Perfunction

Hey, Sexy

Like my fumes, sugartits? Of course you do. Of course you do {sensually twisting my nipple hair}:

Coty Inc said on Friday that it struck a licensing deal with Playboy Enterprises Inc to develop a new Playboy men's fragrance line.

Hope: Obama's Preferred Missile Shield

Juxtaposed against a banner year in missile defense capped by the spectacular and extremely PR-friendly spy satellie shootdown, this newly-found Barack Obama video is absolutely radioactive to his Commander-in-Chief ambitions:

(h/t: Ace)

The Things I Do For You People

Except for luring some quality trollage, I haven't really done anything "bloggy" here, you know? Allah had Rathergate, Captain Ed had Swiftboats, Ace had Beauchamp. Me? A citizen-journalist, fact-checking, giant-killing David?

Get ready bitches --- I am about to lay waste to the foundation of the Main Stream Media, a column of the Establishment, a flying buttress for Moral Relativism, the parapet of DC Elitism, the porte-cochere for Commie Symp chic.

I'm taking on the Washington Freaking Post. That's right. Big time.

About their Oscars red carpet Style section. Stop laughing.

Disgusted by the orange ribbon thing, I went looking for the specific douchetools proudly sporting their sedition. The Post made it sound like the place had more orange than a Neyland Stadium full of jaundiced Carrot Top impersonators.

According to the official Oscar pics website, there was not a sea of treasonous ribbons.

Orange You Glad I Didn't Say Havanna?

Latest trend among our entertaining douchetools, orange ribbons to show support for Al Qaeda terrorists at Gitmo:

The hot fashion accessory was apparently orange ribbons and bracelets in solidarity with terrorist suspects in Guantanamo:

Out on the red carpet, Paul Haggis (the director whose "Crash" won Best Picture in 2006) said he didn't know what accounts for all these deeply dark, brooding, troubled films. But isn't it obvious, he asked, flashing an orange ribbon on his lapel. Orange, why orange? "It's Guantanamo," his Max Azria-clad wife, Deborah, said, showing off her orange bracelet, which read: "Silence + torture = complicity." Suddenly, we noticed -- orange ribbons and bracelets everywhere.

"Got that, flyover hayseeds? We support the architect of 9-11 and enemy troops from the battlefields of Afghanistan, The Good War(tm)."

That's about as far away from the national resolve of September 12, 2001 that we've traveled. There really is not much sunlight left between Hollywood and our mortal enemies now. Awesome.

(h/t: See-Dubya at HotAir.)

Gay or Ghey?

So, is this just ghey because it's a cheesy way to get a kid's temp? Or is it a subversive symbol of gay culture adult rectal thermometer? It's creeping me the hell out:

(h/t: Jonah at NRO)

Arabian Nights: Meet The Cast

From last December's theater season at DaVinci Academy, it's the 7th and 8th Grade Play, Tales From the Arabian Nights.

And here's a tardy cast member backstage:

Target: Svalbard

Obviously, the American War Machine can't be everywhere all the time --- some targets slip through the cracks:

A "doomsday" vault built to withstand an earthquake or nuclear strike is ready to open deep in the permafrost of an Arctic mountain where it will protect millions of seeds from manmade and natural disasters.

The Svalbard Global Seed Vault will officially be inaugurated on Tuesday, less than a year after crews started drilling in Norway's Svalbard archipelago, about 620 miles from the North Pole.

The vault, which Norway built at a cost of about $9.1 million, has the capacity to store 4.5 million seed samples from around the globe, shielding them from climate change, wars, natural disasters and other threats.

The vault is designed to be a "fail-safe backup" for the other 1,400 seed banks in the world, in case they are hit by disasters.

For example, war wiped out seed banks in Iraq and Afghanistan. Mission Accomplished.

Ok, I added that last part. But the first day that peaceful Scandi seed nerds are allowed to roam the tundra unmolested is the last day of American greatness.

Smells Like A Movement

I don't have a dog in this fight, but I found this clueless Oliver Willis headline pointed out by Ace to be particularly funny.

Missile Defense: Primetime

Bullseye, baby:

Destroying the satellite's onboard tank of about 1,000 pounds of hydrazine fuel was the primary goal, and a senior defense official close to the mission said Thursday that it appears the tank was destroyed, and the strike with a specially designed missile was a complete success.

Here's the Pentagon briefing from this morning with video of the intercept (1:00 minute in). As General Cartwright says, "We have a fireball.":

As most of you know, missile shield opponents have had a litany of defeatist talking points about the program since its inception as the Strategic Defense Initiative under Reagan:

1. Missile defense technology is unproven. It can never work. We suck.
2. OK, OK, even if you get it to "work" the "tests" are highly scripted. We always know the what, when, where, and how of every attempted shot. Scientific method? Shut up, scripter.
3. Oh and by the way, until you can prove it "works," we're not going to fully fund it. Figure that one out, rocket scientist.
4. So you somehow got it "working" with no "money" ---- big deal, doesn't matter. The threat is minimal, therefore the need to mitigate it isn't worth those billions. You're building a 21st century Maginot Line.

Each point has been thoroughly trashed with this emergency defensive operation. Geopolitical bonus points for proving our defensive capabilities to North Korea, Iran and others. Even more bonus points for giving China the finger when it comes to our new, ancillary anti-satellite prowess.

With this slamdunk live-fire operation, the Missile Defense Agency (of which I am a contractor) deserves thunderous kudos. I've blogged about various missile defense successes over the past year, but this shootdown really caps what is unquestionably the best year of the program since inception (PDF):

• Total of 9 successful flight tests & intercepts
• 5 sea-based Aegis intercepts, 4 ground-based intercepts (THAAD & GMD)
• First simultaneous double intercept (2 targets, 2 interceptors)
• First non-US intercept (Japanese Aegis cruiser Kongo)
• Actual birds in the ground: 21 interceptors fielded at Ft. Greely, Alaska, 3 interceptors in the hole at Vandenberg, California. Another 21 SM-3 missiles deployed at sea.

Hopefully this track record of scientific achievement and military capability will finally be enough to quiet the naysayers. With likely Democrat victories this fall, the program surely would have been gutted like it was in the 1990's (imagine how much further along we'd be today...). But now, that's a little less likely.

And as Michael Goldfarb says:

The "rogue" satellite cost more than a billion dollars. One suspects its destruction will be of greater value to this country than any mission it could have performed as a functioning spy satellite.

Thanks for the target, National Recon Office! And a hearty congratulations to everyone involved.

UPDATE: Welcome, HotAir. I'm in a fantastic mood, so here's my favorite missile gag (again!). Heh, Ace says I'm a rocket scientist --- NOT! Just the son of one (I'm a non-tech exec).

McCain's Coming "Mister Drummond" Moment

Just like that Very Special Diff'rent Strokes episode where Arnold finds out that Mr. Drummond's ancestors were slave traders, it is time for McCain to prepare for a Very Special attack should Obama become the nominee --- introducing McCain's great-great-grandfather, William Alexander McCain:

William Alexander McCain (b. North Carolina, 1812 – d. 1863), Confederate States Army, owned a 2000-acre plantation in Carroll County, Mississippi and 52 slaves.

A slave-holding, plantation-owning Rebel veteran from the Mississippi Delta. "Casting!"

UPDATE: Thanks to a commenter at Ace's, there appears to be another trump card out there.

Inside the Obama Bubble

VDH on Michelle Obama's "I've never been proud of my country" declaration:

The problem is deeper than occasional slips. For most of the last 25 years the Obama's contacts have been largely confined to universities (Occidental, Columbia, Princeton, Harvard, Chicago) as both students and employees, or to government-sponsored social agencies, or to the incestuous world of Chicago minority politics. These landscapes have proven liberal, sympathetic, and non-confrontational. I doubt very seriously in those environments that the Obamas have had any of their sometimes bewildering statements seriously cross-examined or questioned.

For some reason, though I am not of their world, I've enjoyed lasting friendships with university types. Our politics couldn't be more opposite, but we enjoy the same art, music, food, wine (we're usually neighbors or mutual friends of). And on those nights of wine & cheese, their tongues loosen and piffle like Michelle Obama's comes rolling out uncontrollably. I know exactly what VDH is talking about.

After Hillary's inEVITAble crack-up, watching the Obamas emerge from their patched-elbows bubble this summer is going to be the penultimate nirvana for us political junkies.

Memphis: Fat, Lazy, Envious

w00t, Memphis! Bags the top spots for three of the seven sins. As a former (thank God) resident, I can attest to Forbes findings.

(h/t: HotAir)

New Favorite Election Metaphor

Courtesy of Jim Geraghty and his reader David:

The story of the Democratic race for much of this year has been about competing demographics - Obama racking up votes among African-Americans, young people, and latte liberals, etc. Hillary cleans up among middle-aged women, Latinos, and working class whites - i.e., the beer drinkers vs. the wine drinkers. [my emph.]

That captures it perfectly.

...Only Space Outlaws Will Have Guns

First we're about to shoot down a spy satellite, and now there's a gun on the International Space Station --- lib pants are now as wet as Gus Grissom's Mercury spacesuit:

But although the gun has been there for as long as the space station has been in orbit, its existence is kept quiet. NASA and Russian officials won't talk publicly about it.

Former NASA engineer Jim Oberg, who is an author and journalist, wrote about the gun on his Web site. He said the gun has no place in an environment where people are under such high stress.

"There have been cases of severe psychological strain on people in space, strain that they have taken out -- that their shipmates worried about the ultimate actions," Oberg said.

Relax, Francis, it's a Russian survival gun for taking out bears and Mongols in the Siberian outback should a Soyuz capsule crashland there. Indeed, here's a pic of some target practice with it by the First African In Space, Mark Shuttleworth:

Of course, we have our own ways of dealing with the Russian wilderness:

UPDATE: Thanks for the links, eddiebear and Ace.

Jane Fonda

Still a cunt.

(1972 Hanoi, looking through the gunsight of an NVA anti-aircraft gun)

Noted Maritime Power Introduces Underwater Car

From the land of Ricola and Nazi gold comes the sQuba:

"Other than some kind of a movie situation, for Bond-like stuff with lots of gimmicks, I can't imagine it will have any practical value," Cabaniss said. "Maybe people will need to go from land to water, and traverse a body of water, but underwater? Especially as it gets your suit wet."

A submersible car that you have to wear scuba gear to operate? Awesome.

Stick to cuckoo clocks, papal mercs and tax evasion.

Slowly Coming Around...

Let's ignore the notorious laundry list of John McCain's transgressions against conservatism and take a moment to recognize a lesser known facet of his character:

Flanagan had not heard the promise of withdrawal she wanted, but she admitted to being impressed with McCain, a former US navy pilot who was shot down over Vietnam and spent almost six years as a prisoner of war. She was even more impressed when, a few days later, her telephone rang and the senator himself was on the line.

“He said he wanted to express his appreciation for my brother’s service in person,” she said. “So I invited him to dinner, and he asked if he could bring his son.”

Jimmy McCain is in one sense the black sheep of the McCain family. His grandfather and great-grandfather were both US navy admirals. His father and older brother Jack also attended the US navy academy at Annapo-lis.

Yet Jimmy turned his back on the officer class. He enlisted as a Marine Corps “grunt”, graduated from boot camp as an ordinary rifleman and would later be promoted in the field to lance-corporal.

Presuming that McCain would want media present for such an unusual evening, Flanagan offered to open her home to film crews. It is almost impossible to imagine any of the other 2008 candidates turning down the opportunity for sympathetic media coverage, but McCain told Flanagan he was bringing no reporters. This was to be a private occasion.

Honestly, I knew McCain had a son in the military. But I did not know he was a) a Marine grunt and b) in Iraq. And the fact that I didn't know this illuminates Sen. McCain's noble restraint from shabbily transforming his son's service into crude political capital.

Here are the McCains from 1999. Jimmy is the one in glasses in front of mom:

And today, Lance Corporal Jim McCain returns from his seven month tour of duty in Iraq:

Republican presidential candidate John McCain, who almost always refuses to speak on the campaign trail about his son serving in the military, got a rousing reception Wednesday when he told a private gathering of House Republican congressman that his son Jimmy — whose Marine unit had been deployed to Iraq — had arrived home from safely.

Welcome home.

UPDATE: Welcome, Ace pals. Here's an interview with McCain's other son, Midshipman Jack McCain. Here's a pic of the brothers right before Jimmy shipped out to Iraq:

YouTube: Cult Killer?

Is it me, or has there been a recent flurry of internal videos leaked from Scientology? Most starred Tom Cruise and I assume the rationale for their release was simple Tom Hate.

But it appears there's more afoot. Below is an oddly illuminating speech by David Miscavige, chairman of Scientology's Religious Technology Centre.

Did you know Scientology's distribution strategies had such militaristic imagery?

Does the scapegoating of "psychs" and the fixation on exterminating them cause pause?

And did you know that Scientology has been piggybacking large multinational corporations like Coca-Cola, Dell, and Philips and their perfected global distribution channels? Neither did they:

Just like the internet klieg lights got the debunking ball rolling, these revealing YouTube glimpses into Scientology's inner workings, global strategies, and self-congratulatory celebrations will hopefully take down this dangerous cult even faster.

Schadenfreude: NBA Edition

Remember professional basketball player Latrell Sprewell? Sure you do:

Dec. 1, 1997 - Three days after being fined for missing a team flight and arriving late to Salt Lake City the night before a game, Latrell Sprewell let Golden State Warriors coach P.J. Carlesimo know that it was best to leave him alone.

Carlesimo was warned by Sprewell not to approach him. When the coach ignored the caveat, Sprewell grabbed Carlesimo by the throat for 10-15 seconds before the other players stepped in. About 20 minutes later, Sprewell returned to throw punches at the coach. He landed a glancing blow.

After much soul-searching, Sprewell recognized his ego problem. Or not:

Congratulations, Ace

Dang, a feller picks the wrong long weekend to take a peyote-fueled vision quest --- I totally missed Ace getting awarded CPAC's Conservative Blogger of the Year. Way to go, moron!

But I did get to actualize my inner wolf spirit or something and I'm destined to walk the Peace Path, but maybe I should've beaten my drums a little softer in the sweat lodge.

The gym sauna is now off limits. Whatever.

McCain's Thumb

Our eye. For the thousandth time, I get it.

Please help me retire this cliche, My Friend.

Left Out or "I'm Cold, And There Are Wolves After Me"

Forget the RACE WAR! on the Democrat side---another insignificant, never-heard-from group is feeling ignored:

Seniors have also complained that few candidates directly mention them in their campaigns.

"It's all about youth and Iraq... I don't hear any of them saying a word about seniors," said Maryland resident Lillian, 80, who still works "to keep my mind agile."

I've said it once and I'll say it again: Fuck. Old. People.

Listen up---I SAID LISTEN UP, crank up that fucking Belltone, you wrinkled mooches: we've been hearing your yapping and whining in every damned election since FDR. And you just got a shitload of free drugs in the last election. What other freebies do you want?

P.S. All of the above is null and void in thirty or so years.

Bleg: 'Puter Advice

I'm shopping for a new desktop for the first time since iTunes appeared. Questions:

1. How do I get all those songs I spent hours ripping from all my CDs (not to mention iTunes purchases) from the old PC to the new PC? Is there any DRM/anti-piracy crap I need to monkey with?
2. The 4 year old PC is messed up, but I paid too much to trash it (it'll become the kitchen nook PC). It came with a partitioned drive (found this out about a year later, thanks Sony!) and the smaller C: drive now so garbled with Windows core apps and un/re/uninstalled garbage that I can't defrag it (8% free space and I can't remove anything else) . It's messing up performance of everything. I just want to start over with a brand new hard drive --- XP, Office, Norton, and a browser. What's the best, least painful way to do that? I've never installed a new internal hard drive.

Thanks in advance!