A Counterstrike game where one guy is being a dick and won't let his buddy through the air-duct. It goes on for ten minutes, with the guy who's stuck making all sorts of threats and screaming. Funny if you like this kind of thing. Language advisory.

When the guy gets down to "seven health," from being shot at due to be being stuck in a vent, he drops the threats and insults and starts pleading.

Thanks to Matt.

More... The funniest stories of 2005, according to World Net Daily.

This one's a keeper, and one I'd never seen before. On some talk show where they're talking about sex with a handicapped person, the interviewer can't stop himself from laughing -- though he tries mightilly -- when a male guest with a high-pitched cartoonish voice speaks. As the article notes, you don't need a translator to get the funny.

H/t to Attack Machine.

Posted by: Ace at 03:18 PM | Comments (15)
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Remember that great "Diplomacy" video that came out shortly after 9-11?

Old but still great.

Posted by: Ace at 02:37 PM | Comments (5)
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Okay...

AN ITALIAN judge has ordered a priest to appear in court this month to prove that Jesus Christ existed.

The case against Father Enrico Righi has been brought in the town of Viterbo, north of Rome, by Luigi Cascioli, a retired agronomist who once studied for the priesthood but later became a militant atheist.

Signor Cascioli, author of a book called The Fable of Christ, began legal proceedings against Father Righi three years ago after the priest denounced Signor Cascioli in the parish newsletter for questioning ChristÂ’s historical existence.

Yesterday Gaetano Mautone, a judge in Viterbo, set a preliminary hearing for the end of this month and ordered Father Righi to appear. The judge had earlier refused to take up the case, but was overruled last month by the Court of Appeal, which agreed that Signor Cascioli had a reasonable case for his accusation that Father Righi was “abusing popular credulity”.

Europe sure seems more "advanced" than the US in having almost every controversial topic -- claims of racism, both real and fictive, arguments about immigration, debates upon how threatening Islam may be, and even the basis of Christianity -- "settled" by lawsuits and criminal prosecutions.

They're coming closer and closer to the Soviet ideal, where every action or belief that wasn't illegal was mandatory.

Thanks to Allah Pundit, who would almost certainly be in jail if he lived in Europe.

He's about three steps ahead of the law even in the US.

Posted by: Ace at 02:32 PM | Comments (15)
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He digs it, though he finds the refinements evolutionary rather than revolutionary.

Posted by: Ace at 02:29 PM | Comments (4)
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Outside the Beltway condenses a long article about the efforts of Major Jonathan Fox, the operations officer of the 1st Battalion, 17th Infantry Regiment.

His battalion has been working hard over the past four months, Fox says, to discourage the Iraqis from hitting or beating detainees. "A big thing is to try and teach them to treat people with dignity and respect," he says. There are, unfortunately, consequences to changing the Iraqi way of doing business. "When we first got here, it was very common," he says of the beatings. "Now it is less and less. But the information is also less and less." Does that mean beating detainees works? "The Iraqi Army," Fox says, "will tell you absolutely it leads to actionable intel."

[...]Majeed [an Iraqi interrogator in the employ of the US] has a good relationship with the 1-17 battalion, he says, and particularly with Fox. "I can tell we think alike," Majeed says. "Major Fox is trying to understand how the locals think." But after working with Americans for the past 2 1/2 years, Majeed is beginning to understand how they operate--and to see what he regards as weaknesses when it comes to fighting insurgents. "The Americans have a line. They like to follow a straight line. They don't like to zigzag," Majeed says. "But sometimes there needs to be a special case. Sometimes," he says, "we need to go over the line."

Posted by: Ace at 01:06 PM | Comments (61)
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Twenty foot friggin' great white shark. With video.

Thanks to Boston Irish.

Posted by: Ace at 12:28 PM | Comments (26)
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CGI now being used to insert products in TV shows and movies post-production:

...digital placement gives advertisers and producers the option of cutting multiple deals with advertisers, placing one brand of soda in a first-run movie, selling placement for another brand in that movie's DVD release and a third in the portable video player version. Such customized uses, however, are not yet common.

But there are limits:

"It has to be contextually logical," said Mr. Brenner. "We wouldn't put a Coke can on the bathroom sink."

Advertisers are said to be interested in placing virtual billboards on Tyra Banks' enormous freakhead.

Posted by: Ace at 11:32 AM | Comments (6)
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Go, UN, go!

A spokeswoman for the United Nations inquiry, Nasrat Hassan, told wire services that investigators had requested interviews with Mr. Assad and with Syria's foreign minister, Farouq Shara, along with others. She said the investigators were awaiting a reply.

A preliminary report by the United Nations panel had concluded that the bombing was a terrorist act carried out by high-ranking Syrian and Lebanese intelligence officers...

They'll also be interviewing the Syrian ex-VP Khaddam.

Posted by: Ace at 11:27 AM | Comments (24)
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Haven't they done enough harm already?

Gazprom is the Russian government's largest energy policy instrument - though the company sometimes insists it operates only on business principles. The loss of fuel, if it persists, could shake Ukraine's economy the way the 1973 oil embargo helped plunge the United States into recession. Ukrainian officials said the loss could reverse its modest economic growth to cause a contraction of between 4 and 5 percent this year.

The dispute involves complex arguments by Gazprom, which says the price it wants to charge Ukraine is based on the prices of competing fuels, like diesel and bunker oil, on international exchanges. But not far below the surface, there is the embarrassing loss of a Kremlin-backed candidate in last winter's Orange Revolution.

Posted by: Ace at 11:14 AM | Comments (10)
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The playoff schedule is set.

I have some questions:

1) Are the Bears really any good?

2) Is Seattle really any good?

3) Is Cincinnati really any good?

4) Are the Redskins really as good as they've looked recently?

5) Are the Patriots going to be good again?

6) Is Indianapolis still any good?

and most importantly:

7) Can the Giants just win their game against Carolina? I know they're really not that good, but can I get just one playoff win?

Posted by: Ace at 09:55 PM | Comments (49)
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