"Afghanistan has once more earned the title, “Graveyard of Empires.”

"The genius of Mail Online is that it has figured out exactly how to package stupid content for smart people. And surprise, surprise – we can’t get enough of it."

"The technique, which does not use genetic modification, instead pinpoints naturally occurring DNA that which confer specific qualities in a plant.Armed with this knowledge, breeders can then use classic methods to splice these genes into an existing strain."

-classic!

“Around the game, Burnett has become the symbol for wasted money,” said an AL East scout who also believes the Yankees will have to eat at least $20 million. “When you’ve got a guy who has managed to pitch below .500 (34-35) for a team with the Yankees offense, yeah, it’ll make you apprehensive. This is the question now being asked, even about guys like Oswalt and Jackson. How much do you pay for mediocrity?”

RIP

"a new Liberal government will legalize marijuana and ensure the regulation and taxation of its production, distribution, and use, while enacting strict penalties for illegal trafficking, illegal importation and exportation, and impaired driving." -i know, promises,promises,but, one can dream!

scroop: -the rustling of silk

"Over the past 30 years, the Republican rightwing has become joined at the hip with Israel’s hard right Likud Party, hence the emergence of so-called “Christian Zionists” who are cynically exploited by Israel’s Likud Party even though a generation ago their fathers may have belong to the racist, Jewish-hating Ku Klux Klan.In short, (Iowa is), fertile ground for the Republican party’s far right. We are reminded of the great American writer Upton Sinclair, who wrote in the 1930’s “When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying the cross.”

-"About 90 prisoners have been cleared for transfer out of Guantánamo. Some of them are from countries like Syria or China — where they would face torture if sent home — or Yemen, which the United States considers unstable. And so they sit as captives, with no end in sight — not because they are dangerous, not because they attacked America, but because the stigma of Guantánamo means they have no place to go, and America will not give a home to even one of them. "

"He was a depressed 20-year-old whose hobby was faking suicide in vain bids for his mother's attention. But then he met the world's oldest Manic Pixie Dream Girl and learned to enjoy life and risk heartbreak. Their unlikely romance, 'Harold and Maude,' flopped at the box office when it was released 40 years ago today (on December 20, 1971), yet the movie became one of the most beloved cult hits of all time."

"The 550-pound bear that was found hiding out in a New Jersey basement had been living there for weeks."

-fantastic!

"So while I don't want to have to change out of my pajamas to go shopping, either, and I fully expect the goods I order off the internet to materialize at my front door in about the amount of time it would take them to be transported from the Starship Enterprise, I'm just sayin'. Like I tell people who are unfortunate enough to be friends with me: It's worth considering how the hell those goods get to you, so fast, and for free, when the company you bought them from is posting profits in the millions, or even, in the case of Amazon, billions. Chances are, it's via the people who worked for the small businesses we ruined when we were saving $4 by buying stuff off the internet, people performing dangerously repetitive or otherwise ergonomically unsound jobs in a cold, shitty, emotionally abusive warehouse for very little money and very few benefits, the kind of conditions people endure only because it's their last resort. It's worth considering, because one of the reasons those conditions can so widely prevail is that no one ever does."

"Consider this rather dramatic contrast: when 300 liberals are arrested during an anti-Putin protest in faraway Moscow, the New York Times splashes the news onto its front page. But when 700 radicals are arrested in an anti-Wall Street rally in New York itself, the Times virtually ignores them, pushing the news onto its obscure ‘City Room Blog’.
The difference in framing between these two items is particularly remarkable. First of all, there’s the title: “Moscow Moves to Quell Second Day of Anti-Putin Protests.” Compare the laden term “to quell”, which implies an authoritarian type of crackdown, with the following matter-of-fact statement: “Police Arrest More Than 700 Protesters on Brooklyn Bridge.”

"While tensions continue to grow between the federal government and the First Nations community of Attawapiskat, National Chief for the Assembly of First Nations Shawn Atleo says civil disobedience is one form of action that could be used to draw attention to the current crisis."

"Tommaso, a four-year-old, one-time stray from Rome, is thought to have become the world's richest cat.
Since the death of his 94-year-old mistress last month, he has become a property magnate — or perhaps mognate — with flats and houses worth an estimated €10m scattered from Milan in the north to Calabria in the south."

"The tabloids used to be adept at whipping the public into an infuriated frenzy: now we do it to ourselves. The results can be startling. An outbreak of Twitter rage helped finish off the News of the World as users bombarded advertisers to demand they take a stand. Many would view that as positive (and fitting, given the paper’s history of playing to the mob). "

"Allowing women to drive in Saudi Arabia would cause rampant sex, porn and homosexuality, according to some of the country's scholars. "

"The federal department responsible for First Nations has known about the worsening living conditions at Attawapiskat for years, says former Indian Affairs Minister Chuck Strahl.
In an interview with CBC Radio's The House, Strahl tells host Evan Solomon the crisis at Attawapiskat "has been a slow moving train-wreck for a long time."
However, the current Minister of Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development John Duncan said this week that officials in his department were unaware of Attawapiskat's housing problems until Oct. 28, despite having visited the community several times in the past year."

-Effin facebook!

"Horses could soon be butchered in the U.S. for human consumption after Congress quietly lifted a 5-year-old ban on funding horse meat inspections, and activists say slaughterhouses could be up and running in as little as a month."

"New documents obtained by The Canadian Press under the Access to Information Act directly contradict published claims by Stephen Harper's chief spokesman that bureaucrats have not been directed to replace the words Government of Canada with "Harper Government" in departmental news releases and backgrounders."

"Did you know that Florida has the second-highest population of homeless veterans? Seventeen thousand of them, and Scott cut their services, too. I was in Florida last month, and I didn't meet one single person who wants to reelect him, so at least it's likely that he's a one-termer."

"The original plan to dominate Iraq’s oil and set up US bases there to rule the Mideast has so far failed, and at titanic cost. As we look back on this epic folly and again hear calls for war against Iran, we hear the famed words of King Pyrrhus of Epirus, “one more such victory and we are lost."

-wonderful interview re:career of Nicky Hopkins -you have all heard him. -just may not have known it!

"A dinner host in the 17th century might have wished for a usage manual — a different term was used for carving each dish, and, according to Samuel Orchart Beeton, “for a person to use wrong terms in relation to carving was an unpardonable affront to etiquette.”

"A lot of discretion is left in the hands of police officers, and as you well know, on the West Coast there's a fair degree of sympathy for low visibility, quiet, domestic producers of slightly mind-altering substances for family consumption,"

"Only two smaller Pacific Northwest grocery chains - Haggen and Metropolitan Market - both selling honey without pollen, weren't bashful about the source of their honey. Haggen said right off that its brand comes from Golden Heritage. Metropolitan Market said its honey - Western Family - is packed by Bee Maid Honey, a co-op of beekeepers from the Canadian provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia."

-this is just wrong!

"Wasted $1 trillion in the futile Iraq war? Being defeated by medieval Afghan tribesmen? Can’t pay your bills at home or abroad? Government paralyzed? Worried about China?
What’s the answer? Simple.
A new little war in Africa."

"There is no card in Monopoly that advises a player to stab another."

"The New York Times did what I was not allowed to do - tell you there has been a second diagnosis of Infectious Salmon Anemia virus in wild BC salmon, this time in the Fraser River itself, the biggest wild salmon river in the world."-A.Morton

"Surprise surprise - after years of rumours, infectious salmon anaemia has finally been confirmed here in B.C.Despite the salmon farming industry's smoke and mirrors the smoking gun leads straight back to the Norwegian-owned companies who control 92% of B.C.'s salmon farms."

Read more: http://www.canada.com/Ottawa+must+close+open+salmon+farms/5572035/story.html#ixzz1bKRJ8Qy1

"Everyone knows there are only two kinds of men who feel the need to drive fast: professional racers and the poorly endowed."

"Ever since the days of George W. Bush, US policy in the Muslim world has been driven by a combination of imperial arrogance and profound ignorance. Well, here we go again with Pakistan. Hardly any senior members of the Obama administration understand complex Pakistan."

-i am against the pipeline in the first place, and, it certainly is on the wrong side of Nebraska as well.

"Insite saves lives. Its benefits have been proven. There has been no discernable negative impact on the public safety and health objectives of Canada during its eight years of operation," the ruling said, written by chief justice Beverly McLachlin.

-free Tibet!

"A woolly rhino fossil dug up on the Tibetan Plateau is believed to be the oldest specimen of its kind yet found. "

"The Republican world view is a mash-up of Orwell's 1984 and It's a Wonderful Life – with 'doublethink' at its heart"

-"Aquarium staff were baffled when the 8.8lb giant gourami called Gary rejected normal food after being donated to them.Then the previous owners of the exotic Asian freshwater fish admitted feeding it only with the chocolate-covered wafers. "

"What sort of half-arsed half-measure is that? Cold logic dictates that the only way to turn capital punishment into an effective deterrent is to make each killing as drawn-out and public as possible. Maximum agony, maximum publicity. Anything less is a cop-out – and death penalty supporters should have the stones to say so. Stop this placatory talk about breaking people's necks gently with rope. Go the whole hog."

"The news coverage of the Norway mass-killings was fact-free conjectureLet's be absolutely clear, it wasn't experts speculating, it was guessers guessing – and they were terrible"

“The Stampede's claims to have made the race safer have been proven false,” society spokesman Peter Fricker said at the time.“It is totally unacceptable to continue this event when horse after horse is dying just to entertain a crowd.”

"The results show that angry crows don't just recognize individual tormentors, but they share that information with friends and family. Most notably: They remember it for years and years and years -- even when the person in the caveman mask appears far away from the scene of the original crime."

"While they were beating us, I screamed: "What are you doing?" They responded: "Shut up, slut." I did not feel fear then, and I do not feel fear now. I feel anger that innocent people became victims of overt and unnecessary violence."

-another indictment of the Yankistani health care system!

"Well, it's not the end of the world, Chester."

"the media has ensured that she will continue to get enormous contracts from rightwing TV channels and public speaking events because she is, clearly, a news agenda setter. And that is because the news covers her. Because she's a news agenda setter. She's like an Escher drawing without the skill."

"At the time of writing, if you type "Lady Gaga" into Google, the top result is the Mail's "see-through dress" story, full of smutty pictures. Must they fling this filth at impressionable young kids? Won't somebody at the Mail please, for once, just think of the children?" -yep, always a paragon of virtue is the Daily Mail! ;)

"Athletes earn astronomical sums because that's how society has chosen to reward them. It's wonky and demented, and I don't understand it, but that's the way it is. Corporations, the media and the public have somehow conspired to create that environment. They designed, dug and filled the ornamental fishpond: now they complain when the goldfish shit in the water."

mendaciloquent
adj. able to tell skilled or artful lies

"Me: “I just don’t think ‘The Weed Fanatics” is a good name for the business.”
Client: “What do you mean? It’s to-the-point. And it makes us sound like we’re really intense about gardening and weed removal.”
Me: “I just think some people might…”
Client: “What?”
Me: “Some people might think you’re talking about Marijuana.”
Client: “Only the potheads. Every good citizen knows that when I say I’m crazy about weeds, I mean business.”

-"in 1971 a corrupt bank occupied a building that straddled the border, which permitted it to avoid being searched by the authorities of either state. The Belgian tax department couldn’t reach the safe, which lay behind “Dutch” counters. And the Dutch authorities could pass the counters but couldn’t open the safe, which was “Belgian.” Finally, authorities from both states undertook to search the premises in a joint effort, and the bank was eventually declared bankrupt after investigations into the laundering of drug money."

-FRENCH POLITICS IS A FILM NOIRE-"Strauss-Kahn is expected to step down shortly as head of the International Monetary Fund and announce his run for president."
He may step down for another reason and probably won't run for Prezzie for the same.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/15/nyregion/imf-head-is-arrested-and-accused-of-sexual-attack.html?_r=1&hp

-to slaughter that many elephants,(or any), should warrant a life time sentence!!

"Apparently corpsy (that’s my new name for him) was homeless *GASP* for some time which is nothing less than shocking considering
A) the employment rate in Montreal is so freaking fantastic and
B) Who in God’s name wouldn’t give a job to a dude with rot-face permanently etched into his visage?"

"For much of the past decade, the Iranian government has tolerated what it considers a particularly depraved and un-Islamic vice: the keeping of pet dogs."

"Erstikaitis was once a self-professed admirer of Paul Bernardo and even stalked the convicted schoolgirl killer.In 1999, her obsession drove her to call -- and threaten to kill -- Debbie Mahaffy, the mother of Leslie Mahaffy, who was brutally murdered by Bernardo almost a decade earlier"

-"they've created a sort of self-perpetuating stupidity whirlpool capable of engulfing any loose molecules of logic within a six-mile radius."

-The subject of modest cuts from the sacred cow of military spending is being timidly raised by politicians of both parties. But they are terrified of being accused of the ultimate sin in hyperpatriotic US politics, being unpatriotic and “not supporting our boys.”

-- " ..but the United States-and history-do not look favorably upon tyrants who murder their own people, unless they do it in Bahrain and Yemen and kill them in acceptably low numbers........"

-divorces, Madoff and steroids, oh my! -baseball you are my favourite but sometimes resemble an afternoon soap!!

-"he makes Mulroney a buffoonish yet tragic figure" -always thought Mulroney was a buffoon - buffoons with power have always scared me!!

"It is, to date, the largest accidental marine oil spill in the history of the petroleum industry. BP has used at least 1.9 million gallons of toxic dispersants to sink the oil, in an effort the oil giant claimed was aimed at keeping the oil from reaching shore.Critics believe the chemical dispersants were used simply to hide the oil and minimise BP's responsibility for environmental fines."

WTF?

-amazing how banks can commit crimes, get bailed out to the tune of billions of $s and are still allowed to foreclose on people who were conned!

“We venture no comment on the evidence,” the editors write. “Our readers will appreciate it for themselves. Whatever be their interpretation of the facts, they will, at least, allow that in them there is something of the marvellous.”

lipwisdom
n. wisdom in talk without practice
“It is easier to be wise for others than for ourselves.” — La Rochefoucauld

"Two cheeseburgers, apple pie, a cigarette and a pretty girl was all he wanted," Mr Southard said
RIP!

-role models eh!

"A Tibetan Buddhist monk has burned himself to death in western China, triggering a street protest against government controls, according to a group campaigning for Tibetan self-rule."

-fuck the eu!!!-don't mess with my chocolate!!

"CAIRO Feb 13 (Reuters) - Egypt's new military rulers will issue a warning on Sunday against anyone who creates "chaos and disorder", an army source said.The Higher Military Council will also ban meetings by labour unions or professional syndicates, effectively forbidding strikes, and tell all Egyptians to get back to work after the unrest that toppled Hosni Mubarak."

"And in the aftermath of CUBE DX-9's inevitable election to the highest office in the land, political leaders worldwide would be clamouring for an inscrutable impersonal shell of their own. Before long there'd be a Chilean mayor who rolls around inside a gigantic onyx egg, and a German chancellor who consists of nothing but a runic symbol flickering on a monitor accompanied by a vaguely menacing drone.
And we'll all feel much better about our elected masters. Yes we will. Stop lying. We will."

"Marcy Moriarty says they will be interested to find the mass grave mentioned in the documents.
She says this has been truly difficult to learn of....
".......that description where he notes that one of the dogs he thought had been killed was crawling around in this mass grave.....honestly I had to put down the story then."
She says it's a dirty secret of the industry that so many dogs are bred purely out of greed."

"Phone-hacking. Hidden mics. Heavily publicised show trials for citizens holding private conversations. This is beyond snooping in the public interest. This is the world of the Stasi. And rather than protecting us, reporters are sitting there in headphones, making notes."

"PHOENIX - In a brazen attempt reminiscent of a medieval siege, Mexican smugglers tried to use a hefty catapult to hurl drugs north over the U.S. Border"- nice try ;)

"He said, “I never did like that bird.”-;)

"The Serengeti, once gone, will never return. The potential for collapse of the entire ecosystem exists, should the Serengeti Highway ever become a reality. "

"I'm not entirely certain I can pinpoint the moment I first realised EastEnders isn't a documentary. Maybe it was when Den Watts was assassinated by a bunch of daffodils. Or when he came back from the dead and then got killed again."

"Charlie Brooker has scoured through a whole year's worth of cultural detritus to test your knowledge of what was really important during the last 12 months."

"A Toronto police officer has been charged with assault in relation to the arrest and alleged beating of a G20 protester."

"So 2010 has slithered past, leaving a gooey trail of memories in its wake. As befits the opening page of a new decade, it was a year with a markedly transitional feel. A tainted old era full of Gordon Brown and Big Brother came to an end, paving the way for a fresh haul of new, improved bullshit."

-Joyeux Noel to all!!

my favourite Christmas Angel!

"WikiLeaks is at least doing in part what America’s elected leaders and supposed free media should have been doing: telling citizens what’s really going on. Let’s see what other squirmy secrets will be exposed when the next rock is turned over."

Canadian actor Leslie Nielsen died Sunday at the age of 84. RIP!

"How can you keep a straight face while describing the raw panic that gripped our fair town to someone from, say, Calgary, where last weekend they sold out an outdoor football game in minus-25 weather? Or Edmonton, which had the (unconfirmed) distinction of being the second coldest place on the planet, after the South Pole?"

A little girl asked George Ade, “Does M-I-R-A-G-E spell marriage?”

He said, “Yes.”

"A painting by Roy Lichtenstein has sold at auction for $42.6m (£26.4m) - a new record for the US 'pop artist'.
The cartoon-style painting, sold to an anonymous telephone bidder at Christie's in New York, features a woman on the phone with a speech bubble containing the title."

"Have you experienced 3D telly yet? Don't worry if you haven't, because so far it's powerfully underwhelming: the very definition of a step backward disguised as a leap forward. Consider this a warning from the future."

-"a wife saver" it says! ;)

"nullibiety n. the state of being nowhere" -been there! ;)

"Scottish lairds and grouse moor owners face £5,000 fines or jail terms if they allow their gamekeepers to illegally kill birds of prey, under tough new measures tabled today.The powers would, for the first time in the UK, make landowners directly liable for wildlife crimes committed by their employees, after an upsurge in cases where rare birds of prey have been deliberately killed to protect grouse stocks on shooting estates."

-which really is too bad!

"Maybe all your future dreams will simply consist of a gigantic mouth shouting the words "DIET COKE" over and over until you wake up in tears, and immediately reach for a Diet Coke, hands quivering, without really understanding why.
In fact, yes. That's PRECISELY what's going to happen."

"Right-wing Republicans will press for more war, in more places – financed, of course, by the magic of credit. Few stop to think that this manic borrowing it wrecking America."

"This could quite possibly be the best baseball promotion ever. No, it definitely is the best baseball promotion ever."

"Next week: Clegg defends his decision to force the Chilean miners back underground, claims 2 Unlimited were better than the Beatles, and explains why the coalition's proposed oxygen-rationing scheme will usher in an age of peace and prosperity for all."

"The town's mayor, Jose Luis Guerrero, said she was the most qualified of a handful of applicants for a job, which in many parts of Mexico is considered tantamount to a death sentence."