Wednesday, August 26, 2009

More Quarters Please

Ah, the scourge of internets past... The animated gif. Used properly though, it can be a tool for good. See example below, found on Ace of Spades.

Horsey


Ace writes:
..here's Jennifer Connelly riding a toy pony in the movie Career Opportunities. No one saw it and no one remembers it, but this image, from the commercial campaign, is seared, seared into my memory.


When I saw this gif, I remembered that I saw this movie. I saw it because of this bit in its promotion. May have to see it again for the same reason. Such happy memories...

Here is a trailer... I do the research so you don't have too.

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Sunday, August 23, 2009

Eyes Rolling

John Mackey, the CEO of Whole Foods writes an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal titled "The Whole Foods Alternative to ObamaCare" and liberals get their panties all in a bunch. Probably didn't help that he quoted Margaret Thatcher saying, "The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money."

Now they are boycotting.

Eyes rolling.

Here is how Mr Mackey finishes his article...

Health-care reform is very important. Whatever reforms are enacted it is essential that they be financially responsible, and that we have the freedom to choose doctors and the health-care services that best suit our own unique set of lifestyle choices. We are all responsible for our own lives and our own health. We should take that responsibility very seriously and use our freedom to make wise lifestyle choices that will protect our health. Doing so will enrich our lives and will help create a vibrant and sustainable American society.

I don't see anything in there that is boycott material. It is a guy expressing his opinion. Of course, I am a guy that happens to agree with what he said. What are we going to accomplish boycotting him for expressing his opinion? Whole Foods employs over 50,000 people, you are going to punish them for his opinion?

His company is ranked twenty second in Fortune's 100 best companies to work for. ...And they are one of the 15 companies on that list that pay 100% of their employees health care premiums. He sounds like a horrible guy! [sarcasm]

Andrew Breitbart says:
The success of Whole Foods is largely built on Mr. Mackey's understanding of the liberal mind. It wants the good life - but with instant absolution for the sin of conspicuous consumption. Whole Foods is marketing at its best. Iconography and slogans throughout the store - not unlike those Barack Obama used to win the presidency - tell the shopper they are saving the planet in large and small ways.

The product is so good even conservatives and skeptics are willing to play along.

But Mr. Mackey missed the key ingredient of modern liberalism: intolerance to the ideas of nonliberals. And this miscalculation may prove to be devastating to his multibillion-dollar business.

[highlight by me]

There you go, intolerance to the ideas of nonliberals. Winner, winner, chicken dinner. Heck, disagree with ObamaCare and the Speaker of the House labels you as "Un-American".
In the meantime, as members of Congress spend time at home during August, they are talking with their constituents about reform. The dialogue between elected representatives and constituents is at the heart of our democracy and plays an integral role in assuring that the legislation we write reflects the genuine needs and concerns of the people we represent.

However, it is now evident that an ugly campaign is underway not merely to misrepresent the health insurance reform legislation, but to disrupt public meetings and prevent members of Congress and constituents from conducting a civil dialogue. These tactics have included hanging in effigy one Democratic member of Congress in Maryland and protesters holding a sign displaying a tombstone with the name of another congressman in Texas, where protesters also shouted "Just say no!" drowning out those who wanted to hold a substantive discussion.

Let the facts be heard

These disruptions are occurring because opponents are afraid not just of differing views — but of the facts themselves. Drowning out opposing views is simply un-American. Drowning out the facts is how we failed at this task for decades.

Oh, I'm sorry, "drowning out" opposing views is un-American. Funny, but that is just what the liberals seem to be trying to do. That and demonizing those who happen to disagree.

Some will say, "yeah but, that is what the conservatives Bushitler Fascists did..." So now it is the right thing to do? Some say, "but the others have no ideas to fix health care". BS, there are plenty out there. You just won't listen.

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Effin' ROCK!



Man, I love me some Mudhoney...

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Wednesday, August 19, 2009

...White People Showing Up With Guns...



There are questions about whether this has a racial overtones. I mean here you have a man of color in the presidency and white people showing up with guns strapped to their waists or to their legs...


Here is the image that MSNBC showed....


Wow, white people showing up with arms like that to a black presidents appearance... Racism! There is one problem with the money shot there, though it was covered up with some tight camerawork. Here is a news report showing the face and actually talking to the fella with the firearm... Notice anything?



It looks to me like the guy happens to be black!

Now I am not sure that the point that people are making with firearms at these Town Halls is really conducive to their cause. Unless it is a ploy to get attention, to which it definitely works. But that is not the point of this post.

The point is, I believe that many (the media?) are WAY to busy playing 'chicken little' with the racism card. That little discussion there wouldn't have been as shocking without the shot of the guy with the assault rifle, it would have been silly (sillier) if they would have shown the guys identity. Unbiased... heh.

Sure there may be some in the crowd that dislike the president because of his skin, and they are as silly as these MSNBC people. I'll bet my big toe that the percentage of those people pales in comparison that dislike the president because of his policies...

[h/t Ace of Spades]

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Monday, August 17, 2009

In Summary



UPS and FedEx are doing just fine... ...It's the Post Office having problems.

There you go, do I have to say anything else?


As pointed out here, the package delivery business isn't terribly complicated. Yet even with a protected monopoly on a fair chunk of the market, the Post Office is not competing. Odd, most of the times I've had to go to a Post Office, I've spent a lot of time standing in line too...

From John Stossel's Take
His mistake is telling. If he didn't notice that the Post Office, despite providing worse service than UPS and FedEX, is bailed out by Congress, will he notice when a government-run health care plan is feeding off billions of your tax dollars?

Or would he care? Before the election he supported a single payer system. Subsidized co-ops would be an easy back-door way to achieve the same thing.


Would he care? That is the million-dollar (trillion) question... My guess is no, this is part of the plan.

How 'bout we deal with malpractice abuses? How much do frivolous claims affect my premiums? Nah, that could take income away from lawyers. What was it that Obama did before he was a politician?...

The good news is that people seem to be getting smarter about what is going on.

In summary, I think this quote by Milton Friedman says it best.

The government solution to a problem is usually as bad as the problem.

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Saturday, August 15, 2009

FW: Smart Car? Accident

I always get a kick out of email forwards. It is amazing how many of them are flat out wrong. Honestly, I can't think of any that I have received that are true.

The latest that I received is the "Smart Car? Accident" forward.

Here is a Smart Car......


Below is a photo of a wreck in Jefferson Parish, LA (near New Orleans ) between two trucks and a Smart Car. Think I’ll pass on the Smart Car.



Ouch!

Now I am no fan of the Smart car and unlike many, I have ridden in one (my company has one). Yeah, it works as transportation but that is about it. The transmission is harsh, and so is the ride thanks to a short wheelbase. The fuel mileage is good, but no different than a Volkswagen Jetta SportWagen TDI. Check out the comparison. Plus with the Jetta I can haul three (or an uncomfortable four) of my buddies, with Clyde the wonder lab in the back. I would have to leave Clyde at home in a Smart.

Back on subject, something was fishy about this forward...

Take a look at the crushed cars wheel and compare it to the un-crushed Smart car above. The crushed wheel has five lug bolts, but the Smart only has three... That is a pretty solid clue that the crushed car isn't a Smart car. Heck, it probably isn't even a compact as most of those will have four lugged wheels.

Taking a peek over at my favorite forward busting website, Snopes, I found out that it was most likely a Ford Escape crushed between the two trucks. Ironic because an Escape is a small SUV, the type of vehicle that someone sending this forward is trying to qualify as better in accident. Honestly, I don't know if there is anything that you can drive short of another dump truck that would save you in that situation. That is about as bad as a vehicular sandwich can get. This kinda proves that.

Here are a couple pictures you can send back to anyone forwarding this your way...


Another Escape that didn't


Neither did this Hummer...

I'm kinda thinking that we should all just drive school buses. They seem to take a hit pretty well.

Wait, scratch that.


The moral of this story is, if you want to prove that small vehicles are less safe than larger, just use good old fashioned data.

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Sunday, August 09, 2009

Boat Show!

Mike loves himself some boat show, and luckily Carrie likes them enough to tag along. We headed down to the Seattle Boat Show at the Shilshole Marina yesterday ready to find our yacht. Boy, were there deals to be had. There was a nice Sea Ray for almost a half million off, but that wasn't our style. The boat we liked was an Ocean Alexander 58' Pilot House. Beautiful and spacious. It will be a blast cruising up and down the west coast in the thing. I made an offer thinking that it was a steal, but was unfortunately turned down. Apparently once things cross a certain price point they stop putting cents on the end. My offers decimal point had to move to the right two spaces. Damn.

We meandered over to the sailboats and checked out some used ones that were more in our price range. One of interest was a 1984 LaFitte 44' designed by Robert Perry. I had read a book by him so I took a look. Inside I took a look at the flyer and noticed the boats name, SohCahToa. (Sine - opposite hypotenuse, Cosine - adjacent hypotenuse, Tangent - opposite adjacent. Math.) The was the boat that some guys my sister knew sailed around the world on.

You can check out their log here. Only problem with the website is that it is written as a blog, the newest posts are on the top. Works great if you are following them live, not so great after the fact. You have to read from the bottom to the top, a small price to pay for an interesting story.

I really think I want to do this before I get too old, it sounds like the ultimate adventure. At this point in my life I'll need to take a different path though. First step, I need to get sailing! Dinghy lessons help, but aren't gonna cut it.

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Sunday, August 02, 2009

Well That Didn't Work...

I'm guessing this isn't what they intended to happen when thy tried to take down this building in Turkey...



[h/t Ace of Spades]

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