The SECOND Best Movie Review You Will Ever Read From Me

I want to start this off by saying that I rarely go all full-fanboy over a movie; you may have noticed that I don't post really positive reviews all THAT often.

I am about to.

I am also going to start off with some technical notes about the movie in question.

So.

This weekend, my lovely copilot and I went to see Toy Story 3, having heard reviewers (except that one douchebag) wax rhapsodic about its many virtues.

The very first thing I noticed was something I wasn't expecting; the 3D was done RIGHT.

OK, technical note #1: 3D, as a filmmaking technique, is and should be an enhancement to the movie, but the movie should still sell its story based on the STORY; all 3D is supposed to do is make the movie more immersive.

One huge flaw in most 3D movies is that filmmakers - ever since good ol' House Of Wax, and that infamous paddle-ball scene - have used it for its own sake; "OMG, there's something flying RIGHT AT MY FACE!"

Over, and over, and over.

Really, if I want to see that, I can go sit on the third base foul line at a Twins game. It's not an enhancement to the movie; it just annoys me.

Pixar, however, seems to understand my grievance there, and the 3D in Toy Story 3 is absolutely stellar; both in quality AND in usage, adding depth and feeling to the movie without being distracting.

As a second technical note, Pixar has come a long, long way; the animation is fluid, and I never saw any errors - something I spot in almost every film, computer-generated or otherwise. By comparison, the original Toy Story - which was a great movie in its own right - looks, technically speaking, like amateur hour.

So, the big question; how IS the movie?

I will answer briefly, and then expound at some length.

This is the best movie so far this year.

Based on the movies released thus far, Toy Story 3 is a shoo-in for Best Picture. Of course, they will fob Best Animated Feature on it, and give Best Picture to something political about Iraq and how war sucks, the way they gave Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon Best Foreign Film and gave Best Picture to traffic. (WTF?!)

Why is it so excellent?

Well, Pixar has finally figured out how to do something nearly miraculous; they created a (second!) sequel that not only surpasses the original, but outright blows it away.

That's not exactly a reason, but play along with me here.

The story in Toy Story 3 is one almost anyone can identify with; who hasn't had a moment when one of their friends does something that seems to be a complete about-face, a total betrayal of your loyalty and steadfastness?

The premise is simple: the toys' owner, the rarely-glimpsed Andy, has finally grown up enough that he's going off to college, and his toys are getting packed up for storage in the attic. This is not such a bad deal for the toys, until Andy's mom mistakes the bag of toys for a trash bag, and hauls them out to the curb.

The toys, understandably miffed by this betrayal, contrive to get themselves donated to a daycare, with the notion in mind that they will be played with, and therefore happy.

Unfortunately, the daycare is Efrafra, straight out of Watership Down, run by an innocent-seeming but tyrannical and possibly psychotic stuffed bear named General Woundwort Lotso.

Woody, the ever-heroic sheriff and nominal leader of the motley collection of toys, tries desperately to both break them out, and convince them that in fact Andy was trying to store them in the attic, and their anger is misdirected.

There are tons of references and asides for adults, as is becoming a hallmark (and a well-appreciated one) of Pixar films, and there are jokes that will be comical for all ages (on different levels, of course.)

Watching Buzz Lightyear in Spanish mode was both hilarious and strangely awesome.

There are some very effective cliffhangers, both figurative and literal, and the kind of sentimentality Pixar is learning to manage so well, in which you care without it being either maudlin or overly cheesy.

Unlike Up, in which the opening feels like getting punched in the kidneys with depression while simultaneously stubbing a pack of lit cigarettes out on your pancreas (and I LIKE that movie,) Toy Story 3 manages that ever-so-delicate tightrope walk of making you invest in the characters and the situation emotionally without making it obvious that they're doing exactly that.

When combined with some really creepy villains, and the advent of the unbelievably fabulous (and I use that word advisedly) Ken doll, it makes for a movie that I can actually call "an experience."

Interestingly, Pizar set up another sequel with such delicacy that I actually didn't realize that they had done so until I sat down to write this.

But overall, what I have to say about this movie is simple.

See it.

See it in 3D if you can.

It is the best movie so far this year, but it is also far and away the best film Pixar has ever made; if you don't see it, you are missing a great moviegoing experience.

This is a wonderful movie, and except for that one douchebag in New York, for once the mob got it right: this movie gets a perfect score.

I Am Right Again, As Usual.

I have ranted several times in people's comments - notably Shadowwarrior's - about the various means BP could be using to clean up the spill, while they try to stop the flow without caving in the seafloor and freeing the entire 11 billion barrel deposit into the ocean. (That would be bad.)

One of the things I said was that maybe they should try Kevin Costner's Ocean Therapy machine.

Yo, my win-loss percentage is going up steadily, y'all.

BP bought and tested 32 of them and they are now building barges to filter the oil out of the seawater; they are currently estimating 128,000 barrels per day in cleaning capacity.

That's awesome.

Of course, it would have been more awesome if they had started on that project in, say, late April after the rig sank, but hey.

At any rate, here ya go:

Bringing the awesome.

Hey, Kev, I officially forgive you for The Postman.

And While I'm At It, Jon Stewart Nails It Exactly - And Even If You Hate Him You Should Watch It.

Hat Tip to Kepler1 for finding this one.

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More Editorializing, Just Because

One of the things that invariably grinds my gears about the state budgets is hearing people bitch and complain about the government employee pension funds.

It also grinds my gears when I hear people in the private sector do it, but there's not nearly as much complaining from the private sector people.

That fact in and of itself annoys me.

Oh, don't worry, I will explain all about it, in such exhaustive detail that you will no doubt be tired of my blather before I get done and looking for a slushee.

See, here's the first problem.

Who, I'm asking you, who, ever, told government employees that they had a ticket for life because they worked for the government for a few years?

The reason pension funds for government employees are underfunded is because there is not enough money to fill them. It's nice to claim that there wouldn't be these problems IF they were fully funded, but the bottom-line issue is that they CANNOT BE fully funded.

Want to know why?

Because in a lot of cases, we hand out lifetime pensions and medical benefits to people who work for the government for 20 years.

That sounds like a bunch, doesn't it?

Twenty whole years.

Say you get hired as a public works superintendent right out of college, diploma fresh in your hand and still warm from the press. You're 25, maybe 26; you work in that position for 20 years, maybe even making a real contribution.

Then you retire.

At 45.

And live to be 90.

That means that in exchange for your twenty years of hard work, the taxpayer picks up your tab for the next 45 years - and in a lot of cases, when you die, your spouse and kids can sue to keep the gravy train rolling.

Now, ok, maybe a public service pension won't keep you in a McMansion - although it sure seems to in California and New York - but goddamn, 45 years of pay for 20 years of work?

And meanwhile, the retirees keep rolling in. At every turn, states are faced with ever-increasing pension rolls, people who are contributing nothing, and are drawing in some cases their original full-time base pay.

And they outnumber the number of people who are paying into those plans.

They cannot be fully funded - it is inherently impossible - because they are a giant Ponzi scheme.

They just chucked some guy in jail for running one of those; Bernie Madoff, ever hear of him?

So why is it wrong for him to bilk private investors out of their hard-earned money with that scheme, but fine when the City of Los Angeles does it?

...Because L.A. is doing it to the taxpayers.

Now, far be it from me to offer criticism without a suggestion, so, here goes.

This is how to fix pension plans so that they first make sense, and second, don't screw anyone.

Begin with the notion, first, that compensation for your labor ends when your labor ends; there is no moral justification for claiming you have a "right" to still draw pay after you leave your job, regardless of your reason for bailing out.

There are those who will claim that the pension deals are "part of their compensation and they have a right to it because the state(s) agreed to those terms."

That's not strictly true.

See, the teachers, nurses, firefighters, police, and every bureaucrat who ever scuttled sideways to hide back under the rock you just turned over, are all members of unions.

And the unions, for decades, have given the state governments an ultimatum, every single year: increase the benefits, or we strike - and your state gets shut down.

There is no negotiation in good faith, when your options are "do it my way or get irrevocably fucked."

So the states have agreed under duress to incredibly onerous terms to keep their own employees at work - if you can call what a lot of the bureaucracy does work - and the result - the bill - is coming due.

Public servants have no right to unionize.

That is a fact; they have no right to strike, when they are paid from the taxpayers' pockets.

They have no right to demand more from the government - that means you and I - because they volunteered for that job.

If they don't like the pay and benefits the taxpayer offers them, they have every right to quit. And form their own company to do the same identical thing that they were doing before, and bid on a contract to provide the service.

But they don't have a right to demand that the private sector pay them more than they're worth.

And they unquestionably do; public sector jobs AVERAGE 35% more compensation than equivalent civilian jobs, now.

Which means their jobs are not worth that much, because if they WERE worth that much, someone in the private sector would be paying them that much already.

So.

Retirement is a legitimate benefit; being able to retire is a perfectly legitimate desire on the part of the worker.

But this isn't how to go about it.

The way it SHOULD BE done, is for the government to either get together with the banks to develop a financial vehicle - or simply issue it themselves - that functions similarly to a CD.

As the employee works away in their job, they contribute some portion of their pay into the account; AS PART OF THEIR COMPENSATION, the government matches the funds they contribute.

When they stop working, those matching funds stop coming, for good.

At that point, the retiree has the option to withdraw their money all at once, or get a stipend. If they have done well, and planned well, then their stipend will come out to be a good portion of their original pay rate, even if the financial vehicle in question is set at a measly rate of compound interest and acts like a savings account - the primary difference being that the funds are inaccessible until the termination of their employment for whatever reason.

It is a fixed amount of funds when they quit; if they want to live like kings, they can piss it all away - and many no doubt will.

That is not the fault either of their employer or of the taxpayer.

If they live frugally, they might very well leave a good chunk of it to their heirs - and they can, because when they retire, everything in that account is theirs - but that's all they get.

It is neither the moral responsibility, or even desirable, that the government, in any persona, should make your decisions from birth until death on the premise that you might fuck up.

Taking the chance that you might fuck up, and learning to deal with the consequences of your decisions, is part of being an adult.

I guess what I mean to say is, if you want a government job because you know the pension plan will hold your hand from the moment you start until it trades you out to the icy fingers of Old Scratch, you are a perpetual adolescent; unable to learn, or take, responsibility - and less of a person because of it.

You don't have a right to ask the government to hold your hand until you die, because the government doesn't do anything; the taxpayer does, and you don't have a right to - using the threat of a strike - force ME to take care of YOU forever.

It is not, and cannot be, moral to force others to give you their livelihoods.

That's what the pension riders are doing; they are, explicitly, stealing from the American public.

It is financially insupportable, as California is now finding out.

It is morally reprehensible.

It is theft; perhaps legal, but theft nonetheless.

For the Christian crowd, I'm gonna wow you with Biblical knowledge: Thou shalt not steal.

Thus saith the Lord.

Also, thus saith any human being, who in their boundless capacity for reason, is capable of comprehending the nature of inherent rights; that the right to your life - and thus freedom to maintain it - is the paramount, most fundamental, right that a human being can have; stealing the means of maintaining that life is murder.

Thou shalt not murder. (KJB notwithstanding, that's the accurate translation. Hebrew, yo, holographic language.)

You have no right to threaten me with crime waves, hospital shutdowns, dumber kids than we have already, and raging fires, to force me to choose between death - murder - and "almost as bad as death but not quite."

Pension plans, as they are currently structured, are morally wrong.

They should be ended as an American institution, and recognized for the communist idea they really are; income redistribution - but only to the people on the approved list.

Thank you for reading.

A Total Pointless And Really Nerdy Digression About Firearms

I want to start off saying something that might surprise you.

"I hate Mythbusters."

You'd think, considering I am a huge nerd, that I'd love that show, right?

My problem here is that they all too often DON'T do experiments in a way that scientifically proves OR disproves their hypothesis, and then they present their actions as "proof" that something is true or false.

Considering, you know, they're Mythbusters, people who are unable to think through things themselves often then consider them an authority on things.

Now, this came up as part of an article on a completely unrelated site, and my nerd fury was aroused beyond my powers of self-control by seeing one really, really stupid thing that I see - often - when people talk about firearms on the internet.

That being, "proof" that a bullet cannot cause a body to go flying, as they so often do in Hollywood.

Almost inevitably, someone discussing this will cite Newton's Third Law - for every action, there is a reaction - as proof that a bullet can't do that without also sending the shooter flying.

Those people failed physics in high school.

They also frequently cite Mythbusters episodes 25 and 38, in which the Mythbusters "proved" that a bullet wouldn't make a body go flying on impact.

Now, I grant that Hollywood exaggerates this; but the problem with both the failed physics students and the Mythbusters, here, is that any hunter can tell you that this is bullshit and a round from a hunting rifle will knock a full-grown deer ass over teakettle if you hit it in the shoulder.

Errr, sorta like what happens if you shoot a human.

So, how did the Mythbusters "prove" this wrong, if it isn't, and how did the failed physics students manage their dismal grades?

Let me break the several factors down one at a time.

First, let's dispel the myth about Newton's Third Law.

When you fire a weapon, the energy the bullet has at impact isn't imparted to it instantaneously; the gun doesn't shoot bullets by magic, and it doesn't use teleportation. When a round is fired, the gunpowder in the cartridge is ignited; it burns very quickly, creating a moving wavefront of expanding hot gas. This wavefront pushes the bullet, accelerating it down the barrel at ever-increasing speed; the acceleration ends when the bullet exits the barrel and the gas disperses (that's the "muzzle flash") and the bullet then travels to its target at the speed (this is the "muzzle velocity") imparted to it by its time in the barrel.

What this means is that the shooter in fact DOES absorb most of the energy the bullet takes with it; but the shooter absorbs it as a steady (if brief) push, rather than an impact. (Although, if the firearm is big enough and there's enough recoil to be had, this doesn't matter, as witness this video of an inexperienced shooter getting knocked in the forehead by his scope while firing a .50 caliber rifle.)

I say most, because most firearms have both recoil-dampening springs and other such devices, they also typically vent some amount of the gas in a direction that is safe for the shooter but opposing the direction of bullet travel; say, down, or to the sides. This cushions the recoil for the shooter even more, without removing the force from the bullet.

Now, that said, what happens when the bullet hits the target?

Instantaneous impact. All the kinetic energy carried by the bullet is imparted to the target instantly. Now, this can take two forms: either the bullet remains within the target - as in a bone hit on a deer - in which case the target goes flying, or the bullet blows clean through the target, in which case it carries most of its kinetic energy away with it, causing damage through hydrostatic shock.

Right. So what makes that crucial difference? Two factors: first, the sheer quantity of kinetic force imparted to the bullet by the firearm - primarily a function of barrel length thanks to the longer acceleration time - and second, the type of bullet itself.

A rifle imparts far more kinetic force to a bullet than does a pistol of any variety; you can test this at home, if you're so determined, by using both a rifle and pistol chambered for .22 long rifle ammunition, and firing both at a target. the pistol will impart much more force to the target as target motion, and the rifle will blow nice, deadly (though little) holes right on through it - thanks to the barrel length.

The bullet matters as well; a "jacketed" round, for those of you who care but don't know, is a lead slug physically wrapped in a harder metal, like steel or copper, so that the bullet doesn't expand when it hits the target; the specific purpose of a jacketed slug is to increase target pass-through. In other words, the ammunition is specifically designed to KILL the target, by plowing great honking holes through it, as opposed to knocking it down (what's called "stopping power.")

For "stopping power," - in other words, the power to make your target do cool backflips - you use hollowpoint or frangible bullets, which are designed to expand when they hit a target, thus imparting all their energy to the target and NOT flying on through to hit innocent bystanders.

Now, you may be wondering, where does Mythbusters come into all this?

In both episodes, they used rifles to fire jacketed rounds at targets, then claimed that this proved that the bullets had insufficient(?!) force to knock the targets down.

Howinthehell did the bullets blow all the way through the targets, then?

In order for their experiments to have been accurate, they should have tried both rifles and pistols, in several different calibers, with both hollowpoint and jacketed ammunition.

What they would have discovered is that the slower, lower-powered rounds were far more likely to actually send a target flying, while the faster, high-powered rounds would blow right through the targets with ease.

I am totally unable to comprehend how someone can seriously misunderstand physics to an extent that allows them to proudly display a fucking car door with bullet holes that go all the way through it and still claim that a bullet doesn't carry enough energy to knock down a human.

Here, I'll show you an easy way to prove those people to be idiots: hit them with the car door. I guarantee they fall down, and are far more damaged than the door.

If something can blow holes through steel, guys, it can blow holes through you. Using armor-piercing ammunition specifically designed to GO THROUGH FUCKING ARMOR - not to knock you down, but to pierce the target - to attempt to prove that bullets can't knock you down is goddamned retarded.

Also, Mythbusters fails 10th grade physics.

Rolling Stone Magazine Pwns Obama, Saves Me Further Trouble Writing About BP Spill: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/17390/111965?RS_show_page=0

Sometimes, Dammit, I Hate Being Right.

[A note: all picture captions in this article are also links to further documentation. Feel free to click and explore.]

OK. I'm pretty sure we all agree that the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is an immense disaster, the scope of which boggles the mind. (Pictured: Obama golfing, April 23rd, 2010.)

But I'm also sure some of you have been reading my articles alleging a cover-up with at least some degree of skepticism, as I have been known to theorize about things that - while strictly theory - are interesting to me as intellectual exercise.

So, let me ask you: is it merely theorizing, merely intellectual exercise, when I say that BP and the government have been covering up the magnitude of the disaster unfolding under the Gulf all along? (Pictured: Obama golfing, April 24th, 2010.)

Is it?

Is it REALLY?

I'm not alone in thinking of government collusion; OilPrice.com posted an article alleging the same thing over a month ago. But without supporting documentation, without much in the way of confirmatory linkage, their claims were easy, no doubt, for the government faithful to dismiss.

Does the fact that Rahm Emanuel's rent-free apartment in Washington, DC is owned by a BP adviser and lobbyist, whose firm was awarded hundreds of thousands of dollars by a committee headed by Rahm Emanuel, make anyone suspicious? (Pictured: Obama golfing, May 8th, 2010.)

Because it should.

If it's true, right?

I mean, that kind of obvious conflict of interest can't possibly be true, right?

Right?

Except that kind of back-room deal has been a hallmark of this government. (Pictured: Obama golfing, May 11th, 2010.)

Except that this kind of thing appears to be business as usual for the Obama administration. (Think Sestak.)

So, here we are, approaching the 50th day of oil spilling into the Gulf, with no end in sight, and oil plumes - those underwater formations of undispersed oil that BP CEO Tony Hayward says don't exist - are now being found as far as 142 miles from the Deepwater Horizon rig.

Echoing the arguments used to prevent domestic drilling - "it won't be ready soon, so let's not start it, that way it will never be ready" - the government is insisting that my idea, that of using empty tanker ships to vacuum the oil out of the ocean, cannot be used because the ships aren't ready. Why aren't they ready? They've had almost two months; the answer is because they thought it would take too long to get ready, and therefore never started the process of getting them ready, thus ensuring that they would never be ready. (Pictured: Obama golfing, May 15th, 2010.)

So why?

Why is this government so paralyzed in this crisis?

The answer is simple.

One of the Obama Administration's mantras has been, "never let a good crisis go to waste."

This is, by any standard, a good crisis. (Pictured: Obama golfing, May 16th, 2010.)

And it's one that involves the oil industry, one of leftists' pet bugaboos.

Which means that - as with shootings followed by attempts at new gun control laws - there's an opportunity here for massive parts of the leftist agenda, namely, Cap And Trade, and the nationalization of the oil companies, to gain public traction, something they were unable to achieve before.

That's analysis, and opinion, as yet; don't worry, as soon as they (in my view inevitably) start making moves towards those goals, I will post documentation.

But what other real reason could the government have to try to cover up the scope of the spill? Surely not to make it a far more terrifying scenario when the actual extent of the damage is finally made public, so as to more easily scare the public into compliance with their "regrettably necessary" measures? (Pictured: Obama golfing, May 22nd, 2010.)

Oh, wait, let me back up.

You're still not convinced the government has been covering anything up, are you.

Does this help?

BP released video to the federal government showing not one, but three leaks, one far more massive than either of the others, weeks ago. (Pictured: Obama fundraising for DNC, April 29th, 2010.)

And yet, despite that information being available to the government all along, the video that's made it to the news has been that one little broken pipe, which even so displayed that the "official" 5,000 barrels per day figure simply could not be accurate.

Why?

What purpose does it serve to tell the public that everything's fine, when it clearly isn't?

Especially when there's a convenient scapegoat - BP - right there, just begging to get beaten for their malfeasance?

Unless you ARE planning to nationalize BP.

I remember something... wait, what WAS it... about wanting to nationalize the oil companies some time back... Some Californian... Congresscritter...

Oh, right, Maxine Waters!

See, this has been their plan for years and years; the oil companies make boatloads of money, and what better way to bankroll your communism than to nationalize the oil companies and have all those boatloads of money to do it?

In fact, Presidential adviser and former Clinton-era Secretary of Labor Robert Reich just wrote a column last week advocating exactly that. (Pictured: Obama has time for the Correspondents' Dinner, May 2, 2010.)

Nationalize the company, then Obama can stop the leak using his Magic President Powers, instead of doing what I have been advocating.

My solution would be two-fold; first, ignore the nay-sayers, ready the tankers for oil removal - since it has been tried before and worked just fine - and have them go vacuum up the oil and carry it away. (Instant cleanup.) Stop delaying - every delay merely makes it worse - and DO IT.

Second, since BP is at fault here - clearly - and thus responsible legally for the costs of both cleanup and repair to the site already, the President should request - note that word, which is different from "demand," the assistance of the American oil companies, and require BP as part of its legal liability to pay the other companies for their assistance in capping the leak. (Pictured: Obama meets with Bono, April 30th, 2010.)

Neither of those elements is unworkable; in fact, BP is in far greater danger than they seem to realize, since the $75 million cap on damages that seems to be keeping them from panic doesn't apply if it turns out that they violated safety regulations, which has ALREADY been proven and documented. This fact could simply drive BP into receivership; without a cap on damages of some kind, a jury is likely to award the plaintiffs, who will likely include the State of Louisiana and the federal government, the sun, moon, and stars by way of compensation.

Meanwhile, Obama admits to a press conference that he - and the federal government - knew this was going to be a major disaster from day one.

Really?

Then why did you go golfing, hmmm? SEVEN TIMES since the Deepwater Horizon blew up.

Why did it take you a month to go even take a look at the situation down there yourself? (Pictured: Obama finally goes to Louisiana, May 2, 2010.)

Because he's busily not wasting the crisis, of course. This is a great time for golf, since everyone else is at work, worried about the results and ramifications of this catastrophe; this is a great time for Obama to have the links to himself.

Today

There's only really one thing I can say about it.

BP's Dismal Record On Display... Plus Another Corporate Douchebag. (Thanks, AT&T!)

So, you may have seen my articles discussing British Petroleum and their ongoing disastrous safety record. (Pictured: Disaster.)

Or you may not.

But whether you've read my words on the subject, I'm not the only one who's starting to ask questions.

See, British Petroleum hasn't just had a dismal safety record; no, their ongoing miscreancy crosses genres and invades the financial sector, as well. In fact, the only reason their executives haven't already gone to jail is because they bought their way out of trouble; they agreed to give the Justice Department $373 million in exchange - basically - for allowing BP to throw their trading department under the bus as scapegoats and save the senior executives from criminal charges.

That would be the largest fine for market manipulations ever recorded until 2009.

So what did they do?

Well, they intentionally stockpiled their propane gas supplies so they could bet against propane futures and then dump their stockpile on the market, thus making them (another) fortune while simultaneously causing everyone else in the world who had invested in propane futures to lose their ass. (Pictured: Guilty, arrogant douchebag.)

That would be massive assholery, right there.

Of course, there's also the little matter of the highest fine ever recorded for violations of the Clean Air Act, following BP's total refusal to fix the safety problems at the Texas City refinery that blew up in 2005, even after they rebuilt the plant; another $87 million in fines there.

But that of course isn't all; they paid another $16 million in fines both to the feds and Alaska after they spilled 200,000 gallons of crude oil from a poorly maintained pipeline in Prudhoe Bay - a pipeline which when investigated proved to be almost worn through from untreated corrosion in several places, and without sufficient leak detection. (Pictured: BP's "overhead costs.")

BP's safety issues have, in the last 5 years, resulted in 30 deaths and over 200 injuries.

They've paid fines bigger than anyone else ever; injured more people than any other oil company ever; killed more people than any other oil company ever; and created the biggest oil disaster in U.S. history, and possibly ever.

Oh, and remember that huge new coral reef in the Gulf of Mexico that was all kinds of environmental good news? Kiss it goodbye; it was only 20 miles from the Deepwater Horizon and is almost certainly dead by now. (Pictured: Future Greenie Outrage.)

And guess what? They were the more reliable choice to fix the Gulf spill. The MOST reliable choice. The ONLY choice, as opposed to any of the domestic oil companies, which our delirious and deluded but perpetually campaigning president decided not to call in.

See, when someone says "calling for the president to take over the spill cleanup is the same as telling him to take over and operate a business!" not only YOU should know that they're full of it, but THEY know they're full of it too; the two are nothing alike. There is a difference so vast between governmental operation of a private business and the government asking other oil companies to help seal the massive undersea leak that they cannot be compared, and whoever's talking to you knows that as well as you should - they're just counting on you to NOT know it, and get all flustered when you can't respond. (Pictured: Ignorance.)

Fix your ignorance first, and you can be the one casually dismissing their obviously spurious strawman arguments. Doesn't that feel good?

On a slightly different note, don't email AT&T to ask questions or complain. Because - apparently - emailing their executives will result in legal threats. Who knew it was unwelcome to tell the CEO of AT&T that their corporate practices are pissing off their customers? (Pictured: A second arrogant douchebag.)

At any rate, if you email the CEO of AT&T, you can expect a cease and desist letter. 

Geeeeeeettttt Uuuuussssseeeeeeddddddd TTTooooooooo Iiiiiiiiitttttttttttt...

...Because BP announced today that they have officially given up on any means of capping the oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, and are simply going to let it gush until they finish the relief wells in August.

AUGUST!!!

Good luck going to eat at a seafood joint anytime soon, guys.

Wonder what excuse Obama's going to use to cover his ass after insisting that they be left in charge in the first place?

You Know...

I am not a fan of Michael Cera.

For those of you wondering what I'm blathering about, or wondering who Michael Cera is, he's a gimpy kid who acts in (usually) terrible movies which purport to be comedies but in fact usually are simply pitiable failures.

But even the most wretched "actor" can find a particular movie that redeems their career.

Now, understand that I am not able to foretell the future, and further that as I have not seen this movie - only the trailer - I am unable to guess if this will accomplish that near-miracle for Mr. Cera.

But.

Ok, let's back up a bit.

There's a series of graphic novels - fancy comic books - called Scott Pilgrim.

The eponymous character is a slacker and mediocre musician who manages to fall in love with the wrong girl - the REALLY wrong girl, whose "League of Evil Ex-Boyfriends," each of whom has some variety of supernatural powers - all decide to battle Scott to the death.

There is very little seriousness to be had here, but a hell of a lot of amusement; jokes are made at the expense of video games, comic books, slackers, and the inevitable escapist fantasy life led by those in - shall we say - lower income brackets.

So, yeah, the books are fun.

So when I saw that they were making a movie, and that Michael Cera would be in it, I groaned deeply and banged my forehead firmly against my desk.

Imagine my surprise when the trailer they posted for it managed to capture and convey the graphic novels nearly perfectly.

Imagine my further surprise to discover that it's directed by the guy who made Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz.

So, here it is: Scott Pilgrim Versus The World. If snarky graphic novels aren't your thing, you probably won't like this.

But I thought it was badass, and will melt your face off with awesome.