Palin-drones Lament

After much press, publicity, and serious Harold Hill hucksterism, Annie Wilkes of the GOP has announced that she will cease teasing the Ma-and Pa-Kettle wing of her party with the notion that she will be seeking the 2012 GOP nomination for President of the United States.

She is going to stay on the porch, cut bait, and get the hell out of the way.

That is all.

h/t Sarah Palin Will Not Run for President - ABC News

That Others May Live

Recently, conservative commenator Bryan Fischer complained of the "feminization" of the Congressional Medal of Honor. What he means is that it has been awarded more frequently to those who save lives in combat rather than those who solely kill people and break things.

If Mr. Fischer thinks that those who specialize in saving lives in combat is "feminine," I'd recommend that he go hang with the USAF PJs for a while. Since I know that he wouldn't last through one day of the training those guys go through, I'd instead recommend he see The Conscientious Objector, a great documentary about Desmond Doss, a Seventh Day Adventist Conscientious Objector who served as a Medic in the Pacific Theater during WWII.

Garden Noam

Here is a little treat for all of my left-wing readers out there in the blogosphere. It is the work of Brandon Bird, an artist whose skills are only matched only by his knowledge of pop culture.

You can find even more such treats at brandonbird.com.

Report: Rush Limbaugh taken to Hawaii hospital

Report: Rush Limbaugh taken to Hawaii hospital

According to RushLimbaugh.com, "Rush was admitted to a Honolulu hospital today and is resting comfortably after suffering chest pains. Rush appreciates your prayers and well wishes. He will keep you updated via RushLimbaugh.com and on Thursday's radio program."

I am certain the outpouring of love from his listeners will only be matched by the vicious bile of his enemies.

"You have enemies? Good. That means you've stood up for something, sometime in your life."
--Winston Churchill

Monsterpocalypse Now

There's no need to fear. DHS is here. And they are protecting us from kaiju. " What's kaiju?" you may ask. They are giant monsters popularized by Japanese film-makers like Toho Studios, who gave the world the most famous kaiju: Godzilla. Sure, Gamera can go tear-assing around Japan, but he'd better keep his flame-shooting butt out of the U.S. of A. Too bad these guys weren't around in 1978 when Godzooky single-handedly ruined The Godzilla Power Hour.

According to Reason magazine, the Department of Homeland Security seized the first printing of a strategy guide for Privateer Press's giant-monster collectible miniature game Monsterpocalypse. The result was that the interdiction postponed the game's release for an entire week.

For the full story, see Reason's "Miniature Monsters Attack America."

Next thing you know, the ATF will be interdicting shipments of The Shotgun Diaries.

What's Everyone So Afraid of?


Related Links

Officlal Website for Monsterpocalypse Collectible Miniatures Game

KaijuCast: A Podcast Dedicated to Godzilla & All of His Rubber-suited Foes...

Artist David Wong has some great monster paintings, including a Godzilla.

Play the old Neo Geo King of The Monsters on your PC via emulator.

Last Man Standing

What if a conservative talk show host like Rush Limbaugh were the last man on earth, and everyone else had been transformed into liberal nudist zombies? Find out in Hive Mind, the story of Doug Trench, right-wing radio talk show host, "stevedore of freedom," and the last man on earth. Aside from the zombies who are controlled by the Hive Mind collective.


h/t Kathy Shaidle @ examiner.com

C-SPAN2's Buck TV

C-SPAN2's Book TV had an excellent interview with Christopher Buckley. Usually, I can't suffer through In Depth's full three hours, but Buckley's three hour block was so interest, touching on so many different subjects, it was over before I knew it.

Among other things of interest, I found out that Buckley dispatched his father to the Great Hereafter with a jar of peanut butter, the t.v. remote, and the deceased's favorite rosary. He touched on his endorsement of Barack Obama, praising him as "a very fine guy possessed of a first class temperament" while predicting that Obama's deficit-doubling economic policies will "bring this country to its knees." He also spoke of Dubya's ruinous deficit spending, his love of Dubya's dad, his time in the merchant marine, the war between his dad and Gore Vidal, and, of course, his works -- especially his latest, a memoir, Losing Mom and Pup.

Watch it here.

While checking his blog at The Daily Beast, I found out that Tucker Carlson is a fellow Flashman fan.

The Eyes of Boston Harbor Are Upon You

One of my favorite TV people, Stephen Colbert, on the decision of one of my favorite radio people, Glenn Beck, to hold his Tea Party at the Alamo:

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Tax Atax
colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor NASA Name Contest

Art of The Living Dead
h/t to about half a dozen of the blogs I regularly read for pointing me in the direction of Travis Pitts (a.k.a. Dr. Monster), my new favorite Flickrborne artist. He has a grand collection of Cold War Z propaganda posters and other art at his Flickr site.



Like that? Then check out even more stuff at his main website: Zom-bot.com

Now, if I could only get me a t-shirt with his Hoth 45 piece on it, I would be in hipster-geek heaven.

Hybrid Toys
Cross a donkey with a horse; you get a mule. Cross a toy soldier with a paper doll, you get Walkerloo.

Two Pirate Yarns

Our first tale of piracy comes to us from the Exurban League. These Arizona bloggers have posted the transcript of President Obama's response to the Maersk Alabama incident. File under "Political 'Teh Funny.'"

Good evening. As you know, early yesterday, Somali-based pirates attacked the Maersk Alabama, a freighter carrying relief supplies to Kenya. While we do not yet know all the details, the Alabama's crew re-took control of the vessel and forced the pirates off the ship.

Since the pirates are still holding the captain, I have sent FBI negotiators to facilitate his safe and speedy release. I assure his friends and family that I will not stop until this man-made disaster is resolved in a peaceful, tolerant and ecologically-sound manner.

Obviously, this incident has raised many concerns among Americans. There have been calls for justice and even violence against the misguided perpetrators. But such an emotional reaction has led to the disparagement of entire groups with which we are unfamiliar. We have seen this throughout history.

For too long, America has been too dismissive of the proud culture and invaluable contributions of the Pirate Community. Whether it is their pioneering work with prosthetics, husbandry of tropical birds or fanciful fashion sense, America owes a deep debt to Pirates.

( Read more ... )

Where's Woodes Rogers when ya need 'im?

Our second tale of piracy involves the digital kind. Namely, an attempt to eliminate illegal dissemination of D&D PDFs. In an exclusive interview with ENWorld, Wizards Brethren of The Coast President Greg Leeds addressed the company's recent decision to yank their PDF products from the shelves of Paizo and RPGNow. This removal of products comes a mere month after the company made the following statement in a 3/6/2009 press release:

In conjunction with the Retailer Rewards program, Wizards of the Coast will also release a new Internet Sales Policy on April 6. The new policy will have clear guidelines for online sales of Wizards’ product, and requires that retailers register with Wizards by signing an Authorized Internet Dealer Agreement.

But according to the Leeds interview, it's more like a No Internet Sales Policy.

We do not have any plans to resume the sale of PDFs, but are actively exploring other options for the digital distribution of our content – including older editions. We understand that digital content is important to our customers.

Barring access to those who sell and buy the stuff legally is like sending in a SEAL Team to take out Captain Richard Phillips instead of the Somali corsairs.

In response (or lack thereof) to concerns that WoTC is "punishing the customers who choose to legally acquire electronic Wizards products while not significantly affecting online book piracy," Leeds said:

While we understand that our actions will not eliminate piracy all together, we don’t want to make it easy to acquire illegally, either. We need to have a strong retail base in order to support (and grow) the hobby industry. We hope to deter future offenders – or at least slow down their path to obtaining illegal products.

I think The Eiglophian Press hit the nail on the head:

Basically this Leeds person failed to respond to the first part of the question altogether, which is tantamount to saying "We don't really give a shit if you bought our products electronically." I mean, am I wrong? 'Cus from where I'm sitting I don't see any sort of acknowledgment for the money I legally threw to WotC for PDF copies of OOP books. I guess my support doesn't matter and WotC doesn't value my business.

Fortunately, I don't rely on Leeds and his ilk to supply my gaming needs. I'd be willing to bet that while the rest of us were huddled around a table coated in graph paper, lead miniatures, pizza boxes, Doritos bags, and Mountain Dew cans, Leeds was attending frat parties and filling out his apps for MBA school. Sure, I forked out a few bones to WoTC to pay for my Gamma World PDF and the issue of The Dragon that had the China Mieville stuff in it. But, my gaming dollar has primarily gone to and will continue to go to the crew at Fight On! magazine. The heirs to the legacy of Arneson and Gygax aren't suits like Greg Leeds. They are people like Jeff Rients and James Maliszewski.

Gamma-Fried Chicken

One of my favorite roleplaying game adventure modules was Gamma World's Famine in Far-Go. The player characters are a "group of young adventurers about to begin the sacred Rite of Adulthood." There quest takes them into the Forest of Knowledge to discover the cause of a "mysterious plague." Timothy Truman's artwork alone makes one think twice before eating another order of Frankenfood MacNuggets.

The entire adventure can be found at Scribd.

Gamma World - GW2 - Famine in Far-Go

Publish at Scribd or explore others: eBooks Academic Work future mutant

NRA *heart* NY
Tip o' the pith helmet to New York Governor David Paterson for appointing Kirsten Gillibrand to fill the U.S. Senate seat vacated by Hillary Clinton. Senator Gillibrand is the recipient of an "A" from the National Rifle Association for her voting record on Second Amendment issues. Heck, if the Democrats keep this up, they just may win me back to the party of my forefathers.

New York Gov. David Paterson will name Rep. Kirsten Gillibrand, an upstate Democrat, to replace Hillary Clinton in the U.S. Senate, a Democratic official with knowledge of the governor's decision told FOX News on Thursday night.

But some New York City Democrats are skeptical of Gillibrand, who voted against the financial rescue package last fall. And the National Rifle Association has endorsed Gillibrand -- another cause for concern among some Democrats. . . .

In defense of the endorsement, Gillibrand told FOX News that she comes from a "hunting family" and "wants to support hunter's rights."

[ source : Field & Stream ]

Tip o' the pith helmet to President Obama as well for these kind words:

“Governor Paterson made a wonderful choice in appointing Kirsten Gillibrand to fill Secretary Clinton’s seat in the United States Senate. I am confident that she will continue Secretary Clinton’s distinguished service to the people of New York and to our country….During her career, Kirsten has been a strong voice for transparency and reform in government and shares the belief that government should be open, accessible and work for all of our citizens. In Congress and as special counsel for the Department of Housing and Urban Development, she worked to strengthen public and private partnerships to invest in infrastructure and New York’s economy.”

[ source : Wall Street Journal ]

Yugo
How to clean a Yugo

Abortions Without Borders

During the Wednesday night presidential debate, in his response to a Roe v. Wade question, Barack Obama said, “Nobody’s pro-abortion.” If he believes that, he’s never met the crew of the Good Ship Aurora. Apparently disatisfied with limiting their exports to machinery, chemicals, fuels, and foodstuffs, the Dutch have added another number to their trade repetoire: abortions.

In the Spanish port of Valencia, six women boarded the Aurora, the flagship of Women on Waves, a Dutch evangelical abortion group. the Aurora took on six passengers in the Spanish port of Valencia Friday, all women with the common goal of terminating their pregnancies in international waters in order to flout Spain's anti-abortion laws.

Abortion is legal in Spain in some circumstances, including a doctor's finding that having a baby is likely to harm the mother's physical or mental health. Women who have been raped can end their pregnancies in the first trimester, while those carrying fetuses with severe defects can get abortions up to 22 weeks.

Not exactly abortion-on-demand, but it ain't exactly the Spanish Inquisition either.

In spite of opposition from groups like the Spanish Association of Catholic Doctors (FAMC) and a phalanx of quayside opposition and a flotilla of maritime protestors, the Women on Waves were able to add six to the 100,000 abortions that have occurred over the past decade under Spain's so-called draconian abortion laws.

The Women on Waves Spanish cruise is nothing new. Their tour of clinical carnage has also dropped anchor in Ireland (2001), Poland (2003), and Portugal (2004).

I remember that France had problems with some loony radicals in a boat once.







I guess the Women on Waves hope that the Spanish, Irish, Polish, and Portuguese will quit defending those pesky fetuses and worry about things that are important in Amsterdam, like making certain that no pigs are castrated before they are butchered for meat.

[ sources : Times Online, The Times of The Internet ]

Links

Obama's Abortion Extremism by Robert George

Not-So-Fresh Ayers

Yesterday was the fiftieth anniversary of the bombing of The Hebrew Benevolent Congregation Temple, a Reform Jewish temple located at 1589 Peachtree Street, NE in Atlanta. Angered by Rabbi Jacob Rothschild's outspoken support of the civil rights movement and his friendship with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the bombers detonated between forty and fifty sticks of dynamite which tore through the northern wall of the synagogue, one of Atlanta's oldest and wealthiest. Fortunately, in spite of the desecration and architectural damage, no one died or was injured in the bombing.

Shortly thereafter, United Press International received a call from a man who identified himself as "General Gordon of the Confederate Underground" who claimed responsibility for the attack. Over the next several days, GBI agents and local law enforcement combed the city in one of the most extensive dragnets in Georgia history. Their search netted five men. All were members of anti-Semitic organizations like the National States' Rights Party and the Knights of the White Camellia.

Of the five, only one stood trial: a thirty-four year old engineer and amateur inventor named George Bright, a New York native who had spent his adult years in Atlanta. Twelve years earlier, Bright had enlisted in The Columbians, a neo-Nazi organization founded by Bright's fellow New Yorker-turned-Georgian Horace Loomis, a Princeton dropout. Over the years, Bright ended up on the membership roster the one fringe group after another.

Investigators uncovered plenty of evidence of Bright's animosity toward Rothschild and his temple, such as a handwritten note in Bright's home threatening the Rabbi, a 1958 arrest for carrying anti-Semitic placards outside the Atlanta Journal and Atlanta Constitution offices, and his presence in May of that year at a speech given by the Rabbi from which Bright was forcibly ejected for heckling Rothschild..

Less than two months after the Temple bombing, Bright stood trial for the first time. Ten days later, it ended in a mistrial -- the result of a 9-3 split among the jurors. For the second trial, Bright retained the silk-suited Reuben Garland, a colorful, and, at times, contemptous attorney, who nonetheless secured his client an acquittal. The cases against his co-defendants, which all depended upon Bright's conviction, quickly fell apart and charges against them were dropped.

When Melissa Faye Greene, author of The Temple Bombing, spoke with Bright, he still maintained his innocence (for what it's worth, Greene believes him), but remained unrepentant in his extreme beliefs.

It makes me wonder how many Ayers apologists would give McCain a pass if it had been Bright and his wife who had hosted the gathering at which McCain announced his candidacy for the Arizona Senate. Would they be so willing to let by-gones be by-gones for a bombing that occurred in 1958 as opposed to one that happened in 1970 (Oh, and one that happened in 1971. Oh, wait, and then there's the one that happened in 1972)?

How's this for a defense of the Bright-McCain relationship:

If Bright is such a Awful Terrorist Threat, why did the jury acquit him?

End of story.

Would that be such an "easy shut-down" of anyone suggesting that voters think twice before casting a ballot for candidate that has a skeleton with a penchant for dynamite in his closet as Gareth-Michael Skarka suggests?

Easy shut-down to any ConservaTron who froths about so-called "terrorist" (read here: White trust-fund kid protesting against the Vietnam War) William Ayers and his "friendship" (read here -- serving on the same charitable board) with Obama:

If Ayers is such a Awful Terrorist Threat, why did the Feds drop all charges against him when he turned himself in to the authorities in 1980?

Given the reaction to a stupid statement made by Trent Lott on the occassion of Strom Thurmond's 100th birthday ("When Strom Thurmond ran for president, we voted for him. We’re proud of it. And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn't have had all these problems over the years, either."), I would say, "No. It would not be an 'easy shut-down.'" By-gones are never by-gones in politics. Nevermind that Lott was only seven years old when Thurmond ran in 1948 (that's a year younger than Obama was when William Ayers bombed the NYPD HQ, two years younger than Obama was when Ayers bombed the Capitol, and three years younger than Obama was when Ayers preceded the Atta Gang in an attempt to make the Pentagon go boom).

Both parties have serious double standards. Sean Hannity and others of his ilk blasted the sexual scenes in Democrat Senator James Webb's literary work, yet they defended Scooter Libby in spite of the bestiality, pedophilia, prostitution, biastophilia, and necrophilia in his novel. But this time, it's not just some naughty parts in a novel we're talking about. It's association with a man who is an unrepentant terrorist that is being called into question.

While I don't think it is out-of-bounds to bring up Obama's middle name, I do think it is tacky and beneath the dignity of a presidential candidate. To paraphrase chaos theorist Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum), "Just because you can doesn't mean you should." The same goes for the whole madrasa question. I would much prefer a candidate raised in a moderate Muslim community than someone who has spent twenty years in under the religious tutelage of Trinity United Church of Christ's Jeremiah Wright. But I do think it is cricket to question Obama's association (however small it may be) with a guy who thinks as of 9/11/2001 said, "I don't regret setting bombs," and stated that he found "''a certain eloquence to bombs, a poetry and a pattern from a safe distance.'' I also think it's fair-game to question Obama's association with Mrs. Ayers (a.k.a. Bernadine Dohrn), the woman who J. Edgar Hoover called "the most dangerous woman in America," who commented on the Tate-LaBianca murders thus:

''Dig it! Manson killed those pigs, then they ate dinner in the same room with them, then they shoved a fork into a victim's stomach.''

Considering the much ado made of John Hagee's McCain endorsement, I think the Ayers-Obama question should be explored. What's good for the Goose is good for the Maverick. And vice versa.

Sources:

pbaonline: the website of public broadcasting atlanta

The Temple

New Georgia Encyclopedia: Temple Bombing

"A Church, A School" -- Ralph McGill's 10/13/1958 Editorial in response to the bombing

The Designer Monologues: The Whole Ayers Thing

No Regrets for a Love Of Explosives; In a Memoir of Sorts, a War Protester Talks of Life With the Weathermen - New York Times

The Black Kennedy: But does anyone know the real Barack Obama? - Peter Hitchens