Planet of the Apes - Life Imitates Art

Some chimps in Sierra Leone attacked and killed some people.

 

Police don't know how the chimanzees escaped from the Tacugama Chimpanzee Sanctuary or why they attacked.

OBL and Me Don't Always See Eye to Eye

Courtesy of Al Jazeera comes the text of Osama Bin' Laden's latest rant...

 

My fave bits, with retorts:

 

OBL:  The West is incapable of recognising the rights of others. It will not be able to respect others' beliefs or feelings. The West still believes in ethnic supremacy and looks down on other nations. They categorise human beings into white masters and coloured slaves.

The Litvak:  Dude, Saudi Arabia abolished slavery in 1962.  Sudan still has slavery.

OBL:  [Racism] is why [the West created] the United Nations and the veto power ... . They regard jihad for the sake of God or defending one's self or his country as an act of terror. US and Europe consider jihad groups in Palestine, Chechnya, Iraq and Afghanistan as terrorist groups, so how could we talk or have understanding with them without using weapons?

The Litvak:  Uh, what?  What was the jihad group trying to say in Beslan, exactly?

OBL:  The ongoing injustice and aggression did not stop in the last nine decades, while all attempts to reclaim our rights and exact justice on the Israeli oppressors, were blocked by the leadership of the Crusaders and Zionists' alliance by using the so-called veto power.

The Litvak:  Wow; you're making me wish I had this "veto power."  Oh, wait.  No.  You're saying I do have it.  Sweet.  Watch your step, everyone!

OBL:  [The West's] rejection to Hamas has reaffirmed that they were waging a crusade against Islam.

The Litvak:  Uh...

OBL:  The US was not satisfied by all the sedition and crimes, but went on to incite sedition, the largest of which was the west Sudan sedition by exploiting some disputes between the tribes and sparking a savage war between them that will spare nothing, prior to sending in Crusader troops to occupy the region and steal its oil wealth under the pretext of peacekeeping.

The Litvak:  The U.S. did that?  Finally, we're gonna get something out of peacekeeping...

OBL:  Our objective is obvious, that is defending Islam, the people and the land but not Khartoum government since our differences with them are so enormous, mostly when it backtracked in implementing the Sharia law and abandoned south Sudan.

The Litvak:  Well, I didn't vote for them either, Osama.

OBL:  I urge the mujahidin to get acquainted with Darfur state tribes and land and its surroundings, keeping in mind that the region is about to face the rainy season that hampers means of transport.

The Litvak:  Thanks for the travel tip!  I'll pack galoshes.

OBL:  ...This is one of the reasons why the occupation was adjourned for six months. So it is imperative to speed up action and benefit from the time factor by stocking a large amount of landmines and anti-armour grenades such as RPGs [rocket propelled grenades].

The Litvak:  Right.  I'll stop droppin' bombs all ova' Brooklyn an' save some for Khartoum, yo!

OBL:  What was the aim of the pressure against Indonesia by the Crusaders countries until East Timor, 24 hours after a warning by the UN? A Crusader-Zionist-Hindu war against Muslims.

The Litvak:  I would never have guessed the answer to that one.  Are you saying we have the Hindus on our team now?  We are so gonna kick your butt in the next Crusader-Zionist-Hindu v. Umma cricket match.  It'll be close, anway.

OBL:  With respect to Pakistan, some Muslims have done a good job by assisting their fellow Muslims, God bless them, but the Pashtun tribes must be aided after the Pakistan army devastated their homes in Waziristan in order to satisfy the US.

The Litvak:  Come on, everything the people you don't like do is not "to satisfy the U.S."

OBL:  What does the silence over Russian atrocities inside Chechnya mean, along with mutilating their bodies by tying them to tanks while the so-called free world gives its blessings and even secretly supports the aggression ? This is a Zionist crusade.

The Litvaks:  Yes, the Russians do our bidding.  It all makes sense now.

OBL:  And the use of depleted uranium, besieging Iraq for years, causing the death of more than one million children which amazed all who had visited Iraq, including the Westerners themselves? It is a malicious crusade against Muslims.

The Litvak:  Depleted uranium killed one million Iraqi children? I am amazed.

OBL:  What about the continuous cultural domination through the setting up of radio stations and TV channels along with the Voice of America, London and others to continue the cultural domination of Muslims, combat our beliefs, change our values, encourage vice and even interfere with school curricula? 

The Litvak:  It's all true.  First we distract you with the uranium-child-megadeath, then we land the school curriculum change!  Wham-BAM!

OBL:  I think I'm falling for you, The Litvak.

The Litvak:  Gotta go.  Take a shower.

DNA, SchmeeNA

From an article from today's NYT about "recreational" genetic testing to determine the ethnicity of yer forebears:

Israeli authorities have so far denied John Haedrich what he calls his genetic birthright to citizenship without converting to Judaism. Under Israel's "law of return," only Jews may immigrate to Israel without special dispensation.

Mr. Haedrich, a nursing home director who was raised a Christian, found through a DNA ancestry test that he bears a genetic signature commonly found among Jews. He says his European ancestors may have hidden their faith for fear of persecution.

Rabbis, too, have disavowed the claim: "DNA, schmeeNA," Mr. Haedrich, 44, said the rabbi at a local synagogue in Los Angeles told him when he called to discuss it.

Undeterred, Mr. Haedrich has hired a lawyer to sue the Israeli government.

Please, Mr. Haedrich.  We are honored that you're so proud of your possibly Jewish ancestry-- but there's more to being Jewish than "Jewish genes," suing people, or moving to Israel.  Those are just stereotypes.

Why not start by going to a Holocaust-themed movie and eating Chinese food next Christmas?

 

On that note-- Happy Pesach, everyone.

Friedman's Asian Immigrant Fetish

Not to be outdone by Brooks's simple-minded column on immigration, Thos. Friedman pulls out all the stops with his metaphor-o-thon!: 

Gated Community:  When it comes to immigration, Friedman wants "a very high fence, with a very big gate."  That means tamperproof ID cards, which are like a fence you keep in your pocket if you want health care.

Sports Team:  Talented foreigners are "first-round intellectual draft choices."

Ye Age of Talente:  We now live in the "Talent Age, and countries that make it easy to draw in human talent will have a distinct advantage today."

Immigrants --> Cool Toys:  Switzerland's most famous invention is the lowly cuckoo clock because it is difficult to immigrate to Switzerland.  I suppose our most famous invention is the hamburger because we were savvy enough to open our shores...

Asian Immigrants are Economic Viagra:  The "huge pent-up aspirations" of China and India are like a shaken Champagne bottle -- "Don't get in the way of that cork. Immigrants keep that kind of energy flowing in America's veins."  Friedman is silent about what kind of wonder drug non-Asian immigrants might be.

Money quote #1:  "Porous borders empower only anti-immigrant demagogues, like the shameful CNN, which dumbs down the whole debate."  Pot, meet kettle.  Kettle, pot.

 

Money quote #2:  "...many [factory] jobs can now be done faster by a computer or cheaper by a Chinese worker."  Hah!  Friedman-- you admit there's a difference.  Gotcha!

Reading Newspaper May Cause Stupidity, Foaming at Mouth

David Brooks wades into the difficult and complicated immigration debate with this tripe (Times Select):

The anti-immigration crowd says this country is under assault. But if that's so, we're under assault by people who love their children.

Give me a break.  Even if Brooks is right about immigration, that is the single stupidest argument I've read in weeks.

In a world. On a plane. With snakes on it.

"Snakes on a Plane" will maybe be a little too self-consciously "B Movie" to be the best B Movie ever, but I am there.
Check out the unofficial movie blog (courtesy of F Train).

Thug Cops Nab Hero Coyote

Give 'em Hell, Hal!

Support the Municipality!

From Strongbad's excellent new Easter egg:

Hello there, Widdoo Killa'!

Habitat of the Florida panther disappearing, per NYT.  Booooring.

But wookit the baby panther!

Hewwo thea, Widdoo Killa'!

Firm Life a la OOTS

Rich Burlew, author of Order of the Stick (check my links, yo!), hits the nail on the head:

Sh*t Sandwich in Iraq

Holy crud.
NYT's excellent Robert F. Worth (husband of a friend of mine) reports that-- if I may borrow from "Full Metal Jacket" and paraphrase Worth-- the situation in Iraq is a sh*t sandwich, and we've all got to take a bite.

Everyone in Baghdad seems to be either in the Green Zone, blowing up civilians, or is a civilian getting blown up in a line for a job, kerosene, or whatever.

As I said about two months ago:

Split the country up already. Let the Baathists keep Baghdad, give the oil to the Shia and Kurds, keep around 30,000 troops in the Kurdish part to prevent civil war and discourage them from pissing off Turkey.

There's going to be massive dislocation, but, I mean, a committment to creating a democracy that incorporates the Sunnis and the Shiites is looking pretty naive.
I don't think Iraqis are stupid.
And an Iraqi who voted for someone who's espousing liberal democracy &c., rather than protecting members of his sect from mosque-bombing fanatics, would have to be stupid.

Democracy among groups that don't want to murder each other seems moderately feasible, but this? Narishkeit.

Hmm. Looking back on the page, I see I've strayed into politics.
Fine, then.

I do have a less political question for this post--

Has anyone noticed that the ratio of dead:wounded in these bombings always seems to be about 1:4.5?
Any grisly theories to explain it?

The Manticore Eyes You Tenderly...

So, the New York Times reports that Dungeons & Dragons ("D&D") is going online.

Some poor reporter had to go interview some grown men who play pen-and-paper D&D...

The night's dungeon master, Rich, tax director for a New York City company, would not divulge his last name out of what he described as professional discretion. "I play because I have a very creative mind and a very noncreative job," he said (though some tax experts might disagree). "So the game helps me balance it out. There is no creativity at the computer, because you're limited by what the programmers thought you might do. Here in person, I can react dynamically to the players and craft an adventure specifically for them."

i.e., players can have sex with mythological creatures.

Sam Weiss, 41, from the Bronx, leaned over a few dice and the erasable grid on the table that players use to lay out combat scenarios with miniature figures. "Computer games are inherently limited because they only give you a set number of options," he said. "In a game like this, what we can do is limited only by our minds."

Oh, the poor nymphs!  The unfortunate, uh, dryads!  I'm just glad they didn't include any pictures.

Oh, wait. -->

Alack, mermaids.  Very sorry, valkyries.

I'd've Called it the "Lesser Litvak's Beaver-Otter"

Paleontologists in that dusty part of China where all the fossils hang out have discovered a fossil of the earliest known swimming mammal. 

164 million years of swimming mammals.

Represent.

Looking like a miniature (1-2 lbs.) cross between a beaver and an otter, they named it the "Otver."  Well, actually, Castorcauda lustrasimilis, which amounts to the same thing.

My question is, I guess, did it really have a fin?:

What's Dark and Purple and Full of Torture?

Abu Grape.

 

Honestly.  The New York Times, reporting on the recently-released pictures of torture from Abu Ghraib, fits a megillah's worth of stupid into a little paragraph:

The prisoner-abuse scandal has been acutely embarrassing for the United States military, whose members are taught to treat prisoners with respect. The incidents at Abu Ghraib were considered especially damaging to the United States' image among Iraqi civilians and in the wider Arab world, where nudity is disdained.

"[W]hose members are taught to treat prisoners with respect." 

Okay, they have clearly failed that course.

 

And sex-themed torture hurts our reputation because ... nudity is disdained in the Arab world?

 

Do I need a punchline here?  Yecch.

 

 

Elements of Strategy #1: Don't Start a Pissing Match You Can't Win

Check this out:  Catfight!

The perfect illustration of a basic element of strategy:  Don't start a pissing match you can't win.

Plus, funny.

 

I'm linking to cats now.  I feel so... Litotical.

This Is Not a Time for You to Be Speaking

From CNN: 

Proclaiming "I am al Qaeda," Zacarias Moussaoui [ed:  the suspected 9/11 hijacker who couldn't make it that day] was removed from the courtroom as jury selection began Monday at a trial to determine whether he should be executed for terror conspiracy.

***
The disruption began with Moussaoui protesting that he did not want to be represented by his defense attorneys.
"I am al Qaeda. They do not represent me. They are Americans," Moussaoui objected.
U.S. District Court Judge Leonie M. Brinkema told Moussaoui that "this was not a time for him to be speaking."
***
About 120 prospective jurors who witnessed the outburst sat in silence.
***
After the interruption, Brinkema told potential jurors to note on their questionnaires if they thought Moussaoui's actions might influence their decision-making.

I suppose the answer would be, uh... what?  Would the defendant's declaration that he "[is] al Qaeda" influence my decision-making?

Hmm.  If I told you it wouldn't influence my decision about whether to, say, let someone watch my luggage before I get on a plane that he says he's al Qaeda, would you let me fly?

Of course not.  Someone with that level of opacity can't leave town-- we need him to serve on a jury.

The Wages of Sin Is Now $145,000 a Year Before Bonus

Today's New York Law Journal reports that Sullivan & Cromwell has boosted first year associates' salaries to $145,000 a year before bonuses.

The raise, says the article, mostly shifts compensation toward salary and away from year-end bonuses.

Partner Benjamin Stapleton "said the firm was 're-balancing' its mix of base pay and bonus in recognition of the fact that most associates lived day-to-day on their salaries."

Wow. 

Even living in New York City, saving none of $125,000 a year while you wait for your $40,000 bonus seems kind of obscene.

 

Also, this means I'll probably be able to pay off my debt a little faster, when my firm follows suit.

I'm Rich!

Well, I've been corresponding with a guy in Liberia since last June.
He's promised me a cut of several million dollars if I help him in some unspecified way to move the money to the U.S.
I'm embarrassed to say I believed he was a scam artist, but now I know he was telling the truth when he said his poisoned father bequeathed him a bunch of money and told him to flee to the States and, get a college education.
Why do I believe? Because today he e-mailed me this:

Looks legit to me. Where do I mail my bank account number?

You Got Your Chocolate in My Peanut Butter!

New York Times! 

Look.  I didn't vote for Bush, either.  But I'm not running the most esteemed newspaper in the world.

Does this really belong in a news article:?

 

Yet even as Haiti prepares to pick its first elected president since the rebellion two years ago, questions linger about the circumstances of Mr. Aristide's ouster — and especially why the Bush administration, which has made building democracy a centerpiece of its foreign policy in Iraq and around the world, did not do more to preserve it so close to its shores .

 

[my italics]

 

This isn't even close to the first time, either. You gotta learn to, you know, think some things that you don't write.

Even the rabid Wall Street Journal op-ed page doesn't leak onto the news.

 

Tsk. Tsk.

Separated at Birth:

Osama and Junior Gorg?