Campanastan

More Beck Blather from Qaddafi's 'Brother From Another Mother'

Glenn Beck seems intent on supplanting Charlie Sheen as Colonel Qaddafi's 'brother from another mother.'

For the past several months Beck has taken to lambasting Frances Fox Piven, a 78-year-old Distinguished Professor of Sociology and Political Science at the City University of New York. Piven  and her late husband, Richard Cloward, wrote an article for The Nation in 1966 in which they outlined a plan to help the poor of New York and other big cities to get on welfare.

To Beck, this makes her one of the most dangerous people in the world. From the NPR story:

"Let me introduce you to the people who you would say are fundamentally responsible for the unsustainability and possible collapse of our economic system. They're really two people," he said, "Cloward and Piven."

For about the last three months, week after week, Beck's been hammering away at Piven and her husband. From their 45-year-old article, he sees a vast conspiracy to overthrow the American financial system.

Theirs, he says, is a plan to "overwhelm the system and bring about the fall of capitalism by overloading the government bureaucracy with impossible demands and bring on economic collapse."

Beck says their approach is the main strategy employed by the far left ever since, applying it to everything from the Wall Street collapse to the health care law to climate change.

Soon after Beck made her infamous, Piven says hundreds of death threats poured into her e-mail account and conservative blogs. Things like, "'May cancer overtake you soon!'" Piven says. She ended up asking the FBI and state police for help.

Here's Piven:

"It's a lunatic story, but it's a story that nevertheless is clear," she says. "You can get your hands around it. This woman is somehow responsible for the upsetting changes in your small town where the factory closed down. I don't blame them for being upset. It is upsetting. But I blame Glenn Beck for telling them a factually untrue, crazy story about why those changes occurred."

Nut case.

"Finally, a guy who says what people who aren't thinking are thinking." –Jon Stewart on Glenn Beck

Check This Out: Verizon Gets What It Deserves

I can't make out the infinite series. But I know e**(pi*i) is -1 (Euler's formula). That's good enough for me.

Actually, I'll make my check out to AT&T.

Thanks again to Ari Michelsen.

 "The incompetent with nothing to do can still make a mess of it." -- Laurence J. Peter

Real World Job Descriptions

Job Descriptions in the Real World

A programmer is someone who solves a problem you didn't know you had in a way you don't understand.

A consultant is someone who takes the watch off your wrist and tells you the time.

A banker is a fellow who lends you his umbrella when the sun is shining and wants it back the minute it begins to rain. (Mark Twain)

An economist is an expert who will know tomorrow why the things he predicted yesterday didn't happen today.

A statistician is someone who is good with numbers but lacks the personality to be an accountant.

An actuary is someone who brings a fake bomb on a plane, because that decreases the chances that there will be another bomb on the plane.

A mathematician is a blind man in a dark room looking for a black cat which isn't there.   (Charles R. Darwin)

A topologist is a man who doesn't know the difference between a coffee cup and a doughnut.

A lawyer is a person who writes a 10,000 word document and calls it a "brief."

A psychologist is a man who watches everyone else when a beautiful girl enters the room.

A professor is one who talks in someone else's sleep.

A schoolteacher is a disillusioned woman who used to think she liked children.

A diplomat is someone who can tell you to go to hell in such a way that you will look forward to the trip. 
 

Thanks to friend and colleague Ari Michelsen.

And I'll close with one that hits close to home:

A hydrologist is someone who earns a living determining that water flows downhill and picks up crap along the way.  -- Bill Battaglin

Lest We Forget: Whatever Happened to the '1000 Wells for Darfur' Project?

Remember when this was a big deal - about three or four years ago? Looks like the project has been shelved.Read my post over at WaterWired.

 Maybe the wells have been shifted to South Sudan.

"The Darfur initiative will bring hope to the people of northwestern Sudan; it will allow the migration of the labour force to locations where economic development is suitable and environmentally sustainable. This initiative can be a starting point for ameliorating the human suffering in the region and raising the quality of life and capacity of its people." -- Dr. Farouk El-Baz, 25 June 2007

Why Teachers Drink a Lot of Flor de Caña Rum

From Ari Michelsen. Still the greatest job in the world.

 

 

 

 
 
 

 
 
 

 
 

 

 "Quite frankly, teachers are the only profession that teach our children." -- Dan Quayle

Aasif Mandvi in 'The Qu'osby Show'

Aasif Mandvi stars in The Qu'osby Show a sitcom about a NASCAR-loving Muslim family who eats pork and dances to Toby Keith.

From The Daily Show.

Hilarious (it takes a while to load).

- Exclusive - The Qu'osby Show - The Pilot

"Here is a man who has risen through the ranks all the way from hispanic to Attorney General... from, if you will, Chico to the Man." -- Aasif Mandvi on Alberto Gonzales

Lara Logan Aftermath: Civility Takes a Holiday, Vitriol Abounds

In the wake of the sexual assault on CBS newswoman Lara Logan in Cairo last week the vitriol has begun to flow.

A woman is sexually assaulted and some blame the victim. Sound familiar?

From Debbie Schlussel:

"How fitting that Lara Logan was 'liberated' by Muslims in Liberation Square while she was gushing over the other part of the 'liberation.' Hope you’re enjoying the revolution, Lara! Alhamdilllullah [praise allah]."

The quotes below are from a story in AlterNet.

 Some Tweets from reporter Nir Rosen:

"Lara Logan had to outdo Anderson [Cooper of CNN]. Where was her buddy [General Stanley] McChrystal."

Yes, yes it was wrong what happened to her.Of course, I don't support that. But it would have been funny if it happened to Anderson too."

"Jesus Christ, at the moment she is becoming a martyr and glorified we should at least remember her role as a major war monger."

"Look, she was probably groped like thousands of other women, which is still wrong, but if was worse than [sic[ I'm sorry."

And some comments from assorted blogs:

"A pretty one, with lots of untamed, uncovered wild blonde hair."

"To devout muslims, she's legit rape-bait. What was CBS thinking?"

"Welcome to Islam. It's immoral to eat pork but rape is acceptable."

"It's INEXCUSABLE for a blonde female to be there in the midst of these savages! Maybe now she knows the true face of Mooselimbs."

"She's lucky she wasn't beheaded for infidelity afterwards by the islamic savages."

Civility?

For the record, spouse Mary Frances was groped when she visited me in Egypt in 1995, despite her best efforts to 'cover up.'

I'll close with this beauty from Michelle Malkin:

"I fail to see why we would expend any energy -- beyond that which is released by the detonation of a thermonuclear weapon -- to defend these people and their country. Islam is the opiate of the uneducated -- and unwilling to be educated -- masses in the Third World." --  Michelle Malkin

Happy Valentine's Day to the First-Lady-For-Life

In our 18th year of happiness, friendship, and fulfillment.

In the City of Light with the light of my life, Mary Frances.

 
"One of the hardest things in life is having words in your heart that you can't utter." -- James Earl Jones

Fareed Zakaria on Obama's 'Slow' Response to Democracy in Egypt

Some have criticized the Obama Administration's slow response to support the push for democracy in Egypt and not quickly joining the call for Mubarak to leave.

Fareed Zakaria, one of the smartest guys around, noted something interesting this morning on his GPS show.

When the Filipinos started agitating against President Ferdinand Marcos in 1983, President Reagan took three years to call for him to leave.

When Indonesians did the same with President Suharto, President Clinton waffled until the IMF finally forced Suharto's ouster after a year or so.

 President Obama? It took him about a week to begin calling for a transition to democracry.in Egypt.

"Every revolution evaporates, leaving behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy." -- Franz Kafka

The President-For-Life Gets His Siemens

A few weeks ago I posted about my need for hearing assistance.

The Presidential audiologist has deemed that your PFL needed two open-ear hearing aids. He is now sporting a pair of Siemens digital hearing aids:

 
 
The devices have on-off switches, useful for the times my loyal subjects forget that they should not whine about their meaningless lives and paltry wages.

My model also has the 'dictator' software package, which can filter screams, moans, howls, whimpers, groans, and snapping limbs. My friend Hosni recommended it. Ah, German engineering!

The PFL's otolaryngologist has decided to retire and is now enjoying his new mountain resort home. He originally recommended the model shown here.

The PFL wonders which part will fail next.

So does the First-Lady-For-Life.

"It's like using a rope to shoot pool." -- George Burns on sex at 90

Hosni Gets Hosed; A Street Named 11 February 2011?

President Hosni Mubarak is now out of Cairo and apparently ensconced in his palace in the Sinai. Couldn't happen to a nicer dictator.

When I lived in Cairo I noted that there seemed to be a plethora of streets named after dates. When I would finally ascertain the significance of a particular date, it was usually some lame reason like "That was the day we didn't get our butts kicked by the Israelis as badly as we thought we would" or somesuch nonsense. Didn't seem that modern Egypt had much to celebrate.

Now there is a real reason to name a street after a date. Let's hope that today becomes the namesake of a major boulvevard or a renamed Tahrir Square and that the reason will be "It was the day we deposed a tyrant and started on the road to democracy."

But there is a ways to go yet.

Okay, who's next?

"We won't leave until Mubarak steps down and God willing, today's protest will be peaceful. Everything will turn out good and he will step down for sure."  -- Yasmine Mohamed, Egyptian university student, 11 February 2011

Autocracy in Egypt? No - Like the Other Arab States, It's a Kakistocracy

Kakistocracy - rule by the worst. Kleptocracy also works, too.Wonder is there is such a word as 'moronocracy'?

Love this from Tom Toles. 

"In Egypt today most people are concerned with getting bread to eat. Only some of the educated understand how democracy works." -- Naguib Mahfouz

In DC? You MUST Eat at Rasika!

Okay, you're about to get a restaurant recommendation from someone who is not a gourmet and is not particularly fond of Indian cuisine. Nevertheless, I reluctantly took Don Siegel's advice and accompanied him and Nancy Kim to an Indian restaurant, Rasika. It's at 633 D Street NW (202-637-1222), just off the National Mall.

It was the best restaurant meal I have ever had!

Don is a gourmet and has published a book on Chinese-Kosher cooking. His wife Betty recommended Rasika and none of us was disappointed.

It was so good I even had sweetbreads, a food I'm not partuclarly fond of. They were the best dish (we just ordered about eight plates of appetizers).

We arrived right about opening (5:30 PM) and were seated in the lounge where we could order anything they served. To get a table in the dining room you need to make a reservation about three weeks in advance,.

Service, drinks, desserts, coffee - all excellent.

You won't be disappointed.

"Looks attracts first, quality qualifies later." -- Bengali proverb

Bill O'Reilly Defends Nazi Analogies, Gets the Stewart Treatment

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Bill O'Reilly Defends His Nazi Analogies
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor & Satire Blog The Daily Show on Facebook

Thanks to Sarah Sheldrick.

"As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1." -- Godwin's Law of Nazi Analogies