Happy Tuesday. Its Prime Day for those of you who want cheap shit in July. No pictures for you today.
Here’s a pearl-clutching take on “GHG Emissions”. It turns out that the companies that extract and refine all of the energy, modern feeder chemical building blocks, and other super-useful stuff are responsible for most of it. No shit.
Paul Ehrlich, going back to the Malthusian well, hoping to be right one day.
I think I found the root cause of Mrs. Clinton’s loss last November.
Genius discovers that if you only have to manufacture every other rocket you launch, you can double your launch rate.
Man, Wimbledon finally had an interesting day, didn’t it? Nadal got bounced. The top seeded woman, Kerber, got bounced. Two American women, only one named Williams, are in the Quarterfinals and we still have an American man in the draw, albeit living off his serve. Its almost as if I predicted a few things might happen now that we’re in the second week.
In baseball news, there’s some serious ass business going on in Cincinnati. And Aaron Judge is an absolute monster at batting practice. I’d love to see them tweak the format somehow so the two biggest bombers don’t face off in round 1, but all around, that was an enjoyable home run derby…even if a Yankee won it. All Star Game tonight. Let’s see if the Astros players deliberately tank it so they aren’t stuck with home field advantage in the World Series (should they make it). They’re better on the road.
People still riding bikes and I don’t know what’s going on. I guess that Froome guy is winning? Who knows. Either way, its time to move on to…the links!
The Jane Sanders loan swindle investigation is heating up. Not sure whether the rumors of Bernie pressuring bankers is true, but if so I wouldn’t expect his name to stay out ion the news much longer. Maybe three people with knowledge could let us know what’s happening.
Texas teen dies in freak accident. Seriously, how is this even possible? Even with a GFCI outlet in the bathroom, aren’t cellphone chargers all equipped with a transformer that would break the circuit if overloaded? And don’t most phones just stop working if they’re dropped in water? That’s what’s always happened when something similar happened to me.
Good Monday to you. I am recovered from my “vacation” last week. Mostly by working 40 hours between Thursday and Sunday. Here’s hoping for a better week.
American oil exports are booming. Somehow, in a (more) capitalist society, exports boom as prices fall, where as in states that run oil companies, that isn’t the case. Its almost like there’s some libertarian principle at work there. (Also posted because I miss working at the terminal. Well, I’m not 100% sure I miss wearing full-length FRCs on 10 July, but the pictures made me nostalgic.)
In a far more glib link, people are paying $25,000 to have their browneyes botoxed. I’m not saying these people have too much money, but by the time someone’s looking at your butthole, its probably not going to be a dealbreaker if the eye is a little lazy. Kudos to that doc, though. Way to recognize an untapped market.
Looks like the IRS will be the big winner in the Mayweather-McGregor fight. No wonder Floyd agreed to it.
Well we’ve reached the All-Star Break and have two teams with 60 wins after the Astros demolished the Blue Jays yesterday to split the four-game series. Even money says there will not be a Dodgers-Astros World Series. Any takers?
And after a couple of close calls on Saturday in the women’s tournament, we are on to week 2 of Wimbledon. And I can see an upset or two happening today. Probably not in the man’s draw though. I suspect that will hold form until at least the quarterfinals.
Also, people are riding bikes across France, but I can’t be bothered to tune in. I don’t really know any of the cyclists anymore and there aren’t any of them peddling wristbands for social signaling. And without that, what’s really the point?
This is what the Phoenix heat does to people
That’s it for sportzball. Now let’s dive into…the links!
We’ve pondered making up some Glibertarians hats, but are afraid whichever one of you this was would have kept it on when you went haywire.
International Olympic Committee to Rio de Janeiro: go piss up a rope. And yet there are still cities and countries dumb enough to beg them for attention.
This will probably dominate the news day, so I may as well touch on it too. The story as I see it: somebody called on Donald Trump Jr. and said she had damning info on Hillary Clinton. He agreed to meet her and invited Paul Manafort and Jared Kushner to the meeting as well. The lady they were meeting, a Russian attorney, rambled on for a few minutes and then went into a spiel about overturning a law we passed some years ago that led to Russia not allowing adoptions of Russian kids by American families. The meeting lasted 20 minutes and adjourned. Now that person is alleged to have ties to the Opposition research firm the DNC hired that created the fake dossier on Trump about him liking women to piss on him and other stuff, none of which has even come close to being verified. And I’m supposed to be outraged, somehow. Because according to the ranking Dem member on the House intel committee:
“There’s no reason for this Russian government advocate to be meeting with Paul Manafort or with Mr. Kushner or the president’s son if it wasn’t about the campaign and Russia policy,” Mr. Schiff said after the initial Times report.
I guess he has a problem with free association. And I’m sure nobody in his party has ever taken a meeting with someone saying they have dirt on a political foe. It was unheard of until Donald Trump sullied the political landscape. Except, you know, for the fact that the DNC and RNC have both hired people to dig up personal dirt on opponents since forever.
Anyway, that’s all for the links, except this one. But I’ll warn you: its a sham.
STEVE SMITH FILLING IN FOR FUNNY STONE HEAD. HE TOO BUSY FLYING AROUND IN CIRCLES… FIGURE 8S? IT ALL SAME TO STEVE SMITH. STEVE SMITH PREFER MORE LINEAR OR SERPENTINE ROUTES, WHEN CHASING DOWN HIKERS TO LOVE. AND BY “LOVE”, MEAN “RAPE”.
SINCE STEVE SMITH CAN’T REACH YOU (YET) HE GIVE YOU SOME LINKS INSTEAD.
STEVE SMITH LONG FOR OWN COUNTRY. STEVE SMITH COULD BE NATIONAL RAPESQUATCH!
STEVE SMITH SUGGEST NEW YORK PEOPLE COME TO NORTHWEST WOODS – THEN THEY CAN HAVE REAL “SUMMER OF HELL”. AND BY “HELL” MEAN “RAPE”.
MAN WITH MOOBS NOT LIKE ANYONE TO DO THINGS WITHOUT RULES.
STEVE SMITH NEED TO GO TO ENGLAND AND RAPE VARIOUS NHS PEOPLE, AND JUDGES.
STEVE SMITH GO NOW – MIGHT HEAR LUCKY HIKER COMING UP TRAIL. AND BY “LUCKY”, MEAN “SOON RAPED”.
SP and I go away for a few days and everything goes to shit. Never mind, we’re back from our latest glamorous trip, this time to Kansas City and Eldon, Iowa, and we should be able to handle Missing Links and Site Hacks with a degree of alacrity.
Now you might ask, why Eldon, Iowa? If, like us, you’re an art geek, that question needs no answer. If not, look up Regionalism, which is my favorite art movement. And of the three great Regionalists (Curry, Benton, and Wood), I have the deepest love for the work of Grant Wood. The setup in Eldon is great- they’ll even loan you pitchforks and costumes to pose in front of the house. SP refused, but I’ll come back with the daughter-unit (webdominatrix) who has no hesitation about looking ridiculous with her dad.
OK, none of this is relevant when there’s news afoot! But still, art geek here.
Why does this remind me of the constant stream of stories about how the “number two” in command of ISIS or Al Qaeda or whatever gang has gotten killed? Maybe it’s true this time, who knows. But what is certainly true is we’re still there. Trump seems to show no signs of extricating us from the Bush/Obama Undeclared Forever Wars. This seems to concern Progressives far less than tinfoil hat conspiracy theories about why their warmonger’s campaign tactics last year were exposed.
And I predict that this latest Ceasefire To End The War will work just as well as the last dozen of them. I’m so happy our last election prevented the interventionist Clinton from escalating our involvement in… never mind. This is one of the most frustrating things about being a libertarian- no matter who gets elected, we lose.
ZARDOZ SPEAKS TO YOU, HIS CHOSEN ONES. ZARDOZ GOT IN GOOD PRACTICE FOR FIGURE 8 RACE NEXT WEEK AT WEBSTER COUNTY FAIRGROUNDS. ZARDOZ APPARENTLY HAS STIRRED FEAR IN BRUTAL COMPETITORS. ZARDOZ HEARD THAT BRUTAL FROM MASON CITY IS TRYING TO SPEAK IN DEROGATORY TERMS ABOUT RACING ZARDOZ…SOMETHING ABOUT BIG HEAD WON’T BE SO BIG AFTER DEFEAT. ZARDOZ SCOFFS AT BRUTAL COMPETITOR. BEFORE TRAVELING TO TRACK FOR MORE PRACTICE, ZARDOZ GIVE LINKS TO HIS CHOSEN ONES.
ZARDOZ NOT SURPRISED AT DEATH OF BRUTALS, BUT IS SURPRISED AT SEEING TERM “LEBANESE ARMY PROSECUTOR”. ZARDOZ THINKS THAT IS WORSE THAN BEING BRUTAL SLAVE GROWING GRAIN FOR ETERNALS.
ZARDOZ APPROVES OF THINNING OF THESE BRUTALS RANKS. REMEMBER, THE GUN IS GOOD.
ZARDOZ SUGGESTS TO BRUTAL SCIENTISTS THAT THE NEW PARTICLE BE NAMED THE “ZARDOZDRON”.
ZARDOZ LAUGHS AT BRUTAL NEWSPAPERS. OF COURSE, ZARDOZ LOOKS DOWN AT MOST BRUTALS. HIS CHOSEN ONES EXCEPTED, OF COURSE.
ZARDOZ WISHES HIS CHOSEN ONES A GOOD NIGHT…BACK TO THE TRACK FOR ZARDOZ.
ZARDOZ SPEAKS TO YOU, HIS CHOSEN ONES. ZARDOZ HAS HAD A SLIGHT CHANGE OF PLANS. AFTER ZARDOZ EXPLAINED TO BRUTAL CO-WORKERS THAT DRAG RACING SEEMED TOO TOUGH, THEY SUGGESTED THE FIGURE 8 RACE. THIS ZARDOZ APPROVES OF.
SATURDAY NIGHT – ZARDOZ WILL RACE… BE THERE!
ZARDOZ’S GRAVITONIC DRIVE WILL ALLOW ZARDOZ TO CLEANSE THE OPPOSITION! BEFORE ZARDOZ TAKES A FEW HOVERS AROUND THE TRACK, HE GRANTS LINKS TO YOU, HIS CHOSEN ONES.
THE GUN IS GOOD, THE PENIS IS EVIL AND WINE IS…A BRUTAL PRESERVATIVE?
LOOK UPON THE BRUTAL NATION OF VENEZUELA AND DESPAIR.
ZARDOZ IS UNAWARE IF THIS BRUTAL ASKED OTHER BRUTALS TO HOLD HIS FERMENTED GRAIN BEVERAGE.
CHIEF BRUTAL OF LARGE CITY SHOWS LACK OF SKILLS IN OPTICS.
ZARDOZ MUST CONTEMPLATE HOW TO GET TATTOOS OF “BABY” AND “HEY”, SINCE ZARDOZ HAS NO ARMS.
Originally I was going to post about my experience shooting my new Mossberg Shockwave that I got this week. Unfortunately, after buying $200 worth of ammo and driving 30 minutes out into the desert I find out that it’s closed to target shooters due to extreme fire hazard. I guess all those taxes I pay don’t actually mean they go and put the fires out. Not that I’m bitter or anything. Then I thought I would celebrate Independence day and make a post about the guns of the American Revolution. It turns out that’s actually a pretty boring topic overall, with one notable exception I’ll mention below. So, I’m phoning it in this week with a hodgepodge of random gun tidbits. Think of it like the evening links, but gun themed. ZARDOZ would be proud.
The new Tavor 7. Fuck to the Yes!
The Hearing Protection Act is back! This time it’s called the SHUSH Act. That’s an acronym for Silencers Helping Us Save Hearing. I swear to god I picked the wrong line of work. No idea on the odds of this passing, but I sure hope it goes somewhere.
IWI announced they will be producing my favorite gun in 308. The new Tavor 7 will be 100% user reversible from right to left handed and be almost entirely ambidextrous. If this thing comes in at or below $2000 they are going to sell like ice water in hell.
Apparently the American Revolution was the birthplace of military sniping. Using Kentucky Long Rifles, American soldiers were able to pick off British officers from the treeline while the redcoats strutted around the open fields on horseback. There’s even one story of a particularly gifted individual making a kill shot from 400 yards, which quite frankly I would be hard pressed to do with a modern gun.
Speaking of snipers, no matter how tough you are, you aren’t as tough as this chick. I know I would have needed a new pair of depends after that.
One final thing I wanted to mention before I go. Someone mentioned this in the comments yesterday so I thought I would take a few minutes to tell you about the can cannon. It is an AR 15 upper receiver that attaches to any milspec lower and fires blanks. What good is a blank firing upper? By itself, it’s fucking useless. The can cannon, however, is designed to accept standard 12 ounce soda cans. It can launch these cans a phenomenal distance and they explode quite spectacularly at the end. It isn’t limited to cans, though. Tennis balls, apples, and just about anything you can cram into the sucker will launch when fired. They even make grappling hooks that load into the can cannon, for all your 80s ninja/mission impossible fantasies. Here’s a little demonstration video.
While these things look fun, they aren’t cheap. Right now they’re damn near $400 for the regular upper and almost $550 for the XL version. That’s a lot of scratch. I have some good news, though. If you want the fun of the can cannon but don’t have that kind of scratch, NCstar has you covered. For a mere $25 on Amazon you can pick up your very own golf ball launcher. This puppy will thread onto your AR barrel (or any barrel that uses AR threads) and let you drive those balls farther than Tiger Woods from 10 years ago. Just like with the can cannon, you can stuff whatever you want in there and see if it launches, but I would be a little more careful with this version. For one, there’s nothing stopping you from loading a live round instead of a blank, and that could cause some serious damage depending on what you have lodged in the launcher. The other issue is if something goes wrong and the gas can’t escape from the launcher it’s probably going to split your barrel, which will almost certainly wreck your day. Still, for 25 bucks you really can’t beat it, and in theory you can use it on any gun you want, not just ARs.
