Jesus.

Take a look at what one little typo -- in this case, mixing up two letters in the URL of this humble effort -- can yield.

I suppose I should be flattered.

That someone cloned the URL is, after all, evidence that this blog is being noticed.

"I wish I knew how to quit you."

He's an adult.

So why are Big Brother and/or Big Ed and/or Big Media keeping the name and nationality of the MU-Rolla quasi-terrorist a secret?

University spokesman Lance Feyh described the 22-year-old man as an "international" student but did not reveal his name or nationality.

UPDATE: The Rolla Daily News identifies the man as "Sujith Venkatramolla, a 22-year-old graduate student," "from India."

My own digging reveals little on the internet about him. Here he left the following comment on something called the Valmiki Group:

Here's an enlargement of his picture. Sorry about the image degradation due to the resizing.

And here, he apparently won some competition in his homeland.

UPDATE 2: After I emailed this post to them, KY3 now has an article up.

This first graphic is from my stat counter. Keep in mind it is set to the Eastern time zone.

[Graphic removed by blogmaster.]


This second one is from the bottom of KY3's article.

Nice of them to mention where they got their tip from.

In case you can't tell, that last bit is what we call sarcasm.

UPDATE 3: (3-1-07) I got a nice email from Perrie Campbell complimenting me on my work, and another from the same person asking if I could obscure the part of the graphic that listed KY3's IP address because his (or her?) employer might not be amused. Since my point was made, I removed the graphic.

KY3 used the picture I dug up on their noon newscast yesterday, but again no mention of me. I can kind of understand that on a newscast, where there is no time for extraneous information, but you'd think they could mention this little blog somewhere in their online edition.

Question.

Why did the Wayback Machine stop archiving the Huffington Post after August 20, 2006?

Shhhh. Don't tell the Left . . .

. . . or they'll be wanting to ban carrots, phones and stairs.

A woman accused of hurling a bag of carrots at a housekeeper, striking her on the head with a telephone handset and trying to push her downstairs was sentenced to a year of probation and fined $2,800.

Straight people are perverts...

. . . but then again, so are gay people who want to diddle Smurfs.

It seems a Queens man has been arrested for selling costumes of popular
cartoon characters to be used for kinky bedroom fun.

The article should have stopped there, but the NY Press could not help but be aghast that privacy protections AND intellectual property protections should both be honored:

But wait, it’s not the uneasy mix of animation and beastiality (called “furry porn”) that’s illegal—it’s that the costumes are shoddy knock offs of the real thing.

Product Endorsement.

These

are good.



They seem to be Hershey's version of a smoother, more refined creme drop.

I shan't repeat what my father used to call them.

In Clifton NJ, the dogs apparently know how to tell time.

The city of Clifton is not going to the dogs. At least not if the City Council has anything to do about it. Later this month, the council is expected to introduce an ordinance setting a limit on how long dogs can bark.

Because if they can't tell time, then the city is trying to legislate nature and may next try to define parameters within which gravity may operate.

Columbia's smoking ban is bad for the environment.

Lauren Schult points out:

Since Columbia’s smoking ordinance took effect in early January, more cigarette butts have been showing up on sidewalks and streets as smokers have been forced outside. The litter is not only unsightly — it’s a source of water pollution as the butts wash down storm drains that flow into streams.

...

The most environmentally hazardous part of a cigarette butt is the filter, which is made of condensed cellulose acetate, a mass of plastic fibers thinner than sewing threads that doesn’t decay easily.

Experiments with the crustacean Daphnia (often called a water flea) concluded that the toxic chemicals in cigarette filters dissolve in water and are lethal to the freshwater crustacean, which is a crucial link at the lower end of the aquatic food chain.

Where are all the Greenies with their protests on THIS one?

On a related note, 'burber and business owner Karon Rowe gets a boost from tobacco refugees and makes a business decision to stay outside the city limits.

I need a favor from any of my minions in Tucson AZ.

Go get your Tucson phone book.

Flip to the White Pages.

Now turn to the 'R's.

Tell me; is there a listing for "Richard, Poor"?

Floating upside down, restrained by seatbelt, driver dies.

Apparently, we were mistaken . . .

. . . because Big Brother tells us it's not the shooting of the birds that's bad for them; it's the lead.

So the Thurmonds owned the Sharptons.

But, given the fact that some African-Americans owned slaves, isn't a more interesting and newsworthy question --

Did the Sharptons themselves own any slaves?

I wonder . . .

. . . why didn't they bury Jesus' father in the Jesus Family Tomb?

[H/T 2 memeorandum.]

Nope, no agenda THERE, is there?

Sweetness & Light points out that to Big Media, Romney's polygamous ancestors are news, while Obama's polygamous father is not.

[H/T 2 memeorandum.]

Gee, I wonder why.

Note to Carrie Underwood:

Maybe he wouldn't have cheated on you if you weren't a psycho nihilist vandal who does things like this:

I dug my key into the side of his pretty little suped up 4 wheel drive,
carved my name into his leather seats.
I took a louisville slugger to both head lights,
slashed a hole in all 4 tires.

Tell me; does vandalizing his car solve the problem? Does it somehow make him NOT have cheated? Do you honestly think he's going to be faithful to you, after you do stuff like this?

Look in the mirror, Carrie. Maybe the problem lies not with him or her, but with you.

This is a bad day.

One of the bad things about living one's life somewhere between Hank Rearden and Mr. Spock, by which I mean rationally and setting aside emotions as irrelevant, is that when something DOES cause the emotions to break through, either because of one big bad event or an accumulation of smaller ones, the floodgates open and I don't have the tools to cope with them or put them in perspective.

Smoky, one of my two cats, is at this moment either dead or so near it that there's no coming back.

I found her last night in her box on the front porch, unresponsive. I pulled her out and lay her on the floor of the porch. Her eyes stared, unblinking, into nothing.

Sometime during the night, she somehow summoned the strength to pull herself back into her box. I could tell by her position that she could not move her back legs.

I don't know what happened to her. My best guess is that she got hit by a car, although there's no blood.

I really think I would be able to handle my emotions better if she had been dead this morning when I checked on her. I had used most of the night mentally preparing to bury her first thing in the morning.

But she was still clinging to life. At least, she was still warm and her muscles were slightly spasming.

Even then, I thought I had a handle on it.

But in the shower, my feelings overwhelmed me and I sobbed uncontrollably.

I keep telling myself that she was only a cat. And that I knew she would die someday.

But the more I try to contain myself, the worse it gets.

It is raining.

I could have used a teacher like him when I was in school.

Here is where I make an uncharacteristically personal confession.

I was bullied in school. Daily. Unceasingly. Intensely. By almost everyone. And I know how it shapes the outlook of the bullied for the rest of his or her life.

There were times in that hell when the only thing keeping me from being a murderer or a suicide was the fact that I didn't have a gun in my hand at the moment.

Through it all, the only thing I wanted was for it to stop, and wondering why none of the people who SHOULD have stopped it WOULD.

While I attach the blame for Columbine on the two who did the shooting, I know the hands of those who bullied them, and the teachers and administration that let it happen, are not entirely spotless.

At his school, teacher Mike Collins stopped it.

And in the process, hurt the feelings of a couple of worthless little douchebag future-convict pieces of shit who were bullying a handicapped student.

For that, he got fired.

The Democrat-Gazette version of "flyover people."

Apparently, if you don't live in Arkansas, your opinion doesn't matter.

...letters from out of state are not accepted,...

So, okay. I'll write my letter here instead. And while I'm at it, I just might think about removing the link to the Democrat-Gazette from my sidebar.

Thank you note.

I'd like to thank the legislators of Arkansas for their decision to remove the ability of restaurant owners to decide whether or not to allow smoking in their establishments.

Here in the little border town of Thayer, Missouri, where business owners still have the right to decide for themselves what happens on their property, it has led to a boom in the restaurant business. We're practically being swarmed with Arkansans who want to enjoy a good cigarette after their meals.

Thanks for sending all the tobacco refugees, and their money, our way! I'm sure our little city can find all sorts of ways to spend the tax revenue this generates, which used to go to Arkansas communities.

Keep up the good work!

John Hutchison,
Thayer MO.

Protection money.

Jonesboro begins skimming money off the top from private clubs.

Yates says most of the items in the ordinance were already state law. However there are several items like the 3% tax on alcohol revenue that will be new for city clubs.

"In my mind it is the fairest tax there is because it is specifically user based," said Yates.

No, the fairest tax would be a tax on criminal convictions.

What is being paid, the cost to the city to investigate and prosecuted alcohol-related offenses, is not what is being used, alcohol.

Heat vision -- not just for tracking down potheads anymore.

KY3 shows lots of nifty pics, presumably of heat escaping from city buildings.

But a closer look at those nifty pics shows that all the buildings seem to be leaking from walls pointing the same direction.

Which leads me to wonder, were those walls facing the sun before it set and are they now simply radiating the heat they absorbed during the day?

Maybe the only good reason to vote for Hillary . . .

. . . comes from a commenter to this story about Hillary "embracing gender."

Maybe we should elect Slick Hillary for President, so we can get our art and china back.

But I thought there WERE no WMD's in Iraq.

Is the Left going to argue now that chemical weapons don't count?

[H/T 2 memeorandum.]

Does BlogPAC not see the flaw in their position,

or do they just not care?

First, they denounce the plans to have Fox News host a debate, on the basis of Fox being a

partisan Republican propaganda outlet, not a news station

Then two of the alternatives they suggest . . .

It would be better to do this on MSNBC, CNN, C-Span, or just stream it on the Internet where progressive blogs can carry it

. . . are partisan Democrat propaganda outlets.

Oh, I get it. It's not that Fox is a partisan propoganda outlet that they object to. It's that Fox is a partisan Republican propoganda outlet. In their eyes, partisan propoganda outlets are fine and dandy, as long as they are partisan Democrat propoganda outlets.

And they somehow think progressive bloggers are prevented from covering something that happens on Fox.

And in that last alternative, to "just stream it on the Internet," they reveal their total lack of concern for the poor, who do not have Internet access. What's that, they suggest? They can access the Internet at the Library?

I remind them that at night, when such debates are almost ALWAYS held, libraries are closed.


[H/T 2 memeorandum.]

Arrogance and presumption worthy of Big Media.

Pajamas Media has the gall to decide FOR it's readers whether or not they would vote for Ron Paul.

AND to engage in historical revisionism about it's previous polls.

PAJAMAS MEDIA is to POLLING what DIEBOLD is to VOTE TALLYING.

Are we sure Ted Turner and Michael Eisner aren't running the joint? Because when THEY did such things, real bloggers bitched about it.

They didn't emulate it.

Fuck you, Pajamas Media. Let me know when and if you regain your integrity and put Ron Paul back on the poll.

I didn't realize it at the time, at least not consciously . . .

. . . but my Hill 'n Holler column pointed out how minimum wage laws hurt the poor.

Here's the relevant excerpt (emphasis mine; wait, it's all mine; you get what I mean.):

A proposed increase on admission to the city swimming pool from $2.00 per day to $3.00 per day in the upcoming season was unanimously approved. The increase comes to offset the increase the city will have to pay lifeguards due to the increase in the minimum wage. The price for passes will also increase, but the final amount has not yet been determined.

Who uses public swimming pools? The poor.

Who's going to have to pay a 50% increase to get into the pool or decrease their use of this public facility? The poor.

One more thing, Flat-earther Rog...

. . . about that poll in the upper left of your site today...

Yes, I agree that the Chargers did hire Norv Turner.

Caught a few seconds of the Rush Limbaugh show yesterday.

Note to Roger Hedgecock:

Yes, Ron Paul has for a long time found himself outside "the mainstream."

As did Christopher Columbus.

And Jesus.

And all the heroes of Atlas Shrugged.

Just because it's the mainstream doesn't mean it can't be wrong.

ABCNews: Kucinich more worthy of mention than Ron Paul

Third column over. "Pretend It's 2008! Who Would You Pick For President?"

Pop quiz time.

This one's TRUE/FALSE, and gets all philosophical on your ass.

Context*: A virtual stranger asks you a "Yes" or "No" question, the answer to which is none of his or her business. If you answer "yes," you have rewarded nosiness. If you answer "None of your business," you point him or her toward "Yes." "No" is untrue.

TRUE OR FALSE: It's not a lie if the truth is none of their business.

* -Incidentally, this one is technically hypothetical. I did have a similar encounter, but I have a loophole that lies in the phrasing of the question.

I get that he's a politician . . .

. . . but it happening to a political figure, ABC, does not make it a political issue.

How long have I been telling you . . .

. . . that if the Health Nazis are successful in their crusade against smokers, the government will lose revenue?

Because of quitters like Henkel, Minnesota's tobacco tax revenue is expected to go into a gradual slide later this year -- a drop that may grow even steeper with the expected passage of a statewide smoking ban.

But I thought . . .

. . . helmets prevented head injuries.

Wastak was wearing a helmet but he died of severe head injuries.

From our "Apparently the headline writer is Corky from 'Life Goes On'" Bureau . . .

. . . let's take a look at this headline:

Sex toys ruled unconstitutional

Now let's take a look inside the story (emphasis mine):

A federal appeals court has ruled the state's ban on sex toys is constitutional.

You'd think that anyone in the journalism field would realize that words have meanings.

Those minions who need an extra fix of my writing . . .

. . . and are located here in the Thayer area can pick up a copy of this week's Hill 'n Holler Review.

It should be roughly a monthly thing.

I guess my title would be "volunteer freelance articlist."

What's that, you ask? What's a Libertarian doing volunteering to do something without pay?

Profit does not necessarily require monetary payment.

I want to create an alternative voice to that swill they keep spewing over at the Mayor Deckard Mouthpiece. Voluntarily writing an article once a month recounting the happenings of the Thayer City Council in an existing free shopper-type publication is a faster, more efficient way to do so than starting my own paper. Unfortunately, the Review doesn't yet have any online presence.

I'm hoping that getting more submissions from people will grow the Review into an actual newspaper. For instance, I'm going to talk to a friend of mine about approaching the paper about writing about her Red Hat experiences.

The articles will recount what the city council did at their meeting that month. I will stick to what actually happened, not what I think about what happened. Just the facts, ma'am.

And that will be enough to inform the citizenry. They can decide for themselves.

[Xposted in part to TTA.]

If by "comedian" you mean "someone with all the humor of a eulogist with post-partum depression,"

then yes, WaPo, Al Franken is a comedian.

Even before he got political, I noted the total vacuum of humor in his *ahem* "comedy."

Take a look at his old SNL clips.

It's hard not to be funny on SNL.

It's even harder not to get at least some sympathy laughs from the SNL audience.

But more often than not, in the sketches where Franken was the focus ("Stuart Smalley" anyone? Anyone?) the audience was as silent as the running in Silent Running.

He and Janeane Garofolo should get married and have ugly, miserable children together.

Al Franken is to humor what Ted Bundy is to coeds. And his stint with Air America demonstrates that he is to talk radio what Helen Keller was to cheerleading.

Why should we expect he'd be any less of a disaster in the job he's now seeking?

Please be Iowa! PLEASE BE IOWA!!!

Meth freak, manwhore snuggler, and theocratic social conservative Ted Haggard has relocation plans:

Haggard earlier this week said he and his family plan to move to Iowa or Missouri, . . .

We don't need any more exacerbation of the meth problem here in the Show-Me State, Rev. Dubuque or Des Moines seem like really good places. Especially for people like you.

Oh Gawd, look out. Here we go again.

Look for the media to pounce all over this.

SANIBEL, Fla. - A former Pennsylvania congressman was accused Wednesday of exposing himself to two women at a beach resort.

The alleged offender is, after all, a Republican.

On the bright side, maybe it will give us a break from All Dead Anna All The Time.

Seen on CBSNews.com today . . .

. . . and, I suspect, many, many previous days:

WTF is "Opinion News?"

News is by definition, not opinion. And opinion is not news.

I hope they don't start coloring their pictures BlackWhite. And that ManWoman in the anchor chair really needs to update HisHer Business Suit Evening Gown!

This is the crowd, we must remember, that believes Bush is a Stupid Evil Genius.

GoodBad job, Dipshit Einsteins!

P.S. WTF is the deal with "Products No One Wants To Buy?" Really, no one? How do they know this? Did they interview every single person on the planet?

Cheesophobia jumps the pond.

Remember that I told you about the British government's hate of cheese?

Brownfield tells us that, like the plague, cheesophobia is becoming a global pandemic:

The Physicians Committee for [Nanny Government] Responsible Medicine is asking the Federal Trade Commission to outlaw cheese advertising in children’s programming on television.

What's the point . . .

. . . of a jazz club that is prohibited from serving booze?

How does one violate Lee's Summit's smoking ban?

Municipal Judge James Tobin found Michael M. Morrow guilty of failing to
post no-smoking signs and leaving ashtrays on tables.

Note the absence of actual smoking.

I'll have to paraphrase . . .

. . . but recently one of the DJ's on Kkountry95 made a good point about the Grammys.

How many trees died to provide the paper for what seemed like a ten-minute confetti shower?

And what did eco-advocate Al Gore do? Congratulate the music industry for their support of eco-causes.

Of course, this is the same Inventor Of The Internet who scolds us about global warming while he and his entourage ride multiple SUV's to go a couple of blocks.

Apparently, consistency is not a strong point with the Environmental Left.

Feng shui for poop flingers!

No, seriously.

I didn't know I was that much of an intellectual snob.

I'd talked briefly to him countless times before. He was mostly quiet, but would sometimes come up with something that seemed to originate out in left field. He works with his dad cutting people's grass and doing handyman and light construction jobs.

Last night, I went out for coffee.

Alone, I scooted into the booth and began mixing in the creamer and pink stuff.

He, also alone, was sitting at a table near me.

I guess he was in a mood to talk, because pretty soon he came over and sat down with me and started talking.

I don't know what brought it on, but he began extolling the virtues of capitalism and decrying the welfare class. He called them leeches.

I, of course, agreed. I had believed these things even long before being introduced to the writings of Ayn Rand. But I had long ago gotten tired of being looked at like an exotic species of bug whenever I mentioned her name or one of her works, so I didn't tell him about her.

So, after the conversation ranged from "progressive" taxation to religion to what money actually is ("If money is the root of all evil, why does the church want you to give them 10% of it?") and we found ourselves in agreement on all of it, I was surprised when he said, "Let me tell you about a book that you've gotta read."

I knew which one. I replied, "Atlas Shrugged?"

He said that was the one. He hadn't read any of her other books, but he got . . . really got Atlas Shrugged. And in some ways, was better than I was at explaining it.

See, I have this thing about making my points as concisely as possible. In most cases, that is a blessing, but occasionally it is a curse. It simply can't be done with Atlas Shrugged. The Fountainhead, yes ("No one has a right to veto your happiness, not even society" is one of TF's major points, for instance.). But Atlas Shrugged, no.

I explained TF to him, as well as Anthem and We The Living. He was excited most about TF and wished he could find a copy somewhere.

Then I told him about the upcoming Atlas Shrugged movie and that Pitt and Jolie were going to star in it. His eyes lit up like it was Christmas morning.

We spent the next hour casting the rest of the movie.

I wonder if he feels as bad about underestimating me with his assumptions as I do about doing the same to him.

Last night after getting home, I dug around in my closet for hours until I found it.

My trusty old copy of The Fountainhead.

This morning, I went back to the restaurant. He and his dad have breakfast or coffee there every morning.

But this morning, he didn't join his dad. I gave the dad the book and told him, "This is for Jared; tell him I need it back when he's done."

As opposed to a sandy little butthole.

Al-Qaeda calls Bush an alcoholic liar.

Only if incumbent candidates should be forced to fund their opponents' campaigns, Hillary.

Pop-quiz time.

This one's multiple-choice.

Q: Which of the following stories from yesterday's news merited only a late-afternoon crawl on the CNN ticker at the bottom of the screen, while the others were SO important that they got full-blown stories repeated again and again?

A. Anna Nicole Smith still being dead.
B. John Amaechi still being gay.
C. There was a bear up a tree! And it startled a woman!
D. Terrorist attack on a US army base in Japan.

I am about to commit what may very well be the Worst Pun Ever.

Wow; that took a lot of guts.

Huckabee: "I'm all tampony!"

He says he is passionate about art and music, for instance, interests that
many people don't associate with Republicans.

Dude, metrosexuality is SO 2005.

I'm guessing Alice Bartee didn't steal all the copies . . .

. . . of the Substandard containing this piece of garbage, like she did The Bear Review.

Because exhibitionism, when it's about lesbianism and cunnilingus, is permitted by the College Left.

Just not when it's political exhibitionism, dealing with politics other than those of the far Left.

Meth? Gay prostitute? Drowning his secretary? Trans-fats?

Nanny Huckabee set to make "major announcement."

Gee, I wonder why.

Bloggers, for some reason, are "wary" of John McCain.

Could it have anything to do with his support of squashing their right to freedom of speech?

In case you were wondering . . .

Grey Poupon, it seems, is not a key to immortality.

Immorality? Well, that remains to be seen.

Big Brother is watching you pee. And shouting orders.

Just what we need -- bossy urinal cakes.

Will they tell Claire McCaskill when to clap?

Beasting himself off.

Disney's Beast arrested on kiddie porn charges.

Another victim of seatbelt use.

Man, wearing seatbelt, dies submerged in pond.

In a related story, Missouri's proposed primary seatbelt law is picking up steam.

Steve is a wise man.

Click the strip.

Good to know Opus and pals are still out there plugging along after all these years.

Senator Ratchet already earning recognition.

Hey; I didn't say good recognition.

Hillary's self-loathing.

She's picked a campaign song that "clearly celebrates the failure of socialism and the resistance to central government authority."

You know, those very "it takes a village" values that she holds so dear.

What can we conclude from this?

Either Hillary hates her own values, or she's trying to pull the wool over our eyes by creating the perception that she abhors the very things she most loves.

No, it couldn't be that second one, could it?

Excuse me; I've got something in my eye. Why, it's a piece of wool!

No, wait -- it's an entire sheep.

EDWARDS: "I'd shoot Cheney."

Story here.

Apparently, advocating the murder of political opponents is somewhere in the Democrat platform.

Whew. Dodged a bullet.

Or, in this case, a UFO.

Possibly a meteor.

Which makes me wonder --

how close did we come to another Extinction-Level Event?

Also makes me wonder --

what were those witnesses doing outside at that time?

After all,

it was cold outside.

And the Super Bowl was on

Inside.

Drudge has the story from another source, the StarTrib.

I want to believe we live in a just universe; I really do.

But what am I supposed to believe about a universe that lets a bunch of evil communist douchebags defeat relatively good capitalists?

The Indianapolis Koltskis' means of property acquisition is to the American Way what
forcible sodomy
Charles Manson
crystal meth
John Wayne Gacy
is to
romance
conflict resolution
dentistry
crawlspaces
preschool .

Quiz.

True or false --

If his wife is elected President, Bill Clinton will be the first First Lady who was into chicks.

I know the Muffin Man . . .

. . . but I'm afraid I don't know the Man Man.

All well and good that the Turner CEO apologized . . .

... but shouldn't the Boston authorities apologize for not being able to tell the difference between a bomb and an electronic billboard?

I trudge, therefore I am.

Trudged my way through the snow to get into the library today.

Uphill both ways, honest.

Had to come in and stir a little sh*t.

Gee I wonder who tipped them off.

Gonna get even slicker later today, so I don't know when I'll be in to blog again.

Gotta go trudge back home now.

2.2.07 Update: Temperature got warmer than they thought yesterday, so no snow then. But it's snowing now.