How I Spend My Time

Here's Simon's cat, graphically illustrating a typical Sunday at chez Farnsworth:

The New Apple iPad

Mad TV predicted this several years ago:

I'm Okay but I'm Still in Recovery Mode

I've been silent for a while. I'm still recovering my health, and I find a couple of things are keeping me away from my usual pursuits.

One, I tire easily. I came home from a couple of hours of running errands yesterday and inadvertently fell asleep for three hours, thereby missing the State of the Union address.

Two, watching the news or reading the political blogs I usually read contribute to driving up my blood pressure, when the recovery goal is to lower it...

I'm still around, but I'm not as actively outspoken. Yet.

Activist Judges Work to Dismantle Constitution

With yesterday's 5-4 SCOTUS decision in Citizens United v. FEC, the court has gone against its own precedents and established something that "The Founders" never intended or anticipated. And, as you know, that's the argument that The Right has been using against every single "liberal" decision for the last million years.

Damn activist judges...

So now corporations are "persons", with all the rights -- but apparently none of the responsibilities -- of real flesh and blood human beings.

Does this mean that corporations will have the right to vote in elections? Does this mean that they will have the right to keep and bear arms (Note: See Blackwater)?

Something else: If I have enough loose cash to take over a corporation and then dismantle it, essentially "killing" it, will that be a capital crime?

On the plus side, does this mean that corporations who kill people (again, see Blackwater) or commit other criminal acts will be executed or have to spend long jail terms?

This little exercise in reductio ad absurdem will serve, I hope, to illustrate how corrupt the Supreme Court has become, to be able to issue a decision like this one with a completely straight face.

Bible Coded Weapons?

Are you fucking kidding me?

Here's the latest bit of news on the Military-Religious complex:

Coded references to New Testament Bible passages about Jesus Christ are inscribed on high-powered rifle sights provided to the United States military by a Michigan company, an ABC News investigation has found.
The sights are used by U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan and in the training of Iraqi and Afghan soldiers. The maker of the sights, Trijicon, has a $660 million multi-year contract to provide up to 800,000 sights to the Marine Corps, and additional contracts to provide sights to the U.S. Army.
U.S. military rules specifically prohibit the proselytizing of any religion in Iraq or Afghanistan and were drawn up in order to prevent criticism that the U.S. was embarked on a religious "Crusade" in its war against al Qaeda and Iraqi insurgents.

What's worse, a spokesman for the company doesn't think there's anything wrong with this, and takes pains to point out that the only ones complaining about it is a group that is "not Christian."

That would be Mikey Weinstein, of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, who is consistently out front on these kinds of issues.

The ABC story shows a photo of an Iraqi soldier firing one of these proselytizing weapons. While there are Christians in Iraq, chances are this guy isn't one of them, and to give a Muslim one of these is like serving him a Spam sandwich in his MRE and telling him it's chopped mutton.

It's no wonder the Muslim world sees Baby Doc's misadventure as a crusade. Nothing like delivering the word of god at the point of a sword.

The Devil in Haiti; Child Molesters in The Dominican Republic

By now everyone has seen and heard Pat Robertson's comments on the earthquake in Haiti:

Note that he's comparing Devil-ridden Haiti with its next-door neighbor The Dominican Republic, with its hotels and tourism and such. But old Pat keeps under wraps this little bit of information about Haiti's neighbor: It is the western hemisphere mecca for child-sex tourism.

Remember a few years back when Rusty Limpdick got busted for some illegal Viagra when he came back into the country from a "boy's weekend" in the Dominican Republic? I commented at the time about the child-sex tourism that was -- and most likely still is -- rampant in the Republic. While I didn't actually accuse Rusty of anything untoward, I was asking the question as to why the DR when there were thousands of willing hookers just down the beach in Miami. I'm still wondering about it.

Pat insists that it's "a true story" that the Haitians sold themselves to the Devil, and ignores the source of the tourism dollars flowing into the pockets of their neighbors in the DR.

But what can you expect from typical Rethug Xian assholes? Remember the Rethug motto: It's not a sin if we do it.

I'm Back!

I'm back from my vacation in Hawaii. Interestingly enough I was there at the same time as both Barack Obama and Rush Limpdick Limbaugh. Didn't see either of them, though. I think they tend to travel in different circles.

Hawaii, for those who have never been there, is an interesting place. Once you get away from the glitz of Waikiki and the ritz of the North Shore, it's pretty much a replica of a Third World country. Complete with middle- and upper-class enclaves surrounded by rock walls and high fences. Like the Philippines.

We stayed with She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed's brother, who lives in a literal shack on the beach on the windward side of Oahu (just up the coast from the non-politically-correct-named Chinaman's Hat). Great location but the house is literally falling down around him from termite infestations and the battering of the winter winds and surf. Naturally he doesn't own it, but is renting from "the ranch", an oceanside slumlord which owns a stretch of shoreline with crowded-together houses in various states of disrepair.

One evening I went into his study and found the cat playing with what I thought was a very realistic toy mouse. I went back into the living room and asked if Luna had a realistic-looking toy mouse and the answer of course was no. So the brother went in, scooped up the mouse and tossed it out into the sand. The cat was pissed, naturally, and more or less stomped around for a while to show her displeasure. I was afraid she was stomping too hard and would crash through the floor. It was that shaky.

Sitting on the toilet was an experience. The floor around it is so spongy that it rocked back and forth like a teeter-totter. I had a vision of the entire house collapsing, leaving me sitting up on a toilet suspended ten feet in the air on the sewer pipe.

A terrific book to read if you want a scoop into the real Hawaii is Paul Theroux's Hotel Honolulu. It contains some incisive observations on the whole Hawaii scene, from Waikiki to the North Shore and the Third World stretches in between.

And here's a little video showing how I spent my time:

No, not really. In fact, SWMBO wouldn't even let me drive the Nissan Sentra rental car on our round-island outings.

Since the doctor told me to stay warm and get plenty of fresh air, I'm thinking that I can deduct the price of the vacation from my income taxes.