inspired by this post over at say anything
Dear George:
Hey, how have things been? I haven't seen you in a few years, and thought maybe we should catch up. I know I left kind of abruptly, but you weren't really using me at all, so I figured you woudn't miss me too much. Unlike my counterpart, who's been hard at work standing up to the loony left and fighting the good fight against terrorism, I was just kind of hanging around. I should have been put to use sticking it to Vicente Fox, illegal immigrants and their supporters--because let's face it, breaking the law is a bad thing--but apparently you decided buying a few votes was more important than doing what's good for the country.
I'm sure you'll need me again at some point, but I've decided to hold myself hostage, as it were; if you ever want to see me again, you need to do something constructive (like a wall) about America's southern border. Support the Minutemen; not financially, but at least vocally. Maybe take some advice from Mr. Gingrich. Yeah, I know he has a funny name, but that doesn't stop him from having good ideas.
Anyways, just wanted to let you know I'm still alive, and that I hope we can get together again sometime soon.
Sincerely,
Your Left Testicle
PS: I'll have moved on after sending this letter, so don't bother trying to track me back to the return address.
20060427
an open letter to the president
yarrrgh!
yet another reason for california to fall off into the ocean: california senate endorses monday's (illegal) immigrant boycott
h/t wizbang
20060426
good idea, bad idea
hopefully most of you will recognize that from the animaniacs, possibly one of the greatest cartoons ever. i'm going to do a spinoff, based on the game oblivion.
the following contains spoilers of the main storyline; you have been warned.
here's the scenario. you have just been proclaimed emperor, the last of your bloodline after your father and brothers were assassinated; as such, you are the only one who can use the amulet of kings to permanently close the rift between oblivion (hell, basically) and tamriel (earth, for the sake of simplicity). you're not wearing any armor--just ceremonial robes--and for a weapon you have at best a silver longsword... good against the undead, but not much else. the elder council has just accepted your claim to the throne, when news arrives that oblivion portals are opening up all over the city, and daedra (demons) are attacking.
good idea: getting to the temple of the one and relighting the dragonfires, which will at least keep any new oblivion gates from opening, if not close the ones that are already active.
bad idea: holing up in the palace and hoping to withstand the siege
actual course: going to temple of the one. 1 for 1 so far.
good idea: letting your elite bodyguard protect you while you haul ass to the temple.
bad idea: trying to attack any daedra you come across, even if you have no body guards around to help you
actual course: you've got a melee weapon and don't use magic, so if you can attack them, they can attack you. since your life is really the only one that matters, exposing it to danger is definitely a bad idea. 1 for 2 now... but hey, that's still a passing grade in core 250, or at least it was when i took it.
by this point, you're a little beat up from all that fighting.
good idea: wait to heal up, and let your guard get reorganized.
bad idea: charge on ahead to the next section of the city
actual course: it's not quite the same without a horse, but who cares? chaaaarge! 1 for 3 now... still a good batting average in baseball, but you're failing school.
after charging around killing daedra and getting beat up for awhile, you notice something different about the cityscape... holy shit, it's mehrunes dagon (the uber demon)! with the exception of the imperial palace, he's bigger than any building in your city; although since the imperial palace is visible from about half the map away under decent weather conditions, that's not really a fair comparison. shutting the oblivion gates won't do any good now that he's here, but you have an idea for how to use the amulet of kings as a weapon, if you can get to the temple. you tell the main character (myself, the player) to take you there immediately.
good idea: following said main character--who, while not untouchable is definiteily unkillable by this point, as long as he's paying attention to his health--to the temple as fast as your legs will carry you.
bad idea: letting the main character run to the temple, all the while thinking that you're following him; but instead of following him, you run off to fight more daedra. because it's fun, or something.
actual course: you get yourself killed, dumbass, and the game is over for the main character. mehrunes dagon wins the day, and demons roam freely over the world. normally this would make you 1 for 4, but getting killed pretty much cancels out any smart ideas you had earlier. congratulations, you finished at 0 for (insert any number here). you have failed at life. at this point--since this has already happened three times--the main character gets pissed (again) and quits the game to write an angry blog post that maybe 3 or 4 people will read. which, i guess, puts it right on par with a UN proclamation, so maybe i'm not doing so bad after all.
excellent
all those pro-illegal alien protests over the last few weeks are actually making the minutemen project more popular. which is just fine and dandy with me. they should get together with the folks from send a brick.
senator cantwell, eat your heart out
please? i think both the state and the country would be better off if you did. and while you're busy trying to make "price gouging" by the oil industry "illegal," read this.
20060425
sometimes he thinks he's the only cab on the road
so, the obvious thing to do would be to hitch a ride on the back of a butterfly to the boulevard of broken dreams, where he and greenday can play their crappy attempts at music and not be so alone.
20060422
20060421
from sea to shining sea
today is the anniversary of an event almost as important (at least in terms of land acquired) as the louisiana purchase in American history. on this day 170 years ago, the battle of san jacinto was fought, and the texan army, led by sam houston, did what texans do best: kick ass and take names. or, in this case, prisoners. in houston's force of about 900 men, 9 were killed and 30 injured. the mexican side, led by santa anna, didn't fare so well: 630 dead, 208 injured, and 730* captured--including santa anna himself, although not till a day later.
texas went on to join the Union, bringing with it land that included the present-day states of arizona, new mexico, nevada, california, utah, and parts of colorado, wyoming, kansas and oklahoma. not too shabby for a days work, if i do say so myself.
*i don't think that number can be right. even if we assume (safely, i would think) that all of the wounded were captured, santa anna was only supposed to have a force of about 1200. so unless we captured some dead people too, it looks like this total would put the total numbers at about 150 more than the total size of the mexican army involved.
an intersting idea
so, i read a fun theory on homosexuality awhile back. unfortunately, it was put forward in a sci-fi book, and then shot down later on in that same book, but i still found it pretty intersting. it went like this: homosexuality is nature's way of keeping deficient/inferior (don't remember the exact terms) genes out of the breeding pool. personally though, i still think it's a personal choice.
20060419
Happy Patriot's Day
almost forgot it. on this day, 231 years ago, the shot heard round the world was fired.
20060416
20060413
a day without a mexican
so, apparently may 1 has been proposed as a day that no illegal immigrants will work, shop, or participate in our economy in any way. i think that jay tea over at wizbang has a fairly good take on that. but i want to take it a step further. what would happen if, instead of just a day, we made the absence of illegals permanent, sending them home to either get in line and try things legally or to stay there for good? here's my opinion: wages would rise, and overall unemployment would go down. things would definitely be uncomfortable for awhile, especially for the agriculture industry, but i think we'd get over it. i'll use orchards for an example, since there are quite a few of them in my area. orchardists would have to offer higher wages to attract legal workers, which would probably force the smaller family operations out of business. their land would either be sold off for residential lots, fueling the housing market and creating construction jobs, or bought up by larger orchards or conglomerates who have the capital to offer higher wages, and who will still need workers for their newly acquired lands. many of the smaller orchardists are also dependent on government handouts in the form of subsidies to continue their jobs (subsidies which would no longer be necessary without the smaller orchardists in the picture, allowing the government to spend the money elsewhere, or, ideally [but unlikely], to give it back to the tax payers--because why should i be paying for someone to continue a job that another person or group could do for less or for free?).
it could also have the added benefits of reducing expenditures on public services, reducing crime, reducing insurance costs (at least for auto insurance; since most if not all illegal aliens do not have insurance, the costs of any accident they're involved in is passed on to those who are paying for insurance), and probably some other benefits i haven't thought of.
as i've mentioned at least once before, i'm no economist, and all of that was pure conjecture. but to me at least, it makes sense. so i'm with jay tea... to the illegals who want to "strike", i say bring it on. and once you've done that, keep it on.
school levies
while i understand that they are occasionally necessary, i have to say that for the most part, i'm against them. take the upcoming eastmont school district levy, for example. it would be assessed on home values; they give the example of a $150,000 house, and say that for someone in that situation the cost of the levy would slightly less than $5/month over the 3 year of the levy. they complain that if it does not pass, non-varsity sports and after school activities will be cut, and they'll lose something like 30 teachers, 45 para-educators, and 8 secretaries, and trot out the usual "it's all for the children" guilt-trip. now, the cost itself is fairly insignificant... it's about 1/3 of the cost of playing WoW for a month, quite a bit less than the average cell phone bill, and i think the radio commercial says it's something like 2 lattes a month. it's not the cost that bugs me, it's the thinking behind the cost.
to me, the fact that eastmont would have to fire about 80 people if the levy doesn't pass means that they hired about 80 more people than they could afford, and now they expect the taxpayers to pick up the bill. why should they be rewarded with more money when they can't even manage what they already have? at least, however, they have the decency to put it to a vote. i'm no economist, but if the federal government did the same, giving a vote on the budget to the citizens of the country--not the right to propose budget amendments, but simply to vote yes or no on the budget--i think that out national budget would be much more balanced. on which note, here's a budget simulator... play around with it and see what you can come up with.
20060412
impressive
so, it turns out that the citizens of china are more supportive of free market capitalism than any other country in the world, with 74% approval. france is the least supportive, at 36%.
h/t say anything
20060411
good times (and great oldies?) [updated]
so, i spent this last weekend in spokane, and after getting off to a bad start, it was pretty much awesome.
i meant to leave friday after work, but that didn't end up going so well. i didn't get out of the house till after 6, and then got about an hour out and realized that i had left my suit behind. and since the wearing of the suit was the primary reason i was going to spokane, i figured maybe i should go back for it. at which point, it would have been 10:30 or 11 by the time i got to spokane, which i decided just wasn't worth it.
instead, i left early saturday morning. other than the getting up early to get there at a decent time part, it worked out fairly well... made good time, and didn't get pulled over. gamed and hung out saturday afternoon/evening, then went out drinking with a good sized group (in no particular order: ben, pat, emily, liz, nicole, paul, josh, erin, kyle, katie-o, brandon, mark, dave, and some guy i didn't know) that night... started out at the globe, then made our way to the viking. by that point though, i was done drinking. started out with a pint of mack & jack's, an african beer that was pretty good. then an irish car bomb (always good), a long island ice tea (new to me, and good) and a wildfire (tequila with tobasco sauce... tastes like burning). i think i probably could have handled another drink or two, but the last time i thought that i spent the rest of the night puking in emily's sink, which neither of us enjoyed very much.
sunday i slept in and goofed around for most of morning, then made my way to the library to put some more work into my guest lecture/presentation for the Holy War in Europe class there at Whitworth. left off for awhile to find some washers and bolts for mark's suit of armor, then went back to work till around 6, at which point i went back to visit some old friends at the phonathon. they invited me to make a few calls for old time's sake, but for some odd reason i turned them down. stayed there till it was over at 8:30, then went back to the library and worked till 9:30, at which point i suddenly lost all motivation. nothing much happened for the rest of the night.
got up about 8 on monday and went to the library, where i worked till about 12 to finish up my presentation. i'm fairly certain that i ate at some point, but don't really remember it. something filled the time until 1:30, at which point i suited up and then helped mark into his suit of armor, which probably put to shame any visual aids the members of the class were going to use for their own visual aid. bwahahaha! anyways, i think it went fairly well. to myself, i came across as somebody who definitely knew what they were talking about (though probably not an expert, which corliss seems to think i am... i guess it depends on how you define "expert"), but had trouble getting it out in a coherent matter. i got most of my information across, but skipped around quite a bit... i'm glad i took the time to prepare some pretty decent handouts, so they at least had something to follow along with. in my defense, you have to take the following factors into account: 1) this was sort of an expansion of a paper i had written for the class when i took it, and it was tricky integrating the new with the old; and 2) i would say that i am a slightly above average public speaker at best, and i had been out of practice for about a year, which probably put me somewhere in the area of slightly below average.
so, this should be enough boring personal stuff to balance out some of my recent political rants and keep the blog on a more or less even keel. the end.
--update--
for those of you interested, the handout is available here. i'm not sure what my bandwidth allowance is, but i'm sure it's fairly small, so if you can't get to it and you still want to see it, let me know and i can send it by email.
20060404
20060403
"God will understand. And if He does not, then He is not God."
some of you will probably recognize that as at least a rough quote (though i think i got it right) from Kingdom of Heaven. but that's neither here nor there. it's catchy, and it sort of fits with something i've been thinking about.
why do so many muslims blow themselves up for their religion? why were they so violent in response to the mohammed cartoons? according to them, Allah is supposed to be all-powerful--one imam even proclaimed that Allah would, at some point in the future, wipe out the US with a major flood. apparently he forgot about the part where any flood big enough to get past the cascades and rockies in the west and the appalachians in the east would probably wipe out a good chunk of the rest of the world.
back to the thought; if Allah actually is all-powerful, then why blow yourself and innocent civilians up? is Allah so weak that he needs to be defended by a mere human, and one deranged enough to commit suicide at that?
i think i may expand on this later, but it'll probably be next week at the soonest. i need to get done procrastinating so i can finish up my lecture. on which note, it's time for bed.
20060402
quoting myself
being able to quote yourself is always fun, especially if it's something that sounds (to yourself at least, if not to others) at least semi-profound. it looks like i get to do that. since we all know that if you can't find something on google, it doesn't exist (unless you live in china), here it is:
"A good start means absolutely nothing without a good finish." --Daniel Bareither
i actually came up with that while playing solitaire, of all things... it's most annoying when you manage to get all four aces up within a minute of starting the game, but then the rest of the deck goes against you and you still lose. i think, though, that the quote can be applied to any number of things: relationships, any competitive sport or board game, war, etc.
on that note, it's time for breakfast.
