It’s falling squarely on the head of the Global Warming Sham with a satisfying “squish” sound.
This Wall Street Journal opinion piece outlines the public deflowering of the vaunted Un IPCC. We’ve talked about all that before (here and here), but what makes this one blog worthy is these two juicy tidbits near the end.
[Mr. Jones] has called into question other issues that the climate lobby has claimed are indisputable. [Mr. Jones] told the BBC that the world may well have been warmer during medieval times than it is now. This raises doubts about how much our current warming is man-made as opposed to merely another of the natural climate shifts that have taken place over the centuries. Mr. Jones also told the BBC there has been no “statistically significant” warming over the past 15 years, though he considers this to be temporary.
Oh, now he changes his tune. Too little too late, sir!
The “Mr. Jones” in question, is the totally disgraced Phil Jones, the most guilty member of the Climategate scandal that finally turned the tide of (at least some) media attention about the climate sham. Mr. Jones has now been forced out of his lofty research position and is now, one can only hope, living in a refrigerator box in some back ally preaching his global warming garbage to the ally cats.
DFW saw record breaking snow yesterday. We got nearly 11 inches at our house.
The good news: Both Tammy and I came home early Thursday. We both had the day off Friday. Our power, internet and TV have stayed on the whole time. We got to build our first snow man together (A whopping seven footer!).
The bad news: Opening night of my dessert theater show was canceled (Friday). Ticket holders will be welcomed Saturday. Some how, we’ll get all the folks for both sold-out shows into one fantastic performance. My folks could not change their plans to come see the show Friday, so they won’t be able to see it. Nor will they get to see the updates to the house. But that will come eventually.
Right now, Tammy is enjoying the Olympic opening ceremony. I’ve snuck out during the parade of nations to give you all an update, but I’d better get back in there soon.
P.S. She’s only shed one tear so far, while they were profiling the torch relay.
Remember a month ago when I said I was in this year’s dessert theater production? I said, “That means that I have a new accent to master and I won’t see my wife awake for the first two weeks of February.”
Well, here we are. My Brooklyn punk accent is pretty sharp and my poor, abandoned, but still loving wife did not see me awake yesterday. Tonight, we got about an hour. Sorry, dear. I still love you! Try not to forget what I look like and don’t shoot me when I come into the bedroom at night. Okay? Thanks. You’re the best.
Have you ever struggled to find the right word to express your frustration, pain, fear, anguish, or hate? I’m mean without cussing, of course. Cuz, you know, profanity is the crutch of the inarticulate.
Well, I’m always looking for a good alternative to profanity and today I found a great one!
Opposite of “Yay!”
Example:
Pardon me while I hammer in this nail that is right next to my thumb.
*Thumb crunching sound*
OPPOSITE OF “YAY!!”
Shamelessly pilfered from Chainsawsuit. (Don’t expect to understand Chainsawsuit. It’s weird. Like me.)
If you’ve eaten three meals a day for the last month (not counting you yahoos you think you can starve yourself skinny or get ahead by saving 10 minutes in the morning)…
If you’ve slept in a more or less climate controlled room, in a bed that you have more or less to yourself, for the last month…
If you (or your family provider) makes more than $2 a day…
Please do me a favor and watch *all* of this 40 minute video.
Do you have fat fingers? Have trouble doing things like dialing a phone or typing on a regular keyboard? Yeah, well, me too. My hands look like two hams with five bratwursts sticking out of them. So, for people like us, there are a few helpful tools. Check out this over sized TV remote.
And how about the latest and greatest technology out there? Are your fingers too fat to use an iPhone? Well, hallelujah and glory be. Those big brains over at Apple finally have a solution for fat fingers like yours and mine. It’s their much anticipated iPad.
Of course, it’s not actually an iPhone. In fact, it’s not a phone at all. It’s just a … well … a giant iPod Touch really, perfect for fat fingers like yours and mine! It also costs up to twice the price of an iPhone ($800!). It does have a high speed data connection so you can surf the web, but you can not call in for dinner reservations at Frankies Fat Finger Frankfurter Hut. (Although, the image of someone holding that behemoth up to their ear is much funnier than this bit I’m doing now.)
Oh, and in case you haven’t figured it out by now, yes, this is for real. I’m serious.
If your like me (God help you.) you’ve got accounts on dozens of websites. Your bank, credit cards, eBay, PayPal, Facebook, Twitter, your blog, and any number of forums or hobby sites. Each one has a login and password. How in the world do we keep track of it all?
For most folks, the solution is simple. Simply stupid, that is. They use horribly insecure passwords. A colleague just sent me a link to the Top 20 Most Common Passwords which in turn links to the Top 500 Worst Passwords (Parental Advisory!! Some people have potty-passwords!) Way too many people use names, common words, or easy to guess combinations, like “121212” or “qwerty.” These people are easy marks for hackers. Don’t be an easy mark!!
The advise I’m about to give you is not unique. I claim no mystical knowledge. You can find it on any number of web sites, but I do think it’s worth sharing.
First off, I strongly recommend that you create what I like to call a spam email account. Use hotmail, yahoo, etc. to create a free email account that you’ll only use for signing up on websites. That way, you’ll have a place to get the inevitable confirmation email, but you won’t be risking your personal email address to spammers.
Now, for passwords:
1 – Don’t use words or names.
2 – Don’t use common non-words. (ex. “qwerty” or “asdf” [Keyboard patterns] or “NCC1701” [Registration number of the Enterprise on Star Trek. Don’t laugh, it’s #139 on the 500 worst passwords list!])
3 – Don’t use common personal information like birth or anniversary dates or phone numbers.
4 – Don’t use only numbers.
“Well, good grief,” you might be saying. “What am I going to use?!” In a word, acronyms! Do you have a favorite song, movie quote, or Bible verse? Here’s an example:
Twinkle twinkle little star, how I wonder what you are.
Now as an acronym password, that becomes “ttlshiwwya”.
5 – Add special characters and use both upper and lower case letters.
For our example above, we could use “*” instead of “star” in our acronym. We could also use “R” instead of “are.” We could replace the lower case “l” with a number “1”. And we could capitalize the first word of each phrase. Now we’ve got “Tt1*HiwwyR”. That’s a pretty good password… except that I just published it on the internet, so now it’s junk. Don’t use it!
Now for one more rule that I have not heard anywhere else, so I am claiming as my own.
6 – Come up with a system that incorporates something unique about the website in question.
Remember I said we’ve got dozens of sites for which we own passwords. It does no good to have a rock solid password that you use everywhere. What happens if, say, Facebook gets hacked and someone steals your rock solid password? The hacker is not going to make any money off of hacked Facebook accounts. Where he butters his bread is taking those passwords and trying them out on eBay, PayPal and major financial websites. If you’re Facebook password is the same as your bank, you’re in big trouble. Likewise, you may want to create multiple spam email accounts or login names that are related to the website. This will decrease the chances of someone cross hacking your accounts.
Come up with an easy to remember keyword for each site.
Bank website -> Money
eBay -> Junk
Stamp collectors forum -> Lick
Online T-shirt store -> Threads
You could even use the name of the site (not as secure, but easier to remember). Now, obviously, you’re not going to use these keywords as your password, but you can use them as part of your password.
Let’s say we take “Tt1*” from the example above. We’ll call that our password root. Now we need a password for our bank, “1st Secure Bank of Awesomeness” whose website is “www.1stsecurebank.com”. Take the last three letters of the website: “ank” (Not “com”… duh.) and inject that into your password root. We could just tack it on the end (“Tt1*ank”), but that might be too easy. How about we interweave the two. So “Tt1*” and “ank” become “Tatn1k*”. Now, you need a password for your stamp collecting forum, “WeLoveStamps.com”. Using the same method, we get “Tmtp1s*”. Get it? Now you’ve got a unique password for every website you visit that is nigh impossible to guess.
But what’s this?! You’re bank wants you to answer some simple questions to help identify you in case you forget your password! What’s your mother’s maiden name. What was the name of your childhood pet. Where did you go to school. These are easy questions! No problem, right? WRONG!
Remember a while back when Sarah Palin’s email was hacked. Guess how the hacker got in. “What school did you go to?” Umm. “Wasilla High School?” Bingo! I promise your bank won’t reject you for inventing a fake answer to these questions. In fact, I would recommend that you give the answer to a different question.
Q) Where did you go to school?
A) 1992
Q) What year did you graduate?
A) Amarillo High School
Q) What was the name of your childhood pet?
A) Sarah Parker
Q) What is the name of your closest childhood friend?
A) Freckles the Fish
The trick here is to remember what answer goes with what. If you don’t think you can pull that off, you might be better off just making something up. Be sure it’s something you’ll remember.
Q) Where did you go to school?
A) Gotham High School
Q) What year did you graduate?
A) 1939
Q) What was the name of your childhood pet?
A) Batty
Q) What is the name of your closest childhood friend?
A) Alfred
Did you catch that? Batman? Eh? Nudge nudge? Pretty smart, eh?
Now, I fully expect you to spend the next two hours going to every website you’ve ever been to and changing your passwords and your security questions. You’ve got work to do, buddy! You’d better get crackin’!!
About a month ago, a statue of the Bronco Bomber as a 10-year-old boy, with a butterfly resting on his hand (Aww, ain’t that cute?), was unveiled in Menteng Park in Jakarta, Indonesia. You see, for four years, beginning in 1967, the Boy Wonder lived in Indonesia with his mom and her second husband. The statue was erected by “his relatives and friends.”
Now over 55,000 Indonesians have signed an online petition to scrap the statue.
“Obama only ate and [pooped*] in Menteng.”
“Barack Obama has yet to make a significant contribution to the Indonesian nation.”
[* The didn’t say “pooped” but you get the idea.]
Hey, Indonesia. Don’t feel so bad. He has yet to made a significant contribution to the well being of the U.S. either.
“Bin Laden sending out a tape trying to take credit for a Nigerian student who engaged in a failed bombing attempt is an indication of how weakened he is because this is not something necessarily directed by him.”
ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME??!! This is exactly the kind of pants-on-head, window-licking idiocy that makes insurgency so successful. How unbelievably naive do you have be to say something so incredibly dumb. Seriously, Mr. Bomber. Who, in Alah’s name, do you think provided this “student” with military grade explosives, training on how to detonate the bomb, and thousands of dollars in cash to buy the plane ticket??!! Oh, yeah. That’s right. YOU ALREADY ADMITTED IT WAS AL-QAEDA!!
Breathe, Trint. Breathe. I’m calm. I’m cool.
I think I would be a little less put out if it weren’t for the fact that Bronco really isn’t that dumb. He just thinks that one else is! How else could he say this after he called the Fruit-of-the-Boom bomber “a member of al-Qaeda” after he called him an “isolated extremist“.
Dear Mr. President,
I do have access to the internet. I can, in two minutes, find references to your previous statements. Even if I could not, I do have the capacity to remember what you said two weeks ago. I am not an idiot. Please stop pretending that I am. You may be able to lie straight faced to Diane Sawyer’s doe-eyed allegiance, but you can’t lie to the American people.
About a month ago, a statue of the Bronco Bomber as a 10-year-old boy, with a butterfly resting on his hand (Aww, ain’t that cute?), was unveiled in Menteng Park in Jakarta, Indonesia. You see, for four years, beginning in 1967, the Boy Wonder lived in Indonesia with his mom and her second husband. The statue was erected by “his relatives and friends.”