Month: May 2004

I have long suspected that Karl Rove has been dreaming about engineering a high profile arrest close to the election. Even if they captured somebody now they’d probably just come up with some bogus reason to hold him in secret until the political climate is more attractive for maximum possible votes.

Just to pass on some added information, about which we’ll be saying more. There is chatter in Pakistani intelligence circles that the US has let the Pakistanis know that the optimal time for bagging ‘high value’ al Qaida suspects in the untamed Afghan-Pakistani border lands is the last ten days of July, 2004.

So I made it to the other side of the world. The flight is fucking long – no joke. 21 hours with a stiff head-wind. Thankfully our otherwise stingy company flies us business class internationally so we get to sit upstairs on the 747 and sip champaign and eat warmed nuts. Personal on-demand video provided me with a few movie options and I chose 21 Grams based on a recommendation from my traveling coworker compainion. I liked the movie, but I don’t know if I would have made it through the whole thing if I had not been captive. (Side note, did you know that Benecio Del Toro is the “attorney” in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas?) I started reading Pattern Recognition by William Gibson and browsed Cargo magazine, which has been described to me as a Lucky for men.

The buffet at our hotel (Kowloon Shangri La) has a diverse “station” selection which can easily induce over-indulged, cross-culteral food sickness. An omlette does not go well with mu-shu Pork. Similar to the KFC/Taco Bell where you can’t decide so you opt for the #12 taco/fried chicken combo and regret it big time afterwards.

Photos forthcoming.

 I’m a big Formula One fan. Tivo is taking care of recording this Sunday’s Spanish Grand Prix race, but I won’t be home for two weeks to watch it. The one side benefit of the almost total lack of state-side F1 coverage is that most likely I’ll be able to make it that whole time without finding out who wins and spoiling it for me.

 

Side F1 note: When I first met Hollie’s brother (1995?) who introduced me to the sport, he called me Schumacher cause I kindof look like him. He still calls me Schumacher, which is fine by me because he has since become the all-time winningest driver in history and makes up near $100million/year.

I was just introduced to the binary scale. Assign 0 for you wouldn’t, 1 for you would. Excruciatingly beautiful in design and execution.

Replace your outdated, inefficient 1-10 opposite sex ranking today.

Just in case I haven’t offended enough people yet.

Average IQ by state and how they voted in 2000

	State	Avg. IQ	2000
1	Connecticut	113	Gore
2	Massachusetts	111	Gore
3	New Jersey	111	Gore
4	New York	109	Gore
5	Rhode Island	107	Gore
6	Hawaii	106	Gore
7	Maryland	105	Gore
8	New Hampshire	105	Bush
9	Illinois	104	Gore
10	Delaware	103	Gore
11	Minnesota	102	Gore
12	Vermont	102	Gore
13	Washington	102	Gore
14	California	101	Gore
15	Pennsylvania	101	Gore
16	Maine	100	Gore
17	Virginia	100	Bush
18	Wisconsin	100	Gore
19	Colorado	99	Bush
20	Iowa	99	Gore
21	Michigan	99	Gore
22	Nevada	99	Bush
23	Ohio	99	Bush
24	Oregon	99	Gore
25	Alaska	98	Bush
26	Florida	98	Bush
27	Missouri	98	Bush
28	Kansas	96	Bush
29	Nebraska	95	Bush
30	Arizona	94	Bush
31	Indiana	94	Bush
32	Tennessee	94	Bush
33	North Carolina	93	Bush
34	West Virginia	93	Bush
35	Arkansas	92	Bush
36	Georgia	92	Bush
37	Kentucky	92	Bush
38	New Mexico	92	Gore
39	North Dakota	92	Bush
40	Texas	92	Bush
41	Alabama	90	Bush
42	Louisiana	90	Bush
43	Montana	90	Bush
44	Oklahoma	90	Bush
45	South Dakota	90	Bush
46	South Carolina	89	Bush
47	Wyoming	89	Bush
48	Idaho	87	Bush
49	Utah	87	Bush
50	Mississippi	85	Bush

[Via MetaFilter “Morons for Bush?”]

UPDATE: Great quote from the comments on MetaFilter

It is well known that IQ is not a relevant way to measure “true” intelligence, and that many factors go into determining the political makeup of a stare’s electorate, including historic tradition, perceived affinity with the candidate, differences in campaign targetting, media influence, and haha ha hahaha ha ha ha!

Lettin’ off a little steam …

Rush Limbaugh from yesterday …

This is no different than what happens at the Skull and Bones initiation and we’re going to ruin people’s lives over it and we’re going to hamper our military effort, and then we are going to really hammer them because they had a good time. You know, these people are being fired at every day. I’m talking about people having a good time, these people, you ever heard of emotional release? You of heard of need to blow some steam off?

Should we take a look at the photos again Rush?
[via Talking Points Memo]

UPDATE: A fantastic chronological guide in quotes on the subject: Slate’s ballot box

 I’m going to be leaving for Hong Kong on Saturday and will be there for not quite two weeks. As much of a cultural shock it can be, it falls down when you compare it to the Japanese. I had seen Lost in Translation right before my previous trip to Hong Kong and had really high hopes it would be just-like-that.

Like most people I made a November 1st pledge to myself to step it up next Halloween. Here’s my effort in 2003.

In this spirit I offer this: [link]

(You might need to see the rest of them for the logistics to make sense)

[Via Boing Boing + Geisha Asobi]

 I know Christian Finnegan and he’s quite funny, but given his “host” title, he’s probably only on stage for 10 minutes. I don’t know the other guys.

christian finnegan hosts his monthly show “sob stories“
TONIGHT at the marquee.
come watch your favorite comics talk about this month’s theme:
“tragic drunkeness”
here’s our lineup…
host:
CHRISTIAN FINNEGAN
featuring:
JONATHAN CORBETT (comedy central’s “premium blend”)
EDDIE PEPITONE (“last comic standing”)
JOEY GAY (director of the upcoming comedy documentary,
“the owner heckles”) and more!
here are the details
tuesday may 4
SOB STORIES AT THE MARQUEE
356 bowery (between great jones and e. 4th)
8pm, doors at 730pm
$ 5
call 212.664.5892 for more information. 

From this article

You can imagine the scene: a well publicized funeral featuring a NFL star turned soldier. Flags everywhere, lots of “true-American-hero”, “with God in heaven now” talk.

Then this happened:

Tillman’s youngest brother, Rich, wore a rumpled white T-shirt, no jacket, no tie, no collar, and immediately swore into the microphone. He hadn’t written anything, he said, and with the starkest honesty, he asked mourners to hold their spiritual bromides.

“Pat isn’t with God,” he said. “He’s fucking dead. He wasn’t religious. So thank you for your thoughts, but he’s fucking dead.”

Awkward…

Seriously though – I can imagine his brother sitting there seething at all these people attempting to make what is a horrific personal event for his family into a circus. I find it odd that this Tillman story has seemed to fill people with a kind of proud, war hero mentality that makes them feel almost better about war rather than dealing with death directly? Am I wrong on this?