German police said Sunday they have taken a seven month baby away from a couple in Bavaria who are under investigation after putting the child for sale on Internet auction site Ebay.
The baby boy was put on sale on Tuesday at a starting price of one euro (1.58 dollars) and was withdrawn from the site around two and a half hours later, police said. There had been no offers.
The mother said it was meant as a joke, but police failed to see the funny side, putting the baby into care and launching an investigation of both parents for attempted child trafficking, a statement said.
h/t Instapundit Hmmm. I Just Got Extortion Spam by Bruce Sterling
Not particularly dramatic, effective or well-spelled extortion spam, but it is extortion spam. A death threat, even. And straight from the New York Times.
From: mrs@nytimes.com
Subject: Buy or DIE!!!
Date: May 24, 2008 8:35:21 AM PDT
To: bruces@well.com
Reply-To: mrs@nytimes.com
Pity I can't reply to the New York Times, as perhaps my somber little letter of complaint would see print on the op-ed page.
No! Don't do it, Bruce! Don't give their subscription department any ideas!
You computer was infected by our software! If you will not buy our newspaper software - you will bee lost all data on your PC! "you will bee lost all data" -- Ow! That'll sting.
Buy our software bastards: xpantivirus.com XP Antivirus.
That looks like a genuine badware site, still up and operative. Presumably it's eagerly trying to hijack my browser right now, and that "free spyware scan" doesn't look very healthy.
I'm on a MacBook, losers. Come and get me.
Posted by: Mike ||
05/25/2008 09:30 ||
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A fezw weeks ago there was a contest with a hefty prize for ahacking one of three computers: a Mac, an XP, and a Linux. The Mac was first to go: it was hacked in two minutes. XP came second worst.
Linux rulez. :-)
A man who claimed that he became depressed, anxious and phobic after finding a a dead fly in a bottle of water will no longer get the judgment he won against a bottling company, Canada's top court ruled Thursday.
Martin Mustapha will have to shell out thousands in court costs, instead of collecting the more than $345,000 he won in an Ontario court three years ago.
The Supreme Court of Canada agreed in a 9-0 judgment that Mustapha suffered real psychological harm, but Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin said his reaction was so "unusual or extreme" that bottling company Culligan of Canada Ltd., should not have to pay compensation. Damn. Next time try it in the USA and maybe you'll get somewhere.
McLachlin said the legal test for damages is whether a person of "ordinary fortitude" would suffer psychological harm. In Mustapha's case, she concluded, the reaction was so unique that Culligan could not reasonably have foreseen the consequences and should not be held liable.
Mustapha insisted that he had been treated unfairly and said finding the dead fly in an unopened bottle of water in 2001 devastated him. He became obsessed with thoughts of dead flies, could not sleep and was constantly on edge to the point that his business and even his sex life suffered.
"I'm just the type of person that is very clean and cautious about the health and well-being of myself and my family," Mustapha said. Try Prozac.
He was diagnosed by several doctors as suffering from severe depression, anxiety and phobias.
Dick Martin, the zany half of the comedy team whose "Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In" took television by storm in the 1960s, making stars of Goldie Hawn and Lily Tomlin and creating such national catch-phrases as "Sock it to me!" has died. He was 86.
Martin, who went on to become one of television's busiest directors after splitting with Dan Rowan in the late 1970s, died Saturday night of respiratory complications at a hospital in Santa Monica, family spokesman Barry Greenberg said. "He had had some pretty severe respiratory problems for many years, and he had pretty much stopped breathing a week ago," Greenberg said. He was surrounded by family and friends when he died just after 6 p.m., Greenberg said.
Martin had lost the use of one of his lungs as a teenager, and needed supplemental oxygen for most of the day in his later years.
"Laugh-in," which debuted in January 1968, was unlike any comedy-variety show before it. Rather than relying on a series of tightly scripted song-and-dance segments, it offered up a steady, almost stream-of-consciousness run of non-sequitur jokes, political satire and madhouse antics from a cast of talented young actors and comedians that also included Ruth Buzzi, Arte Johnson, Henry Gibson, Jo Anne Worley and announcer Gary Owens.
Presiding over it all were Rowan and Martin, the veteran nightclub comics whose standup banter put their own distinct spin on the show. Like all straight men, Rowan provided the voice of reason, striving to correct his partner's absurdities. Martin, meanwhile, was full of bogus, often risque theories about life, which he appeared to hold with unwavering certainty.
Against this backdrop, audiences were taken from scene to scene by quick, sometimes psychedelic-looking visual cuts, where they might see Hawn, Worley and other women dancing in bathing suits with political slogans, or sometimes just nonsense, painted on their bodies. Other times, Gibson, clutching a flower, would recite nonsensical poetry or Johnson would impersonate a comical Nazi spy.
"Laugh-In" astounded audiences and critics alike. For two years the show topped the Nielsen ratings, and its catchphrases_ "Sock it to me," "You bet your sweet bippy" and "Look that up in your Funk and Wagnall's" were recited across the country.
Stars such as John Wayne and Kirk Douglas were delighted to make brief appearances, and even Richard Nixon, running for president in 1968, dropped in to shout a befuddled sounding, "Sock it to me!" His opponent, Vice President Hubert Humphrey, was offered equal time but declined because his handlers thought it would appear undignified.
Rowan and Martin landed the show just as their comedy partnership was approaching its zenith and the nation's counterculture was expanding into the mainstream.
The two were both struggling actors when they met in 1952. Rowan had sold his interest in a used car dealership to take acting lessons, and Martin, who had written gags for TV shows and comedians, was tending bar in Los Angeles to pay the rent.
Rowan, hearing Martin was looking for a comedy partner, visited him at the bar, where he found him eating a banana. "Why are you eating a banana?" he asked.
"If you've ever eaten here, you'd know what's with the banana," he replied, and a comedy team was born.
Although their early gigs in Los Angeles' San Fernando Valley were often performed gratis, they donned tuxedos for them and put on an air of success. "We were raw," Martin recalled years later, "but we looked good together and we were funny."
They gradually worked up to the top night spots in New York, Miami and Las Vegas and began to appear regularly on television. In 1966, they provided the summer replacement for "The Dean Martin Show." Within two years, they were headlining their own show.
The novelty of "Laugh-In" diminished with each season, however, and as major players such as Hawn and Tomlin moved on to bigger careers, interest in the series faded.
After the show folded in 1973, Rowan and Martin capitalized on their fame with a series of high-paid engagements around the country. They parted amicably in 1977.
"Dan has diabetes, and his doctor advised him to cool it," Martin told The Associated Press at the time.
Rowan, a sailing enthusiast, spent his last years touring the canals of Europe on a houseboat. He died in 1987.
Martin moved onto the game-show circuit, but quickly tired of it. After he complained about the lack of challenges in his career, fellow comic Bob Newhart's agent suggested he take up directing. He was reluctant at first, but after observing on "The Bob Newhart Show," he decided to try. He would recall later that it was "like being thrown into the deep end of the swimming pool and being told to sink or swim."
Soon he was one of the industry's busiest TV directors, working on numerous episodes of "Newhart" as well as such shows as "In the Heat of the Night," "Archie Bunker's Place" and "Family Ties."
Born into a middle-class family in Battle Creek, Mich., Martin had worked in a Ford auto assembly plant after high school.
After an early failed marriage, he was for years a confirmed bachelor. He finally settled down in middle age, marrying Dolly Read, a former bunny at the Playboy Club in London. Survivors include his wife and two sons, actor Richard Martin and Cary Martin. At Martin's request there will be no funeral, Greenberg said.
Martin lost the use of his right lung when he was 17, something that never bothered him until his final years, when he required oxygen 18 hours a day.
Arriving for a party celebrating his 80th birthday, he fainted and was treated by doctors and paramedics. The party continued, however, and he cracked, "Boy, did I make an entrance!"
#3
Arte Johnson's "Dirty Old Man" approaches Ruth Buzzi's character sitting on park bench:
"Wanna hear a joke?"
She hits him with very large purse.
"Wanna hear a song?"
She hits him again.
"Wanna here me scream?" and keels over.
#4
...even Richard Nixon, running for president in 1968, dropped in to shout a befuddled sounding, "Sock it to me!"
He did not shout, and was not exactly befuddled. Astonished, perhaps indignant. But not befuddled.
His opponent, Vice President Hubert Humphrey, was offered equal time but declined because his handlers thought it would appear undignified.
They were right. Still, good times.
My favorite segment was "Laugh-In Looks at the News" (la-da-di-DA!) especially the "News of the Future". I remember one NotF began with, "198[whatever], twenty years from now. President Ronald Reagan..." It got an enormous laugh.
It seemed like an almost literal answer to their prayers. When two New Zealand pilots ran out of fuel in a microlight airplane they offered prayers and were able to make an emergency landing in a field coming to rest right next to a sign reading, "Jesus is Lord."
Grant Stubbs and Owen Wilson, both from the town of Blenheim on the country's South Island, were flying up the sloping valley of Pelorus Sound when the engine spluttered, coughed and died. "My friend and I are both Christians so our immediate reaction in a life-threatening situation was to ask for God's help," Stubbs told The Associated Press on Wednesday.
He said he prayed during the ill-fated flight Sunday that the tiny craft would get over the top of a ridge and that they would find a landing site that was not too steep or in the nearby sea.
Wilson said that the pair would have been in deep trouble if the fuel had run out five minutes earlier. "If it had to run out, that was the place to be," he said. "There was an instantaneous answer to prayer as we crossed the ridge and there was an airfield I didn't know it existed till then."
After Wilson glided the powerless craft to a landing on the grassy strip, the pair noticed they were beside a 20-foot-tall sign that read, "Jesus is Lord The Bible."
"When we saw that, we started laughing," Stubbs said. But not too hard.
Nearby residents provided them with gas to fly the home-built plane back to base.
#1
God protects children, fools, and preachers.......
....and the occasional student pilot.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
05/25/2008 15:11 Comments ||
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#2
Amen, Alaska Paul.
A preacher being flown over the rain forests to a destination in Africa said that the plane engine blew and died and the pilot immediately said, "We are going down into a place where we may never be found (The deep jungles of the forest)." The preacher started praying in earnest and the pilot saw a village by a river as they were descending and he was able to glide the plane onto a long sand bar along side of the village on the river.
#5
Many Chinese buildings are constructed without re-bar support. That is why they crumble during earthquakes.
I think a lot of them are constructed with what they call rebar, but we would call wires. I have also heard they put a lot more sand in their concrete mixtures.
#6
flyash experts, I tellz ya. Guarantee they don't use what we know as rebar in anywhere near the right materials/size/use. Their concrete and mortar mixes would probably get your license removed here....
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/25/2008 19:49 Comments ||
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#7
So the conclusion is basically that they're using brittle, fabricated artificial stones, which crumble under severe, yet wholly predictable, earthquake stresses?
And for comparison we'll use the next Cal. seismic event, if not the last few, and analyze the relatively stricter Cal. building codes?
#8
Look at the pictures of the quake zones: government buildings, still standing. Schools, total rubble, collapsed with kids inside. Good thing the Communist Party controls the media, and most of the people of China will support the Party no matter what.
#9
gromky, I have to dissagree. I believe we are seeing a "Chineese Awakening", based on what my friends who are there are telling me.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
05/25/2008 21:11 Comments ||
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#10
the 2006 IBC/2007 CBC are criteria to maintain safety for occupants by keeping structures intact enough for safe egress. They are NOT prescriptions for damage-proof structures, a common misperception. That said, the unreliable materials, methods, and QC in 3rd world countries like rural China don't provide much of a lesson to us engineers.
A piece of crap is a piece of crap. We already know what falls down. I also suspect the military nuke facility (a higher level of construction, yet destroyed, if reports are accurate) will be "unavailable" for forensic engineering inspection
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/25/2008 21:14 Comments ||
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#11
I believe we are seeing a "Chineese Awakening", based on what my friends who are there are telling me.
They could strong arm American toy companies for slip shod manufacturing and give lip service to tainted medical supplies for export. However, the blatant substandard performance in the center of their own country can not be buried. The implied level of corruption and disregard of its consequences, particularly when the state demands a 'one child' policy, is the stuff of what in Chinese history lights the fuse to revolt.
#12
Not that anyone will read this, but yeah the Chinese are solidly with their government. It could get really ugly at the Olympics if China doesn't win. They have a very strong persecution complex and do not understand that making defective products hurts their image. To them, it's OK if you screw others, especially foriegners.
Former state Sen. Carol Ronen's brief gig in Gov. Blagojevich's office has proven as lucrative as a win in the Illinois Lottery.
Aaaaah! Boodling, Chicago style!
Heck, this isn't anything big, there's no real estate, zoning or insurance involved ...
Ronen worked just eight weeks for the governor earlier this year, but that job will provide her with a windfall of at least $37,995 every year for the rest of her life.
Where do I submit my resume?
To your local ward committee-man, of course ...
Ronen's stint as a Blagojevich senior adviser is enabling the governor's onetime Senate floor leader to reel in a $102,000-a-year state pension.
Careful where you're walking. You almost stepped on my jaw.
Ronen, 63, will earn 35 percent more in retirement than she did as a $75,301-a-year legislator representing part of Chicago's North Side lakefront.
I'm coming to the conclusion I shoulda gone into politix, rather than joining the army. The money's better, and you don't get shot at as often.
Had Blagojevich not hired Ronen and she retired from the Senate at this time, her pension would be $64,005 annually. "Her increase alone is $38,000 a year," said Rep. Jack Franks (D-Woodstock). "That's more than the majority of Illinoisans make."
Ronen defended the money she will earn in retirement. She left the governor's office to become a volunteer for U.S. Sen. Barack Obama's presidential campaign. "My entire career has been devoted to the Daley Machine public service, part of the time in the Outfit Legislature and part of the time in the executive branches of state and city governments," Ronen said. "My pension is based on all those years of service. It's not a scam."
Course not, happens in the private sector all the time ...
The General Assembly Retirement System allows legislators as young as 55 to earn pensions equal to 85 percent of their final salaries -- regardless of whether those salaries are in the Legislature or in better-paid positions elsewhere in government. Legislative pensioners like Ronen, who has applied to begin getting her retirement money, get 3 percent hikes each year into perpetuity, making the retirement system one of the most generous in the country. There are no state taxes imposed on that money.
Franks cited Ronen as an example of "abuse of the pension system," adding that "it illustrates why it's no surprise our pension system is in peril and why citizens have lost faith in the governor."
Ronen said she meant to stay on Blagojevich's staff longer, but "circumstances just didn't permit that.
Barry called her on the phone all personal, you see, she just had to go ...
"There's a huge, huge deficit in this current year's budget, $750 million, and another one looming for the next one. All the projects I was interested in required resources. . . . Plus, you see what's happening in Springfield. There is a toxic environment that pervades everything."
Did none of that make any sense? Or is it just me?
Ronen was elected to the Illinois House in 1992 and served five terms there before moving to the Senate in 2000. As a senator, she voted for a 2003 law that went after bloated legislative pensions. For her pension to be based upon her $120,000-a-year governor's office salary rather than her final legislative pay, Ronen had to spend one month working under Blagojevich. Ronen was hired March 1 and left the governor's office April 30.
Blagojevich spokeswoman Abby Ottenhoff declined to offer time sheets or work product for Ronen and said Ronen's pension was "never discussed and wasn't a consideration. The governor and Sen. Ronen have worked together as colleagues on a number of issues like health care and early-childhood education. We intended for her role to be a long-term one."
Posted by: Fred ||
05/25/2008 00:00 ||
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#1
So where the Fck is my state tax return Blagojevich ??
KARACHI: When Pakistan will launch their very own version of the Indian Premier League sometime in the first half of next year, they would be borrowing heavily from the much-hyped IPL.
In addition, officials currently preparing the blueprint of the Pakistan Premier League, will also be adding some new ideas in a bid to make what will be a much smaller league than the multi-million-dollar IPL a big success.
But there is one feature of the IPL that would never be a part of the planned league on this side of the border female cheerleaders.
Having the sort of cheerleaders currently engaged with the IPL here in Pakistan would be culturally offensive, Dr Ahsan Hameed Malik, the marketing chief of the Pakistan Cricket Board, told The News on Saturday. We cannot even think about having such cheerleaders here because our culture doesnt have room for such practices, he added.
Cheerleaders instantly made their presence felt in the IPL, with many welcoming the colourful addition while others criticising them.
The IPL flew in cheerleaders from various parts of the world with liquor tycoon Vijay Mallya inviting Washington Redskins The First Ladies of Football to cheer for his team, the Bangalore Royal Challengers.
Within days, protests were raised in various parts of India with many stressing that cheerleaders in skimpy outfits is an affront to Indian culture.
But people marketing the IPL are of the view that the cheerleaders have helped fill the stadiums by drawing many people who earlier were not eager to watch cricket, especially the younger generation.
But back at home, for officials like Malik, its not an issue.
They are of the view that cheerleaders may help fill the stadiums but that is not going to happen in Pakistan.
Malik said that to add colour to the PPL, cricket authorities here can fall back to the tried-and-tested, all-male folk troupes comprising traditionally-dressed drummers and dancers.
Weve had such cheerleaders for our matches in the past and we can bring them in to add some excitement in our league, said Malik.
Then the PCB can also rope in characters like the Sialkot-based cricket fan Sufi Abdul Jalil known in the cricket world as Chacha Cricket.
Abdul Jalil has been a regular feature at Pakistans matches both at home and abroad for several years.
Malik said that the PCB will consider all such options.
We would certainly like to have some sort of cheerleading during our league, the Board official concluded.
Posted by: john frum ||
05/25/2008 00:50 ||
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#1
I thought that PCB was something you needed to clean up after a transformer blew up.
#4
In Singapore they use a Hokkien phrase 'Kaisu', which literally means 'me too' or more generally means, I want to be noticed for doing what my neighbours are doing.
The Indian IPL has been a huge commercial success. A Pakistan IPL will be a commercial failure for rather obvious reasons and nothing to do with cheerleaders.
I regularly watch the games, in fact I'll watch the one on in a few minutes, and I find the regular switching to the cheerleaders annoying. It's a gimmick that will quietly fade away.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Former state Sen. Carol Ronen's brief gig in Gov. Blagojevich's office has proven as lucrative as a win in the Illinois Lottery.
