Month: January 2011

Headlines Humor 1

Humorous tweaks on recent News Headlines, from our favorite Massachusetts Liberal.

WORLD NEWS

Hu Assures U.S. That China is No Threat

“If you can’t trust your banker, who can you trust?”

Embodiment of Evil Baby Doc Duvalier Makes Surprise and Unwelcome Return to Haiti

Came back for the Tonton Macoute reunion.

ALSO IN THE NEWS . . .

Floating Ark Hotel Will Survive Global Ecological Disaster

Offers guests the ultimate in luxury after everyone else has perished.

 

U. S. NEWS

Poll: Americans Overwhelmingly Approve Most Provisions in New Health Law

But desperately want it repealed, according to Republicans

House GOP Group Proposes to Trim Budget by $2.5 Trillion

They’d begin by cutting taxes.

Jeff Immelt Appoints Obama as Key Advisor

Latest move in pro-government tilt for General Electric

Hu Returns to China With Deal For 200 Jets, Other Goods

In return, we get to keep two giant pandas for a little while longer.

Alabama Governor: Non-Christians “Are Not My Brothers”

Back at ya, Gov. Y’all are more like weird, annoying cousins.

MISCELLANEOUS

Study: Claims That Most Couples Argue on Thursday Nights at 8

7 Central. But consult your local listings.

PEOPLE

Italian PM Berlusconi Denies Wrongdoing

Says he didn’t know that the teenage prostitute that he didn’t have sex with was underage at the time they didn’t have sex.

 

MEDIA

Fed Okays Comcast Purchase of NBC

Gains control of Conan’s masturbating bear, among other “intellectual property” assets.

KEITH OLBERMANN LEAVES MSNBC

Who he calls “the worst people in the world.”

BUSINESS

$4 Gasoline, $5 Coffee Predicted

Some may choose to take the bus, drink gasoline.

Goldman Sachs Reports 53% Drop in Earnings

Send your bailout check to: Goldman Sachs, 200 West Street, New York, NY 10282.

Starbucks to Debut 31-oz “Trenta” Cup Size

Trenta means “thirty” . . . or in this context “far too much” in Italian.

SCIENCE

Scientists Find New Life Forms in Unexpected Places

For instance, the back of your refrigerator.

Kangaroos Originated in South America

Island-hopped to Australia.

Researchers Successfully Test Tiny Remote- Controlled Ingestible Capsule

Pill packed with camera, transmitter and three miniaturized researchers, one of them quite beautiful (sorry – you probably have to be my age to get this one).

HEALTH / MEDICINE

Study: 129 Million Americans Under 65 Have Preexisting Conditions

They all suffer from delusions.

Study: Education Helps Slow Dementia

And vice versa.

TECHNOLOGY

Defense Contractors Developing Optically Camouflaged “Invisible” Tanks

Eventually they’ll make consumer version for soccer moms.

 

Pew Study: The Internet Is Not Destroying Society

Finds it was already ruined.

LIFESTYLE

Study: Attractive People Have Higher IQs

Study was apparently funded by attractive people. Still, to be safe, you might want to ask the homely nerd for help with your homework.

CRIME

Biggest Single-day Mafia Take-Down In History: Bobby Glasses, Vinny Carwash, Jack the Whack, Junior Lollipops Indicted

But SpongeBob Squarepants, Donald Duck, Turkey Lurkey, and Chuck E. Cheese lawyer up and walk.

EDUCATION

Half of All Students Learn Nothing in First Two Years of College

The other half learns nothing in last two years.

ADVERTISING

Rush Limbaugh “Straight Shooter” Billboard Removed From Tucson Highway

NRA calls removal “unwarranted and ill-advised.”

 

FACTOID

Average American Spent 34 Hours Sitting in Traffic Last Year

Doesn’t count drivers who left their cars in the middle of the highway, engine running, never to return.

TRAVEL

Tourists Name Los Angeles Rudest City

Especially people who live at addresses mistakenly listed on “star maps”.

NEW PRODUCTS

It’s a $7350 Toilet!

Some of us spend half our lives sitting on one, so why not sit on the very best of thrones?  http://technolog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/01/19/5877807-high-tech-toilet-is-super-luxe-and-super-expensive?pc=25&sp=25

What makes this toilet different from every other toilet on the market? Price. $7350, at Snap-a-Fish.

Some Amusing Twitter Tweets Floating Through Cyberspace During Obama’s SOTU address

“Congrats, parents of America. All of your Baby Einstein toys and your posh suburban preschools, and your kids are still the dumbest (bleep)s born in generations. Way to go.”

OBAMA: “If you want to make a difference in the life of a child, become a teacher!”

Or an X-Box 360! Whichever!

“I always thought Boehner’s tan was a vanity issue. But now I realize that it’s leather chair camouflage.”

“America will seize its ‘Sputnik moment’ as soon as it’s finished watching Jersey Shore.”

“How low have our politics sunk that people are congratulating themselves for sitting next to each other?”

“Oh hey, look! – there’s a bunch of a**holes in suits sitting around talking about sh*t that’ll never get done!”

“Boehner’s tear duct tampons seemed to have worked well tonight. ”

“This sh*t isn’t going to run long and cut into Cougar Town is it???”

BREAKING NEWS Boehner Declares End to Civility: ‘Our Long National Nightmare is Over’

“The Tea Party needs a leader with more credibility than Michele Bachmann. I nominate Snooki”

“Michele Bachmann will push Tea Party agenda, including ‘Don’t Add, Don’t Spell’.”

“What the hell is Bachmann looking at? She looks like one of those “eyes following you” paintings, but with a corporation behind it! She’s probably looking off-camera at Sarah Palin’s hand”

This Just In!

  • Hundreds of federal agents rounded up by mob
  • Baby Doc sublets Paris apartment to Noriega
  • White House honors Hu with takeout state dinner
  • Apple sees Jobsless recovery
  • Weather forces birds to cancel all flights
  • Outback Steakhouses sues Outback Outhouses
  • Deregulation blamed for fewer regulations
  • Bullies beat expectations

The Auto Plant of the Future that Ford Built in Brazil

Unless the Unions in the “Rust Belt” will allow efficient factories, like this one, be built, they will never be able to globally  compete.

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Dog for Sheep Herding Now Sheep For the Dog

Once upon a time, Americans got dogs for their sheep. Now they get sheep for their dogs. “I never dreamed it would go this far,” says Ms. Foster, 56 years old.

Border collies, first bred along the frontier between England and Scotland, are compulsive herders, with instincts so intense they sometimes search for livestock behind the television when sheep appear on screen, says Geri Byrne, owner of the Border Collie Training Center, in Tulelake, Calif.

Herding experts—yes, there is such a thing—say it’s increasingly common for people who get border collies as pets to wind up renting or buying sheep just to keep their dogs busy. “It’s something that’s snowballing all the time,” says Jack Knox, a Scottish-born shepherd who travels the U.S. giving herding clinics.

Each day, an average of 18 dogs visit Fido’s Farm outside Olympia, Wash., their owners paying $15 per dog to practice on the farm’s 200-head flock of sheep. Herding revenue at the farm is up 60% over the past five years, says owner Chris Soderstrom, who bought the farm in 2004.

WSJ commenter Christina Kielich wrote:

As Donald McCaig, the famous dog writer, has said, if you don’t give your dog a job, he’ll find one, and chances are you won’t like it. I know of people who left their border collie in the kitchen to go to a movie and came back to find their entire tile floor chewed up.

via In a Tale That Wags Dog Owners, They Rent Flocks for Bored Collies – WSJ.com.

What Happend to Civilty and Modesty?

The problem is that over the past 40 years or so we have gone from a culture that reminds people of their own limitations to a culture that encourages people to think highly of themselves. The nation’s founders had a modest but realistic opinion of themselves and of the voters. They erected all sorts of institutional and social restraints to protect Americans from themselves. They admired George Washington because of the way he kept himself in check.

But over the past few decades, people have lost a sense of their own sinfulness. Children are raised amid a chorus of applause. Politics has become less about institutional restraint and more about giving voters whatever they want at that second. Joe DiMaggio didn’t ostentatiously admire his own home runs, but now athletes routinely celebrate themselves as part of the self-branding process.

In a famous passage, Reinhold Niebuhr put it best: “Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; therefore, we must be saved by hope. … Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; therefore, we are saved by love. No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as it is from our standpoint. Therefore, we must be saved by the final form of love, which is forgiveness.”

via Tree of Failure – NYTimes.com.

Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior

What Chinese parents understand is that nothing is fun until you’re good at it. To get good at anything you have to work, and children on their own never want to work, which is why it is crucial to override their preferences. This often requires fortitude on the part of the parents because the child will resist; things are always hardest at the beginning, which is where Western parents tend to give up. But if done properly, the Chinese strategy produces a virtuous circle. Tenacious practice, practice, practice is crucial for excellence; rote repetition is underrated in America. Once a child starts to excel at something—whether it’s math, piano, pitching or ballet—he or she gets praise, admiration and satisfaction. This builds confidence and makes the once not-fun activity fun. This in turn makes it easier for the parent to get the child to work even more.

via Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior – WSJ.com.

‘Great Garbage Patch’ in the Pacific Ocean Exaggerated

Claims that the “Great Garbage Patch” between California and Japan is twice the size of Texas is “grossly exaggerated” said the research which reckons it is more like one per cent the size.

Further reports that the oceans are filled with more plastic than plankton, and that the patch has been growing tenfold each decade since the 1950s are equally misleading, the new research claimed.

In reality it often cannot even be seen from the deck of a passing boat, said the latest analysts from the Oregon State University professor of oceanography Angelicque White.

Recent research by scientists at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution found that the amount of plastic, at least in the Atlantic Ocean, hasn’t increased since the mid-1980s – despite greater production and consumption of materials made from plastic, she pointed out.

via ‘Great Garbage Patch’ in the Pacific Ocean not so great claim scientists – Telegraph.

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