Current TV
This one I don't understand. Visit the link current.tv and maybe you can explain it to me.

Here is their stated vision:

"Current is a new, independent cable and satellite TV network. Here's what we're up to:


There's plenty to watch on TV, but as a viewer, you don't have much chance to influence or contribute to what you see. This medium - the most powerful, riveting one we have - is still a narrow vision of reality rolled out in predictable 30-minute chunks. It's still a fortress of an old-school, one-way world.

We want to bust it open."

If you check the programming it is anything but current. I will leave it to the BlogDog to give it a more appropriate name.

I guess they believe we are all television producers at heart. I don't this will have anywhere near the same impact that the Blogosphere has had and will continue to enjoy, but I think that is what Al Gore was intending when he decided to invest his money in this project.

"I've Got Rights"
This was the fearful cry of suspected terrorist Mr. Muktar Mohammed-Said after he was hunted down and arrested in London. Witnesses say that before he was arrested they heard him tell police, who were trying to coax him out of his apartment, that he was afraid the police were going to shoot him like the guy on the London Subway.

All I can say is these guys are well-trained and know exactly what to say if they are captured. The guy the Italians recently caught knew enough law to say he objected to extradition to London, knowing full well this would delay his inevitable departure by months.

Pulling Out of Germany
It's been 60 years since "The Greatest Generation" defeated the Axis Powers and demonstrated to the world what fortitude and courage mean. Now it appears their work is finally over in Germany and plans are being made to end the occupation. Thanks to Varifrank for an excellent essay on this subject. Here's a good bit from his essay, but please read it all for yourself:

"The miracle of World War II isn’t that Americans, who having survived the great depression went into battle with only 90 days of training and managed to beat the “Aryan superman” on his own home turf at a war they had trained for 10 years to fight. The miracle was that despite our losses in a war we didn’t start, that despite our natural desire for vengeance we still managed to set it aside because we recognized the common goodness of mankind. We fed our former enemies and helped rebuild their country. We bet on the Germans, and the bet paid off. It was a gamble, and it was by no means certain to win. Its over now and we can go home, as friends.


We are placing the same bet on the Iraqis. The Iraqis are people and they deserve the freedom that was taken from them by people who wished only to enslave them.

We owe them the same faith in humanity that we owed the Germans. Don’t deny the Iraqis their victory over enslavement by reducing their victory with the derisive term “pullout”.

Busy Weekend
Blogging will be light to non-existent. Atlantic Cycling Thurmont ride on Sunday. If you ride and live in the DC area: be there. Ta!
Also, Firefox is running butt-slow today. Wazzup wid dat? Do I need to go from 1.0.4 to 1.0.6?

UPDATE: If any reader uses Napster, please e-mail me for a promo code from Energizer batteries. Being an iTunes user, I'll be happy to pass along the code to someone who already uses Napster.

In Celebration of The Space Shuttle
I'm working on a dinner menu for a celebration of the launch of the shuttle Discovery. So far, all I have is "NASA Foam Pilaf." Suggestions for other dishes will be greatly appreciated.

Stolen From I Know Not Where

Lycurgus sent me this. It made me laugh.

Geography Question
Which part of Australia shouldn't be looked up online during business hours?

My NASA Cartoon
I repeat, I can not draw so I must explain: The cartoon is of a man in business attire on the phone, with a television in the background where the words "Shuttle launch delayed" are visible. The man is saying "Sorry boss. My gas guage isn't working properly so I won't be able to come in until next week."

Moronic Legislating
I clipped an article from the noisepaper the other day intending to blog it and forgot to note from which day I snipped it but here is an article from the Christian Science Monitor on the subject of Denver's recent ban on pit bull dogs.
One of Kim du Toit's bete noir's is what he properly calls "Gun Fearing Wussies" (shorthanded to GFWs) who have, among other others, a salient characteristic of fear of "scary looking guns." Congratulations to the morons legislating in Denver who now get their designation "DFWs" - Dog Fearing Wussies who enact laws against "scary looking dogs." To quote from the AP article I clipped: "Pit bull typically describes three kinds of dogs - the American pit bull terrier, American Staffordshire terrier and the Staffordshire bull terrier. But Denver's ban applies to any dog that looks like a pit bull. The animal's behavior does not matter."
"Any dog that looks like a pit bull." A city councilman then went on to assert that pit bulls are both bred and trained to attack. I must resist the urge to characterize such a moro ... person's thinking (You mean like Dumbass! -Ed.) but breeding and training are two entirely different things. Breeding makes a dog capable of being dangerous but it's only with training that a dog becomes dangerous. There are several dogs that are bred to be capable of violence: Rottweilers, German Shepherds, Dobermans just to name a few. But only those trained for attack are actually dangerous. In point of fact, Rottweilers are incredibly sweet-natured dogs. If you've ever met one in friendly circumstances, you'll know what I mean. However, Rotties are the most fiercely protective dogs in creation. If a Rottie thinks you are presenting any threat to what he (or she) sees as his (or her) family, that dog will eagerly give its life to drive you off or kill you, whichever leaves the family safe.
It's not the dog. Dammit. It's the person who owns the dog that matters. It was Presa Canarios who killed a woman in a San Francisco apartment building. But it was the owners who knew how dangerous the dogs were and didn't control them who were at fault. The Presa Canario looks remarkably like a pit bull yet according to my reading of the reporting on the Denver ban, it's still OK to have one. Why? It's just as scary looking.
I hope the sensible citizens of Denver will boot these lawmakers out of office next time around so they can get some real public servants for a change. By the way, anyone care to venture a guess at what breed (apart from mongels) is one of the two responsible for the most bites on humans? Hint: It sure ain't scary looking.
Pugs of War suggests all dog owners in Denver who have lost a dog by the action of the city council immediately acquire pugs for themselves to ease the pain. And teach those pugs to pee on city councilmen.

PoW Welcomes the Enigmatic Misanthropes Back
The EM family survived a vacation of hurricanes, diving adventures and diving misadventures in beautiful Grand Cayman for which survival we here at PoW are grateful. We look forward to the witty, acerbic and sometimes derisive commenting of the Enigmatic Misanthrope.

That Damnable Costco!
Shopping for milk, fruit and some stuff (more about that in a moment) at my local Costco, I first saw an iPod thing: the JBL On Stage iPod speakers. I admit - I picked up the package, looked at it, seriously considering throwing it in my cart but thought, "Nahh - too weird a design and I don't remember if it was well-reviewed on iPod Lounge." Stumbling on, I almost immediately came upon the Altec Lansing inMotion iPod speakers. I knew the inMotion was well-reviewed on iPod Lounge. Yeah. I bought it. The link takes you to Apple's store which is selling the speakers for $179 so at least I got a good deal. The Costco price was a mere $140. And, recognizing the limitations of a small set of speakers, this guy sounds remarkably good.
Costco: so seductive. Spend $140 to save $40. And with the cash back option on my card, I've saved probably another 20 cents! Woo Hoo!
I'm glad I bought that big wad of rechargable NiMH AA batteries.

UPDATE: Having said "more about that in a moment," I promptly forgot to say anything more about that. What I picked up was containers of mushrooms, crumbled feta cheese, olive tapenade and roasted red pepper/jalapeno hummus. The point of these is to acquire (in non-Costco quantities) romaine lettice, roasted chicken and red onion to make wrap sandwiches. I think the idea of a romaine, chicken, feta, tapenade, diced red onion and mushroom wrap is just mouth-watering. Care to join me for lunch?

Shoot To Kill
What a surprise!
Thank you Powerline.

Can You Say Criminal Profiling?
The War on Terror comes home. The NYC Police will begin random searches of people riding the subways. I am all for it as I know it's not me they are looking to keep from bombing our transportation system. The profile of the criminal will be anyone looking like they are from an Arab country.

This is just part of what will be done to prevent these maniacs from achieving some vain glorious death. I fully expect the screws to be tightened even further. I would even go as far as to say I wouldn't want to be Arab looking and living in these United States. All it will take is the stimulus of an attack to raise the ire of people with a lot less self-control than myself. Then look out as it won't be safe to walk the streets if you are an Arab. The United States is a vengeful nation and when provoked it has dealt out merciless justice to its enemies. I don't expect anything less in this War.

Anglosphere Solidarity
The Instapundit hits the nail on the head when he writes about the press in Great Britain and how they just don't understand that we are at war. The Press needs to quit making excuses for these terrorists and sympathizing with people who blow themselves up. It's not a realistic approach to this problem and more than likely is exactly what these sick, evil bastards want.

Here it is:

I'M WATCHING TONY BLAIR AND JOHN HOWARD right now, talking about the London attacks and the war -- Howard's particularly good at noting that this is a war, not a series of isolated incidents -- and their frequent invocation of anglosphere solidarity is almost a commercial for Jim Bennett's book. I wonder if they've read it? They're certainly living it.

UPDATE: Some idiot correspondent asked Blair if the attacks were his fault because of the Iraq war. And others are taking an equally negative line -- one asks if the propaganda war against terror is being lost.

No -- but if so, it's because of people in the media like these. John Howard's too polite to tell them to read Norm Geras, but he put them in their place with logic, noting that Bin Laden was unhappy about the liberation of East Timor and declared war on that basis long before the Iraq invasion.

Translation: You're idiots, cowards, and political hacks. Yes! The preening, point-scoring irresponsibility of the press, which is if anything worse in Britain than in America, is one of the most striking things about this war, and it will be decades before it recovers. If it does.

Recently At The Movies
I went with friends who have a young daughter to see Madagascar. Be warned: that link takes yo to The Filthy Critic's review of this misbegotten .... Let me put it this way: This should have been flung by a monkey, not made into a movie. It is unremedially, irretrievably awful. The sole thing I can recommend is Sacha Baron Cohen ("Da Ali G Show") doing thevoice of the king lemur. Cedric the Mildly Amusing voices another animal which appears to be a Furby.

Please, please, please for the love of all that's holy and good, do not let these people get enough money (yours, that is) to make another movie!

I'm Reading That New Book
You know - the new JK Yowling book: Harry Potter and the Half-Drunk Prince. I'm just to the point where Harry is beating Ted Kennedy at a game of ChapaQuidditch.
I can't wait to see how it ends! Something about leaving PigTrough School in disgrace.

To Add My 2 Cents
The greatest tribute a net surfer can make to the passing of James Doohan, at the least inconvenience, is to listen to James Lileks's "Up Your Shaft" mp3.

As Angus lay on his deathbed, he called Jock to his side and said, "Ye know how fond I am o' the wee drop, Jock."
"Aye," said Jock.
"Wull," said Angus "I've left ye a few pounds in me will that I want ye to spend on a good bottle of wuskey on me birthday and pour it over me grave.
After contemplating for a moment, Jock replied, "Aye. I can do tha' for ye. But would ye mind turribly if I strained through me kidneys first?"

I spill a drop of scotch wuskey in the memory of Chief EngineerMontgomery Scott.

Farewell, Scotty
As an ardent Star Trek fan, I would be remiss in not mentioning that they will shortly be sending Scotty's ashes into outer space to join Gene Roddenberry's.

And if you haven't heard the BlogDog do a "spot on" imitation of Scotty during one of those moments when Kirk needs a fast escape, then you have not lived.

Martini Boy Added To Pugs Of War Blogroll
Ever since the BlogDog suggested I check him out, and admire the artwork on his site, I have been a loyal reader. I am speaking, of course, about The Vodka Pundit. This was really an easy addition to our Blogroll. He is a very articulate observer and one that never minces words, though never tries to offend. He is also a favorite of James Lileks, another member of the Pugs of War pantheon, who reads the Martini Boy everyday. I trust you will enjoy him as much as we do. Cheers!

Got My Vote