"Afghan prisoners riot again, police fire on inmates"

http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/asiapcf/
02/28/afghan.prison.ap/index.html

How wrong is it of me that when I hear about Taliban rioting my first instinct is to roll in with heavy bombers and...?

Something I really like about President Bush

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4756054.stm

Every year or so Bush gives us the opportunity to giggle about him falling off a bike.

But as a cyclist, I can say that everybody falls off once in a while -- gravity applies to presidents just as much as it does to me and I try not to laugh at those inevitable whoopsie-daisies of his we all face as par for the course of an active lifestyle.

I certainly don't agree with all of Bush's policies, but a little exercise is a good habit.

And I bet he's a better mountain biker than Nixon.

But still, let's go easy on the Lycra, Mr. President.

Please.

Of livestock and concubines....

Well, seein' as how the world seems to enjoy religious chaos so much, I'm digging through some old texts so's not to be left out of the fun.

The Koran is broken down into convenient, bite sized pieces. If you read one a night for 30-days, or the length of Ramadan, you've be from one cover to the other. Really reader-friendly.

The Gospels were nice. Glad to have read those. Do it again some time. I come away with a little better head for when zealots try to fling their fervor at me. I always knew they were full of it. Now I have a Biblical basis for calling them on their crap.

I always thought they should put the books of the Bible in alphabetical order. Easier to find stuff.
The book of Mormon's been sitting on my bed for a week or so now besides a really big book on muzzleloaders. Still haven't really dug into it.

I'm also working on on the first five books of the Old Testament, the Jewish Torah, as I understand. I'm a little over half way thru Genesis - about to the part about everybody begetting everyone else and having lots of donkeys, cows, sheep....

As a single guy with no livestock some of the chapters are kinda getting by me....

"Student Dies, Another Injured In Fall From UNC Dorm"

http://www.wral.com/news/7394128/detail.html

Wow, I used to live in that dorm. On that hall. And sit in that window and study....

Sad to think after all water balloons, pingpong balls, toilet paper and unicycles we put down those halls somebody actually got hurt.

What did we learn today?

Went to the NC Press Association awards ceremony yesterday.

I came away with two awards, a couple handshakes and a reminder that if I go an entire day short on caffine I will go through withdrawl.

Ouch.

"''Daily Show' befuddles governor not in on the joke"

http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/02/23/illinois.gov.spoof.ap/index.html

Ummm... I don't hold folks accountable for every nuance of pop culture. Heavens, I'm no expert. Personally, I've never watched an episode of Survivor, American Idol, Friends....

But I know what they are. I'm in the loop. I've gotten the memo.

I've never been to Africa, but I know where it is.
I've never played a violin, but I know what one sounds like.
And I don't really enjoy lots of modern art, but I'm aware enough to be socially viable.

I've never watched "The 700 Club", but if Pat Robertson interviewed me I'd have an idea of what he was getting at. I've never watched "Oprah", but I hear she doesn't take well to making up books....

By now "The Daily Show" is ten years old, has won seven Emmys, been on the front of Newsweek, gets a million viewers a night (including me)....

If you're a freaking governor and you and your staff are so clueless as to sit down with "The Daily Show" and not even know who they are (don't they do background checks on this stuff?), you deserve to get caught the fool, 'cause you are.

Hello (ok, now you write something)

Well I had no idea Vice President Cheney was such the outdoorsman, but my copy of this week’s Newsweek has photos of him fishing, riding a horse… and, um, hunting.

I’m not gonna try to make any commentary or jokes or anything on the incident, but that case goes touches a number of issues that are interesting to a gun-owning journalist.

Some folks think the media as a whole is a bunch of gun-dumb, anti-hunter fools (and that's occasionally, admittedly far too correct).

Well, you may have noticed recently that The Star is making a concerted effort to seek more community input – news about events, submitted photos, guest writers….

So here's your chance for hunters and folks to jump in, share their outdoor passions and keep folks straight on some issues that matter to them.

Really, folks, we're asking, imploring, for your pen. Is there not one among you who will shoot Alan Ford (an email about this, alan_ford@link.freedom.com)?

And I’m not sure anyone can gripe about the media being a bunch of hippies if the other side won’t write in to balance things out even when invited.

From the comments on my blog recently I know there are some folks out there who know a thing or two about hunting and who aren’t shy about sharing their opinions (especially with regards to how un-right and wrong my opinions may be). Bravo! Free Speech! Let’s put you to work.

Personally, I put a post on an online gun forum a little while back asking for folks’ thoughts on the media, hunting and guns. I remember going out and covering the beginning of dove hunting season one year and one of the hunters commented that I was a rare sight – a pro-gun journalist. I dunno, I don't really think of myself as a gun advocate, I've just grown up exposed to the concept of responsible gun use for sport, sustenance and when necessary (but hopefully not, especially with my flintlock) defense....I’ve personally never been hunting, but if it’s anything like my fishing exploits, a hunting trip of mine would involve very little shooting, killing or even seeing the animals.

I fish, fish laugh.

I write.

Like Hemingway.

Though I’ll keep names and tales of specific forum responses off the record, the general flavor was that folks needed to be exposed to what they don’t know much about.

A columnist, or maybe a rotation of writers, could help do that.

And from a conservationist’s point of view, I see different sides of the same conservationist coin that could get together more often for greater effect, and a little publicity wouldn’t hurt.

I’m a member of the Audubon society. I don’t know how many gazillion members of Ducks Unlimited there are who share my concerns, but I can’t watch five minutes of a waterfowl hunting show without folks talking about preserving the environment for future generations.

We share common goals, let’s talk, you write.

Well, it's been a while since I said anything incendiary....

So how about climate change?

Now I'm not saying global warming caused Katrina, though climate change certainly wasn't giving us any favors.

And I'm not saying there isn't natural, healthy climate change that just happens over the millennium, but us dumping who-knows-what into the environment certainly isn't helping.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/
science/02/16/greenland.glaciers.ap/index.html

And the scientific process depends on skepticism and free thought, leaving room for radical breakthroughs just as for radical wackos. So you'll always be able to find some guy in a lab coat who'll say his diet pill is the best.

But when when almost all the relevant nations of the world...
(http://climatechange.unep.net/)

and the relevant scientists...
(http://www.climatescience.gov/)

have signed on, you've certainly got my attention. And when the Catholic Church, who have at times not been quite the quickest on the scientific uptake (that universe circling the Earth, Galileo, burning at the stake thing...) signs on...

http://www.nccbuscc.org/sdwp/
international/globalclimate.htm#scientific

and a goodly number of other religious folks, too....

http://www.climateark.org/articles/reader.asp?linkid=43282
(and I did a search of FOXNews for that one... their articles didn't come up, but they gave me that link)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/3728692.stm
http://www.eni.ch/articles/display.shtml?06-0140

to what extent is human-influenced climate change still so debatable and by how many degrees is it just something we need to warm up to.

Tofu Chili

Well, we had one of our regular office chili cookoffs today and I brought my regular recipe:

Vegetarian Chili
by: Liz Applegate Ph.D.

http://www.runnersworld.com/article/
0,5033,s6-53-0-0-5202,00.html

"This tasty, low-fat chili contains four different runner-friendly foods: canola oil, sweet red peppers, tofu and black beans. Eating vegetarian chili can warm you up after a cold or rainy run.Ingredients:
2 tsp canola oil
1 cup scallions, chopped
1 cup sweet red peppers, chopped
2 garlic cloves, minced
8 ozs firm tofu, well-drained and squeezed dry
1 tbsp chili powder
1/8 tsp ground red pepper
1 14 1/2-ounce can stewed tomatoes
2 tbsp red wine vinegar
1 1/4 cups canned black beans
1 tbsp fresh cilantro, choppedDirections: Warm the oil in a 2-quart saucepan over medium heat. Add the scallions, sweet red peppers and garlic, sautéing for 4 to 5 minutes.Crumble the tofu and add to the pan. Stir frequently for 5 to 7 minutes. Add the chili powder and ground red pepper. Stir frequently for 2 minutes. Add the tomatoes and red wine vinegar. Bring to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for 20 to 30 minutes. Stir in the black beans and cilantro. Simmer for 5 minutes. Serves 2."

I googled the recipe on the Runner's World website a while back. I'm not a strict vegetarian by any means but aside from certain social contexts (like chili cookoffs) I've tenth'd my meat intake and am still getting ten times more than I need (actually, with a correct diet you don't even need any).

So I say I'm a quasi-veggie and enjoy occasionally exposing folks to new foods. Like tofu. They seem to get a kick out of it.

I generally toss in an extra can of chili beans and have been ratcheting the heat. Every time I've made this recipe folks have asked for more spice and I've added more spice. I make it again and they still want it hotter.

I like spicy food as much as anyone but not to the napalm-nuke degree of excruciation some of my coworkers do. Some folks enjoy the pain. Personally, life hurts enough without me adding torment recreationally.

I'm not into that S&M stuff, though apparently a lot of folks are.

"Bikers roll to military funerals to oppose anti-gay protests"

http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/02/21/
funeral.motorcyclists.ap/index.html

"They call themselves the Patriot Guard Riders, and they are more than 5,000 strong, forming to counter anti-gay protests held by the Rev. Fred Phelps at military funerals.
Phelps believes American deaths in Iraq are divine punishment for a country that he says harbors homosexuals. His protesters carry signs thanking God for so-called IEDs -- explosives that are a major killer of soldiers in Iraq.
The bikers shield the families of dead soldiers from the protesters, and overshadow the jeers with patriotic chants and a sea of red, white and blue flags."

"They danced and sang impromptu songs peppered with vulgarities that condemned homosexuals and soldiers."

I'm trying to form a response, but my mind still hasn't gotten past WHAT THE....

Ok, now I've had a little time to think....

The protracted existence of such... is a mark of our society's great respect for free expression and the rule of law.

The town my mother comes from in northern Germany, Muenster, had a different solution to religious mis-fervor in 1534, as told by Wikipedia.org:

"Matthys, who had prophesied God's judgment to come on the wicked on that day, made a sally with only thirty followers, believing that he was a second Gideon, and was cut off with his entire band. He was killed, his head severed and placed on a pole for all in the city to see, and his genitals nailed to the city gate. "

By the way, don't mess with my Mom.

"Bockelson, better known in history as John of Leiden, was subsequently installed as king.
Claiming to be the successor of David, he claimed royal honours and absolute power in the new "Zion". He justified his actions by the authority of visions from heaven, as others have done in similar circumstances. He legalized polygamy, and himself took sixteen wives, one of whom he beheaded himself in the marketplace."

"...the town was taken by the besiegers on June 24, 1535, and in January 1536 Bockelson and some of his more prominent followers, after being tortured, were executed in the marketplace. Their dead bodies were exhibited in cages, which hung from the steeple of St. Lambert's Church; the cages still hang there, though the bones were removed later."

The cages have since been replaced with newer models, but the originals are in the town museum, right next to the torture tools....

Now we understand the importance of free speech, of which the funeral protest case is an example of both the vices and virtues.

But I must admit occasional moments of nostalia....

"Iran: End anti-cartoon violence"

http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast
/02/20/cartoons.protests/index.html

When Iran is telling you to calm down the religious riots, you really need to calm down.

That's like when the French, who sometimes wisely aren't exactly the first to jump to arms, say they're prepared to nuke your tail, you know you're pushing it too far....

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/
content/article/2006/01/19/
AR2006011903311.html

Crest High School Strength Gospel Choir

Last night I went and shot photos and video at the Crest High School Strength Gospel Choir performance.

Darn.

I'm impressed.

I mean really. Not that my uncultured ear is any expert judge when it comes to gospel, but I know what I like and I like what I heard.

Editing the video, which will go on www.shelbystar.com and is definitely worth a look, I notice my toe is suddenly tapping for some reason.

And I'm somewhat bobbing to the... the... I think, I understand that's called the "beat"?

This, um, doesn't usually happen....

But I like it.

Escapa! -- Victory thru questionable, yet productive, scruples....

members.iinet.net.au/~pontipak/redsquare.html

As I referenced below, this is an incredibly addicting little game. Basically, you maneuver your icon as other shapes try to run into you. The longer you survive without running into a wall or colliding with something else, the better.

Making it 18 seconds is supposed to be great. I've gotten to around 26.

And I've also gotten to 130.

How?

Basically, I cheated.

A cyclist try to go fast seeks a tail wind. A runner would rather be going downhill. And someone competing against a ticking clock and a fast computer can't slow time, so they slow the computer.

My laptop slows drastically as I download pictures from a digital photo disk -- as the machine sucks hundreds of megabytes off the camera card its "brain" is overworked, and other programs slow down drastically. Including Escapa....

So as the timer merrily ticks away, those lightning fast, malicious little blocks I have to dodge slow to a manageable rate. When I get bored I just ram my icon into something to close the game and give myself an incredible, not exactly kosher, score.

At least I'm honest.

Eventually.

"Goat found at frat house in alleged sex-scare hazing"

Hazing? Sex?... Goat?

I haven't even read this yet. But the title just holds so much promise....

http://www.wral.com/education/7151219/detail.html

130.687

http://members.iinet.net.au/~pontipak/redsquare.html

Kaylin, one of our interns, showed me this addicting computer game today and proceeded to gloat over her piddly 30-odd second record.

:P

130.687 seconds!

Tomorrow I'll tell the secret. For now folks will just have to stew....

"...light Alan on fire...."

Pssst.... Nobody tell Alan Jenkins, our managing editor, but I'm getting ready to light him on fire.

Does anybody else watch "MythBusters"? It's a show on the Discovery Channel where folks test urban legends in scientific and entertaining ways.

Take the one about a penny off the Empire State building killing people. First they compute the a penny’s terminal velocity. Then they build a gun to fire a penny that fast at a human skull encased in ballistics gel. Then they run around their shop with the penny gun shooting each other in the a….

Ahh, yeah, my kind of show.

Anyway, they did one episode on making fire by unusual means.

Definitely my kind of show.

They proved on camera you can in fact start a fire using a lens-shaped piece of ice, with sticks, with a dissected rifle cartridge....

And with an aluminum can.

Apparently, you take a regular soda can and polish its concave bottom with chocolate (yeah, I did a double-take there too) and then use the resulting parabolic mirror to focus sunlight... and start a fire.

I don’t expect this method to overtake the use of matches and lighters any time soon. It’s probably not the best way to light a cigar. But should I be shipwrecked on a desert island with nothing but a candy bar and a Sam’s Choice cola (nothing but the finest), I’m glad to know I’d be able to light Alan on fire.

Here's my plan.

(Gettysburg Address Alert! This column is now officially longer than Lincoln’s speech.)

I've been polishing this can to test whether a can so conceived and so dedicated will light Alan on fire.

I started off with chocolate, then went to steel wool, now I'm back to chocolate. It tastes better.

Once I get it good and shiny I'll highly resolve to show it off to my coworkers....

But I'll let it be a surprise for Alan - it is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
I’ve got to think of some way to get the newsroom folks out of the office on a sunny day. While I’ve got them distracted on some other crazy project of mine, like that time I boiled water using a homemade tin can stove and some denatured alcohol, I can sneak up behind Alan.

He just needs to hold unnaturally still for an inordinately long time and not notice any burning sensations. Or smells.

Yea, four score and seven hours ago I brought forth on this Word.doc a column dedicated to the proposition that Alan be set on fire.

He will little note, nor long remember what I write here, but he can never forget….

He says I have some quirks. I have no idea why.

Sometimes I like this job....

Katherine Kinsey of Winthrop conducts high schoolers in a rehearsal for the Cleveland County Choral Concert at First Baptist in KM. Evening sun through a stained glass window and fast shutter gave a nice silhouette....

Too bad that story's running on a black and white page....

Add one full moon...

... an 8-second shutter and a juvenile photographer....

"Sheriff: Officers Must Have Sex With Prostitutes For Evidence"

www.wral.com/news/7043931/detail.html

Does this seem wrong to anyone else?

Comics too tough on VP?

got this off CNN.com today....

"Do you think the late night comedians were too tough on Vice President Cheney?
Yes: 11% 2018 votes
No: 89% 15757 votes
Total: 17775 votes"

What's your take?

(what I really think about Duke vs. UNC)

I went to UNC, I root for them, and after a big win against Duke I've joined 40,000 other Franklin Street Tarheels cheering untold nastiness upon the Dookies....

But truth be know I've got a lot of respect for Duke University.

While I was attending UNC I worked as a volunteer at the Duke U. Primate Center. I even did my honors thesis there. It's an excellent academic institution and if I ever go back to school I'll be very tempted....

But for 40 minutes at a time, a couple of times a year I really hate those....

"How will you spend Valentine's Day?"

"Romancing my partner: 60%, 6 votes

Looking for a partner: 0%, 0 votes

Home alone: 40%, 4 votes

Total: 10 votes" -- CNN.com

Ba-Humbug.

I could claim it's just a small sample size, but that also means there are only three other people like me out there.

Maybe one of them's cute....

Wrasslin' at SHS

I just thought this was a good shot I took a few back.

MySpace.com

http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/internet/
02/13/rising.onlinespace.ap/index.html

Yep. Getting pretty big with the young folks. Used for good or evil, as decent as the person using it. Great for networking, but folks need to use the same common sense they always should when dealing with people.

""I am the Jesus Christ of politics," Italian PM

www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/europe/02/12/italy.berlusconi.reut/index.html

Well, um. That's setting a pretty high bar for yourself, there. Most folks don't do that. Some folks even consider it non-kosher.

It's interesting to see how big a row is made over this as opposed to Lennon's comment. Thoughts on why?

"Two men say they're Jesus, one of em' must be wrong..." (Dire Straits)

www.dire-straits.org/Lyrics_Love_over_Gold.html

Media coverage of VP hunting accident....

www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/02/13/cheney/index.html

Okay, folks. How's the media doing on this one? There's all sorts of political flashpoints and holes for the talking heads to step in here. There's hunting, guns....

I was watching CNN this morning and it seemed like they were doing pretty well. They had on one of the hunting experts I watch shooting things on OLN, they had a statistic that per 100,000 participants, hunting is way safer than waterskiing and a gazillion times safer than football.... And nobody tried to make a humorous crack on the situation (I'll probably get that tonight from my favorite news comic).

They did put up a graphic of an over-under. We know it was a 28-gauge. I'm not sure if we know it was an double, pump, semi-auto... so I'm not sure I like any "That's a photo of a shotgun? Good enough, they all look alike" mentality, but I'm not sure that's what was going on, anyway.

I will say I know of a fine news organization that was doing a piece on a Rev. War battle and ran a graphic of an "American Longrifle," but instead of an old flinter they ran a shot of a 20th Century British Lee-Enfield bolt action....

"Prosecutors: Kenneth Starr, lawyer sent fake letters"

www.cnn.com/2006/LAW/02/11/Calif.execution.ap/index.html

"Lawyers for a death row inmate, including former Whitewater independent counsel Kenneth Starr, sent fake letters from jurors asking California's governor to spare the man's life, prosecutors said Friday."

Whoa.

Anvil shooting....

www.museumofappalachia.com/
July%204th%20airborne%20anvil.jpg

www.anvilfire.com/iForge/tutor/July4th/top_index.htm
(video on that site)

See, at some point somebody figured out you could put gunpowder under an anvil and shoot it into the air.

Then someone else said that was really not a good idea.

This then hammered a major rift in the blacksmithing community which still has a lot of irons kinda hot....

www.anvilmag.com/comment/111d2.htm

This gets even better. Where's the yearly national anvil shooting competition?

Laurel, Mississippi.

www.2camels.com/festival107.php3

Liberal Media?

Hey folks. In a recent comment to one of my blogs someone mentioned the "liberal media." I hear a lot about the liberal media, and I'm interested in this. What makes the media "liberal." Is it the coverage of the issues or the journalists themselves? Is it all media or just certain outlets? How about The Star? We're actually owned by a libertarian company....

Don't be shy now, folks. Leave your constructive comment....

Let's here it for the Koreas!

At tonight's opening ceremony for the 2006 Winter Games the Koreas, North and South, who have never officially declared peace and have eyed each other through gunsights over the DMZ for more than half a century...

...marched into the arena arm in arm, as one Korea. By my knowing it's the most North and South Koreans in one place since 1953.

Maybe we are making progress.

Maybe that's the Olympic spirit.

A photographer's lament....

Taking photos can be incredibly rewarding.

But there are minefields....

As one of our industrious reporters -- turned impromptu shooter -- learned recently, it's hard to get a picture of a first grade class. But he did a great job of...

...getting good smiles on them...

...getting all the kids in there, even the ones that are hiding...

...the problem is when one of them starts flashing a gang sign.

Fortunately he got several other, excellent shots.

"...taken me for a walk or rubbed my belly"

I’ve taken up tennis here recently.

I’ve only hit myself in the head once.

Hays, on the other hand, hit me once in the leg and once in the face. He was teaching my about "volleying" and apparently I have a little to learn.

He’s our education reporter and has been doing an excellent job of schooling me. Truly, though, he’s been doing a great job of teaching me and I think I’ve been doing a pretty good job of learning a new skill.

Because of my job I wind up with odd periods of free time I try to fill with good things, interesting and productive hobbies like golf, beer brewing, 18th century gunsmithing….

And now tennis.

I figure tennis is one of those skills that you don’t have to be great at, but it’s good to have some basic abilities. Like driving a stick shift. I remember my Dad teaching me to drive a manual. It involved an on ramp to US 64 and the sentiment ‘OK, let’s see what you can do.’

I did pretty well, I recall.

I’d been meaning to pick up tennis for a while now and had been in such discussions with a lot of folks. It’s a group effort of plenty of friends with whom I haven’t had time to check whether they want me to put their names in here, really.

But driving to a shoot a few weeks back with Hays I learned of his tennis background and we decided to give it a whirl a few days later at the courts over by Cleveland Community College.
I got an inexpensive racket and some cheap tennis balls. Maybe as I improve I’ll want to invest in finer equipment, but for now the weak point in my game isn’t the racket.

Still, Hays says I’m doing pretty well. He’s played before and all and seems pretty good at it to me, though I am no judge. I’ve been learning about the rules, the scoring, use of the racket, the scoring….

Baseball’s scoring is very simple. One guy runs across home plate – that’s a point. Heck, they even call it a run. Tennis is Loves and 15s and 40s which are sometimes 45s….

It’s good exercise. The sport seems to involve a lot of chasing down loose balls like a Labrador retriever. I’m getting a lot of exercise there though nobody has yet scruffled me behind the ears, taken me for a walk or rubbed my belly. I’ve played a couple times over the past few weeks and am getting a pretty good hang of it.

Last weekend Hays and I played a set or two. I actually nearly beat him in one game. I’m improving and my goal for our next battle is to win a game or two.

In slightly related news, I’ve also taken up bowling.

I’ve only nearly hit my mentor and managing editor, Alan, once.

"Kiss of life makes Boo Boo the chicken better"

http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/02/08/chicken.ap/index.html

"Hillary Shows a Lot of Anger, GOP Chairman Says"

http://articles.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=20060205120109990001&ncid=NWS00010000000001

"Democratic Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, a potential presidential contender in 2008, "seems to have a lot of anger" and voters usually do not send angry candidates to the White House, said Ken Mehlman, head of the Republican National Committee."

I (Katrina) can't (corruption) imagine (economics) why (Iraq).

"Mehlman cited the New York senator's remarks on Martin Luther King Day in which she called the Bush administration "one of the worst" in history...."

Well, a recent poll I saw indicated almost two-thirds of Americans agreed with her.

And what's wrong with a little emotion at the right place, right time? When I'm at a party I'm boisterous. When I'm at a funeral I might just cry. When I'm out on the golf course I might be cheerful.

A few holes, fairways, forests and creeks later I might just start crying again.

That's life. That's public life. That's politics.

When Howard Dean cheered his infamous "war cry" he was leading a pep rally. That's one of the times a candidate, a boss, a high school principal gets to, is supposed to, cheer their team.

People lambasted Al Gore for being too wooden and then as soon as a candidate blinks a instant of excitement they shred him for being too emotional.

I'm not saying we should let emotions eclipse good political judgment. Don't go setting cars on fire 'cause you're upset about tort reform.

But we are an exciting nation born of the flames of inspired revolution and tempered by heart-wrenching trials from which we've wrested the exhilarating successes that warrant our firecrackers, parades and cheers.

And our people have also suffered infuriating wrongs.

And I'm mad as h....

Looking at that photo of Mehlman, he looks pretty angry himself.

Or maybe just scared.

Google Fight!

Quoth Alan Jenkins... "One of the most entertaining and educational things you can do is go onto a search engine web site, such as Google, and type in your own name. If something that’s actually about you pops up first, then you are an extremely important and valuable person to society."

Yay! I'm the 11th most important John Derrick in the world!

Some days I even make the first page :)

It's not nessessarily a meaningful competition. And some names are more common than others, giving a Joe Smith a lot more competition than a Joe O'Shaughnessy (buddy of mine, #8 on Google...), but it is kinda fun.

What number are you?

The Great Vance County Telephone Book Spat of '06

Up in Vance County a row is brewing over a phone book listing....

http://www.hendersondispatch.com/articles/2006/02/05/news/news02.txt

Turn to the "K"s and you see a hotline for a white supremacist organization who's already getting too much free publicity out of the spat, so let's just call them the Stupid Outmoded Bigots, the SOBs.

And someone is infuriated that the listing is in there and someone else is just enjoying grinding salt into the wound... and it's devolved into the predictable free-speech shouting match between the good-hearted civil rights soldier and the SOBs, who enjoy getting lot of play in the media with such contests.

And in one corner of this bout, trying to avoid getting dragged in but unable to slip out through the ropes, is the phone company in whose telephone book the SOBs' listing was, getting hit with the issue of why the listing is even in there, 'why don't you just do the right thing and take it out?'...

Well, it's not about the company's values, beliefs or support/hate/ambivalence about the SOBs - it's about our Constitution, rights and public utilities.

If I may simplify a little, the telephone company, though privately owned, is allowed it's work and regulated by the government as necessary to the populace - a public utility. The phone company can't just crank it's basic rates sky high, they can't abuse the communities they've been allowed to work in, they can't deny service based on their fallible whim.

Imagine a utility company contracted to install and maintain water lines for a town. They can't pick and choose who can drink the water that flows through their pipes.

A phone company can't simply on their good beliefs deny their fundamental services - 911, basic calls, a listing in the phone book... - to a person or legal organization.

And we live in a country where darn near every organization is legal.

Some communities restrict the existence of certain groups. In the US, our founding fathers, a bunch of rebels, ensured us the right to speak, to gripe... to assemble - an enlightenment concept that it's better to allow folks to have whatever groups they want and sort it out for themselves that have the government clamping down on who has the right to organize, like those union rapscallions, those trouble-making suffragettes, those uppity civil rights folks....

It's that same right which enabled the formation of the Boy Scouts, the Republicans, the Democrats, the NAACP... just imagine Rev. King's march on Washington without the right to assemble. He'd have been standing alone. Race reform wouldn't have gotten very far.

This open system does allow the occasional formation of less friendly groups such as the American Nazi Party and the SOBs, but that's the price we pay and thankfully the groups everyone agrees are full of it don't get too far come election time.

That's how our society works and it's worked better that anyone else's for the past 200-odd years.

And it works with, truly depends upon, the differences of opinion that have festered this debate.
So let's debate, let's discuss, let's reach the right answer (which I already gave you half a page ago)...

And let's all live to toast another two centuries of the First Amendment.

February is Black History Month. Wanna call to support your local NAACP? The number in Cleveland County is (704) 482-7509....

Wanna call the SOBs for a good free speech blessing out? Look em' up in a phone book....

Rockathon

"Surely you have to question all of these as being true?"

an email I got a little while ago....

"2005 STELLA AWARDS!!!!!!!!Time once again to review the winners of the Annual "Stella Awards." The Stella Awards are named after 81 year-old Stella Liebeck who spilled hot coffee on herself and successfully sued McDonald's (in NM). That case inspired the Stella Awards for the most frivolous, ridiculous, successful lawsuits in the United States...."

Yes, you always have to question!

This is an example of how only seeing one side of an issue can horribly misrepresent the truth, and is a lesson on both the importance of fair and balanced reporting and how misleading "truthiness" (thank you Steve Colbert) can be.

Check this out: http://www.lectlaw.com/files/cur78.htm

"it held its coffee at between 180 and 190 degrees fahrenheit..."

"liquids, at 180 degrees, will cause a [third degree] burn to human skin in two to seven seconds..."

"a burn hazard exists with any food substance served at 140 degrees or above, and that McDonalds coffee, at the temperature at which it was pouredinto styrofoam cups, was not fit for consumption because it would burn the mouth and throat. The quality assurance manager admitted that burns would occur, but testified that McDonalds had no intention of reducing the "holding temperature" of its coffee..."

"McDonalds produced documents showing more than 700 claims by people burned by its coffee between 1982 and 1992. Some claims involved third-degree burns substantially similar to Liebecks..."

"A vascular surgeon determined that Liebeck suffered fullthickness burns (or third-degree burns) over 6 percent of her body..."

Have a lower opinion of McDonald's?

Have a higher opinion of the lawyer who spoke up for the victim who spent eight days in the hospital?

Hooah!

http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/02/02/
defining.hooah.ap/index.html

"Never be at a loss for words: 'Hooah!'
Popular Army word defies definition"

Basically, "Hooah" mean everything but "no," and sometimes even that.

I remember back in Army ROTC, how Hooah we super-Hooah, high-speed Hooahs could Hooah all the Hooah Hooah way while Hooahing in an un-Hooah-believable, very Hooahly manner.

I think that was all eight parts of speech.

Hooah?

Hooah!

Groundhog Day!

Photo from http://mbnet.fi/zenbie/upload.php

Rant by John

.... anyway, that Hare Krishna meal was too much tofu, even for me, a quasi-vegetarian. They chanted for almost an hour.

After that the pagans made perfect sense.

Some of my buddies were kinda worried about me going to a pagan service -- "Tell folks where you're going," "Carry a weapon"....

C'mon, folks. How intimidated can I be by someone going by the name "Dolphin Moon"?

I went to the celebration of Imbolc -- the festival of the lactating sheep.

It's not as strange as it sounds.

Pagan religion grew at a time when folks living in Europe depended on their livestock for their survival. As the harsh winter was drawing to a close and sheep were getting ready to have babies, that was a big deal and worth celebrating.

In fact we still celebrate this minor holiday recognizing the coming of spring – we call it Groundhog Day.

Some of the best pictures we can never run....

And you should see the "Crack" picture, the aftermath of a sheriff's department crack bust, literally....