Wednesday - January 25, 2006

Of Dogs And Men

Ancient Chinese Proverb: “If you lie down with dogs, you’ll get up with fleas.” Start scratching, Google ...

Google Agrees to Censor Results in China
January 25, 2006
SAN FRANCISCO (AP)

Online search engine leader Google Inc. has agreed to censor its results in China, adhering to the country’s free-speech restrictions in return for better access in the Internet’s fastest growing market. The Mountain View, Calif.-based company planned to roll out a new version of its search engine bearing China’s Web suffix “.cn,” on Wednesday. A Chinese-language version of Google’s search engine has previously been available through the company’s dot-com address in the United States.

By creating a unique address for China, Google hopes to make its search engine more widely available and easier to use in the world’s most populous country. Because of government barriers set up to suppress information, Google’s China users previously have been blocked from using the search engine or encountered lengthy delays in response time.

The service troubles have frustrated many Chinese users, hobbling Google’s efforts to expand its market share in a country that expected to emerge as an Internet gold mine over the next decade. China already has more than 100 million Web surfers and the audience is expected to swell substantially _ an alluring prospect for Google as it tries to boost its already rapidly rising profits.

Baidu.com Inc., a Beijing-based company in which Google owns a 2.6 percent stake, currently runs China’s most popular search engine. But a recent Keynote Systems survey of China’s Internet preferences concluded that Baidu remains vulnerable to challenges from Google and Yahoo Inc. To obtain the Chinese license, Google agreed to omit Web content that the country’s government finds objectionable. Google will base its censorship decisons on guidance provided by Chinese government officials.

Although China has loosened some of its controls in recent years, some topics, such as Taiwan’s independence and 1989’s Tiananmen Square massacre, remain forbidden subjects. Google officials characterized the censorship concessions in China as an excruciating decision for a company that adopted “don’t be evil” as a motto. But management believes it’s a worthwhile sacrifice. “We firmly believe, with our culture of innovation, Google can make meaningful and positive contributions to the already impressive pace of development in China,” said Andrew McLaughlin, Google’s senior policy counsel.

- More ChiCom Sucking-Up By Google Here ...

Posted by The Skipper     on 01/25/2006 at 06:12 AM   
Filed Under: • Corruption and Greed • Oppression •  
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Barking Moonbat Of The Week

By unanimous decision, Mr. Stein is hereby inducted into the Barking Moonbat Hall Of Fame. This asshat has been getting on my nerves for five years now, ever since the 2000 elections. Joel is the poster child for the Angry Left. He continues to annoy me. None the less for writing crap like this ...

Warriors and Wusses
by JOEL STEIN
(LA TIMES)

I DON’T SUPPORT our troops. This is a particularly difficult opinion to have, especially if you are the kind of person who likes to put bumper stickers on his car. Supporting the troops is a position that even Calvin is unwilling to urinate on. I’m sure I’d like the troops. They seem gutsy, young and up for anything. If you’re wandering into a recruiter’s office and signing up for eight years of unknown danger, I want to hang with you in Vegas.

And I’ve got no problem with other people — the ones who were for the Iraq war — supporting the troops. If you think invading Iraq was a good idea, then by all means, support away. Load up on those patriotic magnets and bracelets and other trinkets the Chinese are making money off of. But I’m not for the war. And being against the war and saying you support the troops is one of the wussiest positions the pacifists have ever taken — and they’re wussy by definition. It’s as if the one lesson they took away from Vietnam wasn’t to avoid foreign conflicts with no pressing national interest but to remember to throw a parade afterward.

Blindly lending support to our soldiers, I fear, will keep them overseas longer by giving soft acquiescence to the hawks who sent them there — and who might one day want to send them somewhere else. Trust me, a guy who thought 50.7% was a mandate isn’t going to pick up on the subtleties of a parade for just service in an unjust war. He’s going to be looking for funnel cake. Besides, those little yellow ribbons aren’t really for the troops. They need body armor, shorter stays and a USO show by the cast of “Laguna Beach.”

The real purpose of those ribbons is to ease some of the guilt we feel for voting to send them to war and then making absolutely no sacrifices other than enduring two Wolf Blitzer shows a day. Though there should be a ribbon for that. I understand the guilt. We know we’re sending recruits to do our dirty work, and we want to seem grateful. After we’ve decided that we made a mistake, we don’t want to blame the soldiers who were ordered to fight. Or even our representatives, who were deceived by false intelligence. And certainly not ourselves, who failed to object to a war we barely understood.

But blaming the president is a little too easy. The truth is that people who pull triggers are ultimately responsible, whether they’re following orders or not. An army of people making individual moral choices may be inefficient, but an army of people ignoring their morality is horrifying. An army of people ignoring their morality, by the way, is also Jack Abramoff’s pet name for the House of Representatives. I do sympathize with people who joined up to protect our country, especially after 9/11, and were tricked into fighting in Iraq. I get mad when I’m tricked into clicking on a pop-up ad, so I can only imagine how they feel.

But when you volunteer for the U.S. military, you pretty much know you’re not going to be fending off invasions from Mexico and Canada. So you’re willingly signing up to be a fighting tool of American imperialism, for better or worse. Sometimes you get lucky and get to fight ethnic genocide in Kosovo, but other times it’s Vietnam. And sometimes, for reasons I don’t understand, you get to just hang out in Germany. I know this is all easy to say for a guy who grew up with money, did well in school and hasn’t so much as served on jury duty for his country. But it’s really not that easy to say because anyone remotely affiliated with the military could easily beat me up, and I’m listed in the phone book.

I’m not advocating that we spit on returning veterans like they did after the Vietnam War, but we shouldn’t be celebrating people for doing something we don’t think was a good idea. All I’m asking is that we give our returning soldiers what they need: hospitals, pensions, mental health and a safe, immediate return. But, please, no parades. Seriously, the traffic is insufferable.

*Update* Radio Blogger has the transcript (and the audio) of an interview Hugh Hewitt did with this assclown.  Go read it.

Posted by The Skipper     on 01/25/2006 at 05:47 AM   
Filed Under: • Democrats-Liberals-Moonbat Leftists • Media-Bias • Outrageous •  
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The First Time

_{Cameron Cardow—The Ottawa Citizen}

Posted by The Skipper     on 01/25/2006 at 05:38 AM   
Filed Under: • Humor •  
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   Tuesday - January 24, 2006

Man Attacks Urinal

I confess that I am not a connoisseur of fine art, but a urinal?

Frenchman fined for attacking urinal artwork

PARIS (Reuters) - A Frenchman who attacked and damaged “Fountain,” a urinal declared a work of art by Dada pioneer Marcel Duchamp, was ordered Tuesday to pay a fine of 214,000 euros ($262,700).

A Paris court also gave Pierre Pinoncelli, 77, a three-month suspended sentence for taking a hammer to the absurdist artwork, the second time he has attacked it since 1993. The attack last month left the ceramic urinal slightly cracked.

Duchamp was a leader of the Dada movement, an avant garde “anti-art” school of the early 20th century that mocked conventional standards, and “Fountain,” made in 1917—is considered one of the most influential artworks of its kind.

“This was a wink at Dadaism,” Pinoncelli told the court in his defense. “I wanted to pay homage to the Dada spirit.”

Posted by Drew458     on 01/24/2006 at 03:52 PM   
Filed Under: • Art-Photography • Odd-Strange •  
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Bring Out Your Dead - II

Dead man rides subway for hours

NEW YORK, Jan. 23 (UPI)—It took more than six hours for anyone to realize that a 64-year-old Brooklyn man had died on a New York City subway train.

Eugene Reilly, who died of a heart attack, likely got onto a Brooklyn-bound Q train just before 1 a.m. Thursday. He wasn’t found until 7:15 a.m. when a curious commuter touched his shoulder, trying to wake him, the New York Daily News reported.

Reilly, a mail handler, worked the 4 p.m.-to-12:30 a.m. shift and was headed home, his wife said. He was sitting up in his seat, which transit officials said was likely the reason their workers left him alone for so long, the newspaper said.

“The policy is that if someone is sitting up, employees are not allowed to touch them,” said Deirdre Parker, a city transit spokeswoman.

A different transit official said employees probably saw Reilly, who was in the last car of the train, but thought he was sleeping.

“People sleep on the train all the time,” an official said. “No one thought anything of it.”

Posted by Drew458     on 01/24/2006 at 11:39 AM   
Filed Under: • News-Briefs • Odd-Strange •  
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Global Warming Strikes Again

Snowstorm Closes Hawaii Volcano To Tourists

MAUNA KEA, Hawaii -- Officials closed the summit of Hawaii’s Mauna Kea volcano to the public after a snowstorm shut down access for the first time this winter season.

Clouds blanketed Hawaii’s tallest peak this weekend. A blanket of snow forced everyone to evacuate, including park rangers”

We’ve got to make sure and keep everybody healthy and safe on the summit. So, I’m closing it,” Mauna Kea ranger Kimo Pihana said.

The heavy snowfall was a rare sight, even for those who are up there almost every day.

“The snow began to accumulate very quickly and we had to evacuate to prevent being trapped on the summit,” telescope operator Paul Sears said.

A California family was at the summit when the snow started falling, before the road was shut down.

“Did you ever think you’d see snow in Hawaii?” a reporter asked.

“Wasn’t really expecting to see snow in Hawaii,” said Bob Nyman.

“So it’s a nice treat on your vacation?” the reporter asked.

“Oh absolutely. It was great,” Nyman said.

For visitors who didn’t have timing on their side, the trek ended at the 9,000-foot mark where the road was closed.

Posted by Drew458     on 01/24/2006 at 11:34 AM   
Filed Under: • Climate-Weather • Environment • Odd-Strange •  
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Oh No! Not Again!

Yes, dear friends. It is 1994 all over again. Deja vu once more. Or should I say “Deja Voodoo”. No matter how many pins I stick in my Hildabeast doll she just won’t go away. And now she’s gearing up for a run at the Presidency in 2008. Even worse, she’s started singing that old “universal healthcare” song again like a damned broken record. Perhaps if I burn some chicken feathers over my voodoo doll. Maybe that’ll help. Regardless, the beast just won’t keep her mouth shut (see below). Must I be taxed with another Clintoon in the White House? Please, somebody help me ....

Sen. Clinton Re-enters Health Care Fray
Former first lady blasts Medicare plan; alleges ‘deliberate neglect’
ROCHESTER, New York (CNN)

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton put her pet issue, health care, at the center of her Senate re-election effort Monday, accusing the Bush administration of “deliberate neglect” of the issue. “I’m ready to get back into the fray, knowing how difficult and controversial it is,” Clinton told an audience of about 100 health care and business professionals at the University of Rochester Medical Center.

“The status quo is not sustainable.” In a campaign swing that touched down in the three most populous cities in upstate New York, the junior senator described the introduction of the Bush administration’s prescription drug plan under the Medicare program as a “confusing and complex transition.”

Earlier, while visiting a pharmacy, Clinton said many elderly residents were paying far more for drugs than they used to and have found themselves hamstrung by paperwork. “A lot of pharmacists are giving the drugs to their customers because they know how much their customers need it,” she said. “One of the bills I’ve introduced is to make sure the pharmacists get reimbursed.” Rochester has a population of about 200,000, and about 2 in 5 jobs in the area are in the health care industry.

Clinton also visited pharmacies in Buffalo and Syracuse to call for improvements to the Medicare drug plan, which took effect January 1. Since then, at least 26 states have had to step in to make sure some of the poorest seniors receive needed prescriptions, an association of state health care officials said last week.  “We have people that are coming up that should have $1 and $3 co-pays that have $40 co-pays on their medications,” said Dawne Rizio, a pharmacy technician at Rochester’s Saratoga Pharmacy. “They’re not getting their meds, or we’re spending hours on the phone fighting with insurance companies.”

In her speech, Clinton said the administration was not doing enough to help the 45 million Americans who have no health insurance or to lower health care costs, which now consume 15 percent of the nation’s gross national product. “The response in Washington to our health care crisis has been to cut Medicaid, erode patent protections and to promote strategies that increase costs and reduce access to care,” she said.

Clinton said Bush’s State of the Union speech January 31 was likely to include new proposals, which she characterized “in three words: on your own.” She said the failed effort to provide universal insurance coverage that she led as first lady early in her husband’s first term as president may have been “too much, too fast.” But she added, “Today, we’re making things worse with deliberate neglect and flawed policies that are diminishing the coverage that Americans have. That is shifting costs to others and leaving consumers, businesses and local governments with the bill.”

Clinton is seeking a second Senate term in November without a well-funded opponent, and she has not ruled out a run for the presidency in 2008. “I’m just running for re-election now—that’s my most important job is to get re-elected,” she told a supporter at the pharmacy. “But I need your help for that, too. I don’t want to take anything for granted.”

Clinton’s comments on health care were the latest in a series of sharp criticisms of the White House. Last week, she took aim at the administration’s handling of the nuclear standoff in Iran, just two days after saying it would go down as “one of the worst” presidencies in U.S. history.

- More babbling from the Hildabeast here ...

Posted by The Skipper     on 01/24/2006 at 07:00 AM   
Filed Under: • Hildabeast •  
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Nuts!

Hidden deep in this scientific breakthrough is the reason why Conservatives are so much smarter than Liberals. And why jocks are such jerks. I present this scientific knowledge to you for your education ... and also because I couldn’t resist the chance to paraphrase the esteemed Dr. Pitnick below for letting me know that when it comes to testicles “there are no free lunches” ....

Size Does Matter in Bats’ Evolution
January 24, 2006, 4:27 AM EST
SYRACUSE, N.Y. (AP)

For some male bats, sexual prowess comes with a price—smaller brains. A research team led by Syracuse University biologist Scott Pitnick found that in bat species where the females are promiscuous, the males boasting the largest testicles also had the smallest brains. Conversely, where the females were faithful, the males had smaller testes and larger brains.

“It turns out size does matter,” said Pitnick, whose findings were published in December in “Proceedings of the Royal Society: Biological Science,” an online journal. The study offers evidence that males—at least in some species—make an evolutionary trade-off between intelligence and sexual prowess, said David Hoskens, a biologist at the Centre for Ecology and Conservation at the University of Exeter in England and a leading authority on bats’ mating behavior.

“Bats invest an enormous amount in testis, and the investment has to come from somewhere. There are no free lunches,” said Hoskens, who did not participate in the study. The relationship between the breeding system and relative brain size has received little investigation, said Pitnick, who teaches evolution and population biology and researches topics such as sexual selection and sexual conflict.

Bats are the second largest group of mammals (behind rodents) with about 1,000 known species. Because of their exceptional navigational and flying abilities, bats have been the subject of countless studies, providing Pitnick and his colleagues—Kate Jones of Columbia University and Gerald Wilkinson of the University of Maryland—with a bounty of data without having to slink off into caves.

Pitnick’s team looked at 334 species of bats and found a convincing contrast in testes size. In species with monogamous females, males had testes starting at 0.11 percent of their body weight and ranging up to 1.4 percent. But in species where the females had a large number of mates, Pitnick found testes ranged from 0.6 percent to 8.5 percent of the males’ mass (in the Rafinesque’s big-eared bat).

“If female bats mate with more than one male, a sperm competition begins,” Pitnick said. “The male who ejaculates the greatest number of sperm wins the game, and hence many bats have evolved outrageously big testes.” Promiscuity is known to make a difference in testicle size in some other mammals. For example, chimpanzees are promiscuous and have testicles that are many times larger than those of gorillas, in which a single dominant male has exclusive access to a harem of females.

Large brains, meanwhile, are metabolically costly to develop and maintain. Pitnick’s research suggested that in those bat species with promiscuous females, the male’s body used more of its energy to enhance the testes—giving it the greater adaptive advantage—and lacked the energy it needed to further develop the brain. The study found that in more monogamous species, the average male brain size was about 2.6 percent of body weight, while in promiscuous species, the average size dipped to 1.9 percent.

Posted by The Skipper     on 01/24/2006 at 06:28 AM   
Filed Under: • Satire • Science-Technology •  
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The Great Right North

OH, CANADA! Welcome back to the civilized world. Now get rid of all that socialist crap the Liberals have foisted off on you folks. Go back to a decent health and medical system! Cut out all of those costly socialist nanny programs! Don’t send us any more Peter Jennings! Invite Michael Moore to come stay! Throw the Frogs out of Quebec! Drink more beer! YAY!

Stephen Harper Wins Conservative Minority
Tue. Jan. 24 2006 6:06 AM ET
(CTV NEWS)

Canadians granted Conservative Leader Stephen Harper a minority government Monday, putting an end to more than 12 years of Liberal rule. Results show Conservatives won 124 seats, versus 103 for Paul Martin’s Liberals. “Tonight, friends, our great country has voted for change,” the prime minister-designate told a crowd of supporters at his home riding of Calgary Southwest.

“And Canadians have asked our party to take the lead in delivering that change. Tonight I am saying to all Canadians that we will respect the trust you have given us, we will keep our word, we will honour that trust, we will deliver on our commitments.” Harper then reached out to the regions, repeating a campaign promise to solve the fiscal imbalance and promising to let the Atlantic provinces keep their offshore resource money.

The West, he said, will now have the voice in Ottawa it has long sought. But Harper fell short of the 155 seats needed to lead a Tory majority, meaning he’ll have to wheel and deal and curry favour of at least one opposition party to support him in the 308-seat House of Commons. The Bloc Quebecois won 51 seats, while the NDP took 29—a double-digit gain from the 2004 election. All four major party leaders won their ridings.

By the end of the night, the Tories won roughly 36 per cent of the popular vote nationwide, compared with 30 per cent for the Liberals, 17 per cent for the NDP and 10 per cent for the Bloc. Addressing a roomful of cheering party faithful in his Montreal riding of LaSalle-Emard, Martin said: “There will be another chance, and there will be another time.”

But that next chance won’t come under his stewardship. Martin said he will continue representing his riding, but he will be stepping down as Liberal Leader. “My dedication to the Liberal family will never wane,” said Martin. “But I will not take our party into another election.” Martin said he called Harper on the phone to congratulate him on his victory. “The people of Canada have chosen him to lead a minority government. I wish him the best,” said Martin. “We differ on many things, but we all share a belief in the potential and the promise of Canada, the desire of our country, to succeed.”

- More on this story here ...

Posted by The Skipper     on 01/24/2006 at 06:13 AM   
Filed Under: • Politics •  
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Skin Deep

      “Beauty is only skin deep but stupidity goes all the way to the bone ... head.”
      -- The Skipper

Animal rights activists from PETA, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, and AnimaNaturalis stage a naked protest as one holds up a banner reading ‘How many lives just for a coat’ in Barcelona, Spain, Saturday, Jan. 21, 2006, to denounce the abuse and slaying of animals to make fur coats. Representing the number of minks it takes on average to make a fur coat, the 70 men and women lay down, curled up on the pavement outside Barcelona city hall. (AP Photo/Manu Fernandez)

Posted by The Skipper     on 01/24/2006 at 06:01 AM   
Filed Under: • Stoopid-People •  
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Stormy Weather

Take a look at the picture below. What you see is a huge twenty foot storm surge during Hurricane Katrina. Or is it? You know how rumors get started, don’t you? Someone tells somebody else something and they tell someone else and so on. With each telling the story gets altered and sometimes magnified. This picture has been circulating around the internet for months and has been rumored to have been taken at Bay St. Louis, Mississippi before that city was smashed by the hurricane. It has also been rumored to have been taken at a number of other places in Louisiana and Mississippi to demonstrate the devastation of Katrina.

I have received this picture from several people lately with varying stories of where it happened. This is one of the problems with the internet. In some cases, more misinformation is spread than information. With all the blogs out there nowadays, it is easy to see why so much is exaggerated and why so many people seem to be totally barking mad. And that’s just in the “civilized” countries. Imagine the trouble that is caused when uneducated, impressionable people like your typical Middle Eastern goober reads misinformation on the internet. Maybe the internet isn’t such a good thing after all if it causes Ahab The Arab to go blow himself up because of some Arab web site’s lies and distortions of the truth.

Always remember, the truth is where you find it but it may not always be 100% true. It may just seem to be true because you want it to be true. Keep that in mind as you surf the blogs today and every day. Or, as we say here in Missouri .... show me. As for this picture, it’s true but not quite what it seems. Go here for the full story. Credit Snopes for researching this one.

Posted by The Skipper     on 01/24/2006 at 05:44 AM   
Filed Under: • Climate-Weather •  
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Bring Out Yer Dead!

_{John Trever—The Albuquerque Journal}

Posted by The Skipper     on 01/24/2006 at 05:38 AM   
Filed Under: • Humor •  
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   Monday - January 23, 2006

Math is Hard

Saw this on Kim’s site and had to pass it along.

Nearing a diploma, most college students cannot handle many complex but common tasks, from understanding credit card offers to comparing the cost per ounce of food.

Those are the sobering findings of a study of literacy on college campuses, the first to target the skills of students as they approach the start of their careers.

More than 50 percent of students at four-year schools and more than 75 percent at two-year colleges lacked the skills to perform complex literacy tasks.

That means they could not interpret a table about exercise and blood pressure, understand the arguments of newspaper editorials, compare credit card offers with different interest rates and annual fees or summarize results of a survey about parental involvement in school.

Let’s see a show of hand of how many of you have been frustrated with the chore of handing a cashier bills and change (so you could get back more usable change) only to see the blank stare of a brook trout while said cashier pondered the significance of what you just did?

But it only gets better.

“This sends a message that we should be monitoring this as a nation, and we don’t do it,” Finney said (Joni Finney, vice president of the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, an independent and nonpartisan group.)

No, Joni, it says that our government education system is a collosal failure.

Almost 20 percent of students pursuing four-year degrees had only basic quantitative skills. For example, the students could not estimate if their car had enough gas to get to the service station. About 30 percent of two-year students had only basic math skills.

The survey showed a strong relationship between analytic coursework and literacy. Students in two-year and four-year schools scored higher when they took classes that challenged them to apply theories to practical problems or weigh competing arguments

Go figure.  When you actually ask the young skulls of much to figure something out (as opposed to just asking for the answer) they actually learn a valuable skill.  Whoda thunk it?

_{*for those who don’t get the headline, see here.}

Posted by Drew458     on 01/23/2006 at 11:52 AM   
Filed Under: • Education •  
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West Wing Clipped

We don’t watch TV at manor Christian, but I’ve heard that “The West Wing” has been a fairly popular show until late.  Apparently, the show has now officially run its course.

NBC Cancels ‘West Wing’ After 7 Seasons
PASADENA, Calif.

The new president on “The West Wing” will be a real short-timer: NBC announced Sunday it was pulling the plug on the Emmy-winning political drama after seven seasons in May.

NBC, struggling to regain its footing after the worst season in its history, also outlined several midseason schedule changes _ including the moves of popular dramas “Law & Order” and “Las Vegas.”

But the part of the story I found most hillarious was this:

Although this season’s story line with a presidential campaign involving a Democrat played by Jimmy Smits and Republican portrayed by Alan Alda has been strong critically, ratings have sunk with its move to Sunday nights.

Anyone in Hollywood who thought Alan Alda was the best choice to play a Republican needs to have his ass handed to him. 

Posted by Drew458     on 01/23/2006 at 10:27 AM   
Filed Under: • Hollywood •  
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Not that very many people ever read this far down, but this blog was the creation of Allan Kelly and his friend Vilmar. Vilmar moved on to his own blog some time ago, and Allan ran this place alone until his sudden and unexpected death partway through 2006. We all miss him. A lot. Even though he is gone this site will always still be more than a little bit his. We who are left to carry on the BMEWS tradition owe him a great debt of gratitude, and we hope to be able to pay that back by following his last advice to us all:

1. Keep a firm grasp of Right and Wrong
2. Stay involved with government on every level and don't let those bastards get away with a thing
3. Use every legal means to defend yourself in the event of real internal trouble, and, most importantly:
4. Keep talking to each other, whether here or elsewhere

It's been a long strange trip without you Skipper, but thanks for pointing us in the right direction and giving us a swift kick in the behind to get us going. Keep lookin' down on us, will ya? Thanks.

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