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I know you've been asking "Matt, name me one way in which the Gulf oil spill could get unimaginably worse." To which I give you this answer: a hurricane.
That's right, a massive hurricane right in the Gulf. To properly scare you even further, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration came up with a chart showing all the hurricanes that have passed directly over the spill area... which, to be fair, constitutes most of the Gulf. Oh yes, this is scientific based fear mongering. The best kind.
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Think it can't get worse than that? How about if some one uses a flamethrower to ignite the oil saturated hurricane and the resulting explosion turns it into a whirling Category 5 hellstorm/malevolent inferno?
OK, that probably can't happen outside of a Roland Emmerich or Michael Bay "film", but then again, a few months back I bet we all thought that a bunch of limeys couldn't possibly ever figure out a way to empty out all the contents of the earth into the Gulf of Mexico. I'm just saying that Hurricane Lucifer is a possibility. Prepare yourself.
We all know the scenarios in which a nuclear attack might be authorized: some other country's nukes are in the air or about to be in the air, we've been hit with a nuclear or large scale biological attack of our own, to kill some large nuclear irradiated monster created as a result of nuclear testing, to surprise Japan for the third time, and because a highly intelligent supercomputer from the seventies thinks it's playing a strategic war game with it's creator.
"If in fact there is a nation who is compliant with all of the rules ahead of time and they've complied with the United Nations on nuclear proliferation, if they fire against the United States a biological weapon, a chemical weapon or maybe a cyber attack, well then we aren't going to be firing back with nuclear weapons," Bachmann said. "Doesn't that make us all feel safe?"
“No!” shouted the crowd of thousands in Minneapolis.
Or maybe a cyber attack? Did anyone see the movie Hackers and think "Surely this is grounds for an atomic strike"? I mean Fisher Stevens was evil in that movie, but not that evil.
Well at least we know what the Bachmann Doctrine will be for her upcoming candidacy on the Palin ticket: guessing her e-mail password, a "denial of service" attack, references to "hax0rz" or "l33t skillz", or the unwanted posting of porn on a non-porn webpage will be met with the full force of America's nuclear arsenal. As it should be.
Today the United States and Russia signed a new nuclear arms reduction pact. It was a stirring ceremony where President Obama strode to the stage, took the irrepressibly tiny Dmitri Medvedev out of his right front pocket, set him on a toadstool, patted him on the head, and went and sat at his chair. Medvedev looked over to Vladimir Putin who flashed a thumbs up and released Medvedev's children from the secret location he was holding them, and the treaty was signed.
The treaty, if ratified, would require each country to deploy no more than 1,550 strategic warheads (down from 2,200), each would be limited to 800 total land, air and sea-based launchers (down from 1,600 permitted under the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty of 1991), and would re-implement a inspection regime and legal framework that had lapsed last December with the expiration of START. It's sensible, is a reduction in nuclear weapons, restores critical inspection measures, and gets us back on good diplomatic footing with Russia... so I'm sure this will come nowhere near getting the 67 votes needed to pass in the Senate.
Indeed, with this and the recent release of the Congressionally mandated Nuclear Posture Review, only one question remains: how has President Obama just insured our nuclear death with these reckless measures towards our precious, precious A-Bombs? Well as right wing pundits quickly informed us: by apparently ensuring that we would not retaliate if comrade Lenin rose from the grave and sent a first strike at the heartland.
Watch Fox News freak out:
Mmm, so reckless towards our safety and yet... so hot. The way her eyes bug out as she contemplates Obama sentencing us to an irradiated exploding death... she cares about our future.
Of course it's bullshit, as we still keep our first-strike strategy, actually reserves the right of retaliation, reserves the right of nuclear retaliation in non-nuclear attacks, and our bombs still give our generals a 10 on the atomic war boner scale.
But just so you're aware of the new panic: we're all going to die as Obama invites a nuclear strike and then fails to retaliate. Maybe he'll even launch our nukes at us, who knows? What's clear is that we have effectively surrendered to Russia. So practice huddling under your desk for protection and come up with a cool pose for when your shadow gets permanently etched onto some wall, because the liberals have killed us for certain this time. All on account of renewing a treaty and releasing a Congressionally mandated review. Who saw that coming?
The above photo, by the immensely talented James Vernacotola, tracks the ascent of the 32nd shuttle mission to the International Space Station, STS-130, which left planet Earth on February 8. This early morning launch and its gorgeous reflection were captured from the Intracoastal Waterway Bridge in Ponte Vedra, Florida, about 115 miles north of the launch site. As always, click to embiggen while you're reminded of What We Can Do.
American Health Care is Just Fine, Thanks When Houston Tracy was born on March 15th in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, everything seemed fine. Ten fingers, ten toes. But not long after the cord was cut, doctors realized that Houston had been born with a life-threatening heart defect. Luckily, the condition is easily treated with surgery. Not so luckily, Houston's father, Doug, had his application for health insurance to cover his newborn son denied. The reason? A pre-existing condition. Doug Tracy said it best himself: "How can he have a pre-existing condition if the baby didn't exist until now?"
Socialist President Bows to Communist Overlords With his left hand (the strong one), President Obama would initiate a government takeover of your health care, your freedoms, and your grandmas, while with his right he would seek to further weaken this great nation in the eyes of our enemies. His latest crime? "The most comprehensive arms control agreement in nearly two decades." This "hopey changey" shit has really got me down.
To Arms! The South Korean military has launched a massive rescue operation after one of their vessels went down near Baengnyeong island, close to the disputed maritime border between their country and North Korea. The ship was carrying a crew of 104 personnel and was apparently targeted for its repeated attempts to interdict North Korea-bound freighters full of jumpsuits, sunglasses, and Courvoisier.
Mission Re-(ally)Accomplished Crusader Castle, home of the largest US diplomatic mission in the world, also known as "Fortress America," is now home to the first artificial turf sports field in Iraq. We might not have provided this country with security, a functioning economy, or a democratic process free of fraud, but we sure as shit gave them the "safest, highest performing, and most durable artificial turf system in the world,” according to FieldTurf President Eric Daliere. No word yet on whether any non-diplomats (i.e. the Iraqi people) will actually be permitted to use the field.
"ButterFat 100 return to their psychobilly/emo core roots" I'm told it's Friday, so I might as well leave you with a little pure gold from the Internet archives. Almost five years ago, atrocious prose factory Pitchfork asked David Cross to write a guest "Top 10" list. The talented Mr. Cross elected to provide them with the classic "Albums to Listen to While Reading Overwrought Pitchfork Reviews." I bring this up now only because I head that Wittgenstein's Mistress absolutely killed at SXSW. What, you haven't heard of them?!?!
From Bibliodyssey and the people of Nuclear Engineering International, comes this graphical reproductions of nuclear reactors built in the seventies and early eighties. You know, just in case you ever get caught in Daya Bay Nuclear Power Plant in Guangdong and not only need to what the condenser tube material is made of (titanium), but also need to know whether the in-core instrumentation room is next to the safety injection accumulator (it is). It happens to me all the fucking time.
PYONGYANG--Presumably in reaction to President Obama's personal appeal to International Olympic Committee members in Denmark this week, the Democratic People's Republic of North Korea, or, MYNUTS, held a press conference earlier today entailing the rouge state's new charm offensive aimed at convincing the IOC to award the 2016 Olympic games to the failed state.
"As we have clarified with repeat on occasion of many numbers, we justified urge the west to cease its monopoly over the athletic contests of athleticism and reward our great land with honor games of compete," proclaimed the unnamed press official, who went on to threaten unnamed aggressors with "Death, embarrassment, great fire, death, deathly fire, and embarrassing death," should the games not be held in North Korea.
As a group of generals and bureaucrats acted out a proposed opening games ceremony that the Dear Leader had sketched out on a napkin at breakfast that very morning, the unnamed press official yelled out "You gave one to South Korea!" before one of the generals informed the assembled press that the man would be holding his breath until such a time as the games were awarded to North Korea.
According to IOC spokesperson Jhavid Helal, the organization has never never received any manner of request for consideration from North Korea. Helal then quickly added, "Not that we could really consider it, on account of the whole 'international economic sanctions/death squad/that crazy four-foot pile of jerky running the country' thing."
Despite being met with what can best be described as laughter and derision by the rest of the world, North Korea continued to press its case to the media. Citing its "Giant throwermen of the people's javelin", "half-dolphin competition swimmers", "expert sliding on water path of many twists", and "one-soldier 1600 meter relay team," the isolationist nation persisted in shouting its empty, seemingly drunken threats at what had rapidly become an empty room.
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