No touching, no sex. A virgin pregnancy, in other words.

If he does this -- and I have every confidence in David Copperfield that he will -- he'll have two of three miracles necessary for being beatified to sainthood by the Catholic Church.

1: Causing a virgin birth

2: Nailing Claudia Schiffert by hypnotizing her into believing he was actually David Coverdale of Whitesnake

I think miracle number three will be especially impressive. Probably a really amazing card-trick or something.

Trivia From A Misspent Youth Update:

Who first proposed the idea of reproduction without sex?

What answer is given to that question, by whom, and in what movie?

Posted by: Ace at 10:52 AM | Comments (53)
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More Mollycoddlng Mountie Moronics:

More police officers are spending time in court rather than chasing down bad guys, while some paroled murderers and sex offenders get passes to amusement parks, the Ontario Association of Chiefs of Police charged Tuesday.

Lengthy court delays, soaring costs and lax prison sentences are making a mockery of the justice system, association president and York Region police Chief Armand La Barge said as he announced a new committee to work with government and community leaders to make the system more effective.

La Barge listed a raft of complaints he said clogged the system and kept officers from doing their jobs - among them a critical lack of justices of the peace, overbooked courts "and a growing insensitivity towards victims of crime."

"Those are the type of situations that really do make a mockery of the criminal justice system," La Barge said.

"Truth in sentencing, meaningful and enforceable rights for victims of crime, a full review of our parole system and elimination of the red tape and bureaucracy that is strangling our criminal justice system and costing our taxpayers millions of dollars may well turn the tide of crime."

Owen Sound police Chief Tom Kaye said he knows of cases where federal parolees get passes to local theme parks.

"The system is just flat broken," said an exasperated Kaye.

"If you go out to (Canada's) Wonderland and you ran into somebody who had already victimized you . . .what would you tell the victim?"

Ah, letting rapists and muggers go right back to the theme parks where they just offended. Hey, if it worked for Michael Dukakis...

This is why I'm always so amused by Canadian and European claims of being more advanced than America. Let the record show America already did all of this stupid bleeding-heart crap, through the seventies and eighties.

These people are twenty years behind us but they think they're fifty years ahead.

Can't wait 'till they put "the first man on the moon" in the year 2070.

Thanks to RCL.

Posted by: Ace at 10:35 AM | Comments (8)
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Cool:

Odoevsky suggested in future there would be a kind of connection between houses that would allow people to communicate quickly and easily, the way they do now via the Internet.

“Houses are connected by means of magnetic telegraphs that allow people who live far from each other to communicate,” Odoevsky wrote.

Even more interestingly, Odoevsky suggested every household would publish a kind of daily journal or newsletter and distribute it among selected acquaintances, a habit which Russian bloggers immediately recognized as blogging.

“We received a household journal from the local prime minister, which among other things invited us to his place for a reception,” one of Odoevsky’s characters tells a friend.

“The thing is that many households here publish such journals that replace common correspondence. Such journals usually provide information about the hosts’ good or bad health, family news, different thoughts and comments, small inventions, invitations to receptions.”

In related news, some analysts note that Catherine the Great seems to have pre-figured Madonna.

Thanks to EricTheRed21.

Posted by: Ace at 10:25 AM | Comments (21)
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Well, Family Guy is definitely one of the dirtiest shows on tv, ever, but I doubt that it's being "marketed as family friendly," as critics claim.

The CSI shows are also cited as family un-friendly. Well, yeah, no arguments on that. When I first began watching CSI, every other episode I'd say "I cannot believe they just showed that on TV." The gore and macabre tone of the show would get it an R-rating in theaters. Nevermind the frequent plotlines involving deviant sex.

Not that I'm saying that's a bad thing. Hey, it's on at 9pm.

But can anyone imagine CSI being made six years ago? How did it come to be that CBS -- formerly the channel for Murder, She Wrote and Matlock -- just decided that it would put on a show regularly featuring severed limbs, decapitations, and CGI depictions of bullets tearing through brain-matter as they ricochet inside a skull?

And then there was that whole "Plushy" fetish episode.

I'm not sure why the other two CSI shows so completely fail to capture the giddily-macabre magic of the original. I guess the main problem with CSI: Miami is that David Caruso seems hellbent to convince me every episode he's gay, what with the queeny line-deliveries, "vogue-ing" body language, and constantly putting on and taking off his $800 sunglasses.

The guy cannot interrogate a witness without foppishly snapping off those stupid sunglassess. "Ricky," he will say to a perp as he snaps off the sunglasses, "these pictures show you entering the scene of the crime three minutes before Maria Santos was murdered." Then he'll get kissably close to Ricky and say "I'm going to nail you hard," and then snap on the sunglasses again.

He's got a whole thing with the sunglasses. They come off to talk about evidence and come back on for his exit-line. A man could make a whole drinking game out of the sunglasses on, sunglasses off thing, if one was determined to become a degenerate alcoholic within the span of a 60 minute crime drama.

Oh-- and also, the show just sucks, generally. I blame Caruso. The show is all about him, his heroics, his conflicted soul, his... indeterminate sexual orientation. And of course his fucking sunglasses.

Posted by: Ace at 10:20 AM | Comments (38)
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Sweeeeeet.

Top Ten Proposals Being Considered To Boost NYT's Falling Profits

10. Gain income from the Times' attempts to right itself by filming PBS series about restructuring at the paper hosted by Bob Villa, titled This Old Media

9. Play to the leftist audience by allowing Paul Krugman one column per week which is completely (rather than mostly) unedited and un-fact-checked; run promotional campaign featuring pitchline "Thursdays are Crazy-Days!!!"

8. Make Bob Herbert's columns more relevant and interesting by forcing him to use a Mad-Libs book for his screeds; readers will take delight in reading about Cinderella's "three NEOCON sisters" who force her to "UNILATERALLY OVERTHROW SOVEREIGN GOVERNMENTS" and who can best be described as "FASCIST" and "STINKY"

7. Put popular NYTimes Forum commenters behind the TimesSelect pay-per-view wall; people will eagerly shell out $25 to read the unhinged ramblings of "ProgressiveAvenger" and "DataNinja77"

6. Emulate the NY tabloids by running frequent contests and give-aways; readers who win the TimesBingo! contest will either receive a collection of books-on-tape by Susan Sonntag or Win a Dream Date With Frank Rich

5. New promotional campaign: Every Bit As Exciting As PBS, Except Without Dinosaur Shows and the Boston Pops!

4. Rejuvenate interest in Maureen Dowd by simple policy: everytime she drops a juvenile reference to a tv series on HBO or Showtime, she has to "show raw nip"

3. Finally admit that urban liberal media professionals only care about what other urban liberal media professionals think; henceforth, polls will only ask questions of employees of People For The American Way, the Washington Monthly, Mother Jones Magazine, and the rhythm section of Outkast

2. Appease readers by declaring 2005 through 2008 to be "rebuilding seasons;" promise to strengthen the paper through the draft and free-agent pick-ups

...and the Number One Proposal Being Considered To Boost the NYTimes' Falling Profits...

1. New managing editor in chief: Vinne Fuckin' Falcone

Posted by: Ace at 09:23 AM | Comments (31)
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W.C. Varrones wonders if Harriet Miers is just basically a politician, telling different interest groups exactly what they want to hear.

Posted by: Ace at 09:12 AM | Comments (2)
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This is a joke.

A really, really long, involved, and detailed joke.

Right?

(h/t to LT Smash)

Posted by: Harry Callahan at 07:59 PM | Comments (24)
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Supposedly all because of the eternally-impending indictment against Scooter Libby, his close aid.

The rumor spread so fast that some Republicans by late morning were already drawing up reasons why Rice couldn't get the job or run for president in 2008.

"Isn't she pro-choice?" asked a key Senate Republican aide. Many White House insiders, however, said the Post story and reports that the investigation was coming to a close had officials instead more focused on who would be dragged into the affair and if top aides would be indicted and forced to resign.

Fun to kibbitz about, but none of it will happen. I don't even think that Libby will be indicted. Maybe he'll cop to some lesser plea before a bill of indictment is prepared.

On the other hand, I guess Dick Morris is praying it happens so he can sell more books.

Thanks to Jason for the fun rumor of the week.

Posted by: Ace at 07:10 PM | Comments (15)
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Find out how much your blog is worth, in fantasy make-believe pretend fakedollars.

Thanks to cutaway and Bob B.

Posted by: Ace at 05:30 PM | Comments (27)
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The Washington Post, today, came out with a piece reporting Patrick Fitzgerald is narrowing his investigation's focus on Vice President CheneyÂ’s office:

As the investigation into the leak of a CIA agent's name hurtles to an apparent conclusion, special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald has zeroed in on the role of Vice President Cheney's office, according to lawyers familiar with the case and government officials. The prosecutor has assembled evidence that suggests Cheney's long-standing tensions with the CIA contributed to the unmasking of operative Valerie Plame.

In grand jury sessions, including with New York Times reporter Judith Miller, Fitzgerald has pressed witnesses on what Cheney may have known about the effort to push back against ex-diplomat and Iraq war critic Joseph C. Wilson IV, including the leak of his wife's position at the CIA, Miller and others said. But Fitzgerald has focused more on the role of Cheney's top aides, including Chief of Staff I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, lawyers involved in the case said.

The New York Daily News pushes the Cheney-centric possibility even further and claims a member of his staff has been cooperating with prosecutors as a 'snitch.' They write:

Cheney's name has come up amid indications Fitzgerald may be edging closer to a blockbuster conspiracy charge - with help from a secret snitch.

"They have got a senior cooperating witness - someone who is giving them all of that," a source who has been questioned in the leak probe told the Daily News yesterday

So, who is that ‘secret snitch?’ more...

Posted by: Dr. Reo Symes at 03:49 PM | Comments (117)
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