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Saturday, December 31, 2011

Jump Around!

Jump Around!

And the winner is...



 What's your favorite "12" movie?
SelectionVotes 
The Dirty Dozen 49%227 
12 Angry Men 26%120 
12 Monkeys 16%74 
Cheaper by the Dozen 7%33 
Ocean's Twelve 1%
Twelve 0%
12 0%
460 votes total 
pollcode.com free polls

Hey look who is doing a poll.  The readers have spoken!  A few move votes and there would not even be a run off in Louisiana.

Update:  She is also doing a post of her top nine posts of 2011.

Top 9?  A Herman Cain reference perhaps?




Blogger Maguro said...
Just curious, but why a Top 9? Isn't a Top 10 more customary for these sorts of things?
12/31/11 6:28 PM
Blogger rick said...
#10 must have been real ugly.
12/31/11 6:33 PM

Could it be commentator disputes at #10?



Blogger Ann Althouse said...
"Just curious, but why a Top 9? Isn't a Top 10 more customary for these sorts of things?"

I was using a Blogger resource that had the top 10 of all time, and all but 1 are this year.

Wish I had a better resource, but that's all I had.
12/31/11 6:45 PM

Well glad that is cleared up.  We couldn't have that could we?  Happy New Year to all!  Especially my Doppelgänger.

Well, well, well...and just in time for New Years Eve!

Andrew Sullivan is confused (or lying) on the economy and Barack Obama...


REVISING MY VENN DIAGRAMS: I would have thought that the circles representing “people who have endorsed Ron Paul” and “people who defend the competence of Obama’s central economic planning” wouldn’t overlap. But I guess I should have known that if anyone were to fall in both, it would be Andrew Sullivan. So the Obama central planners spent nearly a trillion dollars based on their projections, and now we’re supposed to ignore their wildly erroneous forecasts because they just didn’t realize how bad the Bush economy was? 
As Judge Spotswood Robinson used to say to lawyers in trouble, “what’s your next argument?”
Posted at 10:37 pm by Glenn Reynolds    
I recall Andrew Sullivan arguing that George W. Bush's out of control spending needed to be curbed.  Funny, I have not heard Mr. Sullivan make that argument about Barack Obama.  Despite the fact, the evidence of reckless spending by the Obama Administration is overwhelming.


The curious lies of Andrew Sullivan... I am surprised Sullivan has not blamed Trig Palin for these deficits yet.  Sullivan says these charts cited by Glenn Reynolds are all lies.  Hmmm, pathetic. But it's all Sully's got.  Especially since the chair of the DNC said that 
the Democratic Party owns this economy.


Update:   Welcome Instapundit Readers!




Update II:      The Continuing Lies of Andrew Sullivan*



A recent “infographic” released by the White House tries to assign the blame for our massive debt and deficits to former President Bush and Republican Congresses.  However, the graphic conveniently omits President Obama’s record and his plans for the fiscal future of our country.  If the President had his way and his Fiscal Year 2012 budget proposal was enacted, here is what a comparison of the increase in public debt would look like:
As the graph above shows, the debt held by the public increased $2.4 trillion between 2000 and 2008, from $3.4 trillion to $5.8 trillion.  Under President Obama’s budget proposal, the debt held by the public is projected to increase $6.1 trillion between 2008 and 2012, from $5.8 trillion to $11.9 trillion.
That means that President Obama will more than double the debt accumulated under President Bush in half the time.  Twice the debt in half the time: courtesy of the Obama Administration.


Facts are troublesome things...so some people like Sullivan choose to ignore them.


Sully does not need facts!

Sully needs to come out of his cocoon of denial.

Update Hey:  


JUST AS A REMINDER, I’m repeating this graphic from James Pethokoukis’s The 7 Most Illuminating Economic Charts of 2011, illustrating the gap between Obama’s promises and performance on the stimulus and unemployment. Happy New Year! And no excuses.

Friday, December 30, 2011

Why Marriage Is In Danger...

WHEN MARRIAGE IS DYSFUNCTIONAL: “It is unconscionable to recommend marriage to any man under a legal regime in which he has no protection under the law and can be forced out of his own home by a single false charge. While this state of affairs is fair to neither individual men nor individual women, the lamentable fact is that very, very few women, even conservative, politically minded women who are correctly concerned about what low marriage rates will do to American society, are willing to speak out against Marriage 2.0 because they still wish to retain the legal benefits it affords married women in the event of divorce.”
Instapundit


Yes, marriage is dysfunctional.  We also subsidize fail.


Update: Smitty at The Other McCain says we are missing the point...

Has Ann Lost Faith?

And I-ran (I couldn't get away)




I am getting Déjà Moo over all this Iranian saber rattling.  Iran should be careful about what it wishes for...


We should not take such a conflict lightly.  Don't misunderstand, I am not proposing we go to war with Iran.  But if Iran did do something so dumb as the close the Persian Arabian Gulf's Strait of Hormuz--that could not go unanswered.  Wouldn't that give the United States a perfect opportunity to blow up some research facilities in Iran, sink the Iranian Navy, and blow up Iran's limited gasoline refineries?  


Update:  And let's not forget this classic:  Iran So Far Away...


Update II:  Really?


Update III:   Faster, Please!

Best Local News Bloopers of 2011



H/T:  Hot Air

Where in the world is Keith Olbermann?

Don't Tell Anyone!  Hush, hush and on the down low!
Keith Olbermann (Special Video Link)

Keith Olbermann benched?   (Is Olbermann the Milton Bradley of political punditry?)

Keith "Black Swan" Olbermann and Al "ManBearPig" Gore not all hugs and kisses any more?

H/T:  Drudge

Update:  Sounds like Dumpsville for Keith Olbermann at least per this Ace of Spades HQ post.


Lock-Out? Keith Olbermann Says He's Been Informed He Won't Be On Tonight
—Ace
The proper conjugation is: snit, snitted, had snat. Or, en Deutsche, haben geschnitten.
Now why would he have announced he was on his way to his office earlier, if he had an inkling that he wouldn't be permitted on air?
My guess (just a guess) is that it's a legal maneuver, an attempt to show that, despite whatever draaaamaa his previous snittings caused, he was now ready to work as scheduled, and was only being barred by a management which is Legally At Fault and In Breach of Contract.
Or else he's just griefing and creating more drama.
Honestly I don't know.
What I do know is that Keith Olbermann has more draaamaaa and moments of truth than the new reality series about women's biological cycles I'm pitching to Lifetime, called Menses Frenzies.
Continue reading
Posted by Ace at 07:22 PM New Comments Thingy 
So as not to mislead: I am informed Countdown will not be on tonight. I must defer on all questions to @JoelHyatt @AlGore and @Current

Thursday, December 29, 2011

Hell On Wheels (or AMC's version of how the West was won)

Dominique McElligott

Hell On Wheels got renewed by AMC for a second season.  For those of you who have not seen it, it depicts the building of the Union Pacific line of the trans-continental railroad in the late 1860s.

Here is a review from the New York Post.  I do not disagree with the review.  The main actors do a very competent job with the material they have.  The show has its flaws, but it is definitely entertaining and watchable.   Then again, I like westerns.  What do you expect, I am a cow.  The finale for this season will be next month.

The actual history of the trans-continental railroad is far more complex and nuanced than a television series with a limited budget can deliver. The cast, with all its extras, is still obviously far less than the actual manpower that would have been required to accomplish that engineering marvel.  Deadwood, in comparison, always managed to seem like a real 19th century mining boom town.  The Hell on Wheels filming locations, however, look very authentic and it is not done on some studio back lot.

Update:  Good point on the use of language on the show.

How Iraq Was Won...

The corps commander in Iraq during the surge, now the Army chief of staff, General Raymond Odierno, reportedly said that nothing he was doing before the Army published its new counterinsurgency doctrine changed once it was published. A new doctrine did not break the back of the counterinsurgency in Iraq. That was done by the addition of 50,000 more soldiers and Marines to the fight. Note:These were not aid workers or even forces imbued with a new doctrine (most of them had never read it). Rather, they were 50,000 mostly combat troops, prepared to take the fight to the enemy. And it was a hard and vicious fight — one that often required the full combined-arms panoply (armor, artillery, close air support) to win. Somehow, much of the true narrative of this fight is being lost in favor of one that emphasizes getting along with the locals, building schools, and helping farmers. All of these activities were, of course, important, but they pale in comparison to the benefits of increased security, which was only bought by hard fighting. One brigade commander captured it perfectly when he said, “I know all about counterinsurgency doctrine. It means shake hands in the light and kill at night.”
As they say, read the whole thing.

The underlying message is wars are hard.  And brutal.  And when we get in them there better be a good reason and we better be prepared for the worst.

H/T to David French at the Corner.

Update:  Maetenloch at AoSHQ recognizes the merits of the linked article too.

Cheetah death a hoax? Update: Sanctuary denies hoax.




Now I do not know what to believe.   Here is my original post:  Cheetah R.I.P.


"Cobb said that when the chimp didn't like what was going on, he would fling feces and other objects."


Well poo throwing and negative outbursts are true for a lot of actors who work in Hollywood.  


(Allegedly) a particularly foul and notorious chimpanzee actor
and poo thrower who will probably never work on Broadway again.
Some are real jerks.  Cheetah's television and film work should not be judged solely on some alleged bad behavior, which for all we know may have been justified.  


Update:  Suncoast Primate Sanctuary Defends Story!

Running for president is good for business!

When you get lemons, make lemonade!

Newt came to do good, and is doing quite well!

H/T:  The Agitator

Should we have a cow about the Iowa Caucus turnout?

This is important!  Thanks to Jim Geraghty at NRO's Campaign Spot for focusing on this most important issue.  

Socialism Almost Ruined Thanksgiving (and does not work the rest of the year either)



Yeah, this would have been more timely a little more than a month ago.  But Smitty at The Other McCain just did the post.  And it is a good point.
Will The Laws Of Economics Support It?  The short answer:  No.



Weiner was wiener curious?


Why am I not surprised.

H/T:  AoS HQ

Not that there is anything wrong with playing with wieners...


H/T and credit for photo (above):  Serr8d


This is just wrong:  

Mommy and Daddy Weiner walking down the street with their little Weiner in tow, dad looks back to the little one and says Ketch-up!

And one last one:  

Anthony Weiner and Chuck Schumer were sitting on a street corner in Brooklyn wondering if they should buy a beer with their last dollar. Weiner suggested that they buy a wiener. Schumer started bitching, complaining that he couldn't drink a hot dog. Weiner told him his idea.

"What we do is buy a wiener, go into a bar, and order two drinks. After we drink our beers you drop down to your knees, and I'll unzip my pants and pull out the wiener so you can suck on it. The bartender will throw us out thinking we're queers."

Schumer thought this was a great idea, so they bought a wiener. They went into the first bar, ordered their drinks, and drank them quickly. Then Schumer dropped to his knees and started to suck the wiener. Sure enough, the bartender kicked them out thinking they were gay.

They hit about ten or fifteen bars when Schumer started to complain about his knees hurting. He asked if in the next bar Weiner would do the kneeling work. Weiner said, "I'd rather not. I ate the hot dog after the second bar."

Then Weiner said, "Oh all right.  Anything for you Chuckie."

Update II:  

Anthony Weiner loves it!  


At the small plate café...


What I offer is, hopefully, more nurishing.  Thanks for visiting and reading!

The Wee Man Makes A Prediction...



Oh oh.

H/T Drudge Report

Update:  This only makes it more likely.   Now the wee man may be just a water carrier for the Clintons trying to get back in the game, but if some private polling shows Obama is greatly strengthened by switching Hillary Clinton out for Joe Biden...I am sure Obama-Axelrod would consider it.

Update II:   Obama distant (also known as arrogant).  Obama is going to want a game changer.

Update III:  Chris Matthews raises the issues again... (h/t: Hot Air)

You guys might want to stay out of the water...






Guess what he likes to eat.  Ouch!

H/T Hot Air

Update:  Dumbasses

Update II:  You can't only worry about fishes...

Update III:  Maetenloch at AoSHQ finally recognizes the horror!

Wednesday, December 28, 2011

RIP Helen Frankenthaler and John Chamberlain




Update:  Not directly related to this post, but Crack Emcee offers art photos.

Whooooaaaa Nelly! Horse Meat, It's What's For Dinner!



While I am more for promoting vegetarianism, I do not have a problem with this.

Update:  Mr. Ed meets the Dodgers!

The Toughest Job!



The Conservative Commune on the toughest job there is...

Cheetah R.I.P.


Star of Tarzan, Beloved Character Actor and Sidekick, Champion Poo Tosser.
1931--2011

Which of course begs the question:   Do you remember Winston Churchill's parrot?  How many other animal stars of stage and screen are out there living quiet lives in retirement?


Is Arnold still with us?


Update:  Another monkey falls, but this one less beloved.  And that may be some of the worse acting of grief I have seen.

Update II:  But as for the beloved Cheetah I can only say this:   And when I die, and when I'm gone  there will be one child born in this world to carry on.

Update III:  Conservative Commune notes the loss.  They also fill in some of the gaps from Cheetah's retirement life in near seclusion.  

Wall Street Repo Men


Great article at NRO.


There is also a lesson in this tale from Instapundit.  Ben Nelson is not an evil man, but he was corrupted by this system.  And this corruption is in both parties.  There are still people who actually care about this country and do not want this corruption to continue.  Be it from Paulson and his Goldman Sach cronies working for Bush or Summer, Geithner, and Rubin and their Goldman Sach cronies working for Clinton and Obama.  And you don't think they are trying to back stop their positions with Romney if Obama goes down?  This insider corruption has to stop.

And it is frustrating that the one politician who gets it, is also completely nuts on most other issues and is unelectable.

Update:  But let's not forget who turbo charged the current depression we are in.

Update II:  Ace of Spades on the story...

Update III:  Hugh Hewitt does not like this article (what a surprise).

Titus, this is for you...



An interesting social experiment. Certainly less manipulative (if that is the right word) than some hidden camera crew at a store in Brooklyn pretending they just gave the guy who cut in line in front of you $50,000.

H/T to AoSHQ

Tuesday, December 27, 2011

OMG! This is NOT helping!

I am not particularly for Newt (or Mitt) but this is insane.

Update:  Original YouTube video pulled.  Some bloggers can't find it. WORKING LINK!!!> But nothing stopos EBL from delivering!

Update II:  Rumor has it someone spiked the water cooler in Newt's New Hamshire office with "special" mushrooms!  

Rose Bowl 2012--Bucky better be ready to kick ass...



Ducks are fowl foul creatures.

Sometimes Bucky has let me down.  Remember this?

Win Wisconsin Win.  On Wisconsin.  Go Badgers, Beat The Ducks.  

Rose Bowl 2012


Oregon Duck fans dress up like waterfowl excrement to celebrate their team.


I feel bad for folks in Pasadena.  A flock of foul fowl loserdom is descending on them.

Oregon Ducks Suck Facebook Page!

Update:  Oregon Cheats

What if the best remedy for obesity is...


not eating cheese curds?  ADDED: I'm just asking "what if"?  It may a crime in Wisconsin to even suggest such a thing.  




We love cheese curds.

Don't Mess with Firefly! How SciFi Fans Made a Campus Safe for Free Speech...






New FIRE Video: How 'Firefly' Fans Saved Free Speech on Campus - FIRE


H/T: to Instapundit

Update:  I would not have done the headline like this.

Update II:  Hot Air picks up the story.  

A Bow Is A Bow



Ever feel like you are getting a shit bow?  

SUCK


H/T to Crack Emcee for this gem.  

The key to victory in 2012 for Obama...

Ultimately it will turn on how many of  those who joined the herd last time will do so again?

Weird Wisconsin Mini-Tour

Weird Wisconsin Weekend

Monday, December 26, 2011

Copper Mining in Michigan 3000 B.C.?

Wisconsin kid finally gets settlement after getting screwed over by 1% Democrat Donor and Brown University...

Glenn Reynolds  has the story on this.  Poor kid gets screwed over by false rape accusation, but finally gets a settlement.



In documents unsealed Monday, the former student, William McCormick III, said the university had failed to follow its own disciplinary policies and sent him home to Wisconsin after the woman’s father made calls to top university officials.
On the same day that Mr. Dresdale called Brown, five Brown Deans ordered the falsely-accused student into an enclosed room. They surrounded him. They handed him a plane ticket, and told him to go home.
They did not investigate the rape accusation. They did not attempt to substantiate the accusation. They did not merely suspend the student for a semester pending an investigation. They sent the farm boy back to Wisconsin – where he belonged.
Unlike Richard Dresdale, William McCormick III was poor. He was attending Brown on an academic scholarship. While earning straight-As, he was also a star wrestler. He could not have afforded to attend Brown University without substantial financial aid.
Didn’t this poor boy get kicked out of college, ultimately, for not belonging to the right social class? If William McCormick’s father had been Richard Dresdale, does anyone doubt that the case would have been handled differently?
Why didn’t the New York Times focus on the unfair treatment this poor boy received? Isn’t it unfair when the super rich have poor people expelled without due process – and without any good cause at all?
There’s a reason that the Times did not touch the class issue: To the liberal media, a person can commit no greater crime than being born white and male. William McCormick III thus received the treatment he deserved.

Only Assholes Text In Movies...

For people who hate assholes who text during movies...

Just saying.  Somethings are just wrong.  Texters should be thrown out of movies.  

At the Cheese Curds Café...


Feed me!

Pull up a chair and watch me eat cheese curds!  

I Was Lady Gaga's Slave!



I posted this video in response to this story.  And because I hate Lady Gaga for ripping off Madonna, who is truly a genius.  

Rub-A-Dub-Dub, Three Corrupt (D)-Pols In A Tub

I am sure it is just a coincidence that Frank Lautenberg nominated Chuck Schumer's brother in law to the federal bench and Barack Obama is going along with it.


I need a punchline for this post.  How about, the only good thing is at least I did not vote for him...oh wait I can't vote, cows do not have the vote.   


The only good thing about this is it was pork.

"Pretend to be in control and people will assume you are."

"If you live in glass houses, don't throw stones."

"Your brain will shrink faster if you read mindless post from commentators with shrinking brains."

"If you question my authority, you are acting in bad faith."

"Oh wow, oh wow, oh wow."

"Hey look, snow flakes!"

Update: Crack Emcee's musings

Update II:  RogerJ mused:  "Could it be: J is actually the love child of C4 and Carol Herman?"  That was back in November.  11/30/11 9:18 AM