What The Hell?!? Friday - Testy, Swagering Rodent Edition

I have an optical mouse with my lap top, but the old relic desk top in the office has a mechanical mouse with that essential tracking item commonly called a "mouse ball."  That is not what this is about.

On measuring the males, they found that the testicles of the yogurt consumers were about 5 percent heavier than those of mice fed typical diets alone and around 15 percent heavier than those of junk-eating males.

If you ever needed a reason to eat yogurt - well, here you have it.

 Now - what are you - a man or a mouse?

H/T to Tux.

Right to the Moon

My Lovely Wife suggested that I make a blog reference to the Newster's moon base idea, incorporating Ralph Cramden's classic threatening, fist-in-her-face line: "One of these day's Alice . . . . Pow - right to the moon!"

Well, that's how I remember it, anyway.

I am nothing, if not obedient.  My intent was to find (rather cop-outishly, I'll admit) a brief YouTube clip featuring that line.  But, alas, no.  If you can do better, please let me know.

Then, she went and found this page.  Hoo-boy.  Pwned by my spouse.

At the link above, Groobiecat did all the heavy lifting, and put up a damned good post, including a fun Photoshopped pic.  A must-read, I'd say.

Now, by way of fair and balanced (choke!) reporting, I'll also direct you to the ever independent-thinking Tux's defense of the out-of-this-world Newtonian moon-base idea.

 My answer to Tux's "What's the matter with a Moon base?" question includes these points:
- the cost, which in a world filled with austerians, is an automatic no-go;
- the lack of a real need to do anything specifically lunar;
- the unsustainability of a moon base;
- Newt is a lying political opportunist, playing to the Florida space industry base.  His plan isn't a realistic proposal.  It is a cynical, pandering ploy for votes;
- did Newt really float the idea of the Moon becoming a 51st State, or was that commentator hyperbole?

Tux talks about employing all sorts of highly skilled professionals in this potential program, and you can't simply gainsay that.  However, on balance, the negatives overpower, I think.  Besides - isn't there some sort of a project, right here on earth, that would employ all those same skilled professionals, while doing something real?

Space exploration has a very high cool-geek factor.  But, deep in my heart, I believe the time for manned space exploration has come and gone.  Actually, several decades ago.

There are pressing needs here at home, and excess brain-power available to devote to solving them.

Shouldn't there be some realistic way way to bring them together?

On the other hand, though - and more fundamentally - we don't have structural unemployment.  If we did, this kind of specific skill-matching program would be right on the mark.  What we do have is general unemployment.  The answer to that is to correct the aggregate demand shortfall.

I wonder what Keynes would say?

Rats!

As  a fitting follow-up to this exchange with Tux, Hartmann shows us why rats are more highly evolved  than Repubicans.




Link.

So, on the empathy scale we have Rats > Insane Clown Posse > Rethugs.

Seems about right.

What the Hell Friday - Trained Dolphins, Monkey Submarines, and the Hot Chick from MythBusters

The Big Polluter formerly known as British Petroleum, then BP-Amoco, now just BP, will always be BRITISH PETROLEUM in our minds and hearts.  This Colbert clip is a few days old, but since the crude spew will probably go on for weeks and months, its not likely to get stale any time soon.

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Oil Containment Solution Randomizer
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor Fox News

And if you didn't actually know there was a hot chick on MythBusters:

What the Hell? Friday

What the hell is up with Fibonacci?

Still,  you can always count on him.

So to speak.

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Global Warming Hoax Continues - Pt 2*

If I had stuck with it a few days longer, back in the Spring, when I wrote this, I would have found that fool and scoundrel George Will's idiocy was debunked, right on the pages of WaPo.

More recently, it gets better:

If anyone tries to tell you that uncertainty about climate change is a reason for inaction, he’s either a fool or a scoundrel. Probably a bit of both.

           -- Mark Kleiman, with a H/T to Delong**

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Photo from: 
http://www.ebaumsworld.com/pictures/view/223478/____________________________________________
* Part 1.
** Who I should treat to a drink, should we ever happen to meet.
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Global Warming Hoax Continues

Just when you thought it was safe to go back out onto the permafrost, Sarah Palin comes out with details of how global climate change has directly affected Alaska.

That's not to say I deny the reality of some changes in climate -- far from it. I saw the impact of changing weather patterns firsthand while serving as governor of our only Arctic state. I was one of the first governors to create a subcabinet to deal specifically with the issue and to recommend common-sense policies to respond to the coastal erosion, thawing permafrost and retreating sea ice that affect Alaska's communities and infrastructure.

Wha-a-a-a . . . ?!?  Oh, but then she goes on:

But while we recognize the occurrence of these natural, cyclical environmental trends, we can't say with assurance that man's activities cause weather changes. We can say, however, that any potential benefits of proposed emissions reduction policies are far outweighed by their economic costs. And those costs are real.

Quote out of context.

I'm as committed to problematizing exclusivist metanarratives and delegitimating monologic desire as the next gink.

What makes this so remarkable is that I can not remember ever having voiced - or even entertained - this concept.

Silly me.

I ain't no Phila.

Update:  At the risk of supplying context - and forgive me if I've mislead you - here is another quote.

Most of the people who claim that the universe was really created in six days, and that Eve was really fashioned from Adam's rib, are still able to recognize suggestions like "go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor" as confoundingly polyvalent metaphors.

Evolution

How can anyone doubt that evolution is real, when we see it happen every year, right before our eyes?

If You Give a Mouse a Piece of Toast . . .

.  .  .  He's going to ask for a cup of coffee.*

When you give him the cup of coffee, he'll probably start remembering things.

And this if fine, to a point.

But he's not getting any of my Lagavulin!

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*Nope.  No apologies.

This stinks!

Infotainment or Infomercial?

You decide.