Who created this?
The Fairey-esque Glenn Beck
Tip of the old scrub brush to Kenny and the Great Firewall of China.
Changing Glenn Beck
October 26, 2010
2 Comments | 
Humor, Politics | Tagged: Glenn Beck, Humor, Politics | 
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Posted by Ed Darrell
“142nd fastest gun in the West”
October 22, 2010You’d probably have to probe the archives of Dr. Demento to find it, but there was a modest little hit in a humor song years ago, a parody of Jimmy Dean’s “Big John.” The song praised the life of Irving, a Jewish cowboy who was “the 142nd fastest gun [RIMSHOT] in the West.”
I thought of it immediately when I learned that, according to Wikio, this blog, Millard Fillmore’s Bathtub, ranks 2,263.
No kidding. Not even enough swat to rank in a category.
So, why is Anthony Watts so ticked at this measly little mosquito of a blog?
4 Comments | Administrivia, Humor, Weblogs | Tagged: Administrivia, blogging, Humor, Influence, Wikio | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Eleanor Roosevelt: Didn’t like the description, “No good in a bed”
October 3, 2010
Eleanor Roosevelt at Pearl Harbor in 1943 - image from MedScape
Is this story true? I’ve not been able to verify the quote — it’s a great story, and better if true. From MedScape Today, “The Case of the Well-known Woman with Unexplained Anemia”:
Although reserved, Roosevelt had a quiet sense of humor. When commenting about how she felt about having a rose named after her, she remarked: “I was very flattered . . . but not pleased with the description in the catalogue: no good in a bed, but fine up against a wall.”
Can anyone tell us when and where she said that? Gardeners, can you confirm? Can anyone find a photo of the rose, “Eleanor Roosevelt?” (It’s probably a yellow rose, but I haven’t found a description.)
Eleanor Roosevelt teacup, First Ladies Library
More:
- Get the t-shirt
- From the First Ladies Library, the Eleanor Roosevelt teacup, featuring a yellow rose (probably not the rose “Eleanor Roosevelt,” however)
2 Comments | A Good Story, Biography, Famous quotes, First Ladies, Gardening, History, Humor, Quotes | Tagged: Biography, Eleanor Roosevelt, Famous quotes, First Ladies, Gardening, History, Humor, Quotes, Roses | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Are we mice, or fully-functioning human brains?
September 21, 2010I’m still smiling about Ed Brayton’s post at Dispatches from the Culture Wars — here in its entirety:
From the utterly delusional Christine O’Donnell [Republican candidate for U.S. Senate in Delaware], said on the Bill O’Reilly show in 2007:
“They are — they are doing that here in the United States. American scientific companies are cross-breeding humans and animals and coming up with mice with fully functioning human brains.”
Which gives those hypothetical mice a sizable leg up on O’Donnell.
7 Comments | 2010 Elections, Humor, Politics, Republican Party, Science | Tagged: 2010 Elections, Brains, Christine O'Donnell, Ed Brayton, Elections, Humor, Mice, Politics, Republicans, Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Why I’m voting Tea Party
September 10, 2010
T-shirts from I'm Voting Tea Party
There’s a whole series of ’em.
“Why I’m voting Tea Party?”
- “Obama won’t let me hunt the homeless for sport. That’s why I’m voting Tea Party”
- “Obama won’t teach my kids that the Earth is flat. “
- “Obama wants the government to take over Social Security.”
- “Obama doesn’t realize fire departments are socialism.”
And more.
The danger is, maybe Tea Party people are buying them, for real. It was here in Dallas I ran into the Tea Party group who complained, back to back, that the nation isn’t following the Constitution, and they hated that the government was taking the census. (Yeah, that’s right: The census is required by the Constitution.)
Why are you voting Tea Party?
Tip of the old scrub brush to Our Man in Beijing, Kenny.
6 Comments | Humor, Politics | Tagged: Campaigns, Humor, Politics | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
How many at Beck’s rally? Just listen . . .
August 31, 2010All the professional crowd estimators put the number of people attending Glenn Beck’s rally at the Lincoln Memorial at over 50,000 people, but under 100,000 — most came out in the 85,000 to 90,000 range.
But — don’t you love the brevity of Twitter?
lizzwinsteadMichele Bachmann claims 1.6 million at Beck rally. That’s about right if you count the voices in her head. 18 minutes ago via TweetDeck
10 Comments | Humor, Writing | Tagged: Humor, Writing | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Edisonian lightism, or the Bible: Teach the controversy!
August 30, 2010Sensuous Curmudgeon sets the agenda for the Utah and Louisiana legislatures with the discovery that Edison’s “theory of lightism” threatens religious instruction.
Lightism is just a theory — an atheistic belief based on arbitrary presuppositions. No one has ever seen a so-called “electron,” and no one really knows what causes light bulbs to function as they do.
In an incredible, Sisyphean effort, he pushes it uphill from there. Seriously. Go read.
1 Comment | Charles Darwin, Creationism, Humor, Parody, Physics, Religion, Science | Tagged: Atomic Theory, Creationism, Darwin, Edison, Humor, Lightism, Physics, Religion, Science, Superstition | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Want to teach evolution? Then be ready for THIS!
August 25, 2010
What would the police make of such a threat?
Bug Girl lifts the tent flap to show us just a little of what it’s like to be a teacher of evolution, including mysterious threats made on notes left under windshield wipers.
At least, I think it’s a threat. (“If you teach evolution, I’ll make you giggle till you choke!”)
I figure that note came from the sort of person who would pray for this to happen to a good professor of biology.
(Do you think the note writer was trying to say something about the sheets upon which Bug Girl’s parents frolicked?)
4 Comments | Biology, Creationism, Education, Evolution, Humor, Rampant stupidity, Science, Teachers, Teaching | Tagged: Biology, Bug Girl, Creationism, Education, Evolution, Humor, Rampant stupidity, Religion, Science, Teaching, Threats from Students | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
We Are Science Probes
August 14, 2010
Still from “We Are Science Probes.” Full clip of movie below.
In animation, a parable about the dangers of being intentionally ignorant of science. In the not-distant-enough future, a probe from another planet arrives on Earth after the demise of human civilization. Unfortunately, the probes land in Kansas, the land of creationism and woo. The plot thickens.
[My apologies — the version I found did not come with a “pause” button. It will play automatically when you open this post. Fortunately, it’s almost perfectly safe-for-work. If you don’t like the music, turn it off. There is no spoken dialogue in the cartoon. If you wish to pause the playing of the cartoon, right click to get to the Adobe Flash Player controls. To pause the playing click the checkmark next to “play.”]
[Update August 18 — Okay, I give up — 100% of comments I’ve been getting ran against the video without the “start” or “pause” buttons. You’ll have to go see it at another site — here, for example.]
[Years later, it’s on Youtube!]
Found it at a site called NewGrounds, which includes several other animation pieces. The piece was created by a group that goes by the handle Billy Blob.
Sure would love this group to turn their creative faculties to hard history — say, the Progressive Movement and Gilded Age. (Probably less chance of commercialization there, and perhaps less chance of awe-striking art, too.)
4 Comments | animation, Cartoons, Creationism, Education, Evolution, History, Humor, Religion, Science, Space exploration, War on Education, War on Science | Tagged: animation, Anime, BillyBlob, Cartoons, Creationism, Education, Humor, Intelligent Design, Science, Space exploration, War on Education, War on Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Even so, he’s still a better candidate than Jim DeMint
August 14, 2010Who was it who pointed out that, no matter what a boob this guy Alvin Green is, he’d still make a better senator than Jim DeMint?
Still true. Green would be a better senator from jail, than DeMint is walking around.
Most South Carolinians plan to vote for the bad guy in this match up, the more evil of two lessers. But for the few thousand thinking voters in South Carolina, Green’s indictment probably pulls him down closer to the level of DeMint. What to do?
What a train wreck is South Carolina politics and government.
5 Comments | Elections, Humor, Politics | Tagged: All you can do is laugh, Alvin Green, Evidence of the Collapse of the American Empire, Humor, Jim Demint, Politics, South Carolina | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Last one in the water . . .!
August 12, 2010
Sign on an Australian beach. Photo by Laura Hale
Tip of the old scrub brush to Laura Hale.
Leave a Comment » | Humor, Life, Travel | Tagged: Australia, Humor, Life, Swimming, Travel | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Too true for fiction: French fund creationism in U.S., to cripple U.S. science
August 5, 2010Talk about your plots!
Could it possibly be real? [Note to the gullible: No, it couldn’t.]
France to fund Creationism in US schools.
The French Ministry of Science and Technology has surprised many by announcing that it is to commit €50 million to a campaign to encourage anti-science teaching in American schools. A spokesman told us: ” This is a wonderful opportunity for France and Europe. We would like to help American conservatives turn a whole generation of American schoolchildren against science, and instead obsess about stuff in a 2,000 year old book. Today, it’s evolution, but we are confident that within five years we can have them teaching that gravity is a communist idea, and that bio-technology is something to do with the Devil and homosexuality. We have one schoolboard in Alabama voting tomorrow to teach that the Sun revolves around the United States. NASA aren’t happy, but the director of commercial satellite launching of the European Space Agency actually weed himself, he was laughing so much. Sent us a lovely hamper. It had cake.”
The ministry ruled out extending the policy to France. “Absolutely not. we’re building a modern economy here. We need kids who can write software and develop new medicines, not wonder if God designed Zebras to look like they’re wearing pyjamas.”
It must be true, according to Birther Standards of Truenessivity, and the Josh McDowell Rules of Specious Evidence — see the earlier documentation.
Besides, the release spelled “pyjamas” correctly.
Tip of the old scrub brush to correspondent Richard Thomas.
[Serious question: Is there any way we could persuade O’Mahony to put together a pub guide to global warming?]
Leave a Comment » | Creationism, Hoaxes, Humor | Tagged: Creationism, France, Hoaxes, Humor, NASA, U.S. Security | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Mike Rowe proposes an amendment to the Scout Law
July 27, 2010
1 Comment | Boy Scouts of America, Humor | Tagged: A Scout is Clean, Boy Scouts of America, Humor, Mike Rowe, Scout Law, Scouting Centennial | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Warming deniers surprised by winter
July 27, 2010Were you writing fiction, you couldn’t make this stuff up.
Another bastion of people misled by the lack of a Hemingway-brand Solid Gold Sh*t Detector™.
Another person proud as heck of her denial of global warming, points to cattle freezing in South America in July as proof that the Earth’s atmosphere is not warming.
At a blog called Frugal Café Blog Zone, “Where it’s chic to be cheap… Conservative social & political commentary, with frugality mixed in,” blogger Vicki McClure Davidson headlined the piece:
Gee, how to break this news to her?
Vickie, sit down. This is something you should have learned in geography in junior high: In the Southern Hemisphere, winter starts on June 21. It’s cold in South America in July, because it’s winter in South America in July.
Cold in winter. They don’t expect it. These warming denialists provide the evidence those crabs need, who wonder whether there shouldn’t be some sort of “common sense test” required to pass before allowing people to vote, or drive, or have children.
Oh, it gets worse:
Another site picked up the post. No, seriously. (Has Anthony Watts seen this yet?)
- Voting Female [I am convinced that is a sock puppet site designed to insult women; no woman could be that stupid, could she?]
Earth at northern solstice - Wikimedia image
40 Comments | Accuracy, Climate change, climate_change, Cost of Green, denialism, Geography - Physical, Global warming, Humor, Junk science, literacy, Rampant stupidity, Science, South America, Voodoo science, War on Science | Tagged: Accuracy, Climate change, Cost of Green, denialism, geography, Global warming, Green Politics, Humor, Junk science, literacy, Rampant stupidity, Science, Science Literacy, Voodoo science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
If you get pulled over in Arizona . . .
July 26, 2010Has Arizona’s legislature thought about this question?
Si un policia me dice “papeles” y yo le digo “tijeras” . . . gano yo?
6 Comments | Federalism, Foreign Language, Humor, Immigration, Rampant stupidity | Tagged: Federalism, Foreign Language, Humor, Immigration, Language, Rampant stupidity | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 
