No, I'm not kidding.

This is beyond parody:

The administration also argued Friday night that the cost of the Western Regional Conference increased sharply under the Bush White House -- from $93,000 in 2004 to $323,855 in 2006 to $655,025 in 2008, then $840,616 in 2010, or just 28 percent under Obama.

According to Fox, an unnamed White House official defended the conference: "At least we have taken, bold, swift forceful action to hold those responsible accountable and put in place protections to make sure this never happened again."

Bold? Swift? Forceful? The Inspector General's report says that the Obama Administration knew about the party since May 2010. Hang on one sec while I take my socks off. May 2010 was so many months ago I'm gonna need all my fingers and toes to help me count.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 11:08 AM | Comments (356)
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I was going to say I have nothing for this book thread, but then I remembered what day it is and I thought how appropriate for a book thread than a quote from the greatest book ever written:

Matthew 27:62-66 The next day, that is, after the day of Preparation, the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered before Pilate (63) and said, "Sir, we remember how that impostor said, while he was still alive, 'After three days I will rise.' (64) Therefore order the tomb to be made secure until the third day, lest his disciples go and steal him away and tell the people, 'He has risen from the dead,' and the last fraud will be worse than the first." (65) Pilate said to them, "You have a guard of soldiers. Go, make it as secure as you can." (66) So they went and made the tomb secure by sealing the stone and setting a guard.

Matthew 28:1-9 Now after the Sabbath, toward the dawn of the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. (2) And behold, there was a great earthquake, for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. (3) His appearance was like lightning, and his clothing white as snow. (4) And for fear of him the guards trembled and became like dead men. (5) But the angel said to the women, "Do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. (6) He is not here, for he has risen, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay. (7) Then go quickly and tell his disciples that he has risen from the dead, and behold, he is going before you to Galilee; there you will see him. See, I have told you." ( So they departed quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy, and ran to tell his disciples. (9) And behold, Jesus met them and said, "Greetings!" And they came up and took hold of his feet and worshiped him.

Even if you're not a believer, I think you have to admit that there is not one single book that has influenced, shaped, and guided Western Civilization quite like this one has. And to lose it, to ignore it as irrelevant means that our civilization will eventually be replaced by a different one. I don't know what it will look like, but I think I can say that whatever it is, it won't be pretty and we won't like it.

I recently read an old novel set in the early Christian era, Quo Vadis and was surprised how much I enjoyed it. The characters are complex, interesting, and sometimes flawed. I like it how it presented Christianity as a world-changing religion, as it was supposed to be.

The Kindle and Nook editions are cheap, and I believe their are also free eBook editions floating around out there.

This novel has been made into movies twice. The first time was back in the 1950s, Peter Ustinov played Nero, and it doesn't hold up well. Even though you can tell they put a lot of money into it, it looks and feels kind of cheesy.

A better version was made for Polish television in 2005. It is available via Netflix and is well worth watching in its entirety.

So, a happy Easter to all the morons, and to the subset of morons who believe, I say: He is risen!

Tips for this book thread may be e-mailed to aoshqbookthread@gmail.com

Any new books you all would like to talk about this morning?

Posted by: Open Blogger at 07:06 AM | Comments (196)
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... is a slogan you're not likely to see anytime soon.

But if there's one part of the Obamaconomy that's booming right now, no pun intended, it's gun sales.

Plants here and overseas are working full out. It is a question of capacity. Domestic companies are adding shifts, cross training workers, reorganizing how the machines in a plant are organized (the last four gun plants I have been on the floor of were in the process of trying to increase efficiency by moving tooling around) and, in some cases, buying new machines. Firms are reluctant to add employees with changes in health care looming as they do not know what the costs will be, and they would rather not hire people only to lay them off six months from now if conditions change.

One thing I'd be interested in knowing is the breakdown of this sales increase between first-time buyers and repeat buyers. I have a safe full of the things and every time I go to a gun shop thinking about picking up another one, I usually leave with a bunch more ammunition instead.

That stuff's gotten expensive. The chart at the link was kind of dated, so I looked up a couple of current prices on the items they listed:

* American Eagle 9mm FMJ: $14.69/bx in November 2008, now $14.12.

* Wolf .223 FMJ: $7.97/bx in November 2008, now $5.79.

* Remington UMC .40 S&W: $19.89/bx in November 2008, now $19.90.

Other than the .223, it looks like prices are basically about the same as they were 3 years ago. Anecdotally, that feels about right since I remember the big sticker shock back then and not so much of an increase since.

On the gun sales themselves, though, that DC piece also mentions:

Throw in increased popular culture television exposure of firearms and shooting, including everything from “Gold Rush” to “Top Shot” to “Sons of Guns” to “Doomsday Preppers,” and you can see that the trend will continue for some time to come.

That may have something to do with it, but there's a chicken and egg thing here as far as new buyers go. I love Top Shot and Sons of Guns because I'm a gunowner. Do these shows really appeal to the non-gun owning public enough to turn someone into a first time gun buyer? I hope so.

Put us some f'n knowledge in the comments, gun-owning morons and moronettes. What are you seeing locally on availability and pricing of guns and ammo? Are you a recent first-time gun buyer or do you know one?

Posted by: andy at 06:58 AM | Comments (220)
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Happy Easter.

Posted by: andy at 02:52 AM | Comments (236)
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On this day in history, the Japanese Battleship Yamato was sunk by American forces near Okinawa. It is interesting that the Yamato was essentially being used as a sea borne kamikaze on her last mission as she was supposed to move in on Okinawa and beach herself, turning her nine 18.1 inch guns on American forces ashore. Fortunately for US forces, the Yamato was spotted by two US submarines and was engaged well before she could close Okinawa. Here are some summaries and recaps of The Sinking Of the Yamato.

At 12:32 on 7 April 1945, Yamato was attacked by a first wave of 280 aircraft from Task Force 58, taking three hits (two bombs, one torpedo). By 14:00, two of Yamato‘s escorts had been sunk. Shortly afterward, a second strike of 100 aircraft attacked Yamato and her remaining escorts. At 14:23, having taken 10 torpedo and 7 bomb hits, Yamato‘s forward ammunition magazines detonated. The smoke from the explosion—over 4 miles (6.4 km) high—was seen 100 miles (160 km) away on Kyūshū. An estimated 2,498 of the 2,700 crew members on Yamato were lost, including Vice-Admiral Seiichi Itō, the fleet commander.

Posted by: CDR M at 06:00 PM | Comments (690)
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What can you say? From the reports on the ground, it looked like this was going to be awful.

As it turned out, not so much.

VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. (AP) - A 12-ton Navy jet loaded with tons of fuel crashes in a spectacular fireball into a big apartment complex, scattering plane parts and wiping out some 40 units. How is it that everyone survived?

The mayor of Virginia Beach could only call it a "Good Friday miracle" and pilots marveled at how a failed training flight that engulfed buildings in flames managed to crash without killing anyone. The student pilot, his instructor and five on the ground were hurt, but all were out of the hospital by Saturday.

Via @JeffEmanuel

Posted by: andy at 04:48 PM | Comments (80)
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Anchorman Ron Burgundy on Conan.

"Conan, you look awful. I'm being kind right now."

via my eldest kid, who cracks me up a lot and still thinks I'm not a total jerk.

Ok, I'm kind of a jerk, but that's the dad thing goin on. more...

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 03:57 PM | Comments (229)
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Good evening, fellow wood-pushers, patzers, fish, 'C' players, and other assorted USCF ratings list bottom dwellers. It's time once again for the Saturday Nite AoSHQ Chess Thread.

First, a shame-faced, belated thank-you to rdbrewer, who posted the original chess thread a couple of weeks ago and who graciously didn't get too mad at me when I stole the idea from him and ran with it.

rdbrewer is the actual father of the chess thread.

So, why play chess? What does it do for you?

Lurking moron R.C. Speck writes:

Humility.

The most important thing chess has given me is humility.

When I tell people that I used to play chess, they often ask, “How good were you?” My answer is always, “Good enough to know how bad I really am.”

I suppose all sports do this to a certain extent, but I think chess gets you there quicker. Nothing like going 0-5 or 0.5-4.5 in a weekend tournament to hammer home the point that you just suck, you suck so bad you're a towering monument of suckitude on display in the International Museum of Suck in Sucktown, U.S.A.

The rest of Mr. Speck's article is worth reading. For example, I did not know that General Winfield Scott went a couple of rounds with a 9-year-old Paul Morphy in 1846. Predictably, Old Fuss and Feathers got his clocked cleaned by the young lad. And, he was a poor loser, which I guess is also no surprise. Unfortunately, I don't think the games were recorded.

And now, another modern classsic. This one is Kasparov-Topalov, 1999. Kasparov has called it the greatest game he has ever played.

Thanks to all of you who sent me tips. It's amazing to me how many lurkers are out there reading this blog that you never see in the comments. I wonder what the ratio is. For every commenting moron, there are X number of lurking morons, so what is X? 10? 100? 1000?

Chess tips for this thread may be sent to me at

OregonMuse
and then the at sign
followed by yahoo
and then dot
com

Question: what is your favorite chess site? When I started getting back into chess, I discovered there is just no end of chess sites, and I keep discovering good ones. So please post your favorite ones worth checking out in the comments, and we will all benefit.

Posted by: Open Blogger at 02:00 PM | Comments (195)
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When I was a kid, radio stations would play the same playlist every day at the same time. I guess it was on tape. So in grade school, for example, we would hear Tom Jones' She's a Lady on the school bus every morning. Just as we pulled in front of the school, we'd hear Tom Jones sing "she's a weaner" (winner). Of course, that was evergreen comedy gold for a third grader.

A few years later, another station played an incredible keyboard version of the theme to Clint Eastwood's Hang 'em High. I heard it every morning on the way to middle school. By then, I was playing piano, and the closest thing my teacher would let me play was the theme from Exodus. Same notes, same key. Lots of big, broad fifths. In fact, I think the Hang 'em High was based on it.

For years, I tried to find a copy of the keyboard version of Hang 'em High. Last time I looked several years ago, I Googled "hang 'em high organ" and "hang 'em high keyboard." Stuff like that. Couldn't find it. I could only find Hugo Montenegro's original orchestral version.

Last night I was following a link in the sidebar and found it by accident. It was Booker T. & the M.G.'s!

Like most keyboard players in the 60's, Booker T. Jones played a Hammond B-3 organ through Leslie speakers. Listen to Booker uncork it about halfway through this song. more...

Posted by: rdbrewer at 10:42 AM | Comments (218)
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No really, I don't want to hear it and, I suspect, many other folks don't really want to hear it on this beautiful Easter Saturday either.

So tell me about your recipes, Easter or Passover. Tell me about your family trip. Tell me about the neighbor that keeps parking on the grass. But, for the love of Pete, do not tell me about the SCOAMF, racism, delegate counts, or your burning desire to tell Democrats how you really feel about them.

Now DANCE, MONKEYS! more...

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 09:46 AM | Comments (370)
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