Yeah. I'm Old. So What?

One of the bands that I've seen more than once in person. Ladies and gentlemen...Uriah Heep!

The Path To Invasive Species Is Paved With Good Intentions

In the wake of this Gazette story over the weekend comes an email from a loyal reader.

People trying to help revive Lake Leota could be endangering the newly
refilled lake.

DNR Conservation Warden Boyd Richter has cited one person for
releasing fish in Lake Leota. The person who was caught got a $1,133
ticket, Richter said.

Reader PC writes:

Maybe The Happy Circumstance can help remind people that we need to
keep things like VHS, Eurasian watermillfoil and the rusty crayfish out of Lake
Leota as long as possible. Things are not like they were in the 1950's. We are
dealing with very serious problems with our lakes.

Gibbs lake is a poster child for Eurasian watermillfoil and is about 7
miles from Leota as the crow flies.Everyone should go take a good look at the
millfoil problem in Gibbs lake. It only takes a small piece to introduce it to a
new body of water.

We all have a part to play in keeping the lakes clean. It can sometimes start with the things we don't do.

A Most Unfortunate Brand Name

From the BBC comes a tale of an oil venture with (ahem) attitude.

Russia's energy giant Gazprom has signed a $2.5bn (£1.53bn) deal with
Nigeria's state operated NNPC, to invest in a new joint venture.

The new firm, to be called Nigaz, is set to build refineries, pipelines and gas power
stations in Nigeria.

Displaying One's Shortcomings

Former mayor in Georgia arrested for nudity

And, for those who get all bent out of shape over party affiliations being listed, it doesn't (ahem) come that he's a Republican until the second-last graph.

Joe The Plumber In Wisconsin

You just knew that getting JtP into a saloon would be good for a few laughs and last night didn't disappoint.

Christopher Magiera, a board member of Americans for Prosperity, got things off to a rollicking start even though he seemed to be off-message. He couldn't quite get to a violation of Godwin's Law from where he started. Described by the Wausau Herald as a local political activist, Magiera said

[that] he saw a "Stalinization of America" taking place and that "the only
thing that separates Stalinist Russia from what we have in Washington right now
are the re-education and death camps."

Apparently, no one in the crowd, estimated at whopping 75, actually knew enough about Stalinist Russia to call him on his comparison. But then it was time for the main act to take the center ring. Joe the Pretend Plumber said in an interview

[that] a recent Time magazine report that he had left the
Republican Party was false.

“No, that’s not true,” he said. “I said I was thinking about it, but I
did not do it. Right now, they don’t represent me as a Republican. I’m still
thinking about it, to a degree, because we need to promote America — not
Republicans, not Democrats.”

But the big news was that Joe has moved on to calling for vigilante justice and lynch mobs.

Referring to Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., more than once, Wurzelbacher asked,
"Why hasn't he been strung up?"

It's as if he was at one with Daddio who has taken to calling for a shooting war over healthcare reform. Even the reliably conservative Herald has had nearly enough of the media-created Joe-Monster.

[ ] he glosses over facts. Referring to the Constitution as "almost like the
Bible," Wurzelbacher said of the Founding Fathers: "They knew socialism doesn't
work. They knew communism doesn't work." The Constitution predates the origins of socialism by nearly 100 years.

His fifteen minutes long ago used up, Wurzelbacher needs to be progressively more outrageous just to remain in the spotlight. He has become the Republican's very own Sandra Bernhard, a once-upon-a-time minor celebrity with an act that was never very much fun to begin with trying to play out the string.

Capper has more on the conservative disarray in Marathon County. They've become a sort of joke but they're still looking to Pennsylvania for punchlines.

Updated after Tomah on Friday:

Joe says states should be able to ban smoking and that he'd rather be fishing than trundling about with the AFP sideshow.

The once famous Wurzelbacher, technically neither Joe nor Plumber, put in an appearance at Ed Thompson's TeePee Supper Club (Motto: Great prime rib. Common stereotypes) for another 70 people. That put his crowds at a total of 150 for Wausau and Tomah together. That's Walker territory, there but a far cry from the hundreds that saw him when he was stumping with Grampy.

From Race Bannon To Race-Baiting. 45 Years OF Jonny Quest

The intertubes are a wonderful place. You can find most anything out there. There is a two-hour documentary about one of my favorite shows available in sections on YouTube.

One of the great joys from my distant childhood was watching "Jonny Quest." We had to go to a neighbor's house to watch it on their color TV but the trip was richly rewarded. Exotic locales, strange villains and the hint of smoky sex between Race and Jade were heady stuff indeed for a pre-pubescent boy.

Quest was one of the few shows to seen on all three networks during its run. It hangs on today in late-night showings on Adult Swim on the Cartoon Network. It has the to-be-expected high level of 60's violence that would never pass for kid's programming today.

Chapter 12 of the documentary deals with some of the little known facts of the show.




But it is Chapter 13 that deals with some truly uncomfortable realities about the 1960's. It shows the cutting of racist dialogue that has been done for the various CD releases and asks the question, "Can we learn from a past that we simply pretend never happened?"



It is in the comments to this episode that we get a clear view of how much work remains to be done before we can claim that racism has been wiped out in America.

A suggestion to malcontent white hating racists: let those races move in who
the white devils 'killed" upon white US colonization, Kick out all of the
liberals and make room for the heathen monkeys so they can have 'their" land
back and cultural backwardness, Let the US again be a melting pot for pagan and
backward cultures, tee pees spear chuckers, fire dancers, ring noses, camel
jockeys and all the other loser cultures that liberals protect and tout in
history books. Watch Apocalypto moron.

We have along ways to go if a cartoon can draw out this much ignorance.

May We Stipulate?

Can we just adopt as a working assumption that Perez Hilton is an attention whore whose proclamations deserve no more than a cursory dismissal?

I Have Raffle Tickets If You Need Them

Celebrate a Lake Leota 4th

Fireworks Prime Seating Raffle

Tickets are $5 each or 5 for $20

Enter our raffle to win four reserved seats on top of the Warming House to view the fireworks show on July 4th. The best seating in the park, and hassle free. No need to bring chairs or blankets down early to reserve your spot. Just show up that evening and your chairs are reserved and waiting for you.

We will draw 10 winners the night of July 2nd after the Lake Grand Reopening Ceremony. Tickets are $5 each or 5 for $20. Maximum of 500 tickets will be sold. All proceeds go towards paying for the fireworks show. Support your local fireworks show by entering to win the best seats in the park!

4th of July Schedule at www.evansville-wi.net

Evansville 4th of July Committee · Evansville Community Partnership, Inc

A Couple Of Pointers For Teh Noobs

If you think they'll come looking for you, leaving your car at the airport is a tip-off to them.

If your plan for avoiding your troubles includes "Escape to South America," you'd be best to not buy a round-trip ticket.

If you intend to make things better by apologizing you need to start with the wife you've betrayed. Apologizing to the mistress or blaming the media isn't going to make it better at the breakfast table.

If you're going to blather about the sanctity of marriage you need to start with your own.

Perhaps, The Perfect Joke For Our Time

From Bob Zany this morning.

Alaska was hit by an earthquake that measured 4.5 on the Richter Scale over the weekend. Governor Palin is demanding that David Letterman apologize for saying that her daughter was knocked down by the quake.

Rep Bachmann Vows To Push Stupidity To Criminal Level

"I know for my family the only question we will be answering is how
many people are in our home," said Bachmann, who warned of corrupt ACORN
involvement in the census. "We won't be answering any information beyond that,
because the Constitution doesn't require any information beyond
that."

In fact, as a Census Bureau spokeswoman told the Washington Times,
what Bachmann just announced she would do is a crime punishable by a fine of up
to $5,000.

What's the opposite of, "Stand up and be counted?

Wait A Darned Minute

Aren't those the same people who were just saying that we shouldn't be talking to Iran?

The Voice Of A Generation Is Gravely Ill

It's hard to be too sad for a man who has had a great 92 year run but this is still hard news to see.

Legendary CBS anchorman Walter Cronkite, 92, long known as the "Most Trusted
Man in America," is gravely ill, according to multiple CBS News sources and
published reports.

Watching the work of a giant like Cronkite just serves to show the light weight of many of today's journalists.

Godspeed, Mr Cronkite.

Through The Looking Glass

Bruce Murphy and Mayor Barrett are both backing McBride who will, no doubt, claim in contradiction to the facts that those mean old Liberals are out to get her.

Journalists' ethics take a hit...again thanks to the Lecturer in Journalists' Ethics.

It gives another new meaning to the note on McBride's blogs: "Access granted by invitation only."

Scene From A Summer Night

Down at the gas station parking lot. Young stud on a hot bike is talking to a PYT while her friend leans against their car. PYT stands hipshot and grinning while the friend looks bored beyond belief.

The air smells of warm asphalt and the tang of gasoline and glows blue in the light of the canopy lights. For just a moment thirty-five years fell away from me.

Life is good.

No. I Ain't Feeling It

I probably won't start a recall campaign against Jim Sullivan for his vote on the budget. That'd be stupid.

The One Thing It Doesn't Mean

It doesn't matter if you're talking about a household, a corporation or a municipality. When a budget writer says, "Everything is on the table this time," the one thing of which you can be sure is that everything is not on the table.

Insert Heavy Sigh Here

One of my new Astronomy classmates wondered why, if Betelgeuse was so big, it didn't come between Earth and Jupiter periodically.

Another said she was taking the class because she wants to know more about Ares. She was born in Ares and wants to get a tattoo of the constellation but she's taking the class so she knows what it looks like before she does.

I despair.

Painting Himself Into A Corner

It's one thing to hope for the failure of the President it's quite another to position yourself at a point where the only way you can be vindicated is to hope for an attack on the US.

How To Make Their Heads Explode

Want some good sport? Just sneak up behind one of the red-meat true-believers and say, "Governor Baldwin."

Of Course It Was a "Dump" Truck

I got stuck behind a truck this morning that sported two messages on its endgate.

First was

"Save WI. Vote Doyle Out Now."

I presume that was his view of statewide politics. His other message was his own self-assessment.

"Old, Slow, and In The Way."

A clear realization of the Party of No.

Classless Busch

Check your outrage, not my spelling. This is a different classless Busch. But thanks for thinking of the ex.

See, it wasn't just any guitar that Busch whacked three times against the
ground before tossing the chipped steel instrument aside. No, it was a revered
Gibson Les Paul guitar that had been hand-painted by longtime NASCAR artist Sam Bass and has become the symbol of Nashville Speedway.

One of the worst insults my father used was to call someone a horse's ass. I heard his voice Saturday night.

Open Carry Picnic

Emphasis mine.

Since Obama has been president, the NRA has been getting what it wants,
no regulations and a censoring of reasonable, thoughtful debate. Meanwhile, the
children in Chicago keep getting mowed down, with three dozen school-age
children killed so far this year. Chicago police Superintendent Jody
Weis told CNN, "Take weapons such as assault rifles out of an urban area. I just
don't see a need for an assault rifle in the City of Chicago."

When Education Secretary Arne Duncan was running the Chicago public
schools, he told CNN, "If that happened to one of Chicago's wealthiest suburbs,
and God forbid it ever did, but if it was a child being shot dead every
two weeks . . . do you think the status quo would remain? There's no
way it would. All hell would break loose."

Prima Donnas At Play

Pete says that Sarah can't play in the same sandbox as Newt.

It’s the story of the day that GOP leaders have been battling over who’s to
blame for the fact that Palin was “snubbed” when she was disinvited from a
speaking role at the big fundraiser, which is for the two Congressional
committees, the NRCC and the NRSC. Politico laid
the blame on NRCC chief Sessions, claiming he didn’t want her to
upstage keynote speaker Newt
Gingrich, prompting a round of bitter finger-pointing.

Rush and Hugh don't want anybody to play with the General.

"In the effort to reverse this lurch beyond the farthest left fringe of
previous Democratic statist urges, individual Americans have a role to play.
They have to say no to GM products and services until such time as the
denationalization occurs," says Hugh
Hewitt. He acknowledges that this is a serious step that could hurt
people currently working for GM: "But there isn't any alternative,

The Party of kNOw, indeed. It's as if they have a pathological need to be loudly wrong.

Remember?

Do you remember all those wingers who were absolutely certain that Joe Biden would withdraw as a candidate for VP for "health reasons" just before the election so that Hilary Clinton could step into the spot?

Whatever happened with that?

Somebody Should Spend Less Time Watching TV...

...and more time working on their English.

Do you think Adam Lambert should of won American Idol

Just Sayin'

I love my twenty-eight year-old sons without equivocation but I still flinch a little if they have to drive one of my cars.

North Korea Dear Leader reportedly taps
26-year-old son as successor

Republican AG Says, "Do Whatever You Want To The Girl. Just Leave Me Alone."

Budget cuts for thee, but not for me says van Goodhair.

I say, cut his budget by $300 a week until he produces those terrorists training in upstate WI.

A Word To Brett Favre Regarding The Fine Line Between Fame And Futility

Braves release 305-game winner Tom Glavine

Ahem

Aren't those who seek a judicial overturning of Roe v Wade looking for empathy for their cause in the face of laws to the contrary?

Just askin'.

It's Not Just Judge Sotomayor

Most of these guys would be attacking any Obama pick for SCotUS. That makes it a lot easier to ignore them.

The good news is that Newt is getting an early start down the low road that wiped out John McCain's electability.

Do You Suppose?

Do you think that the originators of the TSA security procedures at the airport ever heard of the Maginot Line?

Do you suppose that they learned anything?