being blown out of proportion by the media to sell product, just like the germs stories, the shark stories, the dangerous toys stories, etc. etc.

***

More inappropriate humor

Mrs. Cat looked over at some visitors in the boneyard next door and commented; “The zombies are getting fresher.”

All Smug in Their Beds

Sorry I’m posting late tonight, dear readers; I was participating in Earth Hour and couldn’t find my way back into the house without the lights on.

I know many of you may be surprised that I, a big manly Tomcat who has previously shown nothing but disdain for the environmental movement, would actively participate in such an event, but I’m a sucker for purely symbolic actions that do nothing towards actually achieving what they’re supposed to achieve. It allows me to be a total wastrel the other 8,759 hours in the year, but still feel good about having “done my part.” I don’t feel hypocritical at all, and feelings are what it’s all about these days.

I love the fact that even if a billion people participate in Earth Hour, it would only save the equivalent of six seconds’ worth of China’s carbon output – however the fuck they’re measuring carbon output these days. Are we still hung up on CO2, or are we converting it to grams of the pure element now?

I saw an amusing article that noted how many people used candles during Earth Hour, and demonstrated mathematically that candles are worse for the environment than a 40-watt bulb. I (heart) cogent and logical thought.

Pebble bed reactors. Look them up. We have the technology and the skills to implement them right now. The effects would be immediate. The savings would be impressive. The pollution would be negligible.

I guarantee you that no one in government clamoring about the “Grid” or “Energy Independence” would give it even a passing thought, because those are not their actual goals. Power (not the grid kind) is what they're really after. As I’ve stated before: If they solved problems, they would be out of a job. They’d rather whip the sheep into pointless exercises like Earth Hour to prove how committed they are to the cause.

Talk about the lights being on with nobody home.

Scanning the headlines

Well that was money well-spent

The United States is prepared to discuss the establishment of a political party for the Taliban in Afghanistan, a U.S. diplomat says.

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2009/03/22/Taliban_political_party_being_considered/UPI-68201237732734/

***

But but but…they said it was based on a true story

The movie, "A Haunting in Connecticut," doesn't open until Friday, but curious fans are already making a beeline for the Southington home that inspired the movie.

"It's just been really, really stressful," said Susan Trotta-Smith, who bought the home 10 years ago with her husband. "It's been a total change from a very quiet house in a very quiet neighborhood to looking out the window and seeing cars stopping all the time. It's been very, very stressful, and sometimes worrisome."

The family has never seen anything unusual inside their five-bedroom, two-family white wood-frame house and does not believe the property was haunted.

http://www.kwgn.com/pages/landing_national/?Horror-film-draws-unwanted-visitors-to-C=1&blockID=246234&feedID=23

***

Did we not have enough words already?

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/03/22/BUCT16ES6B.DTL

What the fuck does that mean, anyway?

***

Correction

AIG did not pay their executives $165 million as was previously reported.

It was actually $218 million.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29812224/

We could probably make up some of that money by selling hunting licenses.

***

For those of you who didn’t have enough to obsess over

http://www.anorak.co.uk/media/204690.html

Just when I think humanity can’t get any crazier, they prove me wrong. God bless ‘em.

Yes We Can! (ignore the Constitution)

Today, the House passed a bill imposing a 90% tax on bonuses paid to employees with family incomes above $250,000 at companies that have received at least $5 billion in bailout funding. The bill is retroactive back to January 1, 2009.

This is obviously levied at AIG, since there has been great public outrage over their recently-disclosed $165 million bonuses.

One new point I saw in the article was this gem:

“About 400 AIG employees and future employees received bonuses”

Future employees?!? Those fuckers are paying out bonuses to people who don’t even work for them? These assholes need to die by inches. They are too fucking irresponsible and too fucking impertinent to be allowed to continue polluting our planet. Every fucking dime should be taken away from them before they’re kicked out of their offices. Through the windows.

Now…obviously I agree with the spirit of the penalty tax (and make no mistake, it is a punishment), but there’s just one teeny little problem:

The Constitution forbids it.

Specifically, Article 1; Section 9; clause 3, which states “No bill of attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed.”

[A bill of attainder is an act of legislature declaring a person or group of persons guilty of some crime and punishing them without benefit of a trial.

An ex post facto law (from the Latin for "after the fact") is a law that retroactively changes the legal consequences of acts committed or the legal status of facts and relationships that existed prior to the enactment of the law. In reference to criminal law, it may criminalize actions that were legal when committed.]

Not a whole lot of wiggle-room there, Congress. While the clauses immediately before and after Clause 3 have an “unless” mitigating their directives, Clause 3 ends with a nice, clear period. You can’t do it.

This hasn’t stopped our public serpents, though. The House passed it 328-93, a similar bill is in the Senate, and Obama has expressed support for "the idea."

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Botox) said “"We want our money back now for the taxpayers. It isn't that complicated."

First off, plastic girl, it ain’t your money; it’s ours. Secondly, you only want it back because of the backlash against Congress, which should have been aware of the forthcoming bonuses, but which also stripped out language in the first money-grab bill that would have prevented the bonuses in the first place. You’re trying to save face, which is ironic since your face will be perfectly preserved long after the rest of you has crumbled into dust.

While the House is only stealing 90% of the bonuses, Charles Rangel (D-Ends justify Means), chairman of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee, said he expected local and state governments to take the remaining 10%. What he’s really saying is that he hopes those levels of Government are as corrupt and punitive as the House is.

This administration is showing absolutely no hesitation in ignoring the Constitution in order to punish a group of people. It only took forty minutes for the House bill to pass. Think they’ll hesitate for one second when it comes to doing anything else they want to do?

As much as I loathe the directors of AIG, I sincerely hope they get a few of their attack lawyers to take this to the Supreme Court.

Everybody who voted for this bill should be stripped of their seat, because they’re too stupid to understand Constitutional limitations. Maybe with 98% of Congress joining the ranks of the unemployed, we’ll make some real progress in fixing this shit.

Are They Hiring?

AIG will pay out $165,000,000 in bonuses to their executives. Presumably to thank them for the fine work they’ve done in posting the biggest corporate loss in history last quarter – a loss of $61,700,000,000.

AIG’s legal team states that they have a contractual obligation to make those bonus payments. Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner has asked the company – pretty please – if they wouldn’t mind possibly considering maybe not doing that again…if it’s okay with them.

Let’s see…no matter how the company performs, the executives still get bonuses? No wonder the Government didn’t insist on changing that when they handed over the check for $170,000,000,000; they operate the same way.

Political Funny Business

Tonight, I happened to be at a restaurant that had their TV turned to the news. One of the big stories was the breakthrough on the Chandra Levy “cold” case. While I’m glad that the family finally gets some closure, I was more interested in one little tidbit the reporter included in the story.

It seems that when Democratic rep Gary Condit – who had had an affair with Levy – left politics, he moved to Glendale, Arizona and opened two Baskin-Robbins ice cream parlors, which later failed.

Excuse me? How the fuck do you run two ice cream stores into the ground in Glendale, Arizona, where the average summer temperature is 101 degrees Fahrenheit? That’s way beyond ordinary incompetence; you have to be actively trying to fail.

This explains a great deal about the state of our economy, because I am confident that Condit is not an aberration. If our elected representatives had any business sense at all, they’d stay in the private sector and make more money. Think about this, too:

If you owned a business that was losing profits to the point where you had to lay off a good portion of your staff, do you think spending more money would help you recover?

The answer’s obvious, right? Not to our elected idiots in Washington, D.C. Every day, they prove the old bumper sticker right: If the opposite of Pro is Con, what’s the opposite of Progress?

And it’s not just on a national level, either. Iowa’s House of Reps is considering a bill that would categorize parents whose children are exposed to pornography as child abusers, opening them up to Social Services intervention, as well as getting them placed on an Offenders Registry.

That means if your 14-year-old sneaks a Playboy into his room, you can be haunted by the label “Child Abuser” for the rest of your life.

Iowa state law defines obscene material as “any material depicting or describing the genitals, sex acts, masturbation, excretory functions or sadomasochistic abuse which the average person, taking the material as a whole and applying contemporary community standards with respect to what is suitable material for minors, would find appeals to the prurient interest and is patently offensive; and the material, taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, scientific, political or artistic value.”

There are a whole lot of soft definitions in that definition – Who’s average? What community? Suitable for what? – but it’s the last part that makes lawyers lie awake at night, hoping they’ll get a porn case. Who gets to define “serious?”

How about this?

Two Italians, Luigi and Antonio, met on the street.

"Hey, Antonio," said Luigi. "Where you been for the past two weeks? No one seen you around."


"Donna talka to me, Luigi," replied Antonio. "I been inna da jail."


"Jail!" exclaimed Luigi. "What for you been in jail?"


"Wella, Luigi," Antonio said, "I was lying onna da beach, and the cops come, arresta me and throw me inna jail."


"But dey donna throw you in jail just for lying onna da beach!" Luigi countered.


"Yeah, but dissa beach was ascreamin' and akickin' and ayellin'."

See? This joke violates Iowa state law by describing a sex act, and by definition, jokes aren’t serious. However, using the exaggerated Italian accent to provide an alternate definition of “beach’ and provide the punchline of the joke is a form of artistry. So who wins?

You could also make the case that jokes provide sociologists a way to chart prevailing attitudes or public perceptions. That sounds like a serious application to me.

Actually, the whole point is moot, thanks to the First Amendment. And a ton of legal precedents say that if I categorize the Iowa Legislature as a bunch of jerk-offs, even though I’m violating their laws by referencing masturbation, they can’t do anything about it.

Ha! Jerk-offs.

Roundup

Bootlegging 2.0

On March 1st, Arkansas will institute a $0.56/pack tax on cigarettes. On April 1st, the new federal tax goes into effect, raising the price another $0.62/pack. The Arkansas Attorney General’s Office has stated that any Arkansas resident that drives across the Missouri border to purchase cigarettes is legally restricted from possessing any more than 1 carton and 1 pack (11 packs total) without an Arkansas tax stamp. If the value of the un-stamped tobacco in their possession is greater than $100, it’s a Class C felony, punishable by up to 3-10 years in prison.

The federal government punishes tobacco bootlegging of more than 300 cartons (3000 packs total) with a 5-year sentence.

These hicks are nucking futs.

***

One lump or two?

Speaking of taxation, groups in many states are recreating the Boston Tea Party on a local level to protest all both new taxes and hikes on existing taxes. Unfortunately, a group in Cedar Rapids doesn’t seem to have a clear idea about how to protest, as they asked a senior Environmental Office specialist for permission first. Turns out that tea is considered a pollutant, and discoloration is considered a violation. The Tea Party will instead water from buckets labeled “Tea” into the river. And not just any tap water, either – the group was told they’d have to let it sit out for a while first so the chlorine will evaporate, as chlorine is considered a pollutant.

“We don’t want to hurt the river,” said the group’s founder, Wussy McWuswus.

Uh…when you ask the entity you’re protesting for permission to protest, then meekly follow their guidelines on how to do it, you’re not really effecting any sort of change, you gutless cowards.

***

If I say White-Out, is that racist?

Speaking of “Change,” I guess the President “Change”d his mind on not allowing any sort of pork-barrel earmarks into the stimulus bill, as there are 9,427 of them – one of which, a $7.7 million earmark for Tribally-Controlled Postsecondary Vocational Institutions, lists Obama as a co-sponsor. But not to worry. Rob Blumenthal of the Senate Appropriations Committee assures us that in the next draft of the bill, they will remove Obama’s name from the list of sponsors.

I am fucking gobsmacked over the chutzpah of that announcement.

***

PORN!!!

According to a report from NewScientist, so-called “Red States” consume more online porn than so-called “Blue Staes.” I don’t know if that’s weighted according to population density, or if paging through a 20-page X-rated slide show counts as one visit or twenty, but there’s a simple explanation:

They’re all doing research like the guy from yesterday’s entry.

Actually, there’s a lot that’s lacking in this study in terms of correlation/causation. I think they ran it on their site because people in all states click on links with the word “Porn” in them.

***

Get over it. And get over it.

Two things I read about this week. One, a teen-aged girl in the UK described her job as “boring” on Facebook, and was surprised to find out that her bosses knew how to use the internet. She is completely clueless as to why she was fired after posting comments such as:

'first day at work. omg!! So dull!!''all i do is shred holepunch n scan paper!!! omg!''im so totally bord!!!'

Personally, I would have fired her for not knowing how to spell “bored.”

The other incident was reported on the Huffington Post by Lane Hudson, a man who presumably took so much crap growing up over being named “Lane” that he has to spread his utter lack of humor to as many people as possible.

On a United Airlines flight, the pilot made this statement:

“Ladies and Gentlemen, if you are on the left side of the plane, you will see a spectacular view of New York City and US Airways' new runway, the Hudson River.”

Was the comment on poor taste? Debatable. My first reaction was that of one professional good-naturedly ribbing a fellow professional in light of the heroic efforts he made to protect his passengers and crew. It was not a disaster, so we can be a little light-hearted about it.

Apparently, Lame…I mean, Lane…can’t, and he’s asking for people to help him track down this pilot so he can get him fired.

Someone’s still a virgin.

G4TV Uses Games to Lurer Young Boys Into Sin
http://christwire.org/2009/02/g4tv-uses-games-to-lurer-young-boys-into-sin/

“I’m in utter disgust this morning as I research this website G4TV. It is a classic case of “devil in sheeps clothing.” I could get into all the different way this filth is against God, but I want to focus on one show and mainly one person….Olivia Munn on Attack of the Show.

This female acts like she is into gaming, cartoons and nerds. What she is doing is, using this wool to lure young men into watching her and then she starts using her devil powers to expose them to breasts, uncovers legs, mouth sex acts, sexual suggestions and other unholy things.

Even her website is full of scum and sin. She posts photos of her half naked and posts videos partaking in simulated sexual acts. On her “blog” she tries to act like she is an every women, who loves regular men. We all know she is using this on youth to gain ratings and to drive traffic to her website, when in reality she is doing drugs with her high dollar pimps.”


I love the fact that this guy was “researching” the website. I’ve always wondered how these Evangelicals become aware of all the pornography and filth in mainstream pop culture. Hmmm…it’s a channel devoted to the interests of young men, you say? Gaming, cartoons, technology. Think girls might be another interest? Think the directors of programming know that? Think that may be why she was hired?

Let’s ignore the multitude of spelling, grammatical, and other orthographic errors in this foam-flecked screed, and focus on the important point:

Women have devil powers.

Well duh! Why do you think the human race has lasted this long?

Now I’ve got this song stuck in my head:

The Inside Story

The Tulsa International Airport has installed the latest generation of scanners. The glass cases use electromagnetic waves to generate a full-body scan, which reveals everything beneath the passengers’ clothing, not just metallic objects.

The major concern from people is that the machines produce full images, which of course includes their “private parts.” As a half-salute to privacy, the scanners blur out faces.

This doesn’t really bother me. What bothers me is this quote from one of the TSA screeners:

"I don't look at them as people. I look at them as a thing that could have something on it."

That explains a lot about the way we get treated when we’re in the cattle lines at the airports. I’ve traveled enough that I know how to minimize the hassle, but even when I go out of my way to acknowledge the folks on the other side of the machines as human beings, there’s a distinct lack of reciprocity.

I remember the first time I was asked to remove my shoes at an airport. It was in Birmingham, Alabama, and my first instinct was to say “Now…I know you’re from Alabama, and aren’t familiar with these things, but they’re called shoes, and we use them to protect our feet.”

Glad I managed to rein that in, or I’d be on a “No-fly” list for sure.

I’m waiting for the first scans to show up online. It's inevitable.

I wonder if TSA-TnA.com is available.

Monkeyshines

So Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson have found employment for the next few months, protesting the New York Post’s recent editorial cartoon. As near as I can tell, there was a local story about a rabid monkey that had had to be shot at a zoo. The cartoonist depicted the animal control officers standing over the hole-y corpse and saying “Looks like they’ll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill.”

Of course, the professionally offended are all up in arms about the implication that Obama is a monkey, because they don’t know:

a. The President didn’t write the bill; Congress did.
b. There is an old theory about monkeys at typewriters turning out the works of Shakespeare.
c. It’s not uncommon to refer to a colossal cock-up as having been engineered by monkeys.

I found this quote at DemocraticUnderground:

“The cartoonist should be fired! The office of the president deserves our respect.”

Coming from a group that referred to Bush as “Chimpy” for eight years, that’s fucking rich.

***

Quite possibly the best line on television this week:

Man hands gun to girl: “You know how to use one of these?”
Girl takes gun: “Four brothers.”
Girl cocks gun with attitude: “None of them Democrats.”

Dollhouse

***

I saw where Obama wants to nationalize the banks. Since it was Congress that mandated the lending rules that started this big ol’ ball rolling in the first place, why would we do that?

***

A local job fair charged applicants $20 per person to attend. Talk about a recession-proof business.

Autonomous Collectives

The whole Gay Marriage thing has erupted in our county, and I’ve enjoyed reading the stories and comment threads at the local newspaper sites. One thing that struck me in reading these stories is the awkwardness in sentences like “a group of local gays as well as an out-of-town group of lesbians met to voice their opposition to the bill, whereas a group of religious leaders and various members of the religious community turned out in support.”

Tortuous (and torturous) phrasing like that could be obviated by some choice collective nouns. Surprisingly, there aren’t any; so I made my own.

“A local lisp of gays partnered with a flannel of lesbians to oppose the bill, which has the support of a thump of Evangelicals and a pulpit of religious leaders.”

And because I am not totally without mirrors here:

“Proceedings were documented by a bias of bigots using a cliché of stereotypes.”

It's Like 10,000 Spoons

“You may not have heard much about it, but there's a quiet movement afoot to reassert state sovereignty in America and stop the uncontrolled expansion of federal government power. Almost half of the state legislatures are considering or have representatives preparing to introduce resolutions which reassert the principles of the 9th and 10th Amendments to the Constitution and the idea that federal power is strictly limited to specific areas detailed in the Constitution and that all other governmental authority rests with the states.” (http://blogcritics.org/archives/2009/02/05/1833542.php)

This article goes on to explain that the states are concerned about unfunded mandates (i.e. No Child Left Behind), where the Feds demand the states meet certain goals, but don’t provide enough funding for them to be met, leading to shortfalls which the states must make up out of their own budgets.

And though the article also says “Contrary to the fantasies of some extremists, these sovereignty bills are not the first step towards secession or splitting up the union…”, I can’t help but notice the similarities between South Carolina’s latest resolution:

A CONCURRENT RESOLUTION

TO AFFIRM SOUTH CAROLINA'S SOVEREIGNTY UNDER THE TENTH AMENDMENT TO THE UNITED STATES CONSTITUTION OVER ALL POWERS NOT ENUMERATED AND GRANTED TO THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT BY THE UNITED STATES CONSTITUTION…

Be it further resolved that all governmental agencies, quasi-governmental agencies, and their agents and employees operating within the geographic boundaries of the State of South Carolina, or all governmental agencies and their agents and employees, whose actions have effect on the inhabitants or lands or waters of the State of South Carolina, shall operate within the confines of the original intent of the Constitution of the United States or be subject to penalty of law as provided for now or in the future, within the Constitution of South Carolina, the South Carolina statutes, or the common law as guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States.

…and their earlier one:

The people of the State of South Carolina, in convention assembled, on the 26th day of April, A.D., 1852, declared that the frequent violations of the constitution of the United States by the federal government, and its encroachments upon the reserved rights of the states, fully justified this state in then withdrawing from the Federal Union.



Wouldn’t it be really ironic if Obama had to preside over a second Civil War?

Legume: It May Concern

Northwest Airlines has added peanuts back to its in-flight snack menu, and boy are some people pissed. The web site of the Star Tribune (in Minneapolis, where Northwest is based) was inundated with complaints from the public.

One man stated “This is a very disappointing development. My wife’s allergy is so severe that if someone is sitting next to her and eating peanuts, the odor is enough to trigger an allergic reaction."

I’m thinking if your wife is that susceptible, what the hell is she doing out in public?

“What’s wrong with pretzels?” asked another. Nothing at all…unless you’re allergic to wheat.

We’ve all heard horror stories about severely allergic people accidentally ingesting some peanut product and dying. Schools across the country scrambled to remove peanut products from their lunchrooms, airlines endure the bitching and demands for special accommodation, and lobbyists try to cadge money for research.

Know how many people died of food allergies in the US in 2005, according to the CDC?

Eleven.

That’s eleven total; from all food allergies.

Peanut allergies seem to account for approximately 54% of all food allergy-related deaths, so that’s what…six people a year, or thereabouts? And, as it turns out, many of those deaths happened because the person did not have their epi pens with them, so that’s their own fault. So we’re left with maybe two or three people dying each year from a peanut allergy. To hear the stories, though, you’d think these folks were bursting into flames if they even came into contact with Styrofoam peanuts.

Of course, there’s always that one fucking idiot that piously informs you that if even one person dies, it’s too many. If we banned every thing that ever killed at least one person, we wouldn’t have anything left. People are remarkably inventive/stupid when it comes to finding ways to off themselves. More people die from falling out of bed (about 450) every year than from food allergies, but no one is lobbying for the elimination of beds. (At least...I hope not. I'm not giving up my California King.)

I hate it for them, but people that are allergic to peanuts are in the extreme minority. You don’t hear folks with dairy allergies (the #1 food allergy) kvetching about the creamer the stewardesses are tossing around the cabin, do you? Should the rest of the flying public have their P-NUT PAKs taken away because 0.0000006% of the U.S. population might be on the same flight, and might accidentally hoover up some peanut dust?

Don’t be a goober.

For those of you playing along at home…

Number of deaths in peanut salmonella case: 9
Number of deaths in Michael Phelps pot case: 0

Number of arrests in peanut salmonella case: 0
Number of arrests in Michael Phelps pot case: 8

I’m glad we’ve got our priorities straight.

For further consideration:

Number of Olympic Gold Medals salmonella-infected corpses have won: 0
Number of Olympic Gold Medals Michael Phelps has won: 14

Yet this is the media portrayal:

versus