Reason Morning Links: Fiscal Commission Meets, Chavez Tweets, Voinovich Retreats

• Justice Department may challenge Arizona's immigration law.
• Hugo Chavez joins Twitter.
• Obama's debt commission holds its first meeting.
• Federal regulators take aim at mine safety.
• GOP senator defects on financial regulation filibuster.
• Senators poke Facebook over privacy controls.

Comments

[Johnny Longtorso]

Johnny-links:

More Global Warming Profiteering by Obama Energy Official

Climategate: a scandal that won't go away
...A team of 40 researchers from 12 countries, led by a Canadian analyst Donna Laframboise, checked out every one of the 18,531 scientific sources cited in the mammoth 2007 report. Astonishingly, they found that nearly a third of them ? 5,587 ? were not peer-reviewed at all, but came from newspaper articles, student theses, even propaganda leaflets and press releases put out by green activists and lobby groups. ...

[Jerry]

Brown gaffe as he calls voter 'bigoted woman'

[Slap the Enlightened!]

Brown doesn't seem to be doing to well answering those kind of questions.

Chalk up one more vote for the BNP.

[Celtic tiger]

Siobhan, who grilled Gordon Brown is likely a second or third generation Irish immigrant. The EEU had complete control over immigration and no one was complaining when money was pumped into the economy. The realities of the downturn, and paying the piper have left them wondering about their initial enthusiasm.

[SugarFree]

You Stuck My Flash Drive In Your Vagina

[Ska]

Nothing like reading the random encounters section.

[GORGES]

uh oh

[GORGES]

brb*shart attack

[Jordan Elliot]

Wow.

Then again, it's his fault for letting her leave with it.

[SugarFree]

Maybe he needs a sign over his bed:

"Management requests that you not use your vagina to steal things from this domicile."

[Ska]

Reminds me of the Curb Your Enthusiasm "Big Vagina" episode.

[John C. Randolph]

Seems like a rather novel method for identity theft. Hope the dude didn't have anything too sensitive on that drive.

-jcr

[barfman]

*barf*

[db]

This guy is so very much an employee of a major credit card company with access to enormous amounts of customer data.

[John]

It is not a debt commission. It is a VAT commission. Just after the election it will release its report. The report will recommend a few meaningless and unlikely to happen spending cuts, predict gloom and doom unless something is done and offer up a VAT as the only solution.

[TrickyVic]

I agree.

Obama is going to promote it as necessary, as if he didn't cause much of the problem.

[SugarFree]

I'd follow Chavez on Twitter if he didn't post in some crazy made-up language.

Although, if he had half-a-brain, he'd turn on his geo-tracking feature. His first tweet was from Location: 10.508568,-66.922768. GPS cruise missile, anyone?

[SugarFree]

*turn off* It's too early to start that nonsense, fingers.

[John]

The air force did launch that new secret space vehicle that is supposed to be able to launch missiles from space. Can't it "accidentally misfire" and just happen to hit Chavez? We could issue Venezuela a heartfelt apology and give them a few billion Obamabucks as blood money.

[SugarFree]

Finally got Project Crossbow working, did they?

[John]

It was on Drudge a few days ago. Looks like a mini space shuttle. They are not saying what it does, but the rumor is that it can attack both satellites and ground targets.

[Warty]

Gradually, without us noticing, life has become a James Bond movie.

[Ernst Stavro Blofeld]

No, Mr. Bond! I expect you to die!

Mit herzliche Gru?en,

Ernie.

[Ragin Cajun]

I thought it was Goldfinger that said that.

[SugarFree]

Kinetic kill railgun or missiles?

Of course, for ground targets, all you have to do is let it fall.

[John]

Not sure. But I think missiles. It doesn't look big enough to have a rail gun.

[John]

http://www.wired.com/dangerroo.....e-vehicle/

Here you go. The Air Force isn't saying what it does. But it looks to be some kind of space based drone.

[SugarFree]

Cool. Looks to be too small for a railgun that could be used on ground targets. Probably kinetic kill missiles. It doesn't take much to destroy a satellite.

[SugarFree]

Wow, I'd avoid repeating info if I could only master the deadly art of scrolling up.

[Warty]

If we can fight our way through the Enclave, we can use this thing to destroy the Pentagon. I'm pretty sure we'll find a totally sweet revolver in the basement afterward, too.

[Miyagi-san]

Scrorr up, scrorr down! Scrorr up, scrorr down! Concentrate, Daniel-san!

[gaijin]

do kinetic space weapons leave a trail of kinetic debris?

[SugarFree]

Depends. Since the missile portion drops away (on most of them) to leave the inert "warhead" to hit the target it does leave debris. Railgun systems only accelerate the "bullet" itself.

Of course, all of that is nothing compared to the debris left in orbit by destroying an enemy satellite. This would greatly increase the chances of Kessler Syndrome.

[Bob]

Why would you blow up a satellite and leave debris? You could just poke a few holes in it and disable.

[SugarFree]

They are fairly delicate for what they are. I would imagine it's pretty hard to disable one from fairly far away (the stealth part is a big part of the idea, as is the ability to hit multiple targets simultaneously) and not break it up into relatively small chunks.

But who really knows what our space war capabilities really are at this point?

[Clich? Bandit]

Maybe that thing is going to Phobos...

Elvis isn't dead, he just went home

[R C Dean]

I'm wishing they'd use it to put up god rods* in orbit. The last word in bunker busters, no radiation, can't be stopped. But there's no way this administration would give us the strategic high ground like that, so it ain't gonna happen.

*pure kinetic ground strike "missiles", made out of something very dense, with just enough maneuvering capacity to line them up and get them dropping onto targets.

[Marshall Gill]

Rods of God. I was reading about it on Wiki this morning.

I wonder what a tungsten telephone pole would do to the Iranian underground Nuke facilities?

[EscapedWestOfTheBigMuddy]

These are actually harder then they sound...to come in fast enough to be really interesting they must spend most of their entry ionizing the atmosphere around them, which make it very hard to guide them in either externally or internally.

Plus, if you want a fast and accurate de-orbit, you need a lot of Delta V.

And on the non-technical side of things there are a few inconvenient international treaties.

[TrickyVic]

""can't be stopped.""

You wouldn't need to stop it, just deflect it so it doesn't hit the intended target.

[Ragin Cajun]

Cruise missle? No, evil clown!

Though his guards may be confused as to which is which.

[John Wayne Gacy]

You shouldn't have executed me. I could have wasted Hugo for you and likely get killed afterward. It would have been a win-win!

[Chuck Norris]

Forget it, Gacy. Nobody's going to send a Democrat precinct captain after Hugo. You probably just want to go there and molest little communist youth league boys.

[Groovus Maximus]

"I'm gonna cut you into fifty pieces and mail you to every state."

[SugarFree]

We could just combine the two and fire clowns at our enemies.

[Groovus Maximus]

No. Use Project Crossbow to give these guys a call. I hear they work cheap.

[Who doesn't have coulrophobia?]

Reminds me of the Michael Douglas movie The Game.

[Warty]

Texas Gov. Perry fatally shoots coyote

See if you can quantify the gun-fear in the article. It's rather high.

[John]

"Perry said he carries his .380 Ruger -- loaded with hollow-point bullets"

[Jordan Elliot]

Yep, don't mess with Texas. It's not nice to make fun of retards...

.380!? Carry a J-Frame in .38 special or a 9mm at least for fucks sake. The terminal ballistics of .380 are dismal.

[Ragin Cajun]

Was this a coyote or a coyote? If the latter, his popularity may have just gone up in Arizona.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Took the Detroit loss hard.

[Steve Nash Equilibrium]

I didn't realize Perry was such a pussy. Who needs a gun to deal with snakes? A real man uses a machete, or his bare hands.

[SugarFree]

It's the Washington Post. They purposely know so little about firearms that Perry might have a gun that fires snakes. Which would be so cool. "I'm Thulsa Doom, motherfucker!"

[Groovus Maximus]

"You broke into my house, stole my property, murdered my servants, and my PETS! And that is what grieves me the most! You killed my snake. Thorgrim is beside himself with grief! He raised that snake from the time it was born."

[SugarFree]

I always did want a Tree of Woe for my backyard.

[Jordan Elliot]

His prayer to Krohm (sp?) at the beginning of the final battle is one of the best prayers of all time.

You ever see the special edition? With the deleted scene between Conan and Sumite (sp?) talking before the battle? It adds an incredibly amount of depth to the movie and Conan's character but was cut because supposedly the audience would have not been able to get it. Too high brow for them. It changed the movie for me when I saw it. In a positive way.

[SugarFree]

Crom. Yes, that was stupid to cut out. Why the sequel was a kid's movie is baffling.

[Jordan Elliot]

Yeah there's a real disconnect between Barbarian and Destroyer. Did Milius direct Destroyer? I'd say that's probably a good chunk of the reason why if he did not.

[SugarFree]

The screenplay was re-written by a TV hack at the request of the studio.

Richard Fleischer directed, who had a pretty good track record of SF/F films.

[R C Dean]

Very typical for Texans who spend much time in brushy country. I don't have a good snake pistal, but I'm looking at one of those .410 revolvers or derringers.

[John]

I wouldn't load a snake pistol with hollow points. I would load it with snake shot.

[Jordan Elliot]

I'll back up John's suggestion here. I load up my S&W 442 with the Blazer snake shot anytime I'm hitting the mesa here near 'Burque. Works well in that gun.

One of my friends tried some in his Glock 23 and his S&W M&P 40 and it just wouldn't cycle and feed right.

[John]

It wouldn't want to bet my safety on my ability to hit a snake even at close range with a killing shot while under stress. A large caliber pistol with snake shot pretty much disintegrates them.

[Jordan Elliot]

I'm hoping to get some snake shot in 9mm to try through my HK P30. That guns has fired stuff that tripped up my Glock 19 so hopefully I can just carry that when I'm out on the mesa since that's what I have with me otherwise.

Then again, I don't know if I'd want my CCW loaded with snake shot. Don't want to forget to put a magazine of Gold Dots in when coming back to the city and have to use it for defense.

[R C Dean]

Then again, I don't know if I'd want my CCW loaded with snake shot.

At close enough ranges, your snake shot will put a crater in somebody that should be quite adequate.

[John]

and they don't know you are loaded with snake shot. I think pointing a large caliber piston at someone with the intent to use it generally solves the situation.

[Groovus Maximus]

I think pointing a large caliber piston at someone with the intent to use it generally solves the situation.

The RC'z Law of dating.

[nose/face]

Or you could just walk around it, quicker that pulling your rod and plugging it. But then some of those Copper-headed-water-rattlers will chase you for miles. Or worse, Hoop snakes, done even get me started about Hoop snakes.

[Warty]

Don't miss the Rethinking Virginity conference!

[SIV]

Featuring Racism!
I mean, if people want to listen to Taylor Swift, fine. I personally can't stand the whole cartoonishly innocent and pure (and white-dress-wearing! Always with the virginal white dress!) blonde blue-eyed white girl thing

[SugarFree]

They'd rather cop to racism than the real reason they hate her... she's pretty and popular. If she was a landwhale with eyebrow piercings singing the exact same songs, they'd love her.

[John]

Exactly. They would love some fat chick who renounced pre-marital sex because she wanted men to treat as a person not a sex object. But a pretty girl who is more talented and popular than them, she is just a snotty white girl.

[Warty]

"Debunking The Virginity Ideal: The Feminist Response To Slut-Shaming & Sexual Scare Tactics."

I have an idea. Let's be chicks, and be fat, and be unpleasant, and be ugly, and be slutty, and then we can all hang out together and write books about how everyone else is the problem 'cuz we're awesome. Deal?

[gaijin]

Sounds like guys.

[Warty]

Yes, women attempting to be men is an ugly thing.

[barfman]

*barf*

[Steve Nash Equilibrium]

It's a sad indictment of this culture that there are enough self-hating, beaten down males out there willing to sleep with the kind of people who poster on feministing that they could be considered sluts.

[SugarFree]

+1

[T]

Guys will put up with a lot if they get sex at the end of it.

[zoltan]

Yeahhhhhh, this has everything to do with men sleeping with anything that has a vagina. Case in point, 9-year-old prostitutes, nasty syphilitic prostitutes in the past, and those hos I see on the corner.

[.]

Why is that every new country singer is named Taylor or Jordan or both?

[Citizen Nothing]

Voinovich to Dems: Just dig in your heels, and I'll get tired and vote for debate! Ohh, God do my hemorrhoids ache!

What a stooge. Ohio says, "Sorry, America," (for so many reasons).

[Rich]

Napolitano said the new state law could siphon federal money and staff from hunting down dangerous immigrants.

So could the ban on Happy Meals.

*Please* don't let JN be a Supreme!

[Carl Levin]

"It's going to be like giving dry birth to a porcupine," said former Sen. Alan Simpson, R-Wyo., the panel's co-chair

I believe you mean, "It's going to be like fucking a porcupine."

[T]

Fun fact: male porcupines urinate on the female before coitus to make the quills softer so they don't get stabbed as much.

[.]

"As much"?

[John C. Randolph]

A close aide to Chavez, Public Works Minister Diosdado Cabello, announced a Twitter account had been set up for the president. Chavez said he has a team working on it

What kind of incompetent pinhead pinko dictator moron needs a team to set up a twitter account?

-jcr

[Citizen Nothing]

Woodward and Bernstein await in the conference room.
Fuck! I forgot my bucket!

[Ska]

Get a few coffee cops then. What have you been eating? Hopefully you got some corn and peanuts for texture, and some black licorice for color.

[Jozef]

This is more a reaction to yesterday's Brickbats. Here in Atlanta (Gwinnett County, to be specific), we also have a mandated rate for cops: 25 DUI arrests per cop per year, otherwise they'll get a negative performance review: http://www.ajc.com/news/north-.....98523.html

[SIV]

Roswell PD. Roswell is in Fulton County not Gwinnett ya damn Yankee

[Jozef]

Sorry, my bad... Especially considering I live in DeKalb Co and work in Cobb Co...

[Aresen]

Hugo Chavez joins Twitter

I guess an assh*le can also be a twit.

[Slumpbuster]

Senator, here's a solution if you hate Facebook's privacy controls. Don't use Facebook! Problem solved.

[Michael Ejercito]

Has anyone ever pointed out that the very fact that the SEC was able to sue Goldman Sachs prove that existing financial regulations are sufficient?

[Seward]

Before the government starts worrying about FB privacy perhaps they should concern themselves with their own activities.

[alan]

T|4.28.10 @ 11:09AM|#

Fun fact: male porcupines urinate on the female before coitus to make the quills softer so they don't get stabbed as much.

I thought that was so neat, I copied and pasted it, and texted it to hippie mum.

She wrote back.

Reminds me of something your dad use to do. Kidding. Enjoy your lunch, ha ha. X O X ma

[T]

The "enjoy your lunch" after bringing up the 'rents engaging in watersports is a particularly nice touch. Kudos to her.

[Jordan Elliot]

Alan, your post is complete win.

[WWJGD]

+1 for her