Reality

Disaster porn


We hates it.

Worse than we hates the mindless anti-nuke activists going “see? see?” and the morons from Left, Right, Center, and Alpha Centauri grinding their favorite axe and babbling about why Japan “deserved” this. Not that I plan to forget who signed their names to hatred that would shame a paid union agitator, I’m just busy reviling the news media hysteria peddlers at the moment.

Dear Wisconsin Democrats,


This is not “what democracy looks like”, this is what a temper tantrum looks like. If you wanted democracy, you should have spent the last three weeks hounding your senators to stop hiding out in hotels and go back to their jobs.

Design is not engineering, lesson 692


Words fail me. Windmills. Solar panels. Greenhouses. Only people with advanced degrees could come up with such a stupid bridge design.

Eco-Bridge of Doom

(via Gizmodo, whose writer seems to be about as technically adept as the designers themselves)

Spam that is not spam


Looking through the messages that were trapped by my spam filters, I found an odd one today. At first glance, it was very spammy:

  1. Sent to username johngreely at my domain jgreely.com, something I have never, ever used.
  2. Supposedly from a travel agency in the UK.
  3. Booking a room at a Four Seasons Country Club in Portugal, 2 adults, no children, checkin date today.
  4. Listing a home address for me in Ireland.
  5. With a "click here to complete your payment" link at the bottom of the invoice.

Except, the agency seems to really exist, and all of the links in the message went to their site, and there really is a Jigginstown in Naas, County Kildare. To ice the cake, a search of the Irish Times family notices page turns up engagements for both the son and the daughter of John and June Greely, of Jigginstown, Naas.

So, enjoy your vacation, folks, and I hope the misdirected email didn’t screw up your booking.

Will he demand the bail money back now?


[Update: Not true. So the only thing that was really news in those leaked cables turns out to be no news, hopefully hastening the day when both Assange and Moore fade into well-deserved obscurity.]

Best Wikileaks exposure yet: even Cuba thinks Michael Moore writes bad propaganda.

Perhaps I should have titled this one “When attention whores attack…each other!”.

Red Light Revenue


How well do those red-light auto-ticketing cameras work? This well (emphasis added):

"On top of this, many tickets are never paid, partly because failure to do so does not result in a suspension of license but also because 67 percent of tickets were mailed to people making legal right turns on red."

Dear California high-speed rail supporters,


Go ahead, explain the benefit we’re getting from this. And then start running.

Tar. Feathers. Some assembly required.

Diversity of everything except opinion


SF writer Elizabeth Moon has been removed as Guest of Honor at Wiscon, for the crime of stating an opinion that disagrees with the proper view on the subject.

[Update: The Brickmuppet weighs in, with thoughtful and linky goodness, including a Wiscon review. Honestly, after reading the review, I have to think that the only reason they originally invited her was for a chance to hate.]

“Need a clue, take a clue,
 got a clue, leave a clue”