Author: TSO

Let’s say for the sake of discourse that you are a drug kingpin and you have someone you just absolutely need someone dead overnight. Money is not a huge obstacle, but you need someone with a proven track record who can get the job done. Someone who can be discreet. Now, on a continuum from Marine Sniper with numerous kills in A-stan to the Chaplain, where exactly would a PFC in an Air Defense Artillery Brigade fall?

Pfc. Michael Jackson Apodaca, 18 who was arrested Monday, is accused of working as a paid hit man, and assassinating a member of the Juarez Cartel who had become an informant for U.S. authorities…

Pfc. Apodaca enlisted in the Army in September 2008. He is stationed with the 11th Air Defense Artillery Brigade at Fort Bliss.

Well, the author at least went off to wild-assed speculation-ville to round out his report:

While this is the first known instance of a U.S. soldier working as an assassin for the drug cartels, this may simply be a consequence of the evolving threat posed to this country by the cartels, as well as a result of the criminal gang activity which now exists in the U.S. military.

I wonder if Mark Potok wrote this article?

In April 2009, the FBI released a statement on the growing problem of gangs in the military, and the threat they now pose to U.S. police officers. What follows is an excerpt from that statement:

“Gang members with military training pose a unique threat to law enforcement personnel because of the distinctive military skills that they possess and their willingness to teach these skills to fellow gang members. While the number of gang members trained by the military is unknown, the threat that they pose to law enforcement is potentially significant, particularly if gang members trained in weapons, tactics, and planning pass this instruction on to other gang members.”

Obviously Potok didn’t write it, he would have changed “gangs” to right-wing extremists, since he isn’t concerned about the Crips and Bloods getting into the military, as evidenced by the fact that he has twice now (that I have seen) conflated “Gangs” with “Right Wing Extremists”…

Oh, and Pfc. Michael Jackson Apodaca…thanks a lot, Dick.

(*cal-li-pyg-i-an, Pronunciation [kal-uh-pij-ee-uhn] adjective having well-shaped buttocks.)

Polling our studio audience…OK, so the vote better be damn near unanimous if I am going to go to this instead of golfing and sitting around all weekend….but this weekend in Indy, something called FringeFest is taking place.  Now, this nice young lass at work no doubt perceptively identifying me as a freak suggested I check the stuff out.  So, let me give you an idea of the entertainment. 

First up:

America’s Next Top Bottom

Assorted Fruits and Vegetables
Indianapolis, Indiana

Genre: comedy, improv
Warnings: adult themes, adult language

In “America’s Next Top Bottom,” a satirical spin-off of TV’s “America’s Next Top Model”, contestants vie for the title in various outrageous categories such as “Would You Know Your Best Asset If You Saw It?” and “Famous Historical Bottoms.” Co-hosted by Tiara Skanks and Jasmin Dicklessone. Bottoms-up! Written by Ron Spencer and Company.

Um.  Anyone else get the feeling I might need my gaydar in full working order for this one?

How about this next one, after the jump:
(more…)

OK, so now I will go on with my discussion of GenCon.  As I said before, very nice people, but very dorky.  Saw a lot of ridiculous T-shirts like

• This is the droid you were looking for.
• Will work for anime.
• My other ride is a Kodo.
• Ball State University.

Anyway, back to the pictures.

This first one made me really sad.  I know she had had some problems, first there was the sex tape of her threesome with Pappa Smurf and Gargamel, then she got hurt (and Handy was killed) when the Meth lab exploded.  Now look at her, the years have not been kind to Smurfette.

One of the major themes of Fantasy is apparenly large breasts spilling out of skimpy outfits.  I must say that this is generally something I strongly favor, particularly at Ren Faires and the like.  But as with Spandex and nudist colonies, sometimes they work, and sometimes….not so much.

This young lady was playing the Queen of Breastulon IV.

Lest you think I only pick on the ladies, I give you this cat.  I actually had to have it explained to me what it was.  Does anyone think this schtick actually worked with the ladies?  I’ve done some retarded things to get women (bar rag origami, singing Karaoke, going to a Milblog convention) but dressing up in this ridiculous outfit is not on the list of things I would do. 

But, through it all, the games went on.  Lots and lots of games.

And, I was actually tan compared to some of the folks, many of whom were actually translucent.

If I was actually good at this stuff, I would have had pen and paper to write down the games they were playing.  But, it was scary enough having to be out in public, so I kept my hands on the camera, ready to call on the Power of Greyskull if anyone got too close to me, or god forbid, engage me in conversation.

There was some big inflatable thing there I took a picture of.  Really not sure why.  At the time though I remember thinking “This picture alone could draw in 5-6 readers, making all of this TOTALLY worthwhile.”

I did like some of the modelling stuff like this picture below, and the guy was really nice.  A few years ago I decided that I wanted to do models of famous battles and stuff.  Then I remembered how earlier I wanted to make models of boats.  I still have a Roman Trireme that consists of 4 pieces of wood glued together, and no planking.  Actually Triremes don’t take as long as it would take me to make.

Then, I got tired and couldn’t handle the mass of people, so I popped smoke.  As I was leaving, I saw this arsehole, apparently an Emissary from the Kokeshian Empire, losers at the game of life.

And as I walked home, I did see the movie that was playing at the local theater:

I’ll be in my bunk.

No, let me guess.

• IVAW disbanded, but nobody told Coppa and she is still issuing apologies for a non existent group.
• VT Woody has angered everyone on all sides of the aisle.  Twice.
• Jonn complained about my lack of posting.  Constantly.
• Mass suicides because I haven’t put up part II of my GenCon trip.
• We got sock puppetted.
• Fiona decided her Ogre body sucked and went back to being a hot cartoon broad.

On my end, I just destroyed tons of braincells and a goodly portion of my liver.

OK, here it is! My much anticipated, hugely over rated (and tardy) Gen Con post. In pictures. A picture says a thousand words, so I expect this to cover me with Jonn for the next week, which is convenient, because I will be gone.

I began the day as usual, by waking up. I sneezed, I thanked the good lord Spongebob that he allowed me to make it until 7am without waking up, and then began my rigorous daily regimin of calistenics. This usually consists of hundreds of push ups and situps, followed by working myself into a sweaty lather doing the Krav Maga workouts I learned from my years in the IDF. Saturday I just woke up and made a sausage and egg burrito with some salsa. Then I showered.

What to wear? I mean, this is the largest gathering of dorks in the country. What do I have that signifies a lack of female contact, a desire to live a life online, something which exudes desperation? Oh, I know:

Anyway, next step, do what all good infantrymen do, and plot out an azimuth.  Distance and direction.  Ok, got it.

OK, so I head south, and go by the War Memorial Obelisk.  (A word incidently that my lovely lass is unable to say.  She kept calling it a “ridiculous”.)

(more…)

I’m doing this post because I promised Jonn I would. I still have my other one of the GenCon to do as well. But the more I read of this asshat the more angry I get. Today’s addition to the fetid, stinking pile of shit that is the body of work of inveterate liar Dahr Jamail is entitled: Echo Platoon – Warehousing soldiers in the homeland.

Echo Platoon is part of the 82nd Replacement Detachment of the 82nd Airborne Division at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. Soldiers in the platoon are relegated to living quarters in a set of dimly lit concrete rooms. Pipes peep out of missing ceiling tiles and a musty smell permeates beds placed on cracked linoleum floors.

For soldiers who have gone AWOL (Absent Without Leave) and then voluntarily turned themselves in or were forcibly returned, the detention conditions here in Echo Platoon only serve to reinforce the inescapability of their situation. They remain suspended in a legal limbo of forced uncertainty that can extend from several months to a year or more, while the military takes its time deciding their fate. Some of them, however, are offered a free pass out of this military half-life — but only if they agree to deploy to Afghanistan or Iraq.

It goes on in this vein interminably. Illustrative of what a total pack of [eupemism for cat] these guys are, I give you the words of Specialist Kevin McCormick, a guy who went AWOL for 4 1/2 months:

Echo is like jail with some privileges. [You are] just stuck there with horrible living conditions. There’s black mold on the building [and] when I first got there, there were five or six people to a room, which is like a cell block with cement brick walls. The piping and electricals are above the tiles, so if anything leaks or bursts, it goes right down into the room. … You’re less than human to the commanders. [They act as if] you don’t deserve to be alive. A sergeant told us he wanted to take us out and shoot us in the back of the head. We get threatened all the time there.

Look asshole, the guys deployed sleep on the ground. And they risk death every second they spend over there. In Afghanistan I lived in a plywood hooch that had 8 guys in it. I think the B hut was like 15×30. 8 of us. No walls. The Air Conditioner would freeze over, and temps would rapidly rise. When it got hot enough the Air Conditioner would melt and all of my stuff would get wet. Then this process would begin anew. Those were on good days. On bad days we slept on the ground, on rocks, on whatever there was there. And we pulled guard all night, watched the radio etc.

So I really could give 2 shits that you live in a musty, moldy barracks. The men you were supposed to be serving your country with are over there doing work that you wouldn’t do, and they are shouldering your portion. Next time you bitch about looking up from your play station 3 to view with dismay a missing ceiling tile, how about spending a millisecond in thought not entirely devoted to you.

GD this article pissed me off.

According to a website I was reading last night, the rocks featured above are Oldowan Tools:

Oldowan tools are the oldest known, appearing first in the Gona and Omo Basins in Ethiopia about 2.4 million years ago. They likely came at the end of a long period of opportunistic tool usage: chimpanzees today use rocks, branches, leaves and twigs as tools.

Further,
(more…)

On Monday I will post about my day at GenCon.  Good times, good times.  For just a flavor, I give you this young lady: