Monthly Archives: September 2012

Current events - national, Humor, Politics

In the News

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Recent stories abound about students dissatisfied with the new school lunches.

Am I the only one who sees a disconnect between the “Children are starving”  squeals from the Left and the “Childhood obesity is an epidemic” squeals, also from the Left?

A little boy and his friend sat on a park bench in DC gorging themselves on McDonalds Happy Meals.

Michelle Obama’s motorcade was passing by when she had the driver stop.  She told them that fast food isn’t healthy and they shouldn’t eating that garbage.

One boy responded, “My great grandmother lived well into her 90s.”

“Oh,” she replied,” and did she eat a lot of fast food?”

“No” said the boy, ” but she knew how to mind her own business.”

( the joke is from “JBinIll” on CSP Gun Talk)

The Name Game

The Name Game #296

On this rainy morning in Louisiana I walked out for the paper and hurried back in.  We have a system of thunderstorms moving through, and I can hear thunder in the distance as I sit here sipping a fine cup of morning coffee.

Let’s see what we have this week.  The announcements, twenty-nine of them, all come from the big hospital across the river. Fifteen of those new babies have progressive parents who eschew those tired old social conventions and mores about marriage.  And this week we have a couple of examples of the virgin birth, or its modern equivalent, “It could’ve been any of a DOZEN guys, Mom!”

Diving right on in:

Gerald & Kayla D. give their daughter a stripper name, Lexie Kayleen.

Joe’l(!) & Odelia M. perpetuate a travesty with their son, little Joe’l RaShande.  And yes, I am aware that there is a Cajun singer who goes by “Jo-El” but that doesn’t make THIS a good idea.  There’s a singer that goes by “Will.i.am” too, and that’s ALSO stupid.  And seriously… “RaShande”?  “Honey, da dog ate da Scrabble set.  These is da pieces I could find!”

Donovan C. & Dacia B. do a daughter with Jailey La’Nai.  Do you REALLY want your kid’s name to include “jail”?  “I dunno what happened.  She did okay up until middle school, den she got all jailey!”

Prentiss & Amber B. present their baby girl, little Karmyn Grace, because they don’t want their daughter mistaken for a selection from a Crayola box.

Terence R. & Dynesha(!) M. bring a son, little Drake Antione.  Note that the second name is “Antione”, not the oh so common and plebian “Antoine”, so you know his parents are people of quality.

Trent & Megan M. show their son, little Braxton Blade.  Sounds like an intermediate goal in a role-playing game.

Jimmy & Tiffany T. got nervous about that “ck” letter combo, so they saved their son from it, giving us little Jaxson Henry who’ll spend his life saying “NO!  Not ‘C-K’!  ‘X’!  ‘J-A-X-S-O-N’!”

Corey M. & Julie R. bring a son, little Keithan Dre.  Which is WAAAAY different than “Keith Andre”.

Cedric R. & Jii’Lana(with TWO “i’s”) L. do a daughter with an apostrophicated name of her own, little Lai’ahna Marie.

Miss Laura P. presents her baby girl, little Shamiya Rockill, because “Raquelle” is too hard to spell.  And baby daddy?  Nope!

Miss Kendrea G. apostrophicates her daughter, little A’niylah Jaslynn.  The punctuation takes the place of the baby daddy.

Richard B. & Megan B.(different last names) get all vowelly on their son, little Khaedyn Ion, naming him after a car they saw in the Wal-Mart parking lot.

Derrick & Tasha A. do a son, little Darryn Rai, because if you spell names different, people will think you’re daring and sophisticated.  Or dumber’n a sack of hammers.

And that’s the end of the list this week.

History

Today in History – September 30

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1452 – First European book printed with moveable type, Johann Gutenberg’s Bible, in Mainz, Germany. Mainz has a terrific museum devoted to printing, including a display of an original Gutenberg Bible. It’s worth a visit if you’re in the area. I was.

1544 – King Henry VIII draws his armies out of France. His army leaves behind a considerable amount of genetic material.

1791 – The Magic Flute, the last opera composed by Mozart, receives its premiere performance at Freihaus-Theater auf der Wieden in Vienna, Austria.

1791 – The National Constituent Assembly in Paris is dissolved; Parisians hail Maximilien Robespierre and Jérôme Pétion as incorruptible patriots. Yeah. Just like Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid are “incorruptible patriots”. And cool move, there Gaston: You get rid of a monarchy and pass control to a dictatorship by moonbat.

1841 – Samuel Slocum patented the stapler. Hey! A milestone IS a milestone…

1882 – Thomas Edison’s first commercial hydroelectric power plant (later known as Appleton Edison Light Company) begins operation on the Fox River in Appleton, Wisconsin, United States.

1938 – At 2:00 am, Britain, France, Germany and Italy sign the Munich Agreement, allowing Germany to occupy the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia. Neville Chamberlain forever sets the standard for moonbat politicians being flim-flammed by dictators when he returns to London, waves a copy of the agreement and says it means “peace in our time.” Hitler says “a little piece of Poland, a little piece of France…” (and extra points if you can identify where the Hitler quote comes from…)

1938 – The League of Nations unanimously outlaws “intentional bombings of civilian populations”. Yeah, that worked. The League of Nations died. If only the UN would do the same…

1949 – Berlin Airlift ends after 277,000 flights. America faces down the Soviet Union. Today’s Left would not only have signed West Berlin Over to them, but would have held a star-studded concert to celebrate.

1954 – The U.S. Navy submarine USS Nautilus is commissioned as the world’s first nuclear reactor powered vessel.

1968 – First Boeing 747 rolls out. American aviation shows the world how it’s done.

2005 – The controversial drawings of Muhammad are printed in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten. Muslims are driven to a killing frenzy by cartoons. Who knew? Other things that drive Muslims into a killing frenzy: Days that end with “y”. Puppies. Music. People smiling.

History

Today in History – September 29

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1789 – The U.S. War Department first establishes a regular army with a strength of several hundred men.

1916 – John D. Rockefeller becomes the first billionaire. Oil!

1936 – Radio used for first time for a presidential campaign. Obama loyalists try to get the ads pulled.

1938 – Treaty of Munich signed by Hitler, Mussolini, Daladier & Chamberlain. “If we give them a little of what they want, they will think we’re nice people and stop doing mean things.”

1942 – French government of De Gaulle cancels agreement of Munich. the REAL French government, still actually IN actually in FRANCE is collaborating its butt off. That 1938 agreement in Munich wasn’t worth the paper it was written on. Of course, from the safety of England, neither is the De Gaulle government…

1991 – Military coup in Haiti. Still having trouble with that whole ‘election’ thing…

Technology, Wheels of Industry

winner!

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As an electrical power person, I end up on a lot of mailing lists for various vendors.  Periodically I get tagged to participate in surveys about new products, old products, customer service, etc.  Quite often, participation puts one’s name in the hopper for prize drawings.  Last year I won a $50 giftcard which went to a nice dinner for two.

Last week I got an email that I’d won a new iPad 3 for answering a couple pages of questions about fiberglass conduit.

The thing arrived today.  Brand new, in an Apple-sealed box, a 16-gig wifi model.  I just finished upgrading the operating system to iOS6 and uploading my music library, and I still have almost four gigs of space left on it.

It’s a neat unit.  Darn those Apple folks!

History

Today in History – September 28

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1066 – William the Conqueror invades England: the Norman Conquest begins. Part of what makes us what we are…

1781 – American forces backed by a French fleet begin the siege of Yorktown, Virginia, during the American Revolutionary War.

1850 – US Navy abolishes flogging as punishment.

1928 – Sir Alexander Fleming notices a bacteria-killing mold growing in his laboratory, discovering what later became known as penicillin. He wasn’t “Sir” back then, just a science geek playing with bread mold.

1938 – Dutch Premier Colijn sends radio message “No war coming” . See! They had pacifist moonbats back then, too. 1940 – Nazi occupiers present “New Dutch Culture” in German. Premier Colijn is now right. The war was short and nasty and the Netherlands lost. Now they have ‘peace’.

1939 – Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union agree on a division of Poland after their invasion during World War II. It’s a neat agreement between two blood-thirsty amoral dictators. Two years later Hitler decides that he wants ALL of Poland. And the Ukraine. And everything else.

1958 – France ratifies a new Constitution of France; the French Fifth Republic is then formed upon the formal adoption of the new constitution on October 4. The way things are going, the next one will be written in Arabic, based on sharia.

1961 – A military coup in Damascus effectively ends the United Arab Republic, the union between Egypt and Syria, which brings up a seldom-considered point: If the Arab world DIDN’T have a common enemy, Israel, they they’d be quite happily slaughtering each other.

Wheels of Industry

Hobby With a Paycheck

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Good day today! Had a ten o’clock meeting at the high-rise office building downtown at the offices of the electric company, with representation from our company and the engineering company that is working on our proposal to liquify natural gas and sell it overseas.

That’s fun stuff for several reasons.

One is that I used to WORK for the electric company and have more than a little knowledge of the physical arrangement and capacities of the local grid. Makes me a sort of “Q-ship” (Historical reference) at these meetings.

Second, I LOVE high voltage power systems, and today’s conversation on how we might get electricity to feed our new plant involved equipment at the 230 and 500 kV levels. That’s five hundred THOUSAND volts. I had to restrain myself to keep from giggling like a schoolgirl. And we had conversations about ring buses and ‘breaker and a half’ schemes and 50,000 horsepower motors and new transmission lines. Work doesn’t GET more fun than that.

Third, we have a good group of guys. Good people to work with.

Sad part is that I’m sixty-two, and we’re talking about a project that won’t complete until I’m sixty-seven, but I just might figure out a way to hang around this thing. Who wants to retire when he can be around to push the button on fifty thousand horsepower? Vegas? Buddy, I can SHOW you some flashing lights!

Current events - global, Current events - national, Politics

A Peek Inside the Hive Mind

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This went out via email to the obamanation a few minutes ago:

Friend —

Or lackey or stooge or tool…

Mitt Romney agreed it’s “fair” that millionaires and billionaires like himself pay a lower tax rate than many middle-class families do.

Really? I looked at the numbers. Here’s a fact, straight out of MY life: If I didn’t have a teen-aged son living under my roof, I’d have to look for shelter from the confiscatory practices of the Federal government. But as a ‘family’, there’s no way I will pay more then Mitt. And yes, I’m hopelessly middle-class. Next year, when son rolls off, obama’s IRS (Not Romney’s IRS) thinks I won’t need as much as I earn, so they’ll take a bit more to make sure that I can stand in line at the grocery store and watch what the lady with the four kids and the EBT card buys.

That’s not our spin — that’s straight from Romney. On “60 Minutes” this week, he actually agreed that it’s “fair” that he got to pay a lower tax rate on the millions he made last year than a worker making $50,000 paid. Why? “It’s the right way to encourage economic growth.”

As opposed to taking the money that would have been spent at businesses who, like, hire people and make factories work? Take money that encourages people to work for their out ways in the world? Money that pays for children’s college WITHOUT them resorting to student loans?

Oh, no! That money should be TAKEN from the people who earned it and given to a vast bureaucracy filled with people who know better how to distribute it.

As anyone who’s been paying attention over the past few decades knows, Romney is flat-out wrong. Tax breaks for millionaires and tax hikes for middle-class families lead to endless deficits, not economic growth or job creation. That’s why President Obama is fighting to ensure that millionaires like Romney pay their share.

Truth. A 100% tax rate on millionaires wouldn’t make an appreciable difference in the exorbitant spending of the government. And as soon as (G-d forbid!) obama gets re-elected, you can bet that there’ll be that hand-wringing speech where he announces that the ‘fair share’ of the middle class needs to get bigger, too, because the lower class is getting bigger. And bigger. And golly, we just can’t PRINT them money, can we? (But we’re doing that already.)

We put together some content that looks at Mitt Romney’s idea of tax fairness, as well as a couple videos that look at Romney’s positions on education, which he talked about this week. Check them out, and make sure your friends do, too.

What it boils down to, folks, is that we can, under obama’s caring watch, tax this country to a standstill and we can’t send enough money to Washington to pay off the national debt AND keep up with the ‘entitlements’.

Anybody with half a brain can see it’s teetering and knows it’s gonna fall.

Another truth? Electing Romney’s not going to stop it. Might slow it down. But it’s gonna break.

Did you notice the riots in Spain and Greece in the last couple of days? Short version: the ‘citizenry’ is upset because governments are introducing ‘austerity measures’ in the face of imminent fiscal collapse in those countries. People are used to getting a lot of stuff from the government, and it’s stopping, and people are upset. Honestly, what do you think it would look like in the middle of any city in this country if Washington announced a fifty percent cut in welfare programs? If you think that riots are something in Europe, you don’t realize how thin the veneer of civilization lies in inner city America.

MY friends have some idea of these facts, and as I say often, a wise man (or woman) prepares.

History

Today in History – September 27

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1777 – Lancaster, Pennsylvania is the capital of the United States, for one day. For one brief day the population becomes example of large number of self-serving… nah… THAT’S Washington today. It took them a while to get that way, but they’ve got the act down pat now….

1821 – Mexico gains its independence from Spain, has been a bright example of good government ever since…

1903 – Wreck of the Old 97, a train crash made famous by the song of the same name. “They gave him his orders in Monroe, Virginia, said “Steve, you’re ‘way behind time…”


1908 – The first production of the Ford Model T automobile was built at the Piquette Plant in Detroit, Michigan. You could have any color you wanted, as long as it was black.

1941 – The SS Patrick Henry is launched becoming the first of more than 2,700 Liberty ships. America’s might produced ships like cupcakes…

1942 Last day of the September Matanikau action on Guadalcanal as United States Marine Corps troops barely escape after being surrounded by Japanese forces near the Matanikau River. A Coastie by the name of Douglas Munro gave his life to rescue a group of Marines trapped by the Japanese. His last words were, ”Did they all get off?” His medal was awarded by the Navy for his work with the Marines. He is the ONLY member of the Coast Guard to ever receive the Medal of Honor.

1964 – The Warren Commission releases its report, concluding that Lee Harvey Oswald, acting alone, assassinated President John F. Kennedy. It is widely debated as a cover-up.

1979 – The United States Department of Education receives final approval from the U.S. Congress to become the 13th US Cabinet agency. Public education is fast becoming equivalent in quality to public housing and public toilets.

1998 – The Google internet search engine retrospectively claims this as its birthday.