Christopher J. Arndt fights a never ending battle for truth and justice...


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Happy Birthday Milton Friedman

He would be 95 today.

To hear a number of these Presidential candidates and sitting legislators he would be spinning.

Labels: politics

posted by Chris Arndt at 7/31/2007 03:27:00 PM | |

Ana Marie Cox is a horrible woman

I fall to temptation and refer to he as an absolute bitch, a despicable human being with words of her own to match:

Chief Justice John Roberts has died in his summer home in Maine. No, not really, but we know you have your fingers crossed.

A fifty-two-yeard-old public official with a young family has purportedly suffered a seizure. I'm pretty sure he is a benevolent individual and is as innocent in the general sense as I am. The value of his life to Miss Cox is determined by how his beliefs differ from hers.

Actually that reminds me of a bunch of people but I won't make that comparison.

Prayers should be with Chief Justice Roberts and his family.

Labels: politics

posted by Chris Arndt at 7/30/2007 11:12:00 PM | |

Ann Richards' Republican list

Let's read it together now. This was on the Facebook Ann Richards tribute group. It's entitled "Ann Richards on How to Be a Good Republican" and the list is purportedly written by her.

1. You have to believe that the nation's current 8-year prosperity was due to the work of Ronald Reagan and George Bush, but yesterday's gasoline prices are all Clinton's fault.
2. You have to believe that those privileged from birth achieve success all on their own.
3. You have to be against all government programs, but expect Social Security checks on time.
4. You have to believe that AIDS victims deserve their disease, but smokers with lung cancer and overweight individuals with heart disease don't deserve theirs.
5. You have to appreciate the power rush that comes with sporting a gun.
6. You have to believe...everything Rush Limbaugh says.
7. You have to believe that the agricultural, restaurant, housing and hotel industries can survive without immigrant labor.
8. You have to believe God hates homosexuality, but loves the death penalty.
9. You have to believe society is color-blind and growing up black in America doesn't diminish your opportunities, but you still won't vote for Alan Keyes.
10. You have to believe that pollution is OK as long as it makes a profit.
11. You have to believe in prayer in schools, as long as you don't pray to Allah or Buddha.
12. You have to believe Newt Gingrich and Henry Hyde were really faithful husbands.
13. You have to believe speaking a few Spanish phrases makes you instantly popular in the barrio.
14. You have to believe that only your own teenagers are still virgins.
15. You have to be against government interference in business, until your oil company, corporation or Savings and Loan is about to go broke and you beg for a government bail out.
16. You love Jesus and Jesus loves you and, by the way, Jesus shares your hatred for AIDS victims, homosexuals, and President Clinton.
17. You have to believe government has nothing to do with providing police protection, national defense, and building roads.
18. You have to believe a poor, minority student with a disciplinary history and failing grades will be admitted into an elite private school with a $1,000 voucher."

Reading just this stuff, and knowing what I know about my own beliefs (I am quite self-aware, thank you), it makes me suspect that Ms Richards isn't too sharp, or is suffering from an abundance of kindness.

The lesson to take here, my friends, is what precise image is held of us, in the eyes of the Leftist, the ever-typical leftist. Compare it to reality.

No I am not above speaking ill of the dead. Most people are not.

Labels: politics

posted by Chris Arndt at 7/26/2007 11:31:00 PM | |

the Press verus Ronald Reagan

After his death the media (mainstream media, the drive-by media, the MSM, pick three) treated Ronald Magnus as a saint and as the Mighty Statesman that he was.

Rest assured he was not always reported so magnanimously by the TV and newspaper reporters, as Howard Kurtz writes.

Reagan was, quite simply, a far more controversial figure in his time than the largely gushing obits on television would suggest.

I'd say they were a nemesis. I laughed at

Major newspapers would run stories on all the facts he had mangled, a practice that faded as it became clear that most Americans weren't terribly concerned.

Anyway, he was portrayed as lax, unintelligent, or disinterested, circumstanced depending, although I agree that he should be criticized for withdrawing American forces from Lebanon following the terrorist attack.

Labels: politics

posted by Chris Arndt at 7/26/2007 02:57:00 PM | |

Australian dollar to American dollar

According to Bloomberg.com:

The Australian dollar was at 87.99 U.S. cents at 7:25 a.m. in Sydney after reaching 87.89 cents, the highest since February 1989. It was headed for a fifth weekly rise after buying 87.12 cents late in New York July 13.

This makes it harder for Ricochet1980 to buy comics on ebay, I am told.

I thought this was good news for us, but apparently not in pounds sterling.

Labels: comic books, link dump

posted by Chris Arndt at 7/26/2007 01:02:00 PM | |

Live Free or Dial Hard

Wait, I mean Dial In Free. Oops.

• Instructions for XP
• Access numbers!
  

Labels: technology

posted by Chris Arndt at 7/26/2007 12:06:00 PM | |

The Two Jokes About Hookers

I changed the exact words for effect.

The first is that you do not pay a prostitute for intimacy. You pay her to leave when you are you are finished.

The second is that if a man is looking for sex(ual intimacy), a hooker is actually cheaper than a real (legal) date.

posted by Chris Arndt at 7/26/2007 02:16:00 AM | |

Steve Jobs' greatest trick

Over at the Fishbowl there's a screed on the Apple CEO Grandmaster's ability to persuade companies, an industry, and consumers to use his product as if it was the only product, at his prices when there are other possibilities that just haven't been considered on a large scale, by many producers.

In many ways, the recording industry is the biggest dupe in the DRM wars. They have repeatedly been sold, and have repeatedly bought heavily into copy-prevention schemes that don’t work, can’t work, and only give more power to the DRM vendor. Why does the record industry always cave in to Steve Jobs’ iTunes pricing model? Because the industry accepts it as a point of faith that they can’t sell music online without DRM, and Steve controls the only DRM recognised by 80% of portable digital music players.

It's the fancy Baudelaire quote only in this case

The greatest trick Apple pulled was to build a market where lock-in is mandated, but convince the world that this was something they did reluctantly, at the behest of the villainous recording industry.

Of course as far I am concerned the greatest trick Apple pulled was getting people to purchase multiple albums worth of music for approximately the value of hundreds of dollars, music that will deactivate itself about the fifth or seventh time a system is reformatted and rebooted; but perhaps I don't have the whole story.

I do know that iPods will play music from a variety of legal and illegal sources so you don't need iTunes to buy the music. I encourage you to break the written-in tags so you can play itTunes-purchased music files on multiple media.

Labels: entertainment, politics, technology

posted by Chris Arndt at 7/25/2007 10:22:00 AM | |

Baudelaire is..?

Charles Baudelaire (1821-1867) is purportedly "one of the greatest French poets of the 19th century, called 'the father of modern criticism,'" and apparently I did not know this.

I only need reference who he is because he apparently is the one who first said

The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he doesn’t exist.

That quote is a central component to a couple of writings I have coming up.

The very next one has a relevant relationship to the theme.

posted by Chris Arndt at 7/25/2007 10:04:00 AM | |

Sinestro Corps!

I love this picture:
(click to make bigger, as always)

The particular panel is scanned from

Green Lantern Sinestro Corps Special 1

as reviewed by H at the Comic Treadmill.

In my opinion the Sinestro Corps, or at least an evil Corps of power ring wielders set to oppose the Green Lanterns, is an idea that is at least twenty years overdue when it comes to execution. The visual design on this particular Sinestro Corpsman is definitely 21st century though, and I cannot protest.

I keep thinking that the Sinestro Corps is not the best name they could come up with, but it isn't the worst, and given some of my ideas over the years I wo't judge this naming contrivance. It does a sound a bit like "The Legion of Elvises" or the George Washington Corps. Mind you, the George Washington Corps isn't really a bad name at all, presuming the qualities of the group. Mind you, I think the Lincoln League sounds like mini-log cabin assembly club, with conventions every two years to show off little wooden architecture.

The bad guy Sinestro decided to name the group after himself; that is a better idea than calling them all Yellow Lanterns. The whole point of the yellow power ring is that the color yellow is the one thing a Green Lantern cannot effect with his own superpowers. Unless he can. But that's a discussion for another day.

Labels: comic books

posted by Chris Arndt at 7/25/2007 09:30:00 AM | |

I'm supposed to post an article todsay, right?

Too bad I'm still on hiatus.

Ehhh. Expect a long-awaited Template Update, including some reciprocal link-making.

Labels: site news - hiatus

posted by Chris Arndt at 7/24/2007 11:14:00 AM | |

Lisa Rinna

She is 44 years old this year (she was born born 11 July 1963). Can you believe this? The imagery come from a variety of sources. I believe this is an effect of excercise and good self-care. I only post this in one fine tradition. Ms. Rinna's only real link to me and my interests is that she played the Contessa Valentina Allegra di Fontaine, aka Val, in the telefilm Nick Fury: Agent of SHIELD.


from Clark Samuels 2006 photoshoot








Swimsuit Photoshoot in The Park


There is also this one page. What happened to her fingers?

Update 2008/12/18: Here are some more. I trust there are no complaints.

Labels: imagery

posted by Chris Arndt at 7/23/2007 04:14:00 PM | |

"The New Colossus" by Emma Lazarus

The following is a poem inscribed on a bronze plaque contained within the interior of the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty.

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
"Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

posted by Chris Arndt at 7/23/2007 12:45:00 PM | |

George Washington would be against the Fairness Doctrine

"It will be found an unjust and unwise jealousy to deprive a man of his natural liberty upon the supposition he may abuse it."

-- George Washington

Labels: politics

posted by Chris Arndt at 7/22/2007 12:30:00 AM | |

I am The Libertarian, Part I

The hiatus of this blog is still not officially over, but I still encourage new readers and I still get requests for reciprocal links. Go figure.

If you have been reading the past three years worth of stuff, recommend the appropriate to your friends and enemies, and drop me a line and tell me exactly what you think. Keep in mind that I don't really check the comments boxes.

I really have to start this series, as it just popped into my head; read -- stream of consciousness.

It occurred to me, that you can just lose your home, your property that is purportedly yours free and clear, if your house goes to pot and is quite unlivable and you don't fix it, the government will take it away from you and auction it off for ten bucks.

Labels: politics

posted by Chris Arndt at 7/21/2007 02:16:00 AM | |

Could be a fun game



posted by Chris Arndt at 7/19/2007 04:12:00 PM | |

Narrowly missing oppression from university

Did you know that the police can demand your information just because you'd yell two words about Ted Kennedy?

Fortunately the kid who reminded and educated the public, in Senator Kennedy's presence, about the incident at Chappaquiddick, as well as the unjust death of Mary Jo Kopechne, caused by Senator Kennedy, did not receive punitive actions from his university, campus authorities, or the police. After his act of protest though, they made it clear that they might have.

Labels: politics, Ted Kennedy

posted by Chris Arndt at 7/18/2007 12:03:00 PM | |

Governor Jim Gilmore withdraws from Presidential race

From:	Jim Gilmore
Date:	Jul 14, 2007 5:06 PM
Subject:	Withdrawing my candidacy
Body:	Dear Friend: I am today withdrawing my candidacy for the Republican nomination for President. It has been a positive and rewarding experience for me, for my family, and for my supporters. It has become apparent to me that the combination of my late start, and the front loaded nature of the primary schedule, have made it impractical to continue to pursue this path towards further public service. I am proud of the fact that my campaign focused on the issues, worked hard to block amnesty for illegal immigrants, brought attention to the need to protect private property rights, and called for a new path in Iraq that would provide our valiant military men and women with a more clearly defined and achievable mission. However, I have come to believe that it takes more than a positive vision for our nation's future to successfully compete for the Presidency. I believe that it takes years of preparation to put in place both the political and financial infrastructure to contest what now amounts to a one-day national primary in February. In the coming weeks and months, I intend to remain active in the Republican Party and in the public debate. I will be forming a state political action committee to assist Republican candidates in the General Assembly. Additionally, I will be actively looking for other opportunities to continue in public service in the Commonwealth of Virginia. Thank you for your interest and support of my candidacy. I look forward to finding opportunities to continue working with you in the future so that together we can make America an even better place to live, work and raise a family. Sincerely, James S. Gilmore

Labels: politics

posted by Chris Arndt at 7/17/2007 11:51:00 AM | |