Uhg! Nothing but Road Construction...

Well, we are down in Indiana for our annual trip to the Brickyard-400. Hopefully the rest of the vacation will be more pleasant than the trip down here was. I swear that there was nothing but road construction from the WI/IL boarder to the north end of downtown Chicago. Basically, all of the Edens Expressway is tore up, but once you get to the Kennedy, everything is cool all the way through downtown until you get to Gary, IN. Then, the really insane detours begin...

Once we got through Gary, though, everything was cool. The trip from Gary to Crawfordsville (where we stay for the extended weekend) was really smooth. So, here we are. Today, we will just relax, go out to dinner, have a few beers, and relax some more. Tomorrow, we will probably head down to Indianapolis. Depends on the weather.

Skank Alert...

I mean, just look at the picutre... I think I have caught 12 diseases just from looking at her... I can't believe anyone actually ever paid to had to sex with something like that.

And Justice is Served...

Man shoots wife, man abducts kid, man gets hit by bus and dies. It sure is nice when things work out in the end...

More On Ethanol Policies

It is no secret that I think the ethanol push is moronic. It is not an efficient fuel and it results in higher food causing great pain to the poor (and everyone else). Furthermore, the free market will dictate the proper solution, not government mandates, which will do nothing more than tie us to what is clearly the wrong solution.

It is nice to see others putting pressure on the G8 nations to cut back on these ridiculous mandates (though I would like to see an all out abandonment, myself). It is also nice to see that Great Briton is starting to make moves in the proper direction. Hopefully we will too.

Taking a Page Out of the Clinton Playbook

It appears that Obama is taking a page directly out of the Bill Clinton play book and is moving to the right to appease conservatives who are not all that happy with McCain being the Republican nominee.

US presidential hopeful Barack Obama has said he would expand George W Bush's programme of involving religious groups in government initiatives.
...
He said challenges from saving the planet to ending poverty were too big for the government to solve on its own.

A council involving religious groups would help to set the national agenda, Senator Obama said in his speech.

"We know that faith and values can be a source of strength in our own lives," said Mr Obama.

Obviously, this sounds all well and good. Just don't trust him to actually follow through on any of it.

Fred Phelps is a Tool...

Three young adults were recently killed in an apartment fire at U.W. - Stout (where I went to college 15 years ago).  One of the kids killed was the daughter of a Baptist minister.  Hundreds of students attended her funeral, and you can bet that the First-Baptist Church community has rallied plenty of support for her family, and share in their grief.  It is what Christians do.

On the other hand, tools of Satan, like Fred Phelps and his despicable band of hate mongers react with insane rhetoric, and by sending their evil minion protestors out to try and rub salt in the wounds.  I was happy to see that the current generation of Stout students had quite a nice turnout to drive these degenerate perverters of God's message back to where they came from.

Way to go, Stout!!

See, Some Teams Suck More...

The great thing about this article is that it affirms that yes, there truly are teams who historically suck harder than the Brewers.

Why Does My Food Cost So Much?

Blame ethanol.  Actually, blame the idiots who are pushing idiotic ethanol mandates on us.  In this country, ethanol is made from corn.  However, corn is also a staple grain in our food supply.  So, the mandates result in a higher demand for corn.  The higher demand results in higher prices.  Higher corn prices mean that more land is being used for corn production as farmers react to the market.  More land being put into corn production results in less land being used for wheat, soy, and other staple crops.  As a result, the cost of those crops also goes up.  Since corn and soy are used for feed, this means that the cost of raising cattle, chickens, ducks, etc. goes way up.  It has gotten so bad that Maple Leaf Farms has been forced to close a local processing plant because the increased cost of feed makes raising the ducks cost more than they can get back selling the ducks.  It is not stated in the linked article, but in another article (which I could not find on-line), a spokesman for the company directly blames our government's idiotic ethanol policies.

So, our stupid obsession with trying to use our food for fuel is obviously causing pain for food producers and their employees.  It is also resulting in a disproportionate amount of pain for this countries poorer people, for whom food is already a huge part of their budget.  To make matters worse, ethanol does nothing to make our fuel cheaper or cleaner.  Furthermore,  when the fuel consumption, and related pollution, associated with full production cycle of ethanol is factored in, using ethanol for fuel may even have a negative environmental impact when compared to petroleum.

All of this pain, and who actually gains from this?  Some farmers.  Farmers who are growing grains for cash obviously like the higher prices.  However, farmers who have to buy those grains to feed livestock are not exactly enjoying this.  Mostly, the only people who gain here are companies like ADM and BP.  The rest of us just suffer.

What Comes Around Goes Around...

Given that Eliot Spitzer has built his whole career by ruining other peoples lives for his own political gain, mostly through the over-prosecution of generally minor regulatory violations, it sure is nice to see his career finally being destroyed.

Egosurfing...

While I was egosurging the other day, I ran across a post I made over ten years ago. Thankfully, time has pretty much proven what I said to be correct.

I guess there isn't really much of a point to this other than to point out when you say something on the internet, it is quite possible that whatever you say may last a while, so be careful what you say boys and girls. Make sure you mean it, and use a little discretion. After all, what you say may hang around for quite some time, whether you intend it to or not...