Scorched Earth

Pelosi's beating up on Exxon for making a profit.

Pelosi, like President Barack Obama earlier in the week, said oil companies don’t deserve tax breaks and that the U.S. ought to be investing in clean energy.

"There is no reason American taxpayers should subsidize Big Oil's profits," Pelosi said in a brief statement on Thursday. Obama's 2012 budget aims to strip oil and gas companies of tax deductions and credits including a credit for oil and gas produced from marginal wells.

Stop calling these subsidies. A subsidy is when the government actually cuts a check to these companies.

And "tax break" isn't exactly right, either. They're just vestiges of freedom on a landscape otherwise blighted with taxes. Left over from before the taxes were originally levied.

Put it this way - if every year a city were carpet-bombed, but one church continuously and miraculously escaped the devastation unharmed, would you insist that the problem is that the church is still standing?

Apparently Nancy Pelosi would.

And does.

Why I Won't Use Facebook & Twitter

Can't edit entries after posting.

Can't save posts as drafts.

Can't schedule posts.

When they add ALL these basic features - that have been available for years on even the crappiest blogging software - I'll be there.

Free Simon Ledger!

Who was arrested on "suspicion of racially aggravated harassment" in England after a Chinese guy got offended by him playing the song "Kung Fu Fighting".

No Justice, No Peace!


[YouTube direct link]

Better Motto for Exxon

Exxon Mobil is out there begging people not to hate them for somehow managing to run a successful business in tough economic times.

What's next? The Packers apologizing to the other 31 teams in the NFL for winning the Superbowl?

Try this, guys:

"If you think our profits are too high, maybe you should buy our stock."

Now With Handy Self-Parodying Feature

I do so love Regretsy (a site that makes fun of the more pretentious and self-obsessed people hawking their wares on Etsy).

Quote of the day from a featured seller:

"A wombn in love with her vulva can heal galaxies of unchallenged pain and frustration."

If that line made you giggle, wait until you actually visit the Temple of Wombn home page.

Look, as a guy, I'm VERY supportive when it comes to obsessing over vulvas, but spelling errors are kind of a turnoff.

[Full disclosure: I've used the services of Etsy sellers in the past and was satisified with both the product and the service I received. I'd use it again, and I recommend it to others]

[Fuller discloser: Ditto for vulvas]

Buying Happiness - It's What Money Does

I fully expect my wife to do this for ME, when the time comes:


[YouTube direct link]

Just Another Reason

...that I hate Twitter.

Rounded corners on text boxes.

Because unless a corner exists in the physical world where it can draw blood from the careless or clumsy, there's no reason to round it off.

Misuse

Got this from Spockgirl Musings:

1. Put Your iTunes on Shuffle.
2. For each question, press the 'next song' button to get your answer.
3. You must write down the name of the song no matter how silly it sounds!
4. Put any comments in brackets after the song name.
5. Tag at least 10 friends (this was originally a FaceBook Meme)

For my version, I went to Random Word Generator just to see if any interesting coincidences popped up, and I'm only doing parts 3 & 4:

---

What do your friends think of you?
programmer (My day job involves composing blog posts in html - I'll say that counts)

If someone says, "Is this okay?" You say...
naming (I can't stretch far enough to make this one make sense)

How would you describe yourself?
archive (I've never deleted one of my blogs)

What do you like in a guy/girl?
punishment (*snicker*)

How do you feel today?
soil (it IS laundry day)

What is your life’s purpose?
sender (I *do* send out emails pretty much every day)

What is your motto?
hindsight (it's 2020tastic!)

What do you think about often?
inclination (what DO I want to do today?)

What is 2+2?
severity (it's severely 4. Back in the 80's, they used to say it was totally 4)

What do you think of your best friend?
pump (my wife is my best friend, so this isn't that weird)

What do you think of the person you like?
two (wish there were two of her - imagine the possibilities!)

What is your life story?
lecture (see also, my Good Advice catergory)

What do you want to be when you grow up?
machinery (I'm such a tool)

What do you think of when you see the person you like?
expedition (double *snicker*)

What will you dance to at your wedding?
cream (yup, nothing says dancing like Eric Clapton - is it even POSSIBLE to dance to "Crossroads"?)

What will they play at your funeral?
sinking (well, I *was* in the Navy, plus No Doubt is one of my guilty pleasures)

What is your hobby/interest?
are (I guess that means a) I have more than one, and b) I'm a grammar nazi)

What is your biggest fear?
communication (only via texting)

What is your biggest secret?
gentle (shhhh! don't compromise my gangsta rep)

What do you think of your friends?
former (yes, I hate you all, now go away!)

What will you post this as?
misuse (good title, since I completely blew up this meme)

This Actually Happened to Me Today

[YouTube direct link]

Ok, maybe just that last part.

How to Not Spill Beer When You Tip the Bottle Over

Having spilled my fair share of beers at my fair share of backyard events, I find myself admiring the brilliant simplicity of this (via There, I Fixed It):

Question for the Smokers

When you light your cigarette, do you find yourself habitually cupping your hand around the flame, even when you're indoors, or even using a windproof lighter?

I was watching "Rescue Me" (one of the few TV shows that doesn't demonize smokers), and noticed the lead character cupping indoors.

I caught myself doing it recently while lighting cigars with a torch lighter with has a flame that couldn't be blown out by a hurricane.

Full disclosure. I smoked cigarettes for about 15 years, and lit a lot of those with butane lighters outdoors, so having this reflex isn't really so surprising. But it's been over 15 years since I dropped the pack-a-day habit, so it IS surprising that I'd STILL have this reflex.

Complete Strangers - Fix Your Own Problems

Obama said:

"One vision has been championed by Republicans in the House of Representatives and embraced by several of their party's presidential candidates…This is a vision that says up to 50 million Americans have to lose their health insurance in order for us to reduce the deficit. And who are those 50 million Americans? Many are someone's grandparents who wouldn't be able afford nursing home care without Medicaid. Many are poor children. Some are middle-class families who have children with autism or Down's syndrome. Some are kids with disabilities so severe that they require 24-hour care. These are the Americans we'd be telling to fend for themselves."

Attention codgers, cripples, & kids that Democrats say I'm trying to kill by asking for spending cuts:

I'm tired of paying your bills on top of my bills.

I'm done. Free ride's over. Find someone who knows you and loves you to pay your bills instead of lifting wallets from strangers.

Go to hell, and pay for your own damn handbasket.

Sometimes The Sequel Is Better Than The Original.

I think Harry Met Sally 2 definitely has that potential.

Definitely:


[Funny or Die direct link]

Unclear On The Concept

Mr. President, I fear you are out of touch.

"Companies don't like uncertainty and if they start seeing that suddenly we may have a shutdown of our government, that could halt momentum right when we need to build it up - all because of politics."

Yeah, it's not crazy bullshit Obamacare or wacky EPA regulations that's causing uncertainty, it's that national parks might close in Utah.

I've Seen The Prototype - It's AWESOME!

I'm on board with this technological marvel, yet so few of my friends are brave enough to join me on the cutting edge:


[YouTube direct link]

Trump Has Bad Hair And A Point

Joe Biden's daughter has opened her mouth, so it's open season.

Apparently she's upset that Donald Trump is mentioning Obama's birth certificate in any context.

What pisses me off is the way Trump's position is being misrepresented here. He's not suggesting Obama doesn't have a birth certificate. He's quite sure it exists. He's asking why it hasn't been shown.

Because that question is interesting. It's analogous to Saddam Hussein who kept acting like he was hiding WMD, even though he really had nothing to hide

It's sad that the best case scenario we can hope for with Obama's birth certificate is that Obama is acting just like Saddam Hussein.

Yeah, I Went Through the Same Thing

Dedicated to every boy who was ever treated like a mental patient for the crime of acting like a boy.



[YouTube direct link]

Wrong Reaction

[YouTube direct link]

I'd just like to point out that the person who picked this bottle up didn't do it out of any sense of global environmental obligation.

She did it because she was an obsessive-compulsive anal-retentive neat freak, oddly combined with an unhealthy lack of fear of communicable diseases.

We shouldn't be celebrating mental diseases.

Not Sure Why, But I Really Enjoyed This

The music really isn't my style,but the choreography is just so intricate, polished, and synchronized. And that last minute or so, they do a LOT of precision-timed stuff, yet it's all done in one take. I can't imagine the amount of rehearsal it took to get this right.


[YouTube direct link]

But, truth be told, my favorite moment comes at 1:05 when the airport security guy does a double-take at the sight of what the guys are doing, and again at 1:08 when he spots the camera and realizes this is being filmed.

Off On A Tangent

Guys gets the shit beat out of him by a home invader, and his young beauty-queen wife shoots the bad guy dead with a pink pistol.

To quote Fred Thompson, "that guy's probably better off dead than having to tell that story in prison."

Hilarious, yes, but I'm actually eyeballing this line where Mr. Got-Beat-Up accuses the pizza guy of conspiracy to commit... well, whatever the invader guy would've been charged with, had he lived:

"We live in a very prominent area and my fiancee wears a $60,000 engagement ring," he said. "The pizza man knew we had money because sometimes we needed change for a $100 bill when he came to deliver pizza."

He's 42, she's 25. She's a trophy-wife. He's status-obsessed. And it's a safe assumption this drives him to act like a douche. A LOT.

Brags about the $60,000 ring - yeah, like pizza guys know diamonds.

And "sometimes" you needed change for a $100? Dude, pizza guys don't carry that kind of change. As a former pizza guy, I know this. I also know he's told you this every time you were asshole enough to poke a $100 bill his way. And yet you admit that you've done this to him more than once?

Buddy, that wasn't a home invader beating the crap out of you, that was karma.

These Politicians Are a Tiresome Lot

I'm stuck in Wisconsin. It's spring,and it's April, and it snowed again yesterday.

Meanwhile, Joe Biden jet-sets out of his DC office to hobnob with sports celebrities in Florida, in sunshine and short sleeves.



Joe Biden - a guy who's job description is "outlive the President".

Why is he in Florida, hobnobbing with celebrities, on my dime?

I want my dime back.

Seriously, just shove this turd into his "undisclosed location", lock the door, and bury the key. Let him out if and only if Obama becomes unable to perform his duties and Biden has to take over.

If there's a tie in the Senate, Biden can vote by phone. Works for American Idol.

This country's broke, Joe. You should know that. You voted for every single one of those spending bills since your first day in the Senate.

Please stop wasting my money on stupid, pointless shit like flying 1000 miles for a photo-op.

Why I Hate Obamacare

This guy.


[YouTube direct link]

No, don't bother watching the video. It's just insipid propaganda. Just look at the picture.

He can afford a 3-pound jar of hair gel, but he can't buy his own health insurance.

So... I have to pay more for MY health insurance so this healthy, able-bodied 20-something - who doesn't NEED health insurance at his age - can sponge off his parents' policy.

In other words, I have to forego the very iPhone this slack-jawed jackass is talking to the President on so that I can buy HIS health insurance in addition to mine.

If I ever meet him, I'm going to break all his big, horsey teeth.

Hope Obamacare covers that.

New Front-Runner For Worst Idea of the Decade

See, this is the kinda thing that causes armed uprisings.

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) this week released a report that said taxing people based on how many miles they drive is a possible option for raising new revenues and that these taxes could be used to offset the costs of highway maintenance at a time when federal funds are short.

The report discussed the proposal in great detail, including the development of technology that would allow total vehicle miles traveled (VMT) to be tracked, reported and taxed, as well as the pros and cons of mandating the installation of this technology in all vehicles.

Did these dick-sniffing fuckwits listen to a goddamn thing that was said in the last 6 months? We are broke. And it ain't because we're not taxed enough.

Seriously. Who the fuck do they think they are? These assholes spend us into oblivion then suggest as their solution not only an impossible tax, but a whole now bureaucracy whose sole purpose is to track the movements of every American.

This is a free country. I'm a free man. This suggestion is an obscenity.

Geez, Lady, Can Ya Tone Down the Smug Condescension Just a Pinch?

It's like Michelle Obama speaks for the sole purpose of irritating me.

"They were active and growing, with a healthy sense of themselves, which Barack and I have always encouraged," she writes. "But our doctor told me that their BMIs were creeping upwards. Now to be honest, I didn't really know what BMI was. And I certainly didn't know that even a small increase in BMI can have serious consequences for a child's health."

This is a carefully crafted and scripted lie.

She knows damn well what BMI is. She's feigning ignorance as a gesture to the ignorant, saying "see? All this crazy doctor talk is confusing! And I'm just like you!"

This is nearly as insulting as Barack's lie about his daughter asking if he plugged the hole yet. Another fake "awwwww" moment.

There's "artful presentation", and there's "disingenuously patronizing". I'm going with the latter on this one.

Nerdy, But They Make A Good Point

How the Empire Strikes Back Should Have Ended.


[YouTube direct link]

He Probably Flunked Geometry

He added that three red lights in a triangle is a common pattern for UFOs.

Yeah, that's because three points form a triangle any time they're not forming a straight line.

I'm Sure Psychologists Have A Word For This Disease

Bill Maher called Sarah Palin a cunt.

Wow. He's never even called Ann Coulter that.

He's obviously feeling VERY threatened by her. Reminds me of how the demon in The Exorcist talked to the priest.

Very interesting.

Very revealing.

The Nanny State Does No Favors

From Fox:

After staunchly defending the safety of artificial food colorings, the federal government is for the first time publicly reassessing whether foods like Jell-O, Lucky Charms cereal and Minute Maid Lemonade should carry warnings that the bright artificial colorings in them worsen behavior problems like hyperactivity in some children.

What's the point of warning labels?

1) Unless the label says "this product will kill you instantly" like on a box of rat poison, no one who likes the product will stop buying it.

2) It's useless as a liability shield to manufacturers. 30 plus years of warning labels on cigarettes, and tobacco companies still got billions of dollars extorted from them in a "settlement".

So in this case, I hope that every single FDA employee falls in a vat of red food coloring and drowns.

Useless nanny-state gits.

On Being An Atheist Without Being An Asshole

The headline at NewsBusters gives a fair summary of Susan Jacoby's position:

Atheist 'On Faith' Contributor Slams Religious Americans As Having 'Mind of a Preschooler'

Susan, while some people are raised Christian from childhood and simply never question what they're taught, that's not always the case. Some of them do their homework as adults and consciously commit to the religion. And some non-believers put a lot of thought and study into the matter before choosing to convert to Christianity.

So take that broad brush you're painting with, and shove it into a convenient orifice.

[Full disclosure - I converted to atheism as an adult after putting a lot of thought and study into the matter. I don't condemn people who decided differently after putting forth their own intellectual effort]

Battle of the Sexes: Work Edition

Interesting, especially since a woman wrote this:

For the most part, I prefer to work with men than women. Over the years, I have found female-dominated workplaces to be unfocused and ill-managed, consumed by office politics, less competitive and less ambitious, and I have found male-dominated workplaces to be more focused and better-managed, less consumed by office politics, more competitive and more ambitious.

Since I've worked in both situations, I find myself agreeing 100%.

If you've had it both ways, please chime in.

Try Again, Please

Seriously, I love me some Tea Party, but I stopped by this web site & caught these two logos:



Top one: Well, it's just the gayest banner ever. Looks like Wonder Woman's underwear. Better for leading a pride parade than ousting a socialist government.

The bottom one: "Official Grassroots American Movement"? Makes them sound like astroturfed corporate tools. Are they getting marketing advice from the same people who thought New Coke would be the Best. Idea. Ever?

Please. Talk to someone who does PR for a living and give it another shot. This is not the image you're looking for.