The operators of the Fukushima installation should have been free to experiment with alternative strategies for meltdown prevention.

said Neil Stevens of RedState, “I hope nobody takes those special circumstances and tries to argue against clean, effective power generation technology in the general case.”

Is Neil Stevens admitting to the existence of “dirty” energy? Apostaheresy!

Nuclear meltdowns were merely a cost of doing business in Medieval Iceland — and all true Seasteaders take on such risk with full knowledge of the polite slap the Invisible Hand would give them should they cause a Level 7 nuclear disaster in their perfect laissez-faire economies!

Yeah, that’s about right.

Fucking wankers.

Is it acceptable to argue both for increased usage of nuclear power and for the strong regulation thereof? Even the worst-case scenario for modern nuclear plants is far short of, say, Deepwater Horizon II: Electric Boogaloo.

Technogeek – sure, it’s acceptable. I think you would have to factor in the countervailing force of libertardianism on the regulation part of the equation, though, as you made that argument.

True, but that’s pretty much factored in by default for any remotely political discussion in the US.

It’s win-win for TeaTards…privately owned nuke plants, zero gummint regulation, and if they make their reactor core out of cardboard to increase profit, and it melts down, just socialize the costs! Oh, and don’t build that damn thing anywhere near them! The TeaTard way: bizness can do no wrong, privatize the profit, socialize the cost, whine everything is foolproof, but build it where other people will suffer the consequences. What’re you, a bunch of merka-hating islamo commie nazi fags for not wanting a Koch Brothers/BP nuke plant in your back yard?

Technogeek – sure, it’s acceptable.

I’d kinda lean towards “Maybe in a month or so.”

Well of course we should expand our use of nukular energy because atoms is cool!

And naturally the proper regulation of them atoms is the invisible hand of the free market. Why, we don’t even need any graphite rods or cooling water, either! Adam Smith will personally see to it that the pile* runs just right. And if not, why, they can try another design. In ten thousand years or so.

*VHR

As far as I’m concerned, the more radioactivity & mutations, the better.

Who knows, humans might actually develop intelligence & the ability to reason.

Sounds to me like they are all volunteering (hah!) to store spent fuel rods in their basements.

Clean and effective power generation in the modern era and in the glorious past meant that poor people get sick and die. IT’S NATURE, PEOPLE!!

“I hope nobody takes those special circumstances and tries to argue against clean, effective power generation technology in the general case.”

Can we talk about clean effective power generation technology like all homes and office buildings retro-fitted or built with solar and wind power generation capabilities of their own that are then tied together into a distributed grid thus breaking the strangle hold of centralized power monopolies?

Why does it have to be Nukes?

A distributed grid would also reduce or eliminate the problems of thousands of people without power during a natural disaster.

Or we could spend Tens of billions building and maintaining concrete bunkers to hold toxic waste for 5000+ years.

Whoops. I forgot. Power companies won’t have to worry about the toxic waste they produce. They’ll be able to just dump it in a nearby river and the Invisible hand will take care of it.

Why does it have to be Nukes?

Indeed. Even if we accept that all future nuclear power plants will use technology that makes them perfectly safe and lovely, there are several outstanding questions:

1) How much radioactive waste does it produce? What do we do with it?

2) How expensive is it?

3) How much fissile material is reasonably available in the world?

If the answers are “almost none”, “not very”, and “enough for 100+ years”, by all means, let’s get behind modern nuclear power as the solution to all of our problems. As it is, I remain extremely unconvinced that any of those questions have been satisfactorily answered.

Unfortunately, if my attempts at playing Fate of the World are any guide, developing renewables is a painfully slow process, and you have to resort to culling most of the world population by infecting the drinking water with a deadly virus. To keep emissions down, you see.

Why does it have to be Nukes?

Because you can’t monopolize the wind or the sun.

Nukes are NOT clean.

Comparing it to caveman shit like coal & petroleum is the tell that you’re being sold a bill of goods – sorry, but “it’s somewhat more fun than being castrated with a dull knife” wouldn’t get me to buy a videogame, either.

Never mind that no reliable means exists (or likely ever will) for safely disposing of its highly toxic & mutagenic byproducts. Never mind that you have to either buy (& sacrifice) real-estate to bury it in or find sufficiently desperate/poor/naive bastards to take the hot waste for money (because only a desperate man or an idiot would live anywhere near it by choice). Go take a tour of some uranium tailings some time … don’t worry, they’re dead easy to find: just look for the huge expanse of landscape that looks like Apollo 16 should be landing on it. Then for bonus points, try to imagine what years of rain & snow-melt percolating through all that chewed-up toxic soil must’ve done to the water table by now. FUN!

Meanwhile, in Teh Aggregator Kingdom, the media fishbowl got just a new layer of fresh scum.

The Fukushima reactors are on average about 30 years old, which means they are middle-aged as far as most civilian nuke plants go. They were designed in the US and I’ve read nothing about these plants being retrofitted for a seismically-active environment….residents of Fukushima were opposed to Tokyo Electric building these in the 1970s and they were right.

D. Aristophanes is oversimplifying, as usual. First, we repeal Obamacare and break the back of organized labor, then, we build unregulated nuke plants.

Why does it have to be Nukes?

Because wind and solar are not reminiscent of a penis.

Tehnogeek-

Sure, though, considering that nuclear power is based on an even rarer source material than oil, well, it still doesn’t make more sense than putting our few resources into renewable energy instead (I mean if anything is going to replace King Oil, it should be something that’ll last us more than the energy equivalent of a heartbeat).

So sure, you could make that argument, if you needed to. But it would be a stupid argument.

I swear, the entire wingnut id is simply this:

“It’s not fair the world didn’t end in nuclear fire.”

Ever since, they’ve been obsessed with the apocalypse denied. It’s like, ok, the Ruskies were too smart to shoot even when we turned to taunting them during Reagan, and The Rapture seems to be failing to pay off, and Muslim Terrorists are hardly going to wipe us all off the face of the Earth or be a good enough excuse to launch the missiles, so might as well go all in on global warming and the other energy-related disasters.

All so we can get a suicide without having to “sin” by having the balls to take the blade to one’s own wrist.

(“Well, maybe THAT is the real reason Jesus punished Japan: Jesus hates socialism and big government!”

Indeed, nothing says socialism like an economy controlled by a half-dozen megacorporations who also more or less control the political bodies and government bureaucracies.

But then, Hitler was a socialist, and the Fucking Japs were on his side, so they must’ve been socialists too.

“Christians – Believers – BE WARNED,” advised Pastor Lee at Conservative Patriot. “The earth has shifted on its axis; time is affected; Japan has moved 8 feet and experienced a drastic change in its coastline…”

Yes, and at some point last evening, the Sun went down and there was darkness throughout the land of America. All is lost! Repent, the end is near!

“President Useless Decides to Golf While Japan Burns,”

Aheh heh! Now watch this drive!

“I still say nuclear energy needs to be strongly promoted here in the states,” said Jeff Godlstein of Protein Wisdom. “And I suspect we can use what we learn from Japan to better the containment and cooling technology.”

I can haz Hindenberg type airships back as well, plz?

“The writer failed to mention that climate alarmism is big business,” he wrote. “Of course they aren’t going to let a disaster go to waste, there’s money to be made.”

As opposed to climate denialism, which only has the oil sector, the big money behind the GOP and various other pollution-heavy businesses behind it.

Seriously, who the fuck profits from global warming fearmongering?

owlbear1-

Or we could spend Tens of billions building and maintaining concrete bunkers to hold toxic waste for 5000+ years.

Yeah…

And not just that, but the older models of concrete bunkers have recently been found to have interesting problems.

By which I mean that old Jurassic Park cliche of “life finds away”. Erosion leading to leaks inside, fauna making their way into dump sites and spreading it to nearby ecosystems, and so on.

I think the most secure recent model I’ve heard is that they’re building super long tunnels under the ocean in one of the Scandanavian tunnels which will be sealed, no one to breach.

Even with all the fantastic engineering (and it really is quite marvelous, I don’t want to denigrate), what’s the over/under on either the ocean eroding its way into the tunnels or some idiot future archaeologists stumbling on it and figuring it must be the equivalent of a Great Pyramid before the half-life is spent?

Oh, right, as long as the problem is “dealt with” and out of sight, welp, it’s dealt with. We write it off in this quarter and in next quarter if someone sues for the radical increases in cancer incidences, then it’s “unattributable to any company’s or country’s actions” and so on.

And yes, I think the nuclear energy community should have lost all credibility not after Chernobyl, but after the decades long attempt to prevent neighboring countries from collecting on damages to their ecosystems from the Chernobyl fallout.

It was the clearest proof that the nuclear community has no interest in acknowledging or dealing with “accidents” other than saving their own skins.

See also, every other nuclear power plant meltdown since. Minimizing of risk, failure to respond to damages, denial and constant peals to “safety”.

And of course, the point made a thousand times:

Even if it was safe, who cares?

Nuclear energy is one of our shittiest solutions to the problems of energy waste (global warming, carbon emissions) and peak oil.

Yeah, let’s replace our system with one that creates even harder to get rid of waste products and which is even more rare in its base components.

And in the meantime, we’re wasting brilliant engineers who could be better used making more efficient or installing current renewable energy sources.

I guess our teabagger overlords will enjoy the boots of their new Danish masters once they’ve fully committed to having jackshit for energy supply in the near future.

Sorry, the ghoulish defenses of the nuclear energy and the way everyone pretends its the “only alternative to oil” sickens me to my core. It’s like when “everyone agrees cuts need to be made to government spending to fix the deficit”. It’s an idiot’s solution based on a false dichotomy.

Also, too, Roger L. Simon wrote an open letter to Prime Minister Netanyahu (which I’m sure the Prime Minister will get right on reading). Is he congratulating him on his leadership against the Islamo-fascist menace? On dragging Israel so far to the right that even the teabaggers haven’t been able to follow? Nope, he’s actually berating him. Why?

It is your failure to resist one of the most anti-Israeli presidents in living memory, including Jimmy Carter, that has called your credentials into serious doubt.

Apparently, not only does “I hope he fails” trump all other concerns for the Republican Party here in America: they actually expect entire foreign countries to share their obsession and put everything else on hold to help them bring down That One.

Wyatt Watts III-

Sometimes I wonder if we could be allowed the chance to fucking save our civilization if I started a company to create giant solar panels shaped like penises surrounded by firearms and started a fake feminist group to protest them saying that they were just so masculine and virile that they make hippies cry.

Either that or trick wingnuts into joining my “nuclear support global warming is a lie, Obama is a secret muslim, Freedom America” group which just happens to meet in the core of a nuclear power plant about to go into operation.

Considering that the private insurance market will barely cover any of the liability claims of a nuclear accident–the US government picks up most of the tab–yeah, you might say that there’s a compelling need for government regulation.

Assholes.

That about right?

It pisses off Hippies, so yes!

Sub-question – anyone know if the Koch’s into nukular power? They’re obviously into gas and coal power, two sub-industries that get fucked any time they have to compete with a nuclear plant. The wingnut freedumb agenda seems so totally scripted to suit Koch interests, so just wondered if the signals from places like Reason were pointing in a particular direction. Or maybe they are just happy to see some Hippie-punching, however it happens.

jim-

That and I think it’s mostly the American businessmen getting pissy about being behind the curve.

The main movers and shakers in renewable energy right now are Denmark and Spain with most everyone else playing catch up. Given that the big boys in American oil are nutjobs who don’t just sell the Kool-aid but drink it too, most of the energy money in America must be thinking that they’re unlikely to corner the market on solar panels and wind farms anytime soon.

But nuclear energy isn’t as dominated by foreign businesses. We currently are the main movers in that, because:

A) The cold war left us with a glut of nuclear engineers needing to justify their existence.

and

B) It’s fucking stupid. Short-sighted, huge negatives, massive investments.

And as you say, any blooming idiot can build a wind farm, you can’t control where the sun shines or where the wind blows and the most efficient plans are ones with wide-spread decentralized systems which ruins all the monopoly channels we’ve been carefully building.

Nuclear energy is high investment, thus only a few plants, easy to purchase and easy to offload to a shell company if it looks like another Chernobyl is brewing, see BP trying to blame their shell for the offshore drilling disaster.

As you say, easier to monopolize and gains lots of short-term profit. Especially since then you can try and get on the renewable energy bandwagon slightly later once its revealed that the fissable material will last bullshit and a half years.

In short, these are the people who hack supervillains look at and go “nope, that’s just so stupidly evil as to be unrealistic”.

And yes, I think the nuclear energy community should have lost all credibility not after Chernobyl, but after the decades long attempt to prevent neighboring countries from collecting on damages to their ecosystems from the Chernobyl fallout.

Well, but everything that happened in the Soviet Union can be chalked up to communism and of course we can do better.

Actually, I suspect the failure of capitalist shock therapy in the 1990s in Yeltsin’s Russia is somehow also communism’s fault in the minds of the conservative voters.

Ted-

Well, the WI clusterfuck included a provision allowing Walker to sell government assets specifically things like the nuclear power plant they operate to “no-bid” private industry, which given that Walker is barely anything more than a Koch Brothers puppet would seem to suggest they are at least looking into expanding that direction.

The weird push for more nuclear power all of a sudden, including an even bigger push now that shit’s going down in Japan, would seem to confirm that, given as you say, how many of the “talking points” conveniently cater to Koch Brother wishes.

So nothing specific, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they weren’t expanding in that direction. Oil has been getting dicey as of late and the unrest in the North African and Middle Eastern countries is probably getting the Oil Barons antsy to “diversify” as it were.

Plus, nuclear power has always been an obsession of idiotic sci-fi libertarian fuckwads, because so many sci-fi novels pitch the idea of nuclear-energy based propulsion systems for spaceships, so idiot imagination-less libertarians think nuclear power plants and interstellar travel are inseparably linked.

Chris-

Funny how all these capitalistic industries seem to be immune to failure, but just have unfortunate communism and regulation based failures forced upon them. Especially odd how communism’s evil menace is such that these sudden forced upon them failures occur most often when capitalism is granted the greatest “freedom” from regulation and control.

Damn the insidiousness of communism.

Hell, I bet the so-called “radiation” is actually just communism released in the explosion.

I mean, think about it. Much of this so-called “radiation” seems to have been blown into Scandanavia and look at how much they’ve become a socialist hell-hole since.

Of course that would mean that we shouldn’t build plants to save us from Communist Fallout… no wait, cognitive dissonance activating, stay on target.

Yes, Free Market Jesus’s invisible hand wouldn’t let communism cause our plants to fail as long as we cut taxes, ban all regulation, and move all the plants to urban centers filled with brown people.

There, now no one who matters will be lost and if milk becomes unsafe to drink, then we’ll all learn to love our third nipples and obscene increases in incidence of cancer.

Nuclear power is den Beste but if any of those ArabPersian sorts want to get their handses on it, well, I mean you fuckin’ don’t want them to dispose of the spent fuel on our cities do you? You lib apologists, always with the threats to America, the mostly Northern part that’s ours.
They have unmanned drones that could be dirty! Filthy! With radiation?

What? Private gain, social cost? Never mind, let’s jump in.

Thanks, Cerberus (and good to see you back!).

I know near-as nothing about nuclear technology, but the economics of nuke power I have studied more than it’s healthy. The marginal cost of nuke power is basically zero, so once you have kit built you run it at full capacity and that’s that. The gas and coal dudes obviously do not have such luxuries, so they absolutely hate nuke plants, especially if the nukes are able to meet anything more than 10% of demand.

But nuke plants, given the risks and that no-one will insure them, can only ever exist practically as extensions of the state. So I suppose the Kochs might like the idea of owning nuke plants if the governor were one of their buttmonkeys, but clearly principled libetarians, as they love to tell us they are, would never get into this business. But if they can get rich from it, I imagine they won’t turn down the opportunity.

If looters like you keep interfering, those Producer power companies are going to pick up their nuclear reactors, disappear and go Galt, leaving you dirty hippy librulz in the dark.

And naturally the proper regulation of them atoms is the invisible hand of the free market.

The REALLY TRULY proper regulation of atoms is by Maxwell’s demon, but the teahadists are a-feared of demons.

That last comment was supposed to be from me. Your liberal totalitarian software stole it and gave it to that Cato guy.

They don’t love nuclear power per se. They know that dirty hippie environazis killed the nuclear industry after typically overreacting (ugh pun) to the successful completely normal events of three mile island. It was even Jane Fonda’s fault for her well timed movie just before 3mi, The China Syndrome. Probably the ecohitlers caused 3mi anyway.

It’s just their response to yet another way that liberal elites suppress them unjustly to deny a profitable industry its deceived government cheese.

I deny that I am Dagny Taggart.

Whoops. I forgot. Power companies won’t have to worry about the toxic waste they produce. They’ll be able to just dump it in a nearby river and the Invisible hand will take care of it.

Invisible hand = (gummit) superfund

Here is what pisses me off – the nuclear industry not only wants to build new plants, they want massive taxpayer subsidies AND taxpayer liability for any “unforeseeable problems”.

It’s the same private profit/public risk bullshit they always try to pull.

Man, Cerberus is on a roll.

Plus, nuclear power has always been an obsession of idiotic sci-fi libertarian fuckwads, because so many sci-fi novels pitch the idea of nuclear-energy based propulsion systems for spaceships, so idiot imagination-less libertarians think nuclear power plants and interstellar travel are inseparably linked.

Actually, the earliest nuclear propulsion system in a starship I ever read about was in an episode of… Tintin! No idea if it was actually the first idea, though, and you’re correct that in the meantime it’s been completely appropriated by the sci-fi libertarian crowd.

Which is a surprisingly powerful demographic considering that today, “sci-fi” for most people evokes the work of New Age liberals like George Lucas and eebil, eebil, eebil Socialists like Gene Roddenberry. You’d think the smell of that alone would drive them away before they even got to know the genre…

Here is what pisses me off – the nuclear industry not only wants to build new plants, they want massive taxpayer subsidies AND taxpayer liability for any “unforeseeable problems”.

It’s the same private profit/public risk bullshit they always try to pull.

And somehow, they’ll manage to do it while crying and bellyaching about how the government and everyone else is mean and ganging up on them.

No idea if it was actually the first idea

I didn’t say that very well, did I?

No idea if it was actually the first science-fiction tale that featured such a propulsion system (it probably wasn’t, it’s just the earliest example I can think of. And the author of Tintin, at least, was no goddamn libertarian).

Fixed.

Government regulation is for pussies–literally!

Government regulation is for pussies–literally!

Love it.

Speaking of which, why don’t the God-botherers take onanism seriously? You know, since we are basing our laws on the Bible an’all.

Help me.

I don’t understand why anyone even listens to conservatives when they’re clearly insane.

The wingnut message is basically that we should simultaneously expand our use of nuclear energy while shrinking government’s ability to regulate it.

Don’t forget that we should continue the current government policy of providing large subsidies to the industry, as there hasn’t been a single nuclear reactor in the United States that has been financially profitable if it wasn’t paid for by the taxpayers.

And that’s completely different from welfare and social programs because Shut Up That’s Why.

They’ll be able to just dump it in a nearby river and the Invisible hand will take care of it.

The invisible hand has an extra thumb!

Hey, maybe it’ll be more efficient now.

And that’s completely different from welfare and social programs because Shut Up That’s Why.

Hell. I’m still waiting to hear why welfare and social programs for urban and immigrant communities is Socialism while welfare and social programs for white people in suburbia and ruralstan are Their Due.

Hell. I’m still waiting to hear why welfare and social programs for urban and immigrant communities is Socialism while welfare and social programs for white people in suburbia and ruralstan are Their Due.

I’ll tell you why, Chris. SHUT UP, thats why.

That is simply one variant of the overall conservative policy of expanding the opportunities to catastrophically destroy the entire world while drastically curtailing the ability to limit the destruction.

Seriously, it does boggle the mind. I cannot see any other reason except pure racism.

The unemployed are lazy and don’t want to work. I still hear this, despite there being about 1 actual job availble per every 6 people looking for work.

I heard some “newsperson” on NPR telling me that the public is “clamoring for a solution to the ballooning deficit”. Right. My neighbors are constantly complaining to me about the deficit. I hear about it at the supermarket checkout line, at the hair salon, etc. Its the WORST PROBLEM EVER facing our country.

And the only way to solve it is to cut taxes for the rich and cut programs for malnourished children.

I still hear this, despite there being about 1 actual job availble per every 6 people looking for work.

If it weren’t for the minimum wage, one person would get paid $1/day to do the same job and with the savings the other five could be hired to rub the employers feet and bring him margaritas and fight to the death in themed costumes.

Why do you commies hate the unemployed?

Seriously, it does boggle the mind. I cannot see any other reason except pure racism.

More generic reasons include the inability to admit that they’ve been wrong for the last thirty to forty years (and therefore are partly responsible, because their votes and activism on behalf of crazy fucks like Reagan and Bush are what made the current mess happen): and the absolute terror among the people who still have jobs or government assistance that any move to extend those things to less lucky people will come at their expense.

In other words, equal parts “I’ve got mine, fuck you” and “WAAAAAAHHHHHHH.”

I definitely think the reasons are different for the ruling elite than for the common schlubs.

Thanks, Chris.

Guess I’d better do some work.

Oh hey, racism’s a huge factor too, don’t get me wrong. Just not the only one.

ok, one more. Its been driving me batty to hear my co-workers complain that the teachers get so much because of union contracts and we don’t even get that, darnit! They are of course completely immune to the argument that we wouldn’t even have the little we do not if not for the unions raising the bar for everyone.

When I see a working class person doing well I think “Thats great, everyone who works hard should be compensated appropriately”
Apparently not everyone feels this way. I’ve been hearing a lot more of “Hey I don’t get that! They’re spoiled!, wtf, etc”

Fun: http://bighollywood.breitbart.com/wthuston/2011/03/15/slate-says-detroit-needs-anti-christian-america-slamming-statue/

Strange recommendation for a city that literally drove America’s capitalist success story, isn’t it?

YEAH! What could Detroit possibly have against unfettered capitalism?

When I see a working class person doing well I think “Thats great, everyone who works hard should be compensated appropriately”
Apparently not everyone feels this way. I’ve been hearing a lot more of “Hey I don’t get that! They’re spoiled!, wtf, etc”

Crabs in a bucket, baby.

Crabs in a bucket

Are we back to D-KW’s mom?

When I see a working class person doing well I think “Thats great, everyone who works hard should be compensated appropriately”
Apparently not everyone feels this way. I’ve been hearing a lot more of “Hey I don’t get that! They’re spoiled!, wtf, etc”

But somehow, that mentality only prevails when you’re talking about working class people. As Balloon Juice’s latest anti-glibertarian post puts it,

It’s an interesting mind that can tell you that the jump from 5.25 an hour to 9 dollars an hour makes someone a fat cat union employee while simultaneously arguing that 250k a year is not rich.

Help.

I used to live near the Koch brother’s nuclear power plant, I glowed for a while, but now I AM the invisible hand!

Before we are all nuclear – the better way
Oh let us pray, we want to stay
In North Sea oil.

Late to the party so forgive the out-of-time comments:

Never mind that no reliable means exists (or likely ever will) for safely disposing of its highly toxic & mutagenic byproducts.

Sure there are. Burying it in the mud off a subduction zone will fold it back in to the earth’s crust. Even if the containers leaked the mud has such low permeability that nothing would get out. Dry storage (like Yucca Mountain) is dumb, that’s why you won’t see it open in your lifetime.

because so many sci-fi novels pitch the idea of nuclear-energy based propulsion systems for spaceships
Not Sci Fi novels, serious people proposed it.

And I cannot find the comment to quote, but somebody stated that nuclear fuel is a limited resource. To a degree, yes. There’s lots of uranium in the oceans. Somebody developed a plastic to adsorb uranium from the ocean, so it is (technically) extractable. Don’t forget thorium-based reactors and the CANDU design that can use U-238 (99.3% of all uranium).

You’ll need to understand that most of the current nuclear designs are essentially scaled up versions of the Nautilus submarine powerhouse from the early 50s. Argonne has developed intrinsically safe designs but there’s been no new nuke plants licensed in the US since TMI.

As for nukes being GHG emission-free, when you include the emissions from construction it’s emissions get close to a par with coal plants. Why? It takes lots of heat to make lime, CaO, from calcium carbonate. In doing so, you not only create GHGs related to the heating of the material but the process itself liberates CO2 from the carbonate. Lime is a major component of concrete, of which a whole shitload goes into the making of a nuke plant (much less so for a coal-fired plant). Don’t forget the energy (= GHG emissions) needed to extract, refine, and purify the fuel.

Finally, if you’re worried about radiation, note that coal-fired powerplants would not be allowed to operate if their radiation emissions were limited to the levels of nuke plants. (In fact, the Idaho Chemical Processing Plant, the nation’s only fuel reprocessing plant, has a coal-fired powerplant and it is located off the Plant premises to comply with NRC radiation release regs.) Burning coal releases much more radiation than nuke plants, along with other toxins such as mercury and NOX/SO2.

Siting nuke plants near faults and at almost ocean level is pretty irresponsible. I don’t think that’s the fault of the technology, though.

I heard that the guy from the Kinks got released from a Pakistan prison. Should be a relief to the CIA

“I am one of God’s Watchmen,” the pastor then informed us. “I know of many of His Watchmen and we are of one accord. You, yes YOU must be prepared for at any moment you may be called upon by others for their very earthly existence

Soooo, his religion is based on cartoon characters?

Fucking fusion, how does it work?

It’s you damn liburals throwing up roadblocks to uranium drilling in the ANWR that is putting us in need of foreign oil.

Drill baby drill

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In nuclear physics, nuclear chemistry and astrophysics nuclear fusion is the process by which two or more atomic nuclei join together, or “fuse”, to form a single heavier nucleus. This is usually accompanied by the release or absorption of large quantities of energy. Large-scale thermonuclear fusion processes, involving many nuclei fusing at once, must occur in matter at very high densities and temperatures.

Atoms boink, send off enrgy, heats up water, runs turbine.

Why you need help, T&U?

GET ME PENDLETON!!

Well, duh! Of course that’s their reaction.

These are the same people who rang up massive piles of debt and destroyed the economy, only to turn around and whine about our nation’s massive pile of debt and try to derail any effort to fix the economy.

Q.E.MotherfuckingD.

It’s also why 2012 is such a vital election — if the GOP gets complete control again, we are fucked. Totally, utterly, remarkably, fucked. For generations to come.

I know, I know … Dems suck sweaty donkey balls and often answer to the same corporate masters. I get it. It’s just that there’s still enough sane ones to ward off massive insanity and utter devastation. (At least for now.)

I also know this sounds totes alarmist and worrisome and concern trollish and depressing and has a “GET HEAVIER WEIGHT FOIL FOR YOUR HAT!” vibe.

But prove I’m wrong …

Maybe if we cut taxes for the rich a little more…

Put simply-

Build nuke plant on coast, free water needed, those boinking atoms put out some massive heat. Many fault lines off Japanese coast? No problem, we’re state of the art. (shh, 60s state of the art, but that’s between us.) HUGE quake, controls rods drop to absorb some energy from boinking atoms, not as much heat, SEE!? all is good. Cooling system fails, atoms stil boinking, no where for energy to go but out! RUH-ROH!

Butt pucker time. But who could have forseen?

Maybe if we cut taxes for the rich a little more…

It’s trickle down nuclear decay economics!

It’s also why 2012 is such a vital election — if the GOP gets complete control again, we are fucked. Totally, utterly, remarkably, fucked. For generations to come…

But prove I’m wrong …

No, I believe you. Over the course of multiple generations there is likely to be some fucking… and I’m not one to get Republicans elected on a dare!

nobody could have anticipated the consequences. they’re very hard to anticipate. consequences.

we need to get Ross Perot active in politics again.

Atoms boink, send off enrgy, heats up water, runs turbine.

That was actually a joke. Perhaps a better question would be: “Fucking fusion reactors. How do they work?” given that we haven’t quite figured that out yet, and they would be a less dangerous alternative to current reactors, with byproducts with very short half-lives.

Or, even better: “Fucking cold fusion. How does it work?” Probably not at all, but one can dream.

I need help because I can’t stand hearing about the princess or teen moms anymore.

BUT!!!! FUCKING ARTIFICIAL PHOTOSYNTHESIS!!!!!

How cool is that shit?

T&U misses Charlie Sheen already.

Who?

Semi-off topic:

There is an interesting article over at the New Yorker about the (monopoly/socialist) economics of the National Football League.

http://www.newyorker.com/talk/financial/2011/03/21/110321ta_talk_surowiecki

Is rather silly how the wingnuts blather on and on about an energy technology that to them is an end all. What they don’t want to talk about is the billions of dollars in start-up, a minimum of about ten years to begin construction, another 5 or 6 to build, plus who knows how many cost overruns with the rising price of everything. We have the technology of solar still pretty much in it’s infancy, but ready to be kick started NOW, with results in a few years. Nuclear is a dead end, a quick sound bite to a problem that Goopers keep wanting to push into the future.

Who?

Emilio Estevez’ brother. Whatever happened to him, btw?

Nuclear is a dead end, a quick sound bite to a problem that Goopers keep wanting to push into the future.
Fission is a dead end. Fusion… well the jury is still out. But until we can get fusion up and running, We should totally be doing all we can with wind and solar.

Nuclear is a dead end, a quick sound bite to a problem that Goopers keep wanting to push into the future.

Exactly. The new slogan will be “Fuse, baby fuse!”

Fiss baby fiss?

Emilio Estevez’ brother. Whatever happened to him, btw?

He’s with Elvis, Tupac and Righteous Bubba in the Brazillian rainforest.

mr. mike sed:

“They were designed in the US and I’ve read nothing about these plants being retrofitted for a seismically-active environment…”

I haven’t seen it mentioned much but in fact they were designed to withstand a magnitude 8 something quake within 20 miles or something lime that. It is my further understanding that the problems arose not from direct effects of the earthquake but are due more to the tsunami. They were doing okay until they ran out of fuel for the emergency generators. Ironic, innit?

It is interesting to note that Coal and Oil kill more people and put out more radiation every year, though.

Yes, they should have fueled the emergency generators with all that fissile material and sawdust. dumm liebrals.

I understand the reactors in Japan are of an older model G.E. design that was billed as more “economical”. In other words the reactor core isn’t as thick. Plus I geuss the Japanese jammed everything into as little space as possible, making any explosions more damaging.

It’s trickle down nuclear decay economics!

I would call it trickle melt down economics!

Justin Bieber got a haircut while on the ice with his rod and reel cold fission. This made Britney Spears go nuclear. Lindsay Lohan had a melt down.

Yeah,yeah.

“There is an interesting article over at the New Yorker about the (monopoly/socialist) economics of the National Football League”

I would AHEM with the link to the discussion of that here a few days ago but … iPad and all that. I think Frank Deford got that ball rolling a week or two ago.

Lisping?

I don’t know what all this lockout fuss is about, football season will start in eight days. No worries.

They’re just Twinkies, kid.

Seriously, who the fuck profits from global warming fearmongering?

Apparently, Limbaugh was telling his radio audience that the earthquake was punishment for the Japanese making Priuses and engaging in other environmentally responsible activities.

They are so far up their own asses that they’ve actually convinced themselves that, not only do they not have to limit their own consumption by even the tiniest bit, but that people who do so are evil and should be punished. I do not get it.

I do not get it.

They’re hateful, sociopathic assholes. They’ll do whatever it takes to piss liberals off, even if it means destroying the planet.

Limbaugh is our punishment for….?

everything bad that we’ve ever done ever.

Sensitivity ISRAEL

btw, it really doesn’t piss me off that some idiot wants to waste a shitload of money gassing up an SUV or whatever the hell it is the kids these days are doing in the name of pissing off liberals. its just stoopid.

it does, however, piss me off when Rand Paul comes over for dinner and takes a giant shit that clogs up my toilet

haven’t isrealis suffered enuf? jeesh.

Some old lady thinks she can run a city when she can’t even find a husband.

A few years ago I read that there is only one foundry left in the world big enough to cast reactor containment vessels, and it is in Japan. I have no idea if this is true or not but with the gutting of US heavy industry over the last few decades it would not surprise me.

If this is true, how the hell do they think they can ramp up production of nuke plants?

To heck with survivors! We got us a crises!

“Israeli chefs feel very connected to this product. After the tsunami I received phone calls from hysterical people fearing a shortage of Kikkoman.”

Walk a kilometer in their shoes. How would we feel if something cut us off from Mexico? No tequila. No Coronas. Significantly less weed.

I think its a bit more about timing and tone than actual content. but wtf do I know.

Pedestrian, weed is still something we make the best here in the good ol’ USA.

BE A PATRIOT! BUY AMERICAN!

History shows again and again,
that wingnuts are not the sharpest of men.

Go, go Wingnuttia!

Pedestrian, weed is still something we make the best here in the good ol’ USA.

Interest. Newsletter? Paypal link?

Oh noes! The Green Dragon!

Oh noes! The Green Dragon!

Environmentalists are the real fascists. They should be put into camps.

Yes, I’m planning to send my kids here this year.

http://academic.hws.edu/enviro/?gclid=CMOvv9re06cCFQUz3wodJwkM_g

Oh noes! The Green Dragon!

Excellent. Because the First Century Just So Stories™ are the perfect guide to dealing with an industrialized, overpopulated world here in the 21st century. Forget all that sciency stuff, that’s just confusing.

Don’t forget the growth industry of miracle cure iodine pills. Guaranteed to cut your half-life in half. Sorry, not available to mutants or progressives.

(Standard Disclaimer – Iodine pills sold for entertainment purposes only. Not intended to treat actual radiation sickness. No warranty intended or implied).

Iodine pills sold for entertainment purposes only. Not intended to treat actual radiation sickness.

The upside to this is that the stupid people buying out the iodine pills stand a good chance of poisoning themselves. It’s the Invisible Hand culling the herd!

kg, why do you hate Jesus?

You know, I used to love election season. It was like (insert major sporting event tournament thingy here) for dorks. I can remember watching the presidential debates as a child.

Now? I fucking dread it. Mostly because the reporting is so inane and so frustrating and the Republicans are so, so fucking evil.

You know, I used to love election season.

Just remember to vote.

It is unclear if it is legal for the RNC to sell the broadcasting rights or whether it would constitute a prohibited political contribution in the eyes of federal law.

I’m not familiar with this archaic legal term. It must be obsolete.

S. cerevisiae, he owes me money.

Since nuclear reactors are very expensive to build, we will need a new round of tax cuts to pay for them also.

Just remember to vote.

If I made it to the polls on my scooter, I can remember to show up always. Plus, I have you helpful people to remind me!

Seriously though, that looks like a great environmental ed. program.

On the topic of iodine pills, I think I may have found my post-apocalyptic niche – selling snake oil to the rubes. “Step right up and get some of my miracle electrolyte elixir! It’ll cure your mutations! It’ll cure your depression! It’ll put the ram back in your rod!”

On the topic of iodine pills, I think I may have found my post-apocalyptic niche – selling snake oil to the rubes.

I was planning on letting a super-genius dwarf ride on my shoulders so we could rule over a methane plant.

Pedestrian, weed is still something we make the best here in the good ol’ USA.

Your bet. Humboldt. Hawai’i

Al Jazeera

I’m turning into an Al Jazeera-English junkie.

*steps back into shadows*

Massive tag-fail !!! Do I win a prize or something?

Also too, I blame WordPress.

Will our future be most like Swan Song, The Road, or Mad Max?

I was actually hoping more Night of the Comet.

Call an ambulance! Ira Glass is talking about sex!

Fenwick, I can’t watch AJE here at work, but I’ve found their coverage superb. Remember when we used to have journalism in this country? It was nice… I miss it.

Since nuclear reactors are very expensive to build, we will need a new round of tax cuts to pay for them also.

These could be combined with sports facilities which also require massive public subsidies.

That was me being anonymous about AJE. I blame the cybernannies for not letting F’ing WP remember me any more…

I was planning on letting a super-genius dwarf ride on my shoulders so we could rule over a methane plant.

Cool! Unfortunately I’m not big and scary enough for that kind of job so I will probably end up being eaten.

Call an ambulance! Ira Glass is talking about sex!

An emergency metting? Really? I think they should have an emergency meeting to look up the meaning of emergency.

Argonne has developed intrinsically safe designs

No, no they haven’t. You’re talking about plants that can’t create major explosions &/or go into meltdown. “Won’t go boom” does not equal “intrinsically safe.” The day such a plant opens, much of its lethal impact has already occurred – & the rest of it won’t be mitigated by how the core or the cooling system is designed. The mining is deadly. The byproducts are deadly. There is no design-fu that will magically overcome those drawbacks. But let’s posit a “Squeaky-Clean Nukes 4 Dummies” system that somehow DOES overcome them (presumably involving helpful aliens who need to get rid of a lot of uranium & a portable wormhole) … everyone & their dog would immediately want one – & in a few years you’d have horizontal nuclear proliferation spreading like crabs in a whorehouse on Saturday night. The most important reason that “safe nuclear fission” is an oxymoron is this: reactors are by far the easiest way to develop a nuclear weapons program. With global resources rapidly diminishing & disenfranchised nationalist ethnic movements continuing to do their thing, that’s a perfect scenario for starting World War 3.

“Cheapest energy EVAR” is nearly as much of a canard as “safe as mother’s milk” – because the real net cost is heinous. Atomic power had to be subsidized up the wazoo to even become viable in the first place, & it had to be the state building the reactors, because the private-sector refused to touch it (though some have had a change of heart now that designs are cheaper & often come with big delicious tax-breaks &/or subsidies). Governments are still usually the only ones with both the technical expertise & the deep pockets to start up a nuclear program – & it’s no wonder so many who could do so right now are leaving it alone: there’s going to be a brutal hangover for Teh Kewl Kids’ Nuke Club arriving in the next couple of decades as the necessity to decommission scores of worn-out reactors turns Mister Atom’s magical cash-cows into capital sinkholes.

To reiterate: nuclear has one vital advantage over solar/geothermal/wind – it permits (hell, who are we kidding – it virtually GUARANTEES) the establishment & maintenance of an energy monopoly. That it also provides the countries rich enough to build reactors with a fig-leaf for arsenals of H-bombs is gravy.

kg, Soylent Green is looking eerily prophetic.

I was planning on letting a super-genius dwarf ride on my shoulders so we could rule over a methane plant.

WHO RUN BARTERTOWN?

A few years ago I read that there is only one foundry left in the world big enough to cast reactor containment vessels, and it is in Japan.

I believe that China is the place you will be importing your new reactors from, now that the US has lost the industrial capacity to make them.

Hooray for Canada! Also we have lots of asbestos in case things catch fire.

weed is still something we make the best here in the good ol’ USA

ROTFLMAO

Legions of giddy stoners in British Columbia would beg to differ.
Where do you think the seeds for all that killer Humboldt bud came from in the first place?
BC Hydro™? Wheelchair™? ChemoWeed™? HELLO?

Now THIS is an arms-race I can get behind.

These could be combined with sports facilities which also require massive public subsidies.

Go ‘Topes!

Politicians, entrepreneurs and bureaucrats in Quebec insist that the chrysotile ore being mined today 75 miles north of the Vermont border is perfectly safe, harmless to the miners and to the workers and consumers who will handle it.

No problem then. Onward Canada, may you be as mistrusted as we are!

I was planning on letting a super-genius dwarf ride on my shoulders so we could rule over a methane plant.

My over-producing methane plant has killed most the brain cells of the mediocre-genius ensconced in the brain bucket riding on my shoulders.

…hysterical people fearing a shortage of Kikkoman.

Made in the USA, Walworth, WI.

Canada is widely respected as one of the world’s most civil and polite places and is lauded for spending more to take care of its citizens than any other nation. Yet, many Canadian leaders say they fully favor shipping the lethal product to nations where, asbestos experts say, people are least likely know how to protect themselves from asbestos and how it can kill them.

‘Bout damn time y”all got with the program.

prolly by some commie union thugs I’m sure.

the making of the kikkoman, that is.

If the Kikkoman plant is unionized then Gov Scott Walker is anti-Israeli.

On the other hand, if he’s pro Israel maybe he’s pro union.

Now THIS is an arms-race I can get behind.

I volunteer my services as a judge.

That’s about right?

Yep, D., you got it right. Doesn’t have to make sense in the wingnut mind. People marvel at the cognitive dissonance in their heads, wondering why they don’t explode. But religious training and American exceptionalism indoctrination from childhood is strong containment for whatever turbulence occurs in their weak minds. It’s a law of physics — the amount of volitility caused in one’s mind is directly proportional to the subject’s ability to reason and inversely proportional to their concomitant gullibility.

Where do you think the seeds for all that killer Humboldt bud came from in the first place?

Well, from North American (including BC) and Hawai’ian strains…and decades of grafting experiments. Sadly, primo smoke–whatever its origin–is difficult to find in my area of the world.

[Interesting local patois: Conversion of the phrase ‘get high’ into a noun to identify superior weed. As is “Looking for some get-high.”
See all the odd things you can learn at S,N?]

Libya development: Some aid agencies withdrawing from Benghazi. Red Cross pulls back to Tobruk; Doctors without Borders pulls back to Egypt.

Also AJ has a lot more than hard news. Expert commentary / discussion between newscasts and nifty unusual stories–today about the migration of gray whales–the longest migration of any mammal. Plus some super 30-minutes documentaries–yesterday about preservation of the Araphahoe (sp?) language. All sorts of stuff. AJ is worth a bookmark!

*slips back in shadow*

Don’t forget that we should continue the current government policy of providing large subsidies to the industry, as there hasn’t been a single nuclear reactor in the United States that has been financially profitable if it wasn’t paid for by the taxpayers.

Every proposal for a nuke plant is a money-grubbing joke:

(1) The projected cost is always vastly “under-estimated” (i.e., estimated falsely in general, before idiocy comes into play), so that later we all have to kick in much more money as taxpayer funding;

(2) The projected power output is always far lower than originally claimed, at least for a long period;

(3) The projected date of completion is always hugely earlier than it ever occurs, so years and years of extra time and more cost over-runs prompt greater reliance on fossil fuels than originally planned (yay! two oligopolistic industries win!)

(4) The projected savings to consumers and government versus fossil fuels then becomes a joke;

(5) The projected lifetime of the plants never really gets fulfilled;

(6) Safety “standards” are followed just enough to keep plants operating without major destruction with any frequency.

(7) Congress blocks the NRC from enforcing any regulations which exist, regulations which are under attack by industry lobbyists at any given time, so government supervision is a voluntary affair…

But apart from that, nuclear power generation is a brilliant idea and the only reason it hasn’t been embraced is because of a bunch of hypocrite liberals and ‘environmental’ activists who clearly don’t understand how safe modern plants are and they are encouraging the greenhouse gases they supposedly hate.

LanceThruster: Albuquerque! My brother lives there. I saw the Isotopes play! And bought an ‘Topes hat. (Terrific logo.) I’ve worn it to Camden Yards. And great ballpark, whoever built it! Best AAA facility I’ve ever seen. (though I disapprove of the center-field incline.) Love Dancin’ Homer!

Also saw the old AAA club (Dodger system) in the previous stadium. With Candy Maldonado, before his call-up.

I loves da baseball.

Argonne has developed intrinsically safe designs

Unlike all those intrinsically safe designs from earlier decades, these new designs really are intrinsically safe. And if the intrinsically safe designs of today should ever fail due to unforeseen circumstances (which is utterly impossible), you can be sure that new intrinsically safe designs will be developed that will be really, really safe. Really.

Other recent developments include laser death-rays that will detect and disintegrate any terrorists or saboteurs who might threaten the reactors, impenetrable force-fields that will protect the nuclear plants from invading armies or social unrest, mind-control transmitters that will prevent plant operators from ever making bad decisions, and alchemical elixirs that will turn the spent fuel rods into ectoplasm and silly putty.

Congress blocks the NRC from enforcing any regulations which exist, regulations which are under attack by industry lobbyists at any given time, so government supervision is a voluntary affair…

Sadly so. Wasn’t always that way. Twenty years ago I as a consultant to the NRC on a training program for Inspectors. Those guys were really committed to their work, to public safety, and rigorous inspection. The industry rot was already beginning to start….though not Congressional interference (except for slashing enforcement funds).

The two SMEs (Subject Matter Experts) hated the erosion. I’ll bet that so must damage has been done to regulation and enforcement that the NRC will never come back to what it once was.

Nuclear plants have been cured of homosexuality.

Other recent developments include laser death-rays …

Shurrrre, but they still can’t prevent the knocked over cup of coffee on the control panel that turns the entire plant into a vast nookular pit of DOOOOM!

Shurrrre, but they still can’t prevent the knocked over cup of coffee on the control panel that turns the entire plant into a vast nookular pit of DOOOOM!

There are promising breakthroughs in solid coffee technology.

Have the latest generation of nukes gotten rid of that giant lever that you’re not supposed to lean on?

I mention this for no particular reason. I volunteered, along with a number of other students at Penn State, to help in area-wide environmental rad monitoring. We worked in teams, driving arround central PA doing measurements here and there. It was fun in a geeky way. We weren’t scared because we knew enough about the situation and the way N-plants work that it was almost certainly not very dangerous.

“I was planning on letting a super-genius dwarf ride on my shoulders so we could rule over a methane plant.”

OK, but with extra height it may harder to hide at Jonah’s apartment.

Erm, at TMI, of course. Oops.

Bring back the AEC!

I wish I had time to read the whole thread because nuclear energy is the topic. I’ve read the recent Nuke posts with interest, because I’ve waffled back in forth in my opinion about the wisdom of nuclear (ever since the NRC project). I was against it previously, and have shifted back and forth ever since.

As with many other topics, I pretty much adopt the views of more knowledgeable relatives and friends, who are more plugged-in to the topic. My geology professor brother in Eugene–who tracks energy and environment closely–waffles too, though I haven’t talked to him since Japan. And I adopt my views on homosexual and women’s rights from my lesbian sister.; my views on health care from a nephew with an MS in Public Health (now in his last year of medical school),

So I value reading the comments here, from people who dialed into the issues.

Look, if you take away all of the danger of radioactivity escaping into the environment, how is an armadillo going to be able to wander into the reactor core, and back out again, later to be hit by my car on a lonely stretch of highway, and when I get out to investigate, it bites me with the last of its dying strength, gradually transforming me into the strange and mighty ARMADILLO AVENGER! lover of justice, defender of the downtrodden, seeker of truth and punisher of evil?

a number of other students at Penn State, to help in area-wide environmental rad monitoring.

Did you check Radon gas levels? Might not have been so much fun.

Why would that be any different from anything else? “Expand corporate access to profits while reducing corporate responsibilities” is the core of right-wing thinking. Somehow, in true Underpants Gnomes thinking, this will translate into wealth and happiness for everyone deserving. It’s all very religious, in a sense – if you don’t prosper after all this, it means your faith wasn’t strong enough, not that the fundamental idea was absolute Glenn Beckian, mouth-frothing, acid-tripping, eye-rolling, gibbering lunacy.
There’s no idea so sensible that the hooting, screeching Lemurs of Liberty can’t manage to transform it into an apocalyptic instrument of Hell on Earth.

Yo, Armadillo Avenger, I want your VEE-HICKLE.

Steerpike @22:33-

That was AWESOME!

On topic:

What El Cid @21:44 and jim @21:03 said.

Seriously, there’s a reason they have to keep comparing it to coal to look good. Because coal is one of the only energy sources that they can look preferable to. But I guarantee that if the choice was coal or nuclear, then frankly we’re already fucked, because someone managed to shut off the fucking sun.

Going back through the thread from the start.

Jim: You’ve got a lot of passion on this issue–and seem to be very dialled-in to the topic. Do I detect a professional expertise as well? May I ask your occupation?

On-topic news Wikileaks released a 2008 cable revealing that IAEA experts criiticized Japan’s preparation for earthquakes.

In February, the RNC disclosed it was saddled with more than $22 million of debt left over from the 2010 midterm elections

jesus h christ…let’s not fix the real problem…let’s just sell ourselves!!!

Mine Jeffrey

really? what kind of a name is ‘jeffrey’ for an asbestos mine?

…and again, i choose to post during drive time…have fun driving home everybody! be careful!

I hate asbestos mimes.

Is Boehner a cheese eating surrender monkey?
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/03/boehner-the-united-states-should-be-more-like-france—-when-it-comes-to-nuclear-energy.php
“But there are nuclear reactors operating all over the world. Eighty-two percent of the electricity produced in France comes from nuclear sources, and has done so successfully for decades. Only 20 percent of the electricity in the United States comes from nuclear sources. “

I heard that the guy from the Kinks got released from a Pakistan prison. Should be a relief to the CIA

Nice joke!

From AJE….Here’s the basis for the release: US paid 2-mil in ‘blood money’ to each family of the victims; Pak court dropped case. No indication yet of who signed the checks.

Also have enjoyed Wiilly, Cerebrus, Ted the Slacker on nukes. Sounds like you folks are dialed-in too. Anyone work professionally with it (e.g,, Ted on economics)?

Back to my catch-up on an interesting thread…

Well, when the radioactive cloud settles over the Willamette valley and irradiates the hops we can have…ATOMIC BEER! And maybe we’ll have extra arms to drink it with.

But in this case there’s a dual irony. France is host to the world’s largest nuclear energy company, the vast majority of which is owned by the state. So, you know, actual socialism.

and also, too, all the praising of how the japanese are deporting themselves in the wake of the crises, i.e. no looting, patience, helping others, sacrificing and not bitching about it, etc.

why all the orgasms about socialism, now?

Dems suck sweaty donkey balls and often answer to the same corporate masters. I get it. It’s just that there’s still enough sane ones to ward off massive insanity and utter devastation. (At least for now.)

The Duchy of Grand Fenwick, though still silent (alas!) is the home of Guerrilla Voters Cadre 18. Probably be bunch of posts on this topic in 2012.

ATOMIC BEER!

close enuf?

ATOMIC…too close.

You libs are full of shit. Clean coal. Extract oil from rocks. Drill in ANWAR, the Gulf, contriinental shelf. AND NUCLEAR!!! IF YOU THInk wind, solar, thermal, and horshit like that can meet America’s engery needs–you are fucking delusional on this like on you Global Warming. Whattotal bullshit.

Fenwick-

More tangentially. I’m a biologist by training, but a lot of my work and research was into mutations and aging, which are best studied with artificially induced mutations by aging. I’ve also got a big interest in environmental health concerns.

Studying all the ways radiation can fuck you up and studying all the ways pollutants can really rocket up the food chain without adequate protection. Plus having some basic background in the theories and application from being plugged into the scene (including some friends in Los Alamos) means I’m a little easily triggered on the bullshit.

ATOMIC…too close.

i think louisiana lou is suggesting we need that…

Expert commentary / discussion…today about the migration of gray whales–the longest migration of any mammal.

If we were more accepting of the gay whales maybe they wouldn’t have to migrate like that. Group hug?

Group hug?

and a big bowl of chowdah!

Group hug IN a big bowl of chowdah!

You know WHO ELSE emerged from the seabed after atomic disruption, don’t you?

I give Lou the troll a 4.5 – you need to bring your “A” game to troll here. Need more misspellings and a few !!!!111!! plus a dash of ALL CAPS.

Here, leezard, leezard.

Hitler?

Lou the asshole is right about one thing: solar and wind are intermittent and may not scale like we’d need to maintain our current (heh) energy use. Also (and I’ve said this before, here), anything you do to create energy on the global scale is going to have a big environmental impact.

Making solar panels? Some nasty chemicals are used. Wind? bird strikes. Anything done on a global scale is going to fuck us up. IMO the key is how to minimize the impact.

That’s it! Raymond Burr has to go to Japan to do all their press anouncements!

Worse than Hitler:

With a purposeful grimace and a terrible sound
He pulls the spitting high tension wires down

Oh no, they say he’s got to go
Go go godzilla, yeah
Oh no, there goes tokyo
Go go godzilla, yeah

Louis “Gomer” Gohmert: How about your outreach to Baptists and Catholics? [lifts one eyebrow archly in “hah I gotcha now!” mode and smiles smugly]

Mueller: Thank you Mr. Congrefcritter for letting us know there is a problem of radicalization in those communities. We’ll get right on it.

Alas, this exchange only happened in my head.

Oh noes! The Green Dragon!

I disagree. Much better ale than the Golden Perch.

Oh noes! The Green Dragon!

I disagree. Much better ale than the Golden Perch.

I heard the ale at the Prancing Pony has been exceptional since Gandalf put in a good word for it.

And I am kicking myself for not catching the Green Dragon reference sooner.

Lou the asshole is right about one thing: solar and wind are intermittent and may not scale like we’d need to maintain our current (heh) energy use. Also (and I’ve said this before, here), anything you do to create energy on the global scale is going to have a big environmental impact.

but i have a feeling that lou the asshole and his even assholier friends have no intention of ever cutting back their energy usage even one kilowatt…that would TAKE AWAY THEIR FREEDOM!!!

also, i will argue with you on the wind…where i live, it’s not intermittent…it is every fucking day…

NFZ update (breaking)

UN SC adjourned after 7 hours. Meets tomorrow at 9 AM (4th day). About 75% through the para-by-para discussion. Sponsor France pushing hard for a vote on Thursday.

Good thread you’ve got cooking here!

*steps back into shadows*

you need to bring your “A” game to troll here

Not when this shithole is full of D-minus intellects.

Damn! Forgot the nym change. Unmasked. I thought I could get away with it after Fenwick left….

I think that “Fenwick” is actually the real Gary Ruppert acting all not stupid.

NFZ breaking

US UN Ambassador Susan Rice says US is contemplating other actions beyond NFZ.

Implications (per me): Arms supply? Active air support of rebel opns? Logistical support? Intelligence support (likely IMO). Probably NOT boots on the ground. (But perhaps covert insertions of elite recon teams?) Unclear if the contemplated actions might be unilateral.

—–

On the ground: IMO, there is a lot hingeing on the battles for Misrata and Ajbadiya.

I think that “Fenwick” is actually the real Gary Ruppert acting all not stupid

Wheels within wheels.

VS: I like your art plenty much! I’ve tried to leave genuinely appreciative non-snark comments–some longish–at Martiniss but for some reason they don’t go up at your place. (Also, too, the nifty presentation of fish’s poem. Nice.)

Reading Roy’s column from the link in the post, I am convinced of the following:

The conservative blogosphere is actually a ghetto of lizardoid mutants/aliens that have found a viable ecological niche for their “danger/no danger-food/not food” brain functions.

These, of course, being the highest available functions.

Trip is having a very big week.

Oh yes he is.

Sometimes it seems like any way you try to generate electric power, you’re screwed.

Coal is dirty. Natural gas is expensive (and not much cleaner). Solar and wind are undependable. Hydropower will only work in certain regions, and has a fearsome potential to screw up waterways. Atomic doesn’t pollute the air, but it generates mountains of lethally toxic waste and presents the possibility of horrific accidents.

Maybe the Amish have the right idea.

If there’s one thing nearly everyone can agree on, it’s that we need more research, more development of better technology.

Which is why we’re making massive cuts to the Department of Energy, firing one third of the workers at various national labs and eliminating funding for basic research. I know BNL struggled for every cent during the Bush administration and GOP control of Congress, but this is disastrous. I do not know what the fuck this President is doing.

I think Politifact needs to be updated.

Will our future be most like Swan Song, The Road, or Mad Max?

Planet of the Apes.

Also have enjoyed Wiilly, Cerebrus, Ted the Slacker on nukes. Sounds like you folks are dialed-in too. Anyone work professionally with it (e.g,, Ted on economics)?

Tangentially. I was an environmental consultant for 15 years. During that time one of the things I did was inspect nuke facilities for asbestos. Funny how nuke plant workers are deathly afraid of asbestos (another unseen cancer-causing substance) yet have no qualms about entering a radioactively hot area.

I did have to get my certified Radiation Worker training to work onsite and access hot areas.

Trig is too.

A good week.

Having.

Erm, FYWP!

Will our future be most like Swan Song, The Road, or Mad Max?

Planet of the Apes.

A Boy and His Dog.

T&U FTW. = A boy and his dog. Beautiful.

Natural science: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7W0Nm8iHwk

Till Eulenspiegel said,

March 17, 2011 at 1:41

Science is nonsense unless it promotes our ideology.

Don’t you know that?

“Daddy, what’s them red spots on your head?”
“Nothing, son, nothing, where’s yer mommer?”
“She lyin down, said she dont feel good. Can I touch one of dem spots Daddy?”
“Lyin down…whad she say, she say anythang?”
“Naw. She jest said she dint feel right and thought she might oughter lie down.”
“Get yer hands off me son, these things is itchy.”
“Shoot Daddy, you got dem spots all over, dont they hurt?”
“No, they dont hurt, they itch. It aint the same thing.”
Opens bedroom door.
“Baby, how you feelin?”
“Oh, hey, honey, not too good. I was pickin some ‘maters from Dewey’s garden and I got to feelin a little peekid.”
“Baby, I’ve tolt you not to mess aroun in his garden, Dewey’s been usin that dirt from behind the plant to build up his rows. That dirt stinks. Don’t smell like regular dirt. You shouldn’t be over there. You saw what happened to his youngest, got those tumors growin all over his face and hands and arms and all.”
“Yeah, I know, but Dewey’s family and he’s been callin for me to help him git the ‘maters in since his Betty got sick.”
“Well, then, you see, that’s what I’m sayin, you hadn’t oughter be over there workin, he’s been usin that stinky dirt in his ‘mater rows.”
“Oh hon, I know, but he’s family and the Cashins has always been good about helpin family. Anyway, what’s them red spots on your face? They’re gettin worse honey.”
“Well, they ain’t nothin to be worryin about, the plant sent a doc aroun to have a look at us, the worst of us, and he give us some salve to rub on ’em. He said if they didn’t go away in a week or so, he’d try ‘nother ointment he’d have to order from a place over in Dothan. Ain’t nothin to worry about. Nice doc too. The plant’ll take care of everything.”
“Well, I’ll get up here in a minute and fix y’all somethin to eat.”
“Naw, baby, you just keep lyin there, I’ll run into town and git some chicken. You want biscuits or cornbread?”

Good ear for dialogue / dialect, rodertrudis! Deft characterization, too.

I like reading your fiction here. I hope you’ll try Collaborative Short Story week (whenever the Duchy goes up).

Will our future be most like Swan Song, The Road, or Mad Max?

A low-budget remake of Titanic starring the Three Stooges.

I do not know what the fuck this President is doing.

That is true. You don’t. His budget proposal included a 12% increase for the DOE. BTW, the Republicans are back in control of the House. That’s where the cuts at Brookhaven are being proposed. Did you even read the article you linked to?

Mr. Jaczko’s most startling assertion was that there was now little or no water in the pool storing spent nuclear fuel at the No. 4 reactor of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, leaving fuel rods stored there exposed and bleeding radiation into the atmosphere.

As a result, he said, “We believe that radiation levels are extremely high, which could possibly impact the ability to take corrective measures.”

His statement was quickly but not definitively rebutted by officials of Tokyo Electric Power, the Daiichi’s plant’s operator, and Japan’s nuclear regulatory agency.

“We can’t get inside to check, but we’ve been carefully watching the building’s environs, and there has not been any particular problem,” said Hajime Motojuku, a spokesman for Tokyo Electric. Speaking on Thursday morning in Japan, Takumi Koyamada, a spokesman for the regulatory agency, said that when it was checked 12 hours earlier, water remained in the spent fuel pool at reactor No. 4.

“We cannot confirm that there has been a loss in water,” he said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/17/world/asia/17nuclear.html

Yo, Japan!

Where I live the wind blows from the east, starts somewhere in the Caribbean and sweeps across the dense jungles until it reaches the Cordilleras Isabelia and Dariense, breaks up and swirls around the volcanoes until it reaches the coast, then disappears somewhere in the Pacific. Early in the morning, around five or six, I can smell the jungle in the breeze, but by full sun up the green smell is gone.

Which way does the wind blow in Japan? Are the people in California really at risk of radiation poisoning? Where does the wind go?

Damn! Forgot the nym change.

AWK-ward..

Which way does the wind blow in Japan? Are the people in California really at risk of radiation poisoning? Where does the wind go?

Ugly link:

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2011/03/16/science/plume-graphic.html?ref=science

Which way does the wind blow in Japan?

The prevailing wind blows west-to-east. Californians (and Washingtonians, and Hawaiians, and Alaskans) aren’t in that great of danger from what I can see; the ‘sperts seem to thin the radioactive material would be too dispersed by the time it got to US shores.

The fish, on the other hand, eh, not so much.

Hello Fenwick! I’ve been inviting my (two) friends to read your NFZ updates. You know it can take several hours to catch up here if there are more than a couple hundred posts, especially if there are lots of links, like tonight. I don’t discuss much, maybe a little about the light-weight issues, but never about the heavy stuff, like how to build a nuclear power plant. Did you read Willy’s post at 16:54? I’ll have to come back to that one.

The fish, on the other hand, eh, not so much.

Really. That was my first thought, especially the flying fish. BP shrimp, Fukushima sushi, what’s next?

So long, and thanks for all the fish.

What’s next?

Godzilla vs. Gamera

Sometimes i just want to jump off a bridge.

The fish, on the other hand, eh, not so much.

the generation of fish will bear out my insistence for not liking seafood in the first place…

THIS

and THAT

This or that?

night all…slainte!

This is Sparta?

[sticks head in, stage right]

Has the funny started yet?

solar and wind are intermittent
Solar and wind are undependable.

Not if you get your solar from satellites: not only do you collect way more energy per square meter of surface but it just keeps coming 24/7, indefinitely. The solar sytem doesn’t get cloudy days.

No.

That was to Bouffant and not jim-with-the-ponies.

It’s gotten to the point where it’s like telling jokes while an alligator pops your testicles with its jaws. There’s a time for laughter, and a time for yelling “oh holy shit an alligator just popped my testicles.”

I’m not laughing, but the gator seems pleased.

I’m not laughing, but the gator seems pleased.

Why wouldn’t it? At least it has lunch.

Yummy! Dampniche-Nutz.

I’m all for solar-power satellites. Just let me have the remote so I can point one at someplace (or even someone) that deserves to be fully-roastedpowered.

Sometimes i just want to jump off a bridge.

Sometimes you don’t?

You can’t let yourself get so down that you can’t go on. What good would that do? When it gets to that point, go outside into the Big Blue Room and take a walk. Talk to a friend. Smoke a…well, whatever lets you forget for a bit. A little R&R goes a long way.

As far as bridge jumping goes, I pity the younger.

The Japanese may have a very bright future.

I Pliny the Younger.

The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to jump off bridges.

Aaaaaggghh, I’ve been Timbuk3-rolled.

Transportation below, fertilizer behind, & in hard times, hide for five jackets & three pairs of shoes PLUS enough meat for a month!

Giddy up.

No, wait, ponies! Come back! I didn’t mean it! It was a JOKE! WHOA!

Sigh … guess it’s back to Shank’s Mare for me then.

Beatle-roll.

go to youtube immediately and type in “Gil Scott-Heron+Shut Um Down”.

that is all.

thems some pretty bright shadows

Needs more lens flare.

It’s taken them a few weeks, but PJM finally found a lame excuse why not all public sector unions are created equal:

Police and firefighter unions are different: there is no private sector market for our services.

Oh. Well then.

At the same time, the author claims to be an LAPD veteran, and proudly defends the legacy of his own union, pointing out that there’s in fact no reason why public empoyees on general principle should be denied a union. (At least not public employees like him).

So, the reaction to that should be interesting.

Damn! Forgot the nym change.

AWK-ward..

The fact is: All. One. Guy. You are wondering how I was able to call this.

Also, “Imagine” is the worst song ever.

Police and firefighter unions are different: there is no private sector market for our services.

Alright, he wins this time – but just as soon as someone invents private security, Mr. LAPD gets back in the no-union line with the others.

Shorter Scott Johnson:

Unlike the violent thug mobs in Wisconsin, the people of Miami have a right to recall their representitives because those people agree with me. Also the newspaper is committing a conspiracy by not telling you that the recalled tyrant mayor in Miami is Democrat (admittedly he is a Republican, but he should be identified as a Democrat because he is unpopular and people should know who to hate).

Ok, I’m going to revisit that link I just posted, because it is titled, unironically (or not intentionally ironically, anyway), “The Peasants Are Revolting, Miami-Dade Edition” and features this tidbit:

The recall effort was the work of billionaire car dealer and former Philadelphia Eagles owner Norman Braman. The Herald provides background that is also relevant to events elsewhere: “The campaign to recall Alvarez was launched in October by billionaire businessman Norman Braman after Alvarez successfully pushed for a property tax-rate increase to help plug a gaping budget hole. At the same time, Alvarez pushed for labor contracts with employee unions that included pay hikes for most county workers this year.”

Revolt of the peasants, indeed.

And would a Republican really engage in effrontery that is indicative of a bizarre sense of entitlement?

Yes.

#

mark f said,

March 17, 2011 at 15:35

Ok, I’m going to revisit that link I just posted, because it is titled, unironically (or not intentionally ironically, anyway), “The Peasants Are Revolting, Miami-Dade Edition” and features this tidbit:

The recall effort was the work of billionaire car dealer and former Philadelphia Eagles owner Norman Braman. The Herald provides background that is also relevant to events elsewhere: “The campaign to recall Alvarez was launched in October by billionaire businessman Norman Braman after Alvarez successfully pushed for a property tax-rate increase to help plug a gaping budget hole. At the same time, Alvarez pushed for labor contracts with employee unions that included pay hikes for most county workers this year.”

Revolt of the peasants, indeed.

Count de Monet: It is said that the people are revolting.
King Louis XVI: You said it! They stink on ice!

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0082517/

sire you look like the piss boy.

What the hell is wrong with people?

I’ve been inviting my (two) friends to read your NFZ updates.

BTW, I larfed reading your scene-and-setting description (‘Where I live’…) And, yes, I read Willy. Insofar as possible I try to read all the S,N threads, whether in lurker or commenter mode. I really enjoy this place.

Jeez. Another tag-fail. Way rusty….and pretty rushed today. Proposal is due Friday.

I hope to do serious work on the blog over the weekend. Maybe I’ll put it up even though it’s still pretty crude. This is hard stuff for a Luddite. I have to go the Help constantly.

Fenwick, what platform are you using? I find that Blogger is probably the most user-friendly that I’ve used.

I use WP because I think it’s prettier, though its usability isn’t that great.

And would a Republican really engage in effrontery that is indicative of a bizarre sense of entitlement?

damn…t&u beat me to the punch…

#

Sometimes I am ashamed to be the same species with them.

This:
Alvarez pushed for labor contracts with employee unions that included pay hikes for most county workers this year.”

certainly fits with this:
The recall effort was the work of billionaire car dealer and former Philadelphia Eagles owner Norman Braman

wow, those rich guys can’t stand the thought of sombody besides themselves getting pay raises no matter what industry it is…

What the hell is wrong with people?

oh god…teh stupid and the misogyny are spreading!!!

Of course, if that 11 year old girl was wearing a burka there would not have been a problem. Why are they against sharia again?

T&U: Blogger. As your say, easier. But mine doesn’t look nearly as nifty as the blogs of most Sadlies. But even if the Duchy is crude, that’s sorta appropriate: I can be very crude at times!

VS: I tried in vain (again!) to comment at Martinis today. I’m be-baffled.

Sometimes I am ashamed to be the same species with them.

S. cerevis: What if we’re NOT? Remember the brain was the principal evolutionary organ of homo sapiens. It may be turning into a vestigial organ in some populations of the species.

(Also, I sometimes wonder if men and women are different species living in a wonderful symbiotic relationship…)

And no bridge-jumping, bro! Threads need beer-strands and much as food-pr0n strands.

Why are they against sharia again?

Not Invented Here.

VS: I tried in vain (again!) to comment at Martinis today. I’m be-baffled.

I recommend commenting WITH martinis.

Keep in mind that one of the accused rapists is 27 years old. Now, I’m a few years removed from that age, but I don’t recall it being difficult to not rape children (or anyone else, just for the record) no matter what they were wearing.

Keep in mind that one of the accused rapists is 27 years old. Now, I’m a few years removed from that age, but I don’t recall it being difficult to not rape children (or anyone else, just for the record) no matter what they were wearing.

yes, but have you seen what passes for fashion for they young ladies? you’d be hard pressed to NOT dress your daughter like a slut…unless you shop at the sharia store or the big and tall nun’s outlet store…

not that that excuses ANYTHING…grown men who are turned on by young girls should die a slow painful humiliating public death…

…and with that being said, i will quote t & u: is it too early to start drinking?

<blockquoteLibya

It appears that Ajdabiya (key rebel forward base) may be surrounded; the city itself is still holding out. Gaddafi employing heavy weapons: armor, artillery, MRLs (Multiple Rocket Launchers). And air, of course.

(This is the same drill Gaddafi has used throughout the conflict: Control the roads; isolate the rebel cities and towns; reduce them with preparatory bombardment, multiple probing attack, then take them by main assault. This is the model he used a Zuwariya, the oil towns along the Gulf of Sirte. Misrata still holding; Ajdabia still holding, but both are isolated.)

Benghazi (rebel capitol, 2nd largest city) is 95 miles north of Ajdabia. It has been hit by harassing airstrikes for weeks, but Gaddafi cannot mount a serious ground-forces attack until he controls Ajdabia–and opens up a supply route. Rebels have no serious perimeter defenses at Benghazi, few heavy weapons. But city fighting inside a city is nasty business. Rebel small arms (and morale) will make B. a tough nut to crack.

Another interesting strategic possibility for Gaddafi:

Remember there is an inland highway the bypasses the Cyrenica ‘bulge’ and runs directly between Ajdabia and Tobruk (second-largest rebel city) which is closest to the Egyptian border…and through which supplies and NGO relief travel. Changing the axis of attack could lead to sealing the Egyptian border–he has controlled the Tunisian border from the start–which would almost certainly seal the fate of the rebellion.

NFZ update later. Hope these off-topic intrusions into the thread aren’t TOO annoying.

grown men who are turned on by young girls should die a slow painful humiliating public death

Not to quibble, but that would be virtually all heterosexual men. The issue is not whether they’re “turned on”, it’s whether they act on it that matters…

Fuck these tags. I totally blame WordPress.

Not to quibble, but that would be virtually all heterosexual men. The issue is not whether they’re “turned on”, it’s whether they act on it that matters…

true, but turned on by an 11 year old? ewwwww…

“(Also, I sometimes wonder if men and women are different species living in a wonderful symbiotic relationship…)”

I had a similar notion many years ago. Except I didn’t use that word, symbiotic. As I said it was many years ago so I do not recall many details but the word parasitic comes to mind.

is it too early to start drinking?

A wise man once said “it’s five o’clock somewhere…”

Steerpike: I largely agree, with the proviso that the wired-in ‘turn-on’ applies to ‘young women‘. I think adult (any orientation) sexual attraction to children is an aberration.

the word parasitic comes to mind

Pup: That never occured to me. Could you elaborate: Who are the parasites? Who are the hosts?

A wise man once said “it’s five o’clock somewhere…”

also ‘you can’t say you’ve drank all day unless you start in the morning…”

It’s really nice to know what powerless “libtards” have to say on this. But libertarians don’t control any policy anywhere. Nice strawman- but the pushers of Nuclear Power are intimately tied into Government- are among our elites, our universities, and many many “progressives” in our government as well as retrograde morons like Rush Limbaugh.

It would be a tragedy if this unfolding horror is pushed into the “left” and “right” control mechanism debate. Thanks for contributing to that useless road.

The people who brought us this disaster rule over us- NOW. The “libtards” in their basements did not. Remember that.

Except I didn’t use that word, symbiotic

i’m beginning to think it’s more ‘symbolic…’

Not to quibble, but that would be virtually all heterosexual men.

An 11-year-old? Really?

And, really, this isn’t about being turned on at all. It was about an easy target. Like most rape.

but the pushers of Nuclear Power are intimately tied into Government- are among our elites, our universities, and many many “progressives” in our government as well as retrograde morons like Rush Limbaugh

a guy i used to go to school with has proclaimed via teh facebook, that NOW is the time to begin building nuclear plants because IT’S NEVER BEEN SAFER AND LOOK WHAT WE CAN LEARN FROM JAPAN!!!

i asked him who would be building these plants? private corporations that would be subsidized anyway and won’t give two flying fucks about adhering to any sort of regulations or would they be built by the government, but you know, too much government and socialism…

he has yet to respond…

And, really, this isn’t about being turned on at all. It was about an easy target. Like most rape

AGREED…

I recommend commenting WITH martinis.

I tried that once but all I got was a wet screen and a ruined keyboard.

I tried that once but all I got was a wet screen and a ruined keyboard.

your martini was not dry enough then…

An 11-year-old? Really?

And, really, this isn’t about being turned on at all. It was about an easy target. Like most rape.

As has already been pointed out, men aren’t necessarily able to control what turns them on. What they can control is how they behave. N.B. I’m not personally turned on by 11-year-old girls. Or boys for that matter. The hot sales associate in my office, however, is hot. She still has nothing to fear from me.

And yeah, rape is least of all about sex. It’s about power. And those men, all of ’em, know they were wrong.

And the legislator in question needs to be taken out behind the woodshed and horsewhipped.

As has already been pointed out, men aren’t necessarily able to control what turns them on.

15, 16, 17–okay, completely reasonable. I see high school kids running and think, “Damn,” although I wouldn’t actually want to fuck any of them. But 11?
I would hope that being “turned on” by a child would be an aberration, and not something typical for most heterosexual men. Because, really, I’d like to think better of y’all than that.

And the legislator in question needs to be taken out behind the woodshed and horsewhipped.
and, yes…

I would hope that being “turned on” by a child would be an aberration

I think it’s fairly safe to say it mostly is. However, the human trafficking in young teens says it isn’t entirely unheard-of. I want to be clear: I’m not trying to justify it. I’m just about as squicked out by the thought of it as you are. I’m just saying it exists.

But the point is, acting on those urges is unacceptable. Gang rape is unacceptable. Blaming it on the victim is reprehensible.

Yeah, I mean, I’d like to clarify that if I see a dude with a nice body running or whatever and realize that he’s, like, 16, I’m no longer thinking he’s hot. Because he’s a child.

the fact that he comments on this and looks at my 12 year old niece’s boobs squicks me out completely.

That is NOT OKAY. What a fucking creep.

Of course I can’t speak for my heterosexual male conspecifics but I do believe that sexual attraction to children is an aberration. I also believe that sexual attraction had very little to do with happened in that case. As already noted, rape is not about sex, it is about power, domination.

I remember walking down E. College Ave. one day with the The Ho during parents weekend. We both realized at the same time that we were eyeing up the dads, not the kids. That’s when we knew we were getting old.

What a fucking creep.

he’s a real peach alright! uuuuuggggghhhh…i know my mom doesn’t want to be ‘alone’ in her golden years, but jesus h, i don’t know how she can stand him…

is there a difference between men and women with this? cuz i can look at any boy under 20 and not think…hmmmm, he’s hot!

There are differences between people: your response isn’t a woman’s response, it’s yours. It’s easy for me to think that your response is common to a lot more women than men but it’s pretty obvious that there are women out there who like youngsters.

🙁 I’m sorry, bbkf.

I hit puberty pretty early, especially for 20 years ago. I never even wore “training bras”–it was like I was a girls’ size 12 and then a women’s size 6 all within a few months. I towered over all the other kids. I can remember dudes yelling out their car windows at me when I was 9 and riding my bike WITH MY FAMILY, and how fucking *ick* that made me feel.

I felt awkward and horrible about my body and spent most of my time hiding it. It fucked up my sexuality for a long time. (And I wasn’t really cute at all!) So I’m a little sensitive about it, too, I guess.

having their cleavage in your face and their thongs sticking out of their pants is very uncomfortable for a male

Someone oughtta make a law before your boss becomes a rape victim.

OK, in my defense, I am the father of a 12 YO girl, and another who would have been 14 last Sunday, if she had lived past 10. I agree, being attracted to a preadolescent girl (or boy) is absolutely disgusting, but it is not a crime. Acting on that attraction is where the line is crossed.

I hit puberty pretty early, especially for 20 years ago. I never even wore “training bras”–it was like I was a girls’ size 12 and then a women’s size 6 all within a few months. I towered over all the other kids. I can remember dudes yelling out their car windows at me when I was 9 and riding my bike WITH MY FAMILY, and how fucking *ick* that made me feel.

I felt awkward and horrible about my body and spent most of my time hiding it. It fucked up my sexuality for a long time. (And I wasn’t really cute at all!) So I’m a little sensitive about it, too, I guess.

are you sure we are not the same person???

another who would have been 14 last Sunday, if she had lived past 10

this i am truly and deeply sorry for…

but this:
being attracted to a preadolescent girl (or boy)

while i understand it, will still bother me deeply for the reasons listed upthread…

I knew I was middle-aged when I saw a sexy teenage girl and my first thought was, “How the hell could her father have let her out of the house dressed like that?”

(And before I get flamed for being patriarchal, remember this was my first thought, not my most profound or logical one.)

How about some good news for a change? The following makes me happy in just about every part of me that can be happy. Not least because Eric Cantor is complaining that Dems are using it as a wedge issue.

http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/03/doma-fight-seen-as-turning-point-in-politics-of-gay-rights.php?ref=fpb

What goes around comes around, Eric m’boy. Ain’t karma a bitch?

*Use of the term “bitch” is not intended to disparage any members of the female sub-variety of our species. If they_are_ members of our species.

The following makes me happy in just about every part of me that can be happy

huzzah!

Oh, sorry Fenwick, I spaced out. I really don’t remember much of that little “theory” from my youth. It was almost certainly under the influence of various and sundry mind altering substances that I conceived of it. Plus, it was at a time when I disliked women, such misogyny probably triggered by Anita Bryant.

It was almost certainly under the influence of various and sundry mind altering substances that I conceived of it. Plus, it was at a time when I disliked women, such misogyny probably triggered by Anita Bryant.

The parasitism depends on your crowd. I remember an ex-girlfriend telling her friend about me, stressing that I was really cool because I wouldn’t try to live off her money.

such misogyny probably triggered by Anita Bryant

ooooo…it has been many years since this evil harridan has crossed my mind…time for a fun game! anita bryant: dead/not dead?

Steerpike, I’m sorry to hear that.

are you sure we are not the same person???

Did everyone suggest you should play basketball even though you were horrible at it?

Did everyone suggest you should play basketball even though you were horrible at it?

YES!

I have no idea. I _hope_ she is dead, after a long and painful decline. There are times when I wish I were believer so that I could think of people like her suffering for eternity in a special hell

such misogyny probably triggered by Anita Bryant.

I was about to say that I’d avoid going all Valerie Solanas on your ass, then, but I realized that could be construed as a threat.

Aaaand the memories come flooding back. I really got a kick out of wearing my “A day without civil rights is like a day without orange juice” t-shirt.

YES!

I hated that shit.

There are times when I wish I were believer so that I could think of people like her suffering for eternity in a special hell.

From what I understand, she had a little taste of that after she divorced His Holiness Bob Green, the preacher who egged her on her little crusade. IIRC, after that happened, her Christian allies dropped her like a potato fresh from hell, leaving her almost friendless.

Also, “Imagine” is the worst song ever.

No.

Holy shit THERE is a name that hasn’t crossed my mind in a looking time. So long I had to look her up in the wiki, having blessedly forgotten about her entirely.

“A day without civil rights is like a day without orange juice” t-shirt

wish. i. had. one. of. these. now.

Some important history.

Holy shit THERE is a name that hasn’t crossed my mind in a looking time. So long I had to look her up in the wiki, having blessedly forgotten about her entirely.

Valerie Solanas? Yeah, she died quite a while ago.

Damn you Anonymous. Damn you to hell. And pass the brain bleach.

I had to look her up in the wiki

i had to because i do not recall ever hearing of her…wow, that is some messed up shit…

Important history indeed. Proof that there was in fact once a Righteous Bubba. I was starting to believe I must have imagined him.

She was like an artyfart the-lady-from-Monster!

I Shot Andy Warhol

I Shot Andy Warhol

That was a good movie.

Directed by a woman, too!

Filmed in Arkansas.

Know WHAT ELSE was directed by a woman?

NFZ update

We’ll probably know by 6 PM EST. Resistance is coming from Russia (veto), China (veto), and Germany. Reportedly two Arab states have indicated a willingness to participate in NFZ.

Almost as significant: UK and France–sponsors of the UN resolution–are pushing for measures beyond NFZ, everything short of occupation. In the last 24 hours, the US seems to have shifted to the UK/France position.

That might include: tactical air support for the rebel ground-forces; interdiction airstrikes s to prevent movement of Gaddafi’s ground-forces and supplies; logistical suport for rebels; arms supply for rebels (possibly with trainers); ground-forces trainers; covert insertion of small , elite Western recon forces; intelligence; and, advanced electronic warfare directed at Gaddafi’s forces.

Ever since my breach of civility with DK-W, I’ve avoided commenting about the NFZ (much less about the international political response to the Libyan revolt). I’ve intended my posts as summary of significant military events in Libya; providing some useful (and I hope interesting) background ‘texture’; and, sprinkling in some speculation about them.

After the Security Council’s resolution, I may comment on the NFZ and the international response. However, here is an assessment that may be useful for the future.

NFZ notes

In my opinion, NATO air forces cannot mount an effective NFZ–nor can the two Arab states–unless the US takes an active lead and makes the first strikes to suppress the SAMs and destroy Gaddafi’s aircraft. (Or ground them: cripple the Sirte runways; doesn’t matter if the aircraft are ‘safe’ in their protected bunkers).

With three carriers present–and unified military command–the US could send the first strike very quickly, IMO. I imagine the US air assets in the Med have already have done the essential planning (and target lists). I imagine refining the rules-of-engagement must wait unitl the UN resolution. With arming and fueling, the first attack could go in within hours.

BTW, I think the US would prefer to make the main strike at night: Maximize US advantages in stealth AC; air-superiority AC; missiles (both air-to-air & air-to-ground): avionics and countermeasures; real-time satellite intelligence and AWACS surveillance; and, superior comms and command-control.

Late news:

US, France, UK pushing hard for ‘all necessary measures’ (probably excluding ground combat units), added to it to the resolution. Recess for delegations to consult with their governments. Indications that the SC (including resistors) expect a vote by 6 PM (EST).

Gaddifi is making an address–I’ve been listening live–and it is pretty clear he is bent on vengeance and reprisal. (I wonder what has happened, perhaps is still happening, in Zawiya, the fourth largest city. I’ve heard nothing about it since it fell.)

He also has made a threat to strike ALL shipping in the Med. (Man, I really hope he does it! The Death Ride of the Libyan airforce–and over water so no civilians get hurt. Go for it, Muamar!)

Security Council: Informed speculation there will be abstentions from Russia and China. This is after consultations with their governments. We’ll know within the next few hours.

Forgot to mention the most important US advantage: vastly superior pilots

Murdered the thread. Profound remorse. Especially because it was going so well.

“Know WHAT ELSE was directed by a woman?”

Little known fact: Filmed on a movie lot in Arkansas.

Little known fact: Filmed on a movie lot in Arkansas.

The goose stepping was easy; locals were already adapted to wild-turkey stepping.

Little known fact: Filmed on a movie lot in Arkansas.

if you listen closely, you can hear ned beatty squealing like a pig in the opening credits…

Call Herbert West, thread re-animator.

Report: 3/4 of Religious Persecution Is Anti-Christian

To add insult to injury, these cultists use one of my favorite fonts in their indoctrination vid

*bangs head on desk*

I have hesitated to speak about that horrible rape case in Texas because it reminds me of this story of this house of horrors. I can’t believe I live in a world where people let this kind of thing go on.

Report: 3/4 of Religious Persecution Is Anti-Christian

That report is the most unbiased thing I’ve ever read in my entire life.

“Report: 3/4 of Religious Persecution Is Anti-Christian”

Yah. Loss of hegemony = persecution. I hate that shit.

Relevant

Report: 3/4 of Religious Persecution Is Anti-Christian

hulllooooooo, shoe! meet other foot!

I finally got around to watching some of that Green Dragon shit. Anyone familiar with the “kill more cats” theory the medieval church pushed to (try to) beat the plague? Same. Fucking. Deal.

ruh, roh! just heard on the news that sarah and todd are going to israel for a ‘private’ trip…

You know, I have no doubt that being a Christian in Saudi Arabia can be pretty shitty. But the first comment on the NRO story gets to the real persecution: some reporters and college professors are not Christian, therefore making pious readers & students have a sad!

You know, I have no doubt that being a Christian in Saudi Arabia can be pretty shitty.

Imagine what having no religion would get you.

sarah and todd are going to israel for on a ‘private’ fundraising trip…

Hey is this what you saw too?

Imagine what having no religion would get you.

To the top . . . of the charts, baby!

Yah. Loss of hegemony = persecution. I hate that shit.

Everything is a threat to good White Christians. Even those Satany pigtail lightbulbs.

Report: 3/4 of Religious Persecution Is Anti-Christian

Because of its prolific nature, I wouldn’t be surprised if Christianity was the most persecuted religion in the world, actually. Combine the missionary ethnic and history in Christianity, with the legacy of colonialism which left Christian enclaves just about everywhere. I’m sure plenty of the regimes out there are equal opportunity oppressors – Christians, however, are numerically the largest religion on Earth and they’re just about everywhere, so naturally, there’s more to oppress.

Of course, that also means Christians have done a fair bit of oppressing as well, and then there’s the many, many times that one group of Christians has persecuted another. Is the NRO counting right wing Latin American death squads like the contras as “anti-Christian persecutors?” The ones who raped nuns and hunted down and killed “liberation theology” sympathizers? Cause, they were, but somehow I don’t think that’s what the author had in mind.

(The 3/4 figure feels like hyperbolic bullshit to me, though. Not least because it went through two distorted prisms, first the Vatican and then the NRO).

That was probably my worst post ever. Oh well; I imagine even John Lennon laid a stinker once in a while.

Just so we know:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortion_in_Israel

WTF?

Abortion in Israel is legal under certain circumstances, subject to the approval of a committee for pregnancy termination.

Wonder how many men are on the committee.

*snort*

http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/03/anthony-weiner-sarcastically-mocks-gop-npr-defunding-bill-video.php?ref=fpb

But the first comment on the NRO story gets to the real persecution: some reporters and college professors are not Christian, therefore making pious readers & students have a sad!

Oh, definitely.

The average NRO leader is probably a lot less concerned with people getting beheaded in Saudi Arabia, and a lot more with the fact that he had a Jewish teacher once who didn’t think Jesus was God.

Pup, I’m going to preemptively say I love that guy.

Report: 3/4 of Religious Persecution Is Anti-Christian

So the percentage of religious-persecution cases with christians as the recipient is about the same as the percentage of religious people who are christians? Meh.

How many of those cases are black-on-black christian-on-christian persecution? Somehow I can’t be arsed looking to see.

Further research reveals that 100% of religious persecution comes from believers.

Wonder how many men are on the committee.
At least one of the three must be a woman, sez the Wiki.

A study published in 2001 found that opposition to abortion among Israelis was correlated to strong religious beliefs — particularly Ultra-Orthodox beliefs — below-average income, larger family size, and identification with right-wing politics.

Shocked! Again the theocrats with their Shariah envy.

Pup, I’m going to preemptively say I love that guy

i thought this also, and then i watched the clip…now i will say that if i had a uterus, i would bear his children…

Further research reveals that 100% of religious persecution comes from believers.
Nonsense! Every time an atheist talks about evolution and hurts a creationists feelings that’s persecution! Every time an atheist points out the goal of supposedly spiritual organized religion is the accumulation of wealth and power, its persecution! Every time an atheist objects the religious right’s war on the separation of church and state in the US, its persecution!

Further research reveals that 100% of religious persecution comes from believers.

What about the time I was forced to see Christopher Hitchens’s book cover at Barnes & Noble, or when PZ Myers mocked someone with a silly font?

Help! Help! I’m being oppressed!

At least one of the three must be a woman, sez the Wiki.

How considerate of them!

bbkf, right? LOVE that guy.

We’ll probably know by 6 PM EST. Resistance is coming from Russia (veto), China (veto), and Germany.

I’ve heard that. Russia and China are to be expected. What’s up with Deutschland? Where does their take on it part ways with the other big three Western nations?

Reportedly two Arab states have indicated a willingness to participate in NFZ.

Any idea who? It’d be ironic if it was Egypt and Tunisia, but I imagine there’s still too much disarray in both.

PZ Myers mocked someone with a silly font

Fonts are not a joking matter. Except for Comic Sans.

OT whine: God, I am so tired of everything in my iTunes liberry. Gonna go hunt down and kill some new music.

bbkf, right? LOVE that guy.

i KNOW! we need moar of him!

Fonts are not a joking matter. Except for Comic Sans.

and jokerman…

Steerpike: My mother said that parents grieve twice…for the child that was …and for the person the child would have become. I’m saddened by your family’s loss.

Is the NRO counting right wing Latin American death squads like the contras as “anti-Christian persecutors?” The ones who raped nuns and hunted down and killed “liberation theology” sympathizers?

I highly doubt it, since the dead-tree National Review, back in the Reagan years, described a bunch of nuns who got murdered by Nicaraguan contras as “despicable.”

Oh, sorry, the nuns weren’t despicable, their conduct was despicable. For, um, you know, being there in the first place.

My mother said that parents grieve twice…for the child that was …and for the person the child would have become.

this is very true…at least for my mom…

Oh, sorry, the nuns weren’t despicable, their conduct was despicable. For, um, you know, being there in the first place.

SRSLY?!?!?

I highly doubt it, since the dead-tree National Review, back in the Reagan years, described a bunch of nuns who got murdered by Nicaraguan contras as “despicable.”

And this study was done by the Vatican, which didn’t exactly shout its condemnation until the extent of the brutality created a PR nightmare.

And this study was done by the Vatican, which didn’t exactly shout its condemnation until the extent of the brutality created a PR nightmare.

this i do not doubt…fits their m.o.

Valerie!

SRSLY?!?!?

The liberation theologists were considered to be practicing a sort of Marxist bastard Catholicism . . . not something NRO or John Paul II was really into.

Jehovah (ouch!) is very much against abortion. If you abort the little pre-kids then how can you send a bear to rip 42 of them to shreds for making fun of a bald guy?
2 Kings 2

2:23 And he went up from thence unto Bethel: and as he was going up by the way, there came forth little children out of the city, and mocked him, and said unto him, Go up, thou bald head; go up, thou bald head.
2:24 And he turned back, and looked on them, and cursed them in the name of the LORD. And there came forth two she bears out of the wood, and tare forty and two children of them.

God, I am so tired of everything in my iTunes liberry. Gonna go hunt down and kill some new music.

currently my HD stands at 40,713 tracks. Of course, that includes The Mating Sounds of North American Frogs…. I probably need something new too.

Shush. It’s my only source of pride these days. My life is shallow and depressing….

SRSLY?!?!?

Like Mark said… I suspect the line went something like “those nuns were liberation theology advocates, and you know what that means, they were probably giving aid and comfort to Marxist terrorists…” etc etc etc. Whether or not they were actually LT followers.

Of course, that includes The Mating Sounds of North American Frogs…. I probably need something new too.

Check out the most recent Neko Case album. You’ll love the last track.

Psalm 137:9 is also instructive as to God’s position on abortion.

How blessed will be the one who seizes and dashes your little ones Against the rock.

Thanks Fenwick. Every birthday she would have had is a fresh grieving. I always buy a helium baloon bouquet, and we go into the back yard and release them. Then we all have a good cry and go back inside.

One more nice touch about the Nicaraguan nuns: Alexander “I’m in Charge” Haig described the incident to Congress as “an exchange of gunfire.” Which would make them the only pistol-packing nuns outside of bad movies and sitcoms.

Steerpike: I’m a little late, but please add my condolences. The death of a child has got to be one of the cruelest things in the universe.

I always buy a helium baloon bouquet, and we go into the back yard and release them. Then we all have a good cry and go back inside.

i have a friend who lost a son to suicide after the vietnam war…on his birthday each year, she gives someone who she thinks is having a tough time a bouquet of flowers…i was the recipient one year and it meant a lot…we still light a candle which is next to a picture of my brother each christmas, which is when his birthday is…we also share a good cry and then much laughter as we remember some of the goofy stuff he used to do…

2 Kings 2
I suspect that the prophets were actually prior-day Comic Book Guys and the Old Testament is their second-rate fan fic.

Check out the most recent Neko Case album. You’ll love the last track

Already in the box. The North American Frogs album is even better, though, because it features a narrator straight from those film strips we used to watch back in grade school…

zrm, a lot people pride themselves on having huge libraries. I pride myself on keeping mine tight. I cull…A LOT. If I’m never listening to something, I get to wondering why it’s still around. Then it goes. I always did this with my CD collections, too. Quantity does not impress me, quality does.

There are things that I will probably never get rid of, like my Weezer albums and Truth and Soul by Fishbone and all my Bryan Ferry songs, because they helped shape my love of music…but lots of other stuff could end up on the chopping block. If I’m not feeling it, what’s the point, really?

My current iTunes game is smart folders based on play counts. If I’ve got a bunch of songs in there I’m never listening to, I should listen to them and decide if I want them. DELETE DELETE DELETE.

LossMention of hegemony = persecution.

Doesn’t even have to be criticism. All you have to do is speak or act in some way that makes privilege apparent, and you’re zOMG OPPRESSION!

My current iTunes game is smart folders based on play counts. If I’ve got a bunch of songs in there I’m never listening to, I should listen to them and decide if I want them. DELETE DELETE DELETE.

Amen, brotha!

BTW, I am looking to download some Corrosion of Conformity songs, and could use some suggestions. I think I will probably like their later more metal-y stuff. Probably.

Xecky Gilchrist said,

Yeah, that too. Also.

Quantity does not impress me, quality does.

Not that I’m trying (or dressing) to “impress,” but I must repeat:

QUANTITY IS QUALITY!

It’s taken me weeks – months? – to get a 3000 song at-work library up to five plays per song. Still the top plays.

Mock all you will, mockers, but that North American Frogs recording is great!

I’m gonna check out those Pantera songs.

Quantity does not impress me, quality does.

THERE IS NO FILLER. I NEED FOUR COPIES OF DING(1), BECAUSE DING(1) FUCKING ROCKS.

I told you, it’s my only point of pride anymore. Thanks a bunch.

Substance, if I haven’t heard something in a while, it’s a pleasant surprise when it comes up. Play counts are fascism.

If I’m not feeling it, what’s the point, really?

because you might feel it in a year? Just spitballing here.

Hell, a week or so ago, all I wanted to listen to was Joy Division. I resisted the urge to get rid of all 40,000 other tracks.

to get a 3000 song at-work library

well there’s your problem. You need to get rid of the work. It’s what I’ve done.

I am, however, a bit worried that M Bouffant Johnson is making sense.

Mock all you will, mockers, but that North American Frogs recording is great!

Ahh, so YOU were the guy that bought the other copy.

Who bought the other copy of Ding(1)?

All you have to do is speak or act in some way that makes privilege apparent
BLOOD LIBEL!!

“because you might feel it in a year? Just spitballing here.”

That DOES happen. I just find it VERY RARELY happens with me. I think if havin a liberry that big makes you happy, that’s awesome.

I’m not happy with mine right now at all.

I think 3000 songs is just my Langford/Mekons/related library.

I AM NOT COMPULSIVE!!

No, but friends of mine used to play it on the local Pacifica station early wknd. mornings.

I am, however, a bit worried that M Bouffant Johnson is making sense.

So am I, but should I worry more about you or me?

Sorry, Israel – you just lost the sensitivity award to the Xians.

As the fifth largest earthquake to ever take place, the threat of aftershocks continues. Amid the devastation, “The worst tragedy is that statistically only one or two out of every 1,000 people here would confess Christ as Lord,” says Tony Haug, a Pioneer in Japan for 23 years.

I swear I am not making this up.

http://pioneers.org/Connect/Media/MediaArchive/tabid/149/PostID/274/Tragedy-in-Japan.aspx

I’m not happy with mine right now at all.

Not enough Mekons.

Hell, a week or so ago, all I wanted to listen to was Joy Division. I resisted the urge to get rid of all 40,000 other tracks.

One of the good things about me – and there are many many good things about me – is that I don’t get tired of the things I think are good. It’s pretty clear to me what I can dispose of.

Hey, love what you love.

I went through a phase where I didn’t listen to anything but Soundgarden. That was pretty much IT.

It’s pretty clear to me what I can dispose of, POOP.

is that I don’t get tired of the things I think are good.

me neither.

And every one of those 40,000 tracks is GOOD.

Except for Hold On My Heart. Bleagh.

I have about 20000 tracks at home and I haven’t ripped probably a quarter of my CDs. So the at-home trash rate for unlistened-to tracks is probably 1 in 4.

Has anyone else here seen this? When I first saw the helicopters dropping water on the Fukushima reactor I thought, Jesus H. Christ! I am so glad I never took up that line of work! Then all the thoughts of how dangerous this specific mission really is began to ricochet around in my half empty head. Great article.

Someday, I need to figure out how to convert my vinyl reliably and easily. THEN I will show you all.

I even have an original issue of Consequences. Which seems awfully, tragically, prophetic these days.

Then all the thoughts of how dangerous this specific mission really is

They are probably in some sort of union, so fuck ’em. [/Scott Walker]

So the at-home trash rate for unlistened-to tracks is probably 1 in 4.

feel free to send ’em to me.

I own maybe 5 CDs and 80 or so tracks. All my CDs were stolen once several years ago and pirated music murdered two of my computers. Since then I’ve been too traumatized/lazy to rebuild.

Is there a word for traumatized/lazy? There should be, it motivates a lot of what I do.

http://www.bias-inc.com/products/soundSoap2/

http://www.usbturntables.net/index.html

Can’t remember what the automatic file-chopper I saw was called: the Google can probably help.

pirated music murdered two of my computers

How on earth does that happen?

How on earth does that happen?

Easy. Songs downloaded from Russian sites or file sharing thingies like Limewire are notorious for being virus-laden. I’m pretty sure I fucked my computer doing that too. Also pirated copies of Photoshop.

Even those Satany pigtail lightbulbs.

Would brain-shaped ones be worse?

(Alas, they’re a design concept; who knows if they’ll actually get to market?)

Would brain-shaped ones be worse?

(Alas, they’re a design concept; who knows if they’ll actually get to market?)

Eeeee! I would want those to be visible!!!

I even have an original issue of Consequences.

I used to have that, but I didn’t get around to buying a replacement when someone stole it.

Also pirated copies of Photoshop.

I can’t say I feel sorry for you. You did two things for which hyou should be ashamed. 1) pirating Photoshoop and 2) using Photoshoop.

Someday, I need to figure out how to convert my vinyl reliably and easily. THEN I will show you all.

There are turntables now equipped with MP3 conversion software; just slot your thumb drive/SD card and let it do the work for you. I don’t know much about their qualities as turntables though, nor do I know if you can hack them to do lossless formats.

If we’re talking about music collections, I have some curious old Wendy Carlos LPs– so old she was still Walter. I really ought to fire them up again sometime.

using Photoshoop.

I dunno. I think I’ve made some pretty neat things with it.

Easy. Songs downloaded from Russian sites or file sharing thingies like Limewire are notorious for being virus-laden.

Ho ho, you Windows people. Mind you…

Yeah, I think you can get stuff to transfer your vinyl to mp3s at places like Brookestone and Sharper Image.

There are turntables now equipped with MP3 conversion software; just slot your thumb drive/SD card and let it do the work for you. I don’t know much about their qualities as turntables though, nor do I know if you can hack them to do lossless formats.

So, who was paying attention up there when I said I didn’t have any work? No work = No money, unless your a fucking Kock Brother.

So feel free to send one of these my way also.

It’s common stuff, the headache is getting it to sound nice/split&name files easily.

Yeah, I think you can get stuff to transfer your vinyl to mp3s at places like Brookestone and Sharper Image.

REPEATING: BROKE!

I used to have that,

What the fuck? Someone is cloning me and seeding them in OZ?

That’s a subtle fucking experiment, that is.

Would brain-shaped ones be worse?
Also.

REPEATING: BROKE!

Know a guy who works at Radio Shack or just really really likes it? ADAPTERS UP THE BUTT. A lot of computers have a usable-if-not-great line in and you can clean up the sound a little anyway.

I used to have that, but I didn’t get around to buying a replacement when someone stole it.

If I ever manage to transfer it, I’ll send it your way. That is, if you send me some Riddled Christmas Ale.

..wait, what kind of psycho would steal that album?

Ho ho, you Windows people. Mind you…

Well, there’s a reason I’m not a Windows person anymore.

A lot of computers have a usable-if-not-great line in and you can clean up the sound a little anyway.

Yeah, I’ve tried that a couple of times. but it seems to be a bit outside of my skill set, not that THAT is any fucking surprise.

Know a guy who works at Radio Shack or just really really likes it?

No, but maybe they’re hiring. If they are still in business.

BTW, I am looking to download some Corrosion of Conformity songs, and could use some suggestions. I think I will probably like their later more metal-y stuff. Probably.

jim, if you stumble upon this later, hook me up. You can just suggest some stuff at my blog, too.

Yeah, I’ve tried that a couple of times. but it seems to be a bit outside of my skill set, not that THAT is any fucking surprise.

Turntables themselves often have a really really low output and need grounding besides; stealing the signal out of an amp via a tape-monitor out might work if you haven’t tried it.

Turntables themselves often have a really really low output and need grounding besides; stealing the signal out of an amp via a tape-monitor out might work if you haven’t tried it.

OK, so maybe I am not ENTIRELY clueless.

Just impatient.

And whiny.

You can just suggest some stuff at my blog, too.

ALL I WANTED WAS A PEPSI! AND SHE WOULDN’T GIVE IT TO ME!!

So, who was paying attention up there when I said I didn’t have any work?

Aw, I thought you were looking for “how” overall, not specific resources.

I don’t know what kind of computer system you have, or where your turntable is, but a couple times I ran audio cables to the inputs of the the sound card and recorded the audio as a straight-up WAV file (which, BTW, is the basic audio CD format); then I could burn CDs for friends or make MP3/other format conversions.

(The reason I say “where your turntable is” is because it can be awkward if you have a desktop system and your stereo in different rooms. I used to use a second-hand laptop for the recording and then thumb drives or, God help me, USB cable transfers to get the stuff on the desktop.)

Security Council resolution passes

10 for, five abstentions,. Include the ‘all means necessary’ to protect civilians paragraph that France / UK (sponsors) attached to the NFZ. [For possible applications, see 20:23 third paragraph.] If so.

Correction: Carrier Enterprise has remained in Red Sea. [Interesting.] I’m not sure if there are two carriers in the Med. That may have been misported several days ago. But there are reported to be eight USN ships including two attack vessals with 2,000 Marines, Also the air superiority strike will hardly be limited to naval aircraft.: USAF has major ground-based assets at Aviano (in Sicily).

The French have said they are willing to take the lead. (Which removes some pressure for US.)

It’s nighttime in Libya.

Gigantic celebration erupts in Benghazi.

“ALL I WANTED WAS A PEPSI! AND SHE WOULDN’T GIVE IT TO ME!!”

This has gone completely ovah mah heayud.

Further clarifying: I used the stereo’s amp to get the output up to decent levels; I didn’t just hook the turntable to the laptop.

A search in Google for “ripping vinyl records” should get you quite a few how-to pages, and several point out free/open-source software that can do the job if you’ve got the hardware. (Audacity, in particular, may even eliminate the need for a preamp– but I’ve never used it myself so I don’t know.)

straight-up WAV file (which, BTW, is the basic audio CD format)

Not exactly. But it’s uncompressed audio which is good enough. The zombie’s got a Mac and he’ll get AIFF files off a CD.

AND SHE WOULDN’T GIVE IT TO ME!!!!!

This has gone completely ovah mah heayud.

Of course, I fucked it up, confuzzling a Suicidal Tendencies song for a Corrosion Of Conformity song….

sigh. I suck.

If only I had a vast source of reference handy, where I could check these things before posting.

Ah. My mistake. At any rate, I found when I burned WAVs to the CD I could play the CD even in quite old CD players (like my nearly quarter-century-old Sony player).

I don’t know if I was getting the BEST recording quality but a) I’m not an audiophile and 2) the album I was ripping was spoken-word so as long as there wasn’t too much surface hiss and pop it was all good. (Arch Oboler’s Drop Dead! An Exercise in Horror, if you care.)

“ALL I WANTED WAS A PEPSI! AND SHE WOULDN’T GIVE IT TO ME!!”

All we ever got was cold.

sigh. I suck.

Heh. I thought you just felt like shouting it. I do sometimes.

I didn’t just hook the turntable to the laptop.

i tried putting them in close proximity, pouring wine into both of them, and hoping for nature to take its course…. I guess they were gay.

One thing Audacity will do is host VST plugins and BAD PEOPLE might do a search like this one.

Ha, someone at collegehigh school w/ ashtrays stole Cheech & Chong’s Big Bambu & Beefheart’s Clear Spot from me, probably ’cause they were (alphabetically) next to each other.

The Audacity site or help pp. mention RCA to USB converters. But I don’t think Radio Shack® sells ’em, & the #1 connectors, &c. store in Hollywood didn’t stock ’em. They’re anywhere from approx. $20 – 50 on-line.

The mic input on my crotch-top devil-box made swell files from a cassette deck, but it’s fucking mono.

Turntables themselves often have a really really low output and need grounding besides; stealing the signal out of an amp via a tape-monitor out might work if you haven’t tried it.

Correct. Especially those with moving coil cartridges but if you are broke we definitely dot need to go there. The output of a typical moving magnet cartrdige is on the order of 500 μV, IIIRC, while a “line in” will want something closer to 500 mV. But wait, there’s more! Vinyl is recorddr using RIAA compansion (or maybe it’s just equalization, its been a long time since I fucked around with analog shit though I dearly miss my old H.H. Scott tube amps) which means that you can’t just use a linear amplifier but need an RIAA spec amp.

Also correct that a tape mon output is the perfect solution because your pre-amp or receiver does indeed have the RIAA curve built in.

I’ve been holding off digitizing all the old vinyl because of the ungodly price of cartridges for my B&O turntable BUT thanks to y’all I just looked again and some folks in up-state NY are making new ones for reasonable prices. Thanks SN!

I don’t have any of my records. Which I guess is okay because I don’t have a turntable anymore.

Or a stereo.

US Amb Rice’s statement fills in some details: Frozen accounts against seven more individuals and five ‘entities’–state-owned businesses or enterprises. Total NFZ over Libyan air space. Tight ban on weapons or assistance–including mercenaries–for Gaddafi, including sanctions against those attempting to break the ban.

I still have some vinyl. Including my precious Les Crane record.

Pepsi!

My late friend John Dorr as the military ossifer, after the teacher & priest.

All @0:21: STOP POSTING SO FAST!!!

Of course, I fucked it up, confuzzling a Suicidal Tendencies song for a Corrosion Of Conformity song….

No worries. It would have gone over my head either way…which is why I was asking for suggestions.

Enjoyable thread. Gave up on catching up with the multitude of others I missed while I was in DC. (yes, I survived — FYI: RFD in Penn Quarter has a great beer selection and was only two blocks from my hotel).

I use a USB turntable and Audacity to digitize my vinyl and it works well. The auto-track-splitting plugin works pretty well, but not on live albums, obviously. I ran into some weird interference issues which I attributed to a ground loop or something and at one point ended up using the line in instead, that worked fine too. Eventually the interference went away on its own. Audacity is great, but does have a bit of a learning curve to it.

Amusing aside: A guy I work with is a self-proclaimed “audiophile” and spends ridiculous money on equipment ($600 cables and stupid shit like that).

He can’t hear. Seriously deaf as hell, and doesn’t even know it. He’s constantly talking over people in meetings or missing shit that’s being discussed. We thought maybe he was just annoying and/or stupid, but nope, his hearing is shot. I find this in combination with his audiophile-ness extremely amusing, because I am a bad person.

Abstentions: China, Russia, India, Germany, Brazil.
——————–
Caught up the thread. We Luddites are major confoozed by much of it, especially the parts written in Bulgarian. Even I wasn’t dialled-in elsewhere, I couldn’t have contributed a single thing.

But I looks like a lively discussion! Have fun!

*steps back into shadows*

Corrosion Of Conformity

I recall liking the first album that Pepper sang on, but damned if I could identify it now. I guess it was Deliverance.

In theory Down should be great but I miss Pantera.

I find this in combination with his audiophile-ness extremely amusing, because I am a bad person.

Hell, think how little he’d hear if he didn’t have the best possible gear!

Italy pledges use of its Sicilian airfields and open port as logistical support bases for USN. Useful developments…more than participation by the Italian air force, perhaps. (Couldn’t resist the snark.)

I hear the gold-plated hearing aids are crisper and cleaner.

gold-plated hearing aids

Most ear-buds rust from ear-wax exposure, but not the gold ones!

So is anybody other than me a bit concerned that by this time tomorrow we’ll be neck deep in the middle of another open-ended war? What could possibly go wrong?

And ’cause of that and since it’s St. Patrick’s day and I’m a mostly Irish also too, I’m gonna go drink a bunch of beer now.

And thePersonCurrentlyCallingThemselvesFenwick: It takes like five fucking minutes to setup a blog with Blogger. Get. On. With. It. You can change the format and make it all pretty-like any time.

Cogitating on this: ‘All necessary measures’ to protect civilians. There are 300,000 civilians in Misrata (3rd largest) who have been surrounded and under attack for weeks. Only hold-out rebel enclave in Tripolitania.

Everyone seems focused on Cyrenaica and Benghazi. Don’t forget Misrata.

I have digitope media digitizer on my old windows laptop that I use for ripping vinyl. It has a stereo input, one of the reasons I bought it. I run my turntable through a preamp and it works well. The software was $ 35 and is easy to use as making a tape. I like the different file options it has.

Arab League participation: Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, Jordan will apparently supply aircraft; Egypt has announced it will not. (Not clear yet about NFZ use of Egyptian airbases / facilities. I expect Egypt will grant overflight promptly.)

So is anybody other than me a bit concerned that by this time tomorrow we’ll be neck deep in the middle of another open-ended war?

Not quite yet, not that I’ve read anything beyond Arab League participation: Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, Jordan will apparently supply aircraft yet, but it doesn’t immediately strike me as being a unilateral US deal. This is almost (more or less) the first time the UN has done anything that even appears this serious.

Not to be too positive, but the gov’ts. of the Arab League may realize they should put their asses on the right side of history if they want to keep whatever power or legitimacy remains to them.

Besides, thinking about imminent clouds of radiation her on the coast w/ the most. Most what, don’t ask.

‘grats MB, ya dun busted it.

Gaddafi’s Deputy FM just finished the first live-response to the resolution. Not quite as good as Baghdad Bob, but hilarious neverteless.

(Or would be hilarious….if not for hundreds of civilian deaths at the hands of the para-militaries, mercenaries, and heavy weapons over the last weeks.)

BTW, in addition to the civilians, the ‘all necessary actions’ ALSO extends to ‘civilan facilities’. That might extend to oil facilities; everyone remembers what happened to the Kuwaiti oil fields, tank farms, refineries, and facilities.

Important: The resolution specifically forbids foriegn ground forces in Libyan. It does not, however, prevent unilateral actions by individual nations.

Within minutes of the resolution, Egypt began moving arms for rebels over the border. (Just don’t get out of the trucks, guys. Let the Libyans unload. No boots on the ground, ya understand.) Still fighting in Ajdabia.

As for Gaddafi’s potential move Benghazi (or inland against Tubruk), fuggedaboutit now. C’mon, Muamar: Launch the Death Ride of your rump airforce into the Med! Betcha some pilots might balk, however.

One more thing: Dismantling Gaddafi’s SAM defense is nothing near as difficult as suppressing the sophisticated Iraqi air defenses in Desert Storm. Gaddafi has some mobile SAM’s and may deploy them in dense civilian areas; if so, there will be civilian casualties.

Libya is a b-i-g place, so here’s another thing I’m cogitating one: How will the NFZ be enforced in sub-Saharan Libya? Does AWACS reach far enough to surveil? I’m no zoomie. Use of Egyptian bases would be very helpful. Might be the best place for employment of Arab NFZ forces.

Crap, folks. I’m sorry for injecting all this stuff. It all belongs in blog, not cluttering up the thread. But i hope that some Sadlies are interested . (It also may provide a glimpse into how ol’ Fenwick’s mind worked in the Watch Office….)

Oh, hee hee hee! Oh hee hee hee hee! Oh hee hee!

Oh, this is amusing.

http://publicpolicypolling.blogspot.com/2011/03/palin-trails-sheen-with-independents.html

In my spam box, one right after the other:

Almighty Bible….Are Your Children Christian? Then you need to see this
FuckBook………..FuckBook Private Invite Code

Yes, I am easily amused.

Yes, I am easily amused.

Still, you’re a person of far-reaching interests.

“I recall liking the first album that Pepper sang on, but damned if I could identify it now. I guess it was Deliverance.”

That’s the one. I figured I’d start with that album.

I got an offer for a great deal on a Hoveround…in my inbox proper. WTH? has someone been spying on my convos here?

BTW, I won’t pretend I’m not tempted.

It’d probably make those last few mos. of incubating easier.

That’s exactly what I was thinking.

BULLS WIN!

BTW, I won’t pretend I’m not tempted.

They should seal the deal with a free pair of Pajama Jeans.

VS: Do you know how to make a baby buggy?

Tickle him a lot.

Ha!

I chopped a jalapeno tOnight. Forgot to wash my hands right after–as usual. Now, my fingers are on fire. Seriously. Painfully burning.

I’m an idiot. I’m shocked I haven’t rubbed my eyes or nose, though. I usually do that

RUBBER BABY BUGGY BUMPERS YYYYYEEEEEAAAAAAAHHHH!!!!!

Flash! Jobs, you screwed me again.

Jobs, you screwed me again.

I thought you were supposed to dump people once they got cancer.

Radiation is a wonderful thing.

VS: Not to worry. “Not available in your country.” No other real Middle Americans can see it either.

Not as known fact: Newt-Wife Mark II was starting to suffer from multiple sclerosis when he dumped her. That is one toxic bastard. Perhaps literally.

jim, if you stumble upon this later, hook me up.

HENGH?

Can’t be arsed to link ’em all but I like these:
***Goodbye Windows***Fuel***Man Or Ash***Albatross***The Door***Wiseblood***Redemption City
***The Door***Paranoid Opioid***Pearls Before Swine***Bottom Feeder (El Que Come Abajo)***Who’s Got The Fire***

……. if that helps.

GRATUITOUS PATHOS: It was a sad day indeed when I went to my Vancouver CD barn of yore (a magical place where I’d previously glommed up mucho audio goodness like Frank Zappa, Howlin’ Wolf, nomeansno, Melvins, etc.) to find that they’d disemboweled their kick-ass music section & now offered 40 copies each of several hundred of the usual generic Autotuned hairdo-core schmucks posing as musicians. Ten minutes of searching in a state of shell-shock/RAGE/heartbreak & I walked out empty-handed.

CDs: teh cassettes of the 21st century.

That is one toxic bastard. Perhaps literally.

The creepy thing is the two daughters from that first marriage working for him. Ha ha mom!

Oh, and hey, I hadn’t actually noticed that Newt became a Catholic convert AFTER the last few years of child-molesting scandals. Now there’s a man with morals.

OT but it fits in with the recent discussions of Irish-American culture in NY.

http://www.wisconsingazette.com/breaking-news/irish-official-criticizes-exclusion-of-gays-from-st-pattys-parade.html

What say you B^4? (Not that anyone expects to see you here today and also I corned a pork shoulder for this event, thank you very much. And a beef brisket too but that’s just my way).

Radiation is a wonderful thing.

Coulter’s just trying to gin up a market for her new line of plutonium codpieces.

Meanwhile, in Japan

Callista wouldn’t marry Newt until he became a Catholic so his non-Catholic #2 marriage could be annulled by the Princes of The Church. I think.

Like a bad soap opera, & I’m being a gossip. An excess of patriotic zeal.

Why would one expect from Frito-LAY™?

Betcha some pilots might balk, however.

No kidding. Up, up, and away…..(TWA?)

The way I understood the latest BBC broadcast regarding ground troops was that there would be no “occupation”. Well, that is not necessarily a prohibition against using conventional forces. A military friend said that he expects to see the A10 Thunderbolt used in this operation.

Or something. Damn you, iPhonebrain.

That’s what they make the Thunderbolt IIWarthog for.

Warthog.

I wonder who makes up these names. They seem a little silly, no?

If they really want to scare the enemy with a badass name, why don’t they call these planes something like “Really Gonna Fuck You Up Jet”, or maybe “Ass Ripping Butt Bomber”, and if that doesn’t panic the enemy into retreat, perhaps “Mother Fucker Machine Gunner” will do the trick.

They will be deployed from the Gen. Jack D. Ripper Hegemonic World Domination Base. Located somewhere in the state of Halliburton, USA.

Warthog’s self-deprecating, as the plane’s not a supersonic needle, & there won’t be many Top Guns made about blowing up convoys of 18-wheelers.

General Dynamics today introduced the “Suck On This” advanced tactical raperdrone. The 384 billion dollar contract is expected to ensure America’s energy dependence through the foreseeable future.

F. Zappa, ’bout 1968, suggested branding a guitar amp “Weapon of Death.” He was sure it’d sell big.

Just plain “Ass-Ripper” would work.

Didn’t the state of Halliburton move to Dubai?

Didn’t the state of Halliburton move to Dubai?

Where they’ve blossomed into a global leader of toxic waste and human suffering.

Warthog.

I wonder who makes up these names. They seem a little silly, no?

I find them remarkably descriptive myself (and ‘silly” too but without negative connotations). There is quite a history of naming aircraft. McDonnell-Douglas was partial to the occult (Banshee, Phantom) whereas the A-10 Thunderbolt name was taken from the Republic P-47 Thunderbolt of WWII fame which was effective in close air support. (see – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairchild_Republic_A-10_Thunderbolt_II)

The “Warthog” nickname just fits its look, much as the nickname for the B-52 does (“BUFF” – Big Ugly Fat F*cker – or “Fellow” for polite company), not to mention that an actual warthog is a close quarters scrapper.

As far as nicknames go, it sure beats the one for the WWII era Sherman tank (“Zippo – lights first time, every time”) whose gasoline instead of diesel engines meant they were often flaming deathtraps. You’ve got to have a gallows sense of humor in the warrior biz. My friend’s actual emblem slogan for his Marines 1/5 (there for the fall of Baghdad) was “Make Peace Or Die”

shit man, you go out your way to get really stoned on a Thursday night, only to wake up and find we’ve declared war on another muslim country….. I picked a hell of a week to give up glue, as they say

so, the arguments of the muscular liberals prevail, hope this one turns out better than their last 2 calls…. but somehow I doubt it……

” the B-52 does (“BUFF” – Big Ugly Fat F*cker ”

HERESY! The B-52 is one of my favorite planes EVAH. The thing has a certain grace about it, despite its enormity. Watch film of B-52s taxiing along with the wing tips dragging … great stuff. Not like those wimpy B-17 things that give The Ho stiffies.

I wonder who makes up these names. They seem a little silly, no?

silly or not, what will now follow is 3-4 weeks of pundit masturbation as ‘our boys’ prevail over Quadaffi…. jesus, i’m off to bang my head off a wall…..

Pupienus Maximus – No offense intended. It *is* a beautiful plane. This was the nick I heard aircrews gave it. Even with the radar signature of a flying boxcar, it often still got the call over the B-1 bomber because the B-1 and variants could not deliver the payloads a B-52 could (though full air superiority sure helped).

General “Buck” Turgidson: If the pilot’s good, see, I mean if he’s reeeally sharp, he can barrel that baby in so low… oh you oughta see it sometime. It’s a sight. A big plane like a ’52… varrrooom! Its jet exhaust… frying chickens in the barnyard!

M. Bouffant said,

March 18, 2011 at 5:29

F. Zappa, ’bout 1968, …

God I miss him 🙁

Yep, 50,000 lb. Bomb load, AIR.

WE CAN NOT AFFORD A BADASS PLANE NAME GAP!

WE CAN NOT AFFORD A BADASS PLANE NAME GAP!

xD

Poopy-M: See if you can find footage of the B-52 that lost it’s vertical stabilizer yet still landed. Think it was one of the first off the line, maybe even a test model. Very impressive.

I logged 900 hours as a B-52G aircraft commander (1989-1991)

We always called them “BUFFS”.

They weren’t hard to fly but they were very hard to fly well. They had a lot of bad aerodynamic quirks, especially the G and H models with the smaller vertical stabilizer.

The one that lost its vertical stabilizer encountered mountain wave turbulence while on a low-level mission. The crew lowered the aft landing gear, which provided enough stability to get the plane home.

That’s why the last two models had a shortened vertical stabilizer, since they were designed for low-level flying. They lost some stability when they went to the shorter tail. You really noticed it when air refueling. You’d be fighting it the whole time you were behind the tanker just trying to keep the wings level. The old Vietnam-era guys told me that the “tall tail” models flew better.

The most reactionary man in the U.S. Senate is . . .
Mike Lee.

“Congress decided it wanted to prohibit that practice, so it passed a law. No more child labor. The Supreme Court heard a challenge to that law, and the Supreme Court decided a case in 1918 called Hammer v. Dagenhardt,” Lee said. “In that case, the Supreme Court acknowledged something very interesting — that, as reprehensible as child labor is, and as much as it ought to be abandoned — that’s something that has to be done by state legislators, not by Members of Congress.”
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/01/17/gop-senator-calls-federal-laws-child-labor-unconstitutional/

Good rule of thumb: When someone says “. . . as much as it ought to be abandoned — that’s something that has to be done by state legislators, not by Members of Congress.” he/she is lying.

Did people have a nickname for Lancasters?
You know, real bombers.

Joe miller of course could have been the most terrorist friendly.
http://www.salon.com/news/politics/war_room/2011/03/16/joe_miller_militia_kidnap_plot/index.html

I heard this morning that our gov here in Florida is going to post a website that will show what all the public employees in the state are making in salaries and benefits. I wonder how many tax dollars are being spent on that and I would bet the ranch that the gov, the legislators and other such political types won’t be included.

Did people have a nickname for Lancasters?
You know, real bombers.

Wait, are we talking about BOOBS?

No sir we are not speaking of Bristols.

Please don’t make me think of Palin Jr. It’s early in the day here.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/18/opinion/18krugman.html?hp

But the nice person on NPR told me that the American public is “clamoring” for a solution to the deficit problem. And every time Robert Segal interviews a member of congress (at least two that I heard this week) he repeatedly questions them about why they’re not looking at “entitlement” cuts as a way to reduce the deficit, curiously leaving out the goatse that we shovel billions into known as DOD.

kenny haz a confusee :</

Those B-1’s don’t have much of a payload and I now forget what role they were supposed to play in the Pentagon’s fever dreams, Hanoi runs?, who knows, but they are a lot sneakier than those BUFFs. Twice I’ve been buzzed from behind (V?R) by low level B-1’s while canoeing in Okefenokee and they’ll make you jump I’ll tell you what. I’ve never been snuck up on by a B-52, not even the ones from Athens.

WOW that was fucking fast! (Libyan foreign minister declares his government will halt all military operations in the country).

Warthog — Best damn US ground-support aircraft since WWII. Rugged, excellent survivability, short runways, simple to maintain, a devastating ground-attack warplane. Out of production now. “‘Let’s build some new shiny air-superiority fighters instead…”

B1 — The absolute all-time stoopidest US warplane evah. When it was proposed, the Navy and Army mocked it as the Plane Without A Mission Intended as a long-distance strategic bomber–simiilar to B-52’s role–the Flying Dodo (another drawing-board nickname) had no chance of survival in the Soviet’s sophisticated, dense, and multi-tiered AD (air defense) environment.

After it was built and deployed, the zoomies called the B-1 the Hanger Queen:. USAF discovered that it needed special hangers….so they built them. And they’ve hardly ever left them during their service lifetime.
Couldn’t even use the B1 in Desert Shield, until the Iraqi AD was destroyed. B-1 gets my vote as the Stoopidest Weapon Ever Built by the United States. It would have been simpler to just burn the bales of money this thing cost…perpetual redisgns and truly massive overruns. (Or found a better use for money. S-a-a-y, there’s a thought….)

Gotta reiterate: I don’t know zoomie stuff as well as gound operations.

Major K: That is so cool. You are not only a real-life bigtime pilot…but a former B-52 jockey! You undoubtedly know a helluva lot more about air opns than anyone else here. I’d love to read your observations and comments about Libyan operations!

I’m conscious that some Sadlies–especially the women–may dislike the strands about warfare and weaponry. I feel sort of the same way when my feeble Luddite brain can’t follow dozens of comments about computer / handheld technology and software.

Won’t be able to comment much today. I leave soon for a 4-hour volunteer stint at the Library. Have fun.

In other superpowers-from-being-bitten-by-a-spider news: PENIS.

WOW that was fucking fast!

With apologies to our gracious hosts, Sadly, No!

I am hopeful that I am terribly wrong about foreign military intervention being the wrong option in Libya.

Appropriate for topic, and Zappa nostalgia:

Whoever we are
Wherever we’re from
We shoulda noticed by now
Our behavior is dumb
And if our chances
Expect to improve
It’s gonna take a lot more
Than tryin’ to remove
The other race
Or the other whatever
From the face
Of the planet altogether

They call it the earth
Which is a dumb kinda name
But they named it right
’cause we behave the same…
We are dumb all over
Dumb all over,
Yes we are
Dumb all over,
Near ’n far
Dumb all over,
Black ’n white
People, we is not wrapped tight

Nurds on the left
Nurds on the right
Religous fanatics
On the air every night
Sayin’ the bible
Tells the story
Makes the details
Sound real gory
’bout what to do
If the geeks over there
Don’t believe in the book
We got over here

You can’t run a race
Without no feet
’n pretty soon
There won’t be no street
For dummies to jog on
Or doggies to dog on
Religous fanatics
Can make it be all gone
(I mean it won’t blow up
’n disappear
It’ll just look ugly
For a thousand years…)

You can’t run a country
By a book of religion
Not by a heap
Or a lump or a smidgeon
Of foolish rules
Of ancient date
Designed to make
You all feel great
While you fold, spindle
And mutilate
Those unbelievers
From a neighboring state

To arms! to arms!
Hooray! that’s great
Two legs ain’t bad
Unless there’s a crate
They ship the parts
To mama in
For souvenirs: two ears (get down!)
Not his, not hers, (but what the hey? )
The good book says:
(“it gotta be that way!”)
But their book says:
“revenge the crusades…
With whips ’n chains
’n hand grenades…”
Two arms? two arms?
Have another and another
Our God says:
“there ain’t no other!”
Our God says
“it’s all okay!”
Our God says
“this is the way!”

It says in the book:
“burn ’n destroy…
’n repent, ’n redeem
’n revenge, ’n deploy
’n rumble thee forth
To the land of the unbelieving scum on the other side
’cause they don’t go for what’s in the book
’n that makes ’em bad
So verily we must choppeth them up
And stompeth them down
Or rent a nice french bomb
To poof them out of existance
While leaving their real estate just where we need it
To use again
For temples in which to praise our god
(“cause he can really take care of business!”)

And when his humble tv servant
With humble white hair
And humble glasses
And a nice brown suit
And maybe a blond wife who takes phone calls
Tells us our God says
It’s okay to do this stuff
Then we gotta do it,
’cause if we don’t do it,
We ain’t gwine up to hebbin!
(depending on which book you’re using at the
Time…can’t use theirs… it don’t work
…it’s all lies…gotta use mine…)
Ain’t that right?
That’s what they say
Every night…
Every day…
Hey, we can’t really be dumb
If we’re just following god’s orders
Hey, let’s get serious…
God knows what he’s doin’
He wrote this book here
An’ the book says:
He made us all to be just like him,”
So…
If we’re dumb…
Then God is dumb…
(an’ maybe even a little ugly on the side)

I’m conscious that some Sadlies–especially the women–may dislike the strands about warfare and weaponry.

I’m not especially a woman, but my penis is lacking the sports/military/rock&roll gland (I assume they are all connected somehow).

No complaints if y’all want to nerd it up though.

Unusual side-effects: A single bite from the Brazilian wandering spider has been shown to cause four-hour long erections

The eight-legged creature – also known as the armed spider, banana spider…

and the hey look, a personal towel rack spider.

also vaginally challenged yet I don’t get off on the war pron either.

four-hour long erections

Most men measure PENII in inches, but I guess we can measure using light-hours.

Did people have a nickname for Lancasters?

“Lancs” I believe.

The Canadians have one at their museum in Hamilton. They were nice enough to let me crawl through it.

The baddest of the bad ants. A friend told me that he was stung twice by this creature and was sure he was going to die. He said he passed out from the pain and was taken to a hospital where he was given morphine and an antidote to counter the effects of the poison.

B-52?s role–the Flying Dodo (another drawing-board nickname) had no chance of survival in the Soviet’s sophisticated, dense, and multi-tiered AD (air defense) environment.

Keep in mind that by the time I would have reached the Soviet Union, we would have been lobbing ICBMs at each other for 16 hours. I doubt there would have been much left of the Soviet air defenses.

Our mission plans had us putting the third or fourth weapon on any given target. You know, just to dig the crater a bit deeper.

That being said, you would be surprised at how a well a properly-flown B-52 could get through air defenses. At 300 feet, at night, in the terrain – it would take a very lucky fighter pilot to get a shot at us.

Did people have a nickname for Lancasters?
You know, real bombers.

I thought Smut was moar a fan of helicopters.

At 300 feet, at night, in the terrain – it would take a very lucky fighter pilot to get a shot at us.

That’s amazing! Three hundred feet! I still have my grandfather’s old goose gun, a 40 inch barrel single shot 10 gauge which he used for birds flying over three hundred feet.

you would be surprised at how a well a properly-flown B-52 could get through air defenses.

“If the pilot’s good, see, I mean if he’s reeeally sharp, he can barrel that baby in so low… oh you oughta see it sometime. It’s a sight. A big plane like a ’52… varrrooom! Its jet exhaust… frying chickens in the barnyard! “

My grand-uncle Duane used to be an instructor in the air force in the korean war era. He taught a class to bomber pilots on how to properly release a nuclear bomb and fly home. When he taught the class, he was dismayed to see hardly anyone paying attention. The pilots were smoking and talking and playing cards in class. This was pretty unusual behavior for his students, so after class, he asked them why none of them were interested in the subject material. The students told him to look up the expected casualty rates from the tactics he was teaching. When he saw that only like 10% – 15% of the bombers were expected to survive the weapon blast, he let the pilots continue with their games.

I find them remarkably descriptive myself (and ‘silly” too but without negative connotations).

You’re right LanceThruster, the names are very apt. I really do like the names of certain aircraft, the Thunderbolt and the (UK) Spitfire are probably my favorites.

I thought Smut was moar a fan of helicopters.

Te Wake pleaded guilty to five charges, including wilful and obscene exposure in a public place, when he appeared in Manly Local Court last Wednesday

Surprisingly, the names Boneshaker, Eerieflatulence, and Swandive have never been used by the aviation industry.

When he saw that only like 10% – 15% of the bombers were expected to survive the weapon blast, he let the pilots continue with their games.

Did the projections assume that 85-90% of pilots would blow off “how to drop a nuclear bomb and live to tell about it” class?

I thought Smut was moar a fan of helicopters.

Now that’s some manly news!

According to what I’ve just found on the Interwebs, the B-1B was a spin-off of the original B-70 Valkyrie project, which was supposed to be a Mach 3+ supersonic bomber that would be fast enough to leave Soviet interceptors behind. That project was canceled partly because the development of Soviet surface-to-air-missile technology made it obsolete.

(Just to be on the safe side, the Soviets developed a MiG-25 interceptor that would be fast enough to catch the B-70, and built it even after the B-70 was canceled – then, in turn, CIA reports that somewhat overestimated the MiG-25’s capabilities led to the development of the F-15).

Anyways. After the B-70 was canceled, the B-1 program was started up (in the Nixon/Ford years) partly as a substitute for that. Then, it became a feature in the 1976 and 1980 presidential elections. Carter said the B-1 was a waste of taxpayers’ money, and had it canceled once in office in favor of ICBMs, missile subs and upgraded B-52s. Then Reagan said Carter was weak on defense and used the B-1 cancellation as an example, which meant the program was restarted when he came into office.

Then Reagan said Carter was weak on defense and used the B-1 cancellation as an example, which meant the program was restarted when he came into office.

See, we didn’t really win the Cold War, we just lost more slowly.

you would be surprised at how a well a properly-flown B-52 could get through air defenses.

The B-52 Vincent Black Lightning was also designed to zip in under the radar, evading the air defenses.

Always topical

B-52s are alright, but I’m not sure this is the best use of taxpayer dollars.

Warthog — Best damn US ground-support aircraft since WWII. Rugged, excellent survivability, short runways, simple to maintain, a devastating ground-attack warplane.

I also heart the Warthog. (Went to see Terminator: Salvation solely because the trailer showed A-10s and HKs dogfighting).

Out of production now. “‘Let’s build some new shiny air-superiority fighters instead…”

I believe the A-10’s replacement is supposed to be the F-35.

Thing is, the F-35 came from what was basically a bunch of canceled Air Force and Navy programs cobbled together. I believe it’s expected to replace the A-10 and F-16 in the Air Force, the A-6 in the Navy, and the AV-8 in the Marine Corps (and since F-14s are out of production too, can I assume it’ll be picking up part of the tab for that as well?)

All of which are airplanes with completely different mission profiles – how’s one single airplane supposed to replace them all?

All of which are airplanes with completely different mission profiles – how’s one single airplane supposed to replace them all?
It totally can’t. That’s a feature not a bug. Once all of the planes the F-35 is designed to replace are out of service, a new need for a ground attack/light bomber will be discovered, which means a whole new plane or drone for the military industrial complex to design (slowly) and build(slowly) and sell to the government (at hugely inflated prices on a cost plus basis).

how’s one single airplane supposed to replace them all?

You’ve either never seen Transformers or saw it and did not look away from Megan Fox.

B-52s are alright, but I’m not sure this is the best use of taxpayer dollars.

It should be “Privatized Idaho”.

You’ve either never seen Transformers or saw it and did not look away from Megan Fox.

Are you saying that an airplane was featured in that movie?

It totally can’t. That’s a feature not a bug. Once all of the planes the F-35 is designed to replace are out of service, a new need for a ground attack/light bomber will be discovered, which means a whole new plane or drone for the military industrial complex to design (slowly) and build(slowly) and sell to the government (at hugely inflated prices on a cost plus basis).

And here I was being totally skeptical. I figured they would make one aircraft and for each one built they would build five different engine configurations, five different electronics configurations and five different armament configurations and charge the taxpayers for all of it. Then they could continue to charge the taxpayers to constantly reconfigure the aircraft to meet today’s requirements.

how’s one single airplane supposed to replace them all?

One plane to rule them all, and in the theater bind them.
In DARPA, where the eggheads lie.

And here I was being totally skeptical. I figured they would make one aircraft and for each one built they would build five different engine configurations, five different electronics configurations and five different armament configurations and charge the taxpayers for all of it. Then they could continue to charge the taxpayers to constantly reconfigure the aircraft to meet today’s requirements.
Well, Pratt and Whitney was developing another engine for it, but I believe Obama finally got that killed. It was on the chopping block for years, but Pratt and Whitney’s congressmen kept restoring the funding. And there are at least two separate configurations of the F35 already, the Navy/Marine Corps version can take off and land vertically (Like a Harrier jump jet used to) and the Air force version cannot.

One plane to rule them all, and in the theater bind them.
In DARPA, where the eggheads lie.

Lord of the Wings?

Well played, Thread Bear, well played!

Oy, Jeez. Enough with the fapfapfap warnography. How about a plane that can be built without bankrupting our budget? How about a bomber that drops diplomats to solve problems? How about a ship that delivers food and medicine instead of death and destruction? I read somewhere–can’t be arsed–that we spent something like a million dollars for every civilian we killed in Afghanistan and Iraq. If we had just walked up and given those people the million instead, they’d be our allies now.

B1 — The absolute all-time stoopidest US warplane evah.

*COUGH*

If we had just walked up and given those people the million instead, they’d be our allies now.

There’s that fag talk we talked about!

thank you sp. the last couplea hours have been a little too “top gun”ish for my liking (not that there’s anything wrong with that)

*COUGH*

They totally ripped that idea off Harald Hardrada!

*COUGH*

Bat bomb, eh? “Fa love pa!”

B1 — The absolute all-time stoopidest US warplane evah.

*COUGH*

even more *cough*
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witteman-Lewis_XNBL-1

Actually, whet I read about the bat bomb indicated that it could have been rather effective.

I call bullshit.

I haven’t looked at the study itself, but based on the details Brooks links to on Science Daily, it sounds like crap.

Really? You guys have been talking about warplanes for the last 20 fucking hours and THAT killed the thread?

Really? You guys have been talking about warplanes for the last 20 fucking hours and THAT killed the thread?

We’re all off conducting our own reseach!

THAT killed the thread?

Since I don’t click on bobolinklink, I cannot comment other than to say POOP.

** Revised Edition ** The Trickle Down Theory ** Revised Edition **

If you give large tax breaks and subsidies to the obscenely wealthy then they will be encouraged to invest that money into getting more tax breaks and subsidies. This will trickkle down and fill the coffers of the greedy politicians and the rising cesspool will float all turds.

Amusing co-worker anecdote of the day:

She said, “So, if someone says you’re ‘bright’, what does that mean?”

I couldn’t answer because I’d laugh, and someone else said very slowly and obviously amused: “Well, it means you’re smart….”

I wanted to say “If they said it to you, it means they’re LYING.”

Really? You guys have been talking about warplanes for the last 20 fucking hours and THAT killed the thread?

Warplanes? I really do’t see how planes would be all that useful in a war.

I wanted to say “If they said it to you, it means they’re LYING.”

It may have been a fashion thing, is she wearing a florescent yellow dress or somesuch? Or perhaps a “bright eyed and bushy tailed” kind of bright.

the rising cesspool will float all turds

(VgopprimariesR)

It may have been a fashion thing, is she wearing a florescent yellow dress or somesuch?

She’s wearing a scarf with neon peace signs all over it. Apparently, she’s in the seventh grade? Circa 1993?

You’ve either never seen Transformers or saw it and did not look away from Megan Fox.

I was too busy yelling things like “THERE ARE NO PYRAMIDS IN THE FUCKING SINAI!!!!” at the television.

It totally can’t. That’s a feature not a bug. Once all of the planes the F-35 is designed to replace are out of service, a new need for a ground attack/light bomber will be discovered, which means a whole new plane or drone for the military industrial complex to design (slowly) and build(slowly) and sell to the government (at hugely inflated prices on a cost plus basis).

Okay.

But the Joint Strike Fighter program (which produced the F-35) was itself cobbled together from a bunch of separate programs. I mean, I know the military-industrial sector can be inefficient, but slowly combining a bunch of separate programs into a single one, then recreating those programs one by one tops even my expectations.

Well done laddies, very well done indeed.

I haven’t looked at the study itself, but based on the details Brooks links to on Science Daily, it sounds like crap.

What problem? That the study is from BYU? That the findings were based on self-selected data from online questionnaires? That the metrics are based on processing by the RELATE-Institute, owned and operated by the Church of Latter-day Saints? That the one person not related to the study that is quoted about it is Mark “Price of Sex” Regnerus? I dunno, sounds legit to me.

the media have Americans convinced that the minutest amount is always deadly.

no, ann…that would be every time the x-ray tech steps out of the room to hide behind a wall when i get zapped…

If the Sadlies need to hire someone to post “Afternoon thread” and such as, I will volunteer for the job.
~

What problem? That the study is from BYU? That the findings were based on self-selected data from online questionnaires? That the metrics are based on processing by the RELATE-Institute, owned and operated by the Church of Latter-day Saints? That the one person not related to the study that is quoted about it is Mark “Price of Sex” Regnerus? I dunno, sounds legit to me.

BUT THEY CONTROLLED FOR RELIGION!!!

I’m not even sure what the fuck that’s supposed to mean, especially since we have no idea who composed the people they surveyed.

If the Sadlies need to hire someone to post “Afternoon thread” and such as, I will volunteer for the job.
~

Hmmm, you’re not one of them there union thugs are you?

BUT THEY CONTROLLED FOR RELIGION!!!

I imagine that they controlled for a lot of things.

about 20,000 couples have responded. The team selected responses from 2,035 couples in an attempt to get a sample that demographically reflected American marriages.

About 94 percent had attended college and nearly two-thirds held a college degree. The average age was 36. More than half found out about the survey from a course instructor or a relationship counselor. Most identified themselves as members of a religious faith, but only 6 percent indicated they were Mormon.

They threw out 9 out of 10 data points.

So I googled the Taiwan radioactive apartment miracle, and according to wiki the Taiwanese Atomic Energy Commission tried to cover up the mistake and has harassed researchers looking to follow up on the health effects. According to a poster here(with supporting links, including to the published study itself)) the author of the study and several coauthors have pretty strong ties to the Taiwanese Atomic Energy Commission.

I imagine that they controlled for a lot of things.

Wow. That’s a load of fucking bullshit.

How the HELL did this pass peer review?

Teh most AWESOMESTmom EVAH?

“How the HELL did this pass peer review?”

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Teh most AWESOMESTmom EVAH?

I do love moms.

also from boboslink:
My guess is it would, at least a little, since strict social mores can reduce the effects of impulsive temperaments.

or make the restricted ones go hog fucking wild the first chance they get…

She said, “So, if someone says you’re ‘bright’, what does that mean?”

you may want to explain ‘sarcasm’ to her…

Teh most AWESOMESTmom EVAH?

I would totes do that for my hypothetical kid.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Is peer review not, like, a thing anymore?

Hello? anyone home?

speaking of Ms. Halfday-awful-coworker, T&U here is something you may be able to use during her next royal wedding fapfest…

Is peer review not, like, a thing anymore?

Being judged by a panel of your peers was rescinded along with habeas corpus.

Speaking of scholarly articles and peer-reviewd journals, T&U is now hereby given fair notice and warning to leave the BYU professor alone before she finds out what his previous paper was titled.

speaking of Ms. Halfday-awful-coworker, T&U here is something you may be able to use during her next royal wedding fapfest…

I may have to leave it on her desk…

I may have to leave it on her desk…

the sick bag or the sick?

T&U is now hereby given fair notice and warning to leave the BYU professor alone before she finds out what his previous paper was titled.

Head=splode.

My institution didn’t have access to the article before, but it does have access to this one. Still, for my sake and everyone else’s, I’m going to avoid reading it.

the sick bag or the sick?

Both.