Do We Really Need To Continue Funding Space Research?

In these tough economic times, we need to look at the many superfluous programs that our State and Federal Tax dollars are being spent on. I increasingly hear people wonder why we’re funding the Space program. “Shut NASA Down, We’ll save Billions”, I’ve heard it a hundred, if not a thousand  times. Sounds reasonable to me.

In support of our Space program, I could give a lengthy list of all the things, products, and technologies that come directly as a benefit from Space research.*  (For a full description. please go here:  http://www.thespaceplace.com/nasa/spinoffs.html) However, aside from all of these wonderful gizmo’s, there is one real answer:

Our survival as a species depends on it.

On Monday afternoon, an asteroid (named 2009 DD45) passed dangerously close to the earth.  At 40,000 miles out, it passed at less than twice the distance of most of our satellites in geosynchronous orbit, which is approx. 26,200 miles above the Earth.  It was estimated to be the same size as the asteroid that exploded over Siberia in 1908 and leveled more than 800 square miles of forest. Had 2009 DD45 slammed down onto the Earth, it would have exploded with the force of a large nuclear blast somewhere in the Pacific Ocean west of Tahiti.

Most surprising of all is that we only had 2 days notice… 2009 DD45 was spotted last Saturday by astronomers in Australia, and verified by the International Astronomical Union’s Minor Planet Centre (MPC), which catalogues solar system rocks. Not to add any alarm, but 2009 DD45 will get another chance at hitting us… Astronomers said the asteroid is likely to return for another series of near misses since it’s drawn in by our planet’s gravity.

Beyond False Advertising… Stupid Criminal.

Personal note: Sickos who prey on children are the lowest form of slime. Enough said on that.

However, if you are determined to lead a life of depravity and sickness, shunned and hated by society, at least try to have some professional pride. I suggest the following guidelines:

1. When soliciting under-age girls for sex on the internet… DON’T!

2. If you can’t follow rule #1, try this: When soliciting under-age girls for sex on the internet, make sure that it’s not a sting operation set up by your Local, State, or Federal Attorney General. And finally;

3. When you get busted for not following the above rules, do not, under any circumstances, get arrested wearing a T-shirt that says “World’s Greatest Dad”. You will be the laughing stock of the Internet.

Daniel Allen Everett

Meet Daniel Allen Everett. Or better yet, don’t. Here’s the deets from the Detroit Free Press

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(http://www.freep.com)

Internet sting nets ‘World’s Greatest Dad’

By Dawson Bell • Free Press Staff Writer • July 15, 2008

A 33-year-old Clarkston, Michigan, man was arrested today for allegedly soliciting sex from an online contact he believed was a 14-year-old girl.

The accused, Daniel Allen Everett, was wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with the inscription “World’s Greatest Dad” when arrested.

Attorney General Mike Cox, whose office conducted the investigation, called it “a sad reminder that Internet predators come from all walks of life.” It was not clear whether Everett is, in fact, a parent. But Cox said he wanted to circulate the booking photograph so that other potential victims could be identified.

Everett is the 198th person arrested in the attorney general’s Internet sting program since 2003.

Link to the story: http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080715/NEWS03/80715096

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Now, I’m posting this for mainly one reason: to post this creep’s face in as many places as we can (he may be coming to a neighborhood near you!). IMHO, preying on children cannot be medicated or rehabilitated. The best that we can do is keep track of these guys and keep them away from our children.

And Mr Everett… Please say “Hi” to Bubba for us. I hope you scream like a little girl.

Mr. Bill Returns… “Oh, Noooo!!!!”

This hit me as ‘Well Played’…

I remember watching ‘Saturday Night Live’ as a teenager when most of the episodes were new. One of my favorite bits was ‘The Mr. Bill Show”. Cracked me up every time. Since my name is Bill, I’ve walked into a room or situation thousands of times, only to be greeted with ‘Oh, No, Mr. Bill!!!!’.

I love that. I absolutely love that.

It’s a lot better that the things that you normally hear when your name is Bill (or even worse, when I was younger, it was always ‘Billy”). ‘Which way you going, Billy’, ‘Billy, Don’t be a Hero’, and no, I can’t bake a cherry pie, Billy Boy, Billy Boy. Getting asked where the other the Billy Goats were at. There were many, many songs and nursery rhymes where being Bill or Billy wasn’t very cool.

Then along came Mr. Bill. Suddenly, and for maybe the first time in my life, it was cool to be a Bill. Or, make that, Mr. Bill. Sweetness.

Read today in the New Your Times Online that my friend Mr. Bill is making a comeback. Here’s the link, and here’s the article:

Mr. Bill Returns (in One Piece) to Pitch a Debit Card

By WENDY A. LEE

Published: June 3, 2008

MasterCard executives have found a new poster boy for the angst-ridden economy: Mr. Bill.

The small clay figure that appeared in “Saturday Night Live” short films three decades ago — being dismembered, pulverized and humiliated to his falsetto cries of “Oh, nooooo!” — will be the latest star of MasterCard’s “Priceless” campaign.

He is being revived as a debit-card holder who gets roughed up but keeps on going. The 30-second spot, to start airing next Monday, casts Mr. Bill as an urban professional on his daily routine:

Mr. Hands pours hot coffee on him (“coffee: $2”), a personal trainer launches him off a treadmill (“gym: $59/mo.”), and an opened briefcase flips him onto the windshield of a city bus (“briefcase: $120”).

Mr. Bill, rolling with endless punches, just enjoys the ride home: “Making it through the day: priceless.” A voice-over adds, “For whatever comes your way, there’s debit MasterCard.”

The spot is meant to tap into the current “unsureness about what’s going to happen next,” said Joyce King Thomas, executive vice president and chief creative officer at McCann-Erickson, part of the Interpublic Group of Companies, which created the “Priceless” campaign for MasterCard in 1997.

“This is the sunny Mr. Bill,” she added. “We wanted to make him a character who can handle things beyond his control and stay optimistic.”

MySpace, Personal Responsibility, and Stupid People

We* here in the DogHouse are big fans of Personal Freedom. We also believe that freedom has a price, and that price is Responsibility. Right now in this country, there is a big debate about how the government is taking away our freedoms. Let me say, for the record, that the greatest threat to our freedom isn’t the government, but ourselves.

There are people in our society who surrender their freedom every single day. The greatest freedom, and the most power, that we have in our lives is the freedom to make decisions, choices for ourselves and our families. I define that as responsibility. Thousands, if not millions, surrender this most basic of freedoms every single day…willingly. No one forces it from them, no visit to GitMo is needed, no government agency is involved; people just gladly roll over and take it.

The most obvious symptom of this is watching people not taking responsibility for their own actions. I think it started with Automobile insurance companies telling us not to admit fault when we we’re involved in an accident (that’s mostly tongue-in-cheek… I actually believe that the problem goes back to the Dawn of Man), but this has permeated into almost all facets of our society, from world Leaders and Corporate exec’s at companies like Enron to the lowest public displays of ignorance and stupidity, shows like Jerry Springer and The Steve Wilkos Show (I include the hosts in that statement).

‘It’s not Me’, ‘It’s not my fault’, ‘It’s society’s problem’. Bullshit. The BigDog knows Bullshit, and I’m calling Bullshit right here and now.

The latest item to make me gag comes courtesy of TechDirt. Here’s the Quick & Dirty: 13 year-old girl on MySpace (yet another low public display of ignorance and stupidity) lies about her age, hooks up with an older guy who sexually assaults her. Girl blames MySpace (instead of herself for putting herself in that position), her mother blames MySpace (instead of herself for not exercising the right of Parental Responsibility, having not monitored her 13 year old’s activities in the first place), and guess what: the guy is blaming MySpace as well (instead of not taking the personal responsibility to not be a jack ass and abusing an obviously under-age girl)! WTF?!?

Here’s the article, courtesy of TechDirt:

MySpace Still Not Liable For Sexual Assault Between Two MySpace Users

from the in-case-you-missed-it-the-first-time dept

Two years ago, we pointed to one of the more ridiculous lawsuits attempting to shift the blame and responsibility for certain actions away from those who were responsible, to those who had the money. A 13-year-old girl went onto MySpace, lied about her age, and struck up a relationship with an older boy. Eventually, the two agreed to meet, and the girl says that the boy sexually assaulted her. So, obviously, the mother of the 13-year-old girl sued MySpace. It seemed like such a good strategy that the boy accused of rape also considered blaming MySpace. Of course, as you should know by now, section 230 of the CDA (and basic common sense) protects websites from the actions of their users. And, in fact, that’s exactly what the judge told the woman and her daughter in tossing out the case.

Rather than understanding the law (and basic responsibility), the mother of course appealed the decision, and even tried to come up with a novel argument for why this wasn’t about section 230 at all, by saying that the company was somehow negligent in “policing its premises.” Luckily (and not surprisingly) the judge isn’t buying it. Eric Goldman lets us know that the appeals court has again sided with MySpace in pointing out that there is no liability for MySpace. They also tried to pull in the recent (somewhat questionable) Roommates.com decision, which was in a different circuit and argued that Roommates.com lost safe harbors because it specifically requested illegal information (which probably wouldn’t even apply in this case). However, since appeals are only on the facts argued in the lower court and this was an entirely new argument, the court refused to consider it.

Either way, this still seems like a case where the girl and her mother are blaming the wrong party in trying to squeeze millions of dollars out of MySpace. The best summation of the situation probably comes from the transcript of the original trial court hearing, which the appeals court quoted:

THE COURT: I want to get this straight. You have a 13-year-old girl who lies, disobeys all of the instructions, later on disobeys the warning not to give personal information, obviously, [and] does not communicate with the parent. More important, the parent does not exercise the parental control over the minor. The minor gets sexually abused, and you want somebody else to pay for it? This is the lawsuit that you filed?

MR. ITKIN [Counsel for the Does]: Yes, your Honor.

WTF is right. There’s only one thing that stinks worse that Bullshit, and that’s Money-grubbing whores who are willing to sell their own freedom for a paycheck. That’s something that the Government could never, ever do to us…
…and some of us choose it willingly…
…every
…single
…day.

Shame.
_________________________
*’We’, in all article, means ‘me’. It’s just me here, folks. Don’t get too excited with your conspiracy theories and stuff like that.

Author Arthur C. Clarke dies at 90

Arthur C. Clarke has always been one of my favorite writers. I don’t specify him as a science fiction writer, because he wrote so much in other genres. No matter what he was writing, I was always touched by his humanity and compassion.

This article from CNN.com, tells the story, with only a moment of silence from your truly…

(CNN) — Author Arthur C. Clarke, whose science fiction and non-fiction works ranged from the script for “2001: A Space Odyssey” to an early proposal for communications satellites, has died at age 90, associates have said.

Clarke had been wheelchair-bound for several years with complications stemming from a youthful bout with polio and had suffered from back trouble recently, said Scott Chase, the secretary of the nonprofit Arthur C. Clarke Foundation.

He died early Wednesday — Tuesday afternoon ET — at a hospital in Colombo, Sri Lanka, where he had lived since the 1950s, Chase said.

“He had been taken to hospital in what we had hoped was one of the slings and arrows of being 90, but in this case it was his final visit,” he said.

In a videotaped 90th birthday message to fans, Clarke said he still hoped to see some sign of intelligent life beyond Earth, more work on alternatives to fossil fuels — and “closer to home,” an end to the 25-year civil war in Sri Lanka between the government and ethnic Tamil separatists.

The 101 Dumbest Moments in Business, 2007

Sometimes, whatever needs to be said is said so well that there is nothing more to be said… However, I’m going to try, anyway.

This article from Fortune Magazine comes to us via the good folks over at Yahoo ( I still remember when they were just little ‘ol yahoo.berkeley.edu, but that’s another story) recaps the 101 dumbest Business moments in 2007. We’ll give you the top 50, you’ll have to go to Fortune Magazine’s 101 Dumbest Moments in Business for the rest…

The 101 Dumbest Moments in Business, 2007

Monday, December 17, 2007provided by

Ah, what a dumb year it was! And that’s the positive spin on it. Consider the alternative. Like, if selling poisonous toothpaste to children isn’t dumb, what is it? If the constant slide and imminent collapse of air travel isn’t dumb, what then? If all the hyperintellectuals who created the subprime mess aren’t functional dummies, what might they be, huh? No, we’ll take dumb over evil, inept, and greedy any day. In fact, our hats are off to all of these, the absolutely dumbest of the dumb that the gods of fate and humor delivered into our laps—and yours—this past year. Thanks to each and every one of them!

1. That’s the good news. The bad news is that 2008 is the Year of the Rat. During 2007, the Year of the Pig, Mattel is forced to recall almost 20 million items made in China because of lead paint on toy cars and tiny magnets that could be deadly if swallowed. Lead paint problems are also found in 844,000 Chinese-made Barbie accessories and toys with the Sesame Street brand. Pet food makers recall more than 60 million cans of food laced with tainted melamine in wheat gluten from China. A huge underground distribution network for steroids, human growth hormones, and other bodybuilding drugs is traced to 37 companies in China. Chinese-made lunch boxes, given away by the California Department of Public Health to promote healthy eating habits among children, are found to contain lead. Nike recalls 235,000 football helmets because the Chinese-made chin cup has a defective strap and has caused at least two concussions and a broken nose. Ethylene glycol is found in Chinese-made toothpaste. The government of China executes the former head of its State Food and Drug Administration.

Loud Music in Your Ears Can Make You Deaf

File this under “D” for “Duh”…

Loud things in your ears will make you deaf. I can personally thanking headphones and heavy-metal music in the ’70’s and ’80’s for doing to my ears what computer screens, small type, and Diabetes have done for my eyes.

However, there seems to always be some group or another that seeks to save us from ourselves by shouting out the painfully obvious, as this story from Monsters and Critics tells us…

MP3 lovers risking deafness warns charity organisation

By Stevie Smith Sep 12, 2007, 13:53 GMT

The risks associated with hear loss and personal headphone use are nothing out of the ordinary and have been an issue of concern since way back in the 1980s and the arrival of the Walkman. However, a UK-based charity is now warning that more than 66 percent of young MP3 users are running the gauntlet of premature deafness.

Specifically, the Royal National Institute for Deaf People (RNID) has revealed that its survey threw up worrying figures related to headphone sound levels and hearing loss. The charity has subsequently criticised hardware makers for not placing usage warnings on their products while also advising digital MP3 player consumers to fit in-ear background noise filters to their headphones in order to reduce the need for extra volume and better protect their hearing in the long run.

The survey, spread across MP3 player users located in Birmingham, Brighton, and Manchester, returned that 72 of the 110 people tested were found to be playing their portable music at volumes surpassing 85 decibels. The BBC news Web site equates that to “a loud alarm clock at close proximity,” while the World Health Organisation claims that prolonged headphone use at 85 decibels is certainly capable of causing hearing damage.

In that regard, the RNID survey discovered that close to 50 percent of respondents are immersed in portable music for over an hour a day, while around 25 percent say their headphones are clamped on their ears for more than 21 hours every week. With the RNID pointing accusatory fingers at player manufacturers over the lack of consumer warnings, the survey unveiled that 58 percent of users were ignorant to any headphone-related risk, and 79 percent claim to never have seen package warnings outlining the potential risks.

“MP3 manufacturers have a responsibility to make their customers aware of the dangers by printing clear warnings on packaging and linking volume controls to decibel levels,” said Brian Lamb, the RNID’s acting chief executive. “It’s easy to crank up the sound levels on your MP3 player to damagingly loud levels, especially on busy streets or public transport… But if people can hear the music from your headphones from just a metre away, you\’re putting your hearing at risk.”

The RNID has also said that this latest survey offers similar results to one it ran in 2006. Following its initial foray into the risks of MP3 headphone use, the charity contacted 55 MP3 player manufacturers with a request to include music level warnings on the packaging of their products. To date they have received only two replies.

The risks associated with hear loss and personal headphone use are nothing out of the ordinary and have been an issue of concern since way back in the 1980s and the arrival of the Walkman. However, a UK-based charity is now warning that more than 66 percent of young MP3 users are running the gauntlet of premature deafness.

Specifically, the Royal National Institute for Deaf People (RNID) has revealed that its survey threw up worrying figures related to headphone sound levels and hearing loss. The charity has subsequently criticised hardware makers for not placing usage warnings on their products while also advising digital MP3 player consumers to fit in-ear background noise filters to their headphones in order to reduce the need for extra volume and better protect their hearing in the long run.

The survey, spread across MP3 player users located in Birmingham, Brighton, and Manchester, returned that 72 of the 110 people tested were found to be playing their portable music at volumes surpassing 85 decibels. The BBC news Web site equates that to “a loud alarm clock at close proximity,” while the World Health Organisation claims that prolonged headphone use at 85 decibels is certainly capable of causing hearing damage.

In that regard, the RNID survey discovered that close to 50 percent of respondents are immersed in portable music for over an hour a day, while around 25 percent say their headphones are clamped on their ears for more than 21 hours every week. With the RNID pointing accusatory fingers at player manufacturers over the lack of consumer warnings, the survey unveiled that 58 percent of users were ignorant to any headphone-related risk, and 79 percent claim to never have seen package warnings outlining the potential risks.

“MP3 manufacturers have a responsibility to make their customers aware of the dangers by printing clear warnings on packaging and linking volume controls to decibel levels,” said Brian Lamb, the RNID’s acting chief executive. “It’s easy to crank up the sound levels on your MP3 player to damagingly loud levels, especially on busy streets or public transport… But if people can hear the music from your headphones from just a metre away, you’re putting your hearing at risk.”

The RNID has also said that this latest survey offers similar results to one it ran in 2006. Following its initial foray into the risks of MP3 headphone use, the charity contacted 55 MP3 player manufacturers with a request to include music level warnings on the packaging of their products. To date they have received only two replies. (They probably can’t hear you…).

Ethics and the Freedom of Speech

In this country, we have (supposedly) the Freedom of Speech. However, some people think that freedom is free. It isn’t. There is a cost, whether in spilled blood overseas or at home. That’s the cost: Responsibility. I’m free to go into any biker bar and say whatever I feel like – That’s freedom of speech. I’m also free to get my ass kicked until next Tuesday. Ask the Dixie Chicks about the price of Freedom of Speech.

I believe that with greater freedom comes greater responsibility… to be more accurate, more ethical, more correct, as we are setting a path for those that follow and if we leave a flawed path…

As far as this Professor is concerned, I don’t know whether his firing is politically motivated or not, although I tend to think so. However, the investigation into his unsubstantiated claims, such as:

‘Capt. John Smith intentionally introduced smallpox to the Wampanoag Indians’,

as well as other fabricated statements, give enough weight for his termination. You or I would be fired for much less.

This story by Dan Frosch and published in The New York Times gives the details (and I give the barbs, as always, in Italics…)

Colorado Regents Vote to Fire a Controversial Professor

By DAN FROSCH

Published: July 25, 2007

BOULDER, Colo., July 24 — After more than two years of public tumult, the University of Colorado Board of Regents voted Tuesday to fire a professor whose remarks about the victims of the Sept. 11 attacks led to a national debate on free speech. But it was the professor’s problems with scholarship that the board cited as the cause for his termination.

The professor, Ward L. Churchill, was dismissed on the ground that he had committed academic misconduct by plagiarizing and falsifying parts of his scholarly research.

The board voted 8 to 1 to dismiss Professor Churchill.

“We wanted to do what was right for this university,” the board chairwoman, Patricia Hayes, said after the vote. “We did not address Professor Churchill’s freedom of speech as part of our discussion.”

Starbucks raising U.S. prices…

All I need… another reason not to get my coffee at Starbucks…

I believe in supporting the local ‘Mom & Pop’ coffee shops. The coffee is just as good (if not better), I get a better price, and most importantly, my hard-earned $3.75 stays in my community, supporting the people I live with, work with, and pay taxes with.

Now, I’m not saying that Starbucks makes bad coffee. Au Contraire. However, I believe that when an organization gets too big, any organization, it looses touch with the local people in the community, no matter how well-intentioned they want to be.

That being said, be prepared to pay more for that Iced Venti Caramel Macchiato, as this story from Reuters explains…

By Nichola Groom

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Starbucks Corp will raise U.S. prices on coffee, lattes and other drinks by an average of 9 cents a cup next week to help offset soaring costs for milk and other commodities, a spokesman said on Monday.

The widely anticipated move marks Starbucks’ second price increase in less than a year and comes a month after the coffee shop chain’s chief financial officer warned it would be “very challenging” for Starbucks to meet the high end of its 2007 earnings forecast, in part because of rising dairy prices.

Astronauts and diapers… nope, it’s not the ‘Space Cowboy’ crowd, either…

From The Washington Post June 29, 2007…

Lawyer: Ex-Astronaut Didn’t Wear Diaper

By MIKE SCHNEIDER

The Associated Press
Friday, June 29, 2007; 1:25 PM

ORLANDO, Fla. — Former astronaut Lisa Nowak didn’t wear diapers during her 950-mile road trip to confront a romantic rival, her lawyer said Friday, disputing one of the more bizarre details to emerge from the NASA love triangle.

“The biggest lie in this preposterous tale that has been told is that my client drove from Houston, Texas, to Orlando, Florida, nonstop, wearing a diaper,” Donald Lykkebak said after filing motions to suppress evidence in Nowak’s criminal case. “That is an absolute fabrication.”

The tidbit that Nowak wore diapers during her trip was written in the police report filed after Nowak’s arrest in February.