Nuke the News: Here Comes the Wind and Rain
* The GDP has gone up — 1%! You may think that’s not very much, but it’s better than going down 1%. In fact, it’s two percent points better than going down one percent. Math is fun.
At this rate, we’ll climb out of this hole by… Well, I’m not sure we’re beating inflation. Still, the point is, you can’t have a recession with positive growth. So as long as the economy can cling to growth above 0%, Obama can campaign on “Only one huge recession under my watch.”
* A giant hurricane is headed to DC and New York City. They’re not used to that sort of thing, and since I’ve lived through three major hurricanes, I thought I’d give them some tips. First off, whatever you’re doing to incur God’s wrath, just stop it for a little while. Second, don’t make eye contact with the hurricane. Finally, remember that the most important thing about a hurricane is to have fun.
Anyway, here’s some old posts I did on hurricanes. Here’s a Know Thy Enemy post on hurricanes from over eight years ago (hmm, I guess I used to use language like that; what a little scamp I was). And here’s Hurricane preparedness tips from nearly six years ago. Wow; I bet my archives is full of junk like this.
* Someone in the military felt the need to write an editorial about how Rick Perry doesn’t speak for the military. There are a lot of people in the American military, so if your really look around, you’re going to find one or two liberals. I think the biggest tip off this is a knee-jerk liberal screed is this paragraph:
Please explain to me how a fourth-grade science teacher is less patriotic than a drill sergeant in Killeen, Texas. Or how a social worker who helps single mothers in East Los Angeles is less patriotic than a convoy driver in Baghdad. Please explain how a fire fighter in Boston is less qualified for political office only because she has not volunteered for military duty.
I guess to the first question, what does teaching science have to do with patriotism? To second, are we talking an ACORN type social work? To the last, notice how the theoretical Boston fire fighter had to be a she — probably because he didn’t know how to subtly throw in that the fire fighter is a handicapped minority.
Also, there’s this line: “I would like to ask Perry how strength, character and altruism are missing in the day-to-day work of a community organizer in Chicago.” Only a fringe element of the American public could say that sentence with a straight face.
Anyway, they point of the article is to downplay military service as a qualification for a politician. Of course, not very long ago, liberals were calling anyone not in the military on the Republican side a chickenhawk. They were also finding the few liberal military people they could and putting them as prominent as they could. In fact, in 2004, they did a whole campaign based on portraying John Kerry as a war hero (didn’t work out great). But now they have some guy trying to argue that working at the DMV is equivalent to a U.S. Marine risking his life for the country. Seems rather incoherent, which brings me to a point that should often be repeated: The left has no coherent political philosophy. Everything for them is based on “this is our side and that’s the other side we have to defeat”. So they’ll twist themselves in knots making something a virtue one day and a liability the next. Don’t be like them. Don’t give up your principles to argue for one politician and to downplay another because all politicians are idiots and just aren’t worth it.
And I thank Dan Futrell for his service. I don’t thank the science teacher.
* CERN has found out that cosmic rays are the biggest contributor to cloud formation and thus the largest factors in setting climate temperatures. And since the sun modulates cosmic rays, it’s the biggest factor in our climate. So basically, scientists spent years studying tiny particles to figure out that the giant nuclear furnace in the sky is the biggest effect on the earth’s temperature. Great job, scientists!
* Scientists have found a planet that is basically a giant diamond with five times the diameter of earth. How many carats is that? They say it’s about as massive as Jupiter which is 1.8986×10^27 kg, and a carat is 200 mg, so… about 9.8 nonillion carats. Yeah, that’s the name of an actual number. Math is fun.
This is the sort of news we need to get private exploration: There’s gold and diamonds out there! Of course, this planet is 4,000 light-years away, so we to find stuff closer… like on Mars or in the asteroid belt. Eventually we’ll mine all of space; it’s got to be filled with riches. And hopefully we’ll find life on other planets because that might mean those planets have oil. I just have a feeling we’ll be getting to Star Trek times and our warp drives we’ll be running on diesel while we say to ourselves, “Any day now, we’re going to perfect a renewable fuel source. Now let’s play laser tag with our phasers set to stun.”
* New Crowder video! Time to go green with Crazy Pete:
Them curly light bulbs are weird and scary.
* Friend of IMAO author Mike Z. Williamson has a short story available as free download from Baen if you’re looking for some weekend reading material.
* Wisdom of the Day: “Pandas seem kind of tired of fighting this whole extinction thing. We should probably hurry and take more photos.” -Tim Siedell
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August 26th, 2011 at 11:20 am
We need a nonillion cannon to fire astronauts into space at the speed of light to the diamond planet where they can fill their pocket with like giant bling and such. Then we need another nonillion cannon on whatever planet we name it (BLING) works for me to fire them back with the loot. For the astronauts they will not have aged at all since time stops at the speed of light, but we shall have aged quite some and our deficit will be in the nonillions by then so they better be bringing back gobs!!! Or we could just have them stay there for a couple of months and fire diamonds at the earth. A couple of shovels full, BAM! Another couple of shovels full, BAM! In about 2 years debt will be solved!!! Except if we let the government nit wits know about the plans they will spend the diamonds that are on the way…:(
August 26th, 2011 at 11:27 am
Wouldn’t going up 1% be 200% better than going down 1%?
August 26th, 2011 at 11:30 am
Dibs on Space Tuna!
August 26th, 2011 at 11:38 am
“I want a 9.8 nonillion carats diamond, Daddy. I want one now!!” – Veruca Salt
August 26th, 2011 at 11:55 am
Frank, don’t do that !!! Do not go around announcing new Sciency! big numbers. Now Obama knows nonillion is a number will set a new goal for the national debt.
August 26th, 2011 at 11:59 am
> “The left has no coherent political philosophy.”
I’d say the left’s *tactics* are incoherent. They rely on their conviction that we mouth-breathin’ stump-jumpin’ rednecks are too stupid to notice when they contradict themselves in the same speech or the same sentence. They do have a coherent philosophy, though. It’s called nihilism.
August 26th, 2011 at 12:06 pm
I don’t think the guy that wrote the editorial is even a Soldier. I think the last time Basic Training was conducted at Ft Hood was WWII (no drill sergeants).
August 26th, 2011 at 12:26 pm
Whoo-hoo! I thought Frank J. had made up the “patriotic community organizer” quotation. The guy actually said it. Does anyone recall the article I linked some time back, “Bicyclists Are More Patriotic than Flag Wavers.” I think this Futrell guy wrote it.
In lieu of anything humorous, I post in full this comment to Futrell’s prose:
We have met the enemy, and they are mentally defective.
August 26th, 2011 at 12:28 pm
so…a Hurricane that MIGHT be a Cat 2 by the time it gets to to DC and Bam calls it “historic”. He also said that the Hurricane is a Republican plot to discredit his administration in an attempt to avoid having the Republicans do to him what he did to them after Katrina. Nice.
Meh.
Where I come from, a cat 2 hurricane doesn’t even make the local news. Reporters have to put on trench coats to get that “I’m struggling to stand up in the wind for this report look”. I guess they’re not used to getting hurricanes in Kenya.
August 26th, 2011 at 12:31 pm
I bet that for his Hurricane, reporters will have wind machines off-camera just so they can talk about how “historic” and horrible his hurricane was and how great Obama was at preventing it from doing any damage. Also, that the Hurricane is the Republicans fault, and please ignore the downgraded economic growth number.
August 26th, 2011 at 1:40 pm
Stupid NASA cancelling manned spaceflight right before they find a giant diamond planet. ARRRGGGGH!
August 26th, 2011 at 1:49 pm
Weather Channel: “Hurricane Irene beings assault on East Coast.”
These people make it sound like it’s December 16th, 1944, and we’re awaiting three German panzer armies.
August 26th, 2011 at 1:49 pm
This hurricane will do what the earthquake didn’t do; give us enough broken windows to get the country back to work replacing them. This kind of stimulus is way better then a space alien invasion, yes indeed I see economic growth and prosperity right around the corner….Paul Krugman, NYT.
August 26th, 2011 at 2:09 pm
@Marko, Maybe the UN can pass a resolution condemning the hurricane…problem solved.
August 26th, 2011 at 2:18 pm
Not that I don’t believe everything that FrankJ tells me,
I had to look up nonillion. “…a cardinal number represented in the U.S. by 1 followed by 30 zeros, and in Great Britain by 1 followed by 54 zeros…”
Why is it less (24 zeros less) in the U.S. than in Great Britain! Is it tied to the U.S. dollar?
I then looked up ‘cardinal’ and … it just got more confusing.
I will never doubt FrankJ again.
August 26th, 2011 at 2:18 pm
Right, Son of Bob. Right.
Also, Burma will probably know this already, but I feel the need to inform you that the military, while amazing, awesome, and a fantastic representative of our nation, has always had some idiots. After all, how else do you think Chesty Puller got railroaded out of the Marine Corps?
August 26th, 2011 at 2:20 pm
Get out! Get O U T! Get outta there! Marko.
(Depending on which part of William Penn’s state you’re in!)
August 26th, 2011 at 2:43 pm
If that was a soldier writing that opinion it would be dripping with sarcasm. The military does not disrespect Obama because he has no military service, they have the highest respect for the Office of the President, however they believe that the current occupant is a complete Idiot; not a perfect Idiot, just complete. I would expect the ‘Stolen Honor’ groups to investigate his claims to be a war veteran.
As for playing laser tag with Phasers, if we play with Liberals do we really have to set them for stun?
Just asking.
August 26th, 2011 at 2:51 pm
I notice that the author of that piece is named “Dan Futrell” which is an anagram for “Fallen Turd”.
August 26th, 2011 at 3:02 pm
I predict we will see M’chell in full Klingon garb filling sand bags in a photo op to show she cares. You won’t see Barry, too much work. The guy running around covered head to waistline running around is Biden.
August 26th, 2011 at 3:05 pm
maybe shutting down D.C. and N.Y at the same time for a weekend will allow us to swing the country sharply back to the right while they’re all running around like a president with his head stuck in a bucket…and when they all come back on Monday they’ll be like “hey! what happened??? why are taxes so low and everybody has guns???”
August 26th, 2011 at 3:15 pm
It will take at least 8,000 years to retrieve that diamond. Assuming the mission could be funded for $1,000 (probably using green energy credits) and assuming the diamond could be sold for about a noniliion dollars, that represents about a 1% return on investment. Which is about how fast the economy is growing. So, probably a reasonable investment plan.
August 26th, 2011 at 3:30 pm
Yes, willy – but once we have a warp drive that can do warp 8 then it will only take 1,000 years. Doesn’t seem so farfetched now, does it?
August 26th, 2011 at 3:55 pm
@Willy,
As soon as NASA’s done with their mission to make Muslims feel less like the losers that they are, perhaps they’ll get back to work on that whole “space” thing. Then they can look into it.
August 26th, 2011 at 4:06 pm
A noniliion dollars, a nonillion dollars you say? I’ll gladly buy you a hamburger Tuesday if you loan me a noniliion dollars today!…. B. Obama, always lookin’ for a stimulus loan, Wash DC.
August 26th, 2011 at 4:07 pm
Cat, I’ll give you free tuna for a decade if you can get that diamond planet broken up and back to me.
August 26th, 2011 at 4:20 pm
Sorry, Carolyn – there’s a reason they send dogs, monkeys, & humans into space and not cats. It’s just too hazardous to risk losing a cat.
August 26th, 2011 at 4:52 pm
I honestly could not understand the words coming out of Crazy Pete. “Curly lightbulb” is all I got and that’s only cuz Frank said it.
From whence have you this need to smash the diamond planet, Carolyn? You might want to get that looked at.
August 26th, 2011 at 5:20 pm
1) Didn’t cosmic rays give the Fantastic Four their superpowers? OK, so: Fantastic Four good, global warming bad. We’re ready for the tiebreaker.
2) No one becomes a teacher because she loves America (could be a million other good reasons, but not love of country). Many, many join the services because they love America. That’s all. (And anyone who “organizes” a “community” in the liberal BS sense should be deported.)
August 26th, 2011 at 5:24 pm
@Doug, “I had to look up nonillion. “…a cardinal number represented in the U.S. by 1 followed by 30 zeros, and in Great Britain by 1 followed by 54 zeros…”
Ist britain, it europe, they never have been able to do math correctly.
Why does europe sound like someone with the dry heaves?
If we launch the liberals into space with picks to get the diamonds, we won’t have to deal with them for at least 8000 years. Hmmmm
August 26th, 2011 at 5:28 pm
Fly, we’re talking about diamonds! What else do you need to know?
August 26th, 2011 at 5:55 pm
Science teachers patriotic? As much as our science and math scores suck I’m sure they are patriotic but I’m not sure as to which country they are being patriotic to. If that isn’t a run on sentence I don’t know what is.
August 26th, 2011 at 5:57 pm
Hurricane Prep for DC and NYC…Repent judgement is nigh.
August 26th, 2011 at 6:26 pm
Wow I followed that link to the hurricane post to remind myself what it was….and there’s some, er, colorful comments. Must be from pre-spam-filter days! LOL
August 26th, 2011 at 6:41 pm
If a really big hurricane hit the east coast and an earthquake took out the west coast, would that mean that we could once again follow the constitution? Just asking….
August 26th, 2011 at 7:02 pm
Doug, plentyobailouts:
Actually, this is an instance where I think the UK has it right.
One million (US & UK) is 1,000,000.
In the US, one billion is a thousand million (1,000,000,000). In the UK, it’s one million million (1,000,000,000,000).
In the US, one trillion is a thousand billion (1,000,000,000,000). In the UK, it’s one million billion (1,000,000,000,000,000,000).
In the US, one quadrillion is a thousand trillion (1,000,000,000,000,000). In the UK, it’s one million trillion (1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000).
In the US, every thousand is another named number sequence. In the UK, every million is another named number sequence.
Think about it like this: billion’s prefix is bi, meaning two. Trillion’s prefix is tri, meaning three. Quadrillion’s prefix is quad, meaning four. In the UK, a billion has twice as many zeroes as a million, a trillion has three times as many zeroes as a million, a quadrillion has four times as many zeroes as a million.
There’s actually an elegance to it.
August 26th, 2011 at 7:15 pm
@Marko: Amen bruddah. I seem to recall that Puller was so disgusted with the whole affair that he selected a senior NCO to pin the lt. general star on him during the ceremony just before he retired.
@Cat: Good anagrammatical catch on Futrell’s name. I would have completely missed that.
August 26th, 2011 at 7:17 pm
@Basil: You make my head hurt, except to confirm that the Brits have it wrong again.
August 26th, 2011 at 8:26 pm
Fly is right, Carolyn – that’s no way to treat your best friend.
August 26th, 2011 at 9:18 pm
Frank’s Preparedness for Hurricanes should be a manual sold in every Barnes and Noble here in nyc.
August 26th, 2011 at 9:39 pm
You losers are sooooooo limited! Worm Holes ma boy!!! We just jump into a Wormhole, BAM we are instantly on the Diamond Planet, we rape the dickens out of it (like white men always do) and steal it blind and them back into the Worm Hole and BAM, we are home with the Bling!!! C’mon, people! Get with the program and put your thinking caps on!!! We have a deficit to solve here!!! Jeeze!!!
August 26th, 2011 at 10:25 pm
I’m sorry, Cat. I just really want diamonds. Is that so wrong? Sigh.
August 26th, 2011 at 10:35 pm
What do you call a Chinese lady with one leg?
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Irene
August 27th, 2011 at 12:22 am
NO_MO.
Carolyn, wanting a diamond planet is only natural. Wanting to smash it to bits first suggests some subconscious aggression that I am happily qualified to treat. Shall we begin? Tell me about your parents. Were they smashed by a giant diamond by chance?
August 27th, 2011 at 1:13 am
This hurricane will finalize what has been happening now for years: New York and Florida are one.
August 27th, 2011 at 9:10 am
Oooooooooh sorry. I wasn’t clear. I want to smash the planet into smaller pieces so I can wear the pretty diamonds as jewelry. As for my parents, they won’t take me to the diamond planet either. Sigh.
August 27th, 2011 at 11:35 am
@Basil
It is really that Americans have a much more Grand way of thinking about economics than do the Brits.
In America a million is 1,000 grand. A billion is 1,000,000 grand (twice as many zeros). A trillion is 1,000,000,000 grand (three times as many zeros).
QED
August 28th, 2011 at 1:29 pm
Basil – If: “Think about it like this: billion’s prefix is bi, meaning two. Trillion’s prefix is tri, meaning three. Quadrillion’s prefix is quad, meaning four.”
What is: “nonillion”, it’s prefix being non, meaning not? It’s FrankJ’s new word. And I’m guessing he ripped it off of Buttercup.
August 28th, 2011 at 1:39 pm
Doug:
Heh. It does sound made up. And, maybe he did get it from Buttercup, but it seems to me that most babies would go straight to the number representing 10100: a googol.
But, for those that care, after quadrillion comes quintillion (five), sextillion (six), septillion (seven), octillion (eight), nonillion (nine), decillion (ten) … but then the names get all weird. In the UK, each has the associated number of times as many zeroes as a million. In the US, it’s that many times zeros as a thousand, plus three more. Which is why I think the US method is weird and the UK method makes more sense.
August 28th, 2011 at 1:46 pm
Basil – Thanks a googol, for clearing that up!