This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here

Category: Geezer Alert!

  • Shrinking The Gene Pool – Sorta?

    Okay, this is via Drudge so you’ve all probably seen it, but I needed a laugh…
    Police urge holster use after man shoots his own penis

    As Chandler residents Joshua Seto, 27, and his fiancée, Cara Christopher, walked over to a Fry’s Food Store for refreshments, he tried securing her pink handgun in the front waistband of his pants.

    The gun fired, striking Seto’s penis and continuing through his left thigh. The bleeding started immediately and was heavy, according to police dispatch recordings released Sunday.

    “He is still conscious, there is just a lot of blood,” Christopher , 26, told 9-1-1 operators and dispatchers.

    I’m sincerely NOT laughing at this guy’s pain and suffering. It’s just the images that flashed thru MY mind that cracked me up. Pink pistol – the look on his face just before the pain hit – the look on his face when he realized just where he’d been hit, I could go on… For some reason I kept thinking of The Three Stooges?

    As usual with a Geezer post; YMMV.

    ETA: An accidental discharge simply ain’t as rare as we ALL would like to think.  I’ve been handling firearms since I was about 10 or so. I’ve had some great teachers over the years and am careful enough to be annoying, but Murphy’s Law says I will have an AD sooner or later.  Exit question: Ever been to a range where someone swept you with an ’empty’ gun?

  • But, But… A Free Press is Supposed to be a GOOD Thing?

    First this almost viral story:  From Don Surber, and many others.

    That Vietnam hero John Kerry is saying:

    And I have to tell you, I say this to you politely. The media in America has a bigger responsibility than it’s exercising today. The media has got to to begin to not give equal time or equal balance to an absolutely absurd notion just because somebody asserts it or simply because somebody says something which everybody knows is not factual.

    It doesn’t deserve the same credit as a legitimate idea about what you do. And the problem is everything is put into this tit-for-tat equal battle and America is losing any sense of what’s real, of who’s accountable, of who is not accountable, of who’s real, who isn’t, who’s serious, who isn’t?

    Then I stumbled across THIS curious bit of logic: Journalism Needs Government Help

    At the same time, however, the financial viability of the U.S. press has been shaken to its core. The proliferation of communications outlets has fractured the base of advertising and readers. Newsrooms have shrunk dramatically and foreign bureaus have been decimated. My best estimate is that there are presently only a few dozen full-time foreign correspondents from the U.S. covering all of China, despite the critical importance of that nation to our future.

    Both the Federal Communications Commission and the Federal Trade Commission are undertaking studies of ways to ensure the steep economic decline faced by newspapers and broadcast news does not deprive Americans of the essential information they need as citizens. One idea under consideration is enhanced public funding for journalism. (emphasis added)

    Mr. Bollinger goes on to say we need NOT fear government control of The Press:

    There are examples of other institutions in the U.S. where state support does not translate into official control. The most compelling are our public universities and our federal programs for dispensing billions of dollars annually for research.

    I guess nameless bureaucrats in some cubicles deciding who gets how much, and for what, isn’t really a form of control?

    We, The Great Unwashed, are simply not enlightened enough to make these decisions in the market place! Big Brother will take of of us in yet another way.

  • What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

    We apparently now have elected Czars to oversee future budgetary issues?

    There is NO budget I can find, but The Pampered Princes on the Potomac have established a Super Committee to oversee our financial future?

    One view is here. 

    Even before the package to raise the debt limit was approved by Congress, Republicans and Democrats were arguing about the contours of its deficit- reduction committee.

    This is actually the most optimistic view I’ve managed to find.

    The key problem lies with the enforcement mechanisms, or “triggers,” created to compel the committee members to reach an agreement. While Republicans wouldn’t agree to a tax-hike trigger, they did agree to one that would slash defense spending by up to $600 billion, depending on how far short the committee falls of the deficit-reduction goal. This puts anti-tax Republicans who favor a robust military in a bind.

    Democrats on the committee could insist on raising taxes, and Republicans will either have to give in to their tax demands or accept the deep defense cuts.

    As usual, YMMV, I tend to believe that the military and veterans will get screwed. But far more importantly is what will become of our country.

    See this…

    But the big question is who exactly is paying for it? Well you may be surprised to find out you are.

    /rant

  • Damning With Faint Praise… Or Something?

    While not exactly new or directly probative it does offer some perspective.

    We are parasites:

    Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin accused the United States Monday of living beyond its means “like a parasite” on the global economy and said dollar dominance was a threat to the financial markets.

    I’ve read this bit several times today.

    The kicker? The dance in DC pleases him:

    The deal initially soothed anxieties and led Russian stocks to jump to three-month highs, but jitters remained over the possibility of a credit downgrade.

    “Thank god,” Putin said, “that they had enough common sense and responsibility to make a balanced decision.”

    Putin thanks God.

    I feel much better now.

     

  • Just to Lighten Things Up a Bit

    How is this bad news?
    Poll shows drop in beer’s popularity

    Pollster Nate Silver points out a statistic that might spell doom for the country: “Popularity of beer at record low,” he writes.

    More for ME!

    With that note… A refresher course in REAL relevance:

  • Just in case…

    H/T Carrie.

    I missed this, maybe you did too?
    Banks Offering Emergency Plans for Debt Ceiling Crisis

    More banks are announcing plans to help in the event that the federal government debt ceiling crisis results in non-payment of pay for service members and other Department of Defense employees.

    USAA (my bank) appears to be on top of things, and my VA check went in so we can eat and keep our house for another month.

     

  • Alas Poor Gore – The Internet he invented has betrayed him yet again.

    Okay so this ain’t actually TAH fare, but I needed a chuckle while worrying about whether my VA check will show up.

    New NASA Data Blow Gaping Hold In Global Warming Alarmism

    NASA satellite data from the years 2000 through 2011 show the Earth’s atmosphere is allowing far more heat to be released into space than alarmist computer models have predicted, reports a new study in the peer-reviewed science journal Remote Sensing. The study indicates far less future global warming will occur than United Nations computer models have predicted, and supports prior studies indicating increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide trap far less heat than alarmists have claimed.

    Toss in this bit and it’s quite a hand wringing day for some folks.

    A federal wildlife biologist whose observation in 2004 of presumably drowned polar bears in the Arctic helped to galvanize the global warming movement has been placed on administrative leave and is being investigated for scientific misconduct, possibly over the veracity of that article.

    The latter article DOES use the word “possibly”, but…

    Maybe the EPA will introduce more new regulations against trusting heretic scientists who don’t support their religion?

  • Wade Sanders’ lost Silver Star

    For those of you who are still sending me links to the story about Kerry enabler, Wade Sanders who lost his Silver Star to enhanced scrutiny at the Navy Department, Zero wrote about it and we discussed it last night. So I’m not ignoring your emails, I’m trying to give you all the impression that I read my own blog.