sluggobear

• A 1999 article from the New York Times about Fanny Mae easing requirements for lending. (Eerily spot-on.)
• A more recent Newsweek article describing how we got into this financial mess.
• Six Flags Magic Mountain is building a brand-new wooden coaster: Terminator.
• Six Flags New England is giving the legendary Superman: Ride of Steel coaster a special-effects mega-makeover.
• Can't wait to see Religulous! Oh man I love Bill Maher.
• You still can't send MMS pictures with iPhone, but in the meantime, Quip has been a satisfactory substitute. (Link launches iTunes.)
• Neat: Where do satellites go to die?

• Palin Brushing Up On Foreign Policy At EPCOT
• Members Of Twisted Sister Now Willing To Take It

The boycott of Ford Motor Company continues to be effective. Ford sales in October were 9.5% less than in October of 2006. Ford sales have dropped in 18 of the last 20 months since the boycott began.

Perhaps Ford will soon realize that their support for the homosexual agenda is costing them big bucks. Ford evidently feels that appeasing the homosexual activists is more important than selling their automobiles.

onethsndwords

• Smoke, ash could remain an issue for several weeks [ article | graphic ]
  
• NASA, Northrop offer unmanned aircraft to aid firefighting effort [ article ]

• About 3 deaths, compared to about 1,500+ deaths.
• There are still about 2,000 New Orleans residents that remain unaccounted for.
• About 1,000+ destroyed homes in San Diego, compared to 20,000+ destroyed and 80,000+ damaged.  (Some say the numbers are higher.)
• In New Orleans, citizens endured horrific conditions without food, sanitation or law enforcement.  Civil unrest.  Maddening loss of communication.  Looting.  Mass confusion.  In some cases, people had to leave family members behind, and never saw them again.
• In New Orleans, scores of people fucking drowned.

jkusters

onethsndwords

Mandatory evacuations have been ordered for a huge swath totaling 100 square miles and ranging from Interstate 5 on the west across Interstate 15 to the east, and north from state Route 56 to Lake Hodges.

"The Witch Creek fire is now the number one concern for the state of California at this time," said San Diego Fire Chief Tracy Jarman.

"We've been unable to do any suppression effort because, in most cases, the fire resources are being used ... to do rescues," said Metcalf, chief of the North County Fire Protection District in Fallbrook.

• Avoid using cell phones unless needed
• Minimize physical activity due to the air quality
• Close windows to avoid breathing ash and small particles
• Drink lots of fluids

• Geauga Lake amusement park won't re-open in 2008
• One step closer to having wireless Internet in your airplane
• Annie Lennox' breathtaking new song, video, album and tour
• Burger King to limit advertising to kids under 12
• Depression worse than some chronic illnesses
• Sodas, even diet ones, may be linked with increased risk factors for heart disease and diabetes

Portions of the Patriot Act were struck down as unconstitutional today. U.S. District Judge Victor Marrero ordered the FBI to cease issuing the "national security letters" [NSL's] used to secretly demand customer information from internet providers, banks, and phone companies - demands made without a court order or subpoena.

In his 106-page ruling, Marrero says the letters violate both the First Amendment and the Constitution's separations of powers provision, as there is inadequate judicial supervision of the issuing of NSLs. Marrero said those letters represent "the legislative equivalent of breaking and entering, with an ominous free pass to the hijacking of constitutional values."

Today's ruling comes courtesy of the hard-working good people at the ACLU, who filed a suit on behalf of a "John Doe", an internet service provider who is prohibited by law from revealing having received an NSL.

National Gay & Lesbian Task Force head Matt Foreman notes, “Let’s see — one Republican senator is involved in soliciting sex from a man and the Republican leadership calls for a Senate investigation and yanks the rug from underneath him. Another Republican senator admits to soliciting the services of a female prostitute and there’s not only no investigation but the senator is greeted with a standing ovation by his Republican peers. What explains the starkly different responses? I’d say rank and homophobic hypocrisy.”

I don't care what you heard or care what you seen
I swear it wasn't me in Bear magazine
Because I'm not that hairy oh contrary
I go with the flow though the tempo varies

Greenhouse Simplicities
By Robert J. Samuelson
Newsweek,  Aug. 20-27, 2007 issue

We in the news business often enlist in moral crusades. Global warming is among the latest. Unfortunately, self-righteous indignation can undermine good journalism. Last week's NEWSWEEK cover story on global warming is a sobering reminder. It's an object lesson of how viewing the world as "good guys vs. bad guys" can lead to a vast oversimplification of a messy story. Global warming has clearly occurred; the hard question is what to do about it.

If you missed NEWSWEEK's story, here's the gist. A "well-coordinated, well-funded campaign by contrarian scientists, free-market think tanks and industry has created a paralyzing fog of doubt around climate change." This "denial machine" has obstructed action against global warming and is still "running at full throttle." The story's thrust: discredit the "denial machine," and the country can start the serious business of fighting global warming. The story was a wonderful read, marred only by its being fundamentally misleading.

( Read more... )

Device wakes man with severe brain injuries
Wed Aug 1, 2007 5:47PM EDT

By Julie Steenhuysen
Reuters

CHICAGO (Reuters) - A man with severe brain injuries who spent six years in a near-vegetative state can now chew his food, watch a movie and talk with family thanks to a brain pacemaker that may change the way such patients are treated, U.S. researchers said on Wednesday.

The 38-year-old man is the first person in a minimally conscious state to be treated with deep-brain stimulation, a treatment that uses a pacemaker and two electrodes to send impulses into a part of the brain regulating consciousness.

His awakening may change the way doctors think about people with severe brain injuries, who are largely unresponsive but still have some level of consciousness. These patients typically spend the rest of their lives in nursing homes, with little efforts at rehabilitation and slim chance of recovery.

• "The Padres were experimenting with a new invisible mind-altering electric ray on the kids yesterday. They wanted to create more gays and lesbians, and what better way than to have some handy? Pass the popcorn."
• "I don't get baseball and am not a fan. I don't have anything personal against gays. I just hate what they do to the cost of living when they move into a neighborhood. Home prices and rents skyrocket. And it's always the best areas in any city. There autta be a law that limits the number of gays in a neighborhood so straight folks with modest incomes can live in nice areas, too."
• "If kids didnt have to hear about gays... we would have FAR FAR fewer of em..." (which... fewer gays?  or fewer kids.)
  
• "I took my son yesterday to the game. We had fun!  But today he's mincing about in a sun dress and singing broadway musicals."

"With transvestites and transsexuals running about, many children will have a hard time telling the padres from the madres during this July 8th anti-family fiasco."