Also, watch this:

I love how they don’t actually hide any of the social extortion/negotiation that goes along. Kids behave because if they don’t, no red envelope for you, you little shits. And the adults hang around long enough until they drink enough to stand each other.

Look for the phrase “Gan Bei” (= “bottom’s up”). Repeatedly.

… oh yeah. And happy Valentine’s Day too.

Howard Zinn, the Boston University historian and political activist who was an early opponent of US involvement in Vietnam and whose books, such as “A People’s History of the United States,” inspired young and old to rethink the way textbooks present the American experience, died today in Santa Monica, Calif, where he was traveling. He was 87.

Apple’s CEO, Steve Jobs, finally unveiled the Apple iPad during an event today. The name of the new tablet was revealed only a few days ago, and aims to separate itself from tablet computers such as Microsoft’s new Slate PC category. Leaks have prepared us all for an “iPhone on steroids” and we recently estimated the release date to be April 2010. The “iPhone on steroids” has turned out to be a good description of the new Apple iPad, and the release date will indeed be April 2010.

Presumably with the different versions, there will be a mini and a maxi iPad. With any luck, the product will have … wait for it … wings.

bada boom!

Stupid name for a tweener product (doesn’t do what your laptop does, barely does more than the iPhone and still can’t make calls, too expensive, and yet another gadget to carry … yeah, not seeing the utility of this one).

By Rush Limbaugh

I know there are a lot of people out there who are upset about some of the things I’ve been saying on my radio program lately. My comments about the situation in Haiti have hurt and angered many Americans who genuinely care about the plight of the Haitian people, and that hurt and anger will likely never go away. Many of you are probably wondering, “What would compel a human being to say things like that?” Well, here’s your answer: I am a very bad person. And, to tell you the truth, I don’t really want to be alive anymore.
…

The irony is that, even if I did die, the hell I would surely be sent to could not possibly be any worse than the bottomless pool of excrement I already paddle around in like some demented, shit-covered walrus. In fact, every time I hear my voice coming through the headphones I nearly gag, and I think, “What the fuck am I doing?” Why would I say that Michael J. Fox is faking his Parkinson’s symptoms? Why would I find it funny to play a song called “Barack the Magic Negro”? Why would I tell people not to give aid to Haiti?

What the fuck is wrong with me?

Good times

What Dad got:

What Dad thought he saw:

heh

Love gut explosions. These strings were what I was using when The Magic Night happened (a tennis Magic Night of Sublime Awesomeness, not one of those romantic Magic Nights). Yes, I will be using this setup again.

Main: Tecnifibre Black Code @ 52
Cross: Gaucho gut @ 55

After a loooong time between breaks (winter has cramped my schedule), I broke 3 in one day. The other two looked pretty pedestrian, so no need to display.

Side note: taking off the headtape on one of the other racquets took off the graphics with it. Boo in that cheapass decals come off/aren’t underneath a layer of lacquer and boo that its resale value was just trashed, but yay in that the graphics just became much less embarrassing. Don’t quite know how to feel about that one.

FAKE

The videos that have been released appear to have been edited, in some cases substantially, including the insertion of a substitute voiceover for significant portions of Mr. O’Keefe’s and Ms. Giles’s comments, which makes it difficult to determine the questions to which ACORN employees are responding. A comparison of the publicly available transcripts to the released videos confirms that large portions of the original video have been omitted from the released versions.

Where’s the kerning squaders for truth now?

If reactionary conservatives weren’t dishonest they would have no other recognizable qualities. Fuckers.

Oh, and by the way, that backdoor bill of attainder that Congress tried to pass about ACORN? Ruled unconstitutional today. Suck on that, freepers.

Also, I want an apology from Jon Stewart for running so hard with this story.

From: Simon Edhouse
Date: Monday 16 November 2009 2.19pm
To: David Thorne
Subject: Logo Design

Hello David,

I would like to catch up as I am working on a really exciting project at the moment and need a logo designed. Basically something representing peer to peer networking. I have to have something to show prospective clients this week so would you be able to pull something together in the next few days? I will also need a couple of pie charts done for a 1 page website. If deal goes ahead there will be some good money in it for you.

Simon

From: David Thorne
Date: Monday 16 November 2009 3.52pm
To: Simon Edhouse
Subject: Re: Logo Design

Dear Simon,

Disregarding the fact that you have still not paid me for work I completed earlier this year despite several assertions that you would do so, I would be delighted to spend my free time creating logos and pie charts for you based on further vague promises of future possible payment. Please find attached pie chart as requested and let me know of any changes required.

Regards, David.

It goes on from there.

That reminds me of the interactions I used to have back in the day (I was not the “entrepreneur” side of the equation. Good times, good times. Now I have to be all professional and important-like instead of driving circles of hilariously acerbic wit[fn1] around imbeciles who don’t have a fucking clue and/or are a CEO.

… unfortunately, he doesn’t offer an RSS feed. Cocksucker.

I should also mention that I’ve mentioned him before for one of the funniest email strings ever.

FN1. my perspective, but I assure you it is accurate. Q.E.D.

Now that Vivendi and General Electric have struck a deal, cable giant Comcast is expected to to buy a controlling stake in NBC-Universal; marking the biggest proposed media merger in recent memory. Comcast, the largest cable company and the No. 1 residential Internet service provider in the nation, would take over the NBC empire: a television network, Universal Studios, MSNBC, CNBC, USA Network, Telemundo, the Weather Channel, Hulu.com, 27 television stations and a host of other properties.

This train wreck of a deal will hurt all over. It will mean increased costs for cable television service; currently free online NBC content locked behind a pay wall; less opportunity for the distribution of independent media; even fewer choices and less programming diversity. On average, nearly one quarter of all channels offered to cable subscribers will be owned by the bloated Comcast.

I’m not sure I buy that this deal must mean free content moving behind a pay wall, but for the rest… pretty much. Consolidation of formal, accepted media (that is, not the internet) into such a small number of companies is a Really Bad Idea, for democracy, freedom, and overall entertainment value. Think about it – in just a few months, 80% of everything you see on TV will be coming from one of four companies. That’s just crazy.

The TIME piece is, however, more evidence that we’re the biggest collection of whiny ass babies in our country’s history though. So we’ve got that going for us.

Make sure to check out the customer-submitted pictures.

This is actually from a PBS series, believe it or not. Work it, girl!

Hee

I will never understand why Rand is so popular among the far right and “libertarians” of this country. Let me rephrase – I can understand why the philosophy of utter narcissism may be appealing, but am unable to understand how anyone could devote themselves to it. Add in that her writing is sub-Twilight/Dan Brown-level bad, the dialogue wooden and worse than something from the Cultural Revolution, and that at some point, the reader must come into contact with another human being and I just don’t see its appeal.

Check that, Rand nails the mental makeup of the current American right:

Her heroes are a cocktail of extreme self-love and extreme self-pity: They insist they need no one, yet they spend all their time fuming that the masses don’t bow down before their manifest superiority.

Spot on.

Add in that the narcissism of Wall Street (who are obviously the producers and not the lice, right Mr. Greenspan) and I can see this appealing to an insular little group of aristocrats… but how on earth did our financial policy become beholden to this group of retards?

I encourage all Objectivists to go Galt. Immediately. And/or talk to a girl. I’m not sure which will happen first.

Words cannot encompass just how much wrong is contained in this 7 minute video. Trust me, there are oodles. And oodles. And then more. At some point, it goes around the bend from cover-your-eyes all the way back to fantastic … but then it goes back to horrible.

Wow. Just … wow.

Let’s sum up his actions: he photographed, drugged, and raped (orally and sodomized) a 13 year old girl. He was sentenced to 2 years in prison, but then skipped the country after serving only 30 days and has been living in non-extradition countries since.

Now, boatloads of people are rushing to his defense and I cannot understand why (mostly from the left, too, which is shameful. Whoopi, HuffPo, Applebaum, etc.). Simply because he is a great director does not make him above the law. There may have been some judicial improprieties at the trial, but the undisputed fact is that he raped a young girl. I don’t care how different standards of sexuality are in Europe – rape of a child is rape of a child. A 13 year old is only a “woman” if you’re living in Sparta and the wheel hasn’t been invented yet.

Polanski is now the entertainment world’s OJ Simpson.

(the others aren’t nearly so good)

Right up there with the reality show “I’m not here to make friends”

This video cracks me up. Music’s awesome too.

Update: cracks me up… disturbs others. Overly Kubrick, I guess, but what got me was the bridge with the interlude to the childhood friendship. C’mon, genius! Way less Clockwork Orange that way. Anyhoo, Here’s the fine young lads being all young and brit-like:

(note, not the studio cut)

Try not to be slightly disturbed that Alex Turner (lead singer) looks a lot like Martin Freeman (Tim from the British Office).

I am not going to toy with your emotions the way I usually do in reviews like these and give you some long political analysis about class or social anxiety or lesbians. The fact is that this movie was lame, both as a movie and as a cultural symptom. It was dimly lit, filled with boring spaceship corridors and even more boring monsters, and lightly sprinkled with a backstory far more interesting than the front story. Watching Pandorum was like playing a metal album backwards to hear the Satanic messages and getting only some voice saying, “I like balloons” over and over again.