Headlines
Father of soldier killed in Iraq burns NJ flag
Constitution 101 - free course.
Preschooler’s Homemade Lunch Replaced with Cafeteria “Nuggets”
Whitney Houston dead at 48
Video of Gun-toting Dad Blasting Away At Daughter's Laptop
Man Robs Bank Armed with McDonald's Apple Pies
Police Arrest Naked Man Found Covered in Peanut Butter & Chocolate
Man Dies After Swallowing Dentures During Sex
Time for a Change, of Hope
As the gristmill that is the run for the Republican nomination grinds down, the incumbent Prez is testing the waters on a new slogan. This in itself is not unusual, since every nominee and incumbent must have some sort of catchy slogan to capture the imagination of millions of sheep voters. However, unlike most other incumbents, the Prez is testing them by using them in speeches. It helps when you give a speech every week.
…Obama’s surrogates have roadtested some slogans in recent months, including “Winning The Future,” which the White House used to promote its budget, and “Greater Together,” which the campaign has used to brand its youth outreach effort.
Shockingly, the article douses the campaign with much needed ice water:
A new tagline will have to reflect a new reality.
Obama is no longer a Washington outsider, unemployment is falling but still high, and economic insecurity for many voters is a huge concern that a simple slogan cannot overcome.
As the article points out, the Prez may have kept some promises, but he broke many others. That did not instil the Change We Could Believe In™. It was more along the line of Change We Didn’t See Coming™ for a lot of those who voted for the Hope and the Change. But don’t think that the Prez’ team is done with that word.
“I listen to these Republicans speak and they have such a dark, grinding kind of view of this country,” [David Axelrod] said.
“We have a lot of strengths in this country. We’ve got a lot of challenges, but we’ve also got a lot of strengths, and we’re going to work our way through this moment. But that will require change, and those changes are changes that we have to continue.“
Yes indeed, Mr. Axelrod. Republicans do have a “dark, grinding view” of this country. Everything this administration has done in the name of Change™ has made this once shining beacon of a country into a dark abyss, the policies have ground economic freedom into dust, and unlike Pandora’s Box, there is doubt that there is any Hope™ left to bring us back from the hell your Prez has mandated.
This time around, the sheepdogs will not stay silent.
Sweetness and Dark
I think my brain just suffered an aneurysm.
Sugar Should Be Regulated As Toxin, Researchers Say
Tell me this is a nightmare. I SAID TELL ME!!!
Sugar and other sweeteners are, in fact, so toxic to the human body that they should be regulated as strictly as alcohol by governments worldwide, according to a commentary in the current issue of the journal Nature by researchers at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). (emphasis mine)
First of all, that whole “regulating alcohol” bit won’t wash, seeing as every government has its own laws about consumption, and they are all different. Maybe I’m misunderstanding it, but my guess is the researchers want the regulations to be as strict as OUR alcohol laws, not Spain’s. They go on to tell us that over 67% of our population is overweight, and half of those are considered obese, and of those that are obese, 80% will suffer from diabetes or other metabolic diseases, and that 75% of U.S. health-care dollars are spent on such diseases.
You knew it was coming down to money, right?
They also note that even though the role of sugar in obesity is not well known, we still need to learn us some prehistorical stuff.
From an evolutionary perceptive, sugar in the form of fruit was available only a few months of the year, at harvest time, the UCSF researchers said. Similarly, honey was guarded by bees and therefore was a treat, not a dietary staple.
Having studied Nutritional Anthropology, I can tell you that makes sense. But what the researchers forget to add is, we evolved right along with our diet. They forget about the Theory of Evolution when it’s convenient.
I did say this was about money, right?
Lustig, a medical doctor in UCSF’s Department of Pediatrics, compares added sugar to tobacco and alcohol (coincidentally made from sugar) in that it is addictive, toxic and has a negative impact on society, thus meeting established public health criteria for regulation. Lustig advocates a consumer tax on any product with added sugar.
Among Lustig’s more radical proposals are to ban the sale of sugary drinks to children under age 17 and to tighten zoning laws for the sale of sugary beverages and snacks around schools and in low-income areas plagued by obesity, analogous to alcoholism and alcohol regulation.
This is a bit too radical, even for San Francisco. And economists agree!
Economists at Iowa State University led by John Beghin suggest taxing the sweetener itself at the manufacturer level, not the end product containing sugar.
Because as we all know, the manufacturer would never, ever pass along that tax to the consumer, right?
First we regulate trans fats, then we regulate salt, and now sugar. Alcohol is made from sugar. I wonder how that will be greeted by distilleries. Now, I’m not saying there are no obese people. But what happened to fats being the culprit? Or carbohydrates?
What about lack of exercise?? When I was in school, we had PE every day. We could go outside after lunch and play in the playground, or as we got older, we walked around greeting people and hanging out. Here in this school district, PE is done 2 or 3 times a week at the elementary level, and you must stay seated at the cafeteria table until the teacher dismisses your class. Intermediate is 3 times a week, and you must also stay at the cafeteria table. Hell, you have to raise your hand to get permission from a teacher to go to the bathroom during lunch. As kids we were very active in school. Things have changed.
But sugar is to blame for obesity now.
I feel the need for some very rich chocolate right now.
Light ‘Em If You Got ‘Em
One of my favorite posts at Bring the Heat, Bring the Stupid are the videos of what Brad likes to call “‘Splodey”. Watching something blow up is therapeutic to me. Makes me feel all calm, and that all is right with the world, even if only for the few seconds of beautiful incendiary footage.
Seriously, doesn’t this make you feel good??
If I smoked, I would soooo need a cigarette right about now 
Buffetting a Need
Funny how the world works. By “the world” I mean politics, and by “works” I mean “screws”. Just last week the U. S. State Department recommended that the Keystone XL pipeline project be denied. Their reason for the denial was that there was not enough time to study the proposal by February 2i, 2012. Nevermind that the State Dept. “has been conducting a transparent, thorough, and rigorous review of TransCanada’s permit application for the proposed Keystone XL Pipeline project” since 2008. The deadline is just too soon!! But as Newton said, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction:
Warren Buffett’s Burlington Northern Santa Fe LLC is among U.S. and Canadian railroads that stand to benefit from the Obama administration’s decision to reject TransCanada Corp.’s Keystone XL oil pipeline permit.
I find it funny that Berkshire Hathaway, Warren Buffett’s company, just happens to be centralized in Omaha, Nebraska, the very state where the envirowhackos have claimed the pipeline would destroy wetlands and agricultural productivity. As we all know, that’s the government’s job, not the pipeline’s. Oh, and if you think it’s about environmental issues, think again.
The rail option, though costlier, would lessen the environmental impact, such as a loss of wetlands and agricultural productivity, compared to the pipeline, according to the State Department analysis. Greenhouse gas emissions, however, would be worse.
So it’s ok to protect the wetlands from the evul Canuck pipeline, the study of which the State Dept. claims would take too long before the Obama Administration deadline, but not ok to protect it from greenhouse emissions that can suffocate it, right? I guess dealing with a railroad bottleneck effect, more pollution, and higher transportation costs is better than providing much needed job creation and income stability to Americans.
At least Mr. Buffett gets to profit. From the government. With our money.
Paul Simon They Ain’t
Via Weasel Zippers:
Virginia Elementary School Indoctrinating Third-Graders With Occupy Sing-Along: “They Want More Money, They’re The 1%. . . I’m Happy To Be Part Of The 99%”
I don’t know how things are in Virginia, but around here, it is illegal to promote any political propaganda in the school. I don’t care if any Prez has a message for the kidlets about staying in school. My folks took me out of school when Reagan spoke to the schools in the 80′s, and they voted for him. But what really bothers me aside the obvious in the lyrics, is the affirmation by the by the school board that the third graders wrote the song themselves. Here is a sample of the lyrics:
Some people have it all
But they still don’t think they have enough
They want more money
A faster ride
They’re not content
Never satisfied
Yes — they’re the 1 percent
I still remember what I was writing in Third Grade. Hell, I remember what my kids wrote. Roses were red, and violets were blue, and that was the extent of their poetry. Class warfare this early? Sorry, I don’t buy it. Eldest is 16, she reads political blogs and watches the news, and is just now coming to understand what the term class warfare means. Little One can’t grasp the concept of what 99% is, outside of a bar of Ivory Soap™. So I ask you, how do eight year olds come up with these lyrics?
But I look at every side and I’m always willing to give the benefit of the doubt. In this case, let’s say the kids did write it. You know what that tells me? If indeed the kids wrote that, then it’s golden proof that the schools do a poor job of educating, and a great job of indoctrinating. And if so, it may already be too late to stop our decline.
Obviously Not Two Front Teeth
I love Christmas. I love Hanukkah. I even love the paganism of Winter Solstice. I love giving at this time of year, in charity, to friends and neighbors, to family, and even to some I’ve never met before, but consider friends all the same. I love walking into a store and perusing for the one thing that screams a recipient’s name, or making my own gift for a special person.
I just do not get the overblown, overpriced, one-of-a-kind useless gift that some people with money to burn will buy.
One year, the Neiman Marcus catalog had a (I’m not kidding here) Longhorn Steer Portable Desk. The desk was the average size of a Longhorn steer, and had wheels hidden under the “hooves” so you, the wealthy rancher, could roll it out to the pasture and do business while being cleverly disguised from your herd. The price on that tomfoolery was $65,000.
That was the price in 1984.
Of course, we are all familiar with the Victoria’s Secret Fantasy Bra™. The 2010 edition was worth only $2 million:
That bra wasn’t all that spectacular. What’s in it sure is, but the bra, not so much. I much prefer this year’s entry into the Fantasy Bra That Will Never Sell™ category:
Why?? Because PEARLS!!! And Miranda Kerr looks happy compared to Adriana Lima, who always looks so damn angry, probably because her bra is too tight.
Any other ostentatious gifts that boggle the mind? If you know of any, leave links in your comments so we all can laugh and laugh 
Europe According to the World
Yeah, I got nuthin’ today.
Virtual Criminals
I really don’t know what is more screwed up: that playing a videogame may be grounds to charge one with a crime, or that it’s the International Order of the Red Cross that says so.
The Red Cross is investigating whether 600 million gamers are violating the Hague and Geneva conventions when they kill and blow stuff up for fun.
Now, I understand that this organization is tasked with observing and reporting violations of the Geneva Convention, but how exactly is a 14 year old sitting in his room, playing a game consensually with other like-minded people online violating a “humanitarian law” written for the express purpose of times of war?
Especially when the characters can be reset to life again??
In its daily bulletin, the ICRC&RC stated that “for the first time, Movement partners discussed our role and responsibility to take action against violations of IHL in video games”. Apparently they seem to think a kid who is a sharpshooter on Call of Duty Doing Modern Warfare During World at War with Black Ops while Reaching Halos is going to go outside and grab the nearest AK 47/uzi/P90 and massacre the entire neighborhood.
“While National Societies shared their experiences and opinions, there is clearly no simple answer. There is, however, an overall consensus and motivation to take action.”
You may ask yourselves why this very big, very influential organization is now worried about 600 million people playing war videogames. Well, they videogaming industry is a multi-billion dollar industry which has so far escaped the wrath of the global body to which the ICRC&RC reports Geneva Convention violations: The United Nations. And y’all just know they want a piece of that pie.
But like we in the real world understand, their is a difference between fantasy and reality. And the videogame industry, unlike governments, will not take this bent over while asking for a reach around.
The Darker Side of Hookers
Sometimes, it doesn’t pay to do business in your hometown:
Man orders prostitute, daughter arrives
That’s a hell of a WTF moment right there.
Father-of-three Titus Ncube of Bulawayo said he called for a prostitute to come to the hotel room in which he was staying while having marital problems and was shocked when his 20-year-old daughter arrived.
You know, usually I have something snarky to say, but not right now.
His daughter fled the scene, crying. But people always try to make the best of a bad situation. The father has decided to go into counselling with his wife, and the daughter has decided to return to school. So, a kind of good ending… I think.
“If it were not for my children, I could have divorced him a long time ago. But because of the trauma that divorce has on children, I decided to stay,” [Ncube's wife, Rosemary] said.
I don’t know about y’all, but that’s a red flag for me. If your daughter is prostituting herself, you may want to rethink that whole “trauma” thing, Rosemary.
Hat tip to Hubby!!
This is What It Sounds Like When Boys Cry
A fleet of high-performance cars, including eight Ferraris, has been involved in one of the most expensive accidents in history after an astonishing multi-car pile-up in Japan.
I’m not a big fan of Lamborghinis and Ferraris, but HOLY SHIT!!! If they wanted to break or make a record, they succeeded.
I can hear the whimpers from here. Miraculously, no one was seriously hurt. Not even the poor sap that was in a Toyota Prius.
Such was the severity of the damage, several of the luxury cars have been written off, leaving their owners with the nightmare scenario of seeing their prized possessions turned into expensive scrap metal.
The total damage bill is expected to hit several million pounds. A new Ferrari 355 retails for several hundred thousand pounds.
Grab a tissue, gentlemen. There is no shame in crying.
There is only shame in being such a piss-poor driver.
Hat tip to Hubby
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