The CIA has a task force to assess the impact of WikiLeaks and it’s called WTF.
The New York Jets head coach’s wife is apparently featured in some foot fetish videos.
And Pat Robertson of the Christian Coalition has come out in favor of marijuana legalization.
All this in one day. If this keeps up, what’s The Onion going to do?
Say what you want about Brett Favre, but consider this.
The Vikings have no chance at the postseason.
They are going to be playing in total crap conditions.
Against a Bears defense that will punish the quarterback.
With their star running back out.
He has nothing to prove, so why play?
Because he loves to. It’s what he does. He plays football. Like him or not, all the drama around him revolves around that basic fact. He loves to play football.
He has zero reason to play tonight. He will get beat up in crap-ass conditions and almost certainly lose. But he’s playing.
This is ridiculous. I would totally agree that a school shouldn’t have a McDonald’s as their primary lunch option. Or that schools should have vending machines full of soda and nothing else.
But suing McDonald’s because the toys in Happy Meals entice children to eat unhealthy food is ludicrous. My daughters love happy meals. They always go for the toys (even though they are usually lame). But here’s the deal. My eight year old doesn’t say to me, "see you later, I’m going to McDonald’s".
She gets McDonald’s when I take them. I’m the grown up. I am making a rational choice to treat my girls occasionally with food that isn’t great for them because it makes them happy (and it’s easy, which makes me happy). That is a rational adult choice that I should be allowed to make. And as a parent I should be smart enough to say no if my daughter wants McDonald’s two days in a row.
The plaintiff in the lawsuit says that McDonald’s
uses toys as bait to induce her kids to clamor to go to McDonald’s
So can I sue Nickelodeon for airing ads that make my kids "clamor" for sugary cereal? How about the circus? Let’s sue Ringling Brothers for making my kids "clamor" for cotton candy. What about the ice cream truck that plays that stupid music. Talk about clamor…
Better yet, can we sue people for being crappy parents?…
I was a Verizon Blackberry user. I wanted to stay on Verizon because my phone needs to function as a phone. But I ditched Blackberry as soon as the HTC Incredible became available.
So I held out until April 2010. But the original Droid came out in October of 2009.
Check out the chart below. Verizon uses dumped Blackberry as soon as the Droid came out and haven’t looked back.
Literally.
A measure that passed the House and can pass the Senate 57-42 will never get a simple up or down vote due to Republican pressure.
We can’t have a mosque anywhere near Ground Zero, that would be un-American. But helping the folks who actually risked their health after 9/11, that’s, well, I really don’t know. Are they really saying it’s unpatriotic?
OK, I get it. We can’t pass any spending bill unless it’s paid for. What? This bill would be paid for by closing a loophole that lets people keep money in the Cayman Islands?
So Republicans prefer rich folks hiding their money in the Caymans to paying for health care costs for firemen who helped after 9/11?
Someone please tell me I’m reading this wrong.
This is just bizarre. Julian Assange has not actually been charged with a crime in Sweden. He is wanted for questioning.
Interpol is involved. He’s arrested in the UK. Denied bail. And he hasn’t been charged with a crime?
Like I said, a conspiracy theorist’s wet dream…
One of the interesting things about working in Dumbo (note: if you check out the Wikipedia entry, look for the picture of the "pocket park", my office building is the one behind it) is that there is so much filming going on.
Walking to work and seeing the big film trucks and areas blocked off and the catering trucks for the crew is a fairly regular occurrence. The neighborhood just has a funky warehouse feel that works in movies and TV shows.
Sometimes it’s just a fashion shoot. These are less of a production. You usually see one drop dead gorgeous woman in clothes that make no sense for the neighborhood being followed around by a motley group of photographers. Seeing a model try to navigate the cobblestone streets in 6 inch heels is quite amusing.
And so it was today. It’s 30 degrees and windy. So of course there was a beautiful woman in purple spandex exercise shorts pretending to run while guys on ladders take photographs.
An amusing way to start my day…
I’m fascinated by this whole story. I can’t say that I’m a supporter of WikiLeaks. There’s something altruistic about saying that everything should be open and transparent, but in the real world some aspects of diplomacy, like sausage-making, should not be exposed to the world. I want to still enjoy eating that bratwurst.
But this story is a conspiracy theorist’s wet dream. He is widely reported as being wanted for rape in Sweden, yet the real charge is apparently for sex without a condom, which is apparently a crime in Sweden with a fine of around $700. For this Interpol wants him. Hmm.
Amazon gets pressured to yank his web site. Of course they claim that there was no pressure and that they just yanked him for violating the terms and conditions. And that’s actually decent cover. Amazon has terms and conditions to prevent illegal file sharing type sites that basically state you have to be able to prove ownership of whatever you post. WikiLeaks clearly can’t do that, so Amazon has a legit argument. And the phone call from Senator Lieberman had nothing to do with it.
Their DNS provider was clearly pressured. They tried to claim that WikiLeaks violated some terms but ultimately they said that they dumped WikiLeaks because the DoS attack threatened them. So in this case they are punishing a web site that is the victim of an attack. Senator Lieberman clearly got to them.
And then there’s the Denial of Service attack itself. It’s strong, it’s been going on for days, and no one is taking credit for it. WikiLeaks has been handling it pretty well (the founder is a former hacker after all), but the question of who is behind it is fascinating. There are plenty of candidates. Pretty much any major government including our own is a candidate, along with rival hackers.
Meanwhile Julian Assange is getting boatloads of the thing he probably appreciates the most, free publicity.
It will be fun to see how this one turns out. Personally, I think Scientologists are behind the whole thing…
Mariano Rivera turned 41 yesterday. And reports seem to indicate that the Yankees negotiations are moving much more smoothly than with Derek Jeter.
So today’s blog will be filled with quotes about my favorite Yankee:
"We don’t want to face him any more. He’s too good. He belongs in a higher league. He should be banned from baseball."
– Tom Kelly (former Twins manager)
"He’s the most mentally tough person I’ve ever played with."
– Derek Jeter
"If my life depended on it – if my daughter’s life depended on it – I’d want Mariano Rivera closing. Wouldn’t you?"
– Alex Rodriguez
"I’m sure you can learn it, but it won’t cut like his."
– Mike Mussina, talking about Mo’s cutter
"That stuff of his is unbelievable. That stuff is unfair."
– Joe Mauer
"The best ever, no doubt."
– Dennis Eckersley
"I get the ball, I throw the ball and then I take a shower."
– Mariano Rivera
As they say, keep it simple…
I’m fairly amused by the Jeter negotiations because both sides are saying ridiculous things.
But there’s one negotiation that I’m more worried about. That’s Mariano Rivera (for the record, my favorite Yankee). Mo wants two years. The Yankees are offering one. Unlike Jeter, Mo was excellent last year. Yes, he’s 40, but have you seen him pitch? Effortless. He’s not going to break down next year. He could throw that splitter at 45 and no one hits it.
As a Yankee fan, I haven’t worried about the ninth inning for 13 years. Think about that. Since 1997.
I can handle a new shortstop. Not sure I can handle a new closer.
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