Comic Relief: Flashback Humor

Preview of tonight's address to the Congress... via a popular pic thrown around when many of his supporters went into a panic that McCain was briefly ahead in the polls once:

Hope Floats?

Seems to sink:



At least for now anyways. Hopefully that will change. Some would rightly note that it is absurdly early in his administration to pin any of this economic news on anyone except Bush, let alone the guy running against his imaginary 3rd term. But then again... Obama seems to have racked up a hero status among the American population before actually accomplishing anything either:

1. Obama
2. Jesus
3. Martin Luther King
4. Ronald Reagan
5. George W. Bush
6. Abraham Lincoln
7. John McCain
8. John F. Kennedy
9. Chesley Sullenberger
10. Mother Teresa

No word yet on how Jesus feels about being knocked from the #1 spot in earlier polling.

So far it seems that his fans may be up for some serious disappointment. The stimulus bill has added a massive amount of debt to the even more massive amount of debt we already had... with small change promised to our pockets and big promises of a tsunami of jobs that all indicators seem to show are not forthcoming. Of course that was the Bush admin circa 2008. Obama did it all at once to start off 2009. At least he Obama hasn't also promised to halve the deficit he helped jack up like Bush did... with long term projections that seem to promise getting back to deficits we considered monstrosities several years ago. Oh goodie.

We can add this to the other "changes" we can be confused in:

• Change We Can Be Confused In: On all sorts of foreign policy and few other policies.

• Non-Believers Too: On reaching out to non-believers.

• More Change We Can Be Confused In: On the inauguration and McCain being tapped by Obama for advice.

• A Tale of Two CnCs: On reaching out the Islamic world.

• Comic Relief: Windows Error: Obama proving that it isn't just Bush who can have embarrassing moments.

I'm sure there are more hits to come on this front. Some disgruntled fellow even made a photoshop representation of the morphing of Obama into something a little less hopeful:


(click to enlarge... or just increase the creepiness)

The middle one probably being the most nerve rattling:



Yikes!

Treating Objects Like Women, Man

CNN has the results of a recent study that to many, may just be confirming the obvious:

Men see bikini-clad women as objects, psychologists say

CHICAGO, Illinois (CNN) -- It may seem obvious that men perceive women in sexy bathing suits as objects, but now there's science to back it up.
Images of women in bikinis prompted brain responses in men associated with using tools.

New research shows that, in men, the brain areas associated with handling tools and the intention to perform actions light up when viewing images of women in bikinis.

The research was presented this week by Susan Fiske, professor of psychology at Princeton University, at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

"This is just the first study which was focused on the idea that men of a certain age view sex as a highly desirable goal, and if you present them with a provocative woman, then that will tend to prime goal-related responses," she told CNN.

Although consistent with conventional wisdom, the way that men may depersonalize sexual images of women is not entirely something they control. In fact, it's a byproduct of human evolution, experts say. The first male humans had an incentive to seek fertile women as the means of spreading their genes...

As for the title of this post, it's from the Big Lebowski. For further study, an easy at home test to see if this bikini-effect applies to you is this optical illusion:



If you look long enough, you'll see three legs in this picture.

Amazing, eh?

Blago Strikes from the Political Grave

As expected, Burris taking a nomination nobody in their right mind would take seemed fishy. From the Chicago Tribune:

U.S. Sen. Roland Burris said today he is open to a Senate ethics investigation into how he got the Senate seat from ex-Gov. Rod Blagojevich and that he has reached out to a Sangamon County prosecutor who is reviewing Burris' sworn testimony before Illinois lawmakers.

Burris comments came less than 24 hours after he acknowledged he sought to raise campaign funds for Blagojevich at the request of the governor’s brother at the same time he was seeking the appointment to the Senate seat previously held by President Barack Obama.

It was the first time Burris has publicly admitted trying to raise money for Blagojevich. Previously Burris has left the impression that he always balked at the issue of raising money for the governor because of his interest in the Senate appointment.

Ain't that just precious?

Blago Chavez strikes again!

Comic Relief: Valentines Day

Comic Relief: Zombies!!!

Hat tip to Illinoize for this little compilation:

Apparently hackers have been toying around with those electronic roadside signs one finds near construction zones warning drivers of upcoming conditions. So far the joke has merely been reckless as opposed to deadly... and likely to be far less funny if someone is actually injured or killed due to the tampering:

KSDK -- Drivers in the Metro East were warned about zombies during their Tuesday morning commute.

This happened on 1-255 Southbound just south of the Pontoon Beach exit. Someone changed IDOT's sign to read "DAILY LANE CLOSURES DUE TO ZOMBIES."



IDOT believes someone hacked the sign's computer remotely. While crewmembers were still on the scene after fixing the message, the display changed back to the hoax.

Other sign sightings in Illinois and Austin:



Kids these days! I swear!

UN Retracts School Bombing Claims

...and Doctor wailing about death of daughters found to have deliberately kept them in harms way.

But first things first...


UN "School Bombing":

Last month the UN went on a spree of outrage over one of their schools being bombed and using that as an impetus to continue their extremely one sided demands for Israel to immediately cease their operations in Gaza with little to no demands on Hamas to discontinue its attacks.

This month they issue a quiet retraction. From the Jerusalem Post:

UN: IDF did not shell UNRWA school

A clerical error led the UN to falsely accuse Israel of shelling one of its Gaza schools in the Jabalya refugee camp during Operation Cast Lead, the international organization admitted this week.

For close to a month, the UN accused the Israel of hitting the educational compound ran by its Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees, which was sheltering more than 1,300 Gazans as the IDF battled Hamas in the camp on January 6.

The strike made international headlines and was one of the many incidents of civilian deaths that led nongovernmental organization and international politicians to call for Israelis to be charged with war crimes for the 22-day military offensive.

...

Israeli defense officials noted that in two previous reports, the UN had stated that the IDF attack had been against the school and not outside the school.

In addition, the defense officials said it was not certain that the number of casualties reported by the UN, 43, was accurate and that Military Intelligence had noticed Hamas attempts to cover up the identity of those killed in the strike.

"We know of at least three terrorists among the dead," one official said. "It is clear that there were more people killed but Hamas has been covering up their identities."

Why wasn't this information released sooner? Because the UN told staff to keep their mouths shut while they used the incident to depict a false but politically powerful impression to aid their anti-Israel efforts. From Haaretz:

Questions about the veracity of the claims that the school had been hit by the IDF were also raised last week by the Canadian newspaper The Globe and Mail. The newspaper said that a teacher in the UNRWA compound at the time of the strike "was adamant" that no people had been killed inside the compound.

The newspaper quoted the teacher as saying that, "I could see some of the people had been injured... But when I got outside, it was crazy hell. There were bodies everywhere, people dead, injured, flesh everywhere."

The newspaper said that the teacher had been told by the UN not to speak to the media.

At the time of the attack there was some confusion as another UN school incident had occurred earlier in the same news cycle that had Hamas apologists coming out of the woodwork wailing about a UN school full of refugees being bombed... which also turned out to be inaccurate and based on grossly inaccurate UN descriptions. As it turned out the "bombing" was actually an missile airstrike against a mortar crew in the area, confirmed by witnesses. More on that here.

In the end no UN schools were bombed or even attacked. But at the time anyone watching the media coverage and buying into the UN deceptions would have sworn that cowering refugees in UN schools were being bombed by Israeli forces.

And as usual, all corrections get almost zero attention and often come way beyond the attention span of our news cycles.


Doctor Endangers Family, Israel Blamed In Spite of Pleas to Evacuate:

Another big story during the ground invasion of Gaza was distributed as a video on the internet of a Doctor who while on the phone giving an interview with an Israeli news station loses several family members in what was described as an unprovoked and unwarranted attack on civilians without warning.

The video relays the emotional cries a man who just lost children and is authentic. But it also wasn't the full story. From the Toronto Star:

After what it called an extensive investigation, the Israel Defense Forces acknowledged the deaths were caused by two Israeli tank shells fired at the gynecologist's third-storey apartment north of Gaza City, but it said the shooting was "reasonable" in the circumstances. The Israeli military expressed "sadness" at the deaths but also laid much of the blame on Abu al-Aish and his family.

The Israeli military said its personnel contacted the doctor by phone "several times" in the days before the incident, urging him to evacuate his home because of fighting in the area, as many of his neighbours had done. But Abu al-Aish insisted on remaining.

"The IDF is saddened by the harm caused to the (Abu al-Aish) family, but at the same time states that considering the constraints of the battle scene, the amount of threats that endangered the force, and the intensity of fighting in the area, the forces' action and the decision to fire towards the building were reasonable."

...

The Israeli military said its forces in the area on Jan. 16 came under mortar and sniper fire from Hamas gunmen located in a building "adjacent" to the one occupied by the Abu al-Aish family.

"During the counter-fire opened by the IDF forces, suspicious figures were identified in the upper level of (Abu al-Aish's) house and were thought to be spotters who directed the Hamas sniper and mortar fire," the Israeli military said.

The military said its field commander assessed the situation under the pressure of combat and gave the order to open fire on the suspicious figures. Shortly afterward, two tank shells slammed into a bedroom occupied by four of the physician's daughters and a niece.

The rest of the story changes the depiction that has been left in the minds of those on the receiving end of the video and the endless one-sided commentary against Israel that was typically linked along with it. The man ignored multiple warnings and refused to leave a combat zone even as his neighbors fled for their safety. The warning came from the alleged cold blooded IDF that, as it turns out, couldn't have done much more to look out for his and his families safety.

Instead he risked the his life and the lives of his family, who ultimately paid the price, to remain next to a militant staging area... and for what? Propaganda value against Israel? Was it worth it? This man doesn't deserve sympathy. He deserves prison for intentionally endangering minors. Instead he's getting a job at the University of Toronto.

Makes perfect sense in an insane world.

COMMUNISTS!!! ZOMG!1!!!

Youtube clip of the fox news response as soon as Obama got done signing the schip bill:



They're not even trying anymore. Criminey.

[updated 7/4/2009 with a new link... previous video was removed]

Iraqi 655,000 Deaths Researcher Censured

From the BBC:

Gilbert Burnham said in the Lancet medical journal in 2006 that 650,000 civilians had died since 2003 - a figure far higher than other estimates.

...

The AAPOR's executive council said in a statement carried by the Associated Press news agency: "When asked to provide several basic facts about this research, Burnham refused."

It said it wanted to know the wording of questions asked and instructions and explanations given to respondents.

"Dr Burnham provided only partial information and explicitly refused to provide complete information about the basic elements of his research," said Mary Losch, chair of the association's standards committee.

She added that Dr Burnham's refusal to co-operate "violates the fundamental standards of science, seriously undermines open public debate on critical issues and undermines the credibility of all survey and public opinion research."

...

For Dr Burnham's study, researchers spoke to more than 1,800 families comprising 12,800 people, comparing mortality rates in selected areas before and after the invasion.

Its conclusion was undermined by allegations that the number of people surveyed was too small and that the authors may have inflated the figures for political reasons.

A group known as Iraq Body Count has been tabulating confirmed deaths in Iraq since the war began and its figures mirror the estimates of the Iraqi government and even Bush publicly stated figures in line with theirs in an earlier press conference.

Their current figures range just below 100,000 and include figures far beyond those killed by US forces (of which a significant minority make up that total). The 100,000 figure includes civilians killed by criminals and even insurgents and terrorists the coalition forces have been fighting so shouldn't be construed as civilians killed by US forces, the bulk of which were in the initial incursion as opposed to the later insurgency and intercommunal fighting that dominated the later figures.

The John Hopkins research appeared politically motivated from the beginning when their earlier figures appeared timed with US presidential elections (October Surprise in 2004)and using figures that were astonishingly higher than any estimates at the time, and then again prior to the 2006 congressional elections (another October Surprise move) with the 655,000 figure which resulted in serious questions about the political motivations and connections of some of the pollsters on the ground where some figures estimated more dead than actually lived in some areas, and a methodology that suggested upwards of 3% of the total Iraqi population being wiped out which drastically conflicted with figures on the ground.

The numbers were often thrown out as fact during the political debates of those years, but as many suspected, this has always been a fairly clear cut case of 'manufacturing dissent.'

Will Stimulus Checks Miss Disabled Vets (Again)?

Reminder... if you're stumbling onto this page from a websearch recently, this is an OLD POST mainly referring to a PREVIOUS STIMULUS BILL... NOT WHAT BECAME THE CURRENT STIMULUS BILL...

UPDATE - Latest post on the 2009 Veterans Stimulus/Recovery Checks see this post:

Veterans Checks by June 30th?.



Again this post is from before the latest information. For the latest information see the most updated post here: Veterans Checks by June 30th?.

Here is the original post:

At the beginning of last year I blogged about a hiccup in the stimulus checks that Bush signed into law that included disabled veterans whose disability compensation isn't regarded as "income" for income tax filing, nor is it normally reported. The problem occurred with the new requirement to report that compensation on an unrelated line for social security benefits, and the change was not noted in the instructions which were probably all printed long before the bill became law. From the late IRS notification last year:

Normally, certain Social Security, Railroad Retirement benefits and certain veterans’ payments are not subject to income tax. However, the economic stimulus law passed in February contains a special provision allowing Social Security recipients and recipients of certain veterans’ benefits and certain Railroad Retirement benefits to count those benefits toward the qualifying income requirement of $3,000 and thereby qualify for the stimulus payment.

...

People should note that Line 20a of Form 1040 and Line 14a of the Form 1040A are designated for Social Security. To qualify for the economic stimulus payments, these lines should also be used to include any qualifying Railroad Retirement or veterans’ benefits.

This year is looking to hit the same snafu as the hotly debated stimulus package appears to include a similar scheme to issue stimulus checks to tax payers but also once again includes disabled veterans who generally do not pay income taxes on their disability compensation.

Almost all veterans are familiar with the concept of "hurry up and wait" but if you were an early bird on your taxes last year that could have resulted in having to waiting to file a corrected filing and then waiting even longer for that correction to result in a stimulus check long after everyone else in line. To avoid that unnecessary waiting, it may be best to hold off on filing your taxes this year until the fate of the stimulus package is known and the IRS figures out how it's going to handle disabled veterans compensation.

It'd be interesting to see how many veterans missed out on last year's stimulus checks given the inaccurate tax directions and the abysmal outreach to qualifying veterans. I haven't seen any numbers on that though.


-- UPDATE 9:46 AM --

It's been pointed out to me that a new line on the 2008 tax forms may take care of this issue from last year as it calculates qualifying income under last year's standards and includes veterans benefits (line 9 of the 1040EZ form and page 17 of the 1040EZ instructions). As long as the new stimulus package uses the same standards then the worksheet should make this issue moot this year.

SIU Stolen Valor Case

An SIU administrator may be facing federal charges for lying about his military service. From the SIU Daily Egyption:

A university administrator said he plans to take a leave of absence after allegations that he committed a federal offense by lying about military service surfaced late last week.

Career Services Director James Scales said in a Nov. 13 Daily Egyptian article he served two tours in the Vietnam War; served in Bosnia, Honduras, Panama, the Persian Gulf and Iraq; and was a three-time recipient of the Purple Heart, an award given to soldiers who are wounded or killed in battle.

But Scales never received a Purple Heart, never experienced combat and did not serve in Vietnam or any of the other countries he listed, according to records from the Army Human Resources Command.

...

“There is nothing in his records that would indicate he was in Vietnam,” said O’Donnell, chief public affairs non-commissioned officer for the Army Human Resources Command in St. Louis. “There is nothing that has indicated that he has ever served in combat anywhere or has received combat awards.”

O’Donnell said Scales’ records did not include the Purple Hearts; the Vietnam Service Medal, which was given to any officer who served in Vietnam; and the Combat Infantryman Badge, which is given to any officer who serves in combat.

His early explanations revolved around some sort of decades long paperwork snafu that failed to mention any of his purported exploits but now he appears to have just entirely clammed up and supposedly even admitted his deceptions and the reasons for his recent silence on his lawyer's advice.

So far there doesn't appear to be any sign that he'll face any punishment from the university, even for what may be defrauding them for false medical claims after the allegations became public. Hopefully the feds will step in and make it clear that this crime doesn't go unpunished.

Is This Right?

Last year I had a little rant about the VA travel pay for disabled vets going up, but not enough to make up for gas costs at the time, especially when gas hit 4 bucks a gallon... and a quick'n'dirty chart on it:




This year however, the new pay, which I heard about, but didn't do the math on, and just now got first hand experience with... my initial response: "Is this right?"

From where I live... roughly 73 miles from the nearest interstate exit to the VA hospital, a little longer if you count in town driving, but best case scenario for people who live here... which gets rounded down by some unholy bean counters to 68 miles for unexplained reasons... that 68 miles will get a disabled vet about a buck and half in 2007 travel reimbursement for the round trip... in 2008 it would have yielded them nearly 4 bucks...

This year:




As the key notes... the blue lines are from darker to lighter, past to most recent reimbursements. With gas prices dropping, the 2008 reimbursement was finally approaching the cost of actual travel for the first time in a long time. The new rates have anyone covered, even at outrageous gas prices beyond distances that used to get zero coverage under previous rates (55 miles used to be the minimum with the deductible... as opposed to 15 miles now).

Here's the breakdown of the numbers:

Mileage Pay * Miles - Deductable = Travel Reimbursement

.11 * 68 - 6 = 1.48 -- Prior to 1/31/2008

.285 * 68 - 15.54 = 3.84 -- After 1/31/2008

.415 * 68 - 6 = $22.22 -- After 1/9/2009

Yeah... I still didn't believe it until I checked the new numbers and crunched them quick at home. I could have sworn this was some type of error, and asked to that effect... but as I told the ladies with the thankless job of putting up with grumbling vets getting their pennies on the dollar for travel expenses for years... "I won't complain."

Atheist Bus Campaign

While some Christmas time advertisements from atheist groups were bigger in US headlines, the Atheist Bus Campaign has gone on beyond the holidays. I particularly liked this suggestion noted on Richard Dawkins' website:



Heh...

And so it begins...

So far the Obama Administration has appeared to try to live up to its promises of bipartisanship, from it's selection of moderate Democrats, rival Democrats, consulting with conservative and Republican leaders on appointments and policy, and even keeping a Bush appointee holdover in the SecDef spot. Many of his policy statements continue to be reflective of his general campaign as opposed to the more radical impressions one may have gotten earlier in his career, or that seemed to show through during the early primaries.

One thing that has become apparent though is that the congress critters have little interest in this, on both sides of the aisle. The Democratic leadership in both the House and Senate have made moves to distance themselves from their president and continue the partisan division in their respective bodies. The stimulus package seems to exemplify this well. The Obama Administration appears to have gone leaps and bounds beyond tradition to get Republicans on board with a bill that doesn't really require their support... while congressional Democrats appear to be getting even for the years where they were shut out of legislation when their input was neither required nor desired by congressional Democrats when Republicans held the gavel.

In the case of this stimulus bill, it appears the congressional Democrats are going to win the day, and for such coin-purse legislation, it may be the only way it could realistically play out. But what then of the firearm legislation dripping into the congressional schedule? The NRA is already sending out e-newsletters crying foul:

As we reported last week, legislation to require a federal license to possess any detachable-magazine semi-automatic rifle or shotgun, or any handgun, has been introduced in Congress. Bills to re-impose the federal "assault weapon" and "large" magazine ban, or to impose a much broader ban, have been introduced in Congress since 2003, and will likely be introduced in the current Congress soon.

Already, the deliberate deceptions we heard from anti-gunners previously are resurfacing. Anti-gun Sen. Carl Levin, (D-Mich.), said Thursday on the floor of the Senate that "assault weapons" are "capable of firing up to 600 rounds per minute" and that they are "once again pervading our streets and neighborhoods."

Did we mention that our opponents are deliberately deceptive?

Notorious anti-gun congressmen appear to be making the same mistake that the Brady Bunch did after the election, assuming some sort of mandate on firearm issues over an election where the issue wasn't even on the back burner, let alone a primary issue, and both candidates generally avoided the issue except to alleviate any worries of single issue voters on the subject (NRA members).

As I posted back then:

Brady Bunch Claims Victory

...on an issue that got almost zero focus throughout the entire election process:



Meanwhile exit polls show that voters from gun owning households made up 42% of the electorate and voted against Obama by wide margins in spite of little focus on guns throughout this election. Imagine the margins if Obama, congressional dems, or the Brady Bunch try to make it an issue...

Say if they suddenly started pushing big headline grabbing gun control measures shortly after getting a candidate into office mainly on economic issues... let's call him Bill Clinton. Say they have some early successes due to congressional leaders supportive of the idea even though their constituents generally oppose it and just didn't see it as a major issue in the prior election.

Remember how that worked out? The early successes turned into a steady loss of congress, and then the White House, and eventually a reversal of their successes into irrelevance. Then as now they initially won primarily on the economic issues of the day and the people turned on them when they shifted their focus in office to measures that had nothing to do with the economy. Measures that conflicted with views that are strongly held by many, though tend to lose their attention when other issues keep such matters in the shadows or generally off the radar.

Will Obama stick to his promises of keeping the focus on the economy? Will he renege on his promises to gun owners? Will he be dictated to by congressional Democrats on an issue he intentionally avoided to win his election?

Will he defend the deception behind these laws even though the last assault weapon ban may have been one of the greatest gifts to defenders of these weapons the government could have ever given them (as FBI crime data showed it made no difference as the weapons were rarely used in crimes before, during, or after, and none of the hysterical claims trying to associate them with machine guns or Hollywood style action scenes was ever based on fact.)?

Will he stick to his guns after the Heller decision to defend the ownership of handguns?

Will he support registration schemes devoid of any protections from any concerns of their ability to be used for confiscations in the future as with other registration schemes used in other western nations, as well as some local/regional efforts here in the United States?

Will he help to make this an election issue when he won, in part, by keeping it a non-issue?

I guess we'll see. The fight has already begun regardless. The question is whether or not Obama will join it or declare a cease fire.