The Comedian

Shame

2012-01-26T16:10:00.004-05:00

A man who spent two years in solitary confinement after getting arrested for DWI was awarded $22 million for suffering inhumane treatment in New Mexico's Dona Ana County Jail.

I spent a summer in law school working for a NYS Court of Claims judge. I worked on all manner of prisoner Pro Se claims against NY prisons and learned that many, if not most prisoner complaints are marginal at best.

Man arrested, put in county jail & left there for 2 years with no trial, no medical care, and often left completely inside his solitary cell for months at a time.

Before this judgment came down I don't know if I would have believed such a thing possible in the United States. I'd certainly never heard of anything like this in the U.S. before, and I hope it never happens again.

Evil people did this, whether they wears labels of incompetence or sadism, they are pure evil.

Via Clayton Cramer

Regulation vs Equality

2012-01-18T16:11:00.002-05:00

"The easiest way to get everybody on the same level is with a steamroller." -- Me

Refuses to quit!

2012-01-18T12:30:00.004-05:00

Stop Pippa too!

Did my part to fight for online freedom

2012-01-18T12:26:00.001-05:00

Well, I did my part.

I didn't take a shower this morning.

You know, to help Stop SOAP!

Life is too short to own cheap X

2012-01-16T14:39:00.003-05:00

Surprising few unique responses to a Google search reveal fairly consistent believe by internet writers on what you shouldn't cheap out on.

"Life is too short to own cheap" ...

flashlights

cheap, ugly handguns

guns

knives

dogs

tools

Here's an big list compiled by Australians -- Life is too short for...

Which I suppose could be summed up as simply tools, dogs and shoes.

For everything else, I suppose, frugality is A OK.

2012-01-16T14:10:00.002-05:00

Original found at Clayton Cramer's Blog.

Better version spotted here.

QOTD

2012-01-16T10:19:00.000-05:00

"Cynicism is just a fancy word for pattern recognition."

-- Commenter "davelog" over at boingboing.com

Thanks, but no thanks, I've already got more problems than I need.

2012-01-12T09:43:00.005-05:00

If someone on the other end of a telephone call tells you to not defend yourself with the best means possible, you can pretty much write off everything else they tell you as well. In a situation that stressful (four men breaking into your home), the last thing you need is a delay brought about by trying to satisfy the voice on the phone AND stay alive.

'Do not, while I’m on the phone, do not fire that firearm, OK?' the dispatcher says

'What if another one comes in the house, ma'am?' he asked.

'Let me know, OK, if you see anybody. I will let you know (when a deputy gets to the house),' the dispatcher responded.

I wonder if the dispatcher saying that is in their SOPs or if they went off book?

Spotted here.

Al Quaeda gets its just desserts

2012-01-11T12:50:00.001-05:00

Latest terrorist treat?

The Molotov cupcake.

Apparently Batman didn't always eschew guns

2012-01-10T12:22:00.003-05:00

From this post over at The Batman Universe.

But how many of us know that the original Batman of the comic books started out using guns? As written by Bob Kane, Batman would occasionally make use of a gun to level the playing field against the criminals he faced. It wasn’t until later that the mythos of Batman was revised and he renounced the weapon that was responsible for the deaths of his mother and father.

NOTE: Image not from the Bob Kane era.

funniest tweets and facebook posts of 2011

2012-01-04T17:53:00.000-05:00

Tweets

Facebook

Obama lists himself as 4th best President

2011-12-20T12:52:00.001-05:00

Obama lists himself as 4th best President.

Must be using Cooley rules.

It Was On Fire When I Lay Down On It

2011-12-08T15:18:00.000-05:00

Mr. Corzine's testimony seems to be channeling Robert Fulghum, or perhaps President "I inherited this problem" Obama."

"Without adequate time and materials to prepare, I may be unable to respond to various questions members might pose," he said.

I suppose the dog ate his homework as well.

A purse is not a gun when...

2011-12-02T14:26:00.000-05:00

TSA Idiocy Continues

Gibbs said she was headed back home to Jacksonville from a holiday trip when an agent flagged her purse as a security risk.

'She was like, "This is a federal offence because it's in the shape of a gun",' Gibbs said. 'I'm like, "But it's a design on a purse. How is it a federal offence?"'

After agents figured out the gun was a fake, Gibbs said, TSA told her to check the bag or turn it over.

Doing a heckuva job there Lu.

Google+ trying to capture the lucrative stalker market

2011-11-29T16:20:00.005-05:00

Caught this ad last night on TV.

Its message seems to be that Google+ is the preferred social networking site for stalkers and their materialistic prey.

Google titled this advert "Google+: Circles Love Story".

Love?! Those are some warped folks out there if this is love to them.

It would have been better if the creeper got dumped into circle creeper, never to escape there from. Some other fella should have been the one to advance through the ranks, probably without the circle that qualified boys based on their automotive ownership status.

Those small changes would have shown how easy it is to isolate creeps on Google+, made the female mouse-driver seem less money (car?) grubbing, and left the viewer with the idea that Google+ and its circles gave you power that other sites don't.

Instead I'm left feeling like I wouldn't want to interact with any of the weirdo, stalking and/or materialistic mouse-jockeys hanging out at Google+.

My previous employer relearned this bit of history first hand

2011-11-14T09:49:00.000-05:00

Jerry Pournelle on traditional Chinese business practices.

It is a traditional Chinese business practice to establish relations with a customer, then slowly over time degrade the product delivered until the customer complains. This is described in stories out of China dating back hundreds of years, involving both British and Japanese customers. It was not considered unethical by Chinese merchants.

So, combine a low cost country outsourcing program with underfunded inspection and quality departments and you have hundreds if not thousands of companies setting themselves up as easy marks.

We need to stop promoting from within...

2011-11-04T14:29:00.002-04:00

Like the score of a cricket game...

2011-11-04T00:07:00.000-04:00

From

Courant.com.

To be fair they do cover geographically and climatically different parts of the state, but I thought the juxtaposition of the two was dramatic.

Sometimes paying Net90 bites you in the ass!

2011-11-03T01:28:00.001-04:00

Connecticut Light & Power paying out of state emergency crews at Net 90 +?.

Usually not a problem, but Hurricane Irene wasn't so long ago, so now out of state crewed may have been slow to respond because CL&P has been running emergency operations using other peoples' money.

(fwiw, got my power back about 97 hours after it went out on Saturday. Post Irene I was out of power for about 24 hours.)

Like a tornado hit every tree in town

2011-11-01T16:31:00.000-04:00

That's how my town looks as of today.

Saturday into Sunday we had Octsnowber 100 (+?) year storm.

Leaves were still on trees, so now the trees are all on the ground.

As one of my friends put it "That huge tree that was in my backyard is now my backyard."

No power, won't likely have power likely until next week. Running heat off of an inverter (oil heat doesn't take too much juice to run).

I'll upload some pictures if I find the time to take them.

The Thomas M. Cooley School of Law Stil Sucks

2011-11-01T12:30:00.001-04:00

About 5 1/2 years ago I blogged about how much The Thomas M. Cooley School of Law Sucks.

Luckily I stuck to opinion and a few basic facts.

If you go past that, it seems, then Cooley isn't above suing bloggers for libel.

Moronic Connecticut Legislator proposes new law moving Halloween to always be on a Saturday

2011-10-25T16:55:00.009-04:00

Meanwhile, in Connecticut, the state with the highest per-capita state government debt load, State Rep. Tim Larson (D) has proposed a new law moving the celebration of Halloween to always be on a Saturday.

You know, for the children.

While Halloween is not an official state or federal holiday, Larson said that parents of young children have complained to him about weeknight trick or treating and would prefer a weekend day. Saturday allows for events during the day as well as an earlier start to trick or treating, Larson said.

"This would be good for the economy and make Halloween a more family-friendly event every year," he said. "Everyone looks forward to Halloween a little more when it falls on the weekend."

I wonder if he wants to move All Saints Day as well?

BTW - He isn't planning this as a one time thing. Rep. Larson already says he'd like to reintroduce this next year if there is no time for a vote this year.

Larson said he doesn't expect lawmakers to take up the matter this week when they meet to vote on two jobs bills. However, the lawmaker said he hopes it can be addressed in next year's legislative session.

What a no-good busybody.

If he gets re-elected, it'll just confirm every bad thing that people think about East-Hartford and South Windsor.

NOTE: Some links to coverage in the Courant, since some folks don't trust Patch.

State Lawmaker Wants to Change the Date of Halloween to Ensure it Always Falls on a Saturday

Move Halloween? Cue Chilling Scream

Alto Water Tower

2011-10-17T10:57:00.000-04:00

Saw a water tower with the name "Alto" on the TV news Friday night. This visual joke popped into my head.

The Truth About The Chevy Volt

2011-10-14T09:00:00.000-04:00

TTAC has a great piece covering Pennsylvania Congressman Mike Kelly's (R) take on the real world impact of the Chevy Volt.

When you look at this, it makes absolutely no sense. I can stock a Chevy Cruze, which is about a $17,500 car and turns every 30 to 40 days out of inventory… or I can have a Volt, which never turns and creates nothing for me on the lot except interest costs

...

[With dealers like that, who needs competitors? Seriously, Kelly even says he fired the guy who ordered a Volt for his dealership… which he then counts against the Volt’s job creation record. Hit the jump for the rest of his quote.]

I can tell you… as far as job creation, the guy who ordered that Volt for my store is no longer in that job. So it actually worked against him. I was told that the reason that car is on our lot is that General Motors told him he had to stock it. I said “let me understand. I told you that under no circumstances were you to order a Volt,” and he said “yeah.” “So, why did you order it?” “Because General Motors told me.” “Is this the same General Motors that tried to take my Cadillac franchise from me? These are the guys you’re listening to, but the guy who signs your paycheck doesn’t have as much influence as the guys who tried to take away the franchise?”

Motel Caswell

2011-10-11T08:14:00.000-04:00

Whole bunch of arrests and bad doings at the Motel Caswell - Criminality by guests, sometimes reported by hotel clerks, often for criminality that happened elsewhere. Crooks stay at the hotel, not necessarily committing crimes at the motel. Often the hotel and its property were the victim of crimes.

That said, reviews tend to indicate the place is a dump and that you might be solicited just outside your room's door. No reason to seize it under asset forfeiture, but how bad does a place have to be for it to be compared to Joe's Apartment?

The real question to me, though is post Kelo why don't they just skip asset forfeiture and condemn it for economic development? Oh right, then they'd have to pay for it.

Cheap sons of bitches.