100 Top Female Tattoo Owners

While killing time earnestly gathering news, I found this site, World's Hottest Women With Tattoos for 2007,

You mean they've been doing this for years? And there's a trend going on?

Yeah. Stupidity is apparently contagious. Many of the women are rocket-scientists-in-disguise. Like Brittney Spears. And Angelina Jolie.

Whose Profits Are These, Anyway?

You need to see this naked grab for money and power. by Sen. Hillary Clinton.

Newsflash, Hill!

The oil companies' profits are just that, THEIRS!

Last time I checked, unless a specific crime is involved, a corporation's money cannot be confiscated, EVEN if you think you have a really, really, nifty-good purpose for that money.

She has to be the DUMBEST woman on the planet. I mean, just think about it.

1. Oil resources are finite.
   
2. The oil companies know about (1). That's what they pay all those geologists on staff for, to let them know where the oil is, and approximately how much of it is around.
   
3. If they run out of oil, but don't develop alternatives before that time, the corporation is TOAST!
   
4. So, one of the things oil companies already do it to research alternative sources of energy. They also put a little of that profit into other energy companies - like some of the alternative energy places.
   
   It's called "diversification". I know I didn't graduate from a fancy Ivy League school, but even the community college I attended had that concept in Econ 101. And, yes, I made a "C", but I did remember what I learned there. The non-Ivy way to state that is:

   Don't put all your eggs in one basket.

   So, I think we can presume that the oil companies, knowing that basic investment strategy, already are trying to find cheaper, better, and more plentiful energy reserves.
   
   But, whether or not they are, it's still NOT YOUR MONEY!

The above rant ignores the question of whether we can trust the government to

• use the collected funds wisely (as, of course, they already do with Social Security money - sarcasm intended), and,
  
• do what no government agency has been able to do so far, which is solve problems, instead of making them worse.

BTW, Hill, did you realize that the people who vote for you are increasing their retirement investments, in part, due to the profits of the big, bad oil companies? Think about what the teachers, public employees, union workers and the like would say if someone (not me, of course) dropped that little factoid in their ear. Would you still be able to be re-elected?

Worse than Carter

Hard to believe that there could be a worse person than the former President of the US, Jimmuh Carter.

Why do I call him that?

• He broke precedent when he began publicly commenting on Presidential actions. Think of it - he's still taking money from the US, but acting contrary to our interests.
  
  
• He travels the world, using the cachet of his former position to intervene in foreign affairs - including secret negotiations with heads of foreign governments. The Logan Act, still on the books, specifically forbids private citizens (that's you, Jimmuh) from the following:

  Any citizen of the United States, wherever he may be, who, without authority of the United States, directly or indirectly commences or carries on any correspondence or intercourse with any foreign government or any officer or agent thereof, with intent to influence the measures or conduct of any foreign government or of any officer or agent thereof, in relation to any disputes or controversies with the United States, or to defeat the measures of the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both.

  Sounds like Jimmuh better start loading up on cigarettes to trade in prison.
  
  
• His hostile attitudes towards Jews. His new books contains a substantial amount of anti-Semitism, enough that 14 members of the Carter Center resigned in protest.

Folks, I voted for Jimmuh. After his term in office, I had some admiration for the work he did with Habitat for Humanity.

But, his recent actions go beyond the pale. He is wrong to keep taking money from the US, yet act in ways that directly hurt the government and its citizens. You can't have it both ways - either stop his ILLEGAL actions, or give up the pension and expense money, and stop referring to himself as the "Former President".

Y'all ain't in charge now, Jimmuh. And, God willing, we'll never go back to the days of your Presidency, and its accomplishments, including:

1. Failure to act in defense of American officials, as you did in the Iranian hostage crisis.
   
   
2. Double-digit inflation. AND sky-high unemployment.
   
   
3. Establishment of the Department of Energy and Department of Education, both of which suck up substantial amounts of money, but deliver no solutions.
   
   
4. The Camp David accords, which emboldened the "Palestinians" by giving them everything they asked for, yet not stopping their terrorist activities in Israel. Also gave you a totally undeserved Peace Prize, which has apparently gone straight to your head. Jimmuh, you ain't no Ghandi.
   
   
5. The Panama Canal treaties, which led to Noriega's reign of terror, before Reagan sent in the troops to take him out.
   
   
6. Full diplomatic relations with China. No concessions on their side about human rights. Guess the US is the only country that needs to be sensitive to human rights.
   
   
7. He took the nukes out of S. Korea. At the time, I'm sure he believed that he made the stalemate less dangerous.

   One of Carter's first acts in office was to order the unilateral removal of all nuclear weapons from South Korea. He also announced his intention to remove all US troops from South Korea. During his first month in office he cut the defense budget by $6 Billion.

   However, with Kim II testing nuclear weapons, I think the least Carter should do is to apologize to S. Korea.
   
   
8. But what about human rights?

   The Carter Administration ended support to the historically U.S.-backed Somoza dictatorship in Nicaragua and gave aid to pro-U.S. factions of the Sandinista National Liberation Front Revolution after Somoza had been overthrown. However, Carter ignored a plea from El Salvador's Archbishop Óscar Romero not to send military aid to that country. Romero was later assassinated for his criticisms of El Salvador's violation of human rights.

   Hmmm. Guess that old HR stuff is only for those agreeing with tyrants.
   
   
9. Did his HR policy work better in the Dark Continent?

   after Bishop Abel Muzorewa was elected Prime Minister, protested that the Marxists Robert Mugabe and Joshua Nkomo had been excluded from the elections. Strong pressure from the United States and the United Kingdom prompted new elections in what was then called Zimbabwe Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe).

   And we all know what a paradise on Earth Zimbabwe is today.

I hold no personal animosity towards Carter. I just wish he'd SHUT UP!

Speaking of Shutting Up,



Mr. Cash & Kerry, y'all weren't even elected. Not even close. So, what the heck are you doing wandering the world, consorting with declared enemies of the US?

I feel a rant comin' on

From Psychology Today:

Most people are surprised to learn that there are real, stable differences in personality between conservatives and liberals—not just different views or values, but underlying differences in temperament. Psychologists John Jost of New York University, Dana Carney of Harvard, and Sam Gosling of the University of Texas have demonstrated that conservatives and liberals boast markedly different home and office decor. Liberals are messier than conservatives, their rooms have more clutter and more color, and they tend to have more travel documents, maps of other countries, and flags from around the world. Conservatives are neater, and their rooms are cleaner, better organized, more brightly lit, and more conventional. Liberals have more books, and their books cover a greater variety of topics. And that's just a start. Multiple studies find that liberals are more optimistic. Conservatives are more likely to be religious. Liberals are more likely to like classical music and jazz, conservatives, country music. Liberals are more likely to enjoy abstract art. Conservative men are more likely than liberal men to prefer conventional forms of entertainment like TV and talk radio. Liberal men like romantic comedies more than conservative men. Liberal women are more likely than conservative women to enjoy books, poetry, writing in a diary, acting, and playing musical instruments.

Why, oh why, do I get the distinct feeling that, first, the writers of these studies looked for persons that fit their stereotypes of conservatives, then, second, included them into the study. Is it possible that the liberals in those studies were found on college campuses (students and professors), whereas the conservatives were found in the campus security department, the maintenance staff, and Home Depot parking lots.

I am just one of the MANY conservatives whose personality and temperament fit the liberal stereotype in most regards. The article does say:

Even with impeccable methodology, bias may creep into the choice of which phenomena to study. "There is a bias among social scientists," admits Glaser. "They look for the variables that are unflattering. There probably are other nice personality traits associated with conservatism, but they haven't shown up in the research because it's not as well studied."

The consistent use of the term "conventional" is an example of that bias. Why isn't rigid adherence to recycling dictates classified as "rigidity"? Why is flitting around, aimlessly picking up the "cause de jour" characterized as "openness", rather than "flightiness" or "inability to commit"?

Feel free to read the article, and see what your take on it is.

As Jim Traficant used to say, "Beam me up, Scotty"

You have absolutely GOT to see this video! It's the actual speech by Rep. Wu (Do I have to mention Democrat?), who said there are Vulcans in the White House, then corrected himself to say that they were Klingons, not REAL Klingons, but faux Klingons.

I feel that Oregonians were especially - NUANCED - to realize that what the House of Representatives needed, in this time of international crisis, is someone who has a breathtaking and comprehensive understanding of Star Trek trivia. Like the guys below.



See? Even Sulu is laughing.



REAL KLINGONS?

Moron.

More to the Gym Story

You know, when the story first broke about the Muslim who was rudely interrupted at prayer, then told by the gym's staff

The manager told me, 'You have to respect her (the patron), but she does not have to respect your God,' " said Wardeh Sultan of Dearborn.

- something about it just didn't ring true to me. I was sure that the staff would have bent over backwards to treat Ms. Sultan with respect, particularly in Detroit, where so many Muslims live. I didn't understand why the staff member would have said "you have to respect her" - the other member.

Now I understand. In Front Page Magazine's story by Janet Levy: (Oy! Her supposed religious/ethnic background will allow the story to be ignored)

According to Jodi Berry, executive director of Fitness USA, Wardeh Sultan was praying in front of another member’s locker when the member wanted access to her belongings inside the locker. The inconvenienced patron tried to interrupt Ms. Sultan, but she remained prostrate in front of the locker and an altercation ensued. A manager was called into the locker room to intervene.

OK.

Now it makes sense. The director wasn't making a gratuitous snide comment, but simply stating reasonable expectations about Ms. Sultan's need to respect her fellow gym users' need to have access to their lockers - even if it interrupted her prayers. In other words, she needed to act as though the world didn't have to stop 5 times a day to accommodate her.

This is an example of an unreasonable accommodation. Western society isn't set up for separate prayer rooms in businesses. Nor should businesses and government offices and buildings have to provide them. They never provided a place for me to quietly say the rosary.

Ms. Sultan and her fellow Muslims need to understand. We don't stop for them to say their prayers. We never did. We don't HAVE to now. If a business or person wants to wait, that's fine. But, unlike the countries that have imposed mandatory observance, we don't have to.

Don't like it?

Move to a Muslim country.

Think I'm being unfair? Or rude? Let me explain what happens in those countries.

Residents of a southern Somalia town who do not pray five times a day will be beheaded, an official said Wednesday, adding the edict will be implemented in three days.

Shops, tea houses and other public places in Bulo Burto, about 124 miles northeast of the capital, Mogadishu, should be closed during prayer time and no one should be on the streets, said Sheik Hussein Barre Rage, the chairman of the town's Islamic court. His court is part of a network backed by armed militiamen that has taken control of much of southern Somalia in recent months, bringing a strict interpretation of Islam that is alien to many Somalis.

Those who do not follow the prayer edict after three days have elapsed, "will definitely be beheaded according to Islamic law," Rage told The Associated Press by phone. "As Muslims we should practice Islam fully, not in part, and that is what our religion enjoins us to do."

Granted, this is extreme, but most Muslim countries have rules about not working during prayer time - even for non-Muslims. It's not optional.

It's the law.

UCLA "Tasing"

At SFGate.com">, a CA newspaper online, the taser incident is explored.

Tabatabainejad, 23, was shocked Tuesday night after arguing with a campus police officer who was conducting a routine check of student IDs at the University of California, Los Angeles, Powell Library computer lab.

Campus police say he refused to show his student ID and refused to leave the building when asked.

Several things occur to me:

• First, other reports have said that this was technically NOT a tasing, which is a pretty potent weapon, that would likely make speech more difficult than the recording (on YouTube). That doesn't totally excuse the apparent overkill on force, it just puts it into perspective.
  
  
• There is absolutely no evidence that the student was targeted because of ethnicity. In fact, since the student refused to show ID, it would be difficult to prove that the campus cops even knew his ethnicity.
  
  
• These were campus cops, NOT LAPD. They were students with low-level orders, training, and weaponry. It illustrates the bad decision-making that puts in place security with little training.
  
  As a teacher, I can forthrightly say, you give the order. If they do not comply, repeat - ONCE! After that, either get physical (i.e., pick him up), or call in back-up. Don't continue repeating the order.
  
  
• What a malignant, whiny, wimp! He got pissy when told to either prove his right to be there or move. He started screaming about brutality even before they used the stun gun on him. He made the decision to continue resisting.

The only reason he screamed and yelled, and continued resisting is that he wanted to provoke a riot. If I were on a jury for a lawsuit, I'd give him one dollar. And the advice of Chris Rock, who created the famous How Not to Get Your Ass Kicked.

I watched it - it's good advice.

Even Paranoids Have Enemies

Gagdad Bod, AKA One Cosmos, has some illuminating (NOT Illuminati) things to say about the far left kooks.

it is very unsettling that a large segment of the population believes things about conservatives that are not only untrue, but cannot possibly be true. They are terrified of a wholly fantasized version of reality, while I am afraid of their seemingly boundless capacity to fantasize and to inhabit their malicious fantasies.

The purpose of language is to communicate about reality. But what if it is not communicating reality, but fantasy? Somehow, these people are "successful" in communicating to one another (they all know exactly what the others are talking about, while you or I would say, "wwwhhhhaaaat?), and are even perversely emotionally "nourished" by the communication. It is a relief to them that others share the same fantasy--it satisfies them, fills some kind of need. But it is not a need for truth. It's like an anxious group of primitives who invent a spurious cure for a disease they don't understand.

If that doesn't scare you, read his post (with comments) about the 14 Characteristics of Fascism.

When you're down, in trouble, and need a helping hand....

Whatever you do, don't call on this demented POS. It's a sure bet that the majority of the country will be strongly tempted to kick his heinie to the curb, as he so richly deserves.

I'm trying to picture the kind of person that would take their hatred of Bush and his crew to exploit the victims of terrorist actions in such a vile and despicable way. It's beyond me.

H/T to the Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiller, for alerting me to the existence of the video.