I get better odds at a blackjack table. And free drinks too.

Moron NFL standings, week 12

1 Nodakdrunkhobos 99
2 buzzion 98
3 mesablue 96
4 Is pigskin kosher? (joshin) 95
4 jimmytheleg3 95
5 Gib 94

Fewer names on the list means fewer people to hate with a white hot hateyness.

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 06:26 PM | Comments (20)
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My first response to the headline: it's not a big deal, thought is very basic. Get it? Basic? Okay, tough crowd. Don't we have any chemists in the house?

If this article is any indication, the crisis of national scientific illiteracy has reached the hallowed halls of National Geographic. The writer, Helen Scales, and her editors should be ashamed.

Her headline is shit. She (or her editors, whoever picked it) get "ten times more acidic than thought" from this:

Since 2000, scientists have measured the acidity of seawater around Tatoosh Island off the coast of Washington state. The acidity increased ten times quicker than climate models predicted.

First of all, the ocean is not ten times more acidic than previously thought. We had a pretty good idea how acidic the ocean was because, like, we measured it. That's the dumbest thing I've heard all day (and I work with lawyers, so you know this shit's pretty dumb). It doesn't even pass the smell test. Really? The giant frikin' ocean out there is ten times more acidic than we ever were able to measure before?

So what's happening here? The process of acidification near Tatoosh Island is occurring ten times more quickly than the scientists' models called for. This may be an issue of off-the-chart atmospheric carbon in the vicinity (cue the Global Warming hysteria) or a really shitty model based on almost no data.

Take a wild guess.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 05:59 PM | Comments (58)
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"Oldowan" sent this. As you can see, the scammer writes in the same exotic English as the typical Nigerian scammer.

Here's the hook-- lots of money. Will you help? more...

Posted by: Ace at 05:54 PM | Comments (45)
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So I'm going to Thanksgiving dinner at a friend's parent's house this year, same as last year. They always say don't worry about bringing something, but that's silly. My folks always taught me to bring the drinks if you get invited to dinner at someone's house, so I bought the wine already. But I'm thinking of bringing a veggie, a bread, or a desert dish, too.

Recipe suggestions would be appreciated. Nothing from Ace's new favorite cookbook, please, IYKWIMAITTYD.

Think of your favorite side dish at Thanksgiving Dinner.

I mugged the Anchoress and stole this idea. She's looking for a veggie recipe.

Also, this is most definitely an opportunity to flame your fellow commenters for having such poor taste as to actually consume the three-bean salad.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 05:15 PM | Comments (128)
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Yep, $2.00/gal gas compared to $4.00/gal gas certainly is.

But the collapse of gasoline prices since the summer -- a drop of more than $2 a gallon in my neighborhood -- is an economic stimulus worth more than $200 billion a year.

The U.S. Department of Transportation last week said that gasoline taxes paid into the highway trust fund fell by $3 billion in the 2008 fiscal year.

[UPDATE] Here's how congress can raise the gas tax anywhere between $.05 and $.10 and seem like "heroes". Simply cite this commission study that recommended a $.40/gal hike in the gas tax and claim they're giving us all a break.

Posted by: Purple Avenger at 04:25 PM | Comments (46)
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Okay.

Batman is not an magical hero (though he does get involved with the supernatural a fair amount), so bringing him back to life (which they will of course do) is a very tricky business. Use magic to bring him to life and you've made the quintessential no-magic-or-technomagic-powers superhero into an expressly magical one. The magic of his rebirth will be unavoidably part of his character.

Of course, he might just be faking his death to, um, lull criminals into a false sense of security (resulting in a criminal rampage and many civilian deaths... ah, the plan is working perfectly!), but 1, that's lame, and 2, I'm pretty sure he's done that before. At least like six times.

Another dumb stunt to sell comic books. I thought that the nineties had taught them there was a downside to relying on "event" issues to drive sales. Spiderman had great sales through its infamous Peter Parker is really a clone story arc... and then the public got really annoyed by the whole stunt. I think sales are still depressed by that, or at least were for a long time afterwards.

Clarification/Correction: As lorien points out, they're not necessarily talking about death. Hinting at it, but not saying death.

There are rumours that Batman will suffer a gruesome end when his sidekick Robin goes over to "the dark side" and destroys him in a terrible betrayal.

Batman, alter ego of Bruce Wayne a wealthy industrialist, operates in the American Gotham City.

Others speculate that Wayne may either retire from his duties or be killed by a mystery villain known as the Black Glove.

His fate will be revealed in the latest issue of DC Comic's Batman, published on 26 November.

Either way, his demise will lead to a hunt for a replacement.

"What I am doing is a fate worse than death, things that no one would expect to happen to these guys at all," Mr Morrison told Comic Book Resources.

"A fate worse than death" is not in fact death. Being worse than death and all.

All right, so Robin's "turning to the dark side." All right. Sounds like this is Robin's big infiltration mission. He's "evil" now, you see. Wink wink.

Fake death.

Related: Robert Downey Junior Talks Avengers Team-Up Movie: more...

Posted by: Ace at 01:57 PM | Comments (72)
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I imagine this will get fixed. But what the hell?

Technically, this occurs due to a Pentagon regulation-- but that regulation itself was promulgated to be consistent with the Democrat-passed law.

I think this is all just a big mistake, and not intended by anyone, but can anyone imagine the screaming Keith Olbermann would be doing had it not been the Democrats primarily responsible?

Marine Cpl. James Dixon was wounded twice in Iraq -- by a roadside bomb and a land mine. He suffered a traumatic brain injury, a concussion, a dislocated hip and hearing loss. He was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder.

Army Sgt. Lori Meshell shattered a hip and crushed her back and knees while diving for cover during a mortar attack in Iraq. She has undergone a hip replacement and knee reconstruction and needs at least three more surgeries.

In each case, the Pentagon ruled that their disabilities were not combat-related.

In a little-noticed regulation change in March, the military's definition of combat-related disabilities was narrowed, costing some injured veterans thousands of dollars in lost benefits -- and triggering outrage from veterans' advocacy groups.

The Pentagon said the change was consistent with Congress' intent when it passed a "wounded warrior" law in January. Narrowing the combat-related definition was necessary to preserve the "special distinction for those who incur disabilities while participating in the risk of combat, in contrast with those injured otherwise," William J. Carr, deputy undersecretary of Defense, wrote in a letter to the 1.3-million-member Disabled American Veterans.

The group, which has called the policy revision a "shocking level of disrespect for those who stood in harm's way," is lobbying to have the change rescinded.

Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), chairman of the Armed Services Committee, said the Pentagon's "more conservative definition" limited benefits for some veterans. "That was not our intent," Levin said in a statement.

Thanks to C. in AZ.

Posted by: Ace at 01:50 PM | Comments (37)
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Light content warning: The secret isn't conversation, after all.

Thanks to Blest.

Posted by: Ace at 01:03 PM | Comments (35)
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I think a lot of us fell in love with Rumsfeld for his no-nonsense demeanor and his disdain for the press. And, of course, the victory he was part of in Afghanistan, and in Iraq too... for a time.

But he turned out to be better at fighting the Washington Press Corps insurgency than the Iraqi one, and I, for one, continued supporting him well past the time I should have been demanding his resignation.

Now he offers a reexamination of his tenure and the Surge. He's a bit eager to claim credit for victory now.

In retrospect, a number of things are clear. One is that the Pentagon’s Phase IV (post-war) planning was badly mismanaged. There was a huge gap between ends (a secure, stable, well-functioning Iraq) and means (the mission and number of troops necessary to secure order). Another is that while the appeal of the “light footprint” approach is understandable - a foreign occupation of a nation is never an ideal situation - the costs of this strategy far outweighed the benefits. We didn’t adjust to the enemy we faced and the circumstances we found ourselves in. A third is that Secretary Rumsfeld never accepted the fact that in Iraq we were committed, whether we liked it or not, to a massive nation-building effort. A fourth is that Rumsfeld’s commitment to “speed and agility and precision” rather than “mass” was the opposite of what was needed (Rumsfeld spoke about what he viewed as the key lessons of the war in a December 5, 2005 speech to the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies).

On the matter of the surge itself, Rumsfeld claims

there had been earlier surges without the same effect as the 2007 surge. In 2005, troop levels in Iraq were increased to numbers nearly equal to the 2007 surge — twice. But the effects were not as durable because the large segments of the Sunni population were still providing sanctuary to insurgents, and Iraq’s security forces were not sufficiently capable or large enough.

But what made the 2007 surge different than everything before it was not the increase in the number of troops but, much more importantly, a new mission that was based on classical counterinsurgency doctrine, meaning that it was focused on living with, securing, and winning the confidence of the Iraqi people. The strategy of clearing areas alone gave way to clearing, holding, and building them. The days of “commuting” to the war from forward operating bases were ended by General Petraeus; under his command, American troops became part of the neighborhood, eating, sleeping, and staying in close contact with the local population. This increasingly won them over to our side, which led to a massive increase in tips against AQI and reducing the need for Iraqis to turn to militias for safety.

Posted by: Ace at 12:58 PM | Comments (36)
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Imported from the sidebar, because I figure people have their own bands to name.

Posted by: Ace at 12:22 PM | Comments (103)
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