Palin and Kasie and speedo

Hat tip to Mostly Cajun!

By KASIE HUNT | 6/3/11 9:14 AM EDT
SEABROOK, N.H. — Sarah Palin’s bus is plastered with a mock-up of the U.S. Constitution. But her entourage — both the three-vehicle motorcade that includes the bus and the smaller, two-SUV version she uses for smaller events — hasn’t been very respectful of traffic laws.

Snip

Journalists in the caravan trailing her “One Nation” tour bus describe the experience as harrowing, a rolling menace careening up the East Coast in hot pursuit of the former Alaska governor who declined to provide any advance itinerary of her tour over six days on the road.

As they left the clambake she attended Thursday in New Hampshire, Palin’s two-SUV caravan traveled at 52 miles per hour in a 35 mph zone as it peeled away from the hosts’ neighborhood. Both cars blew through a stop sign about a mile later. They did 70 mph in a 55 mph zone on I-95 — and then, after they got off, without signaling, flew right past a flashing sign informing them they were going 45 mph in a 35 mph zone.

Link

Uh, don’t you just love it???

Kasie, two things.

1. Quit whining. There are probably a million folks who would gladly take these terrible risks for the money you make! So shut up already. Climb out of the Obama Tank and start being a REPORTER!

2. Besides, they were just trying to make it to all those 57 states Obamie visited.

I mean, can the media’s hatred of Palin be made any plainer??

Oh well.

The garden is doing fine, thank you. The onions are delicious and the peppers are close to being big enough to be picked. I hoed it out today and put mulch around the tomatoes. I have suckered them and put up the metal cages I use instead of sticks and they are loaded with blooms. The Crook Neck and Patty Pan squash looks great and the candy, aka Okra, has finally caught on and is growing so fast you can almost see it shoot up.

Summer time and the living is easy….. Whoever wrote that never had a garden and a big yard.

Took time out today from cutting up downed trees and gardening and such to go pick up my wife’s Buick Regal from the repair shop at our local GM dealer. The car had started quitting and then restarting and dying when stopped at red lights and I took it in yesterday.

The problem, according to the Service Manager, was that the Mass Airflow Sensor had gone bad and was turning of the air to the cylinders from time to time. After market sensor $253.22, cleaning throttle body and other labor $197.18, one gasket $8.82 and $45.74 tax and the total was $514.82.

Yeah. Wow. Ouch.

Now, no complaint. The Regal has performed royally and its supercharged 3800 cc V6 can outrun a jack rabbit being pursued by a rattler. And no complaint about the mechanics. I’ve used’em for years and found them to be honest, trustworthy and helpful.

It’s just that my first car cost me $50.00. A 1950 Ford 2 door. Black. Flathead V-8, stick shift. Bought it from my father-in-law when we got married.

Sad to say mine didn't look this good. But it got me where I needed to be.

Yeah. $50.00. Wow. Kept it for about three years. It had a nasty habit of chewing up clutch throw out bearings. I think the part cost about $4.00 and the labor was free since I was the mechanic. I got so good I could fix it in the dark, or at least with minimal lighting….

I remember the axle inner race bearing driver side went and started allowing grease to get on the brake lining. That provided a rather interesting stopping paradigm. …… Tap brake, correct pull to the right…tap brake, correct pull to the right, etc., etc…… and yeah lady, I almost hit you but I didn’t so quit giving me that look.

A buddy and I fixed it in the back yard of the house the wife and I had rented. It was cold and she kept us supplied with coffee. We didn’t have a blow torch to heat the bearing but we did have a (at least) a 5000 watt soldiering iron that did the job of heating the bad bearing so we could get it off.

Being married, short of cash and needing transportation can lead to perspiration followed by inspiration.

It could find its way to the squadron’s hangout almost without steering and after those cold nasty nights when we had Sea Air Rescue (SAR) duty it could produce warm air from the heater by the time I arrived home.

We’d pre-flight our aircraft and bunk down in a Quonset hut left over from WWII. Fully clothed with all our logs and maps and other necessary stuff we would play endless games of pinochle. We even had our very own pick up truck poised and ready to rush us to our plane.

Doctor Strangelove had nothing on us!

Along about 2200 we’d get horsecock sandwiches and coffee. They would be any cold cut of meat, with mustard on white. And assuming we didn’t take off to save some hapless person’s behind we’d often have a patrol take off around 6AM and some other crew would become SAR while we looked for Soviet subs and played other games.

But that’s another story.

And unlike Kasie, we never whined and made barely enough to feed ourselves.

Of course a few of us died. And I am damn resentful about that. Good men dead and in their graves…. Just so people like Kasie could grow up and write the nonsense that she does.

What a waste. What damnable fucking kiss my ass waste.

OnTwitter I am Lesabre1

"Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them." - Karl Popper

“Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants. It is the creed of slaves.” - William Pitt

"Logic. There is little logic among the cultural elite, maybe because there is little omnipresent fear of job losses or the absence of money, and so arises a rather comfortable margin to indulge in nonsense." - Victor Davis Hanson

Once upon a time in Russellville

RUSSELLVILLE, Ark. - A middle school yearbook in Arkansas has created controversy around the country after it named Former President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney in a list of the "worst" people of all time.

The yearbook included a list titled the "Top 5 worst people of all time." The list begins with Adolph Hitler, Osama Bin Laden, Charles Manson, but then lists Bush and Cheney.

Students didn't vote on the list, and it was taken from an opinion website. Parents in the community are outraged.

"I'm furious as a parent and as a board member and as a tax payer and as a resident of Russellville," resident Chris Cloud said. "It's wrong."

Parents spotted the list after the yearbooks were printed. The school's solution was to cover the list with tape.

The superintendent said the yearbook's editing process is under review.

Guess whose job security is also under review?

Once upon a time I spent about a month in Russellville. First helping install a new telephone Solid State Electronic Private Automatic Branch Exchange (EPABX) system for the college and later fixing problems. It featured something called DID (Direct In Dial) and DOD (Direct Out Dial) trunk lines that could be accessed by the students dialing “9” for a local call... To dial long distance the student supposedly dialed “0” and was connected to a long distance ATT operator. “1+” was supposedly blocked.

We were told three college employees who had previously been operators were "reassigned" to other tasks. The long march to underemployment had begun.

I say supposedly because it took the students about 15 seconds to figure out how to defeat the system’s "Toll Restriction” and call whoever they wanted free of charge. Of course when the bill came back to the school the accountants went postal and we were summoned back to fix the problems. One of the not so sweet things about it was that we could only work on the system after 10:00PM because it was carrying live administrative traffic as well as the future Masters of the Universe’s desperate calls home for money during the day and earlier night time hours.

Of course the school just looked at the “Called number” on the bill and decided that John Smith, Jr from Forest City was the person who called John Smith Sr in Forest City and billed the criminal.

Never, never, never doubt the ingenuity of an American college student when they are given a chance to show that they can “beat the system!” Or the system's ability to have the last laugh.

But that was the least of our woes. The trunks lines were spread over two different Central Offices by the telephone company. One was an ITT 71/72 stage by stage and the other was a North Electric NX1 cross bar. That meant if you dialed out, the dial tone, that’s the sound you get when you pick up the phone to use it, would be different depending on what equipment was connected.

And since our equipment was electronic it had an “Allotter” that selected trunks at random. That confused the users but they eventually got use to it.

Worse, if you dialed a number that was connected to the NX1 andyour trunk was connected to the 71/72 you had to trunk between exchanges. (You can only have 10,000 numbers in one exchange.) What that meant that the connect time was so long that people would hang up and file a trouble report. Worse, if they stayed within the same exchange the connect time was much shorter. Confusion reigned.

The solution? We installed a Tick Tone generator on the intra office trunks that provided a scratchy “tick” that the caller could hear which told him the call was being made.

We stayed at the Holiday Inn, which is still there. Unusual given that the typical business plan is to not do any maintenance, depreciate the property down to zero and then sell it to someone who will refurbish/upgrade and turn it into a EconLodge or some other chain.

The room bill was $14.00 a night and my boss, a Turkish immigrant who was Director of Engineering, complained bitterly. He smoked Turkish cigarettes that were about 6 inches long and never took them out of his mouth. He would just put them in the center of his lips and talk around them. As the ash got longer and longer it would finally fall off onto his tie and he would just wipe/smear the ashes...

He did the same thing when he interviewed me and we had a “failure to communicate.” I didn’t understand three words he said. Fortunately one of them was “Boolean” and I desperately sketched some AND, NOT and OR gates. All of these are now available by the gad zillions on trillions of chips smaller than the eye of the needle those rich men must go through on their way to heaven.

But that was not the case when Holiday Inn rooms were $14.00 a night in Russellville, AR.

OnTwitter I am Lesabre1

"Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them." - Karl Popper

“Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants. It is the creed of slaves.” - William Pitt

"Logic. There is little logic among the cultural elite, maybe because there is little omnipresent fear of job losses or the absence of money, and so arises a rather comfortable margin to indulge in nonsense." - Victor Davis Hanson

This is the machine for curing man made global warming.

Hat tip to  Bill T!
OnTwitter I am Lesabre1

"Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them." - Karl Popper

“Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants. It is the creed of slaves.” - William Pitt

"Logic. There is little logic among the cultural elite, maybe because there is little omnipresent fear of job losses or the absence of money, and so arises a rather comfortable margin to indulge in nonsense." - Victor Davis Hanson

New York says you can't smoke in the park

I posted this a few years back. It is worth repeating.

More years ago than I like to remember I smoked. And, at that time, airliners had smoking and no smoking sections... On one fine day I was in First Class on a flight from Anchorage to Seattle and I indulged in my habit. Yes, I did. I smoked.

A few rows away sat two guys who also indulged in their habit... they knocked back about four or so drinks each before dinner, guzzled numerous glasses of wine with dinner and several after dinner drinks. In a word, about an hour out from Seattle, they were wacked, blotto, zapped, smashed. I know all this because they had had enough in the airport bar to believe they knew everying about everything, and should speak loud enough for everyone to hear their words of wisdom, and were giving us this as the boarded. Clowns are hard to miss.

They then ordered more. Which they received. Now, you may be getting ready to hear how I chastised the Flight Attendant for serving them. Wrong. I, who had a VO before dinner and a couple of glasses of wine with dinner, said nothing. In fact, I was nodding off when I glanced up to find a drunken oaf standing in the aisle at my row. (I was in a window seat and the aisle was empty.)

I don't remember what he said, something to the effect that my second hand smoke was giving him cancer.

"No," I replied, "you won't die of cancer. You will kill yourself and some other driver in an car wreck on the way home because you will be too drunk to drive."

(Actually I said something like: "You idiot. You're drunk. Sit down and shut up."
But that doesn't sound nice.)

At that point the Flight Attendant arrived and gently escorted him back to his seat and noted that he should remain there. Fortunately he did.

Whether or not he killed anyone on the way home, or caught lung cancer from my second hand smoke is not known by me.

I dredged that memory up while reading my "hotel/motels stayed at list." The hotel, if you are interested, was the Sheraton Anchorage which had a wonderful location almost across from the street from the Alaska Bush Club, a den of inequity where North Slope workers were known to spend huge amounts of money for the company of delectable looking young ladies... But I digress....

Years later I figured out that smoking was not made socially unacceptable by the thought that people where developing lung cancer, but because it stinks. It smells bad.

Now this isn't a defense of smoking. I quit 16 years ago and wish I had never started and wish that no one smoked and consider it THE most dangerous drug known. My problem is, if nicotine is bad for you, so is alcohol. So why tolerate, even celebrate one and not the other?? Why don't we demand drinkers take their drinks outside the restaurant?

The answer is simply this. They don't want to suppress drinking because it yields huge tax dollars and doesn't easily intrude into anyone's space. Tobacco also yields huge tax dollars, but it does easily intrude, and generates complaints from the "I'm a whiner generation." Ergo. All can drink in comfort, but not smoke.

So forget about the health issues. Forget about the carnage on the highways.... It was, is and remains, all about "me." OnTwitter I am Lesabre1

"Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them." - Karl Popper

“Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants. It is the creed of slaves.” - William Pitt

"Logic. There is little logic among the cultural elite, maybe because there is little omnipresent fear of job losses or the absence of money, and so arises a rather comfortable margin to indulge in nonsense." - Victor Davis Hanson

Now you know why a Chevy Volt runs around $48K

And why GM went broke and beome Obama Motors.

General Motors broke ground Wednesday on a six-acre field of solar panels in front of its Detroit-Hamtramck plant as part of an effort to green the production of its Chevrolet Volt…DTE will lower GM’s energy bill because of the solar panels, which were first reported by the Free Press, saving about $15,000 a year. (Bold mine–we’ll come back to that.)

It gets better.

Money Quote: “This isn’t only going green for green’s sake,” said Bob Ferguson, GM’s vice president of global public policy. “This is about reducing this plant’s environmental footprint and reducing our bottom line.”

And now the trap door springs.

Six acres = 261,360 sq. feet. A 190-watt solar panel covers about 4 sq. feet. 261,360/4 = 65,340 panels. But they’ll need room for wiring and pipes, support equipment, etc., so let’s say they can only put 64,000 in place. Now, the big panels can run $30,000 a pop. But let’s say they get a deal–$10,000.

Our cost, just for the panels is…yes, you can do it in your head: $640 million. Isn’t it amazing that guy from GM can’t do that in his head. VP, huh? (Yes–I should always have my glasses on when I do this–two more zeros required.)

-But, harrumph, it will save $15,000 a year.- Hmm, 640,000,000/15,000. Cool, the payback is only 42,700 F.... YEARS YOU .......G! But alas, it’s really not. The average life of a solar panel is about 20 years. So they’d have to replace them about 2,135 times. $640 million x 2,135 = $1.36 trillion. Hey, but amortized over 42,700 years…? (corrections made)

Now do you understand why reasonably intelligent people just snear when they hear about the wonders of solar power?? Wind power???

It just aint here yet!

Link, but be warned of very strong language.

OnTwitter I am Lesabre1

"Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them." - Karl Popper

“Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants. It is the creed of slaves.” - William Pitt

"Logic. There is little logic among the cultural elite, maybe because there is little omnipresent fear of job losses or the absence of money, and so arises a rather comfortable margin to indulge in nonsense." - Victor Davis Hanson

Diversity is just another word for surrender.

Just as a President named Barack Hussein Obama throws Israel and the Jews to the dogs we now find political discourse shall be in Spanish.

We knew it would come to this, didn't we?

El zapato está en el otro pie

That’s Spanish for “the shoe is on the other foot,” a phrase that seems applicable to a mayoral debate held in Miami last week that excluded participants who were not fluent in the local vernacular. In the case of the debate, the local vernacular was Spanish.

The event, held at Florida International University and broadcast by Spanish language TV channel Univision, outraged the non-Spanish-speaking mayoral candidates and many audience members. A student at the university commented, “We have a large Hispanic community, but this is Miami and we like to celebrate our diversity here. I don’t think it’s right to exclude any candidate.”

Interestingly, the complaints of racial bias are being leveled not only by Caucasians but by other people “of color.” Roosevelt Bradley, a black candidate, called the publicly funded event “polarizing and divisive,” adding, “This turns the clock back 50 years on race and ethnic relations.”

Link

Are you surprised?? Really? I don't think you are. Anyone knows that when the majority decides to give up its power then the minority will become the majority. That has been true since 1,000,000 BC.

OnTwitter I am Lesabre1

"Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them." - Karl Popper

“Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants. It is the creed of slaves.” - William Pitt

"Logic. There is little logic among the cultural elite, maybe because there is little omnipresent fear of job losses or the absence of money, and so arises a rather comfortable margin to indulge in nonsense." - Victor Davis Hanson

Bits and pieces 5-19-11

Well, where have I been?

Doing things like confirming that using the chain saw to cut up trees on the ground doesn't leave much energy for anything except eating and sleeping.

And I haven't used anything except the 14 inch saw. I'm gonna have to work up to the 20 incher.

And just to remind us that tornadoes come in bunches, we had another come through last Friday. This one was to the north of us and didn't touch down but managed to shake down more branches that had previously been ripped off but hung in the branches 30' up. There is nothing worse on an old man than having to bend over and pick up limbs.

I have got the garden mostly in. Patty Pan and Crook Neck squash planted. Cucumbers up. Tomato plants set out. Okra up but looking sickly. Too much water.  Giant Reds, Green Bells and Banana peppers in and growing. Onions looking great and the cabbage making heads. Watermelons and cantaloupes next week.

Discovered something I didn't know. This is a Zone 3 earthquake zone. That means the deductible on the home and contents is 15%, or around $100,000. So if the big rock and roll comes I'll have to transfer $100,000 out of petty cash.

No problementoooooo. Doesn't every one have $100,000 in petty cash??

The county has now been declared a disaster area. We're lucky. We don't qualify for any FEMA loans..... But I was hoping I could get one of those $1500 debit cards they passed out during Katrina...

Obama's bump has become a thump. He's now back in the 46%-49% approval range and heading south. Why is that?

Well $4.00 gasoline, 15% plus real unemployment and things getting worse lead the indicators. Along with that we find Afghanistan in turmoil, we have po'd Pakistan, our supposed ally, Syria is trying to flood Israel's border and provoke an incident while killing its own citizens. Meanwhile Libya is in flames, Egypt is probably going radical Muslim and wanting to attack Israel and Iran is going nuke and has a deal to build rocket launching sites in Venezuela.

Not to mention England is talking about withdrawing their troops from Aghanistan.

Do you think Obamie and Queenie not getting an invitation to the wedding was a clue??

It looks like the smartest man in the world couldn't pour piss out of a boot with instructions printed on the back of the heel.

And then there's Iraq. Oh wait. That was Bush's war and is look pretty stable. Wow. 

I think you will love this link.

Hat tip to Jim M!







OnTwitter I am Lesabre1

"Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them." - Karl Popper

“Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants. It is the creed of slaves.” - William Pitt

"Logic. There is little logic among the cultural elite, maybe because there is little omnipresent fear of job losses or the absence of money, and so arises a rather comfortable margin to indulge in nonsense." - Victor Davis Hanson