Brett Kimblerlin Free Speech Hating Criminal SOS

Today I’m joining a free speech blogburst in support of bloggers harassed and threatened by Brett Kimberlin (SOS) and his butt monkeys.  Brett has a problem with people pointing out his bomb detonating criminal terrorist past but, unlike your typical effeminate impotent lefty whiner, Brett isn’t going to take any truth-telling lying down. No Brett is going to wage scorched earth lawfare and if that isn’t good enough get some of his unhinged goons to threaten violence.  Yes, Brett practices the restrained dispassionate discourse advocated by The One.  Unfortunately Brett has pissed off some real men and women and those of us with gnarly gonads and fertile ovaries will not be intimidated by our intellectual, moral and cosmetic inferiors. So sue me if you want Brett. Threaten me if you have the balls but before you get in my face keep in mind that Missouri is a concealed carry state.

Brett Kimberlin speedway bomber mug shot

The Instagram Metadata Massacre

Instagram Fingers

I’ve been playing around with the iPhone app Instagram.  I decided to give this freebie a try after a gaggle of soulless self promoting Apple marketing zombies declared it ”imaging app of the year.”  Instagram, like Hipstamatic,  (which incidentally stopped working after the last update), crops iPhone images to squares, applies hokey filters and then offers you the opportunity to “share”  or print your masterpieces on related websites.  Apparently Instagram is already one of the words largest online photo libraries. Considering Instagram images are filtered iPhone shots it’s almost certainly the worlds second largest online collection of crappy throw-away shots.  Facebook is the largest if you’re wondering!

You probably sense that I am not drinking the Instagram cool-aid. Instagram is a fine fun freebie but it strips EXIF data from the images it drops in the iPhone camera roll. This is the second iPhone EXIF exterminator I have encountered.  I have this thing about EXIF data; it annoys me when software massacres it.

Here’s a little poem:

Exterminate EXIF – NOT

Let it be

Set your fricking EXIF free

Alas, with Instagram, it’s not to be!

Iranian Regime Justice is pathetic Sharia Savagery.

Yousef Nadarkhani

I rarely comment on the “news” but the planned execution of Yousef Nadarkhani for the make-believe crime of Islamic apostasy has really pissed me off. Once again the Iranian branch of the “religion of peace” shows its primitive, ass-backwards, subhuman side to a stunned world that finds it hard to believe that changing your mind about fictitious religious nonsense is punishable by death! It’s rubbish like this that turned me into a hardcore atheist. If this is Sharia then Sharia is shit!

Let’s be perfectly clear. I am not condemning Iranians. I am married to an Iranian!  I have many lovely Iranian in-laws, and not a single one of them approves of this atavistic assinity. Like civilized people everywhere their feelings alternate between disgust, shame and rage. While I forgive the Iranian people I condemn the Iranian regime. The government courts that imposed this sentence are pathetic throwbacks. They don’t belong in the modern world and one day they won’t.

Savages always assume they can bully and terrorize people forever. At first people are easily cowed but even the most egregious assaults fail to deter in the long run. The next time the Iranian masses take to the streets the regime will fall and with the exception of a few islaminals nobody is going to miss it!

P.S.  Before you go all brave fatwa waving kafir killing jihad warrior on me keep in mind that Missouri is a concealed carry state.

1421: The Crank History of Gavin Menzies

Crank history is big business and it’s getting bigger. For reasons that infuriate skeptics there is a never-ending parade of pseudo-historians spouting rubbish that is eagerly devoured by a credulous pig ignorant public. Gavin Menzies’ ludicrous tome, 1421: The Year China Discovered America, (also titled 1421: The Year China Discovered the World), is the finest example of delusional sophistry I’ve encountered since Graham Hancock’s insane Finger Prints of the Gods.

About  the only thing you can say for Gavin’s fantasy is that, (unlike Hancock’s Finger Prints — the “science” behind the movie 2012), 1421 is remotely plausible. It’s to bad that remotely plausible does not make your case! Skeptics are hard-asses we demand rigorous and repeatedly verified evidence before deeming suppositions possibly not crap!  By this standard Gavin falls way short. I’m not going to catalog Gavin’s many errors, omissions and deceptions. That task has already been done by an army of critics. You can look here and here and here and here. In particular Bill Hartz’s exhaustive demolition is a bracing tonic for Gavin’s numbing elixir.

To get the gist of Gavin’s arguments let’s look at one of his claims. On page 241, (paperback edition), Gavin first mentions the Sacramento Junk. The Sacramento Junk is allegedly the remains of a large wooden ship entombed under a sand bank in the Sacramento river of California. Ok, so far so good! We have a wooden wreck in a river. The Chinese junks Gavin imagined sailing around the world had unique characteristics that would easily distinguish them from plain old Pacific west coast wrecks. For example:

1. They had 15th century teak hulls.
2. Metal bins bolted hull compartments together.
3. They used silk sails.
4. They often carried porcelain, seeds and trade goods.

If the Sacramento Junk is the remains of a 15th century junk it looks like identifying it would be an archaeological no-brainer! All we have to do is sample the site, collect some 15th century teak wood for carbon dating, and bingo the case for the Chinese reaching the west coast of the America’s before Columbus is looking promising.  Gavin describes drilling into the sand bank, extracting some wood and carbon dating it to 1410.  Isn’t science wonderful?

Here are a few questions.

• Where the hell is the Sacramento Junk?

Your impressive end-notes mention collecting samples in 2002 and 2003. I believe GPS was up and running. Could we have exact coordinates please?

• Was the wood teak?

If you’re looking for teak ships you might want to consult a wood expert. Teak, even old rotting teak, is easily identified. Look into it.

• How many samples were carbon dated?
• Where the hell are the lab reports, sample photographs  and other documents?
• Did you notify the historic relic Nazi’s of your amazing Chinese wreck?

You almost need a permit to weed your own damn garden in California for fear of disturbing native artifacts yet somehow you pillaged an ultra-historic wreck without the save our culture weenies whining —  yeah I once lived in California. With so many simple facts omitted you wonder if the Sacramento Junk is a figment of Gavin’s lurid imagination.

Gavin repeats this pattern of building a case for the Chinese Stopped Here over and over again and, without exception, always omits basic information that would lend credence to his claims. You need to set your bullshit detector on maximum when sailing with Gavin!

Debt Dolts Diddle and Drone!

Government Fiscal Policy

Well well it turns out that when John Boehner isn’t crying like a little girl he can deliver a speech. Tonight he smoked Obama like a fine cigar. I tried to flip around Obama’s debt limit rant but ended up watching like a gawker at a hospital fire.

Any dolt with a fifth graders grasp of arithmetic can see the US is completely and irrevocably broke! We’re in such a deep dark debt hole that we haven’t seen sunlight for eons. Financial rickets is setting in; the soft bones of the republic will soon need Viagra.

But don’t worry our elected pets have a plan! They’re going to borrow and print more money so we can wire up our deep dark dept hole with overpriced union-made lamps connected to a green, made in China, energy source. If the government’s math is right the lights should stay on long enough so we can all find our assholes and shove our heads up them!

Top Ten Invalid Annoyances

I have been in the rehab/old-folks home for eight days: long enough to adjust to the routine. It’s amazing how quickly we get on with a new normal. This doesn’t mean I am comfortable or thrilled with my circumstances. I have a list of invalid annoyances.

Let’s do this from least to most annoying.

1. Call bells that ring for hours on end.
2. Marginal cable package: cripples don’t need HBO.
3. Late night nurse chats; I had forgotten about noisy hospitals.
4. Butt-plugging food. They have been trying to give me stool softeners since my arrival. If my wife wasn’t bringing food I would need them.
5. Locked courtyards. It’s winter and the courtyards are locked to protect the elderly. This should be a weather dependent rather than seasonal policy.
6. Inability to put on my socks.
7. Unable to get in or out of my wheelchair without assistance.
8. Cannot shower or bathe until my cuts heal
9. Peeing into a plastic bottle.
10. And the number one annoyance: cannot wipe my ass. I suspect my nurses concur.

The UN Space Treaty is Holding Us Back!

Apollo Earthrise

2011 marks the 42’nd anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing.  42 idiot infested years have passed since that glorious day and nothing that has happened since comes within a nautical league of matching it.  My vile boomer generation has downplayed the significance of space exploration for decades.  I remember getting a shrill lecture from my left leaning fifth grade teacher about what a waste of money the space program was.  Being a self-assured child so I told my teacher he was preening unimaginative Neanderthal. This landed me in detention but I refused to apologize.

Manned space flight has been in a depressing, decades long, holding pattern. The real advances in space exploration have come exclusively from unmanned probes and robots.  While astronauts have been going round and round in that orbiting boondoggle known as the International Space Station the Voyagers are on the brink of interstellar space, probes are on their way to Pluto and Mercury, Cassini is orbiting Saturn, a small armada of orbiters and crawlers are exploring Mars, low-budget missions discovered water on the moon, space telescopes like Chandra, Hubble and Spitzer have shown us wonder after wonder and, capping it all off,  WMAP determined the age of the entire frigging universe.  Compare these awesome achievements to ISS astronauts unplugging zero-G toilets.

Why has so little been accomplished? I can think of two good reasons.

1. Exclusive government control
2. The UN Space Treaty

Until recently only governments could afford space programs.  In the early days of space exploration government control made sense but that era is coming to an end.  In a few decades private entities will be able to mount manned Mars expeditions and send robots anywhere in the solar system and beyond.  The technology is coming along nicely but I am afraid the politics will soon be a gigantic millstone around our necks. The millstone takes the form of the absurd UN Space Treaty.

Green: UN Space Treaty nations

The UN space treaty is another sorry artifact of the 1960′s.   It reads like a bunch of unwashed socialist hippies got together and decided to ban capitalism in space. There is no other way to explain ridiculous terms like:

1. The exploration and use of outer space shall be carried out for the benefit and in the interests of all countries and shall be the province of all mankind.
2. Outer space is not subject to national appropriation by claim of sovereignty, by means of use or occupation, or by any other means.
3. States shall be responsible for national space activities whether carried out by governmental or non-governmental activities.
4. States shall be liable for damage caused by their space objects.
5. States shall avoid harmful contamination of space and celestial bodies.

Suppose some daring entrepreneur decides to mount an asteroid mining expedition.  This is not as crazy as it sounds.  Asteroids are relatively easy to get to and very easy to get off of. They also contain mountains of valuable rare earths, platinum and gold. Eros alone holds well over 20 trillion dollars of metals.  You could pay off the US national debt by mining one dinky asteroid! One day, not very long from now, robot asteroid mining will make a compelling business case. To bad the UN Space Treaty outlaws it.

If you have to pay off all of mankind (#1, #2) your compelling business case evaporates.  Environmentalists, (yeah space environmentalists),  would complain that mining damages and contaminates a celestial body (#4, #5). Finally, even if the operation was 100% privately funded, various governments could legally ransom our daring entrepreneur or shut him down (#3).  These tactics have already been tried.  Remember the hysteria that preceded the launch of Cassini.  A pack of morons decided that the Plutonium powered RTG on Cassini posed a grave threat to all mankind and started citing the UN Space Treaty in hopes of blocking the launch.  Cassini was not a money-making operation so we ignored the loons. Asteroid mining will be another thing all together.  Everyone will want their cut.  With the UN in charge we’re going to feel like the probed subjects in this Kids in Hall video.

The Kindle is just like the KKK

Oh Mohammed in a brothel how much more of this idiocy can we endure?  A certain brain-damaged official, (Thomas Perez), in the US Department of Justice apparently thinks allowing Universities to experiment with delivering textbooks via the Kindle violates the civil rights of the blind. This so is mind-boggling stupid that I thought it was a bad joke. Well it is a joke and it’s on us! We are entering the final stages of Pournellian Iron Law paralysis in the United States.  Remember a vote for any Democrat anywhere is a vote for submission to morons like Perez.

G20 fails to end G20

Last weekend I passed through Toronto.  The city was bracing for the over priced and utterly pointless G20 dog and pony show.  The G20 circus did not disappoint.  On cue the usual crew of recreational anarchists left their parents basements long enough to engage the police, set cars on fire and smash store windows.  The police responded by arresting hundreds of protestors and holding them for hours in horrific detention facilities that did not offer vegan food!  Hey, it’s Canada, a gluten-free diet is probably enshrined somewhere in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Mirroring the idiocy in the streets the G20 leaders wasted tax dollars in grand style by literally phoning one in for the children.  They also muttered something about reducing government debt and doing a better job of pretending to be fiscally sane.  Hey G20! I have a suggestion for that debt reduction thing — how about no more G20 meetings!  Video conferencing software does a pretty good job; give it a try!

Given the pitiful track record and high costs of the G20 one wonders why any sane country would host such a boondoggle.  Nothing of importance is ever achieved at these photo-ops and if something worthwhile accidently emerges it will be ignored or sabotaged.  I know it’s good for our rulers to get out and meet with their peers: all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.  Still it’s hard, in ostensibly democratic countries like Canada, to sell the public on the awesome benefits of hosting the G20. Do you remember how the Canadian public refused to fund the G20 when asked in the pre-conference referendum?  Oops sorry, I was thinking of how things should work!  Nobody ever asks the public if they want to pay because the answer would be a resounding no.

The G20 is coveted, courted and consummated for exactly the same reason that more expensive boondoggles like the Olympics and the World Cup are: it’s a great opportunity to punt public funds to your friends.

I did not have sex with that Oil Spill!

I would like to thank BP for accidently creating a teachable moment for our political class.  Prior to the gulf cluster-fuck the most ethical congress in history did not know that fluid dynamics is one of the hardest of the hard sciences.  But, after two months of heroic attempts to contain the spill with blame games, bribes, threats, legislative initiatives and golf it’s finally dawning on the powerful minds that rule us that fluids cannot be bought-off, community-organized, press-marginalized or change-the-channel ignored.  Reality is such an unfair bitch.

Last night, sensing a disturbance in the zeitgeist, Obama subjected our nation to a rousing I did not have sex with that oil spill speech.  The One’s words soared but we, the little unworthy peons, were as unmoved as oil soaked pelicans.  Even our Obamabot leg tinglers failed to detect executive command.

I wish I could say I am disappointed but I wrote this government off a longtime ago.  The stark fiscal, technical and rhetorical incompetence they display every day is no more surprising than sunshine.  The oil spill is an infuriating accidental disaster but it’s not the biggest spill confronting us.  That would be our insane, reckless and entirely man caused deficit spending.

Let’s do some arithmetic.  Let’s assume the unhinged moonbats turned reservoir engineers have pulled the correct gulf spill rate of 100,000 barrels/day out of their asses.  Let’s also assume an oil price of $80 dollars/barrel. When you multiply everything together you find that

8000000 =  1e5 * 80

eight millions dollars of oil is spilling into the gulf every day.  Sounds bad.  Let’s compare that to our government’s fiscal spill.  The deficit for this fiscal year is expected to approach 1.3 trillion dollars.   This works out to

3.56164384e9 = 1.3e12 % 365

roughly 3.6 billion dollars/day or 445 times the gulf spill rate!  If I could plug only one damn hole I know which one I’d choose!