Contributed by: filbert Tuesday, March 16 2010 @ 10:32 AM CST
SECTION ONE: The Word:
Stand by for Hoop-a-rama posts, where your humble blogger picks ALL of the Division I college basketball tournaments . . .
SECTION TWO: Things That Amuse Me:
Simians and other aminals*:
Thieving baboons wipe out vineyards [*1]
Environment May Impact Apes’ Ability to Understand Declarative Communication, Study Suggests [*2]
Travel:
Cruise Ship Suffers Massive Gastrointestinal Outbreak for Third Cruise in a Row [*3] — If you’re booked in the near future on Celebrity’s Mercury, it may be time to take a good look at your cruise insurance policy . . .
Update: CDC Says “Don’t Sail” to Noro-Stricken Cruise Ship [*4]
Sports:
No. 1 KU beats No. 9 K-State 72-64 in Big 12 final [*5]
Packers fan who sold his blood to pay for season tickets voted to team’s Fan Hall of Fame [*6]
Basketball and jazz in perfect harmony in KC [*7]
Gone in 64 Seconds [*8]
Live tonight: Jackrabbit women learn bracket fate [*9]
Postseason ruminations [*10]
Selection Monday gathering planned for Frost Arena [*11]
There’s plenty of reaction to possible expansion [*12]
Jackrabbits travel to Oklahoma for NCAA opener [*13]
A perfect tournament for our times [*14] — If a majority of the additional 33 teams come from “mid-major” conferences, then NCAA tournament expansion will be a good idea.
Kansas chosen unanimous No. 1 in final AP poll[*15]
Jackrabbit women to open NCAA tourney at Oklahoma [*16]
Science Fiction and Writing:
Making Historical Characters Your Own [*17]
Stealth Worldbuilding & the Other Kind of Standalone Fantasy [*18]
Why reviewers don’t often say “This sucks”. [*19]
What’s a standard submission process like? [*20]
Publishers who ask for camera-ready copy [*21]
Write What You Don’t Know [*22]
Interstellar World Building [*23]
Hey! Your Politics Got Into My Science Fiction! [*24] — Nobody likes being beaten over the head with dogma in a book that they’re reading for fun . . .
Science, technology, and space:
Gliese’s Pieces [*25] — The Death Star approaches?
Help wanted: Space flight experience required [*26]
Straight news:
The Democrats Must Be Stopped [*27] — “Is it going too far to say that the Democrats are selling our children into servitude in order to finance a government that is wallowing in luxury we cannot afford? That sounds extreme, doesn’t it? But for how many years do you think your own children will have to labor to pay off the debt that the Democrats are inflicting on them?”
‘Joey, Do You Like Movies About Gladiators?’ [*28]
Miscellany (amusing things not fitting above, or below):
Pi Day! [*29] — Yes, I missed Pi Day. I couldn’t get around to it. Thank you, thank you, I’m here all week, tip your waitresses . . .
SECTION THREE: Politics: The neverending battle against blithering idiocy:
People doing potentially good things (including sightings of politicians doing something less than totally idiotic):
Another billboard mystery in Minnesota? [*30] — The Billboard Rebellion?
An End To The Culture War? [*31] — The government has no business dictating “culture” . . .
Great Merciful Zeus. CSPAN set to upload ENTIRE HISTORY to the web. [*32] — This is how you do “transparency.” Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, and That Guy From Nevada, take note.
The cure for blithering idiocy: freedom and individual liberty (yeah, I know–ooh, ick, philosophy!):
The nature of rights, and of wishes [*33] — “To argue that people have a right that imposes obligations on another is an absurd concept. A better term for new-fangled rights to health care, decent housing and food is wishes.”
The Size of Government: Palin and Sweden Vs. Obama [*34]
The Consent of the Governed [*35]
Tea Party Connect: Principle and Ideology [*36]
The reality of President Obama and his entire Administration as blithering idiots:
Wrong Bill At The Wrong Time [*37] — “both the Democratic Party and President Obama have mutually reinforcing blind spots that have rendered them incapable of seeing what’s crystal clear to every other sentient being in the country: This was the wrong bill at the wrong time.”
The reality of Washington Democrats (and Independents, and Socialists) as blithering idiots:
Aw: Democrats ready to roll out the red carpet for tea partiers protesting tomorrow in D.C. [*38]
The reality of Washington Republicans as blithering idiots:
“He does have Republican values. Is it going to make a big splash with his current identification as a vampire? That’s only for the voters to decide.” [*39] — Weird. I thought the Democrats were the party of bloodsucking parasites, and their power-grubbing enablers . . .
Opposition Research: because blithering idiocy can be dangerous, especially when organized into idiotic groups with idiotic ideologies:
BIG FAIL. St. Louis Libs Hold Coffee Party – 30 People Show Up [*40]
Far Left Coffee Party Founder Annabel Park Claims Media Is Supportive of Tea Party Movement (Video) [*41]
Catholic Archbishop Warns About Dishonest Pro-Obamacare Leftist Groups Posing as Catholics [*42] — They lie. Shamelessly. Constantly.
SECTION FOUR: Case Studies in Blithering Idiocy
“Global warming” aka “Climate change” — or should that be “Climate Reform?”:
“Global” Warming? [*43] — Featuring a curious, curious picture . . .
UK ads banned for overstating climate change [*44]
Dr. Nicola Scafetta summarizes “why the anthropogenic theory proposed by the IPCC should be questioned” [*45]
Corned grief: biofuels may increase CO2 [*46]
Health care “reform” aka health insurance “reform” — or should that be health care “change?” Perhaps “Global healthing?:
Brown: An entire year has gone to waste [*47]
With a Stiff Spine America Must Stand Against Obamacare [*48]
White House: We’re Happy to Have 2010 Elections About Our Unconstitutional, Abortion-Funding, Power-Grabbing, Racist Health Care Bill [*49]
Dem’s Reconciliation Bill Is Posted; Contains Student Loan Takeover …Update: Boehner Says “We’ll Kill It” [*50]
Introducing ObamaCare 2.0: The 2,309-Page Scam That Will Live in Infamy [*51]
The Democratic Health Care Obsession [*52]
Opposition to Obamacare Holding Steady [*53]
Obama flip-flops on dealmaking for ObamaCare [*54] — Or, as Ace more pithily put it . . .
Obama: Bring on the bribes! [*55]
Unconstitutional Procedure Being Used to Pass Unconstitutional ObamaCare [*56]
Nomentum Yes To No! And No Means No Edition [*57]
More Nomentum: Jerry Costello Flips “Yes” to “No” [*58]
Rasmussen: People still oppose ObamaCare [*59]
Whip Count: Pelosi Needs 25 out of 29 “Maybes” To Break Her Way [*60]
FAIL. Obama’s Health Care Rally Prop Is In Hospital… Getting Care… Despite No Insurance [*61]
Rep. Drier: Democrats Down About 10 Votes; More Votes “Peeling Off” [*62]
The Slaughter Rule: Yet Another Reason Obamacare Would Be Unconstitutional [*63]
Question: Who do you think will be eviscerated and put out as the sacrificial lamb when Healthcare Rationing collapses? [*64] — I suppose it’s too much to ask that the person most responsible for putting the country through this agony for the past year and a half now–Barack Hussein Obama–will be the one thrown under the bus by the Democrats. The American public at large are increasingly of that opinion . . .
Stupak still a no, and not just on abortion [*65]
An unconstitutional solution [*66]
Tyrant Pelosi on Slaughter Rule: “I Like It Because People Don’t Have to Vote On the Senate Bill” [*67]
Is Now Really the Time To Create a New $2.5 Trillion Entitlement? [*68]
Liar Obama: Your Insurance Premiums Will Decrease by 3,000% Under Obamacare (Video) [*69] — Eye-rollingly stupid lying on the part of the Liar in Chief . . .
The Economy (Can the blithering idiots bring down the most productive economy the world has ever seen? Yes, They Can! Will they?):
They Spend WHAT? The Real Cost of Public Schools [*70] — “Citizens drastically underestimate current per-student spending and are misled by official figures.” The phrase “throwing good money after bad” comes to mind . . . schools in this country have plenty of money to do their job of educating people. Quite possibly, they have far too much money, which attracts the usual unsavory crowd of grifters and leeches to suck the lifeblood away from those dedicated teachers and their students, and so our entire society.
Social Security starts cashing in US debt [*71] — “Yeah, hey, Congress? You know all those IOU’s you left us with when you plundered our trust fund? Well, we need the money NOW, so we’re starting to cash in those IOUs. Have a nice day. Sincerely: The Social Security Administration.” Now, things will get really interesting (as in the Chinese curse “may you live in interesting times”) . . .
Americans Not Totally Clueless About Government Spending [*72] — The Number 1 crisis in the U.S. today is out-of-control government spending.
WH: Don’t expect employment growth in 2010 [*73] — So, explain to me what that so-called “stimulus” was about, again?
Foreign affairs and National Security (Will blithering idiots get us all killed, or make us all speak Spanish–or Chinese–or Arabic–or all three?):
Dubai Only Looks Modern [*74] — “Two Britons were just sentenced to a month in jail followed by deportation for a kiss on the cheek in a bar.”
The Morning Whip is a (mostly) daily review of what’s out there that caught my attention, sometimes but not always posted before 11 am Central time in the U. S. of A., unless I just don’t feel like it that day, am out doing something more important or more fun, or I’ve been abducted, detained, arrested, or otherwise flummoxed by the agents of blithering idiotry.
I surf the Web, so you don’t have to! (which would be a trademark, but come on, who am I kidding?)