{ Monthly Archives }
March 2008
Fort Wayne, Indiana bomb squad called out to defuse a turnip
An employee at Haller & Colvin Attorneys at Law called 911 Thursday after opening a U.S. Postal Service box and finding a suspicious gift bag inside, police said.
Officers then called the city’s bomb unit, which brought in a robot to carry the package outside to a parking lot. X-rays showed no signs of an explosive, but bomb technicians decided to detonate the package with a water cannon just to be safe, police spokesman Michael Joyner said.
After that, they opened the box and found the turnip, wrapped in lettuce-green tissue paper inside a sandwich bag.
Full article can be found at IndyStar.com
Terry Pratchett auctions entire Discworld library signed to fund Alzheimer’s research
Price at the time of this post £1,801 (US$3655.67).
The auction can be found at Ebay.com
Bush speaks to personnel about their work in Afghanistan
“I must say, I’m a little envious,” Bush said. “If I were slightly younger and not employed here, I think it would be a fantastic experience to be on the front lines of helping this young democracy succeed.”
“It must be exciting for you … in some ways romantic, in some ways, you know, confronting danger. You’re really making history, and thanks,” Bush said.
Full article can be found at Reuters.com
Political Primer 5: Line Item Veto
Jeff and I agree on Line Item Vetoes under certain circumstances. And pretty much all of those circumstances involve “Riders.”
Riders are a nasty little invention. What they boil down to is stuff that can be added to a Bill after it has already passed a vote. That’s kind of like if someone asks you if you want Apple or Cherry pie, and you tell them “Apple”. Then they bring out this foul smelling concotion and say, “We felt it best to change your pie to Horse-apple.”
“But that isn’t what I wanted,” you say.
“Well, then you shouldn’t have voted for it.”
So, you see, an open Line Item Veto would really just be a Presidential rider, which is kind of crap. What Jeff and I would like is one of two things; No more riders (really, the best option), or Line Item Vetoes, but only for Riders. See, that way stuff doesn’t get to sneak by without people taking responsibility for it. Bastards, no wonder no one trusts politicians.
Tune in next time for more jolly politics.
Political Primer 4: McCain
I wish I had more to say about McCain than I have found. But judging by his website, if you thought the last seven years have been dandy, he’s your man.
On most fronts McCain and the Democrats are pretty similar; Education needs work and our economy is going down the tubes. He has the same problems with Jurisdiction that they do, too. Lots of promises about spending and bills that aren’t within his power to create. Well, actually, they are currently within his power to create, since he’s a Senator, but he’ll lose that authority if he becomes President. The big difference between McCain and the Democratic candidates is in Iraq.
McCain is still chasing the boogeyman that attacked the U.S. in 2001. Pity, like our current President, he’s looking in the wrong country.
The war in Iraq is at a crossroads and the future of the entire region is at stake - a region that produced the terrorists who attacked America on 9/11 and where much of the world’s energy supplies are located.
I really hate it when people live up to stereotypes, and here is a Republican fearmonger saying we need to kill some more brown people to make sure we have oil. Damn.
I’ve never been to the Middle East, but I’d like to at some point. It would be interesting to see a region that so many people have killed for over the last 5000 years. The place has to be spectacular, though it doesn’t look it from any pictures I’ve ever seen. Now, Hawaii I can see killing some people over.
Tune in next time when we take a look at some of the hot items coming up in politics. And sometime soon we’ll resume our irregularly scheduled programming.
A Love Story
Just because someone doesn’t love you the way you want them to, doesn’t mean they don’t love you with all they have.
Ralph and Edna were both patients in a mental hospital. One day while they were walking past the hospital swimming pool Ralph suddenly jumped into the deep end. He sank to the bottom of the pool and stayed there. Edna promptly jumped in to save him. She swam to the bottom and pulled him out.
When the Head Nurse Director became aware of Edna’s heroic act she immediately ordered her to be discharged from the hospital, as she now considered her to be mentally stable.
When she went to tell Edna the news she said, “Edna, I have good news and bad news. The good news is you’re being discharged, since you were able to rationally respond to a crisis by jumping in and saving the life of the person you love. I have concluded that your act displays sound-mindedness.”
“The bad news is, Ralph hung himself in the bathroom with his bathrobe belt right after you saved him. I am so sorry, but he’s dead.”
Edna replied, “He didn’t hang himself, I put him there to dry. How soon can I go home?”
This just in…Daylight Savings Time is ridiculous
Matthew J. Kotchen, a professor of environmental economics at the University of California in Santa Barbara, and Laura E. Grant, a doctoral student in the same field, studied the effects of daylight saving in Indiana, where some counties used it and others did not. The states changed the law two years ago so that all counties now use daylight saving time.
In an interview, Kotchen said using residential electricity bills for Indiana, he and Grant found that daylight saving time reduced electricity use for lighting but that more was used for air conditioning in the summer and heating in the fall than was saved.
Article found at USAToday.com
