Top ten action today, all times EDT:

Eastern Kentucky at ( Louisville, 12pm

S Carolina St. at (4) Clemson, 12:30pm

(2) Oregon at Virginia, 3:30pm

San Diego St. at (3) Ohio St. 3:30pm

(6) South Carolina at (11) Georgia, 4:30pm

Sam Houston Institute of Technology at (8 7) Texas A&M, 7pm

UAB at (9) LSU, 7pm

San Jose St. at (5) Stanford, 11pm

Don't forget to get your picks in if'n you're pickin. Yahoo groups set up by MikeTalley73 over at Yahoo, 16167, 16172, 16176 password is: paulanka

Have a great weekend morons!

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 07:11 AM | Comments (79)
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Mornin', morons.

It's probably going to be a bit slow around here today, as Ace Brought It all week.

ICYMI, John E. Brought It over on BuzzFeed yesterday because RINO Sellout Traitor ... or maybe, just maybe, hitting LIVs where they live makes more sense than preaching to the choir.

Podcast? Brought it with Noah Rothman.

And I haven't even read this yet, but Charles C. W. Cooke always Brings It. Even on the weekend.

Posted by: andy at 04:06 AM | Comments (301)
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He's a crank but Nolan Bushell is crapping on Nintendo again

Oh yeah, Microsoft finally announced the release date of the X1. Out on November 22nd

Sony is having a Japanese press conference tonight/tomorrow morning here at 2AM Eastern. more...

Posted by: Gang of Gaming Morons! at 10:46 AM | Comments (140)
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That's it, folks. That's the nail in the coffin. We cannot go to war under this clownshow's disaster-movie leadership.

Iran was apparently Samantha Power's Hole Card.

Iran is enduring economic sanctions designed to slow the country's nuclear weapons program, but President Obama's team thought the regime might abandon dictator Bashar Assad over his use of chemical weapons in Syria's civil war.

...

"Ah-duhhh... ah derrrr..."

"We worked with the UN to create a group of inspectors and then worked for more than six months to get them access to the country on the logic that perhaps the presence of an investigative team in the country might deter future attacks," Power said at the Center for American Progress as she made the case for intervening in Syria.

"Or, if not, at a minimum, we thought perhaps a shared evidentiary base could convince Russia or Iran — itself a victim of Saddam Hussein's monstrous chemical weapons attacks in 1987-1988 — to cast loose a regime that was gassing it's people," she said.

Yeah, Iran said "No."

What a dick.

That was from @allahpundit and so's this: 224 no votes in the House, enough to block the AUMF, assuming no defections.

Unfair? Now that I've had ten minutes to reflect I wonder if she's just playing the same dumb game as everyone else, which is trying to put your rivals on their back foot by saying things like "I thought Iran loved peace and justice, I guess I was wrong."

You know?

But even in that case, I don't see the point. Do they really imagine they're going to shame Iran or Russia?

Posted by: Ace at 01:31 PM | Comments (344)
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The Washington Post's "Fact Checker" examined Obama's egregious claim that he had not drawn a "red line," other people did, and this was so false that he refused to say so, because the Post's "Fact Checker" twists Republican truths into lies and also twists Obama lies into truths.

Jonah Goldberg is amused that apparently everyone in the world drew that red line, except Obama.

He reminds me of someone.

The fate of the Syria Air-Snub may rely on the intelligence of one woman: Nancy Pelosi.

But she must know better than war planners at the Pentagon, who don't want this Air Snub.

At Instapundit, an interesting argument from W.R. Mead about the Obama Smart Power Vacuum.

Convicted bomber and perjurer Brett Kimberlin is suing bloggers yet again. And he will keep on suing, forever, so do hit these guy's tip jars!

Somehow I missed this until it was all over -- MSU guest professor harangued Republican students as being among those "raping" the country, and was then relieved of some duties.

It was probably on the blog, so that's why I missed it.

A couple, both born in 1986, is trying to raise their kids in a 1986 Environment, and are reverting to ca. 1986 technology -- no cellphones or computers. I bet they have a high-def tv though, huh?

Yeah this is cute and interesting and will last like #twoweeks.

John Ekdahl went behind enemy lines to post on Buzzfeed: Top 14 Super-Principled Anti-War Celebrities We Haven't Heard From since 2009.

I did some funny things this week. Three of them came on Saturday, when I wasn't even Supposed to Be Here, so in case you missed them:

Betsy Karasik, Former Lawyer and Current Artiste, Argues That Maybe Teachers Should Have Sex with Underage Students;

An exploration of the artistic art of Artiste Betsy Karasik;

You're not going to believe it but some twentysomething feminist artiste conned someone into giving her money to fund yet another Giant Vagina Puppet art installation;

Robin Thicke and his very popular Rape Anthem;

and The Sorrow and the Pity, Kaboom Cereal Edition.

Plus, the Podcast.

Two fun things in videos below.
more...

Posted by: Ace at 02:35 PM | Comments (411)
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That was a joke I wrote.

But this was real:

Sen. Bob Corker: “What is it you’re seeking?”

Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff: “I can’t answer that, what we’re seeking.”

— Senate hearing on the use of force in Syria, Sept. 3

The YOLO Doctrine in full effect.

We have a problem. The president proposes attacking Syria, and his top military officer cannot tell you the objective. Does the commander in chief know his own objective? Why, yes. “A shot across the bow,” explained Barack Obama.

Now, a shot across the bow is a warning. Its purpose is to say: Cease and desist, or the next shot will sink you. But Obama has already told the world — and Bashar al-Assad in particular — that there will be no next shot. He has insisted time and again that the operation will be finite and highly limited. Take the shot, kill some fish, go home.

What then is the purpose?

What's the purpose of Poppin' Molly? Some things we just do for the experience of them and because it's expected of us, like drinking way more than we want to drink on New Years Eve because if we're not vomiting in a lobby ficus then we're just Not Living Life to the Full.

I keep saying this: I sort of would like to bomb Assad. I sort of do want some one to give a good reason to bomb Assad, because in the Lizard Brain that all conservatives have (and apparently Qui Es Mucho Macho? Barack Obama has quite the Lizard Brain on him too) I do want to blow this guy up.

But no one's giving me that reason. It seriously is just YOLO.

Let's just see what happens.

Let's have fun with it.

There are no judgments in Brainstorming.

Don't say "No" say "Yes, and..."

Let's just stop overthinking all this! and Just Live a Little!

These are good reasons to buy $800 shoes, but not good reasons to launch a YOLO Strike.

Red Lines Make All the Difference: Jim Geraghty noted how Obama's Red Line had changed MSNBC:

more...

Posted by: Ace at 10:43 AM | Comments (496)
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I like Erika Johnson's short post.

As you probably know, I think this is a useful (Alinskyesque) manner of attacking the left: Hitting them where it hurts, in their Vanity.

Their overweening, unwarranted vanity.

If they want to Play Smart, let's make them Live Up to Their Own Rulebook and actually Be Smart.

If you check out the video, which you probably shouldn't because it puts coin in MSNBC's warmongering pockets, you'll see Ed Schultz, Professor of Cirrhosis, claiming:

1, that Obama can't build an international coalition Because Bush;

2, that Republicans only oppose this war (the first war we've ever opposed... except for Kosovo, Haiti, taking it to China in the Korean War, etc.) due to "spite" by which he of course means "racism."

But the most embarrassing part of this comes during his Shock Jock Morning Zoo style clip package that proceeds his drunken rage. In that, he plays Wacky Sound Effects as he plays Donald Rumsfeld's Known Unknowns soundbite.

Now, Rumsfeld's Known Unknown analysis of the nature of uncertainty is actually a cute and helpful template for thinking about all the things you don't know -- and, especially, the things you don't know that you don't even know you don't know. The difference between a Known Unknown and an Unknown Unknown is that one understands the former and can, in Risk Management terms, assign it a Risk Factor and intelligently analyze it.

But you can't do that with Unknown Unknowns. As to those, you're ignorant even of your own ignorance. (Caveat: By naming them Unknown Unknowns you gain psychological power and dominion over them, as Adam gained dominion over the animals by naming them, and thus this framework might actually wind up suggesting you know more than you know, as you've created a Defined Category of Things You Don't Know and, having so defined it, are now the master of it. But this nuanced thought would be lost on Red Ed so let's ignore this for the moment.)

Now, how does Ed Schultz, Mensa Chapter President, handle this interesting epistemological (Ed: that means "concerning the theory of knowledge and knowing") framework?

Like this: When Rumsfeld says "Known Unknowns," he plays a Wacky Morning Zoo Sound Effect of a spring going Booiinnnnggg (most commonly used to indicate an audibly-registering erection) and flashes the words "SAY WHAT?" in big red letters because Strong Primary Colors appeal to imbeciles.

Well actually they appeal to everybody but forget it, I'm rolling.

Funny, anyone of average intelligence (or even a bit below) understood what Rumsfeld meant about Known Unknowns and Unknown Unknowns.

But apparently MSNBC Viewers are not up to the level of "slightly below average intelligence." That's so far outside their grasp it's not even a dream to them. It's an Undreamt Dream.

So sorry, MSNBC People. I know you think you're Apple Jacks Kids and Muesli Munchers but you're really just dirty subliterate Kaboom Folk.

more...

Posted by: Ace at 09:43 AM | Comments (278)
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This is from Mother Jones, the archliberal/leftist magazine.

It is however pretty funny, and I don't just mean "It's funny because I agree with it," though I do. I mean they've added funny things to what might otherwise be clapper material.

John McCain really needs to be more discriminating about which countries he wants to attack this week.

John McCain is treated as a serious foreign policy theorist because of his reflexive belligerency and his cavalier statements about sending troops to foreign lands.

Were he not a veteran with a very compelling heroic backstory, this would be a reason to treat him as not terribly serious about foreign policy.

No one can deny that McCain was a hero in Vietnam -- but what I would deny is that there is any connection between that service and the "seriousness" with which he analyzes military/foreign policy questions.

Were anyone but John McCain to offer such reflexively belligerent policy prescriptions, we wouldn't take that hypothetical person seriously at all.

And McCain's instincts, which are poor, cannot be saved by his biography, which has nothing at all to do with his probity and judgment.*

* I think McCain like many other Republicans offers reflexive "Let's Get After Them with Bombs" type statements because they are -- or rather were -- generally popular with Republican audiences.

I've been saying this for months: I happen to know, because I engage with conservative opinion on this every single day, that such statements are no longer popular with the caucus.

Not to say there aren't those who don't agree, but the days when a "Let's bomb someone" statement would get automatic applause and guaranteed "Attaboys!" have long since passed.

It is a serious indictment of the Republican political class that they don't know this.

I don't agree with the principles of isolationism. Some on the right do; some don't. But I think there is at least a consensus about a more modest foreign policy, a greater willingness to say "It's not our fight," and more of a desire to give our troops a break once in a while.

One doesn't have to be a Doctrinaire Noninterventionist to start questioning this all-but-unquestioned assumption that if two groups are murdering each other somewhere in the world, America is expected, as the default scenario, to join in in some way.

We shouldn't go to war on Autopilot and we shouldn't have Muscle Memory Airstrikes.

Which isn't to necessarily say we have no interest in blowing up Assad-- Noah C. Rothman made a case for it in the podcast (which will be linked later).

But I don't think this assumption that Wars Are Better When American Troops are Involved is a sound one.

Or, let me put it like this: Most wars will be better for civilians if American troops are involved, as they're so professional and ethical. But realistically-- Would we rather have more of our boys alive (and ready to fight, because they're not exhausted) or would we rather save some foreign civilians?

I don't get the premise that if we're involved we somehow have more "control" over things. Control is an illusion in such matters. These are tectonic forces we're talking about. Social revolutions are tidal waves. They are not easily channeled, directed, harnessed, and ridden.

Posted by: Ace at 09:04 AM | Comments (287)
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It's not just the Conservative Partisan Snipey Claim that the unemployment number fell for the wrong reason. Look at this pisher:

So unexpectedly Barack Obama's economy continues to inflict misery on a nation.

Can we give him a Nobel Good Economy Prize? I know they don't have that but we should just make it up.

“The civilian labor force participation rate edged down to 63.2 percent in August,” the report adds.

In fact, and this is worth noting, the last time the labor force participation rate was this low was in August 1978.

Also called "the Depths of Carter."

There is some good news, though: The motion picture industry took it hard in the ass lately, too.

And when I say "took it hard in the ass" I mean that joke you do when you say "and when I say this I mean that" and then you say something unexpected.

Oh: And Syria:

via @jennjacques and @gaypatriot

Posted by: Ace at 11:42 AM | Comments (369)
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On today's episode, Andy, Drew M., John E. and Rick Tempest are joined by Noah Rothman, Editor at Mediaite. We discuss the latest on Syria, NBC's Harlequin romance novel-worthy analysis of Obama's body language, Crazy Uncle Ron Paul, the Democrats' core philosophy of Don't-you-dare-call-it-socialism! (but, yeah, it is) ... and how people are becoming conditioned to it, the kickoff of the 2013 football season, and Noah's piece on Maria Rodale's ridiculous open letter to Obama comparing chemical weapons to pesticides, which prompted an hilarious dramatic reading of this Salon piece - No, thanks: Stop saying “support the troops”.

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Andy (@TheH2 and @AndyM1911)

Posted by: andy at 12:40 PM | Comments (83)
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