the blog quebecois

This is too funny. A writer for Salon is dismissive of the RNC bloggers, accusing them of too much fluff and celebrity-spotting. He perhaps unwisely adds this:

Indeed, Protein Wisdom contributor Jeff Goldstein weighed in with the definitive word on Harmon's appearance.

"Observations from the convention floor: Angie Harmon smells of honeysuckle and cloves--her flawless skin the color of sun-baked mahogany, her sultry voice the hum of Mezcal and cigarettes and late night conversations with friends on the deck of a rented beach house. Truly dazzling.

"Oh. And Jason Sehorn, John McCain, and Rudy Giuliani spoke tonight, too."

Sure, Jeff is "blogging the RNC," if you sort of expand the definition to "sitting in Colorado, making stuff up out of whole cloth."

Hilariously, the writer attempts to defend himself in Jeff's comments section, proving the merit of the old adage -- "When you're in a hole, stop digging."

Salon article here (premium, requires watching an ad to read the whole thing). Jeff's incredulous discovery of it here.

is he strong?
listen, bud
he's got radioactive blood

-- trad.

Enough with all this election hoo-hah. There's other important news, such as this:

The cool thing about "Yellow" is that you always end up needing it a lot more than you anticipate. Nobody ever picks yellow out of the box just for the Hell of it, but once you start coloring in whatever coloring book or colored coloring you colored, there's a 99.9% chance you'll eventually need the yellow for something. In that I cheerfully liken it to bay leaves.

Can't disagree with that. 95 (Well, 94, 'cause he's really down on the "white" crayon, which he thinks is a bogus excuse for a crayon. He's got a point there, too.) other Spidey-tastic colors reviewed here.

I know that my audience is on tenterhooks awaiting this; so I will get to the point: This blog officially endorses the bid of George W. Bush for reelection as President of the United States.

<wildapplause>

</wildapplause>

Actually I decided a couple of years ago. Something about . . . New York? Bali? Madrid? So it wasn't Bush's speech tonight that tipped the scale.

It did everything he needed it to do -- he was calm, didn't flub too many words, and he looked Presidential.

At the Chicago Boyz blog a couple of days ago I left this comment:

Granted, Bush is a lousy extemporaneous speaker, but he can be quite effective delivering a prepared speech. His performances following 9/11 were very strong -- certainly better than anything Kerry has done.

And the trend continues. The money 'graph?

The world saw that spirit three miles from here, when the people of this city faced peril together, and lifted a flag over the ruins, and defied the enemy with their courage. My fellow Americans, for as long as our country stands, people will look to the resurrection of New York City and they will say: Here buildings fell, and here a nation rose.

He nailed it. Go Dubya.

William F. Buckley once famously remarked that he'd rather be governed by the first hundred people in the Boston phone book than by the faculty of Harvard.

I must say that I agree. Though in practice, we'd be ruled by people named AAAAAAAAA1 Pizza and AAAAAAAAAAAAAA Auto Repair.

It'd still be an improvement.

I've got 6 Gmail (that's the new -- free -- Google service, with 1 gigabyte of mailbox storage) invites available, so if you'd like one, leave a comment (with a valid email address).

and i think it's gonna be a long long time
till touch down brings me round again to find
i'm not the man they think i am at home

-- elton john

The Washington Post:

Former senator John Glenn (D-Ohio) took the defense a step further by comparing the Republicans' misleading statements to those of Nazi Germany. "You've just got to separate out fact from fiction. . . . Too often, too often, in this country, if you hear something repeated, it's the old Hitler business -- if you hear something repeated, repeated, repeated, repeated, you start to believe it," he said.

Hey, Mr. Helpless-plaything-of-V2-mastermind Wernher von Braun! Do I have to repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat this?

I'll let the editorializing -- "the Republicans' misleading statements" -- speak for itself. But do tell: What were the "misleading statements" of the Nazis?

Nothing says I care like a message written in blood.

and the sign said, "the words of the prophets
are written on the subway walls
and tenement halls."

-- simon and garfunkel

Every now and then I come across a website that, in an elegant, understated way, says, "You'll never program as good as me, you loser, so why don't you get lost and quit wasting my time? And bandwidth."

At least that's my interpretation.

Otherwise I don't know what to make of sites like this.

Warning: Music & Sfx. Albeit understated electronicz.

Now you, too, can become a professional cartoonist, courtesy of the Garfield Comic Creator!

I left the word-bubble blank, because I couldn't think of anything funny. In other words, it's exactly like an authentic Garfield cartoon!

Use Google talk by entering three or four words below. The system will search for this sentence at Google, find the next word and print that. Than it will remove the first word of the search string, add the found word and repeat. The result seems to be meaningfull sometimes. Other times it is giblish. But always fun.

Google talk a
Google Hack by
Douwe Osinga

Try entering famous names: "Osama bin Laden is"; "George Bush can't," etc. Or definitions: "meaning of life is"; "madness is" and so on. Or questions: "Is Iraq a quagmire?" (Remember the four word limit.)

It will get stuck in an infinite loop occasionally: did did did DID DID DID . . . seems to be the most popular one.

Via The Presurfer

I think we can all agree that the prospects of the European Union are dim indeed, if this is any indication.

so she tells him she must go out for the evening
to comfort an old friend who's feeling down
but he knows where she's going as she's leaving
she’s headed for the cheating side of town

-- the eagles

To which, Ben Kepple asks:

Our question: what in hell is the cheating side of town? We mean, come on. Are we to believe some sort of weird socio-economic divide separated a municipality into sections for its respective adulterous and non-adulterous residents?

Indeed. We need to know this sort of stuff, if only for future reference.

front and forgery
pass on, pass on, move on ­­­ forget it !
get started, don't know where it begins

-- urban dance squad

I don't think he can be reelected if this is true.

Of course, it might possibly be a fake, but it's a darn good one if it is. Let's hold on to that hope.

I offer this as a public service only and I very reluctantly link to this
tasteless thread on Dave Barry's blog::

The grossest thing I've ever heard it referred to as is "blowing out a stink pickle." And that came from a girl. I personally don't announce exactly what I'm going to do in the bathroom.

Posted by: Sarah on September 10, 2004 09:52 PM

Whatever happened to the innocence of childhood and Mister Poopyoopyoopydoodydoodypoopypoop?

It's an outrage.

Via Instapundit:

JUST CAUGHT Jonathan Klein debating Stephen Hayes about the CBS forgery scandal. Klein says that "Bloggers have no checks and balances . . . [it's] a guy sitting in his living room in his pajamas."

This is a vile calumny. Let it be known that I blog clad only in underwear. On my head. (I find it blocks The Voices much better than tinfoil.)

The Drudge Report:

In last week's WASHINGTONPOSTWABCNEWS Poll, John F. Kerry was viewed favorably by 36 percent of registered voters, down 18 points over the past six months.

But just how low Kerry's standing has fallen cannot be appreciated fully without comparing his standing with that of other household names in GALLUP polls over the years, the POST's Dana Milbank reported on Tuesday.

Kerry finds himself in a dead heat with Martha Stewart and Joseph McCarthy, and behind Herbert Hoover -- although he narrowly beats O.J. Simpson.

"You hate me! You really, really hate me!"

Here's the list, with the year of the poll in parenthesis:

Michael Jordan: 83 (2000) Tony Blair: 76 (2003) Pope John Paul II: 73 (2003) Democratic Party: 54 (2004) John Ashcroft: 49 (2003) Michael Dukakis: 47 (1988) Prince Charles: 45 (2003) Herbert Hoover: 43 (1944) Jesse Jackson: 38 (2003) Vladimir Putin: 38 (2003) John Kerry: 36 (2004) Martha Stewart: 36 (2004) Joseph McCarthy: 35 (1954)

John Ashcroft? Kerry polls lower than the demon John AshKKKroft? This is not good news.

This is an interactive display of part of the Great Wall of China. Stunning views.

Annoying flute music.

in the clearing stands a boxer
and a fighter by his trade
and he carries the reminders
of ev’ry glove that laid him down

-- simon and garfunkel

I wonder if boxers ever wear their championship belts when they're out and around on the town?

You know the things I'm referring to? Those huge bellybands encrusted with rhinestones? About half the height of the boxer?

It's difficult to imagine fitting it into your standard belt loops, and you'd look like one of those old retired guys with your pants hitched up to your armpits if you ever did manage it.

Most boxers aren't that well known apart from the heavyweights and a few others like Sugar Ray Leonard or Oscar de la Hoya. Nobody knows who the junior featherweight champion is. At least I don't.

So it'd be nice if he had a small, decorous ribbon or medal that he could pin on his lapel to denote his mastery of the Sweet Science.

Rather than something that belongs above his mantleplace, if even there.

Because it looks like a hernia truss.

Well, it does.

Yahoo/AP:

Humanitarian Teresa Heinz-Kerry, on the aftermath of Hurricane Ivan:

"Clothing is wonderful, but let them go naked for a while, at least the kids."

Via Ace of Spades

This is an odd but addictive shooting game. It's in Japanese, but easy enough to figure out: Click on either of the buttons on the title page, then point and click to shoot. Spacebar to reload.

Did I mention that it's Japanese? Ah so, so it's impossible to figure out.

Shoot the tumbling beer (?) bottles. Shoot the tumbling clock to stop the countdown clock for a few seconds. You can shoot the owl perched on the sign, but it doesn't seem to do anything except make the owl look sad.

Don't shoot the tumbling fish, as that will cause a giant demonic kitty to materialize, obscuring your view.

Did I mention that it's Japanese?

This, believe it or not, was created on a typewriter (or maybe with Microsoft Word) by Paul Smith, some of whose other creations are here.

In case you don't recognize the picture, it's of John Davidson, whom I remembered chiefly as one of the co-hosts on the 80's That's Incredible TV show, which featured stories on unusual people and events.

I was all set to have some fun with this -- I mean, John Davidson? -- but then I read a bit more about the artist to find that he was born with severe cerebral palsy:

When typing, Paul uses his left hand to steady his right one.

Since he can't press two keys at the same time, he almost always locks the shift key down and makes his pictures using the symbols at the top of the number keys. In other words, his pictures are based on these characters ...

@ # $ % ^ & * ( ) _

Which, quite apart from the artistry involved, sounds like an excruciating amount of effort. Then it hit me: Davidson probably had a piece about Smith on his TV show and Smith either did it as a demonstration or as a gift for Davidson. (He gave away a lot of his work for free.)

Doing a bit of googling on Davidson, I learn from his website that he's gone on to a successful career in Broadway musicals. So I can't make fun of him, either.

But I'll always have Kerry.

Via Waxy.org

Jonah Goldberg in The Corner posted this. It's a combination of The Matrix and, er, ping-pong. Safe for work, at least if the boss has tolerance for music and absurd rhythmic chanting.

Mark Glaser in the Online Journalism Review:

Just what the heck is "comment spam" and how did it get so many prominent bloggers up in arms? Basically, spammers have been using blogs to help boost their standings in Google searches by posting massive numbers of comments that include links to their pornography sites, scams and get-rich-quick sites. If your site is linked by a top-ranked site or blog, then Google will often raise your site's ranking -- at least that's the thinking of spammers.

I think that Google (and other search engines) has been tweaking its algorithm to downgrade the Page Rank of blog comments, so the spammers are ultimately going to lose whatever benefit they get from these attacks.

That doesn't mean they're any less annoying to deal with in the meantime, of course. I've got some 4000 pieces of spam to catch up on, so I've been shutting down old comments. (Yes, I know about MTBlacklist and MTClose, and I'll get around to installing them one of these days.) Eventually I'll just leave the main page open and I can kill new spammers as they arrive.

Jerks.

Via J-Walk

Too busy, so in lieu of a proper post I offer this. It's a program that figures out your "Birthday Star," a star that is as far away in light-years as your present age. Here's mine:

Your birthday star is in the constellation Corvus. It has the name (Alpha) Corvi in Johann Bayer's Uranometria star catalog. It is also called 1 Corvi in the Historia Cœlestis Britannica of John Flamsteed and Edmund Halley. It is called NS 1208-2443 in the NStars database.

Isn't that special?

Bah. Sony's sponsoring this Armchair Games competition. The game isn't terribly interesting and the music is interestingly terrible, but I thought it'd be worth enduring, because the prize is a 37" flatscreen plasma TV.

So I played it, filled out the entry form, then clicked on Terms and Conditions to find out it's only for residents of the U.K. Which would explain the drop-down list of countries.

Bah. OTOH, if you happen to live in the U.K., go for it.

lies of a nature we’ve heard before
do my prayers remain unanswered
like a beggar at your sleeve

-- paul simon

I really thought that this was a joke:

Saint Clinton's image on these keepsake items will remind you of better times (about 4 years ago) when you had enough money to eat at a nice restaurant, get your car washed, or take a day off work.

His timeless, sympathetic words, "I feel your pain," echo in his reassuring expression.

Yes, things will be better again someday, and with Saint Clinton watching over your home, the golden boy from Hope, Arkansas, can help keep hope alive for you.

But it isn't. Click here to view the page; click anywhere on it and you'll go to a Café Press page featuring the Billikon plastered on coffee cups, refrigerator magnets, and lunchboxes. There's also some other stuff for sale, like I ♥ Abortion infant-size shirts and bibs. Charming.

I was going to write a long, funny, insightful, masterly post today, but I got sidetracked by this instead.

You try to set up an electrical grid to light up all the components. Hellishly difficult, especially trying to make the border conductive (which you very much need to do to win)

Via Fazed

Media Research Center:

[CBS reporter Jim] Axelrod consulted a Democratic pollster who contended Bush delivers a simplistic "candidacy for the fast food age, whereas Kerry is more like a long dinner party."

Sort of like a looonnnngggg deadly dull dinner party where the host rambles on and on and on and on about his four months in Vietnam, punctuated now and then by screaming from the kitchen, where Terezzzah is flogging a maid who dropped a teacup.

Yeah, I can visualize that.

I would pay good money to see this:

A woman used her talent for gymnastics to destroy two art installations at a controversial exhibit in the Hamburger Bahnhof museum late Wednesday, yelling as she did a series of flips across the room into one object and pushed over another, organizers said yesterday.

Frauds and poseurs beware. I can see it now: The nondescript white panel truck screeches up to your local gallery, the rear doors fly open, and "Zelda, the Art Avenger" goes cartwheeling in, destroying all in her path.

"What's that flipflipflip sound? flipflipflipFLIPFLIPFLIP Aiiieee! It is 'Zelda, the Art Avenger!' Run, run for your lives!"

Via NealeNews

Look, I'm not the world's biggest curling fan -- I barely know the rules -- but this doesn't seem like a very good simulation.

For one thing, there's no sweeping, and curling without sweeping is like hiphop without the bling bling.

Or something like that.

This is something that'll show you the popularity of your first name through the last century, at least in the U.S. (It uses names culled from Social Security registrations.)

Q: Is this blog getting even more lame lately, or what?

A: It is. I should be back to my usual standard of sustained mediocrity by next week.

Via The Presurfer

The Boston Herald:

Police say a man wearing a jacket that said ''FBI Anti-Terrorism'' showed up at the [Rochester, N.H.] airport last Wednesday and began asking about airport entrances and security. He took off when Skyhaven employees chased him away from hangars and called police.

Police said airport personnel were immediately suspicious of the man, who was wearing flip-flops and could not produce proper identification.

I wonder what it was that tipped them off?

Via Best of the Web