I dunno, but archaeologist Robert Samast thinks so. Great find, if true. Nex thing you know, they might actually dredge up evidence that Howard Dean ever ran for president.

Posted by: Physics Geek at 01:49 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Cool little animated test found here. Drag and drop the states where they go in the map. My score? 90%, average error of 15 miles and 291 seconds. However, if you start with a lot of central states first, the odds are good that you'll have some distance errors because you can't dead reckon ALL of them.

Posted by: Physics Geek at 07:19 PM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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And it's time for the annual year-end dash by imbeciles to get their names onto the list of this year's Darwin Award nominees. Here's the latest entry. Unbelievable.

Posted by: Physics Geek at 05:37 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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So fat people are more likely to suffer from heart disease later in life. Again I say to you: no shit.

Posted by: Physics Geek at 05:29 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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And that source would be none other than Ted Rall. Excerpt:

Firstly, living in the sticks doesn't make you more American. Rural, urban or suburban--they're irrelevant. San Francisco's predominantly gay Castro district is every bit as red, white and blue as the Texas panhandle. But if militant Christianist Republicans from inland backwaters believe that secular liberal Democrats from the big coastal cities look upon them with disdain, there's a reason. We do, and all the more so after this election.

No shit. Of course, this nugget of truth is buried in the rest of Rall's crap. I'm certain that he didn't mean for this to be the money quote. Oh, what the heck, here's the final paragraph:

So our guy lost the election. Why shouldn't those of us on the coasts feel superior? We eat better, travel more, dress better, watch cooler movies, earn better salaries, meet more interesting people, listen to better music and know more about what's going on in the world. If you voted for Bush, we accept that we have to share the country with you. We're adjusting to the possibility that there may be more of you than there are of us. But don't demand our respect. You lost it on November 2.

I have nothing to add to this dreck.

Posted by: Physics Geek at 05:26 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Since I number among the -apparently- ignorant, Confederate flag salutin', NASCAR lovin', gay bashin' contingent that obeyed the voices in my head by voting for Bush, I have to say this to my lovable lefty loons: I understand your ideas just fine, I just think you're dead wrong on most issues. However, I believe that reasonable people can disagree on issues and that a spirited dialogue can help both sides by pointing out the holes in each other's arguments. What I'm hearing from a lot of you, though, is that you don't give a shit what I think and would rather spend your time castigating any and all who have the temerity to disagree with you. For the record, you're not going to win many converts this way. My opinion, of course, but I think that I'm on to something. Stay with me here.

Back in 2002, many people pointed to lying propagandist such as Michael Moore and described him as being indicative of a disease that had crept into the Democratic party. Many of you were outraged by this comparison because- you said- Moore was a fringe element in your party. Extrapolating his views and ideas to the Democrat party as a whole was patently unfair. And guess what? You were absolutely correct. Then a funny thing happened: you decided to make Michael Moore the poster child of your party. You even gave him a seat of honor during your national convention, seating him next to former president Jimmy Carter. The Photoshopped newspaper headlines, distortions of the truth and outright falsehoods that Moore displayed in F 9/11 became campaign slogans for the Democrats. I'm going to go out on a limb and state that this might not have been such a good idea. Let's see why this might be true.

Tom Daschle, the soon to be former Senate minority leader attended a screening and was photographed with Michael Moore. Since Tom represents a very red state, this probably wasn't too smart. Every 6 years, Daschle pretended to be a right-winger to get re-elected. It worked, too, until this year, when the voters in his state realized that maybe, just maybe, a guy who doesn't distance himself from a shithead like Michael Moore probably isn't the best choice to represent their interests in the US Senate.

The Republicans increased their majorities in both the House and Senate. 'Nuff said.

Let's recap: the Democrats moved their party's center below the Mendoza line of reason and put this on public display. They displayed no interest in reasoned discourse, opting instead for ad hominem attacks on anyone and everyone that didn't believe that Bush was just like Hitler. That is, if Hitler were much stupider. And now that-surprise!- your candidate lost, you've decided to simultaneously increase the ferocity and decrease the sanity of your arguments. And I hear that you're thinking of making Howard Dean the new chair of the DNC. Maybe you haven't heard of the first rule of holes; I suggest that you aquaint yourself with it, pronto. Not that I expect you to listen to me any more that you have in the past. But I can still hope.

Update: Dean provides a far more eloquent dissertation on this subject. It is your required reading for today.

Posted by: Physics Geek at 03:41 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Along comes a real bomb that puts the MOAB in its place: the MOP. Excerpt:

The Air Force built a weapon so big it was nicknamed "Mother of All Bombs" on the eve of the war with Iraq, but MOAB would be dwarfed by a much larger munition now under study.

The proposed Massive Ordnance Penetrator, or MOP, would weigh 30,000 pounds, nearly 40 percent more than the 21,000 pound MOAB -- officially Massive Ordnance Air Blast -- that never saw combat.

"The reason it's heavier than MOAB is that it has to penetrate a target," said Fred Davis, technical director for assessment and demonstrations at the Air Force Research Laboratory's Munitions Directorate.

MOP would be designed to explode deep in the ground or inside a structure to destroy tunnels and bunkers or topple tall buildings.

Posted by: Physics Geek at 07:47 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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Bookmark this page, print it and keep a copy nearby as a useful reference for the next election cycle. National and battleground polls are graded on how closely their final polls aligned with reality. What follows is the excerpt with regards to proven polling hack John Zogby:

As we all know, Zogby had been on record for months saying that Kerry was going to win this race. Despite his final tracking poll that put Bush ahead by one point nationally, Zogby's polling at the state level reflected his belief that Kerry was going to be the beneficiary of huge turnout - especially among the youth vote. The result is that Zogby missed three of the eleven states he polled in (FL, IA, and NM), had a relatively high error rate across the board (3.8%), and his numbers generally skewed in favor of John Kerry.

Adding insult to injury, Zogby's bizarre election day antics calling for "surprises" in Colorado and Virginia and a decisive 311 electoral vote victory for Kerry suggest he was relying on (not to mention taken in by) the badly skewed early exit poll data.

Let's be honest: Zogby's conduct this year bordered on outrageous. No other independent pollster was out making public predictions of a John Kerry or George W. Bush victory months before hand. And no other pollster decided to wait until 5:30pm Eastern time on election day to post their final numbers.

Posted by: Physics Geek at 05:54 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Found this over at Best of the Web:

The Bush political team intuitively understood the tone of the U.S. voters
much better than the media did. To be honest, I still don't quite understand
how certified media junkies like me could have been so wrong.

I read the New York Times and the New Yorker religiously. I watch CNN
and the networks' evening news programs as well as the gabfests on Sunday
mornings, too.

Go figure.

Posted by: Physics Geek at 03:00 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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It's the day before Thanksgiving and the butcher is just locking up when a man pounds on the door.

"Please let me in," says the man, "I forgot to buy a turkey and my wife will kill me if I don't come home with one."

"Okay," says the butcher. "Let me see what I have left." He goes into the freezer and discovers that there's only one scrawny turkey left. He brings it out to show the man.

"That's one is too skinny. What else you got?" says the man.

The butcher takes the bird back into the freezer and waits a few minutes and brings the same turkey back out to the man.

"Oh, no," says the man, "That one doesn't look any better. You better give me both of them!"

Posted by: Physics Geek at 02:49 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Okay, I've avoided gloating about the election results. John Kerry gave a gracious concession speech, which kind of prevents me from piling on. I could, but it would make me feel icky. I had planned on kicking Edwards for that screechy speech he gave, but then I heard about his wife's cancer. The Edwards clan gets the hands off treatment from me. The election pales in importance to a struggle between life and death. If I haven't mentioned it before, I lost several relatives to breast cancer. Watching a loved one get slowly devoured from within was a truly horrific experience. I don't wish it on anyone, and that includes walking piles of anal leakage such as Mikey Moore.

Where was I? Oh yeah, avoiding the gloat. As I suggested-not because of it, of course- some Democrats have engaged in the type on introspection necessary to determine what flaws exist within their party and how to go about correcting them. However, some more, umm, misguided leftists have engaged in the lots of keyboard farting about how stupid, misguided, bigoted, etcetera Red America is. Well, here's a t-shirt that those assholes will really love. Give them as gifts to Dean supporters. Wear them around Hillary voters. Send one to Dan Rather as a gift. Hey, go crazy with the idea.

Posted by: Physics Geek at 02:11 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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The Glittering Eye hosts the Carnival of the Recipes #12. Go there and drool.

Posted by: Physics Geek at 02:52 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Here's an online petition to try and help block Specter's confirmation to the head of the Judiciary Committee. Go vote. Now.

Posted by: Physics Geek at 01:26 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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So an honest Democrat calls for the type of party introspection that I've been calling for. If the Democrats actually start asking themselves these questions, the party will be well on its way to becoming what it once was. My bet? This guy will have to move. He'll be labeled a right-wing mouthpiece and his house and car will get egged. And we won't be allowed to play in anymore Democrat reindeer games.

Posted by: Physics Geek at 07:52 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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I've said repeatedly that I hope the Democrats would get creamed in this year's election so that they'd-finally- grow up and realize that the party need to change. Well, they're a-changin' all right, but I don't think they've quite got the idea. Steven H. has more. Excerpt:

It would be funny if the Democrats were responding to their third ass-kicking in four years by offering more of the same. But moving even farther to the left...that's downright hysterical. If they keep it up, during the next round of elections, we're going to see street nuts in San Francisco telling reporters, "We have to get rid of these liberal head cases before they ruin the country."

Of course there's more. Lots more.

Posted by: Physics Geek at 07:25 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Sort of. I've enjoyed reading Claire Wolfe's Hardyville columns since they were on WND back in the day. Every now and then, though, she writes a column that makes me go huh?! This one is an example of that type of column. Wanna stash some stuff and then find it later via GPS? Then it's right up your alley. And no, I'm not kidding.

Posted by: Physics Geek at 07:10 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Can't. Stop. Laughing. Ace, you're killing me. Excerpt:

DAN RATHER: I did my best. I'm a Texas newsman, Mr. Trump, and I go to where the story is, no matter who might be angry about. Not the White House, not political partisans on the Internet--

TRUMP: Dan, I've gotta be honest. Those were some really bad forgeries. They were ridiculous.

RATHER: We put them through the most intense fact-checking possible--

TRUMP: Dan, one of them was scribbled on the front of a Taco Bell tray-liner. It said that George Bush was to be suspended for flying for failing to complete a required gordita. And it gave the name of his Air National Guard unit as "Extra Spicy." I've seen better work, Dan.

Posted by: Physics Geek at 06:29 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Super gorillas that eat lions for breakfast. Ugh. No one told me that Michael Moore clones were on the loose.

Posted by: Physics Geek at 06:14 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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DId anyone else see Jane FrownySmiley's article at Slate? Here's the title:

Why Americans Hate Democrats—A Dialogue
The unteachable ignorance of the red states.

Posted by: Physics Geek at 04:56 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Found at the Kerry Spot. Excerpt:

Bill Maher had it right when he called Kerry a Frankenstein's monster of the worst Democratic candidates in recent memory: the I-know-better-than-you arrogance of Al Gore; the toxic inability to relate to human beings of Michael Dukakis; the dippy never-lost-faith-in-liberalism outlook of Walter Mondale. And, one might add, the decisiveness of Bill Clinton.

Posted by: Physics Geek at 04:47 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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