Lassie?

I have been thinking about this for a while now; what kind of name is "Lassie" for a boy dog? Like, isn't that what the Scots call chicks (girls)? Or are they maybe trying to tell us something?

Anyway... Humouroceros

Lassie and her bee-yotch

Planet X, the new Nibubu

One of the greatest things about the World Wide Web (along with the cute baby pictures and bad jokes) is that at any point in time you are only one mouse-click away from rubber-lipped insanity. This is terrifically handy for those of us who have a penchant for smart-assery, and even more importantly, for those who depend on the more exotic, or rather, 'slack-jawed crazy' web-sites for news and information. Now take Planet X, also known as the mysterious planet Nibiru. If one merely follows the traditional mainstream media then it is entirely possible that one will have never heard of Planet X, unless it was during the last two minutes of a newscast during one of those "human interest", "let's see what the loons are up to" sorts of stories. You know, where they show a surfing squirrel or maybe some cow that can count to three, that sort of deal. Apparently Nibiru, also known by the science fictionally cleverly name Planet X, was first described in 1995 by Nancy Lieder. Nancy, who is the founder of the web-site http://www.zetatalk.com/ , says that she received her information from aliens living in the Zeta Reticuli star system via an implant stuffed into her brain by these aliens (apparently these were 'brainal' rather than 'anal' probally inclined space-aliens).

These aliens have been sending all sorts of info to Nancy for years now, explaining what the result of Planet X's passing by the Earth will be. The stories appear to have been muddled up some but I will do my honest best to clear it up as much as I can. Planet X is either a planet which may be four times larger than Earth or maybe ten times larger than Jupiter or maybe either a red or brown dwarf star or perhaps even a hot-dog shaped asteroid with slightly too much sauerkraut. It passes through the Solar System somewhere between every 3,600-years and every 6-million years and is expected to pass by Earth sometime between 2003 and, well, never.

Now obviously most people will have noticed that the Earth did not end in 2003, which as the original year that Nancy said the Zeta's had told her that Planet X was supposed to pass. As Nancy explains it the May 2003 date was a "white lie to fool the establishment" and she said that if she had said the real date then the establishment would have time to declare martial law and confine millions of people in cities where they would die when Planet X passed. Naturally this raises a couple of questions: I don't remember the secret world wide government declaring martial law in 2003, although I could have missed it, I was kind of busy just then. Also, many sites claim that NASA is aware of Planet X (as must be the millions of amateur astronomers all around the world) and is merely suppressing the information. If NASA is aware of Planet X, then how would they have been fooled by any misinformation from Nancy? They would have known the truth from their own observations. Just wondering. This also raises another point: Why can't your average goof-in-the-street see Planet X coming towards us? By all accounts it is pretty big and since we can see Jupiter and Saturn with the naked eye (as long as you know where to look) we should be able to see Planet X, right? The answer is that it is hidden behind the sun as it approaches the Earth. There are many pictures on the 'net of Planet X peeking out from behind the sun, all taken in the early morning or at dusk, and as is rapidly becoming the norm for this post, this raises yet another point. Being as the Earth is traditionally suspected to travel around the sun once a year, every year, then wouldn't the Earth be on the same side as Planet X for at least part of the year, and wouldn't Planet X be clearly visible for a large part of the year? This was a puzzler but after a few seconds of thought I figured it out, Planet X is approaching the Earth in a reducing spiral orbit which unfortunately for those who want to watch, keeps it on the far side of the sun. That is until it races past the sun and across the inner Solar System to pass by Earth

Planet X (AKA: sun flare)

Next, just what is going to happen to Earth when all this comes to pass? Apparently the heavily magnetic Planet X will cause our planet's core to separate from the mantle and reorient towards Planet X. This will cause the Earth's rotation to stop for between one and five point nine days. In that time the Earth's core and mantle will reorient to one another which will bring the North Pole south to about where Brazil is now. Then the Earth will start to rotate again and will soon be back to a 24-hour day, just like now. Of course now the old north and south poles will be on the equator and all that polar ice is going to melt causing some pretty substantial floods, resulting in the deaths of millions. On the bright side all the tectonic activity from the core and the mantle sliding all over the place shouldn't cause earthquakes any worse than nine on the Richter scale (here's a thought: the most deadly earthquake in recorded history took place on January 23, 1556 in Shaanxi, China. It is estimated to have been 8 on the Richter scale and caused the deaths of 830,000 people. That was about .18% of the world's population at the time, and would translate into about 11-million people today).

There are those who believe that Planet X will actually hit the Earth, causing the extinction of all life, including cockroaches and televangelists. Many of these people are convinced that NASA, as well as some nebulous idea of "the government", is aware of the impending disaster but is saying nothing and is even denying that there is anything to the "theory". As proof of NASA awareness it is pointed out that the Infra-Red Space Observatory detected an "unknown object" in 1983, "possibly as large as the giant planet Jupiter and possibly so close to Earth that is would be part of this Solar System." Further analysis showed that these initial announcements had been premature and that what had been detected had been distant galaxies and "intergalactic cirrus", which is sort of a lemon drink, I think, maybe like "the drink of astronauts", Tang. Naturally the doomers quote the initial reports and ignore the later analysis.

Further "proof" of NASA being involved in some sort of conspiracy is apparently the United States built South Pole Observatory (SPO). The doomers say this was built at the south pole because Planet X is best observed from the southern hemisphere and you really can't get further south than the south pole (I just thought of something. If you were at the south pole and you climbed up a ladder, would that put you further south? Hmmm... Back to our regular programing...) so obviously the SPO was built to observe Planet X. Totally wicked circular "logic", which has only one flaw, and that is that it is really nuts. The SPO was built at the South Pole because of the low humidity there, making for better observations of outer space, and it was not built or funded by NASA. Also, considering all the photos of Planet X taken by believers in the northern hemisphere, why would these same people be saying "the South Pole is best"?

Now, as marginally interesting as all the Planet X stuff is, really it is all just a steaming pile of butt-mud made up by people who are crazier than a plastic-wrapped cat. Back here in adult-world where mysterious planets don't spend all their free time playing peek-a-boo from behind the sun before scuttling up and tipping the Earth over so that east and west are the new north and south, NASA has had to spend way to much time and effort trying to point out what a joke the whole thing is. NASA public affairs, particularly the link Ask An Astrophysicist (http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/ask_astro/ask_an_astronomer.html) has been emphatic in pointing out that the entire concept is a hoax based on pseudoscience, heavy on the hoax. Of course the believers, the faithful if you will, don't like hearing that and some get really angry that NASA says that the world is not going to end in 2012, or at least go through some huge change as foreseen by the Babylonians, the Sumerians and the Mayans, but not by any actual modern day scientists. In fact it seems that the more that experts, people who actually know what they are talking about say that nothing of the sort is going to happen, the firmer the doomers cling to their delusion.

And what will happen in early 2013 when we are not all dead and the Earth has not tipped over on it's axis? I figure the excuses will be thick on the ground and they will be imaginative and all the usual suspects will believe them, and then what will the next upcoming disaster be? I hear there is an asteroid flying in our general direction (http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2005/13may_2004mn4/) and at one time NASA thought that there was a slight chance that this might be a disaster, but further analysis showed that this is not the case. Asteroid 2004 MN4 will pass very close to the Earth, cosmically speaking, missing by 22,300 miles, which is close but no disaster. Some say that is will then swing around for another try in 2035 or so, but as Jon Giorgini of the Jet Propulsion Labs says, "Talk of Earth encounters in 2035 is premature." The near pass of Earth will change the asteroids orbit and actual scientist don't know how yet. In any event the scientists are not losing any sleep over it and neither am I but there are a couple of potential doom-dates involved so the dim and the dumb will have something to look forward to for decades to come, and that's good. It keeps them off the streets where a car might get them or something.

Anyway... Humouroceros

The Truth about 2012 from NASA Lunar Science Institute on Vimeo.

Adam and Eve

Boy, that would have sucked.

Anyway... Humouroceros

Vivos - Why wait?

Every so often it becomes apparent that some of the more mindless optimism from the 1950's is still alive and well. Take the backyard bomb shelter for example. As I understand it back then there were folks who were so convinced that they were about to be attacked by the "Reds" that they would actually build a a concrete bunker in their backyards where in the event of a nuclear attack they could stuff their families and live of jugged water and canned peas for a while before emerging into, what, a radioactive wasteland. Yay.

My point, such as it is, is that even the best home shelter built was completely useless because of the eye-buggeringly terminal horribleness of the event it was supposed to protect you from. It was sort of like lighting a paper match at the beginning of a hurricane for light and heat. In other words, the idea that you could survive a nuclear war by squatting in a concrete bunker, drinking stale water and eating mouldy cheese is, to be nice, silly. If the mouldy cheese didn't kill you then the radiation would. Of course the idea that false security is every bit as good as real security has never really gone away as anybody who paid attention to the airport "security" in the continental 48 would have noticed post-9/11. Still, that was the way some people thought in the 1950's, oh so long ago.

Then right here in the 21st Century along comes inventor and real-estate mogul, Robert Vicino and he has convinced some out there that the whole bunker idea is a damn fine one. Vicino has opted to "kick it up a notch" though and through his company, called The Vinos Group, plans to build a series of luxury underground survival shelters, each capable of holding up to 200 specially selected folks in pampered comfort as they survive any of a series of potentially world-ending disasters for up to a year (since obviously any world-ending disaster would only last up to a year, right?) Then, after the rest of the planet has been scoured clean by nuclear or biological war, or a giant tsunami, or super-volcanoes, or maybe something even more unlikely (like magic turtle-shaped chickens with laser eyes and zeiss monocles) the residents can come back up to resume their lives. Yep, that's about the dumb of it.

There is, of course, a web-site and actually if you ignore the content it is excitingly dynamic and pretty easy to use (a quick click on the post title should take you right there - hold on tight!) There are lots of colours too! There is a set of icons explaining the why-fors and the who-hows of the whole Vivos Group deal, with time-tables, descriptions of the proposed shelters and a general list of supplies, including a menu (with wine but not beer. That's unAmerican, isn't it?) There are comments from interested parties as well as applications for membership ans much more. Below this is a clock counting down to December 2012 (the site says that, "Vivos is not about 2012..." which certainly explains the count-down clock.) Along the bottom of the page is another set of icons describing the different possible wold ending catastrophes: Nuclear war, bio-war, planet X, solar flares, pole shift, global tsunamis, killer comets and super volcano. Sounds like one of those disaster movies on steroids.

In an interview with CBS (http://cbs2.com/local/Vivos.Hidden.Bunker.2.1699568.html) Vicino said, "our web-site is very careful not to promote fear, but to provide an education about the things that are already out there." Right, like Planet X or super-volcanoes. Planet X was first proposed in 1995 by Nancy Leider who claims to be in contact with aliens from the star Zeta Reticuli via an implant in her brain. As intriguing as it may be to gather astronomical evidence with brain implants, I tend to side with actual astronomers and scientists who say that Planet X does not exist and Nancy Leider is a nut. Oddly enough the Vivos take is a little more accommodating to Ms Leider's delusion with the suggestion that mysterious Planet X will pass close to the Earth possibly causing a pole shift which may wipe out humanity. A pole shift, by the way, is a natural event that takes hundreds or even thousands of years when the Earth's axis shifts a degree or two. The Vivos example is where this happens within a few hours and causes earthquakes, acid rain and giant ill-tempered quail appearing out of a trans-dimensional rift. Ok, I made up the quail thing (quail are generally confused rather than ill-tempered) but it does have the benefit of being just as accurate as what is on the Vivos site.

Just to reassure potential members the site says that Vivo's shelters will be able to survive flooding submersion for extended periods (up to a year, I guess) and force 10 earthquakes in successions (although I sort of wonder how the folks inside the shelters will do getting shaken around like that - imagine a bunch of jelly-sacks in a paint-can shaker). Regarding the earthquake thing, the site has a map of the continental US showing where the shelters are planned to be built. Several are set conveniently along the west coast of the US, which I hear is prone to the occasional earthquake.
Incidentally; I believe that traditionally earthquakes are measured with the Richter scale and not some imaginary "Force" scale.

Another non-fear educational icon is the one regarding solar flares. NASA, an entity which has some small understanding of outer space, says that we are entering a time of higher solar activity, which is a cyclical event and has been happening since, well, ever. There may be some static in wireless communication which borders on the inconvenient, but is hardly a global disaster. The Vivos Group looks at it a little differently however. The picture they paint is one of a sun just waiting to blast the Earth with protons, cooking people where they stand and frying the heck out of all electronics on the planet. They present the example of "Carrington" who observed a solar flare in 1859 and the resulting electronic pandemonium of that flare. NASA mentions this story as well; Richard Carrington was monitoring sunspots when he noticed the flare. The flare reached the Earth the following morning and lit the sky with auroras and caused some havoc with the telegraph systems then in use. Vivos claims that a similar event today would fry electronic systems worldwide, and estimates that 90% of the population would die off due to the lack of infrastructure. Hmmm... Sounds bad. A Carrington event is a once in five hundred years sort of thing and really not worth worrying about (http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2006/06may_carringtonflare/). What say we give the Vivoians the benefit of the doubt for a moment though. So someone noticed the major solar flare and the word goes out to "man the shelters!" Everybody gets to the shelters and the blast doors are closed then the EMP hits, frying electronics world wide. So now they are all trapped deep underground in the dark with electronic doors that they can't open. Yeah, good one.

They also mention gamma radiation emitted from star WR104 which is suspected to be on it's way here to totally ruin our day. Um, hate to be a wet blanket but this isn't going to happen either. It is true that at one time some scientists thought that WR104 shared a rotational axis with our solar system and if the star went super-nova then the gamma burst could head our way. Wr104 is 8,000 lightyears away, and that is a long way even in metric. More recent observations have shown that WR104 in fact does not share the solar systems rotational axis and we are not in harms way. Oddly enough the site does not mention this, but that's all right since the point I am trying to make here is that both of these events (solar flares and gamma bursts) are impossible to predict and nearly impossible to detect until they hit. At 8,000 lightyears away anything going on at WR104 will be hard to detect and if a gamma ray burst is headed our way we won't know about it until it hits. It takes light from the sun just over eight minutes to reach the Earth so anything happening there we won't know about for eight minutes, as long as someone happens to be looking at the time. Honestly, are these things really worth worrying about?

Yeah, here are some quick quotes: "Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public" - H.L. Mencken, "There's a sucker born every minute" - David Hannum, "Who's the more foolish: the fool or the fool who follows him?" - Obi-Wan Kenobi. Do I think Robert Vicino is trying to take advantage of the dim and the dumb? Yeah. Taking advantage of those who don't think too fast on their feet is probably the oldest way to make a buck and Robert has just followed in the footsteps of televangelists and other snake-oil salesmen. Well, whatever, I suppose. If someone has a pile of money just burning a hole in their pocket, well, why not, right? Just to be uber-reasonable and everything, let's just buy into this fantasy for a moment. The very first thing I thought when I first read about it was, "then what?" You have just spent a year underground, drinking cheap wine and eating vacu-packed "food" while some world devastating event has taken place outside. When the doors open you walk out into a world where the top metre of soil is radioactive, the sky is black with ash and ill tempered quail are everywhere (heh, quail, man. They're funny). Or maybe due to some tectonic shifting the shelter entrance is now several hundred metres underwater. So, where and how are you going to live. What will you eat while you wait for your mutant radioactive veggies to maybe grow? What will you do for protein, unless you go the Donner Party route and chow down on those who don't object too much. In the CBS interview mentioned earlier Robert says, "Who is to say that the world won't be fine afterwards? Might have a lot less population, but it could be a very nice world." A very nice world a year after a world devastating catastrophe? Right. Now that's a fantasy.

Anyway... Humouroceros

PS: In the section on global tsunamis the site says. "a megatsunami is meant to refer to a tsunami with an initial wave amplitude (wave height) measured in several tens, hundreds or possibly thousands of metres, potentially reaching up to about a kilometre in height." Actually a thousand metres is a kilometre, so essentially they are saying these waves could be several kilometres in height, approaching a kilometre in height. Good math. And "initial wave amplitude" for gosh sakes. What is that, trying to sound all scientific and everything? I believe that is a term that someone at the Vivos Group pulled out of their dimpled butt.

Also, this whole 2012 Mayan calendar thing. Please. In fact December 2012 is just the end of the Mayan long-count calendar. The following day is the beginning of the next Mayan long-count calendar. Honestly, do the people who buy into this junk wet their pants every December when our currently popular yearly calendar ends? http://www.2012hoax.org/vivos

Defence of Draw Muhammad Day

I found this online at http://thesunbreak.com/2010/05/20/an-atheists-defense-of-everybody-draw-mohammed-day and I really like it. Over the past couple of days I have read too many "liberal" folk who think the whole idea of "Draw Muhammad Day" is offensive to Muslims, and I suppose it is and if it hadn't been for the murder and the violence I probably would have ignored the whole thing. Unfortunately with the poor excuse of some pictures drawn in Denmark, simpletons world-wide decided to riot in the name of Islam. This was the best defence they had? "You hurt my feelings so I'm going to burn a building down"? Pathetic. And I am supposed to take people like this seriously? I don't think so. Any of the currently popular religious sects that call for violence should probably be banned. That is, of course, frustration speaking. Frustration at the creeps who hide behind the skirts of their "faith" so they can wreck stuff.

Also, just as an observation, I have tried going to the site where I submitted my drawing, and I can't get it to open. I'm sure that there are those who will say this is some sort of supernatural thing while I think it is a technological thing so out of curiousity I went over to the FaceBook site to look around (I am not registered on FaceBook, but one can still look). There were a few cartoons I liked, and the expected bigots are bounding all over the place (you can't keep a good bigot down, although I believe that a weighted net and about twenty feet of water ought to do the trick) as expected, but it is like the fellow below says, "I support free speech. Even speech I don't like. Especially speech I don't like." Anyway:

An Atheist's Defense of "Everybody Draw Mohammed Day"
By rootwinterguard

Posted on behalf of Mike Gillis, Board member of Seattle Atheists. "Everybody Draw Mohammed Day" was an idea conceived by Seattle cartoonist Molly Norris who jokingly floated the idea in reaction to South Park's debacle with portraying Mohammed in an episode of the animated series.


I support "Everybody Draw Mohammed Day." Why? Because I support free speech. Even speech I don't like. Especially speech I don't like.

Just the same way I'd support "Everybody Eat a Hamburger Day," if it were Hindus using threats of violence against people who ate beef.

In a free society, free speech means having the right to say exactly what someone doesn't want to hear. If you don't like what someone has to say, you need to answer with your own free speech. Violence and the threat of it is not free speech. It is the admission that you have a losing argument in favor of your position. Nothing justifies violence to chill free speech, not one having their religious sensibilities offended. Nothing.

If some religious person drew an offensive cartoon or wrote an offensive op-ed about atheists, it would be insane and morally reprehensible for me to kill the person who wrote or drew it. It would be wrong for me to cut off their head, shoot them eight times and stab them through the heart. It would be wrong for me to set embassies on fire and beat people up.

It would be wrong for me to chant for their deaths and call upon other atheists to kill them for being offensive. It would be wrong for me to imply a death threat to the writer or cartoonist and then post pictures of the above beheaded murder victim on my website. It would be wrong for me to break into the writer or cartoonist's house with an axe and try to kill them in front of their grandchild. Ever. No matter how much I was offended. No matter how bad the cartoons or op-ed was.

And it would be insane for anyone on the outside of this--especially liberal-minded people who claim to support the right to free speech--to be more offended by the cartoons than by my threats of violence, or the actual execution of said violence. It would be insane for well-meaning liberal folks to take the side of militant fundamentalists' violence enforcement of their blasphemy laws against people who aren't even a part of their religion. Yet, this is exactly what we've done with Islam.

We wouldn't tolerate this violence or the threats if the Catholics or Mormons or Scientologists were doing it in response to having their religion mocked in a cartoon. In fact, they all have been. Part of living in our society means that your culture will have to integrate into a few ways. We want your language, your sense of humor, your food, your clothing, your historical narrative, and your music. We want all of the things that other immigrant groups have brought to add to and enrich American culture.

But there are some basic principles we won't compromise on, freedom of speech and expression being the big one. The proper answer to speech you don't like is more speech. Not violence. Not because you're offended. I'm offended to the core by what various religious people say all the time. That doesn't give me the right to use law or violence to silence them. It burdens me with the responsibility of responding with words, not fists, blades, bullets, or threats.

You will occasionally be offended by what you hear people say here. And things you say will inevitably offend someone else. That's the price of admission. We're not allowed to kill or threaten people because we don't like what they say. Period.

We don't let Pat Robertson do it. And we won't let you.

And to my well-meaning liberal friends that seem to believe that blasphemy is a worse crime than murder, battery, arson, or inciting violence: Ask yourself if you'd feel the same way if the Pope had called upon Catholics to kill cartoonists for depicting Jesus in an offensive way.

I support "Everybody Draw Muhammad Day" not to be pointlessly provocative or to single anyone out for being mocked. In fact, I believe the very opposite. Islam, like every other religion, isn't immune to mockery or criticism. And no one should try to make themselves immune through death threats.

I'm participating because the point still needs to be made that religious sensibilities don't give someone license to use violence or the threat of it.

*****

Well said.

Anyway... Humouroceros

Draw Muhammad Day 2010!

Yeah! It's Draw Muhammad Day and here is my contribution. If I understand the technology at all, and I don't, then a quick click on the title of this entry will take one to a web-page called Draw Muhammad Day 2010 where there should be all sorts of offensive stuff. Good times, man, good times.

Anyway... Humouroceros

Hayseed Dixie

Just when you think you've seen it all along comes something like Hayseed Dixie to show you a new way. Sounds like fun to me.

Anyway... Humouroceros

Nerds on parade

Still, it would be pretty cool to own one. I don't know if one would exactly be a chick-magnet, but going by some of the girls who enter the Princess Leia slave-girl competitions at the Star Wars conventions, it wouldn't be a bad thing if they were.

Anyway... Humouroceros

Glenn Beck is an idiot.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Courtesy of Keith Olbermann, MSNBC and Lewis Black. Oh my.

Anyway... Humouroceros

Zap!

So let's see, some 17-year old goofball jumps onto the field at a baseball game and runs around like a maniac, waving a towel in the air. The security personnel on hand, rather than chasing this kid down and then tossing him from the park, taser him. Ka-zap - you down.

Had he just robbed a store? Nope. Had he just mugged a little old lady? Nope. Had he just peed on a politician? Hardly. His "crime" was to run around on a field during a baseball game and for this he had several thousand volts zapped through him. Good thing he didn't have some sort of heart defect, or that he didn't fall badly and damage his neck. A death sentence for interrupting a baseball game is a little extreme, even in the United States.

Well done, security people, well done. I mean, he could have been a terrorist or a Mexican or something, right? It is just fortunate that in your zeal to bring this thug down and all pumped up after the thrill of the chase nobody kicked him in the face a couple of times, you know, to subdue him some more.

Anyway... Humouroceros

Birdbath conversation

Anyway... Humouroceros

Be prepared!

I don't know for sure but if they couldn't even take care of the sign, what sort of condition is the food inside like? A five year supply of mouldy cheese and stale water just isn't as appealing as one might think. I bet the magazines and newspapers kept for future generations would be all out of date too.

Anyway... Humouroceros

Funny or Die - Presidential Reunion

Funny or Die's Presidential Reunion from Will Ferrell

Draw Mohammed Day - May 20, 2010

Okay, I'm not a big joiner or anything but I like this idea. It's kind of funny but up until those Imans travelled around to different Muslim countries, lying about pictures drawn of Mohammed I had never even thought about it much. Then the usual crowd start rioting and destroying stuff, well. It was pretty bad back in the day when that loon Ayatollah Khomeini called for the murder of author Salman Rushdie, and a pack of idiots thought that was a good idea, but Khomeini was crazier than a dog farting in a sack (as apparently were his followers). This "you can't draw no pictures" thing, well to quote the wise, "Fuck them. Fuck them up their stupid asses." I can't draw worth crap, but I'll be doing this one.

Anyway... Humouroceros

Senate Bill 1070

Hey, that's not funny!

And then we have Arizona's Senate Bill 1070 (SB 1070), signed by Governor Jan Brewer on April 23, 2010 and which is causing all sorts of ruckus, within the state and without. Those who are opposed to the bill say it calls for racial profiling, targeting Hispanics in the great state of Arizona. Those who favour the bill say it does not call for racial profiling and in fact forbids it, and it is necessary to protect the people and the economy of the great state of Arizona. Of course one could be all wacky and actually read the Bill, which courtesy of the magic of the Internet you can do by clicking on the title of this particular blog entry (if I understand this techie stuff right, and you can always Google it just in case I don't). Warning, it is kind of a dull read, dry in some spots and even drier in others.

First off everybody agrees that Arizona has a real and continuing problem with illegal aliens crossing the border. Also, I don't think anybody believes that the only people entering the US this way are only in search of a better life. There are criminals crossing, bringing drugs to the US markets or otherwise getting up to whatever it is that that bunch gets up to. The situation has been getting worse and has been ignored for decades by the federal government. So I think it can be agreed that Arizona is in a tricky position. But is SB 1070 the answer?

Really the waters have been muddied by both sides in this argument with those against the bill calling it the 'show me your papers' bill, invoking images of Nazi Germany, Soviet Russia and all sorts of totalitarian states. They claim this will lead to racial profiling (actually I think this is a valid point, which I will get to later) and the treating of US citizens with Hispanic ancestry as second class citizens.

Those who are for the bill say all it does is reinforce federal law as regards illegal aliens. An article by Arizona State Senator Sylvia Allen printed on SFGate.com (http://articles.sfgate.com/2010-04-30/opinion/20877565_1_illegal-immigrants-border-patrol-mexico-us-border) talks about murders and kidnappings along the border and how people who live within 60-miles of the border live in terror of the human and the drug smugglers. She mentions the financial cost to Arizona of illegal immigrants and bemoans the fact that the border guards are not allowed to use force to stop people who enter the state illegally (this is honestly a bit rough though isn't it? Who wants to be the guard who accidentally shoots a little kid who is with his or her parents crossing into the US?) Unfortunately she allows a fairly reasonable argument to be sidetracked by one rancher who she says has found, "alarmingly, several copies of the Quran." Yeah, right, the Quran. That's not crazy at all. I think the situation is bad enough without making up crap like that.

Another person writing in favour of the bill is Dan Stein, president of the Federation for American Immigration Reform (http://articles.latimes.com/2010/apr/30/opinion/la-oe-stein-20100430). He too brings up the financial burden on "Arizona, writing, "...state taxpayers spend more than $2-billion a year on education and health-care for illegal immigrants and their children." Now that's some serious coin that his groups study shows is being spent, but I wonder if since they know where the money is being spent why not just round them all up and buy bus tickets home for them? Seems that $2-billion would buy a lot of bus tickets. Dan also addresses the racial profiling thing, pointing out that, "under the law, Arizona police are prohibited from racial profiling or stopping anybody merely because of appearance or ethnicity." All right, lets get into the racial profiling thing.

I have read through the bill a couple of times and I have not seen anything identifying the illegal aliens as having come from Mexico. Everybody talks about the illegals crossing from Mexico, but the bill is a little more general than that. Technically this bill refers to illegals from Ireland, Tibet, New Zealand, South Africa, Antarctica, and pretty much everywhere, which is good. Mexico is not being singled out. I suspect that this is what they mean when the pro people say there is no racial profiling in the bill. Now let's look at the real world. Let's say there is an illegal from Germany, an illegal from Ireland, an illegal from Australia, a US citizen of Hispanic background, and me, all standing by where a window has been broken in a business in Arizona. Now, since the broken window creates a "reasonable suspicion" that a law has been broken, when the Arizona police show up they are now in "lawful contact" with the five of us. Of the five of us, which is going to be asked to prove their US citizenship? Fine, SB 1070 does not mention racial profiling, but honestly, where are the illegal immigrants coming from that they are worried about in Arizona? Obviously racial profiling will be a result of this bill.

So how does this bill improve the situation in the great state of Arizona? Everything the advocates say the bill is for is already illegal. Drug smuggling and/or people smuggling - both illegal. Hiring an illegal alien - illegal. Border security is not toughened up any and now police officers will have to, by law, check everyone they pull over to see if they are US citizen or a legal resident of the United States (remember, no racial profiling). Of course if they were to only check people of Hispanic background, well, can you spell "lawsuit"?

Something already being made worse by the bill is the Arizona economy, which had just begun to bounce back after the recent financial "kick in the sack". The "hospitality" industry is being smacked pretty good, with tourists avoiding the place and conventions cancelling. The American Immigration Lawyers Association will be relocating it's fall conference from a resort in Scottsdale to another state. They are hoping to renegotiate the cancellation fee, which could run as high as $92,000 (which is a funny idea. Why would any organization ever go back to a resort that had charged them $92,000 for nothing? Is this resort, the Camelback Inn, such horrible place that there is no way they could ever fill those rooms even with five months notice? Still, the A.I.L.A. signed the contract, and they are lawyers, so there it is.) Vice-president of communications for the Scottsdale Convention and Visitors Bureau, Laura McMurchie has expressed concern about the negative impact of SB 1070 on tourism and she also points out that the bill was not designed to have a negative impact on tourism (although for the first time Mexico has issued a travel advisory to it's citizens to be careful in Arizona). Personally I am just sort of revolted by the idea of travelling to a place where people are treated differently just because of the colour of their skin.

The Sheraton Tucson is also taking a hit with the loss of at least two conventions. "I know people are very passionate about this, but a boycott is just going to hurt everybody in this state. People still need to work here," says Sheraton Tucson general manager, Damen Kompanowski. I am wondering who Damen is talking to here, people who live in Arizona or to people from outside Arizona who no longer want to visit because of the bill. Phoenix based attorney, Lisa Devlin, a hospitality law expert, says, "if groups decide to cancel, it will have a sweeping impact on the state and penalize people who don't deserve to be penalized, including hotel service workers, taxi drivers, the trickle down effect..." Polls have said that as many as 70% of Arizonians approving of this bill, and was Ms Devlin being ironic when she said, "penalize people who don't deserve to be penalized"?

So, does Arizona have a very serious problem with illegal aliens? Absolutely they do. Is SB 1070 the way to go? I don't believe so. The net is spread too wide and unintentional racism is still racism.

Anyway... Humouroceros

American Hardcore

I just watched American Hardcore again. Man. "In the early 80's...the whole country goes into this really puerile 50's fantasy where they're dressing in these cardigan sweaters and we were just, like, fuck you. Fuck you. Not us. You can take that and shove up your ass." Vic Bondi - Articles of Faith



Yeah, time to be crazy again.

Anyway... Humouroceros

Mississippi larnin'

Ah yes, in a successful effort to make themselves look as stupid and petty as possible the Wesson Attendance Center and the Copiah County School District out of the great state of Mississippi has taken on one of their own honor society students. Ceara Sturgis, Honor Society member and 2010 Graduate, wanted to wear a tuxedo in her graduation portrait for the yearbook, and the school was "uncomfortable" with that wish and so to teach Ceara a lesson (they are, after all, a school) they completely removed her photograph from the grad portrait section of the yearbook. There are other photos of Ceara in the yearbook, including one of her in her tuxedo on a page paid for by her family, but there is no acknowledgment of her in the grad portraits. Plenty of room for the druggies and the drop-outs, but no room for Ceara.

Copiah County School District spokesperson, Martha Traxler, had no comment on the story although an appropriate comment from the District members would probably have run along the lines of, "Yep, we're a bunch of world-class a-holes. No doubt about it!" In fact I am confident that is exactly what they would have said were they capable of mouth sounds more sophisticated than, "Ghnnnnnnnn." Still, there is hope that one day all these folks will be gone and normal people will take their places. In the meantime the Mississippi ACLU has yet to decide whether they will sue the crap out of the District on Ceara's behalf.

Mississippi is also the great state where the Itawamba County Agricultural High School actually cancelled the senior prom because Constance McMillan wanted to attend with her girlfriend. Well they certainly showed her, by jingo! But bizarrely, or Mississippily enough the story doesn't end there. In late April Constance and her date were invited to a senior prom at a local country club in Fulton, Mississippi. It turned out to be a "fake" prom with only Constance, her date, and five other unpopular students invited. All the other "good" students had gone off to another prom where they wouldn't be distracted by "undesirables" and they could just get on with line-dancing and farm-animal molesting (I understand the chickens were very popular this year.)

So, who were the utterly clever people who planned this totally hyuu-larious turn of events? Why it was the parents of the other students! What a great and hardly slimy at all bunch of folks. Teaching their kids that if someone is different it is okay to dump on them and hey, maybe bully them up a bit. After all, lying is a good thing and chickens are finger lickin' good! One actually valuable lesson they missed but probably really could have used though could have been taught to them by Constance, had she not been having a good time at the "fake" prom, and that is how to be a good person. Something that there is no way in hell their parents will ever be able to teach. I swear, Constance has more class in her little finger than anyone else in that town has in their entire body.

I think the final question is, what is the matter with so many of the people in Mississippi? It seems that if you don't want to toe the party line and be a clone along with everybody else you are not welcome. Hanging ten with those biblically based values certainly makes it easier, what with not having to think or anything, and it beats having a mind of your own, I guess. Just to be on the safe side though I think I would want the water checked if I lived there. There is something seriously wrong with people who do these sorts of things. Seriously wrong.

Anyway... Humouroceros