I don't know much about this issue. People start talking about tubes and I just can't follow the techincal details.

This is pretty much the state of the debate as far as I can tell.

1) You put things into tubes.

a) There are many things that may be put into tubes.

b) But they break down into four broad categories:

i. Pictures of big-breasted lesbians hitting each other with pillows.

ii. Pictures of cats.

iii. Guys pretending to be big-breasted lesbians, trying to find other big-breasted lesbians, so they can punch the clown to dirty typing about hitting each other with pillows, resulting in thousands of dudes wacking off with other dudes while they're all pretending to be a lesbian stripper named "Summer Autumn."

iv. More pictures of cats.

2) There is only so much room in these tubes.

3) So some people would like to charge different users different amounts to fill the tubes with different things.

a) Some worry that without this scheme, low-tubewidth users will not be able to send each other pictures of cats.

b) But with such a scheme, high-tubewidth users will have to pay more to download video of big-breasted lesbians hitting each other with pillows.

4) Both sides of the debate lay claim to the virtues of promoting freedom, equal access, innovation, and capitalism.

a) But no one will tell me if which side is going to cost me more for logging on to AOL chat under the name "Summer Autumn."

5) Ergo: I care passionately about this issue, but I don't care, because I can't understand it, and no one will tell me how my clown-punching activities will be affected.

Analog Kid explains what the debate's about.

But he doesn't mention the tubes, so I'm lost right away.

Posted by: Ace at 09:51 AM | Comments (37)
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From around the world.

Most seem pretty weak to me, though they beat "Baby, back that ass up."
These are the top three, the rest are at the link.

1. Was your father a thief? Because he stole the stars from the sky and put them in your eyes.

2. Didn't it hurt when you fell from heaven?

3. You must be tired, because you've been running through my mind all day.

Maybe its mostly in the delivery.

Ace Has A Question He Really Wants Answered: Do girls ever use pick-up lines? If they do, I know I've never received one.

So I'm curious. Are girls using pick-up lines on other guys? If so, what might these lines be? I mean, apart from the obvious, like "Hello" and "Would you please stop trying to rub my boob with your elbow."

Posted by: LauraW. at 09:48 AM | Comments (179)
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HEY THERE!
HA HA HAAAA!

THE BABY? NO, YOU CAN'T SEE HER!
SHE'S BEEN HOOKED UP TO AN E-METER SINCE RIGHT AFTER BIRTH!

I HAVE A BAG OF FROZEN PLACENTA IN THE FRIDGE! MAKES GREAT SMOOTHIES!
HA HA HA HAA!

Dear God.

Posted by: LauraW. at 09:17 AM | Comments (26)
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I'd never heard this. Until two minutes ago.

"I want to deal with you guys awhile before I make any transactions at all, period.... After we've done some business, well, then I might change my mind...."

..."I'm going to tell you this. If anybody can do it -- I'm not B.S.-ing you fellows -- I can get it done my way." he boasted. "There's no question about it."...

But the reluctant Murtha wouldn't touch the $50,000. Here on secret videotape was this all-American hero, tall and dignified in a disheveled way, explaining why he wasn't quite ready to accept the cash.

"All at once," he said, "some dumb [expletive deleted] would go start talking eight years from now about this whole thing and say [expletive deleted], this happened. Then in order to get immunity so he doesn't go to jail, he starts talking and fingering people. So the [S.O.B.] falls apart."...

"You give us the banks where you want the money deposited," offered one of the bagmen.

"All right," agreed Murtha. "How much money we talking about?"

"Well, you tell me."

"Well, let me find out what is a reasonable figure that will get their attention," said Murtha, "because there are a couple of banks that have really done me some favors in the past, and I'd like to put some money in....["]

The dialogue continued as follows:

Amoroso: Let me ask you now that we're together. I was under the impression, OK, and I told Howard [middleman Howard Criden] what we were willing to pay, and [This is where the available videotape begins]I went out, I got the $50,000. OK? So what you're telling me, OK, you're telling me that that's not what you know....

Murtha: I'm not interested.

Amoroso: OK.

Murtha: At this point, [This is where the available videotape ends] you know, we do business together for a while. Maybe I'll be interested and maybe I won't.... Right now, I'm not interested in those other things. Now, I won't say that some day, you know, I, if you made an offer, it may be I would change my mind some day.

Was that a crime? I guess not. I guess it's not a crime to refuse to take a bribe, if only for the reason you want to further test your fellow criminals' bona fides and you want more money.

But he wasn't against taking a bribe. He wanted to take a bribe. Just a bigger bribe.

What a son of a bitch.

James "Ocicat Fever" Wolcott made much of my calling Murtha a "cocksucker" or "scumbag." Forget which.

How about now, Ocicat Fever?

Remember back when Nixon was named as an unindicted co-conspirator in Watergate? Yeah, back when the media thought being an unindicted co-conspirator in a crime was a bad thing or somethin'.

Smart. Tough.

Holdin' out for a bigger payoff.

Layers.

Posted by: Ace at 09:07 AM | Comments (31)
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I say "stupid," because the thing was declared a landmark, preventing (or at least greatly complicating) additional development, and the fact that it has been reduced to rubble takes that restriction away and increases the value of the land.

When I first heard of this building, I assumed it was in the outer boroughs, because the building was only four stories tall. Nope. It was a four-story building, no bigger than the row-houses here in my shabby Boston suburb, in the middle of one of Manhattan's most expensive neighborhoods. Upper midtown. Near Central Park.

Four stories.

"Historic landmark preservation."

Layers.

Posted by: Ace at 08:57 AM | Comments (9)
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I suppose this is a close call, but I don't think the WaPo did anything wrong here. True, it gives terrorists a forum, but the Hamas PM is the political leader of the Palestinian "state."

Crosblog fisks him.

[Terrorist PM:] [The Israelis] think, doubtless, of the hostage soldier, taken in battle -- yet thousands of Palestinians, including hundreds of women and children, remain in Israeli jails for resisting the illegal, ongoing occupation that is condemned by international law.

[Gib:] "Taken in battle" - now I get it, Shalit isn't a kidnap victim, he's a prisoner of war. Here, Mr. Haniyeh, I have your back, to an extent. He could be a prisoner of war - if you're at war. If you are, in fact, at war, then Israel is entitled, I'd think, to try and win said war, and frankly, the Gaza incursion is a miniscule fraction of the destruction Israel has the capacity to bring down upon the Palestinians. I'm sure if you had the means Israel has, you'd show similar restraint. If Israel is not entitled to fight a war, then Shalit has been illegally kidnapped, and the only question that remains is whether you're an accomplice before the fact (authorizing the strike where Shalit was taken), or after (in helping the kidnappers make their ransom demands.)

I think that's about the sum of it. Muslims wish to make perpetual war on non-Muslims while not calling it war, and being protected from a warlike response.

I think those days are almost over.

I like the lead of that story:

An Israeli airstrike targeted a group of people in this southern Gaza town on Wednesday...

A "group of people." Not Hamas "military" commanders or anything.

A "group of people." If this the final euphemism for "terrorists"? Terrorists become extremists who become militants who finally become a "group of people."

Just a group of people, sitting around, drinkin' Schlitz, playing canasta.

And Lebanese Hezbollah "warriors" captured two Israeli soldiers.

Muslim nations wax poetic about "sovereignty" when action is taken against them, but "sovereignty" isn't all rights. It also encompasses responsibilities. Such as not allowing your land to be used as a safe-haven for psychopathic paramilitary groups.

Either you're permitting the paramilitaries to operate on your soil, in which case you are engaged in an act of war yourself, or else you can't police your land to stop such paramilities, in which case you don't really have "sovereignty" over your land at all and can't really complain if, say, Israeli invades. If other armed groups are using your land as a murder-playground, hey, you really can't complain if one more group of armed men comes in, can you?

The US faced "indpendently operating" troops making violence on it from Mexico, and we responded by invading Mexico. The "Punitive Invasion," it was called, back when people were ballsy enough to use the proper words for things.

Israel promises a "far-reaching" and "painful" response.

A Punitive response, perhaps?

Posted by: Ace at 08:31 AM | Comments (20)
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Backwards jogging? Or yogging? I'm not sure; it might be a soft j.

Anyway, running backwards, as anyone who's ever done it can attest, is pretty hard on your leg muscles, hits a lot of muscles that aren't otherwise worked out very hard, and it does improve your balance.

Upside? You burn 20% more calories. Downside? You are 90% likely to wind up crippled or dead.

So, it's a glass-is-half-full situation.

Posted by: Ace at 06:26 PM | Comments (32)
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Waaahmbulance chasers.

Khairi Edbary and his family of eight normally share a tiny concrete house with his brother and his family of eight, with a raw dividing wall of concrete blocks providing a touch of privacy.

These days, however, the house is almost empty. The Edbarys live on the eastern edge of the broken runway of what was once the Gaza airport, which has now been taken over by Israeli troops.

Like many of the people here, mostly poor farmers, the Edbarys have heeded the Israeli call to evacuate their homes to escape the fighting and are sleeping in United Nations schools in nearby Rafah.

Mr. Edbary, 36, displayed a large brass shell from an Israeli heavy machine gun that had fallen from an attack helicopter onto his roof. “At night,” he said, “the noise is frightening, and the firing shakes the ground. They shoot at anything moving at night.”

As the great, Prince-like Justin Timberlake sang, Cry Me A River.

Here's a headline:

NYT Reporters Ponder Similarity of Asses, Elbows
Editorial Staff Declares Them "Essentially Indistinguishable"

Posted by: Ace at 05:37 PM | Comments (23)
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Another inside joke that gets repeated from time to time, and still funny.

A judge denies a motion citing the abject incomprehensibility of the motion, and cites -- really, with a footnote and everything -- an insult from the Adam Sandler movie Billy Madison.

Good stuff:

Defendant filed the above entitled motion. The court cannot determine the substance, if any, of the DefendantÂ’s legal argument, nor can the court even ascertain the relief that the Defendant is requesting. The defendantÂ’s motion is accordingly denied for being incomprehensible.¹

¹ Or, in the words of the competition judge to Adam SandlerÂ’s title character in the movie, “Billy Madison,” after Billy Madison had responded to a question with an answer that sounded superficially reasonable but lacked any substance,

Mr. Madison, what you've just said is one of the most insanely idiotic things I've ever heard. At no point in your rambling, incoherent response was there anything that could even be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.

Deciphering motions like the one presented here wastes valuable chamber staff time, and invites this sort of footnote.

Not really out-of-character for the judge, though. 75% of his legal citations are to U.S. v. Fischbein, a case which only appears in the movie Fletch.

Thanks to Mrs. Peel for reminding me of this legal gem.

Posted by: Ace at 05:21 PM | Comments (11)
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Some more TRUTH, without so many layers, for the NYT:

Disclosure of a secret program giving the U.S. government access to a massive international data base of financial information was “very damaging” to efforts to catch terrorists, Congress was told Tuesday.

“This disclosure compromised one of our most valuable programs and will only make our efforts to track terrorist financing — and to prevent terrorist attacks — harder,” Stuart Levey, undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence at the Treasury Department, argued before a House Financial Services panel.

The program, started shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, generated lots of leads, Levey said. But he added that details remain classified.

...

Levey said the program played an important role in an investigation that eventually led to the capture of Indonesian Riduan Isamuddin, or Hambali, the operations chief of the al-Qaida linked Jemaah Islamiya, a Southeast Asian terror group. Hambali allegedly masterminded the deadly 2002 Bali bombings.

...

Asked whether the government is investigating the disclosure or leak of the program, Levey said the Treasury Department is in consultations with the Justice Department about the appropriate way to go forward.

...

When asked whether the program is effectively dead because of the revelations of its existence, Levey responded: “It remains to be seen.”

"Ratting out your country to its most vicious enemies is the highest form of patriotism." -- Benedict Arnold, from Stuff Arnold Said, 3rd edition

Posted by: Ace at 03:58 PM | Comments (27)
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