Linked List : rand() % interesting

Just the links, m'am.

Well, with some commentary and snark, obviously.  I mean, we're not barbarians.

• Han Solo in carbonite Pop-Tarts.  Sadly, not edible.
• 23 Best Military Science Fiction Books.  I've read 16/23, which means I now have seven new books to add to my reading list. Very pleased to see Dan Abnett on the list, because man, that guy can write. If you have never given him a shot, go grab Eisenhorn and start in on it.  Go ahead, we'll wait for you.
• The High-Tech Toilet That Sank a Submarine.  'nuf said.
• Tha Illiad of MC Homer.  Translated from the original Greek by MC Lula.  Seriously - it works. Who could not love a translation that contains phrases like "...Achaeans with greaves that are pimpest"?
• Moscow's stray dogs are selecting for intelligence, have learned to ride subway trains, and are learning and teaching new behavior patterns for dealing with the humans they share their habitat with.
• This Is That profiles "Smoke & Flame", a Vancouver artisanal firewood company that is selling bundles of kindling for $1000.  Locally sourced, organic, pesticide free, hand-crafted. Bummed that they didn't mention whether the ginger rub was a basic part of the process or an extra touch.
• Jim Butcher has a new novel coming out on September 29th.  Already planning for a couple of sleepless nights as I pounce on it and devour his writing, in accordance with The Prophecy.
• My brother and his business partner are going to be appearing in the upcoming season of Shark Tank.  Which product?  Here's a hint: watch the clip, and pick out the two most incredibly goofy looking pair of guys in it. Yep, that's them. They are, indeed, complete goofballs, but they are smart goofballs.
• Dashcam footage of instant karma.  Cut someone off, and you just might get sucked up by a mini-tornado as they get to watch.
• Tone Deaf Choice of the Year: "Xignite Picks Brutal Founder of Firing Squads and Labor Camps as Icon of New API Ecosystem".
• A Reflection on a Room, Part I and Part II.  Stories and lessons learned from time in the command & control center for Desert Storm, as told by a man who was there.

Linked List : Curiosities

There is an angel on Mars:

She is standing on a small rock and, calculating from the scale of the picture, she is just shy of four inches high... I would say the "parasol" is actually a flaming sword. She is, after all, a Martian angel, not an Earthling angel, charged to defend the honour of that planet, and not ours. Notwithstanding, an angel is an angel, and the family resemblance between theirs and ours is plain enough.

When Danes were under Prussian rule, they were forbidden from raising the Danish flag.  So they bred the Protest Pig instead. (H/T: Scandinavia and the World)

Anyone can call the International Space Station:

... there is a ham radio on the space station like the ones used by amateur radio enthusiasts around the world. It is how space station astronauts conduct Q&A sessions with students, for instance. The space station's ham radio frequencies are publicly available and you too can try to call the space station when it passes 250 miles above. That does not mean anyone will answer, but sometimes one of the astronauts will be there and will converse.

What are the odds that a plane will be hit by a meteor?  About one in a billion.

Linked List : History Edition

For whatever reason, there were a bunch of interesting articles on history in my feeds this morning...

To start things off, an archaeologist believes he may have found clues to the fate of some of the original Roanoke colonists:

Mr. Luccketti, 66, chose his words carefully as he described the fruits of their latest work. "I'm trying to make sure that I say this correctly," he said. "We have evidence from this site that strongly indicates that there were Roanoke colonists here." In Chapel Hill, N.C., on Tuesday, the foundation will reveal its findings, which have been submitted for peer review, and the theory that at least a few of the settlers moved inland to Site X.

Next, an article on the American program to eavesdrop on enemy radio communications in Europe and Africa... from Scituate, Rhode Island:

Seventy years ago this week Rhode Islanders swarmed into the streets with other joyous Americans celebrating the end of World War II. It would be three more months before the world learned of Rhode Island's top-secret role in defeating Germany and Japan. It was a tale of espionage, now virtually forgotten, centered in, of all places, an old farmhouse in Scituate.

Also related to WWII - excavation while building luxury apartments in Bethnal Green, England turned up a 500lb bomb:

The Royal Logistics Corps was on site preparing to stabilise and defuse the device, dropped during the Blitz in 1941. It was found by builders working on a site behind Temple Street. Photographs released by the Ministry of Defence showed the rusting shell embedded two feet below the ground encased by mud.

Finally, via Peter Grant - a.k.a Bayou Renaissance Man - a report of the recovery of the ship's bell from the HMS Hood by a team funded by Paul Allen:

The bell was brought up from the shattered wreck lying in the Denmark Strait between Iceland and Greenland at a depth of more than 9,000 feet. The bell will now spend a year undergoing restoration before being placed in the National Museum of the Royal Navy in Portsmouth.

Update: Almost forgot that I wanted to include a link to cracked.com's article on "5 Insane True Stories That Change How You Picture WWII":

#5. The Nazis Had A Supervillain Arctic Base To Make Nukes ... And 11 Men Took It Out

#4. Japan Was Building A Tesla-Inspired "Death Ray"

#3. Hitler Saved America From A Nazi Bioweapon Plot

#2. An American Citizen And A Downed Japanese Pilot Teamed Up To "Invade" Hawaii

#1. Japan And Germany Planned To Send A Dirty Bomb To America Delivered By Kamikaze Submarines

Linked List

RPC handshakes and mbuf corruption;multi-threaded with task list interruptions.All of the pain that a core file brings;These are a few of my least favorite things...

So, yeah, work is really worky this week, and my posting schedule (what there is of it) has suffered.  To make up for it, here's a  bunch o' linkage for yinz guys.

• Over at The Smallest Minority, Kevin has no Faith in Government.  According to recent polls, that puts him well into the majority.
• At Sharp as Marble, Robb Allen expounds on just one of the reasons that you shouldn't be sleeping soundly at night.  I say this is one reason you shouldn't have faith in the government, either. Wait, no - make that two reasons.  Um.  Or maybe three reasons?  Wait -  four?  Man.  You know what?  Never mind.  Just go read his blog.
• Neo-Neocon points out that the presidency actually requires some skills.  I'm pretty sure she means "some skills other than continuous campaigning, fund raising and playing golf."
• Larry Correia has posted The Internet Arguing Checklist.  Learn how to give ammo to the people already on your side!  Convince the undecided!  Allow your opponents to display their petty ignorance to the world!
• Speaking of argument ammo, College Insurrection points to a Harvard (yes, that Harvard) study that shows gun control doesn't work.
• Via Questions and Observations, you can find Andrew Klavan explaining the progressive's version of the IAC: "Shut up!"
• House of Eratosthenes points out an alternate strategy employed by global warming advocates: never start a discussion, just declare that debate is useless.
• Robb Allen (there he is again... seriously, guys just go read his blog!) points out that the progressive argument for gun control is specifically based on emotion as opposed to logic.
• Not to be left out, Aaron Ross Powell has a handy pointer on How Not To Argue Against Libertarianism.  Well, really, it's got some good points on how to not argue against anything, really.  Starting off with not misconstruing your opponent's positions in order to knock down a strawman.  I guess there are some people who need to be told that's not a valid debate tactic?

Plenty of good stuff in there, right?

Now go read your Robb Allen.

Linked List

Glanced at briefly, filed away for future reading, and presented here for your edutainment.

• Obama likes The Universal Solution to all problems: take something away from you. "Thing I Know #410. When the guy telling you what to do keeps coming up with the same solution for every single problem, that’s a problem."
• How To Green The World's Deserts.  Hint: it isn't the way you think.  It is also entirely different from how to green the world's desserts, by the way.
• "Bring out your dead!"...  middle class.  Tyrants have always hated those not dependent on them.
• "I can’t do that, so I don’t want you doing that either..." - that seems to be the rallying cry of the progressives. Witness that clown, wosshisname, Bloomberg... he's getting older, like all the Boomers.  Can't have salt, can't have sugar, can't have trans-fats anymore.  So by golly, if he can't have them, then you can't, either, peon.
• Well, whaddya know!  Gun laws do nothing to prevent homicides.  Quelle surprise!  What next - a study that shows tax laws do not affect those who ignore tax laws?
• Tam hasn't posted on Hugo Chavez because, and I quote, "His death made me sad and depressed."  After reading her post, I have to admit that I, too, am saddened and depressed by the circumstances of Hugo's death.
• Rope.  Large lengths of it.
• Peelian Principles.  Should make for an interesting topic of conversation for the next time I run into one of our local police officers.
• An interesting account regarding the domestication of dogs and foxes.
• An interesting account regarding the domestication of free men.  Oh, wait  -  no, that's the closing of the liberal mind.  Same thing, really.
• OK, I am just going to stop posting links to Sarah Hoyt, because I just do not have enough time or electrons to link everything interesting she comes up with.  The woman spins off ideas - good, interesting ideas -  faster than Obama tosses former supporters under the bus.  Just, y'know, read her blog, and you'll be covered.
• Note for the Times, and other pollsters: you are not measuring reality, you are measuring what people say.  So, for example, when the Times conducts a poll and finds that fewer people admit to owning guns, that does not necessarily mean that fewer people own a gun... it just means that fewer people are willing to tell you whether or not they own a gun.

Linked List

Glanced at briefly, filed away for future reading, and presented here for your edutainment.

• Over at Chicago Boyz, David Foster documents The Normalization of Abusive Government.
• Captain Capitalism opines on The Politicly Leftist Rationalization Hamster.
• The sun!  THE SUN IS 'ASPLODING!
• Vladka Meed's obituary.  Death of a heroine.  Via Bayou Renaissance Man, who also has a link to her testimony, recorded in 1996.
• Gun Control's Great White Fleet.  He points out that We, The People, are more than a bit unruly.  Especially in the face of those who think that we need to be shown our place.
• My pastor is fond of saying, "Your talk talks and your walk talks, but your walk talks louder than your talk talks."  Borepatch points out that the walk of the modern environmentalist is practically shouting, "We hate the poor!"  And the elderly.  And, well, just about anyone else who isn't a latté-swilling statist, really.
• Emo mages Warlocks get their green fire, finally.  So now they can die happy.  Or will, once I finish leveling my rogue.
• For Sale: a research station in Key Largo, only $1.9 million! Mosquitoes, no-see-ums, and fire ants included at no extra charge.

Linked List

Glanced at briefly, filed away for future reading, and presented here for your edutainment.

• Packaging food for consumption in space.  Not as easy as you might think.
• Drone strikes are bad enough, even without the moral preening and hypocrisy.
• Who in the world ever could have thought that the Arab Spring might have some not-so-good consequences?  Aside from anyone with two functioning brain cells, I mean.
• Ace of Spades notes that If It Will Save a Single Life, We Must Get Piers Morgan's Stupid Fat Face off the Television.
• In a completely coincidental story totally unrelated to anything that Piers Morgan might have inspired, Noah Rothman notes that the media displays admirable restraint when they can't link a shooter to the Tea Party.  Baby steps.  Next goal would be to stop soiling themselves when around certain people, I suppose.
• Oh, hey - Piers Morgan again.  You think that the man would eventually run out of feet to insert in his pie-hole, but you'd be wrong.  The Smallest Minority points out item number mumblety-large in the list of things that Piers Morgan doesn't get.
• Ah, who am I kidding?  The Silicon Graybeard points out that It's Not About Guns and Maybe It's Not Even About Control, and really, I have trouble finding fault with his argument.
• Low-Tech Magazine.  Ironically enough, available online, as it its sister site, No Tech Magazine.  Mind you, I am not complaining.  Just pointing out the irony.
• Google releases a C++ B-tree library that implements STL container interfaces.  Good for them, and good for us code monkeys.  Seriously, if I had a quarter for every time I wished I had a good STL compatible B-tree implementation in the past year, I'd have... eh, half a buck.  So, you know, not life changing, but certainly very cool.
• The O'Floinn talks about the price of tea in China.  Well, not really.  However, he does discuss the value of gold, which is marginally more interesting.
• David Horowitz has some notes for the Republicans on that pesky "winning" thing they seem to keep leaving off of their campaign checklists.  Worth noting as anybody who ends up in the sights of the progressives will face these issues, because let's face it... they don't care about the issues, they don't care about the people, they don't care about anything except power.

Finally, for your entertainment: A production of F. Paul Wilson's classic short story. "Lipidlegging":

Linked List

Glanced at briefly, filed away for future reading, and presented here for your edutainment.

• John Pepple has a an observation on leftists, the Chinese, and Islam.
• The Constitution is awesome, folks.  A billion Chinese can't be wrong.
• Sarah Hoyt has a few ideas about waging a Culture War On A Shoe String.
• Coincidentally, the House of Eratosthenes discusses The Art of War Against Liberals.

Linked List

Glanced at briefly, filed away for future reading, and presented here for your edutainment.

• Jenny reminds us to trust in God, but keep your powder dry.
• Borepatch talks about debating fundamental differences with gun banners.
• Meanwhile, Sebastian provides some similar insights on how to talk to the non-initiated.  Great minds, and all that.
• The Czar looks towards the coming changes in the university model higher education.
• A disturbing possibility raised - certain charitable organizations may be channeling money donated for Hurricane Sandy Relief efforts to fund Hamas.
• On the other hand, The Coyote points out his positive experiences with Teach For America.  He mentions that the teacher's unions hate TFA, which - as far as I'm concerned - is a glowing endorsement for the organization.
• China and capitalism.  Once more proving Dogbert's wisdom.
• Lest you think all is suddenly rosy in China, read about a haunting message of forced labor in a box of Halloween decorations.
• The Bayou Renaissance Man has an interesting piece on the Royal National Lifeboat Institution's sea trials for their new Shannon class lifeboat.
• The next great war may well be between mutants and humans.  Or, more likely, between mutants and mutants.  But not in the way that you might think.
• Finally, Michael Flynn has his own, quite wonderful linked list to peruse.

Linked List

Glanced at briefly, filed away for future reading, and presented here for your edutainment.

• From Reason, D.C.: More Legal Guns, Far Fewer Murders.  Call it the corollary to Quinn's First Law: "If you want to achieve liberalism's stated intent, do the opposite of what they advocate."
• The O'Floinn [1] notes a novel reading of the first amendment used to silence speech.
• Mike Flynn [2] explains, using small words, how "equal pay" does not result in equal median pay.
• A resistance movement against Obamacare?  How could that be?
• In the NYT, Nicholas Kristof talks about Profiting From a Child's Illiteracy.  Perverse incentives and Quinn's First Law are best buddies, folks.
• Transparency?  That's so pre-election.  Crony capitalism is the in thing now.  Well, it was always the in thing, but now the administration can be... more flexible.  All of which naturally leads to a culture of corruption and The Sebelius Coverup.

[1] Also known as Mike Flynn.

[2] Also known as The O'Floinn.

Linked List : Political Incorrectness Edition

The judge who ordered Major Nidal Hasan to shave his beard has been taken off the Fort Hood shooting case.  Let's just transfer the twelve Amish beard-shaving culprits to the same prison that Major Hasan is currently infesting.  Problem solved!

There's apparently some question as to whether or not Hillary Clinton's top aid,  Huma Abedin, has ties to the Muslim Brotherhood.  Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank opines that "It’s hard to escape the suspicion that it has something to do with the way she looks and how she worships."  Hey, Dana?  I'm a white, Christian male.  I am continually judged by idiots like you based entirely on how I look and how I worship.  As Dogbert said, "Cry me a river, Liberal."

Those stinking racists in Congress are opposing immigration reforms again.  No, not the GOP.  The real racists.  Apparently only people from the correct countries - you know, the ones that produce potential Democratic voters - should be shown any preference with regard to immigration.

Being a conservative academic.  How difficult could it be, really?  Apparently not difficult at all, so long as you sit down and shut up.  Step out of line, though...

Finally, one day, an administrator called me in to chastise me for hanging a protest letter on my office door.

The protest letter included a photograph from the “NO H8” campaign, with a man in a white T-shirt gagged by duct tape... Ironically, the administrator did not know that the No-H8 campaign was originally for gay rights, so he thought the picture of a man with duct tape over his mouth came from some Tea Party hate site....

The word “offended” came up a dozen times — in the context of my colleagues who’d made anonymous complaints.

“When do I get to feel offended?” I asked.  ”Let’s say you were a Jewish soldier, and someone hung posters advertising some slapstick lampoon making fun of Jews.  Would you say nothing?”

The administrator stared back in deafening silence.

“Would you say nothing?”

“Yes,” he finally answered.  ”I would say nothing.”

Those clever progressives.  Why bother with censorship when you can just give your buddies the ability to sue anyone you disagree with into oblivion?  All you need to do is provide the proper incentives to the right people, and before you know it, your enemies are cowed, and you can claim that your hands are clean.  Not that they are, mind you, but you can claim it.

Finally, in the aptly titled post "Politics of Doom", Robert X brings the snark on GOP opposition to Susan Rice vis-à-vis GOP support for Condeleezza Rice:

Lookie here, WaPoMSNBC and Dems in gen, if'n y'wanna call 'em "partisan hacks," that's supportable; if you wanna tell us the GOP can't abide Mr. Obama's pick 'cos they are making a wrong interprtation of her role in wallpapering the Administration's slant on Benghazi on the Sunday politricks programs, fine; but you haven't a leg to stand on when you clam Susan Rice is opposed 'cos she is a woman of color -- unless you are claiming Condeleezza Rice is actually a fiendishly talented white female impersonator? (And in that case, why do you hate effeminate gay men?) Is it some "who's more black" contest? If so, you're objectifying women and racial minorities!

Readin', Writin', 'Rithmatic

... or not.  In any case, some bits about our educational institution that have impinged upon my consciousness recently:

• Students are 100 times more likely to be sexually abused by a teacher than a priest, according to that eeeevil bastion of conservative Tea Baggery, the Department of Education.
• Professor Grover Furr of Montclaire State University believes that communism in Russia was not responsible for any deaths.  He also has a nice certificate attesting to his ownership of the Brooklyn Bridge as well.
• Of course, if talking about how Jews faked the Holocaust in order to gin up support for Israel is more your style, you can always mosey on over to Lincoln University of Pennsylvania and hang out with associate professor of English and journalism Kaukab Siddique.   Which is amazing, as pro-Palestine, anti-Israel professors are rarer than hens teeth these days.
• Finally - though it's easy enough to find anti-Semitic communist sympathizers in the classroom, if you really want a sure thing, you'll need to skip school and head out to the 2012 Midwest Marxism Conference instead.  As with any convention, don't forget your badge, don't let hygiene become an issue, and above all, make sure that you're ideologically pure before attending, comrade!  Or else.

Linked List

Glanced at briefly, filed away for future reading, and presented here for your edutainment.

• Huh.  Planned Parenthood says that they don't do mammograms.  I'm sure they're mistaken, since pretty much every liberal friend of mine absolutely knows that they do them.
• If you're interested in success, got to college for engineering, computer science or math.  Or, y'know, you can major in puppetry and... well, not succeed.  Your choice.
• Or you could always try to get a "job" at a stimulus-funded "green" battery manufacturer, where you can "work" at playing cards while you pay off that puppetry loan.  Then you'll certainly be a "success" and really "enjoy" your "life".
• Only in America.
• Not Optimal.
• Avenge Me.

Linked List

Glanced at briefly, filed away for future reading, and presented here for your edutainment.

• The DiploMad calls it: politically, after Clinton's statement, Obama has to accept responsibility for Benghazi.  And so he does.
• Bryan Jacoutot at Legal Insurrection says Obama's foreign policy "is an absolute disaster", based on reports from those right-wing media outlets, CNN and Forbes.  Quinn's First Law, folks.
• RedState has a list of failed or failing "Green Energy" companies that have received state or federal subsidies.
• Coal miners are not happy with Obama, for a number of reasons.  Like, say, lying about them.
• The Bayou Renaissance Man provides essential reading for adventurers.
• The Coyote endorses Mal Reynolds for president.
• "The illusion of Obama winning has disappeared".
• The Daily Mail digs up the dirt on Benghazi for we poor colonials.  Perhaps we could arrange for an aid shipment of a few investigative reporters and a couple of decent politicians, since we're apparently a bit short on both?
• ZeroHedge shows us where the administration would like you to think the jobless claims are, and where they really are.  And it's not a pretty picture.

Linked List

Glanced at briefly, filed away for future reading, and presented here for your edutainment.

• Watts Up With That? provides some details on environmental fable and fallacy.
• The recent global warming trend apparently stopped 16 years ago, but for some reason, that's not interesting enough to report.
• Besides, even if increased in CO2 aren't causing AGW, it's still killing shellfish.  So there's the new anti-carbon rallying cry, then.
• The new Obama campaign slogan: "Things are going swimmingly."  Of course, not everyone agrees with that sentiment.
• Democrats seem to have a problem following the rules.  Quelle surprise.
• It looks like the Obama administration is going to have to put some of those monster truck tires on their bus, just so they can fit everyone under it.
• Sliding down the slope,  it looks like Ontario’s Education Minister would love to tell the Catholic Church that it can no longer teach that abortion is wrong.  Because telling someone that killing children is wrong is bullying them.
• Now witness the food power of this fully planned and operational ultimate kitchen garden!
• We can't travel faster than light yet, but when it does happen, we'll know how the math works out.

Linked List

Glanced at briefly, filed away for future reading, and presented here for your edutainment.

• A closer look at Gary Johnson.  Wonder if he's be open to a V.P. slot?
• How Intellectual Property Destroyed Men’s Shaving.  Holy cow, you mean there's another use for a straight razor?
• 33 Geeky Insults You Can Use Almost Anywhere.  You nerf herder.
• Should You Need the Government's Permission to Work?  Survey says...
• The land of fruits, nuts and flakes is apparently "the ninth circle of business hell."
• How the elite see us uppity peons: Murderers of the Middle Class
• Rand Paul has a quick fix for TSA: Pull the plug ... next week?  Yeehaw!
• Bad hair day? Ah-yep.  "I’ve seen tropical birds with smaller, better kept pompadours."