They Say It's Google's Birthday, It's My Birthday Too, Yeh!

Evan Rachel Wood looking sexy.

Today is my birthday. It has been uneventful. I celebrated this weekend so don't feel bad for me. I don't know about most people, but for me birthdays are about having a little fun, seeing what celebrities you share a birthday with, and contemplating suicide as the rotting carcass that encompasses my mind and soul deteriorates at an increasingly rapid pace. I look each year anew with anticipation that some famous person that I actually give a crap about shares a birthday with me. Maybe someone who just got famous happens to have a birthday that coincides with mine. I realize this is pure vanity, but it keeps me distracted from my own mortality. I've been seeing Corbin Bernson's sorry a$$ on this list for years *dismissive wank motion*, but today I decided to head over to the Wikipedia and just look up the date of my birthday. I was entertained.
Here are a few highlights:
1533- Queen Elizabeth I of England
1936- Buddy Holly
1950- Julie Kavner (voice on The Simpsons)
1963- Brent Liles (bassist for Social Distortion)
1963- Eazy-E
1987- Evan Rachel Wood, she's pretty (see: above)
Those are the birthdays. There are also a few events of note that took place on September 7th.
1822- Brazil declared independence from Portugal
1963- The Pro Football Hall of Fame opens with 17 charter members
1979- ESPN makes its debut
2008- The U.S. government seizes control of mortgage financiers Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac
1998- Google
1996- Tupac Shakur was fatally shot four times in Las Vegas. He died a few days later.
Tupac was one of the greatest. I have gained a renewed appreciation for him recently. I have been listening to "So Many Tears" several times a day for the past week or so. Here's a video of him performing that song live along with "All About You" at Club 662. That is the same club Tupac and Suge Knight were on the way to the night he and Knight were shot.

Nonpopulist's Browsings of the Day: Web Soup Joke and Gillian Jacobs Gif

Many of you may be aware of the television show Web Soup that airs on G4TV on Wednesday nights. You may also be aware they have a segment titled "Twittershots" where they post a video the prior week on twitter with the intent of using three jokes from twitter users on the show. I have tweeted a joke to the show a few times and 75% of the time I feel the jokes I tweeted are better than the ones used on the show. The only conclusion I can draw from this is they only check the tweets during a certain time period and choose the best joke from that small window. With that being said, here is the video they are going to use for "Twittershots" on tonight's show followed by my joke.


The joke I tweeted for them to use is, "@websoup now let's see you hit the broad side of that pool without a man's hand on your ass." I guarantee that is funnier than the jokes they will use unless they actually pick me this time. The show airs Wednesdays at 8 EST.

A 24-hour documentary channel? Yes, please. It's times like these I am glad I have DirectTV. [Documentary Channel]

Trey Parker and Matt Stone, creators of South Park, are facing death threats after using Mohammad in a recent episode. My advice to the guys is keep up the good work, and if you need to hide somewhere come to the South where they have guns and dislike Muslims. [WWTDD]

A well thought-out and nicely executed flow chart on which summer action movie is right for you. Funny stuff. [Vulture Blog]

Conan O'Brien got a letter asking him to prom a few years ago. He responded. The response note will now be moved the Library of Congress. [Letter of Note]

Hackers catching heat. [Alt Report]

This was interesting to me. Wikipedia article on Werner Erhard and The Collection of Crazy People Known as Scientology. [Wikipedia]

A collection of pictures that indeed made me say WTF. [Regretful Morning]

Jeff Zucker, keep Conan O'Brien's name out of your damn mouth. Just shutup. [Vulture Blog]

Nonpopulist's Browsings of the Day

 

Quality link collection if I do say so myself. I meant to burn off some of these last week, but here they are now. Deal with it. If you are that mad about it then leave an angry comment. I will honestly take any comment I can get. I know people read this because I see the page views, but there are too many chickens with too little to add out there. That probably did not help, did it?

The phrase, "That's what she said," has been overused for several months, but somehow it is still funny to me. Sometimes I do not think things are funny until they are run into the ground, though. That is a me problem.[Huffington Post]

Roger Ebert interviews Leonardo DiCaprio.This is a great interview. Even though Shutter Island did well at the box office a lot of people are saying was not good. Good thing that does not affect me. I will see it because of the good will Scorcese and DiCaprio have built up over time and decide for myself. That is the nonpopulist thing to do. [Rogerebert.com]

Just like Grandma used to make. This seems like good news for bacon. Do I have your attention now? Interesting article by Harry Kreisler of Alternet. [Alternet]

U.S. troops being handicapped during Afghan offensive. After watching Generation Kill and knowing all the mistakes that have been made in Iraq and Afghanistan I understand it, but it is still very difficult for the soldiers. [MSNBC]

Liam being Liam. Liam Gallagher of Oasis fame (American translation- the guy who sang Wonderwall) made a twat of himself at the Brit Awards. What's new? I am an unapologetic Oasis fan even though I am an American. I definitely side with Noel in the breakup of the band. [The Telegraph]

Wow. Just read this. A college professor had his students dress up in a Muslim-style veil for a day. [Alternet]

Danny Glover dancing with predators. Nothing to see here. [FilmDrunk]

A touching passage of prose. Read it if you like quality. [Kelly Oxford]

Tom Morello or Rage Against the Machine is still raging against the machine- thank goodness. [OC Weekly]

We Should Be More Like the Swiss

You may have heard the quote, "I would never invade the United States. There would be a gun behind every blade of grass" from the Japanese Admiral Yamamoto before, but what you may not know is Switzerland has a leg up on even us gun-happy Americans. I got this link to "Why No One Invades Switzerland" from a helpful reader tip. Here's the video embedded at that page from brasscheckv.com.

From that video we learn that the Swiss are required to serve in the military for a time like South Koreans and several other countries, and it got me thinking. Why do we not do that in America? I wanted to go into the military after high school before going to college, and if it was mandatory my mom could not have stopped me. It would help sagging recruitment numbers in our armed forces which have been buoyed some recently by the current recession. A year or two of mandatory military service would help our country by instilling some discipline in and giving a skill set to our young adults. And it would make our country even more unfeasible to invade.

9/11: Science and Conspiracy

I have had a morbid fascination with 9/11 since the events of that day in 2001 so I have a compulsion to record anything I see on my dvr relating to it kind of like Mel Gibson had to buy every copy of Catcher in the Rye in that movie. I watched one such recording recently on the National Geographic Channel titled "9/11: Science and Conspiracy." I realize that saying you believe anything other than the verbatim story of the 9/11 Commission Report makes you a fringe member of society who might as well eat paint chips and dress like Lady Gaga because you are effin crazy. I realize that so let me say this; I think the 9/11 commission answered questions, but only the questions that were asked of them or they asked themselves. Is that vague enough to keep any shred of credibility? No? Well, it does not matter because we will never know the whole truth about 9/11 and nothing more of any relevance will be revealed in our lifetimes. There is ample information available on the internet for either side of the argument you want to believe. And really, I think it comes down to what you want to or are able to believe and keep your sanity. And the show on National Geographic did a good job of driving that home. They gave both sides equal time in my opinion and allowed for rebuttal even though Nat Geo obviously could not allow anything resembling the validating of 9/11 conspiracy theories on their channel because they would lose all credibility. Some of the things in the show made me ponder my own views, but the experiments were not really that scientific. You really have to watch it to understand, but there were a lot of leaps and gaps in the various experiments they did to disprove 9/11 conspiracy theories. I try to look at things from both sides, especially something as important as this topic, but something the narrator on the show said revealed their bias and their disregard for being scientific. The narrator said, "The truthers are determined to belive that the official story is wrong." Well what does prove? The non-truthers are determined to believe the official story is right. Saying that does not prove anything. I am rambling now. Sorry, I am distracted. I just saw the commercial for some show on National Geographic called "Taboo: Strange Love" where this guy is pretending he is married to a life-like doll and saying that finding love with an organic woman is just too hard. Now I have seen it all. This is the kind of thing that terrorists see and then want to kill the "great Satan." Toward the end of the show is where the producers made a fatal flaw. They come up with their own conspiracy theory that is easy to disprove and somehow that makes all other conspiracy theories wrong. This really was not worth my time. This was just a silly exercise.

Things No One Else Is Talking About: Posse Comitatus

I know what you are thinking. "What in the hell is a posse comitatus? That sounds like a posse of Bolsheviks or a weird sex position." After reading that wikipedia article  you should know how important this may be in coming years. Posse Comitatus is a latin phrase meaning explicitly "Power of the county." What is means in American law is very important to you and I in regards to the ever-tightening police state noose around our necks. Before I start trying to pass myself off as intelligent I must admit that I first became aware of the idea of posse comitatus from the television show 24,which I love, but after that I have done my research, so there! To sum it up very simply the law states that the American military cannot be used for domestic law enforcement. I found an article on the subject and what it may mean in America's not too distant future by Jacob Hornberger on the Campaign for Liberty Website. It is an important read. Hornberger hypothesizes a scenario in which the ever-evolving war on terror evolves to where the same American military that has had to endure on-the-fly training to be police in Iraq and Afghanistan may become police here in America in the name of a "war" on drugs or terror within our borders. And I doubt the issue of posse comitatus will be broached with the same deference, much less trepidation, in which it was dealt in the hit Fox television show. The lines have already been blurred with the use of the National Guard overseas. The vice-versa of that would not be a good thing.
We need education. We do not need people to continue to be lazy and roll their eyes every time history or constitutional law are mentioned. Look at you, sitting and wallowing in your ignorance. 24.

Fundamental Assumption Review: Full-Body Scans at Airports

One can not swing one's dead cat without hitting a place where one of our personal freedoms used to lay (correct usage of lay/lie- had to look it up.) We need to examine the assumption that every single measure that is introduced to protect us and make us safer is really going to work. I do not have any evidence to back this up, but does it not seem as though all of our security measures are reactive instead of proactive? Either way I am not happy about another invasion of privacy in the form of full body scanners at airports. Here are a few tweets I noted when the story broke. I have been too busy keeping up with Conan to blog about this until now. Damn you NBC!

Hannaloves27 RT @politicsoffear: When Obama promoted "transparency" I didn't think it involved Napolitano seeing me naked. #tcot #tlot
3Report Airport Body Scanners Provide Crisp Image Of Your Genitals http://is.gd/5Soz7
Funny, but another thing to consider (thanks to Alternet) is who is getting rich from these body scanners?

My personal policy is this: Want to look at my junk? You have to pay. This ain't no freebie. I do not have much choice in this, however, so my plan is next time I fly to make sure I work up a rock hard bon, smile, and in my mind say, "Scan this!" 

Irony Alert: Dynamite Choice for the Nobel Prize

The Nobel Peace Prize is already ironic enough. Its inventor, Alfred Nobel, was the inventor of dynamite. I think the folks who chose President Obama for the award were feeling the need for an homage to the founder of the award this year. The headline, Obama Defends US Wars as He Accepts Peace Prize, is like something I would expect Alanis Morisette to sing about along with "a free ride for which she has already paid." I am not even commenting on if either war is just or if the President is being a hypocrite or not. I think we can safely assume that he did not ask for the award, and although he probably should have turned the award down, defending the current American wars is not the best thing to do while accepting the Peace Prize. The above story has some excerpts of his acceptance speech that he wrote himself, and the speech has some good tenets of policy and reads well. The bottom line is being in the precarious position he is in, he addressed the two elephants in the room with as much class as one could imagine.

Fundamental Assumption Review: Constitution

Tea party this, real American that, knowing where we all come out on every single issue facing our country right now is impossible. Besides that, I heard a very wise man say, "Consensus is a synonym for mediocrity." This article, written by Chuck Baldwin on prisonplanet.com, lists several sentiments he feels a Constitutionalist should echo. I'm not sure I agree with every single one of the sentiments although I do fancy myself a Constitutionalist (as well an asshole that sticks his pinky out when he sips hot tea.) I, with naive idealism, believe that if we can truly back peddle, rediscover, and reapply our founding document we can keep this thing afloat for a few more decades.
I am not sure number fourteen on the list is viable considering how long the U.N. has been around. We need to have our hands in there still.
Here are a few that stuck out to me with which I agree:
Number seven, "You might be a Constitutionalist if you believe that the federal government has no authority to be involved in education or law enforcement, or in any other issue that the Tenth Amendment reserves to the States, or to the People," interested me greatly. Ever since reading the Constitution (link to full text) the whole way through I have wondered how law enforcement agencies have proliferated at the federal level over the past 200+ years.
keep reading...

Things No One Else Is Talking About: 9/11 Truth

Another 9/11 anniversary passed recently with a little bit less ado than the previous year, as has been the trend since the incident's first anniversary. I'm not saying no one cares. That's not the case. All Americans care about every aspect of the national tragedy that was 9/11. We have had several years to process some grief and move on to other struggles and pain, though.
Even I have a hard time writing this because the issue is so sticky, but there is an aspect of that day's events that may not be dealt with for several decades. Let me explain. Many people do not believe the official story that has been published on 9/11. In fact, many people on the commission don't think they got to the complete truth. I refer you to, as crazy as it sounds, Charlie Sheen. This is a long article, but read what you can of it. In spite of being viewed as a crackpot for his views on 9/11, even President Obama had to give him his due since Sheen was so well-researched for his "20 minutes with the President."
http://www.infowars.com/twenty-minutes-with-the-president/
I'm not sure what I believe about 9/11 other than it was horrible. There are many lingering questions that have been raised and researched since 2001, but I doubt we will have any answers to them for a long time. We might be disconnected from that day's events by the time all of the truth sees the light.

They've Got Just As Much of a Right As We Do

Hugo Chavez recently being given a 2.2 billion credit line in order to buy arms may be a shock to some, but to me, it is rote dictatorial behavior that does not excite me in the least. The story (The Associated Press via Yahoo) details how Venezuela has already received $4 billion in financing from the Russian government in recent years, and quite frankly, they have a right to arm themselves. At the heart of Chavez anti-Western rhetoric lies the truth that the US does keep a watchful eye on his country to the point of increasing the access and number of American troops stationed in Columbia. Chavez is a cog in the balance of power that we learned about in history books when we were in high school. Even though the juggernaut that is America has slowed to a molasses pace, we still need someone to call us on out on shit. Why not a South American dictator? Bottom line: Venezuela is a sovereign country that has just as much of a right to defend their soil just as America.

Secrets of the Founding Regular People

The History Channel aired their new documentary, Secrets of the Founding Fathers. I DVR'ed and watched it. I don't like when people say they watch the History Channel all of the time. Don't get it twisted, I enjoy history, but only history tools say they watch it every damn day. Don't be that guy. The documentary was serviceable. The content focused primarily on the role secret societies such as the Freemasons played in the founding fathers lives with a brief stopover around weed. When they weren't calling the founding fathers a bunch of drunk potheads, they featured different interviewees who were on the extremes of saying the founding of America was in every way, shape, or form a Masonic plot for world domination or someone who downplayed every aspect of Masonic influence on the founding of America. I swear they had one guy come on and just give one liner poo-poos to every thing the other guys were saying. There was one guy with a PhD who was middle of the road enough to actually give good information. I would still recommend watching it because I watch the History Channel often and they have high quality programming.
***Spoiler Alert***
That's where that goes, right?