the government is closing the noose on your infant child
Are two of the characters from Michael Bay's Transformers 2 movie racist stereotypes in nature? The blog post/article does not answer the question very well (and perhaps raises more questions) but the comments will help.
I love Roadbuster and am one of the few I really do, I think. Unicron.us has a good page.
Why the heck is it a big deal that a Governor can vanish for a few days! A state does not really need him if it is organized properly. The government should not rely on a particular individual in just that way especially if it is proper government, that is to say, minimal government. Then again, if the behavior of Senator Ensign and Governor Sanford are replicated across the line of Republicans then we can just sit and wait for government healthcare and a massive reevaluation of the proper relationship between citizen and the government. Mark Steyn makes the same argument but backs it up and actually attacks specific viewpoints.
The Environmental Protection Agency is a department of the Executive Branch and operates under the command of President Obama. When the actual science as presented by an individual and his report does not fit with his narrative the fool squelches it all so he can pass the largest tax hike in American history and further squelch our liberty. So if global warming or climate change is not what the President of the United States says it is he will not allow you to know the truth, all so he can take your money and make certain elements of enterprise and energy non-viable, destroying industry and smothering prosperity under his black hand of evil darkness.
Home of Friedman Foundation first new state in 2009 to be added to school choice ranks
Indiana lawmakers today approved a $2.5 million scholarship tax credit program in the home state of the Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice. The new scholarship program was inserted into the state's budget and won approval in the late hours of the special legislative session. The bill, which passed the Senate 34-16 and the House 61-36, now goes to the governor who is anticipated to sign it in the coming days.
"The state of Indiana today joined a growing number of states that are putting the educational needs of children before partisan politics by adopting school choice programs," said Robert Enlow, President and CEO of the Friedman Foundation. "Indiana's scholarship tax credit program received support from members of both parties as well as strong support from Governor Mitch Daniels, Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Bennett, and House Republican Leader Brian Bosma. We're grateful that Senate budget negotiator Luke Kenley and the other legislators held firm in budget discussions and worked so hard to provide parents with meaningful options for their children. We'd also like to acknowledge the support of the original authors of Senate Bill 528, Senators Carlin Yoder, Marlin Stutzman and Joe Zakas, Senate Education Committee Chair Teresa Lubbers, House Education Committee ranking Republican member Bob Behning, and House Ways and Means Committee ranking Republican member, Jeff Espich," Enlow said.
We would also like to acknowledge the role that our state and local allies in the school choice movement have played in this victory, including School Choice Indiana and their leader Fred Klipsch, as well as the Indiana Non-Public Education Association and the Indiana Catholic Conference.
"We are proud that this year's first new school choice program is located in our home state and that thousands of Hoosier families will now have real options when it comes to finding the school that best fits their child's educational needs," Enlow added.
A similar tax credit proposal passed the Senate with bi-partisan support during the regular legislative session. Governor Daniels kept the measure alive by including it in his budget proposal during the special legislative session, and the senate re-inserted the program in their special session budget proposal. Indiana is the first new state to join the school choice family so far this year.
No company is too big to fail. I'm seriously re-thinking my life-long "buy American" pledge given the recent turn of events.
That was written June 8th, 2009 and ripped by me.
The way I hear it the very act of "saving" this company and other automotive companies, as well as other major corporations, has actually damaged these institutions to the point where they respectively are incapable of improving, innovating, growing beyond their peak.
Iran, Michael Jackson, Pelosi-Waxman, and more broken priorities
The ignored horror in Tehran -- a Tienanmen-level even featured here.
Jonah Goldberg reflects on how the public, especially our media, has honored Michael Jackson without meaning to do so and notes that while his life may have been tragic, mourning his death is not about him.
Here was a guy so many of “us” read about in People magazine for so long. His passing, therefore, isn’t a loss in the sorrowful sense of the word, but in the selfish one. It’s a loss of an interesting subject, a creature to gossip about and to fill a few minutes on E! or Entertainment Tonight.
That reflects the bulk of our mourning in celebrity deaths. As it is, and Mr. Goldberg points out, Michael Jackson's death was a death but that in and of itelf is hardly a tragedy; "Michael Jackson’s life, not his death, was tragic. " I say broadly that every person whose time on earth ended without knowing Jesus dies a tragic death, but for Michael Jackson's place in the world, his life brought much more pain to himself and to others compared to his anticlimatic passing from this world.
In response to the fear that our mankind's behaviors are destroying the planet and altering its natural balance and behaviors in catastrophic ways, the US House of Representatives has passed a bill that will probably alter the American economy in catastrophic ways. This destruction should hit Michigan in particularly severe way, although given the state of our present economy most people will not notice. This sort of devastation could have been avoided except that eight Republicans, instead of being reasonable, decided to pass it so they could appear environmentally conscious. As a result the governments of China, Russia, Japan, India, and other countries are pursuing thier pre-set courses of action because they do not care about American environmentalist mythology and certainly are unwilling to cripple to their respective economies because some Americans suspect that doing so will save the world. So naturally speaking whatever American pollution is halted has no bearing on the effects of the pollution that other industrialized nations may generate. That is barely touching the edge of the problem.
That bill, however, does not actually exist. So much of what our Democrat partisan-controlled legislature does is legally and ethically inappropriate and a special shame goes to any Republican that endorses the behavior.
Legislative analysts and historians of both the American Left and American Right agree that the Congress exists to be deliberative body and to pass no bill as to become a new law in haste. Yet this so-called legislative process has been overrun and overriden, disregarded, on quite a regular basis these past few years, but quite nastily by these Democrats and their Republican sidekicks. Iain Murray has an idea to stop it. This would make a wonderful Constitutional Amendment! If you cannot and did not read the bill, why allow its results to change the country one way or the other.
In European politics if your reasonable and possibly mainstream political ideas are unpopular you are legally lumped in with the political undesirables. Fascism grows that way. If people are thinking reasonable things to the point where they are blocked they turn to the unreasonable items in order to speak out. So the fascists get joiners. So fascism wins either way.
The present government/regime in Iran committed acts of war against the United States of America.
The Mullahs, a body of religious figures, appoint who is in Iranian executive elections.
The Mullhas operate Iran like Vince McMahon and other writers run the World Wrestling Federation and other large professional wrestling outfits
Just like WCW, WWF, WWE, the results of this match is likely pre-determined by the writers.
Considering that the characters (with names) in the story have been written out ahead of time, why should we Americans believe that it makes one bit of difference which of those Iranian politicos is the Iranian President?
If a new individual is the Preisdent of Iran, the old regime in Iran still stands.
That regime committed acts of war against us.
We should retaliate.
We should retaliate while that regime still stands; it should be punished.
The Iranian people, by and large, are innocent.
The Iranian people, spurred by what they purportedly believe to be falsified election results, are rioting, demonstrating, protesting.
The Iranian people do not have the backing of the Iranian military or civilian police authority or armed forces. They are mostly unarmed.
The Iranian government commands the police and military. They are shooting people.
People are getting beaten by government representatives, both official and unofficial.
The government of Iran has blocked most telecommunications transmissions in and out of the State/County/Nation, including e-mail, telephones, popular websites capable of carrying photographic images of the events and the violence.
In response to that rhetorical lack of rhetorical perspective a number of people launched a series of responses to Congressman Hoekstra which consisted primarily of comparisons that are similarly outlandish in nature. Congressman Hoekstra's Twitter error went viral. For example
had high water pressure in the shower this morning, must be what it's like to get waterboarded
I just burned my hand with some bacon grease. I feel exactly like that Buddhist monk who set himself on fire
Honestly there is not enough time in the world to track and reprint all of these things without coding help, and some of them just are not funny/clever enough to mention. Others are not part of the meme but simply preachy idiots who apparently want a politician punished for making an inappropriate comparison.
The best of them can be found here. I will steal them now.
mike_bosworth @petehoekstra I got a sunburn last weekend. Makes me think of Hiroshima.
KyleOrl @petehoekstra My softball game was rained out today. Now I know what Hurricane Katrina felt like.
stealingfrom @petehoekstra Sitting in a chair, feeling a good deal like Stephen Hawking. #GOPfail
mattortega RT @petehoekstra Walked out onto Constitution Ave in D.C. and was almost hit by a taxi. Reminded me of Tienanmen Square.
mmnowakjr85 @petehoekstra our office cooler ran out of water. this must be what its like in Sudan.
curtsmith @petehoekstra, fell off my surfboard in Malibu today, now I know what D-day felt like.
jwzich @petehoekstra Didn't have breakfast this morning, it was exactly like the Great Potato Famine
stevensantos @petehoekstra Still haven't got paid for a job I did. Now I know what slavery is like.
trisloth @petehoekstra Just got into a snowball fight. Reminded me of the Hundred Years' War
donnahon @petehoekstra Got some sand in my shoe. Now I know what it's like to be on my third deployment in Iraq.
ceedub7 @petehoekstra I got a splinter in my hand today. Felt just like Jesus getting nailed to the cross.
netw3rk @petehoekstra Someone walked in on me while I was in the bathroom. Reminded me of Pearl Harbor.
trisloth @petehoekstra My toilet just overflowed a little. Now I know what it was like for the Indonesian tsunami victims.
paganmist @petehoekstra Had to move all my stuff to a new office w/o a corner view. Now i know what the Trail of Tears was like. #GOPfail
benhuh @petehoekstra I had to sit in the last row of our corporate jet this morning. This is what Rosa Parks must have felt like.
BrianYoung @petehoekstra: Missed lunch today cuz I was late and walking to a meeting. Reminded me of the Bataan Death March.
I don't know why the Iranians are rioting. Neither does any other American but I am honest enough to admit it while the others simply go with one common conjecture as fact.
President Obama actually said that the real reason the election was going as it did, back when it was an election, was that he gave a speech in Cairo.
His speech in Cairo had nothing to do with the Iranian President's lack of popularity.
His speech in Cairo had nothing to do with the Iranian elections at all.
In the northern hemisphere, the longest day of the year (near June 22) when the Sun is farthest north. In the southern hemisphere, winter and summer solstices are exchanged. The summer solstice marks the first day of the season of summer. The declination of the Sun on the (northern) summer solstice is known as the tropic of cancer (23° 27').
The summer solstice is the longest day of the year, respectively, in the sense that the length of time elapsed between sunrise and sunset on this day is a maximum for the year. Of course, daylight saving time means that the first Sunday in April has 23 hours and the last Sunday in October has 25 hours, but these human meddlings with the calendar and do not correspond to the actual number of daylight hours. In Chicago, there are 15:02 hours of daylight on the summer solstice of June 21, 1999.
The above plots show how the date of the summer solstice shifts through the Gregorian calendar according to the insertion of leap years. The table below gives the universal time of the summer solstice. To convert to U. S. Eastern daylight saving time, subtract 4 hours, so the summer solstice occurs on June 21, 1998 at 10:00 a.m. EDT; June 21, 1999 at 15:47 (3:46 p.m.) EDT; and June 20, 2000 at 21:36 (9:36 p.m.) EDT.
Note that the times below were calculated using SummerSolstice[] in the Mathematica application package Scientific Astronomer, which is accurate to within only an hour or so, and in practice gives times that differ by up to 15 minutes from those computed by the U.S. Naval Observatory (which computes June 21, 1999 at 19:49 UT instead of 19:47 UT and June 21, 2000 at 01:48 UT instead of 01:36).
Here is a QuickTime movie illustrating the tilt of the Earth's equatorial plane relative to the Sun which is responsible for the seasons. The dates of maximum tilt of the Earth's equator correspond to the summer solstice and winter solstice, and the dates of zero tilt to the vernal equinox and autumnal equinox.
We are shocked at the recent demolition of Tiger Stadium. It dishonors the hundreds of thousands of dollars raised by the Conservancy, the State of Michigan changes to the historic tax credit laws to enhance this project, the federal appropriation granted by the U.S. Congress and signed by President Obama, and the thousands of volunteer hours contributed by the Conservancy, its consultants and its supporters in advancing this effort. We believe – and the DEGC has said they agree – that we had made substantial progress toward our redevelopment goal with a strong likelihood of ultimate success in the worst economy in decades. Then out of the blue, we received notice that the DEGC was tearing the stadium down. In answer to misleading statements made to the press and the City Council by the DEGC, we offer the following:
NO EXTENSIONS GIVEN: The OTSC received no extension of any deadline from the DEGC from the date the city agreed to spare the Navin Field portion of Tiger Stadium in 2008. Prior to that time, extensions were only received following intervention of the City Council. The DEGC never granted any extension of its own accord.
SUBSTANTIAL CASH RAISED: The OTSC raised more than $600,000 in cash from more than 700 contributors – individuals and entities – and secured the $3.8 million federal appropriation in the past nine months.
TAX CREDITS AVAILABLE: Experts in tax credits and historic preservation commissioned by the OTSC identified tax credits totaling more than $18 million for which the project was likely eligible. The OTSC made substantial progress in the complicated process to secure these tax credits. Potential buyers for the tax credits had been identified and the sale of the tax credits would have provided $18 million of cash for the project. This is exactly the same financing structure that was used for other projects in the city, including the Book Cadillac Hotel development, so it was not an unfamiliar process to the DEGC.
ESCROW ESTABLISHED: The OTSC deposited $300,000 in escrow with the DEGC to secure demolition costs and the purchase price of the stadium.
SECURITY / MAINTENANCE – 100% PAID BY CONSERVANCY: The OTSC paid $93,000 for security and maintenance for the period through June 30, 2009 and was able to pay additional sums required in the future for security and maintenance costs at the Stadium.
DEMOLITION COSTS – RED HERRING: The “increased demolition costs” cited by the DEGC as a reason for immediate demolition were a function of the current low steel prices, which will likely turn around with the economy and produce lower demolition costs again in the future.
BEST USE OF DEMOLITION FUNDS? Demolition now will cost our financially stressed city $250,000 more than the funds deposited in escrow by the OTSC. Is this the highest priority of the city to spend taxpayer’s dollars on demolition at this time?
NO MEETING NOTICE / DEFECTIVE MEETING: We had no notice from the DEGC of any meetings of the City Council or the Economic Development Corporation where the fate of the project was considered. In particular, we had no notice of the EDC meeting of June 2, 2009, which was conducted out of public view, and our first notice of the meeting and the demolition decision was from the press. At that meeting, the EDC members received no explanation of the OTSC’s substantial progress to assist its board in making an informed decision. Moreover, though required under the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), the EDC Board did not make the determinations and findings required to terminate the MOU and authorize the demolition of the stadium, nor did the Board ratify the action taken unilaterally by the DEGC (in the name of the EDC) when it notified the OTSC a day earlier that the MOU was being terminated.
CURRENT M.O.U <1 YEAR OLD: We had been working under the current MOU with the DEGC for less than one year, not since 1999, when the Tigers left for Comerica Park, as DEGC representatives have stated publicly. The OTSC was only incorporated in May, 2007, and the current board has only been in place for the last year.
T.R.O. VIOLATED: We were able to obtain a temporary restraining order on Friday, June 5, 2009 at 5 p.m. in an attempt to avoid significant damage to the stadium. At about the time the TRO was granted, the demolition resumed and later intensified until a supporter jumped the fence and gave the TRO order to the demolition operator at about 6:30 p.m. The demolition seemed to be intended to cause the most damage to disparate parts of the stadium in the shortest time. The demolition sacrifices in excess of $12 million of historic tax-credits to the city.
NO D.E.G.C. SUPPORT OR COOPERATION: The DEGC provided us no technical, financial or organizational support whatever in our redevelopment efforts, and no other encouragement of any kind. For example, recently, the OTSC’s request to the DEGC for access to the field for press and fundraising purposes was denied.
NEIGHBORHOOD SUPPORT: Though the DEGC has made public statements that neighborhood residents were supportive of demolition, in fact the Corktown neighborhood, the neighborhood that surrounds the stadium, was strongly in support of the efforts of the OTSC. The neighborhood’s own community development organization has two members on the OTSC board, and many residents of the neighborhood contributed both their money and time.
REMAINING STRUCTURE A VIABLE HISTORIC BUILDING: Despite repeated characterizations by the DEGC and media of the remaining portions of Tiger Stadium as a “stub” or “remnant,” the structure the city is currently demolishing was a viable, historic major league ballpark, circa 1930. It was not an incomplete or unusable remainder.
NO PLANS FOR THE SITE: Before the demolition began, DEGC intimated that they were in talks with outside developers – developers interested in a cleared and vacant site. Since demolition has begun, the DEGC has acknowledged that there are indeed no serious development proposals for this site.
Not only the city, but the state and the entire country have lost the opportunity to redevelop an historic treasure that would have anchored a significant enhancement of the near west side of Detroit and spurred much-needed economic development in the years ahead. Instead, we will have an empty field at the corner of Michigan and Trumbull to further blight the landscape of our city. This historic “corner” will have a new meaning.
We thank our many supporters for their steadfast support and encouragement, as well as their time, money and passion for this project. You gave us the strength to carry this effort forward and we regret that the DEGC, the EDC and the city did not provide us the continued opportunity to achieve this objective.
The recent actions of the city, the EDC and the DEGC raise questions about the city’s priority regarding demolition and the use of the city’s funds. Why the urgency to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars of city money to demolish at this time? Why is the DEGC so quick to demolish the Navin Field portion of Tiger Stadium when there are thousands of vacant and abandoned structures throughout the city that are in need of immediate demolition and are clearly a danger to Detroit’s citizens and firefighters? What are the plans for the site that require immediate demolition? The political leaders of our city need to address these issues and take charge of setting the development priorities of the city.
Senator Levin has informed us that the Conservancy remains entitled to utilize the $3.8 million Federal appropriation that the U.S. Congress so generously provided for economic development in or near the stadium site. In conjunction with the southwest Detroit community, we will determine how the money might best be invested and leveraged to have some good come of Senator Levin’s steadfast effort and support. We hope the city will assist us with these efforts for the good of the city and its citizens.
The failure of the DEGC to support the Conservancy is a tragic loss of a unique opportunity for economic development in the City of Detroit. The larger question the people of Detroit and the entire region should ask is why the DEGC is allowed to heavy-handedly run roughshod over the efforts of the not-for-profit and preservation communities and the thousands of citizens who are supporters of development efforts. The DEGC should be encouraging and assisting these efforts rather than quashing them at every turn.
Alpena is the home of the world's largest cement plant.
Rogers City boasts the world's largest limestone quarry.
Elsie is the home of the world's largest registered Holstein dairy herd.
Michigan is first in the United States production of peat and magnesium compounds and second in gypsum and iron ore..
Colon is home to the world's largest manufacturer of magic supplies..
The state Capitol with its majestic dome was built in Lansing in l879.
Although Michigan is often called the Wolverine State , there are no longer any wolverines in Michigan . However, one was spotted in 2007, so there are some.
Michigan ranks first in state boat registrations.
The Packard Motor Car Company in Detroit manufactured the first air-conditioned car in 1939.
The oldest county based on date of incorporation is Wayne in 1815..
Sault Ste. Marie was founded by Father Jacques Marquette in 1668. It is the third oldest remaining settlement in the United States
In 1817, the University of Michigan was the first university established by any of the states. It was founded by priests. Originally named Cathelepistemian and located in Detroit . The name was changed in 1821. The university moved to Ann Arbor in 1841.
The city of Novi was named from its designation as Stagecoach Stop #6 or No.VI.
Michigan State University has the largest single campus student body of any Michigan university. It is the largest institution of higher learning in the state and one of the largest universities in the country. Michigan State University was founded in 1855 as the nation's first land-grant university and served as the prototype for 69 land-grant institutions later established under the Morrill Act of 1862.It was the first institution of higher learning in the nation to teach scientific agriculture..
The largest village in Michigan is Caro.
Michigan's state stone, the Petoskey, is the official state stone. It is found along the shores of Lake Michigan .
The Mackinac Bridge is one of the longest suspension bridges in the world connecting the upper and lower peninsulas of Michigan . It spans five miles over the Straits of Mackinac, which is where Lake Michigan and Lake Huron meet. The "Mighty Mac" took three years to complete and was opened to traffic in 1957.
Gerald R Ford grew up in Grand Rapids and became the 38th president of the United States . He attended the University of Michigan where he was a football star. He served on a World War II aircraft carrier and afterward represented Michigan in Congress for 24 years. He was also an Eagle Scout, the highest rank in Boy Scouts.
The Kellogg Company has made Battle Creek the Cereal Capital of the World. The Kellogg brothers accidentally discovered the process for producing flaked cereal products and sparked the beginning of the dry cereal industry.
The painted turtle is Michigan 's state reptile.
The western shore of Michigan has many sand dunes. The Sleeping Bear Dunes rise 460 feet above Lake Michigan . Living among the dunes is the dwarf lake iris the official state wildflower.
Vernor's ginger ale was created in Detroit and became the first soda pop made in the United States . In 1862, pharmacist James Vernor was trying to create a new beverage when he was called away to serve our country in the Civil War. When he returned, four years later,the drink he had stored in an oak case had acquired a delicious gingery flavor.
The Detroit Zoo was the first zoo in America to feature cageless, open-exhibits that allowed the animals more freedom to roam.
Michigan is the only place in the world with a floating post office..
The J. W. Westcott II is the only boat in the world that delivers mail to ships while they are still underway. They have been operating for 125 years.
Indian River is the home of the largest crucifix in the world. It is called the Cross in the Woods.
Michigan has the longest freshwater shoreline in the world
Michigan has more shoreline than any other state except Alaska .
The Ambassador Bridge was named by Joseph Bower, the person credited with making the bridge a reality, who thought the name, Detroit-Windsor International Bridge , as too long and lacked emotional appeal. Bower wanted to symbolize the visible expression of friendship of two peoples with like ideas and ideals.
Michigan has more than 11,000 inland lakes and more than 36,000 miles of streams.
Michigan has 116 lighthouses and navigational lights. Seul Choix Point Lighthouse in Gulliver has been guiding ships since 1895. The working light also functions as a museum, which houses early 1900's furnishings and maritime artifacts.
Forty of the state's 83 counties adjoin at least one of the Great Lakes .
Michigan is the only state that touches four of the five Great Lakes .
Standing anywhere in the state a person is within 85 miles of one of the Great Lakes .
Michigan includes 56,954 square miles of land area, 1,194 square miles of Inland waters, and 38,575 square miles of Great Lakes water area.
Sault Ste. Marie was established in 1668 making it the oldest town between the Alleghenies and the Rockies .
Michigan was the first state to provide in its Constitution for the establishment of public libraries.
Michigan was the first state to guarantee every child the right to tax-paid high school education.
Four flags have flown over Michigan - French, English, Spanish and United States .
Isle Royal Park shelters one of the largest moose herds remaining in the United States ...
Some of the longest bulk freight carriers in the world operate on the Great Lakes . Ore carriers 1,000 feet long sail Michigan 's inland seas.
The Upper Michigan Copper Country is the largest commercial deposit of native copper in the world.
The 19 chandeliers in the Capitol in Lansing are one of a kind and designed especially for the building by Tiffany's of New York . Weighing between 800-900 pounds apiece, they are composed of copper, iron, and pewter..
The first auto traffic tunnel built between two nations was the mile-long Detroit-Windsor tunnel under the Detroit River .
The world's first international submarine railway tunnel was opened between Port Huron , Michigan , and Sarnia , Ontario , Canada in 1891.
The nation's first regularly scheduled air passage service began operation between Grand Rapids and Detroit in 1926.
In 1879, Detroit telephone customers were first in the nation to be assigned phone numbers to facilitate handling calls.
In 1929, the Michigan State Police established the first state police radio system in the world.
Grand Rapids is home to the 24-foot Leonardo Da Vinci horse, called Il Gavallo. It is the largest equestrian bronze sculpture in the Western Hemisphere .
The State Motto (written in Latin) translates to:"If you seek a pleasant peninsula, look about you."
Was that interesting or what?
With all of the negativity due to pooreconomics and housing markets these days, let us try to remember and say something positive about our beautiful and interesting Michigan !! We will strive to thrive once again! It would also be a good thing to keep our Michigan in our prayers and thoughts, too.
Thank you, and may God bless our Michigan and her people.
The following was ripped off from Kiplinger.com without permission.
10 Quirky Economic Indicators
These off beat barometers of the economy can give you much needed guidance for your portfolio or simply a good laugh.
By Candice Lee Jones, Reporter, Kiplinger's Personal Finance Magazine
June 2009
Everyone is scrambling to get their fingers on the pulse of the economy. When will it turn around? Have we seen the worst? The answers may not be as elusive as you might think.
You’ll find all sorts of clues in everyday life to help determine where the economy really stands. The racks of dry cleaners, for instance, may seem a bit more cluttered these days, and it’s true—many people are stalling an extra week before shelling out to pick up their clothes. And to paraphrase a famous quote from other troubled times, don’t shoot back into the market until you see the whites of their eyelids: Eyeliner sales have surged during the recession.
Packed Theaters
When times get tough, people go to the movies. Box-office sales have increased in all of the last five recession years. According to the National Association of Theatre Owners, the number of movie tickets sold in the first quarter of 2009 increased more than 9% from last year.
People continue to fill theater seats, NATO says, because movies are one of the least expensive entertainment options out of the house. The average ticket price in 2008 was $7.18. So when the lines get shorter and ticket prices higher, will happy times be here again?
More Green Thumbs
The National Gardening Association finds that the number of households that will grow their own fruits, berries, vegetables and herbs this year is 19% higher than in 2008.
That makes 43 million gardeners in the United States this year. It’s fun and relaxing, no doubt, but 54% of the respondents say the prospect of saving money on groceries motivates them to till the soil.
More First Dates
Misery loves company, eh? Online dating service Match.com notices a pattern in its site activity during tough times. The fourth quarter of 2008 was its busiest in seven years (the site has been around since 1995). Match had a similar surge in late 2001, right after 9/11.
The company believes people are looking for someone with whom they can forget about money troubles—or share the pain. When the Dow Jones industrial average dropped to a five-year low last November, Match.com had its second-busiest weekend of the year.
Romance Novels Are Hot
The economy broke your heart. Time to bury your sorrows in a a romance novel? At least that’s what Harlequin, the giant romance-novel publisher, says is happening. In 2008, Harlequin’s sales were up 32% from the year before. In 2009, its sales are still rising.
The publisher credits the increase to its uplifting stories that offer a haven, and to the low prices of the books relative to other entertainment. Harlequin saw a similar sales increase during the recession of the early '90s. So if these books start piling up unwanted on the discount table at the bookstore, alongside all those mistimed guides to real estate riches, better news might be on the way.
Droopier Eyes I
America is all tuckered out. The 2009 Sleep in America Poll found that nearly one-third of Americans lost sleep because they were worried about their finances. The poll, by the National Sleep Foundation, also found that 10% of those people tossed and turned, specifically worrying about their jobs. That's roughly the same percentage of Americans who are out of work.
Droopier Eyes II
Americans spent $10.3 billion in 2008 to endure 1.7 million cosmetic surgeries, which is 9% less than in 2007. The American Society of Plastic Surgeons cites the bad economy.
Without as much extra cash—and facing depleted retirement funds and much less home equity—fewer people can spend freely on plastic surgery. The number of liposuction procedures was down 19% in 2008 and tummy tucks were down 18%. Sure, you might get an appointment with a top surgeon without much of a wait now. But will you be able to get in so easily next year? Some would say, let's hope not.
Goopier Eyelashes
You’ve got that recession look in your eye. Total eye-makeup sales at supermarkets and drugstores were up 8.5% in the one-year period that ended on March 22. In that period, more than $260 million was spent on eye makeup – in particular, eyeliner was up 9% and mascara almost 13%, the industry says.
The leading lipstick indicator – the past trend that lipstick sales rose in economic downturns as consumers settled for inexpensive luxuries – is not holding up. Lipstick sales are down 11%. But eye makeup has replaced lipstick as the indicator, devotees of this theory say.
Too Many Gators
What do 100,000 alligators have to do with the economy? They're all residents of Savoie’s Alligator Farm, one of the largest in Louisiana. Yet, the farm, which sells gator-skin hides to tanners who in turn sell them to luxury designers like Louis Vuitton, says it hasn't sold a single hide since November.
People just aren't buying alligator skin handbags and luggage. Yes, it's tough on the gator farmers. They're trying to keep the hides they already have in stock from spoiling. But it’s good news for alligators everywhere—if they only knew.
Dry Cleaning Pickups Are Down
The International Drycleaning and Laundry Institute is hearing gripes from many of its 5,000 members. Because of the poor economy, customers are visiting less frequently and leaving clothes longer. Customers who once came weekly now visit every two weeks, monthly customers visit bimonthly, and some people delay their pickups even longer to avoid the bill. This has been a staple indicator of hard times in the past. We're not making these up. People really do look at such trends and patterns.
More Mosquito Bites
In Maricopa County, Ariz., huge numbers of foreclosed or abandoned homes have vacant swimming pools and unattended ponds. The stagnant waters – known as green pools -- are a hotbed for mosquito breeding, say local authorities. Crews have treated more than 4,000 green pools already in 2009. During the same period in 2007, before metropolitan Phoenix’s housing market collapsed, they had treated only 2,500. While most are on vacant properties, some also belong to residents who can't afford to maintain their pools and ponds.
Our first nominees come from Lake Geneva, Wisconson. Local news station WISN says two nurses snapped photos of a patient’s X-ray and, according to their employer, posted them on Facebook. The patient in question allegedly had a sex device lodged in his rectum, hence the keen interest on the part of the nurses.
The accused nurse claims she never actually posted the pictures on Facebook—that they only discussed the incident on her page. Police haven’t been able to locate anyone who has actually seen the photos. Nevertheless, both were dismissed for misconduct.
Moral of the Story
Violating a patient’s privacy is just plain wrong. Violating a patient’s privacy, then advertising it on a social networking site is just plain stupid.
2. Would You Like Boogers with That?
What’s on your pizza?
Our next contenders are competing in two categories: stupidity and depravity. Dominos workers Michael Setzer and Kristy Hammonds filmed their gross-out kitchen antics, like sneezing on sandwiches or cleaning a pizza pan with a sponge one of them used to wipe his bare bottom just moments before. They posted their video on YouTube, and it quickly became an internet sensation. Both employees were fired and now face criminal charges for tampering with food.
Moral of the Story
You are what you eat? Let’s hope not.
3. Calling Your Boss on His “Self Love”
Our next nominee proves social-networking stupidity is not just detrimental, it’s universal. A 23-year-old administrative clerk from South Africa called his boss a “serial masturbator” on his Facebook status. A co-worker saw the status, informed the employer and the young man was fired. Oops.
Moral of the Story
It’s a double whammy for this ex-employee. Don’t say anything on Facebook you wouldn’t want your boss, spouse, parents or children to see. Ever. Also, that’s TMI about your boss. None of your friends want to know that.
4. A Wii Bit Stupid
Sadly, this next nominee is more tragic than dumb. Three radio DJs in Sacramento ran a contest in which listeners were asked to drink as much water as possible without going to the bathroom. The prize? A Nintendo Wii console. The price? Someone’s life.
A 28-year-old contestant was found dead in her home five hours after drinking around two gallons of water. The coroner concluded that the cause of death was “water intoxication”. The DJs, along with seven other morning show employees, were subsequently fired.
Moral of the Story
You can have too much of a good thing.
5. Busted by GPS
John Haplin worked for the NYC school system for 21 years. He was a carpenter supervisor who, according to his managers , was falsifying time-records. How did they know? They’d been tracking his whereabouts for five months, via the GPS system in his government-issued cell phone. They found that he’d repeatedly accepted payment for times when he was clearly not working. Haplin says it was unfair for his employer to track him without warning. Fair or not, he no longer has to worry about them tracking his location.
Moral of the Story
Disable the GPS tracker on your work phone.
6. Sleeping on the Job
It wasn’t enough that he’d already missed three appointments. When this Comcast technician finally did show up to repair a faulty cable modem, he fell asleep the customer’s couch. Not surprisingly, he was canned.
Moral of the Story
Napping mid-day is only okay if you’re in one of two places: preschool or Italy. And it’s certainly not okay in a customer’s home.
7. Teacher Sends Nude Photos
High School teacher, Beth Ann Chester, sent nude photos of herself to a 14-year-old student’s cell phone. Allegedly, the student’s parents later found suggestive text messages in his phone and confronted Chester. Later that day, the 26-year-old physical education teacher resigned from her post (not quite fired, but close enough). Since the photos emerged, Chester has confessed to having a sexual relationship with the aforementioned student and now faces criminal charges including sexual abuse of children and corruption of minors, among others.
Moral of the Story
It better be obvious. Pedophilia is something for a rap sheet, not a resume.
8. The Coffee Cop
In many parts of the world, police live on bribes and kickbacks. An officer in Daytona Beach, Florida seemed to forget that he was a cop in a country where that doesn’t happen. For about two years, Lieutenant Major Garvin was given free specialty coffee drinks from a local Starbucks. When one day he was refused his drink on the house, the Lieutenant threatened employees with a much slower response time if they “needed a little help.” When investigated, he denied the claim and agreed to a polygraph. He failed.
Moral of the Story
A Triple Chai Latte isn’t that good. And don’t abuse your authority, whether or not you’re a law enforcement officer.
9. Crime Scene Photography
You hear some weird stories out of New York, but usually not from its smallest borough, Staten Island. Earlier this year, an emergency medical technician (EMT), responding to a murder snapped some photos of the strangled victim. The EMT proceeded to upload the pictures to his Facebook page. (We wonder what he called the album…). A friend who saw the gruesome images contacted his employer, the Richmond University Medical Center, and he was promptly let go.
What’s sadder: the EMT, a former cop, had been a hero before he retired from the force. He saved a man from a burning car, rescued a mother and daughter from a capsized boat, and prevented a homeless man from taking his own life. With a click of the mouse, he ruined his reputation and landed himself unemployed.
Moral of the Story
All employers take privacy rights seriously. Be careful that the photos you’re posting online don’t violate those rights.
Bonus Moral
Your friends don’t want to see gruesome pictures anyway. They’ll probably think you’re creepy.
10. A Bath Isn’t a Job Perk
After a hard day’s work, what do you do to unwind when your shift ends? Dinner? A long, hot shower? Three now former employees of a KFC decided to take a bath. The only problem? They went for their soak in one of the chicken fryer’s dishwashing sinks. Though the restaurant was closed, one of the trio put some pictures on her public MySpace profile and of course, their manager learned of the incident. Apparently, bathing in the multi-section sink is a violation of KFC’s operating standards. Who knew?
A local health inspector noted that the girls’ actions were also a violation of the state health code because “they are not wearing clean outer clothing.” Would it have been all right if they were? Maybe their path to unemployment was a blessing in disguise. Now they are free to find work at a spa, where after-hours bathing is a career benefit.
Moral of the Story
When you want to relax after work, leave work.
11. We’ll Do it Live
In most jobs, accuracy is a key benchmark for keeping your job. If you are wrong 90% of the time, odds are you will be joining the legions of the unemployed. As we all know, though, there is one profession for which this is not the case: the weatherperson. As far as “sciences” go, meteorology’s closest cousin is astrology (though horoscopes are usually more on point).
But a forecaster is not immune to the chopping block. As this one from upstate New York learned, a meteorologist’s job is really just to smile, stand in front of a map, and notyell a string of profanities.
If you have to unleash a string of expletives, don’t do it on live TV.
12. Felony Urination
When April 15 rolls around, urinating on the IRS might be on top of your to do list. But be careful—like audits, the IRS does not take peeing lying down. As first reported by The Smoking Gun, an IRS employee relieved himself in the freight elevator “on numerous occasions.” After the signature scent was noticed, a federal agent installed a surveillance camera and caught the urinator in the act.
Did the culprit have a bladder problem? No, he said he “did this because he felt he could get away with it.” If you think you can get away with something, make sure you actually can. The contract employee not only lost his job but got slapped with a $4,600 cleaning bill and a felony charge for damaging government property that carries a maximum ten year sentence.
Of all our nominees, this one fell the farthest. Niklaus Leuenberger was the managing director of The Palace, one of New York’s most exclusive and luxurious hotels. On Wednesday, February 25, he spotted an employee with something on his forehead. Rather than try to figure out what it was (or think for a second what the day was), Leuenberger told his employee, “Wipe that f*****g s**t off your face!” The bell captain, a Catholic, had ash smudged on his forehead in observance of Ash Wednesday.
Moral of the Story
Think before you go ballistic… Or at least have some basic knowledge of religious observations, especially if you’re a manager.
14. Fake Celebrities Deserve Privacy Too
AP / Nick Ut
In ages past, celebrities were people who had amazing talent or skill. These days, being a rich alcoholic or accidentally birthing eight children at once seems to count. 15 Kaiser Permanente employees were not immune to the public’s strange fascination with Nadya “Octo-Mom” Suleman. Curious about the medical oddity, the employees rummaged through her medical files looking for clues to the secret of this prolifically fecund beast. All they found was a pink slip. Without even trying to sell or publicize whatever they found, the workers were fired.
Moral of the Story
Some mysteries aren’t worth solving.
15. Conference Call Hang Up
Several senior employees at a technology retailer were on a conference call with the CEO who was out of the office. When the meeting had ended, one employee said, “If that idiot tells me how to do my job one more time, I’m going to quit.” He didn’t have to. A few seconds later everyone in the room heard an ominous sound coming from the three-footed conference phone, “I’m sorry, what was that?”
She hadn’t hung up. They hadn’t hung up. That “idiot” told him how to do his job one more time: leave it.
Moral of the Story
Don’t shoot your mouth off unless you are 100% certain who’s listening. Hit the button on the conference phone until you hear a new dial tone.
BONUS: You’re No Dumbledore
The location was Land O’ Lakes, Florida 2008, not Salem, Massachusetts 1692, but a substitute teacher was fired for witchcraft. Jim Piculas, the teacher in question, performed a 30-second magic trick in front of a middle school class where he made a toothpick disappear. Later that day he got a call from the substitute teacher coordinator who told him he could not take any more assignments. “Why?” he asked. For being suspected of “wizardry.”
Moral of the Story
Leave your wand at home. Apparently, witchcraft is still a scourge on local youth. ——
35% as moderate, and 21% as liberal... 9% call themselves "very conservative" and 5% "very liberal."
Leave aside the specifics of how "Conservative" and "Conservatism can be defined, how they are defined and what individuals intend when he or she refers to himself or herself as "conservative" or what political views are considered to be "conservative". I will also set aside the specifics and vagaries of how the results were gathered and how the poll is taken. Obviously polls are intended to be representational and thus it cannot be taken as an absolute that a sample can literally mean that that quantity of individuals or citizens in this country definitely believe a given thing. Especially since statistics never mean that every sampling of individuals will reflect the statistical results of a given sample in a specific instance of research. After all, just because one in every 12 bottles of Mountain Dew has a cap that will give away a free bottle of Mountain Dew as they bottles were manufactured and filled, does not mean that every gathering of 24 bottles of Mountain Dew you will see in a fridge in a gas station has two winning caps (because three winning bottles got purchased already back when there were 36 bottles at the gas station). No! We take all that into consideration and set it aside as irrelevant when I take it as given that 40% of Americans consider their views to be "conservative" or further right than that.
The first point is that different people take diametrically opposing viewpoints of war, abortion, and education as "conservative" and consider the view opposite his or her own as something not conservative. Yet both declare that their views are "conservative". Hence why Ron Paul, Tom Tancredo and Fred Thompson could declare themselves, present themselves as "Conservative" (not "libertarian") and their arguments/presentations were all equally credible.
The actual point is that John McCain could not credibly argue that he was "conservative" or a "Conservative" and that was the reason why he failed to win the 2008 presidential election. In order to win an election a candidate has to secure a base then expand to other group and blocs of voters. The conservative base includes most Republicans and a number of individual I cheerfully refer to as "Reagan Democrats", as well as quiet, willful non-visible union members, teachers, and auto-workers. Those labeling themselves as "Moderates" generally/usually do not vote for conservatives, but liberals, Democrats, and certain sorts of Republicans. Since Senator McCain failed to secure the Conservatives and only grabbed the most honest of "Moderates" (a cursory examination of self-proclaimed political "Moderates" that I saw on Facebook shows that most of them "supported" "Barack Obama" as a politician instead of his opponent; Barack Obama is an avowed leftist and John McCain certainly is a Moderate). A true Conservative could grab hold of 40% of the electorate, presuming a statistical alignment of stated political beliefs and voting habits among Americans, if that Conservative candidate is unapologetic, and then expand to various single-issue individuals and thoughtful people who are not otherwise stringently tied to left-wing political parties and/or candidates.
Even though George Bush 43 was, in hindsight, clearly a being closer to the political center and socioeconomic left than that of fiscal conservatism (and thus was an activist for government taking an increasingly larger role in the American sociopolitical fabric/continuum) he still held a greater appeal to/for the American right, the so-called 40% than did either of his respective opponents in 2000 and 2004. Frankly his speeches during the 2000 Presidential election hid nothing and it's easy to see or deduce that he is/was not a purist in the philosophical sense for Conservativism and certainly not the standard for the Conservative ideology, as it stands as an ideology.
Now for some Conservatism is a philosophy and not an ideology. For others the distinction does not matter and there clearly it is more of an ideology. That most people are not educated in the history and background of Conservatism in this country is obvious, sad, and borderline irrelevant. To Russell Kirk and his followers this matters and to a great extent the success of political activists is determined by whether they grab hold of Conservatism as a philosophy and not merely an ideology. The simplest distinction is that it is an ideology for those less educated; in terms of victory it might not matter. Yet if more Americans were educated in what it means then they would not have swallowed/accepted/believed so much propaganda from the Left that George Bush 43 was some sort of Conservative ideologue or an "Ultraconservative". Then again, greater and more widespread understanding of what it means to hold "conservative" ideals would mean that less people would believe the standard educational claptrap that "fascism" is a "far right" ideology. Logical people would not readily believe anyway that a facet of political belief could include both a libertarian and totalitarian line of thought without spontaneously destroying itself. That President Bush states that he "abandoned [his] free market principles to save the free market system" rings entirely hollow to me.
Keep in mind that in order to win an election a candidate merely has to achieve 50%+1. That is far less than 51% of the votes and certainly an oversimplification in a system that includes an Electoral College. Which means that in specific states a sorting of votes is required. 50%+1 of all votes must be obtained in patterns of states that would make up that magic number of electoral votes to gain victory. Once you have that, gaining votes from people who declare themselves as "liberal" or "very liberal" is merely frosting on the electoral cake. If a Republican loses an election, assuming an even geographic spread of this 40% (and I will), it was only because his views, presentation, character, and history were not compatible or appealing to those with that 40%, an easy demographic to identify. To this point we should not race to appeal or transform into a Colin Powell or a Michael Steele archetype. The character, presentation, and history of George Bush 43 had a great enough appeal and while it did not quite cut into a certain 21% of Americans as Senator John Kerry and Vice-President Al Gore clearly could, it worked easily enough.
Also with some geographic specifics the demographics necessarily vary, hence Rudolph Giuliani, Sam Brownback, or Tim Pawlenty. New York City elected a man who would turn out to be weak defended the Second Amendment of the United States Constitution and be entirely a defender of abortion yet is a "warhawk" regarding terrorists and the state that backs them. Kansas elected Senator Brownback and despite his moralist views on abortion and traditional marriage he is not the most stringent defender of American sovereignty regarding the border or how the wars in the middle east should be executed. Yet despite the contrasting views on war, Mayor Giuliani was secure in his belief that New York City could function well as a Sanctuary City to illegal aliens. Tim Pawlenty seems like a genuine Conservative in so many ways yet his policies regarding the environment are statist and certainly lean towards a greater commonality with Al Gore than to Fred Thompson, Jerry Doyle or Glenn Beck.
This revelation has a great, clear impact on Michigan. One does not have to infiltrate or turn the 40% to win an election but merely take advantage of a "right-wing" candidate failing to engage that 40% sufficiently. Dan Pero (and others) stated that Dick Posthumus failed to secure his base in the 2002 gubernatorial election which is why Attorney General Jennifer Granholm managed to grab hold of sufficient numbers of what voters there were and take victory, become our governor. Now Mister Pero stated also that if the election were held a couple of weeks later then Lt. Governor Posthumus would have won. Elections are races literally in the sense that whoever is in the lead by the finish line is reached, wins. If at the speed of the running the losing competitor was due to catch up at a later point, then he would simply have wished the later point is where the finish line was; if the finish line was further away Jennifer Granholm would have lost. This is only an issue at all because Dick Posthumus could not excite the base and certainly if he could engage a sufficient number of voters he did not do so at the right time.
Dick DeVos lost a gubernatorial challenge against Governor Granholm, and Sheriff Mike Bouchard lost the US Senatorial race against Debbie Stabenow because they disengaged from the interests and enthusiasm of the base (look again at how sizable that base is) when they stood against the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative. The MCRI won because right-minded people of that base and additional right-minded people embraced it. Traditionally the opponents of the MCRI were philosophically leftist and so among those expected to oppose it were the Democrats. Yet both the Democrats and the Republican establishment in Michigan campaigned against the MCRI, with the exception of Attorney General Mike Cox. The right-minded people did not see worthy candidates in the Republicans, and the people who were going to vote Democrat voted Democrat as they would anyway. That base is the source of volunteers and activists to help convince people for a candidate and when Mr. DeVos and Sheriff Bouchard (not to mention MIGOP Chair Anuzis) spoke, and even campaigned, against the Civil Rights Initiative it discouraged volunteerism and activism, hurting and perhaps killing the respective Republican campaigns.
This sort of conjecture is fun, although draining. I don't expect anyone to have read this whole thing given that I never read the whole Gallup poll article. Yet we clearly demonstrate right here that we work against ourselves when we don't fight for beliefs that logically would be our own. How can this not make sense? If we had a candidate that was so clearly one of our own instead of an aborted attempt to act as a fusion of "us" and "against-us" (which certainly describes Senator McCain or any Michigan Republican who opposed MCRI) then we would certainly have an easier time and a more substantial foundation to convince a conservative to not vote third party or even to consider a Democrat to be a reasonable choice. When we blur the line between Republican and Democrat why would a Moderate consider a Republican? More importantly a conservative makes a better ideological ambassador to moderates than a moderate makes an ambassador to conservatives. A Conservative Republican has to simply get "Moderates" to vote for them, which is an easier task than getting a Moderate Republican to convince conservatives that he is conservative and then getting those conservatives to vote at all!
I cannot promise this will be good, or my reporting relevant, and frankly sitting like this in these chairs hurts my back, and since my fingertrackpad is busted, using the mouse with the next chair as a mousepad is hurting my wrist. Better to listen than to type.
Technology is most often a bevy of potential and promises undelivered and/or broken.
All expectations sparked from encounters with new technology often end up dashed!
Which is why the women's liberation promised by abortion's advocates have led to females being used more as sexual objects, rather than relational participants. What was supposed to be freedom from consequences ended up being an emotional anchor without the biological reward. Instead of babies we have ghosts, or those insane enough to believe that their moral rights are suddenly defined by technological potential!
There is the potential of the automobile, the personal computer, the digital camera....
To be "DanBrowned" is to be inundated with self-promotions of a so-called expert who insists that he has done the research and that anything in his fictional story that is not fictional story is in fact true. That is to say that the fictinal events occur in a world that has a realistic world foundation. We also find it in politics, but right now we are watching some Tropers from the TVTropes wiki dismantle and dissect the author Dan Brown's most highly-touted works.
As the trope title shows, Dan Brown is well known for this. Two years of graduate school in cryptography forced this troper to put down Digital Fortress somewhere around the phrase "rotating cleartext cipher". Even someone without a background in crypto would be a little surprised by the classification of ZIP as an encryption scheme.
You should have kept going. The best Dan Brown moment of Digital Fortress comes at the end. The enemy is the greatest cryptographer in the world, the genius who invented this patently impossible piece of magic encryption, and the main characters have to guess his password. Turns out it's THE NUMBER THREE!
In the same book, the main character's linguist husband signs notes to her with the valediction "without wax". He eventually explains that this is the etymology of the word "sincerely": from the Latin sin cera, "without wax", it referred to marble of such high quality that no wax was needed to fill in the pits. Trouble is, this is a notorious folk etymology that tends to reduce any actual linguist to tears.
Dan Brown fails middle school physics forever over the U-238 atom bomb bit.
By Dan Brown's logic, non-commissioned officers in many armies actually show their rank by wearing a number of womb-symbols on their sleeves, rather than the phallic symbols he imagines.
This troper started laughing when Dan Brown referred to Islam as a language in Angels and Demons, when he says that the word "Satan" came from the "Islamic" word "Shaitan". In Real Life, the language is called Arabic.
The term originates from Hebrew; Arabic and Hebrew are both Semitic languages and contain many cognates. The name "Satan" originally comes from the Hebrew "Ha Satan" or "the Accuser", a character who shows up in the Book of Job and a few other sources. Saying that Satan started as a character from Islam is absurdly wrong on many levels.
Another section of Digital Fortress talked about a breakthrough that occurred after realizing that they'd been reading some text as "Mandarin symbols" as opposed to "the Kanji language", causing anyone with cursory knowledge of Chinese or Japanese to facepalm, hard. Mandarin is a dialect, not a set of characters, and Kanji are a set of characters, not a language.
Not to mention that due to simplification and linguistic drift on both sides, kanji and Chinese characters aren't nearly as identical as usually assumed. 剣 and 剑 are the same word in Kanji and Simplified Chinese, originating from the Traditional Chinese 劍, but you probably wouldn't guess that the three are the same just by looking at them.
In Angels and Demons, Brown in one scene reveals that Christianity got the ritual of eating our god (communion) from the Aztecs. Even if Brown wasn't aware of the fact that the Aztecs didn't appear until the 14th century, one would think he'd be familiar with the fact that the Christians in Europe had no contact with American civilizations until late 15th century. Which makes the chronology of the first Christians borrowing this tradition back in the 1st century a bit unlikely, nay? Unless he is also claiming that the Catholics have been hiding their time machine from us all this time...
This troper got angry at the book around the time the antimatter container was described as a breakthrough (or something along those lines). Ahem. Antimatter does not work that way!!
Don't get this troper-iconographer started on Langdon the "symbology" professor. It's not a discipline, it hasn't been relevant since the seventies, it is not a department at Harvard (or anywhere), and SYMBOLS DO NOT WORK THAT WAY.
I always wondered what Umberto Eco thought about Mr. Brown's "symbology" career. Umberto is a respected author and professor of semiotics — which is (loosely defined) the study of symbols and the way they interact and are interpreted by humans. In addition, Signor Eco really has been a professor at Harvard.
The end of Angels and Demons has a news commentator state that Ventresca may technically have been elected Pope by acclamation due to the crowd's spontaneously cheering him after they thought he had saved St. Peter's from the antimatter bomb. Except that election by acclamation was formally done away with in 1996 (four years before the book was written), the crowd did not intend to demand that Ventresca be elected Pope, and the papal electors would still have to ratify the crowd's demand even if they had made one.
This troper likes to point out that all the parts that belong to Angels and Demons was removed or fixed in the movie, (minus the whole Anti-Matter bomb but that's a major plot point)
The difference between Holy Grail and the Holy Chalice. That Jesus passed around a cup at passover is recounted in the Bible, but the idea that a vessel caught some of his blood while he was on the cross only came many centuries later, and whether the two are the same or different objects depends on the source you read. Either way, the entire central premise of The Da Vinci Code is pretty much bunk, as it claims that a story that first arose more than a thousand years after Christ's death is correctly interpreted as describing historical events during Christ's life.
Not to mention that the history of the Catholic church, as told by the characters, is chock full of errors.
He didn't even bother to do any research on CERN for Angels And Demons — if he had, he might have noticed that creating antimatter in the LHC wasn't a great breakthrough, seeing as the accelerator they used before they built the LHC collided matter and antimatter together.
Not to mention that you can't walk out with anti-matter. Generating antimatter is a complex and difficult process. Trying to contain it is even more complex. IIRC, the small amount that they do manage to generate are stored in a massive cylinder which requires constant magnetic containment. Try getting that out of the CERN building!
Oh and who can forget Brown fueling the "Louvre Pyramid has exactly 666 panes of glass" fire? Or explicitly claiming François Mitterrand demanded it that way. In reality the Pyramid is constructed with 673 panes and according to its designer, I.M Pei, Mitterand made no such demand.
Angels And Demons to the contrary, there was never a computer game based on the trading card game Illuminati: New World Order. Perhaps in that respect Dan Brown's world is better than our own.
It most likely is, since Robert Langdon teaches a course that doesn't even exist at the Harvard University in our world
Then there's the scene where the protagonist gets angry at the Vatican for "not reading its history" concerning the branding and execution of several Illuminati members in 1668. This despite the fact that the Illuminati was founded in 1776.
In Deception Point, National Reconnaisance Office Director Pickering addresses Rachel, the book's heroine, as "Agent Sexton". Intelligence analysts are not law enforcement officers and the NRO does not have clandestine field operatives.
This troper is fond of calling Dan Brown out for being the reason why people mistakenly refer to Leonardo Da Vinci as "Da Vinci" instead of Leonardo. I explain it thus: "It's not technically a surname, since Leonardo was born to a single mother; he took that tag at the end of his name since Vinci was the town he was born in. It would be like me, for whatever reason, going by the name "Morraeon from Tewkesbury", and then everyone starts calling me "from Tewkesbury" instead of Morraeon."
The Da Vinci Code is one long book of faulty history. The character Teabing claimed that the Council of Nicea was to debate Jesus' divinity. It was not. It was a debate over whether the Son of God was equal and co-eternal to God the Father. He also states that the vote was relatively close. It wasn't. It was 300-2 in favor of the Son being equal and co-eternal with the Father. Teabing also claimed that some of the gospels Constantine attempted to destroy were found in the Dead Sea Scrolls. There are no gospels in the Dead Sea Scrolls. It is Old Testament fragments. Langdon argues that Jesus was married according to Jewish tradition. However, most prophets were unmarried, like John the Baptist for example. Langdon also states that Jews condemned celibacy, however the Essenes, an extremely puritanical sect, were celibate. Teabing points out that the Aramaic word for companion meant spouse, and thus the Gospel of Philip, which calls Mary Magdalene Jesus' companion, proves that Jesus was married. Too bad Philip was written in Greek, three hundred years after Jesus' life on Earth before His ascension, while the four canonical gospels were written in the first century. Brown also states that Constantine simply used the Church as an organizational technique. While Constantine did do so, Roman historians are clear that Constantine was a Christian by the time of his death. Brown also claimed that the gospels do not depict Jesus as God, and Jesus Himself did not say He was God. This was also not true. John 1:1-3, 14 declares Jesus, the Word, to be God. Jesus also has all the attributes of God. He is omniscient as stated in John 16:30, omnipresent as Jesus Himself states in Matt. 28:20, is omnipotent as He declares Himself in Matt. 28:18, and is eternal as stated in John 1:1. In Matt. 16:15-17, Peter calls Jesus the Son of God, and Jesus confirms this. In John 10:24-33, Jesus claims to be one with the Father, and the people listening to Him condemn Him for blasphemy, claiming to be God. John 20:28-29 shows Thomas calling Jesus God, which Jesus does not deny. In Mark 14:60-64, Jesus responds to the high priest's query of whether He is the Son of God with "I am", which is what Yahweh, the Hebrew name of God, means. Brown also states that Genesis says that man is the Creator of women, since women came from man's rib, but God is very clearly the Creator in Genesis. This is akin to saying that dirt is the Creator because man was Creator from dirt. Brown also states that Genesis shifted the fault of sin to women, while Gen. 3 makes it clear Adam was silently complicit in the sin. Adam was with Eve when she was tempted, and knew that the fruit he was eating was from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. He also portrays the Gnostic gospels as showing Jesus as more human, while the Gnostic gospels actually show Jesus as less human. While some might counter this troper's arguments by pointing out most of the evidence comes from the Bible, this troper would like to point out that nearly all our information on Jesus and the origin of Christianity come from the Bible. How can Brown make statements and claims that run contrary to the very source? As one troper mentioned above, Brown equated the Aztec rituals to Communion. But Communion was not originally the transubstantiation of bread and wine into the Flesh and Blood of Christ, it originally was a remembrance of Jesus' sacrifice and confirmation of one's faith. It was only until the Late Middle Ages that transubstantiation became doctrine, and the majority of Protestant denominations today reject transubstantiation. Not only does transubstantiation predate the Aztecs, but Communion predate transubstantiation.
On a more trivial Da Vinci Code related note, Dan Brown somehow arrived at the conclusion that, in Britain, people are obsessive about the way the drink tea (they aren't- standard procedure is to use a kettle and teabags- not many people bother with tea leaves and teapots), that if you ask for coffee when offered a drink, the British person will be deeply offended (they won't be) but may find you some coffee anyway, which will invariably be crap because nobody drinks it enough to care about how good it is (bullshit).
Also, Silas the albino seemed to be able to aim perfectly well and have great vision, even though albinism tends to hinder eyesight. However his condition was considered deeply embarrassing and freakish, although in real life it just isn't seen like that. Not in Europe, anyway.
Another point about Silas—-he's an Opus Dei monk. Opus Dei is a lay organization. There is no such thing as an Opus Dei monk; it makes only slightly more sense than if he had used a "Lutheran nun" or something. And of course Opus Dei members are portrayed whipping themselves half to death as a form of physical atonement, when in reality most just wear a mildly uncomfortable leg brace a few hours a day. *sigh*
I personally found The Da Vinci Code to be slightly boring and highly pretentious. The Troper that actually cites my Bible impresses me the most and I find his interpretations of Scripture to be well-done. Technically the definition is stated as follows:
There's an old writer's adage that tells us that we should write what we know. Not terrible advice, and if the writer had followed it, you might not be in this situation, but, perhaps more relevant to you is this corollary: do not read what you know. Some (most) of it is unavoidable in the name of telling a good story, some of it is that the writer was lazy, but the net result is that the very same level of research that can make a convincing story for something that you don't know very well will result in a painfully silly story when it's about something you do... This trope is obviously related to, but separated from, other topics of its creed. Did Not Do The Research is when an author shows general ignorance on a topic, whereas Critical Research Failure is that brain frying occasion when Techno Babble goes horribly wrong. Dan Browned is, in short, the result of an author making noticeable claims — or very quietly implying — that their work is 100% factual & correct, only for people to quickly find out it to be a big pile of pants (hence it being named after the...misinformed Mr Dan Brown)
I occasionally worry that after touting that I have studied western political philosophy for approximately ten years I will make an arse out of myself by misstating or even erring a principle held by Kirk or Hayek or Publius.
The amazing thing is that (in the prime Star Trek reality at least) James T. Kirk survived his own days as a redshirt (presumably) because these guys are the backbone of Away Team missions and James Kirk is presumably the best Away Team member.
That is, of course, why the Captain went on all the Away missions, contrary to Jonah Goldberg's reasoning.
Each lecture has a video component and a slideshow. The video may be viewed as a progressive flash video or a realmedia streaming video. All links open in new browser window.
Video: Black Robe (purchase or rent on your own) or watch a RealMedia version of the movie available. Click here to view:Black Robe (rm).
Quiz
Prepare a two-page (750 word MAXIMUM) essay (double spaced) comparing and contrasting the French and British experience in ruling Michigan. Use examples and complete sentences.
Each lecture has a video component and a slideshow. The video may be viewed as a progressive flash video or a realmedia streaming video. All links open in new browser window.
Prepare a two-page (750 word MAXIMUM) double-spaced essay addressing the following statement: In January 1835, acting territorial governor Stevens T. Mason declared that the Michigan Territory had a “right” to be admitted to the Union as a state. What angered Mason and why did it take two more years for the Michigan Territory to become the nation’s 26th state?
Each lecture has a video component and a slideshow. The video may be viewed as a progressive flash video or a realmedia streaming video. All links open in new browser window.
Michigan Soldiers in the Civil War by Frederick D. Williams
Quiz
Drawing from the readings and lecture, prepare a two-page, (750 word MAXIMUM) double-spaced essay that details how Michigan responded to secession and civil war. Use examples of that response.
Each lecture has a video component and a slideshow. The video may be viewed as a progressive flash video or a realmedia streaming video. All links open in new browser window.
Prepare a two-page (750 word MAXIMUM) double-spaced essay addressing the following questions:What happened in 1913 that led copper miners to go on strike? How did the Copper Country community respond to the strike? Was there any violence and how did the strike end?
Manufacturing: Cars, Cereal and Stoves Section 5/Week 5
Lectures
Each lecture has a video component and a slideshow. The video may be viewed as a progressive flash video or a realmedia streaming video. All links open in new browser window.
Prepare a 750-word essay on the following statement. (Consult the readings in preparing this paper; be sure to use complete sentences.)
Henry Ford and William Durant were both accomplished automakers. Highlight their most significant accomplishments, while comparing their similarities and differences? Why is Ford one of America’s best-known manufacturers, while Durant is unknown to most Americans?
Each lecture has a video component and a slideshow. The video may be viewed as a progressive flash video or a realmedia streaming video. All links open in new browser window.
Video:(realmedia format) A Job at Ford’s (The Great Depression)
Quiz
Both essays must be completed and submitted for full value.
Prepare a one-page essay (300 words MAXIMUM) double-spaced explaining the significance of the Flint Sit-Down Strike.
Prepare a one-page essay (300 words MAXIMUM) double-spaced explaining why Father Charles Coughlin was one of the most popular and dangerous men in America.
Each lecture has a video component and a slideshow. The video may be viewed as a progressive flash video or a realmedia streaming video. All links open in new browser window.
This is a TWO PART essay. Write 500 words for EACH question. (Consult the readings in preparing this paper; be sure to use complete sentences.)
How did Michigan contribute to the Arsenal of Democracy? Be sure to explain what the Arsenal of Democracy was and use specific Michigan examples in your paper.
Who was Milo Radulovich, what was “his story” and why is his story important to remember?
As an online course, you may choose to view the lectures and presentations, read the outlines, and review the course documents as your schedule permits. There are specific due dates for the unit quizzes and the three papers.
Each section or unit is organized by "week" for organizational purposes. Each week includes the following components:
Lecture: Each unit has one or more lectures. Each lecture is a combination of a RealMedia video file and a converted-for-web powerpoint presentation. The video should automatically open the plug-in when you click the link. We suggest that you click the "video" link and pause it, then click the link for the presentation, which will open in a new browser window. Position the two on the page, the lecture will prompt you to advance the slides as it goes. You can pause the video and "rewind" as you need for clarity.
Quiz: Each unit has a short written quiz that must be posted in dropbox by due date. Keep on schedule. You can turn things in early. If you have questions or problems with an assignment, ask in forum or email your instructor ASAP. See each unit quiz for detailed instructions. Each Section/Week has a dropbox folder, and individual dropboxes for each Team.
Papers: There are three longer papers that must be posted in the dropbox by due date. The Papers dropbox is located under the "lessons" tab. Each paper has its own folder, and you will find your team folder within. Keep on schedule. You can turn things in early. If you have questions or problems with an assignment, ask in forum or email your instructor ASAP. See each paper assignment for detailed instructions.
DropBox: Put your Quizzes and Ppers in the dropboxes. Please use Microsoft Word. If you do not have MS Word, save your documents as RTF (See course Frequently Asked Questions forum for details). If you have problems posting in the DropBox, contact your instructor immediately.
Frequently Asked Questions: This is a forum where you may ask questions related to the course structure, assignments, and technical issues. If you cannot get the answer you need in the forum, email your team instructor immediately. Don't hesitate to add your replies to questions or make comments.
Instructions on how to view Real Videos and PowerPoints
This course was designed to optimize your learning potential. To this end, we suggest that you view the video lectures and then go through the Powerpoint for the lecture as a review. This will allow you to focus on and enjoy the lecture and then use the powerpoint as a way to review the content of the video. Following two things at once on your computer screen can be distracting and confusing. However, for those who would like to view both at the same time, we offer the following instructions.
Step One:
Double click on the PowerPoint File from ANGEL. It will open in a new Browser window (such as FireFox or Internet Explorer). Each file will be different, but it will resemble something like this:
Step Two:
Step two: Resize the window so that it only takes up part of your screen. We suggest resizing the window to roughly two thirds of your entire screen size. At that size, it should look something like this:
Step Three:
Step three: Double click on the Video File from ANGEL. The video is streaming media and should open using real Player. Each file will be different, but it will resemble something like this:
Step Four:
Resize your the window so that it only takes up part of your screen. We suggest resizing the window to roughly one third of your entire screen size. After minimizing all other windows except the Presentation and Video windows, you should be able to arrange them both as follows:
Step Five:
You can now press play on your video and while it runs, you can advance through the PowerPoint file as needed. Happy learning.
Weekly writing assignment: In your discussion groups, debate the following proposition, using sources from course materials to support your position: “The formation and growth of the Republican Party was the death knell of the federal Union.” Please see separate instructions for debates. See separate instructions. [link]
Ken Burns, Forever Free, a segment of The Civil War, (PBS) (flash video) [ click to open in new window ] Please note that there is a 20 second delay within the video before it begins to display content. This is not due to your connection, but is part of the video itself. As soon as you see progress in the gray bar you can click on the play button.
Allen Guelzo, "The Emancipation Proclamation: Bill of Lading or Ticket to Freedom?" History Now, No. 6, (December 2005). [link]
“Emancipation Proclamation” [link]. The final draft is [here].
Lincoln to Albert G. Hodges, Washington, April 4, 1864 [link]
Ira Berlin, et al., "The Destruction of Slavery," in Slaves no More: Three Essays on Emancipation and the Civil War (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), 1–76 [link]
James M. McPherson, "Who Freed the Slaves?" Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 139, no. 1 (1995): 1–10. [link]
Recommended Reading:
Reporters’ sketches of the battle of Antietam: access Harpweek, the electronic edition of Harper’s Illustrated Weekly via MSU Library electronic resources; run a full-text article search for the dates 09/01/1862- 12/31/1862, with keyword “antietam” and “select feature” set to “illustration.” Several A. R. Waud sketches will appear in the hit results. Originals of Waud’s sketches may be viewed here: [link]
Generals Fremont and Butler on slaves, in Fellman, p. 439.
A splendid, if eclectic and unattributed, collection of photographs and information about war correspondents has been compiled by Michael Farnsley, a correspondent reenactor, at [link]
Weekly Writing Assignment: Online debate: In your discussion groups, debate the following proposition, using sources from course materials to support your position: "The Emancipation Proclamation was behind the curve of events: it ratified conditions already long in motion, as the slaves, not Abraham Lincoln, undertook the responsibility for their own emancipation." See separate instructions. [link]
Documents and context, (especially the editorials in the LaCrosse Daily Democrat) provided in lesson plan, “Wisconsin Copperhead: Marcus ‘Brick’ Pomeroy,” at [link]
Virtual New York, “New York City Draft Riots” [link]
Gettysburg Address, in Fellman, p.447
Recommended Reading:
Lessons X-XII, Marinda Branson Moore, The Geographical Reader, for the Dixie Children (Raleigh: Branson, Farrar & Co., 1863) [link]
Report of the President, Directors, &c., of the Milledgeville R. Road Co., to the Stockholders. Oct. 6th, 1862, (Augusta: Constitutionalist Print, 1862) [link]
1864 platforms of the Democratic and Union (Republican) Parties [link]
Sherman on the meaning of war, in Fellman, p. 454.
Abraham Lincoln, Second Inaugural Address, in Fellman, p.465.
Recommended Reading:
"Sherman's March to the Sea," a collection of diaries, field orders, letters, and maps [link]
Political cartoons from the election of 1864, in American Political Prints, 1766-1876. [link]
Douglas Linder, “The Trial of the Lincoln Assassination Conspirators” [link]
Wade-Davis bill controversty, in Fellman, p.461
Weekly Writing Assignment
Weekly Writing Assignment: Online debate: In your discussion groups, debate the following proposition, using sources from course materials to support your position: “Either the leaders of the Confederacy were blind, stupid, or suicidal – something which no historian has yet proved – or they had some reasonable hope of achieving their victory conditions. At what point did the Confederacy’s cause truly become a lost one?” See separate instructions. [link]
Radical Reconstruction/Impeachment/XIV & XV Amendments
Southern Republicans
Sharecropping
Required Reading:
Fellman et al, chapter 10.
Thirteenth, Fourteenth, Fifteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution
Article and documents in Reginald Washington, “Sealing the Sacred Bonds of Matrimony: Freedmen’s Bureau Marriage Records,” Prologue Magazine 37 (1) (Spring 2005). [link]
Documents, images, and context by Lucia Z. Knoles, Curator, “Northern Visions of Race, Region, & Reform, in the Press and Letters of Freedmen and Freedmen’s Teachers in the Civil War Era” [link]
Booker T. Washington, “An Address Delivered at the Opening of the Cotton States and International Exposition, ... September 18, 1895” audio transcription [link]
For our course, we have broken the class into teams. The teams will work as pods to complete a number of tasks collaboratively. You will have access during the course to you team dropboxes and forums. If you have problems accessing your team materials, have questions about your team, or are not in a team, contact History Online Courses Support: online.courses@matrix.msu.edu.
Post questions you have about the course on the Frequently Asked Question Forum found under Lessons Tab. You may want to check there first if you have questions about the course's organization, assignments, materials, progress, policies, procedures, etc. Contact your team instructor if you have any specific concerns or questions about team materials, assignments, or grading. Your team instructor is Marcie Cowley: cowleyma@msu.edu
Q: How can I tell what team I am on? A: You should be receiving emails from your Team leader letting you know what team you are on however you can also confirm your team by going to the first weekly assignment. Whether the first assignment requires you to use a discussion forum or a drop box, you should only see one destination and that destination bears the designation of your team. Topics: Teams, Team Assignments
Q: How can I see my grades? A: When you first go into this class from the ANGEL home page, you are brought by default to the "course" tab. You should see a window labeled "grades". This should give your grades at a glance. If you do not see that window or you want a more detailed report on how you are doing, click on the "report" tab. Under Category, select "grades". The "Report" field should now read "member greades". Now click Run. This will produce a more detailed report of your grades, with scores and comments from your instructor. Topics: Grades, Instructor Comments, Gradebook viewing
65 years ago today Americans, English, and Canadian forces stormed the beaches of Normandy France, sacrificing much and engaging much, putting their lives on the line to protect freedom.
It is not as important that these men died to protect our freedom as it is that they killed to protect freedom. The sacrifice of life is tragic, important, and worth speaking of, but that they put themselves at risk following duty and proving themselves to be great men was predetermined. Sacrifice of life alone means nothing unless it is in the pursuit of a greater cause, and as that pursuit is especially empowered. That is the difference between lip service preceding death and true self-sacrifice. Every man who died on those beaches is one who made it possible for inevitable victory. I believe every tragedy is a stepping stone towards the victory over horror and tyranny.
These men, better than I, took action to insure what we take for granted, and what I use here to write and speak and declare. All speech, especially political speech, is stated as free because men stood for something deliberate and special.
So I cannot minimize the gallant deaths of good Americans, but I will maximize the acts and impacts of those who lived long enough to make us win. I paraphrase, or quote
No bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor dumb bastard die for his country.
- George S. Patton
War is won because one side chose to do terrible things to the other side longer and harder. Victory comes with a prize but the price we pay is not a moral compromise but that of a man's own ease of thought. Peace is a purchased through acts of violence. Modern men and classical men alike will acknowledge that, if they think. Post-modern men will not; I have trouble calling them that. Because doing violence upon our fellow men, even for the best of causes, can make heavy burdens, I cannot help but thank and think gratefully of our old warriors from so long ago.
Enough of my philosophizing; there is more.
General Eisenhower commanded the invasion, and he delivered his orders.
SUPREME HEADQUARTERS ALLIED EXPEDITIONARY FORCE
Soldiers, Sailors and Airmen of the Allied Expeditionary Force!
You are about to embark upon the Great Crusade, toward which we have striven these many months. The eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty-loving people everywhere march with you. In company with our brave Allies and brothers-in-arms on other Fronts, you will bring about the destruction of the German war machine, the elimination of Nazi tyranny over the oppressed peoples of Europe, and security for ourselves in a free world.
Your task will not be an easy one. Your enemy is well trained, well equipped and battle hardened. He will fight savagely.
But this is the year 1944! Much has happened since the Nazi triumphs of 1940-41. The United Nations have inflicted upon the Germans great defeats, in open battle, man-to-man. Our air offensive has seriously reduced their strength in the air and their capacity to wage war on the ground. Our Home Fronts have given us an overwhelming superiority in weapons and munitions of war, and placed at our disposal great reserves of trained fighting men. The tide has turned! The free men of the world are marching together to Victory!
I have full confidence in your courage and devotion to duty and skill in battle. We will accept nothing less than full Victory!
Good luck! And let us beseech the blessing of Almighty God upon this great and noble undertaking.
SIGNED: Dwight D. Eisenhower
That was a present tense viewpoint, looking towards the future.
Looking back was President Ronald Reagan on the 40th Anniversary of D-Day. The text of his speech is here.
President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's thoughts of the impending invasion consisted of a prayer.
Historian Newt Gingrich describes it as
President Franklin Delano Roosevelt leads the nation in prayer on June 6, 1944 as the Greatest Generation launched its mightiest battle of the Second World War.
There is to more to see than I have time to direct or examine. Nothing I can do is quite sufficient.
Now for a bit of irony. On this, the 65th anniversary of D-Day, something which should be a national focus today, and a European focus, and a world focus, so I demand reverence, Google commemorates That's right, Google celebrates Tetris, the (25th) anniversary of the puzzle block arcade/video/console/TV/computer game from Russia. What a bunch of jerks.
cartoon series.
