Okay, which moronette is in Florida?

Florida, it's always Florida.
The set-up
Trooper Gary Dunick said. "If I wasn't there, I wouldn't have believed it. About 10 years ago I stopped a guy in the exact same spot ... who had three or four syringes sticking out of his arm. It was just surreal and I thought, 'Nothing will ever beat this.' Well, this takes it."

So what beats that?
The hero
The day before the wreck, Barnes was convicted in an Upper Keys court of DUI with a prior and driving with a suspended license, ...was ordered to impound her car, and her driver's license was revoked for five years,

Oopsie, but still not that weird.
Wait for it....wait for it.....
troopers say a two-vehicle crash Tuesday at Mile Marker 21 on Cudjoe Key was caused by a 37-year-old woman driver who was shaving her bikini area while her ex-husband took the wheel from the passenger seat.

They don't mention any jerking off, I'm going to assume he got his pants zipped up before the police showed up.

Via Boortz. I can't believe he beat Drudge to that story.
Sorta like when I see this at Ace's next week I'll know I was first. 
Again.

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Wait. Bipartisanship? In DC?

Teh Won is fighting hard to get some semblance of bipartisanship.  He promised to bring sweeping change and hope and unicorns and rainbows and skittles to D.C., and instead, all he's achieved is the Chicago Way and infighting and hatred and anger.

That said, it's got to be refreshing for the administration to finally get some cooperation between the GOP and the Democrats.  It's got to be nice to know that there's some common ground between these two parties.  Perhaps, even, a sign of great things to come for Big O and his plans to turn America into one big entitlement nannarchy.  A place where Democrats and Republicans can hold hands and agree with each other!

Except, of course, that this bipartisanship is in opposition of his NASA budget and the cancellation of Constellation ... which means that the only time Obama can get two parties to meet in the middle is when they're opposing him.

That tastes almost as good as bacon.

Obama's plan to terminate Constellation, including the Orion crew exploration vehicle and Ares family of rockets, encountered bipartisan resistance from House and Senate lawmakers during budget hearings held in February.

 On Wednesday, Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, proposed a new bill that, if passed, would extend the space shuttle program for two years beyond its planned 2010 retirement.

 Hutchison's bill would also require the space agency to study options for a new launcher that could be ready to deliver U.S. astronauts to the International Space Station by the end of 2013 and beyond low Earth orbit by the end of 2018.

 The bill, dubbed the Human Space Flight Capability Assurance and Enhancement Act, calls for spending an additional $3.4 billion between 2010 and 2012 to keep the space shuttle flying. It would require NASA to spread out its four remaining shuttle missions, now slated to wrap up by October, and potentially add additional flights.

 Companion legislation is expected to be introduced in the House next week by U.S. Reps. Suzanne Kosmas, D-Fla., and Bill Posey, R-Fla.

3.4 billion is peanuts to this administration.  And, hey, bipartisanship's gotta count for something, right?

Posted by: Ember at 08:14 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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I will never get tired of giving out B+'s.

In typical Teh Won short-sightedness, it looks like shutting down Constellation - the program that was supposed to get us back on the moon - is going to be harder than it sounds.  Funny how, when you sign a contract and then decide to reneg on it, you still have to pay the people you contracted.  Then, to further complicate matters, as I mentioned a few months ago, Congress has made it impossible for NASA to cancel any of its space programs without express consent from - oh, yes! - Congress.  Not Teh Won, but Congress.

Delicious, delicious irony.

Letters have gone out to Constellation contractors, asking how much it will cost to shut their work down. Monday, NASA wrote to ATK Launch Systems Inc., which is building the first stage of the Ares I, requesting estimates of termination costs "as of the end of this and each of the next three [financial] quarters."

The agency was careful to point out that the letter "is in no way to be construed as direction to cease [work]." Congress has forbidden NASA from canceling any part of Constellation without its permission, which so far it shows no signs of giving.

Indeed, about 30 members of Congress wrote Bolden recently to warn that his efforts to prepare for termination without permission from Congress — including gathering information about closeout costs — could be viewed as illegal.

Then, at a hearing Thursday, some of those same members berated Bolden for not having a cost figure.

"You really don't have a handle on what the cancellation cost will be," said U.S. Rep. Rob Bishop, R- Utah, in disbelief. "To me, it's somewhat of a backwards approach. It would be nice for a congressman or somebody making policy decisions if we knew what the costs would be before you actually make that decision."

This is such a giant clusterfuck, and it gives me immense, incredible joy to point out that The Suit-In-Chief hasn't had the foresight to consider any of this before he went about shutting down an expensive program that is all about the Hope and Change he tries to espouse.  Shit, the Congressional rule that NASA can't close shit down without their permission happened in 2009, which means that it crossed Obama's fucking desk! 

I hate to go back to an old meme, but seriously, Obama, good, solid B+.  Yep.

(H/T Slashdot via Joe Collins)

Posted by: Ember at 01:46 PM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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Forget about vision; get a clue.

Remember, once upon a time, in a far away land (also known as a month ago), when NASA was supposed to be getting man back on the moon?  Do you also remember that the Obama administration cut the funding and the projects that would, in fact, get us back to the moon and started to turn NASA into a global-warming - er, excuse me, climate change - monitoring agency? 

Apparently, this has a few of the fine congresscritters up on the hill a bit miffed.  With NASA.  Not the administration's budget, oh, no, but with NASA.  Yep.

NASA needs to go somewhere specific, not just talk about it, skeptical U.S. senators told the space agency chief Wednesday.

 President Barack Obama's proposed budget kills the previous administration's return-to-the-moon mission, sometimes nicknamed "Apollo on steroids." That leaves the space agency adrift without a goal or destination, senators and outside experts said at a Senate Commerce science and space subcommittee hearing, the first since Obama unveiled his new space plan this month.

 On top of that the nation's space shuttle fleet is only months away from long-planned retirement, an issue for senators from Florida, where NASA is a major employer. And while the new NASA plan includes extra money — $6 billion over five years — for private spaceships and developing new rocket technology, NASA shouldn't be just about spending, the senators said. It should be about John F. Kennedy-like vision.

Um, Earth to dumbasses:

more...

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Color me a little skeptical

The Daily Mail is reporting that a US Soldier stationed at Ft. Lewis has been accused of waterboarding his 4 year old daughter because she couldn't recite the alphabet.

The link they attempt to draw is that his service made him do it -

Police have not revealed Tabor's military service, but his base is home to units that have served in Iraq and Afghanistan.

I'm a little skeptical. First, I haven't heard this reported on local news so I kind of doubt the story in general. Second, Parents abuse kids everyday and it has nothing to do with military service so this is a cheap shot at the military.

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We're going to the happiest place on Earth! Tijuana!

Via Tim Blair we see that there's a threat against one of the world's great resources, Dutch bestiality pr0n! They're working on making it illegal.

This will just drive it underground and all sorts of wrong things will start happening. Like underage mules and unconsenting chickens getting fucked.
Oh the human...errr...bestiality!

I'm not sure why, but this made me laugh.
precise figures on animal pornography video sales are difficult to find.

Heh, I bet.
As an aside, I shudder to think of the searches that hit this post.
Further aside, I really just wanted to post something in "I'm afraid I can't blog that" category.
Further, further aside, I'm getting sick of scraping snow off my satellite dish every 45 minutes so I can watch TV.

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Hope you can't believe in!

Hot on the heels of Big O deciding to turn NASA from a space agency to a global-warming tracker, Iran is announcing that Kavoshgar-3 (translated as Explorer-3) has been successfully launched into space with a mouse, a couple of turtles, and some worms on it. 

Why, do you ask, does this matter, when many other countries have done the same thing with more advanced species?

Well, aside from the implications of Iran having a fully functioning space program on national defense and security (if you can send a ship to space, you can send a rocket just about anywhere), there is our own standing in the world as a strong power in technology and space to consider.  While Iran continues to push forward with nuclear technology that we definitely don't like, they also plan on having a man in orbit within the next ten years.  Meanwhile, we've decided to stop working on spacecraft that have the potential to take a man beyond orbit.

Space travel is about the first half of Obama's campaign platform - hope.  About the hope and desire of mankind, and Americans, to make an impact, not just on our earth, but on the universe.  To know what's out there and what it's like, to learn new things about the marvels around us, and, to get a little Trekkie on you, "to seek out new life and explore strange new worlds." 

But, I guess, that's just not the kind of hope that Obama was talking about.

As usual.

Posted by: Ember at 09:40 PM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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This Mutinous Cretin Does Not Speak For Conservatism

Usually, I blow off the "guilt by six degrees of separation" that the left loves to play against us, because I refuse to be cowed for the actions or people I do not know, nor have ever known. Besides, that tactic is disingenuous and lazy. But not this time. This asshole (warning: Lefty link) does not speak for me. This asshole does not speak for conservatism. This asshole needs to get HIS asshole forcibly widened for what he has done. And this asshole needs to be thrown down a hole and forgotten about. The fact that this guy is a child rapist is enough to convince me that he needs to be purged from humanity and civil society, and I would say nothing more about him. But, the fact that he is a member of a group that strikes me as mutinous is something that needs to be called out.

Mutinous? I think so. You see, the Oath Keepers, of which this Charles Dyer cat claims to be a member of, have this as their mission statement:

Below is our declaration of orders we will NOT obey because we will consider them unconstitutional (and thus unlawful) and immoral violations of the natural rights of the people. Such orders would be acts of war against the American people by their own government, and thus acts of treason. We will not make war against our own people. We will not commit treason. We will defend the Republic.

Umm...an organized and coordinated plan to refuse to follow orders? Last time I checked, this term came up in my UCMJ knowledge.

Mutiny? Yes. Mutiny.

Look pal, if you have issues about orders, there are avenues of redress. But an organized and coordinated plan based not on an abusive or insane Commanding Officer, but (apparently) solely on the fact you do not like who is in charge? NO. FUCKING. WAY. A long time ago, I took a fucking oath to serve the fucking Constitution, and this shit will not be tolerated. This shit will not be allowed anywhere near where I stand. And if I were still in the military, I would have pushed for any Oath Keeper to be arrested on the spot for being involved in an activity as such (besides, I would be arrested if I knew of such a plot and did nothing. But that's another issue for another time).

No. I will not tolerate mutiny or sedition. This Constitution and Republic have a way of cleansing itself without criminal fucking activity. Any asshole who takes the oath and then involves themselves in what appears to be a mutinous endeavor needs to be sent away, for they have violated their commitment and oath. They have violated the Republican (not the party, but the system of government) process, the process that can and will fix itself.  And they are of no use to those of us who wish to save this country by legal and electoral means.

Get the fuck out of my sight, Charles Dyer and the rest of you folks associated with him. And stay away from my military.

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Another Senate Race To Watch

This time, it's the Republican Primary in Illinois, which pits Mark Kirk against a bunch of other people, including a Tea Party Endorsed candidate. Needless to say, I am not a fan of the RNC and GOP leadership, but the gay slurs being thrown around by one of his opponents is a disgrace.

Look, oppose Kirk for his voting record. Oppose Kirk for his stance on issues. Oppose Kirk just because. But gay baiting? Fuck. And. No. The people doing that need to be jackhammered by a steer so deep that their ears get jealous.

So fuck off, gay baiters. And come up with a better reason to oppose a guy.

 

***NOTE: I ORIGINALLY THOUGHT THE TEA PARTY GUY WAS THE ONE MAKING THE GAY SLURS. BUT  I WAS WRONG. SOME OTHER GUY IS DOING THE SLUR STUFF. REGARDLESS OF WHO SPREADS THE RUMORS, WE SHOULD LEAVE SOMEBODY'S CHOICE OF (LEGAL, NO CHRIS HANSEN PAYS YOU A VISIT TYPE) GENITAL GRATIFICATION OUT OF OUR VOTING PATTERNS ***

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What is it with Russia and space lately?

In a move sure to have PETA up in arms, the Russians are contemplating sending monkeys to Mars.

You can't make this shit up.

“We have plans to return to space,” said Zurab Mikvabia, director of the Institute of Experimental Pathology and Therapy in Georgia which supplied apes for the programme in the 1980s.

The Institute is in preliminary talks with Russia's Cosmonautics Academy about preparing monkeys for a simulated Mars mission that could lay the groundwork for sending an ape to the Red Planet, he said.

Such an initiative would build on Mars-500, a joint Russian-European project that saw six human volunteers confined in a capsule in Moscow for 120 days earlier this year to simulate a Mars mission.

Mr Mikvabia said: "Earlier this programme was aimed at sending cosmonauts, people (to Mars).

"But given the length of the flight to Mars, and given the cosmic rays for which we don't have adequate protection over such a long trip, discussions have focused recently on sending an ape instead of a person."

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Move over, Hollywood, it's Russia's turn to blow up an asteroid.

The nerd in me gets all giggly and happy at the thought of someone actually talking about sending a mission to an asteroid to knock it off course so it doesn't hit earth.  The bigger nerd in me can't figure out why, when the calculated odds of the asteroid actually impacting earth are 1 in 250,000, a country would spend what will likely amount to billions of dollars on trying to deflect said asteroid from its path.  The even bigger nerd in me is up in arms that it's a Russian idea and not an idea from NASA.  (Of course, the pragmatist in me that doesn't want to waste NASA funding on a 1 in 250,000 chance is glad it's not NASA.)

So many conflicted inner nerds.  I don't know what to do.

In October, NASA lowered the odds that Apophis could hit Earth in 2036 from a 1-in-45,000 as earlier thought to a 1-in-250,000 chance after researchers recalculated the asteroid's path. It said another close encounter in 2068 will involve a 1-in-330,000 chance of impact.

Without mentioning NASA findings, Perminov said that he heard from a scientist that Apophis is getting closer and may hit the planet. "I don't remember exactly, but it seems to me it could hit the Earth by 2032," Perminov said.

"People's lives are at stake. We should pay several hundred million dollars and build a system that would allow to prevent a collision, rather than sit and wait for it to happen and kill hundreds of thousands of people," Perminov said.

Scientists have long theorized about asteroid deflection strategies. Some have proposed sending a probe to circle around a dangerous asteroid to gradually change its trajectory. Others suggested sending a spacecraft to collide with the asteroid and alter its momentum, or using nuclear weapons to hit it.

Perminov wouldn't disclose any details of the project, saying they still need to be worked out. But he said the mission wouldn't require any nuclear explosions.

Hollywood action films "Deep Impact" and "Armageddon," have featured space missions scrambling to avoid catastrophic collisions. In both movies space crews use nuclear bombs in an attempt to prevent collisions.

"Calculations show that it's possible to create a special purpose spacecraft within the time we have, which would help avoid the collision without destroying it (the asteroid) and without detonating any nuclear charges," Perminov said. "The threat of collision can be averted."

Boris Shustov, the director of the Institute of Astronomy under the Russian Academy of Sciences, hailed Perminov's statement as a signal that officials had come to recognize the danger posed by asteroids.

"Apophis is just a symbolic example, there are many other dangerous objects we know little about," he said, according to RIA Novosti news agency.

Posted by: Ember at 01:14 PM | Comments (8) | Add Comment
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Another airplane that didn't get blown up ...

I thought, with all this talk of mean Nigerians trying to blow up perfectly good airplanes with firecrackers, a news story about somebody not trying to blow up airplanes with firecrackers would be appreciated.  You're welcome.

In the world of competitive paper airplane throwing [there's such a thing as a "world of competitive paper airplane throwing"? -ed.], a 20-second flight is exceptional, 25 or better is world class.

Thirty is the stuff dreams are made of.

Only one man — Japanese paper airplane virtuoso Takuo Toda — has ever come close to breaking the 30-second barrier. On Sunday, he set a world record for a hand-launched plane made with only paper, but fell just short of the 30-second mark.

Toda, flying a 10-centimeter-long craft of his own design, made 10 attempts to break his own record of 27.9 seconds set earlier this year in Hiroshima but failed to best his previous mark, settling for a 26.1-second flight.

That was still the best ever recorded for a strictly paper-only craft. His 27.9 record was set with a plane that had tape on it.

[...]

Toda, an engineer, is the head of the Japan Origami Airplane Association and is virtually unmatched in his ability to fold paper aircraft.

In keeping with traditional rules of the ancient Japanese art of origami, he uses only one sheet of paper, which he does not cut or paste.

He flew two variations of his world record-setting paper airplane Sunday — the one he used to set the duration record in April and an updated version with a fin. His April mark was recognized by Guinness World Records.

He did not use tape Sunday, which is allowed by Guinness. He chose to forgo tape because he wanted to follow traditional origami rules. His 26.1 mark was the best ever for a plane without cellophane tape keeping it together. Toda had that previous best as well, just over 24 seconds.

"I will get the 30-second record," he said. "It's just a matter of time."

Toda said that the secret to throwing a paper airplane is to aim upward — not straight — so that it has time to gain altitude and slowly circle back to the ground. Toda appeared to be on his way to a record Sunday, but his second and best throw was ruled a foul because it hit a passenger jetliner parked nearby [I'm not even sure how that happens; why are they throwing paper airplanes on a tarmack? -ed.].

"It's really a sport," he said. "The throwing technique is very delicate."

Along with breaking the 30-second barrier, Toda said his next goal was to launch a paper airplane from space. With funding from Japan's space agency, JAXA, Toda and a team of scientists have designed a plane they believe can withstand the intense heat of re-entry.

One of Toda's designs was scheduled to be released from the International Space Station this year, but that plan fell through in part because of problems with devising a means of tracking the planes as they fell back to Earth.

Toda and his colleagues are currently trying to interest Chinese or Russian space officials in reviving the idea.

We let Russia beat us into space.  We cannot let them beat us in the throwing-paper-airplanes-out-of-a-multi-billion-dollar-space-craft race.  Something should be done about this!

Posted by: Ember at 09:00 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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To Saturn ... and beyond!

Saturn's most famous moon, Titan, may be getting a visit from earth in the semi-near future.  In case you're unaware, Titan is cool because it has a lot of things that earth has - liquid lakes and seas, a weather system complete with rain and wind.  Of all the places in our solar system, Titan is the most similar to earth in many respects.  Now, of course, since Titan is orbiting Saturn, it is far from being in the Goldilocks zone, and is very, very cold, so it doesn't rain water and its seas aren't made of water. 

We could still learn all kinds of cool things from Titan.  If, for example, we learn that weather patterns behave similarily on Titan, we can use that data here on earth.  The group proposing this most recent trip would also use the trip to test a new type of power that is supposedly more efficient than the power they currently use on space exploration.

The other great thing about this trip?  By NASA standards, it would be dirt cheap.

Scientists got a few brief hours worth of data back from Titan's land surface in 2005 when the Huygens probe touched down in an equatorial region of the moon.

Now a number of those same researchers are desperate to go back for a longer-lived stay, but to investigate this time the huge pools that contain methane, ethane, propane and probably many other types of hydrocarbon (carbon-rich) compounds.

The Titan Mare Explorer (TiME) has already been under study for about two years. It is envisaged as a relatively low-cost endeavour - in the low $400m range.

It could launch in January 2016, and make some flybys of Earth and Jupiter to pick up the gravitational energy it would need to head straight at the Saturnian moon for a splash down in June 2023.

Of course, Big O's administration hasn't appeared to be very friendly to NASA, and, as I noted a while ago, the new NASA budget doesn't allow for any programs to be created without approval from the Congress, so this may be short-lived.  But damn, if it wouldn't be fucking cool.

Posted by: Ember at 05:51 PM | Comments (9) | Add Comment
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Back to the moon?

As the resident space nerd, I noticed today that there was a claim going around that the extra $3 billion that Big O's NASA oversite panel had recommended for the space agency to stay on track with its Constellation and Aries program had been okay'ed by a group of House and Senate negotiators.

However, somehow, the NASA budget has only been increased by $948 million, and, of course, this budgetary bill has yet to even go up for a vote in the House.  I know political math is different from real math, but even I can tell that $948 million isn't $3 billion, and I'm no expert.

So, how does $3 billion turn into just under $1 billion?  Like this:

The bill trims $28 million from the agency's $6.17 billion request for space operations and another $6 million from NASA aeronautics programs. It also shaves $3 million from NASA science programs and reduces the president's $3.4 billion request for cross-agency support by $206 million.

Another interesting thing to note in all of this is that, should this budget pass, included within the budget is a rule that NASA cannot cancel or start any new programs without going through a bunch of congressional bullshit.  So, there's that, too. 

These budgetary changes are designed to get us back to the Moon.  Still no mention of Mars.

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