The Body Politik

I'd like to have my own country, somewhere. Not a super power, per se; but a big chunk o land where I could rule as the benevolent dictator. I assume this is something of a common fantasy. And fantasy it is, because I'd want it to be America; but right... and Ruled Solely by ME.

A perfect place I could escape to every 4-8 years when the others take back over.

In a fantasy world, where everyone would instantly recognize and worship my obvious brilliance.

But, eventually, I'd never come back. I mean a lot of the time, my side is just as stupid as theirs.

But at least it'd be a constant 76 degrees, night and day, on my utopian isle of MINE-ness...
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This

http://www.collegehumor.com/video:1910892

and

http://www.critical-hits.com/2009/05/18/the-contrary-opinion-jj-abrams-star-trek-with-spoilers/

Yep.
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Ethanol is worse than Gasoline

Like "Clean Coal", Ethanol as "'GREEN' alternative energy" is fictitious bullshit dreamed up by- surprise surprise- people who stand to gain lots and lots of money from its use. Ethanol is crap. It raises the price of food. It causes more smog than gasoline. It destroys engines to the tune of ~$1000/repair. And it does nothing to curtail our use of crude oil to manufacture all sorts of things.

Environmentalism is Big Business, easily co-opted for it's popularity, and just as suspect as the corporations it so often opposes. Spend some time, and read the following article. The article indicates we need some perspective, better studies, and less Ethanol.

(via /.)
(Article: The Great Ethanol Scam, by Ed Wallace)
(snippets after the fold)

First, the primary job of the Environmental Protection Agency is, dare it be said, to protect our environment. Yet using ethanol actually creates more smog than using regular gas, and the EPA's own attorneys had to admit that fact in front of the justices presiding over the Third Circuit Court of Appeals in 1995 (API v. EPA).

Second, truly independent studies on ethanol, such as those written by Tad Patzek of Berkeley and David Pimentel of Cornell, show that ethanol is a net energy loser. Other studies suggest there is a small net energy gain from it.

Third, all fuels laced with ethanol reduce the vehicle's fuel efficiency, and the E85 blend drops gas mileage between 30% and 40%, depending on whether you use the EPA's fuel mileage standards (fueleconomy.gov) or those of the Dept. of Energy.

Fourth, forget what biofuels have done to the price of foodstuffs worldwide over the past three years; the science seems to suggest that using ethanol increases global warming emissions over the use of straight gasoline.

...

On Jan. 16 of this year, Lexus ordered a massive recall of certain 2006 to 2008 models, including the GS Series, IS and LS sedans. According to the recall notice, the problem is that "Ethanol fuels with low moisture content will corrode the internal surface of the fuel rails." In layman's terms, ethanol causes pinpoint leaks in the fuel system; when leaking fuel catches your engine on fire, that's an exciting way to have your insurance company buy your Lexus. Using ethanol will cost Toyota (TM) untold millions.

...

Though the media is ignoring it, one can easily find many stories on BMW (BMWG.DE) blogs relating similar problems with fuel systems damaged by the use of ethanol. Certainly that was the case with Christi Jordan and her 2007 Mini. For weeks it was difficult to start; Moritz BMW in Arlington, Tex., inspected it and found severe carbon buildup inside the engine. On her second trip to the mechanics they decided to test the ethanol content of Christi's fuel and found it was much higher than the federally mandated limit of 10%. This time the fuel pump had been destroyed by the ethanol. The repair bill came to $1,200: As in all cases where vehicles are damaged by ethanol, legally the factory warranty no longer applied.

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Star Trek: The College Years

Watched it yesterday. Go see it, you'll probably like it.

(spoiler laden review below the fold)
(if you're viewing this on the Facebook feed, try checking in at my actual blog: http://tomhand.blogspot.com , where there are no formatting SNAFU's to overcome- like the lack of an actual fold)




Some Thoughts:
Jar Jar Binks cum Scotty (the cute little rock guy) is for merchandising purposes- look at JJ Abrams, he does/understands marketing very well.

The time travel alternate universes is old old hat. It goes something like: At every decision there are, at least, two choices. You pick one and that becomes your universe. A different version of you picks a different option and that becomes a different universe. Now, to add some Micheal Chricton from Timeline, you can't actually TIME TRAVEL, but you can move to other, slower, universes that are very similar to your own (most of the choices have been the same, or all have been the same, so far). But that may be nit picky. They may posit actual time travel, but that the act creates the new universe, or any act done outside your natural timeline creates a new Alternate Reality.

Star Trek has already shown the alternate Realities, where they meet their EvilTwins(tm)- they did this a couple times in DS9 and once or more in TNG, but I could be wrong about the latter.

What pissed me off was:
The Blatant use of Time Travel as easy to use plot point. Others have already commented on this, so I'm just agreeing. "Why make it good, when we can make it EASY?"

The Internal Inconsistency: Red Matter makes a black hole- everyone travels safely back in time, no problems. Lots of Red Matter makes a big black hole (maybe)- with a visible accretion disk that's about the same size as the original hole (and by "about" I mean, I didn't notice any difference), yet this one destroys your dumb ass. Stupid.

Scene first, someone gets sucked out into space and there's no sound. Not five minutes later a shuttle craft buzzes the camera and we hear it whistle-puttering past. Stupid. Then there was the blatant stealing of cinematography- on the free fall to the drill platform- from Firefly: silent, off kilter, shakily acquired, zoomed in on.

Summation: I succeeded a little too well at psyching myself down about this movie. But worse, I was right: they did it the easy, commercial way, rather than spending their massive budget on something other than pretty-ness. The reboot of Star Trek will be profitable; but it won't be satisfying. What make me think so? THEY MISSED THE DAMN POINT! Spock is talking about "faith" and they're all talking about "destiny". To start with, this is just weasel words to absolve the individual from responsibility for their own actions. To finish, the episode they seem to be referencing is from TOS. SPock is told by Kirk to fly the shuttle craft in a way that is not logical, because MAYBE- if their faith in their crewmates is justified- the Enterprise will be able to save them (if not, they die for sure). So Spock does it, and they get saved and everyone dies from the cute sugary plot-like thing they've just swallowed, right? WRONG. The point was Spock was an absolutist: logic was ALWAYS the answer. The point was that absolutism eventually fails, and is just as short-sighted as anything else, when done fanatically. But Mr's Abrams, Orci, and Kurtzman don't want deeper meanings, or science, to get in the way of selling their fucking movie. So, expect horoscopes in the next one, or Feng Shoe-y , or goddamn chiropractors and homeopaths....
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craptastic

Which is diametrically opposite of mantastic, just so you know...

"There is more than one of everything..."

"This truck was never made..."

And the FBI agent who hasn't watched enough Law and Order to know that "Was it a mask, or bandages?" is a leading question...

Craptastical.

UPDATE: COMPLETE, UNADULTERATED, HACKERY! Fucking douche bag, un-talented, commercialists. Dickwaded cockfingering turdshits.
Fucking Sans-tastical.
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FAIL!

They should just change the show to FAIL- or better yet, EPIC FAIL. The cardinal rule of Vampire fiction: you don't use Bella Lugosi's Dead (especially, a shitty version of it). Otherwise you violate the Laws on Pretension Prevention, a little known subsection of the Geneva Convention.

Also, knew it was the girl as soon as she was on screen.
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The Un-Kosher Flu

First off, fuck the pork industry for getting upset that "swine" flu might cause their sales to drop: Everyone they should be concerned about feeding already knows you don't get the H1N1 flu from bacon, you get it from Mexicans- and apparently a couple kids at Heritage Middle School in Madison, Alabama.

Second off, fuck the pork industry for being justifiably concerned people might think they can get ManBearPig Flu from bacon. But more importantly:

FUCK ALL THESE IDIOTS.

So far, there is no indication that Swine Flu is worse than regular seasonal flu.

From the CDC:

Yesterday, CDC issued new interim guidance for clinicians on how to care for children and pregnant women who may be infected with this virus. Young children and pregnant women are two groups of people who are at high risk of serious complications from seasonal influenza.

(emphasis mine)

How serious is swine flu infection?
Like seasonal flu, swine flu in humans can vary in severity from mild to severe. Between 2005 until January 2009, 12 human cases of swine flu were detected in the U.S. with no deaths occurring. However, swine flu infection can be serious. In September 1988, a previously healthy 32-year-old pregnant woman in Wisconsin was hospitalized for pneumonia after being infected with swine flu and died 8 days later. A swine flu outbreak in Fort Dix, New Jersey occurred in 1976 that caused more than 200 cases with serious illness in several people and one death.

In other words, it's not actually all that bad. Stop freaking out; or bury yourself in your flupocalypse bunker and throw away the key.

I'm not lucky enough that this will kill all of you.

-You Loving Kludge

P.S. Warren Ellis knew about all this since, at least, last Friday.
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Culture for the Masstards

In an on-going attempt to get everyone on the same baseline, I bring you another in the series:

This time, a double-header: Blogs vs Forums and Idiot vs Stupid. We'll look at them in reverse order. (A warning: kinda long)


Idiot vs Stupid

An idiot is someone who is ignorant or unskilled in knowledge. Stupid is the active inability to understand, comprehend, or apply knowledge/understanding/comprehension.

Everyone is an idiot, someway, somehow, somewhere, somewhen. It's impossible to not be an idiot, and to communicate. Idiot is derogatory in our society; and it should be used with an understanding of that, lest the user be stupid or an Idiot.

Stupid is more equivalent to "Retarded" that idea of non-politically correct inability via deficiency- though, technically "stupid" makes no effort to determine why the person is stupid; but merely that the person is such.

See the difference? Good. If not, well...


Blogs vs Forums
Both are full of people spouting their particular brand of bullshit. Both often feature controversial topics. Both tend to be more full of opinions than facts. Both require login (some do allow anonymous posting) and tag comments/posts with a name/userID/what-have-you. Yet, there are differences.

A Forum is a group effort. There are group-blogs, but it is not, necessarily the same thing. In many ways, the difference is akin to the difference between "religion" and "cult". Those links don't do it justice, so I'll provide an example: Some people say that Mormonism is a cult, some say it's a religion. The fact is it's whatever the speaker wants it to be- it fits both definitions. There is a side of this argument that speaks to the idea "common usage", that if the majority of people say Mormonism (to continue the example) is a cult then it is a cult, if they say religion it is such.

The problems with that are "Who counts?" Literally, who counts up the people and takes their official opinion on the matter. Also, who should be counted, should Mormons get to effect the common usage of their beliefs as religion or cult? (How many cults are happy being called cults, and don't maintain that they are actually religions?)

This same sort of thing can apply to Forums vs Blogs- especially when we only look at the mechanism each use for displaying/disseminating their content. The software is VERY similar- if not outright the same (look to those websites that are essentially a piece of forum software that contains ways of handling front pages, blogs, news, forums, among other things). Yet, there do exist some differences.

Blogs are always a hierarchical setting. Forums can be, and may appear to be even when they aren't; but blogs are always hierarchical. Blogs say: there are posters and there are commenters, one creates topics and performs maintenance and administration, one can only comment on posted topics. Forums say: There are administrators and there are non-administrators, one is capable of actually performing maintenance and administrative functions, both can post new topics and post comments about created topics. Though there is a lingo (i.e. "OP" = "original poster") and some mutual conceptions (i.e."First Post/Reply!", "First Page!") to Forums, there is no significant* functional distinction between the post creator and the people who post replies. On (most) forums, everyone is equal; on Blogs the bloggers may be equal, but the commenters are not equal to the bloggers.

Look at it this way:
Genius and Genius#2 are on a forum, arguing. Neither is an administrator. Genius cannot edit/delete posts made by Genius#2, and vice versa. The administrators can, of course; but on good (read: professional) forums the reasons such a thing might happen are posted, reviewable, and often subject to appeal.

Genius and Genius#2 are on a blog, arguing. Genius is the blogger, Genius#2 is a commenter. Genius#2 cannot go open a new topic to discuss Genius or some aspect of the argument. Additionally, Genius can disemvowel or delete Genius#2's comments/posts. If it's Genius's Blog, the rules don't have to be posted, and Genius is the final arbitrator of what is okay, and what isn't.

So, here's the difference:
Forums are a group effort to talk and discuss things amongst the group. A Blog is a way of disseminating information (often opinion), and though discussions can happen, that is secondary to the fundamental nature of simply "putting it out there".

Either can fulfill the role of the other, of course. If a website could be either, try looking to see how the website refers to itself. Remember, this is a guideline, nothing is ever 100% cut and dried, especially on the internet.


* There can be a distinction, like the ability to add a "formal" poll to the topic; but that's not exactly significant.
------------------
To end, allow me to address the elephant in the room.

Yes, this is in lieu of explanations. Yes, this is my way of warning people (see link above) who may not already know: This is MY Blog, MY Opinion, MY Rules- and not a democracy/fair/etc.
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Top Gear

If you don't watch the BBC's Top Gear, you're missing one of the smartest, funniest, and most entertaining shows on television. I have watched it with my sisters in the room, one who mildly cares about cars the other who doesn't at all, and we were all laughing and enjoying the show. It's great, and most of you will probably already have seen it.

Recently, I saw a clip on YouTube that made me want to move away more than I ever have before. (A Quick Aside: Part of growing up in Alabama, and not being a worthless redneck bigot, is an intense desire to run far far away as quickly as possible- though this is usually an expression of teenage angst, and massive poverty tends to undermine this for most, imo.) Whatever. The point is, there are two clips, totaling about 20 minutes of an hour long Top Gear episode where they go through Florida, Mississippi, Alabama, and Louisianna.

What happens in Alabama is.... embarrassing, to say the least. (It happens in the second half, and there's no need to preface the events by watching the first half, but Top Gear really is entertaining and if you have the extra 10 minutes watch both instead of the horribly uncool bits of part 2)....

Without further ado:
(These are posted on YouTube by the BBC and embedding is disabled, but they should stay up for a long long time)
Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DOyDLUzAAOY

Part 2: (Containing the truly embarrassing visit to AL) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2syY12OPkwI Read More...