Naginata

Do not panic.

The comments will be back shortly. The imcomparable Dave has cooked up a captcha scheme for us, and I will be attempting to make it work on this site as soon as possible.

Hopefully it is easy to get working, and this post will soon have a follow-up.

Katrina

Originally a comment over here, I'm going to bring this one on home, so that everyone can see the heartlessness and depravity that is my mind.

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A few observations and conclusions:

-To pull out of the Iraq now would be to turn the country over to religious nutcases or Iranian influence. Wait, now I'm repeating myself. The point is, we need to stay the course in Iraq, to eliminate Saddam only to let the country be governed by someone else potentially as bad would be to throw the baby out with the Baath-water.

-The federal response to Katrina was approximately as fast as the federal response to Andrew... but now that the federal government is our mommy, people expect it to be quicker. The federal government is not and should not be a first responder. Period. Ultimately, you are the one responsible for your own safety, no one else. Man is a heroic being with remarkable powers and fortitude, but waiting on the government to come wipe your nose is easier than being a hero.

-If we have both federal mandates that insurance companies pay out for things they clearly did not cover in their policies, and also cheap beyond cheap federal flood insurance, plus federal money to rebuild the state... look, I'm a pretty compassionate guy, but I have insurance on my house that covers all likely eventualities anyway. My feeling is, if you live below sea level, and don't have flood insurance... you know where I'm going. I'm happy to donate my time and treasure to help people get back on their feet - the private american citizen is a wellspring of charity unlike any other in the world. That being said, I dont' like the idea of the government taking $1000 from every man, woman, and child from the country, and pumping it into a corrupt an incompetent LA/NO government. Based on the response to the disaster, let Wal-Mart, Halliburton, and General Honore rebuild the whole thing by themselves, it'll cost less and come out better.

-I think the government can walk and chew gum at the same time. I think we can continue rebuilding Iraq, and also rebuild the Katrina Zone simultaneously. I also think that the entire price of Katrina could be covered by (1) cutting some pork and (2) delaying the prescription drug benefit for 1 or 2 years. People lived without federal drug money since the nation was founded, they can make it another year or two. Hell, I say let's delay it forever, but Lyndon Bush Johnson isn't going to let that happen, he's got to buy him and the GOP some old people votes.

*puff puff wheeze*

-Cindy Sheehan belongs in a mental institution, or possibly on the editorial board of the New York Times. "Occupied New Orleans" indeed. It's like watching a car accident, I can't look away. She just keeps getting more and more unhinged.

ok, I think I'm spent. It's too bad, pouring out my vitriol here keeps me from doing it on my own webfront. Actually, maybe that's not so bad.
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Something like that. I dont' want to get ahead of you, but I read my comment, and I could probably make some money, betting on what the resident commies are going to say about it.

/grumpy

Opportunity

This guy wanted to recruit with our guild, so we invited him on a raid to check out his skills.

Needless to say, he was on the ph4t L3wtz like white on rice in a glass of milk on a paper plate in a snow storm. He's not recruiting any more.

This image showed up in the flame thread though, and it's too good not to share.

More British Foolishment

Read me

This guy should get his stuff back, and a get out of jail free card for the next time he commits a crime.

Katrina: The Gathering

Q: What does Bush think about Roe v Wade?
A: I don't think he cares how people get out of New Orleans

More bad taste here

Stuck on Stupid

Watch some reporter get absolutely owned.

Longer version (audio only) here

Shamelessly stolen from LGF

This post is awesome, no matter which side of the looney bin wall you happen to be on. Caution: contains some insane liberal profanity.

This post, more than any other, summarizes the debating tactics of every angry Liberal (and hell, probably a lot of Republicans) you will ever meet. To wit:

I'm not the racist, YOU ARE.
I'm not angry, YOU ARE.
I don't have you, YOU HATE ME.
My words are profane, but YOUR THOUGHTS ARE PROFANE.

And even reading my handy summary there, your average angry Liberal will probably say "well yeah, and that would be bad if it weren't so true".

Of course, the Liberals in the ranks of the readers will probably disown this guy, just like every other champion of Liberalhood that I parade around. I think I'll even hit the trackback button this time, and call down the thunder.

Britain Waves the Rules

I was going to pick one article from this post and expand on it but all the ones I read were so good. I suggest reading the post, even if you don't click any links.

Americans, your future is right there, unless we reverse this trend. Britains, I feel for you. If you agree with the policies of the government in those cases, I feel for you even more. And I'm glad you can't vote here.

Is he Jesus? I bet he's Jesus.

Many mighty deeds were accomplished this weekend, none of which have any bearing on the real world.

1) I beat Katamari Damacy. Not all that mighty... but you should play this game. It's pretty easy, I only "failed" a stage once in the entire game. You'll play, and you'll be like "this music is strange, man, this game is stupid" then you do a few lines, and it's pretty fun.

Only without the lines. The game is strange, that's what I'm saying. Just go play it, and you'll understand. For Example...

2) I beat Xenosaga2. I was stuck on the third-to-last boss (Inversion), and basically gave up. At this point in the game, every fight is a boss fight. Seriously, most fights take 7-10 minutes. There are some foes that I could fight and level up on, but I didn't have a half hour to burn to beat TWO of them.

Anyway, once you get past Inversion (hint: use Zebulun and Dinah, and just pop Break Senors on him and then stock stock stock Iron Blade), everything from there out is CANDY. I won't spoil anything, but if you're spoiler averse, you might want to skip the next bit anyway. The ending is SO GOOD, with the guys, and the hidden knowledge, and the phase transfer cannon, and HOLY CRAP. ALBEDO!

Seriously, who is chaos? Is he Jesus? Is that what I'm missing? Have I had the son of God in my party this whole time?

3) I downloaded FF7: Advent Children. Attention ethics cops: I'm going to buy it. If it were released in the US, I'd have it in my collection as soon as possible, but it's not, so I downloaded a fansub. That being said, I watched about 2 minutes of it, and then stopped, and went upstairs and started playing FF7 again.

You see, I was playing FF7, and was at least 70% done with the game, when my FF7 savegames were (Apparently) corrupted by my FF8 savegames. The lesson here is don't play FF games on PC, ever. I've made a few false starts at beating it again, I've probably played all of disc 1 at least 4 or 5 times... but I have one save game at Corel right now, about 11 hours in, and even though I only played for about a half hour, and did nothing but xp the whole time, maybe I'll finish it this time.

Also, the game looks like dog squeeze compared to Xenosaga 2. FYI.

And that's this weekend in video games.

Also have you programmers heard about this LINQ thing? Turns out Q is the new X. Look for a post here, or maybe elsewhere if it's good enough. I'll keep you updated.

Because I'd hate to lose that Int

Look, I'm a big nerd, and I'm going to get that out right now, so it has time to sink in before I continue with the story.

I went down to the dealership after work yesterday to pick up my car. While waiting for the paperwork to be done, and the car to be brought around, I captured wisps of conversation drifting over from the parts department...

"... +15 spirit and all those hit points, so you know it's... "

"... yeah, but I hate to lose that dex... "

and so on. I leaned over, and sure enough, the parts counter guys were discussing the World of Warcraft. A fine game, to be sure. The first thing I said was "you guys are nerds", which caused one of them to stomp off in a huff. Fine. I engaged the other one in conversation, saying that I had played a priest up to 43 or so, and then went back to EQ, to which he made a funny face. Apparently EQ is too old and busted for him.

Then the first nerd came back, and I was regaled with a 10 minute soliloquy on how to take over a Shadowbane server.

Yeah. Shadowbane. Apparently these two guys in the parts departments are corpse-campers and city-siegers of legendary renown on various shadowbane servers, including one 24 hour round-the-clock vigil to maintain the pain on another guild.

Needless to say, I mumbled something about the plane of time, collected my keys, and then left.

I mean... Shadowbane. Wow.

Flying Blind

So my computer won't boot. You hit the power switch, and the ON light flashes green once then returns to darkness. This will be good for our crushing schedule, when we have to get it repaired.

Did I mention that I'm out of warranty?

I have literally (Almost) nothing productive to do right now. Expect that almost to be gone by the early afternoon.

The War on Mexico

Last night, I stayed up a little late. Just a bit past midnight. As is my custom, I set my alarm forward from 7 to 730, giving me enough time to get up and walk to work, while still getting a few extra Zs.

At 5 till 7, the Mexicans invaded. They struck at the lot next door to mine with chainsaws and chippers, yammering back and forth to each other above the din.

Being awakened by the sound of chainsaws at 6:55 AM is unacceptable.

Timecube the Game

This is awesome

On Levee Funding

read me

"In a telephone interview with reporters, corps officials said that although portions of the flood-protection levees remain incomplete, the levees near Lake Pontchartrain that gave way--inundating much of the city--were completed and in good condition before the hurricane.

However, they noted that the levees were designed for a Category 3 hurricane and couldn't handle the ferocious winds and raging waters from Hurricane Katrina, which was a Category 4 storm when it hit the coastline. The decision to build levees for a Category 3 hurricane was made decades ago based on a cost-benefit analysis.

"I don't see that the level of funding was really a contributing factor in this case," said Lt. Gen. Carl Strock, chief of engineers for the corps. "Had this project been fully complete, it is my opinion that based on the intensity of this storm that the flooding of the business district and the French Quarter would have still taken place."

On Society

If you have some time to kill, read this.

Who wants to see Mike Meyers look uncomfortable?

Labor Dabor

So, had a great weekend with the better third, and ate at the Matchbox twice (woo). There was some very strange timing there, with people flying in as people were flying out, but everything worked out to put pizza and various beverages in my belly.

Anyhoo, one of the nights of her visit, the better third and I ended up at my favorite bar (the Cowboy) for a little midnight snack (White Russians). In the bar were VideoPokerGuy, CaptainConservative, Liberalman, and the bar wench. It was a good time. I think that, aside from the women, if you lined up conservative, liberal, and myself, and told someone that there was one liberal, one conservative, and one crypto-libertarian, they'd be able to tell you which was which. Conservative tried to keep us there by buying us more drinks, because living where he does, it's probably a novelty having other people around who agree with him.

Anyhoo, as I was walking to work today, something became apparent. At one point I was arguing "you know, if you're in a news chopper, and you see some people standing on top of a house, holding a sign that says "please help us", and you have 5 minutes of footage on that, that's great... but maybe before you take off you could put a few liters of water in your chopper, and throw em down? Not to interrupt your news story overmuch, just a little something, since you're not only the only one around that can help, but you're also documenting the fact that you're the only one around that COULD help."

The liberal's position was, basically, "that's not their job. They're there only to document and observe what's happening".

Fast forward a good 30-40 minutes. Now the question is about who you would or wouldn't let in your home in a time of need. I take the position that I would help someone in an emergency, but before they cross my threshold, I like to know certain things. The liberal's position is that that's terrible, because you should help anyone, any time. Look, if I see someone beaten and bloody in the street, inviting them into my home is probably not the best thing I could do for them. I'm thinking they need some bandages, and probably a bambalance. I don't know what point the liberal was trying to make, exactly, that there's probably a few situations you could hammer out in which I'm less than perfectly compassionate? It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure that one out.

I just thought the contrast was striking - I'm supposed to let someone, who I know nothing about, into my home and take care of them until they no longer need any help from me, and some news organization in search of prize winning coverage can't put a bottle of water or two into the FloodChopper?

Which brings me around to this.

Anyhoo, hopefully the liberal realized that, as I was leaving when I said "don't worry, you'll grow out of it" I was kidding. The world needs liberals who don't mind engaging in actual intelligent conversation from time to time. Lest you form a negative opinion of the guy, he was very well spoken, and clearly believes what he does for a reason. He seemed like a "good guy", I just disagree with him A LOT.

al-Reuters makes a point

On Looting and Katrina and the rest of the world.

Idiots III

You're not allowed to read this until you've clicked the Red Cross link up top and donated some money.

After you've taken care of that, go read this. I'll let it stand on its own.

Update: Look, I know I wasn't clear when I posted this... I wasn't encouraging this sort of behavior. I think that this guy is part of the problem. Everyone has a "donate" button. Everyone is encouraging donations. Can't anyone, on either side, throw down their sword for just a moment? This applies to the left AND the right. And now me, I suppose.

Idiots II

From The Interdictor, a blog I linked to in my original post. If anyone has the right to call out Jesse, it's this guy:

"Jesse Jackson"
Dear Sir:
Respectfully, I submit that you should shut the hell up. Looting and lawlessness IS the problem. The National Guard choppers are BEING SHOT AT. The NOPD are BEING SHOT AT. You want to focus on the levee? So do they, but check this out: THEY CAN'T UNTIL THE MOB STOPS ATTACKING THE RESCUE OPERATION.

I know you're looking at this situation with concern for the racial implications of the deterioration of civilization out here, but this is bigger than whether people are going to be racists after this is over. This is about rescuing the masses i.e. life and death.

I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and blame your stupid comments on your lack of knowledge of the situation. Don't prove me a fool for doing so.

Regards,

Michael Barnett

You are all idiots

I know, I know what you're thinking. You read my title and you're wondering what sort of things I'm going to say.

Let me back down just a smidge from my title: many of you (as in, everyone) are idiots. There's actually a good chance that more than half of the people actually reading these words are not idiots, but as part of the total population, you're insignificant. And so am I.

Anyway, the tragedy in New Orleans has weighed heavily on my heart. I read websites like this. I have a few friends in the city, who got out, who are speculating on just how much of their stuff will be salvageable. It breaks my heart. When I hear about the conditions in and around the Superdome, it makes me want to grab a shotgun, a dinghy, and a case of Aquafina and get to work.

Now then, the reason I say that you are ALL idiots is this: both political parties seem to be taking the following position:

"It's unfortunate that my opponents have chosen to politicize the situation. We need to work together, which my opponents refuse to do, to stabilize the region, which my opponents don't care about, and to keep gas prices, which my opponents don't understand, under control."

Now look, I could chicken-and-egg this thing, and try to figure out who decided to take advantage of the situation first, but I'm not going to. Not today, and not after the time has passed. Take that chicken and that egg, fry them, and send them to new orleans. They need the food. I can't believe that people are getting into political pissing contests when there are people dying of dehydration in the streets. People are claiming that flood control has been inadequate for the last 4 years... ERRRRT, wrong answer. This is a problem 40 years in the making. But this is NOT the time to figure out where the levees and pumps failed and how to rebuild or relocate. Let's leave blame until after the time when we have people dying for lack of water.

I'm not blaming anyone for the flooding.

Now it's time to say something insensitive. Not Dennis Hastert insensitive, but probably close. Keep in mind that the FEMA and the DHS have been radically reorganized in the last 5 years. I'd rather they work the kinks out of the system now, in the aftermath of a hurricane, than in the wake of a terrorist nuclear detonation.

That being said, taking 100 hours to work the kinks out of the system is unacceptable. The slow response of the federal agencies involved? Unacceptable. Everyone from the mayor of New Orleans on up passing the buck? Also unacceptable.

Look, I just heard a story about some doctors and nurses carrying patients upstairs, in the dark, because looters are seizing the bottom floors of the hospitals. Why aren't there helicopters full of national guard troops landing on the top of those hospitals? I mean, granted, this story could be made up, but if it's not, and I think that it's not, it's a shame. Throw a dozen national guard troops in there, leave one looter with a bleeding chest wound in the stairwells and watch the looters stop moving upwards.

Now then, you people who are talking about how the international community isn't supporting us? Shut up. Just shut up. France, Germany, Russia, these are just some of the countries that have expressed solidarity and offered help to us. Others have too, but I decided to just list the ones that have taken a "screw America" stance lately. Yes, they disagree with our positions on fighting terror. That's a given. They disagree strongly. But to suppose that the French government is so devoid of humanity as to be callous to the tragedy in New Orleans is absurd.

That being said, there's some Muslim douchebag who has come out with an article titled "The Terrorist Katrina is a Soldier of Allah" or somesuch. You can imagine how it reads. This guy is the head of the Kuwaiti Ministry of Endowment research center. Excuse me Mister Minister, but didn't we, you know, save your country about a dozen years ago? Just checking. Didn't we airlift food and medicine into various Muslim nations in the wake of the Tsunami? Just checking.

Shouldn't we send some special forces guys in there to kidnap this guy, and then perform the black mass with pork rinds instead of the host?

Yeah. "Whoa".

Now then, if you haven't donated to the Red Cross yet, go and contribute. Skip lunch today and send them five dollars, if that's all you can do. I'm not saying that you have to send them your next paycheck, but for the sake of all that's good in the world, do something.

Let's move on for a moment and discuss one of the major impacts of this disaster outside of New Orleans. "major". That's a funny word to use there, considering the contrast. Which would you rather have, $3.50/gal gasoline, or 3 days without food and the stench of rotting flesh and human feces surrounding you?

I digress. One of the first things that certain politicians did was to declare that anyone engaging in price gouging for gasoline would be punished severely. So let me get this straight: our ability to import and refine gasoline is diminished by the loss of New Orleans. Supply is diminished. Guess what? Prices go up. Personally, if the supply is hurt as much as I think it may be, I hope prices go up. I'd rather pay $4.00 a gallon or $5.00 a gallon for gas, and be able to buy gas when I really need it, than go to a gas station with a federally mandated $3.25/gal cap that has no gas. People will change their habits, and use less gasoline, when you give them the incentive. Yes, times will be tough, but the mechanism for reducing people's use of gas is already there.

Frankly, if I were a gas station owner, and the average gas price in my area was $3.30/gal (about what it is where I live), and I was down to my last 200 gallons of gas, with no idea when more was going to arrive, hell yes I'd raise the price. I'd raise it to $3.50 or more as my supply dwindled, because when someone pulls into the station with a dire need for fuel, I don't want to turn them away. Let prices do what they will, the last thing we need right now is to be talking about killing price gougers and putting price caps in place.

In conclusion, people stuck in New Orleans, and people whose homes are flooded or rubble, our hearts go out to you. People attempting to use the situation to advantage, just shut up. The time for investigations, recriminations, rebuilding, and restructuring will come, but not for several weeks. In the short term, you are all idiots.

The S is for Superb

For all you people who have a Nintendo DS, Advance Wars: Dual Strike is the game you've been waiting for. Just like the first two, it's campy, it's fun, and though I'm only on the 3rd mission, I can see challenges ahead.

The stylus is a very natural control mechanism for this game. In all game modes, they've gone to great lengths to make sure that you can play the game with your left hand and the stylus. No pushing buttons with the stylus in your hand. If there is something that requires you to push a button, even if it's tasked to the L button, they give you a little icon you can tap on screen.

As far as new game modes go, there's two, one of which I haven't actually tried.

The one I have is a psuedo-real-time thing, where you drive around and shoot things. If this were the whole game, I'd want my money back, but as a little minigame, it's pretty fun. Hints of SmashTV.

The other mode is the standard sort of game, except it has a map on each screen. You can swap between screens and transfer units from one HQ to the other, balancing resources to achieve your objective in both screens. I haven't tried one of these yet, but it sounds neat. You'll lose the "always on" info display that you have in the single-map mode, but by the time you get to those maps, you've probably got a good feel for that info anyway... plus you can always bring it up by pushing the button, or tapping the info icon.

In short, if you liked Advance Wars 1 and 2, there is no reason for you to avoid this game. If you never played Advance Wars before, Dual Strike's natural interface will draw you in, and you'll be crushing the armies of Black Hole in no time.

Afterthought: the new starting CO for Orange is "Jake", who likes music. I'm not going to lie to you, it's still very campy... but after the first or second battle with Jake, his endgame taunt was "Owned". That touches a special place in my heart.