March 21, 2009

Random 4-Koma is Random


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For Those Who May Be Concerned....

...my earlier post, linking to a post on the Bear was not in any way, shape, form or fashion linking to anything regarding this bear.

Thus you may click without worry.

Er....in that post..but not in this one...'cause if you click on the hyperlink in in this one you'll find the wrong bear...and that would be bad....

...if you're good.

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So...Would this be the Eucalyptus Curtain Then?

The Australian government has begun censoring the internet.

As Pixy explains, it gets even stupider from there.

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March 20, 2009

Above the Fold

OK. I have very little time right now but this needs to be said.

Give the POTUS a break.

The other night the President made a self deprecating comment about his bowling score. In the process he offended some people. It was not a politically correct comment and was inartful for a political leader to utter. 

Big
Effing
Whoop

For one thing the fact that the President tried a self deprecating remark is a major improvement over the mini Parthenon of his nomination speech.

This kerfuffle should be given a rest.

Many of us on the right are making the bleedingly obvious point that if Bush , McCain or Palin had said this it would be run into the ground by the press incessantly. Well yes...and it would be wrong...and you know what?We would say so.

This flubbed bit of self deprecation is a non issue.

He has made some cringeworthy faux pas over the last few days and like many of my friends my face is often embedded in my palm over them. But he is our president and this is an exceedingly trivial issue.
There are quite a few issues pertaining to policy that we can, and must oppose him on...I have and I will.

However it is not good to be playing the "gotcha" game and crowing about hurt feelings over a joke. This is stupid and bad for the country.

Political correctness is a bane of our nation and its corrosive effects on free speech need to be fought tooth and nail...including here.

Yes it is delightfully Karmic crow over this and give the Dems a well deserved dose of their own poison, but it is unfair to the office and bad for the country to hound our President over trivialities. It also cheapens our outrage over the many very real, nontrivial issues we have.

I am no fan of the current resident of the White House, but Barak Obama is the President of the United States...he has taken the weight of the world onto his shoulders on our behalf. He damned well deserves not to be hounded over PC trivialities for the good of the nation.

God knows there are enough substantive issues to oppose him on .

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March 18, 2009

How Very Fortunate We Are

For the benefit of those with lives or weak constitutions, the hyper-partisan hyperlinks are below the fold....For the benefit of everyone, there's this...


Artist Unknown

more...

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The Bear

Eagle One has taken the time to put a long and well researched  post up concerning one of the finest and most storied ships to ever split waves and break ice. The mighty cutter Bear.


Go now...Go read the whole thing.

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Norks Make Massive Technological Breakthrough

Fear the might of the DPRK...

It has taken almost 10 years of work, but North Korea has acquired the technology to launch a project very dear to its leader's heart - the nation's first "authentic" Italian pizzeria.


It's nice to see them get a success under their belt.... seeing as how the Atomic Bomb and feeding their people projects were utter busts.

Somewhere in heaven Sejong the Great is weeping.

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Anime News: Some Regrettably Accurate..Some Regrettably Not


THAT Anime Blog has a roundup of most of the upcoming season. It makes an interesting comparison with this prediction I recently received via E-Mail.

As your brains may grudgingly recall, this time last year I predicted some of the anime trends we'd be seeing soon. For those of you whom
time has been a balm to soothe the mind, let me rub raw some
old wounds: remember Hobos, Hairdressers, Veterinarians, and Mushrooms.

I confidently measure my predictive powers against the track records of
such luminous benchmarks as Nostradamus, any economist (other than Adam
Smith), and the Christian Bible. As we venture forward further, the
producers of Japanese manga and anime have begun to make their intentions
known. I predict 2010 shall be the year of:

1) Demolition Derbys (a.k.a Banger Racing in Europe)
2) Reptiles/Dinosaurs (listed separately because there are too many people
on this list who know the difference).
3) Gardening
4) Belgians

As usual, at first the new elements will be introduced into fairly safe
territory:

Thumb Green : A heartfelt series about an orphan, Tanazaki, who is adopted
into a family of estate gardeners. Mom works in topiaries and Dad prefers
tea roses, but the adopted son follows in bonsai-enthusiast grandfather's
steps. When the last Japanese heir to the estate dies and the manor falls
to the young Belgian heiress, can Tanazaki learn to forgive her shameful
secret and teach her to live in harmony with the back lawn? And will
Tanazaki's new sister, who may feel more than sisterly-affection for
Tanazaki, ever perfect her compost pile? Look for the hidden symbolism of
the koi pond as it reflects the state of romance between the heiress, the
orphan, and the possibly-insane sister.

Crash 1911 :  A truly anachronistic and jingoistic offering, Crash 1911 is
set in 1914(!) in a Miyazakiburgstein (one of those generic
Western-Central European with steampunk touches) setting. "Crash 1911" 
refers to the undefeated reign of driver Josef Tildeff's and his 1911
season winning twelve-competitor collision. Now in 1914, most of the
participants of that epic season have returned with even more-outlandish
cars and unlikely proteges, including a deaf Mongolian, a Cajun
zydeco-playing grandmother, and Tildeff's own protege who is (you guessed
it) a Japanese orphan. How will each of the competitor's life experiences
aid them in the upcoming derby? And why is it every non-Asian character
except the son of the Belgian calvary officer painted in such a negative
light?  Still, all the mechanical designs will look like "the Secret of
Blue Water" meet "Chitty-Chitty Bang-Bag" to the point that the only fan
disappointment will be that none of the cars actually fly.

Sensai Crocogator-san's Class Trip : Middle-school Crocogator takes his
students on a different class trip each week, visiting factories, places
of historical interest, zoos, etc. Students from different walks of life
(dirt poor, privileged rich, brains, jocks, and just-average-losers) all
learn important lessons each week while they face the challenges of
growing up Japanese. Each week at least one student will be eaten by this
pedagoguish member of Osteolaemus holtzus (common name:  the Too-Clever
Crocodile), but never fear - they tend to reappear in the middle of the
episode with no apparent ill-effect. The series will impart a love of
history. Season highlights will include the hilarious Alligator-wrestling
episode and the tour of the Diet building.


Later, as fallow ground goes further a-weed, we will see:

Caimen Maid Crisis! : This rather pedestrian tale will be a complete
ripoff of last season's 'Matic-Panic Stylist Yuki, except the
cybernetic-valet will be replaced with an alien Crocodilian Princess and
the original threatening alien invasion will be replaced by Atlantean
golems. There will be no plot-twists that couldn't be predicted by
hyper-active ten year-olds. Sales of the figurines of the Caimen Maid will
convince the producers to put out 19 OVAs, each of which feature her in a
different provocative outfit that can be lucratively merchandised.

Pumpkin Road-rage: It's the future, and a growing segment of the
transportation market features mutated, semi-intelligent vegetables. The
smartest of these appears to be Pumpkin Buggy, an orange sports-car with a
seed-spitting cannon. When rogue cars from the Belgian-based Zucchini
Biotechnical begin causing traffic havoc, Pumpkin Buggy and his owner are
drafted into the Tokyo Police Department to fight these street-racing,
squash-smashing renegades. It's "Jayce and the Wheeled Warriors" meets
"Speed Buggy" with a hint of "Riding Bean" and "ADP Police."

(Name Witheld For His Protection)



 Lest you judge my corespondent too harshly I would point out that he really did guess...unlike the above linked bloggers who I strongly suspect...peeked.
Note too that unless there is some hapless cypher-nebish added to Queens Blade he was surprisingly prescient in not predicting any Harem shows.

Which is one of the few bright spots of the upcoming season (For me anyway)

Regards the actual upcoming season, my corespondents predictions certainly showed more innovation than the real thing.  Queens Blade looks to likely to take 'fan service' well into the realm of diminishing returns...(the trailer is age blocked by You Tube...and rightly so ). However, while the reverse harem show Hanasakaru Sheishounen appeals to me even less, it is neat to see that there actually is one.
 
As to things that I'm actually looking forward to, the upcoming season is sparse pickings...with shows that seem to be ranging from the dystopic to the insipid. There are some things that seem to have some promise however.
Providing I have any opportunity to watch anything, the long awaited sequel to Full Metal Achemist is certainly high on my "to watch" list, and I take comfort in the fact that it is the only one I'm reasonably confident will be brought over.

The brief synopsis given of of K-ON looks interesting...
The story about four high school girls that try to sustain their school’s popular music club despite being unable to read music or play instruments.

Heh...This could be cute.


The return of Hayate the Combat Butler is unlikely to suck, while the original was not high art it was enjoyably demented...For those unaware it tells the story of a competent and practical but...unlucky young lad who lands a job as a butler/bodyguard for an insanely rich and sheltered debutante and her bizzare household.

Of particular interest to me (being that I'm an utter geek) is, of course, that show the THAT crowd tossed onto the end of their post...as if it was an afterthought or something. (Infidels!) It appears that the next several weeks will see a straight up remake of...
 Mazinger Z!



Oh be still my beating childhood!
Wow...Sad case of arrested development that I am, I fear I am going to have to watch this. I mean what could be cooler?

Oh yeah....that.

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March 17, 2009

Cheer Up !

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March 12, 2009

Owch! Owch! Owch!

It burnnnnsss!!!!!!!!!!


Via Ace

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March 11, 2009

Aerospace Projects Review

A few months ago I rather furtively purchased an item from Aerospace Projects Review. The item was on the stillborn project Meteor, a 1950's proposal for an orbital space station I mentioned in passing here.

I immediately bit the bullet and subscribed.

It is worth every frigging penny.

 Lowther is an aerospace engineer and has meticulously researched and obtained information on all manner of historical projects, both those that were built and those that weren't.

Mr. Lowther is also an accomplished draftsman and he provides superb artwork both by himself and people like Damon Moran to complement the existing schematics and his in depth analysis...


PLUTO art by Damon Moran

There is a lot of crap on the internet concerning projects that were never built...much of it utter bilge. Lowther's site is NOT one of those.

I cannot recommend this site highly enough. The prices are nominal and the information on various aerospace projects  is amongst the most detailed available.

Anyway....plug.


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Mirror Eyes

For the first time ever, a  vertebrate has been discovered that uses mirrors in addition to lenses to focus light in its eyes.


                                                          image via BBC

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Banality of Terror


more...

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March 10, 2009

Capitolism

Yes Brickmuppeteers, a new word is born.


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March 08, 2009

OK This Crap Needs to End NOW

  As anyone who has perused this blog at any length is aware, as a citizen I am NOT an advocate, fan or booster for the current President.

However....

He IS the President and he is damned well due the respect, even in disagreement, that Americans who are not hyperpartisan douchebag putzes accord a holder of that august office. (Just as Bush was.)

I was going to do a normal below the fold politics post on the cacophony of fail currently emanating from the oval office when I discovered that this piece of excrement had arrived in my inbox.



The video is short (2:28  ) and purports to show the different level of regard the USMC has for the previous and current Commander in chief.

Two points:
One....It is quite probable that these were cherry picked speeches. No indication is given of what sort of ceremony the two speeches were for, they may have had different solemnity levels and the different commands may have had different standing orders for their troops.

Two...The United States Armed Forces, while in uniform, do NOT, must NOT play politics. That leads down a trail which ends in blood. Happily, we have a pretty damned professional officer corps whose oath is to uphold the constitution, not any party, so I don't actually see this happening short of an actual suspension of the constitution.

While it is perfectly OK (and IHMO right now necessary) to criticize our President. This video manages at a stroke to  disrespect the office, disrespect a man who has taken the weight of the world on his shoulders on our behalf AND dishonor the Marines of Camp Lejune by painting them as disloyal.



This line of attack is libelous, seditious crap and Brickmuppet Blog unequivocally and without reservation condemns it.

UPDATE: I sent this to several Milbloggers a few others.Sent it to some of the Volokh conspirators because I wonder if the  video would constitute a violation of the Hatch Act.

UPDATE 2: I'm behind the curve on this one,  Greyhawk  comments

UPDATE 3: I am off base, this doesn't even come close to a Hatch Act violation. To clarify,
I wasn't concerned that the Marines in the vid were violating the Hatch act in any way, but I failed to make that clear. I thought that the vid might have been produced by a servicemember, but even if it was it is merely in poor taste, not any violation of the Hatch Act. Thanks to all those who responded and set me straight.
My opinion of the merits of the video still stands.

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March 07, 2009

Warrior Queen Boudica and the Lost Art

Colleen Doran laments the disappearance into the publishers aether of the last of the "Big Books" the Big Book of Wild Women which would have featured a story illustrated by Ms. Doran about the warrior queen of the Celts. In fact she laments its disappearance so much that she went ahead and published her story as part of a long, informative post concerning the historical Boudica.

Anyway, read the whole thing.


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Refined Cultural References For the Erudite Geek

Wonderduck has started a conversation about what sort of geekery geeks should grok.

I'm not one to really ask about this as video games are a big part of the geek culture that long since passed me by and...well...I don't play many video games. I can count the ones I have played over the last 5 years on 1 hand.

 Avatar however, has picked up the baton and run with it.


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Interesting Find

Amongst the 37 songs I've thus far hunted down and put  in the Blogradio rotation is one I blundered into quite unexpectedly: The radio edit of Hoshi no DejaVu,  the OP song from Southern Cross.



I've been told that the song, (rather unlike the show) was fairly popular in Japan, topping the charts in 1984 at one point. It's an oddball find and it sort of blends with the other stuff too...

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Columbiad of the Atom Age

We`ve talked about launch techniques including space cannons before, and we`ve talked about pulse nuclear drive as well. Now in this post Mr. Wang brings these two indescribably cool things together with a touch of Jules Verne. He proposes a cannon powered by underground atomic bombs using underground nuclear testing testing technology. This is akin to Project Plowshare...but rather more sane as the radioactivity can be kept underground. Of course it is unworkable in the current political climate and a failure of the vessel would, of course, be....bad.
It is probably best suited for a lunar site but it is an interesting proposal nonetheless.

 Rand Simberg has a response here. And Mr. Wang continues his proposal here and here.

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It's OFFICIAL!

I've now been formally accepted  into the College of Oceanography!


 Yay!
more...

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