Archive for October, 2007
Wednesday, October 31st, 2007
BBC apologises after ‘black people in dark’ comment
The BBC apologised Wednesday after a top national radio presenter triggered protests by saying she could not see black people in the dark.
Radio 2 DJ Sarah Kennedy made the comment when, during a discussion about winter road conditions on her morning show, she explained how she had almost run over a pedestrian.
“You know what happened to me yesterday? It was this black guy. It’s lucky he opened his mouth to yawn or do something and I saw him. He was wearing a black hat, black clothes and he was just invisible,” she said.
Posted in Politically Incorrect | Comments Off
Wednesday, October 31st, 2007
Russia schools ban “cult of death” Halloween
Moscow schools have been ordered to ban students from celebrating the cult of the dead, better known as Halloween, despite the widespread popularity of the imported festival to Russia.
Halloween is being forced underground because it “includes religious elements, the cult of death, the mockery of death,” a spokesman for the city’s education department Alexander Gavrilov said on Wednesday.
Posted in Idiot Authorities | Comments Off
Wednesday, October 31st, 2007
The always entertaining and occasionally correct Debka Files offers us all the following:
Al Qaeda declares Cyber Jihad on the West
In a special Internet announcement in Arabic, picked up DEBKAfile’s counter-terror sources, Osama bin Laden’s followers announced Monday, Oct. 29, the launching of Electronic Jihad. On Sunday, Nov. 11, al Qaeda’s electronic experts will start attacking Western, Jewish, Israeli, Muslim apostate and Shiite Web sites. On Day One, they will test their skills against 15 targeted sites expand the operation from day to day thereafter until hundreds of thousands of Islamist hackers are in action against untold numbers of anti-Muslim sites.
DEBKAfile’s counter-terror sources report that, shortly after the first announcement, some of al Qaeda’s own Web sites went blank, apparently crashed by the American intelligence computer experts tracking them.
The next day, Oct. 30, they were up again, claiming their Islamic fire walls were proof against infidel assault.
They also boasted an impenetrable e-mail network for volunteers wishing to join up with the cyber jihad to contact and receive instructions undetected by the security agencies in their respective countries.
Our sources say the instructions come in simple language and are organized in sections according to target. They offer would-be martyrs, who for one reason or another are unable to fight in the field, to fulfill their jihad obligations on the Net. These virtual martyrs are assured of the same thrill and sense of elation as a jihadi on the “battlefield.”
Posted in Technological Travesties, War | Comments Off
Tuesday, October 30th, 2007
Shocking Inside DC Scandal Rumor: A Media Ethics Dilemma
So I was down in DC this past weekend and happened to run into a well-connected media person, who told me flatly, unequivocally that “everyone knows” The LA Times was sitting on a story, all wrapped up and ready to go about what is a potentially devastating sexual scandal involving a leading Presidential candidate. “Everyone knows” meaning everyone in the DC mainstream media political reporting world. “Sitting on it” because the paper couldn’t decide the complex ethics of whether and when to run it. The way I heard it they’d had it for a while but don’t know what to do. The person who told me )not an LAT person) knows I write and didn’t say “don’t write about this”.
Posted in Politico Follies, Sex, Sinners in the hands of an angry God | Comments Off
Tuesday, October 30th, 2007
Dog shoots Iowa man during hunt
A man out hunting in Iowa was shot in the leg after a hunting dog stepped on his gun, authorities said.
The accident happened after James Harris, 37, put his gun on the ground to retrieve a fallen pheasant.
One of a pack of hunting dogs following behind stepped on the trigger, and up to 120 birdshot pellets hit Mr Harris in the left calf at short range.
Posted in Animal Rebellion Update | Comments Off
Tuesday, October 30th, 2007
Stripped at Club 10
Two months after a recent college graduate incurred $53,000 in charges at a gentleman’s club on Okaloosa Island, investigators are reviewing allegations of fraud and larceny.
Tommy Salter, 24, of Warner Robbins, Ga., was at Club 10 early Aug. 18, celebrating his graduation from Georgia Tech, according to his father and an Okaloosa County Sheriff’s report.
Salter told Club 10 employees he could only spend $600, according the report.
But his dad, 52-year-old Joe Salter of Mary Esther, was shocked by the $53,000 charge that ended up on a joint American Express credit card account he shares with his son.
Posted in Doh!, Sex, Sexual Deviants | Comments Off
Monday, October 29th, 2007
Clam claims oldest animal record
A clam that lived on the seabed in the frigid waters off Iceland’s north coast has been hailed as the longest-lived animal ever discovered.
The mollusc, which is thought to have lurked beneath the waves until at least the age of 405, would have been a juvenile when Galileo picked up his first telescope, Hamlet was first staged and the gunpowder plot failed to blow up King James I.
The Arctica islandica clam was plucked from 80m-deep water by researchers at Bangor University in Wales, who were dredging the north Iceland shelf for the creatures. By studying their shells, the scientists hope to learn how the marine environment has changed in recent centuries.
The clam was alive when it was brought to the surface, but at that point, the researchers had no idea how old it was. Only after cutting through the shell and counting annual growth rings under a microscope did they date the mollusc to between 405 to 410 years old.
Posted in Animal Weirdness | Comments Off
Monday, October 29th, 2007
Norfolk-based ship sinks two pirate skiffs
Sunday, the Porter responded to a distress call from a merchant vessel carrying benzene. The warship fired on and sank two skiffs used by pirates to hijack the vessel in international water.
An official said that when the Porter fired on the skiffs tied up to the merchant vessel, it was not known that the ship was filled with highly flammable benzene.
At the request of Somalia’s government, a second U.S. ship, the Norfolk-based guided missile destroyer USS Arleigh Burke, is now shadowing the merchant ship inside Somali waters.
Posted in A Bit of The Old Ultraviolent, Concentrated Criminality, Pirate Update, War | Comments Off
Sunday, October 28th, 2007
Space rocks go under the hammer
Some of the world’s most famous meteorites are going under the hammer at a New York auction house in what is said to be the first sale of its kind.
The pieces are drawn from collections across the world and many examples are richly coloured and intricately patterned.
Price estimates range from $1.1m (£0.53m) for a 13-kilo (29-pound) piece to pebbles worth a few hundred dollars.
Posted in Space, Toys! | Comments Off
Sunday, October 28th, 2007
Amateur Hockey Player Killed After Puck Strikes Chest
An amateur hockey player died after a puck struck him in the chest and caused him to go into cardiac arrest late Thursday, officials said.
Nathan Crowell, 22, a University of New Haven student, was pronounced dead at Bridgeport Hospital shortly after the incident during a league game at a Shelton hockey rink, police and team officials said.
His death remained under investigation Friday, but police said no foul play is suspected.
Crowell, who is from Portsmouth, R.I., tried to block an opposing player’s slapshot with 3 seconds left in the game when the puck struck him and he collapsed, said Howard Saffan, a co-owner of the SportsCenter of Connecticut facility.
Crowell was wearing the required chest protector and other gear, but the puck apparently struck an unprotected part of his torso just below the pad, Saffan said.
Posted in Oops | Comments Off
Sunday, October 28th, 2007
Report: Pair tried to blackmail British royal
The Sunday Times said the pair had approached the unnamed family member and demanded 50,000 pounds ($100,000) not to publicize a video allegedly showing the royal engaged in a sex act.
The blackmailers also claimed to have evidence suggesting the royal had supplied an aide with an envelope containing cocaine, the newspaper said.
Posted in Drugs, Idiot Celebrities, Idiot Criminals, Sex | Comments Off
Saturday, October 27th, 2007
D’Oh: House Panel Screw-Up Reveals Whistleblower Email Addresses
Here’s a whoops with a capital W.
This summer the House Judiciary Committee launched an effort to collect tips from would-be whistleblowers in the Justice Department. The U.S. attorney firings scandal had shown that much was amiss in the Department, and with the danger of retaliation very real, the committee had set up a form on the committee’s website for people to blow the whistle privately about abuses there. Although the panel said it would not accept anonymous tips, it assured those who came forward that their identity would be held in the “strictest confidence.”
But in an email sent out today, the committee inadvertently sent the email addresses of all the would-be whistleblowers to everyone who had written in to the tipline. The committee email was sent to tipsters who had used the website form, including presumably whistleblowers themselves, and all of the recipients of the email were accidentally included in the “to:” field — instead of concealing those addresses with a so-called blind carbon copy or “bcc:”.
Posted in Doh!, Idiot Authorities, Oops | Comments Off
Friday, October 26th, 2007
Weekly Piracy Report
…
17.10.2007: 1830 LT: 10-20 NM off Mogadishu port, Somalia.
A general cargo ship was proceeding to Mombassa, Kenya after discharging UN WFP chartered cargo at Mogadishu when pirates in a boat chased her, opened fire with automatic weapons, boarded her and hijacked her. They sailed the vessel into coastal waters and anchored closer to shore. To date, owners have lost all contact with the vessel. Fate of the crewmembers and ship is not known.
…
16.10.2007: 0145 LT: 30:06N-048:24.4E: Shatt Al Arab river: Iran.
Five pirates in a speedboat, armed with AK-47 automatic rifles, boarded a container ship underway. They took the master, C/E, 2/O and pilot as hostage. The C/O discovered the incident and raised the alarm. The pirates fired at the C/O. Luckily the C/O escaped. The pirates robbed the crew of cash and property before escaping in their speedboat. Port control and coast guard informed.
Posted in A Bit of The Old Ultraviolent, Concentrated Criminality, Pirate Update | Comments Off
Friday, October 26th, 2007
UN Expert Seeks to Halt Biofuel Output
A U.N. expert on Friday called the growing practice of converting food crops into biofuel “a crime against humanity,” saying it is creating food shortages and price jumps that cause millions of poor people to go hungry.
Jean Ziegler, who has been the United Nations’ independent expert on the right to food since the position was established in 2000, called for a five-year moratorium on biofuel production to halt what he called a growing “catastrophe” for the poor.
Scientific research is progressing very quickly, he said, “and in five years it will be possible to make biofuel and biodiesel from agricultural waste” rather than wheat, corn, sugar cane and other food crops.
Posted in Idiot Authorities, Unintended Consequences | Comments Off
Friday, October 26th, 2007
‘Miracle’ fuel that made a mockery of Mugabe
When Nomatter Tagarira, a spirit medium, claimed that she could conjure refined diesel out of a rock by striking it with her staff, ministers in Robert Mugabe’s Government believed that they might have found the solution to Zimbabwe’s perennial fuel shortage.
After witnessing her apparently miraculous gift they gave her five billion Zimbabwean dollars in cash (worth £1.7 million at the start of the year but now worth one seven-hundredth of that) in return for the fuel. Ms Tagarira was also given a farm, said to have been seized from its white owner during Mr Mugabe’s lawless land grab, as well as food and services that included a round-the-clock armed guard on the rock in the district of Chinhoyi 60 miles (100km) from Harare, the capital.
More than a year later officials realised they had been duped. Ms Tagarira is now in custody, awaiting trial on charges of fraud or, alternatively, of being “a criminal nuisance”. Details from court papers published this week said that over 15 months, until July this year, Ms Tagarira convinced Cabinet ministers, ruling party heavy-weights and top army and police officers that by striking the rock with her staff she could produce enough fuel to supply the country for 100 years.
Posted in Concentrated Criminality, Crazed Dictatorships, Idiot Authorities | Comments Off
Friday, October 26th, 2007
Aliens caused Sicily fires, say officials
Aliens were responsible for a series of unexplained fires in fridges, TV’s and mobile phones in an Italian village, according to an Italian government report.
Canneto di Caronia, in northern Sicily, drew attention three years ago after residents reported everyday household objects bursting into flames.
TV news footage at the time showed electrical appliances as well as cookers, a pile of wedding presents and furniture smouldering.
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Dozens of experts including scientists, electrical engineers and military boffins, arrived in the village 60 miles east of Palermo to investigate the phenomenon.
Arson was quickly ruled out and at one stage an amazed scientist was interviewed after he described how he saw an unplugged electrical cable burst into flames.
Locals were quick to blame supernatural forces and at the time the Vatican’s chief exorcist Father Gabriele Amorth backed up their fears and said: “I’ve seen things like this before. Demons occupy a house and appear in electrical goods. Let’s not forget that Satan and his followers have immense powers.”
Now in an interim leaked report published by several Italian newspapers it has emerged that the Civil Protection Department has concluded the most likely cause was “aliens”.
Posted in Aliens, Most Mysterious | Comments Off
Friday, October 26th, 2007
Scientists Generate Powerful Antimatter Ray
Researchers at North Carolina State University have produced the world’s most powerful antimatter beam.
“There is a reactor in Munich, Germany, that has been generating those types of radiation beams for some time now, and our analysis of the data shows that we have exceeded what they have reported,” Dr. Ayman Hawari, director of the Nuclear Reactor Program at North Carolina State, told the university’s Web site.
The beam, consisting of an intense burst of positrons, was generated at the school’s PULSTAR campus nuclear reactor, which first went online in 1972.
Posted in Weird Science | Comments Off
Friday, October 26th, 2007
Feds: Latino Gang Targeted Blacks
A south Los Angeles Latino street gang targeted African-American gang rivals and other blacks in a campaign of neighborhood “cleansing,” federal prosecutors say. Alleged leaders and foot soldiers in the Hispanic gang Florencia 13, also called F13, are being arraigned this week on charges stemming from a pair of federal indictments that allege that the gang kept a tight grip on its turf by shooting members of a rival gang—and sometimes random black civilians. The “most disturbing aspect” of the federal charges was that “innocent citizens … ended up being shot simply because of the color of their skin,” U.S. Attorney Thomas O’Brien told reporters in announcing the indictments.
Posted in A Bit of The Old Ultraviolent, Anarchy, Concentrated Criminality | Comments Off
Friday, October 26th, 2007
Human race will ’split into two different species’
The human race will one day split into two separate species, an attractive, intelligent ruling elite and an underclass of dim-witted, ugly goblin-like creatures, according to a top scientist.
100,000 years into the future, sexual selection will mean that two distinct breeds of human will have developed.
The alarming prediction comes from evolutionary theorist Oliver Curry from the London School of Economics, who says that the human race will have reached its physical peak by the year 3000.
Posted in End of the World Update, Weird Science | Comments Off
Thursday, October 25th, 2007
America Could Have Killed Usama bin Laden — But Didn’t
We know, with a 70 percent level of certainty — which is huge in the world of intelligence — that in August of 2007, bin Laden was in a convoy headed south from Tora Bora. We had his butt, on camera, on satellite. We were listening to his conversations. We had the world’s best hunters/killers — Seal Team 6 — nearby. We had the world class Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) coordinating with the CIA and other agencies. We had unmanned drones overhead with missiles on their wings; we had the best Air Force on the planet, begging to drop one on the terrorist. We had him in our sights; we had done it. Nice job again guys — now, pull the damn trigger.
Unbelievably, and in my opinion, criminally, we did not kill Usama bin Laden.
You cannot make this crap up; truth is always stranger and more telling than fiction. Our government, the current administration and yes, our military leaders included, failed to kill bin Laden for no other reason than incompetence.
Posted in Concentrated Criminality, Idiot Authorities, War | Comments Off
Wednesday, October 24th, 2007
Information Warfare: The Silenced Storm
The most powerful Internet weapon on the planet is apparently dying the death of a thousand cuts. The weapon in question is the Storm botnet. This was the largest botnet ever seen, and it appeared to be acting like something out of a science fiction story. Last Summer, the Storm network was believed capable to shutting down any military or commercial site on the planet. Or, Storm could cripple hundreds of related sites temporarily. Worse, Storm could have done some major damage in ways that have not yet been experienced.
Posted in Conspiracies, Most Mysterious, Technological Travesties, War | Comments Off
Wednesday, October 24th, 2007
CIA agent who helped kill Che Guevara to sell icon’s hair
One of the men who tracked down and killed Ernesto “Che” Guevara is selling a dozen strands of the iconic revolutionary’s hair at auction on Thursday.
The sale has generated protests from both Guevara’s widow and supporters around the world.
The lock of hair and other artifacts, including photos of Che’s dead body and fingerprints taken post-mortem, are being offered with a minimum bid level of 100,000 dollars.
Posted in Cloak and Dagger, Commies | Comments Off
Tuesday, October 23rd, 2007
Aussie swimmer dives head-first into crocodile
An Australian who went for a drunken dip in the sea got more than he bargained for when he dived into the jaws of a large crocodile.
Matt Martin was camping alone near a beach in northern Queensland when he decided to go for a dusk swim, despite having drunk what he later admitted was “half a slab”, or 12 cans of beer.
When the 35-year-old construction worker dived into a wave, he butted heads with a submerged saltwater crocodile.
“I thought I was dead. It was sort of like when you hit rocks but the rocks had give and movement in them,” he told The Cairns Post.
Posted in Animal Rebellion Update, Fun with Alcohol, Oops, You lucky bastard | Comments Off
Monday, October 22nd, 2007
Italian Mafia turnover ‘$120bn’
Italy’s retailers have denounced the growth of Mafia extortion rackets which they say now affect big companies as well as smaller ones.
The Mafia has turned into one of Italy’s biggest business enterprises with a turnover of more than $120bn (£60bn) a year, a new report says.
The report, prepared by Italy’s leading retailer’s association, warns of growing Mafia influence in the south.
It estimates that 7% of Italy’s output is filtered off by organised crime.
Posted in Concentrated Criminality, Conspiracies, Idiot Authorities | Comments Off
Monday, October 22nd, 2007
Tuberculosis outbreak blamed on stripper – Infectious Diseases
Dozens of people in St. Maarten are being treated for latent tuberculosis after health officials warned that they may have been exposed to the illness by a stripper infected with an active form of the disease.
At least 40 people tested positive after the health department treated an exotic dancer from the Dominican Republic several months ago and sent her home, according to a government news release issued Friday.
Posted in Disease, Sex, Sinners in the hands of an angry God | Comments Off
Monday, October 22nd, 2007
Somali pirates seize ship off Africa
Somali pirates seized a cargo ship off the east African coast – one in a series of high-seas attacks in the last week alone, officials said Monday.
Gunmen hijacked the ship last Wednesday, said Andrew Mwangura, the program coordinator of the East Africa Seafarers Assistance Program. He did not know the number or nationalities of the crew on board.
Two other ships were attacked off the Somali coast on Saturday, with pirates firing on one of the boats, he said. And on Sunday, pirates in two speedboats attempted to seize a ship carrying cargo for the World Food Program – the third attack on a WFP ship this year, said Peter Smerdon, a spokesman for the U.N. program.
Not counting the attacks of the past week, Somalia has had 26 reported hijackings this year – compared to eight by this time last year, the International Maritime Bureau said.
Posted in A Bit of The Old Ultraviolent, Pirate Update | Comments Off
Monday, October 22nd, 2007
Video Fix: Shaolin Monks, Tough All Over on Danger Room
I’ve never respected — or feared — the Shaolin monks more than after watching this NSFW video.
Hat tip to Steve!
Posted in Crazy is as Crazy Does, Cultural Oddities | Comments Off
Sunday, October 21st, 2007
Violence flares again in Amsterdam
Disturbances broke out for a sixth successive night in an immigrant quarter of Amsterdam when four cars were set on fire, police said.
The unrest started after police shot dead a man of Moroccan origin last weekend who had stabbed and injured two officers.
The fires brought the total number of burnt cars to 11, a police spokesman said.
Posted in A Bit of The Old Ultraviolent, Anarchy, Concentrated Criminality, T.R.O.P. | Comments Off
Sunday, October 21st, 2007
Reports: Senior Indian official dies after monkey attack in New Delhi
A senior government official died Sunday after falling from a balcony during an attack by wild monkeys at his home in the Indian capital, media reported.
New Delhi Deputy Mayor S.S. Bajwa was rushed to a hospital after the attack by the gang of Rhesus macaques, but quickly succumbed to head injuries sustained in his fall, the Press Trust of India news agency and The Times of India reported.
Many government buildings, temples and residential neighborhoods in New Delhi are overrun by Rhesus macaques which scare passers-by and occasionally bite or snatch food from unsuspecting visitors.
Posted in A Bit of The Old Ultraviolent, Animal Rebellion Update | Comments Off
Friday, October 19th, 2007
Man shot with flare gun called apparent suicide
A 79-year-old man shot himself in the mouth with a flare gun Thursday morning, in an incident that Town of Tonawanda police are calling an apparent suicide.
Emergency crews responding to the 8:52 a.m. call of a man down on an Elmwood Avenue front lawn took the man to Erie County Medical Center, where he died about an hour and a half later.
Posted in I hate it when that happens, Suicidal Tendencies | Comments Off
Friday, October 19th, 2007
Journalist feared killed by elephants
The herd of wild elephants that are on the rampage in the forest areas of Srikakulam and Vizianagaram districts claimed yet another victim, this time a reporter working for a Telugu daily, on Friday.
K. Nagaraju of Andhra Prabha was suspected to have been trampled to death while three other reporters narrowly escaped the wrath of the nine pachyderms which have been playing havoc in several villages.
Disregarding the advice of forest officials, the four scribes had gone to take photographs of the herd in the Hussainapuram reserve forest area, near Veeraghatam in the early hours.
Posted in A Bit of The Old Ultraviolent, Animal Rebellion Update, Career Limiting Move | Comments Off
Friday, October 19th, 2007
We can’t say we haven’t been warned!
Robot Cannon Kills 9, Wounds 14 on Danger Room
The gun, which was fully loaded, did not fire as it normally should have,” he said. “It appears as though the gun, which is computerised, jammed before there was some sort of explosion, and then it opened fire uncontrollably, killing and injuring the soldiers.”
Posted in End of the World Update, Technological Travesties, War | Comments Off
Thursday, October 18th, 2007
News: Authorities say a Washington state man hacked into Orange County’s 9-1-1 system, leading to a SWAT response in Lake Forest.
SWAT officers expected to find a victim shot to death, drugs and a belligerent armed suspect when they surrounded the home of an unsuspecting couple, but found they were only a part of a false emergency call caused by a teenager who hacked into the county’s emergency response system, authorities said.
Posted in Concentrated Criminality, Hackers and Hacking | Comments Off
Wednesday, October 17th, 2007
UK looks to make Antarctica claim
The UK is looking to claim sovereignty over a large area of the remote seabed off Antarctica.
The claim for an area around British Antarctica is one of a number being prepared by the Foreign Office, a spokeswoman said.
Even if granted, those rights would not allow Britain to contravene the treaty that prohibits oil and gas tapping under the seabed.
The spokeswoman labelled the move “a safeguard for the future”.
Posted in Idiot Authorities | Comments Off
Wednesday, October 17th, 2007
RIAA tries to pull plug on Usenet. Seriously.
The Recording Industry Association of America has found a new legal target for a copyright lawsuit: Usenet.
In a lawsuit filed on October 12, the RIAA says that Usenet newsgroups contain “millions of copyrighted sound recordings” in violation of federal law.
Only Usenet.com is named as a defendant for now, but the same logic would let the RIAA sue hundreds of universities, Internet service providers, and other newsgroup archives. AT&T offers Usenet, as does Verizon, Stanford University and other companies including Giganews.
Posted in Idiot Authorities, Pirate Update | Comments Off
Wednesday, October 17th, 2007
Fury as DNA pioneer claims black people are less intelligent than whites
One of the world’s most eminent scientists is at the centre of a row after claiming black people are less intelligent than whites.
James Watson, who won the Nobel Prize for his part in discovering the structure of DNA, has drawn condemnation for comments made ahead of his arrival in Britain tomorrow for a speaking tour.
Dr Watson, who now runs one of America’s leading scientific research institutions, made the controversial remarks in an interview in The Sunday Times.
The 79-year-old geneticist said he was “inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa” because “all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours – whereas all the testing says not really”.
Posted in Politically Incorrect | Comments Off
Tuesday, October 16th, 2007
U.S., British Militaries May Deploy Flying Saucers
Researchers in England have developed their own flying saucer — and it might be going to work for the U.S. and British militaries.
GFS Projects’ unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) can soar high in the air, hover, bank and fly over any terrain, making it ideal for military surveillance.
Posted in Technological Travesties, War, Weird Science | Comments Off
Tuesday, October 16th, 2007
Mexican Experts Say Flesh Was Human
Forensics experts said Monday that chunks of flesh found in the apartment of an aspiring horror novelist were human, and that DNA tests were planned to confirm whether it came from the body of his girlfriend.Dr. Rodolfo Rojo, chief medical examiner for Mexico City’s prosecutor’s office, said flesh found on the plate and frying pan in suspect Jose Luis Calva’s apartment corresponded to parts missing from the corpse of his 32-year-old girlfriend, Alejandra Galeana.
…
Police said that a search uncovered an unfinished novel by Calva titled “Cannibalistic Instincts.” One witness, whose name was withheld by officials, said Calva was fascinated by witchcraft and explicit and sadistic literature.
Posted in A Bit of The Old Ultraviolent, Cannibal Update, Concentrated Criminality | Comments Off
Tuesday, October 16th, 2007
Man, 21, Killed Riding Atop a Subway Train in Manhattan
A 21-year-old man was killed last night while riding atop a subway car in Upper Manhattan, the police said.
The accident occurred about 6:30 p.m. on a C train, in a tunnel between West 145th and 155th Streets, the police said. Service was disrupted on the A, C and D subway lines for nearly two hours.
Posted in Darwin Award | Comments Off
Tuesday, October 16th, 2007
Neither man nor beast
…On Sept. 5, a government agency (called the Human Fertilization and Embryology Agency or HFEA) decided to let scientists, mad or otherwise, create human/animal hybrids. Let me repeat: Science fiction will become science fact very soon; and man and beast will be combined into one.
A bill will be introduced in the British Parliament this fall to make this a positive right under English law, rather than simply the consequence of an administrative interpretation (which the HFEA issued). It is likely to pass, but even if it does not, the administrative interpretation of the HFEA will permit creation of human/animal hybrids to go forward. And go forward it will, for this is no hypothetical possibility — two teams of scientists have already applied to the HFEA to create human/animal hybrids.
Posted in Crazy is as Crazy Does, Mad Scientists, Weird Science | Comments Off
Saturday, October 13th, 2007
Vatican Bars Gay Cleric After TV Program
An Italian monsignor was suspended from his position at the Holy See after the cleric said in a television interview he “didn’t feel he was sinning” by having sex with gay men, the Vatican and news reports said Saturday.
Vatican spokesman the Rev. Federico Lombardi told journalists that while the case was under investigation the monsignor was suspended from his job as a top official in the Vatican’s Congregation for Clergy, an office which aims to ensure proper conduct by priests.
Posted in Career Limiting Move, Politically Incorrect | Comments Off
Saturday, October 13th, 2007
Pets Hurled Off Bridge in Puerto Rico
Animal control workers seized dozens of dogs and cats from housing projects in the town of Barceloneta and hurled them from a bridge to their deaths, authorities and witnesses said Friday. Mayor Sol Luis Fontanez blamed a contractor hired to take the animals to a shelter.
“This is an irresponsible, inhumane and shameful act,” he told The Associated Press.
Fontanez said the city hired Animal Control Solution to clear three housing projects of pets after warning residents about a no-pet policy. He said the city paid $60 for every animal recovered and another $100 for each trip to a shelter in the San Juan suburb of Carolina.
Posted in A Bit of The Old Ultraviolent, Concentrated Criminality, Idiot Authorities | Comments Off
Saturday, October 13th, 2007
Amid furor, DJ cancels party for ‘light-skinned’ blacks
A local DJ and party promoter retreated Thursday from a plan to sponsor a bash that would let “light-skinned” black women into a downtown club for free.
But the “Light Skin Libra Birthday Bash” at Club APT on Woodward Avenue turned out to be a bashing — of promoter Ulysses “DJ Lish” Barnes after word of the unusual party spread on the Internet.
Posted in Idiot Celebrities, Politically Incorrect | Comments Off
Friday, October 12th, 2007
Now they’re taking tacos to Mexico
WHEN Taco Bell first launched in America, its menu of tasty Mexican cuisine was trumpeted with the slogan: “Cross the Border”. The firm’s latest venture requires a swift rewrite. In the latest twist of globalisation, Taco Bell is planning to subdue a new territory with groaning platters of Mexican burritos and tacos – Mexico.
In a daring consumer assault akin to selling sacks of ice to the Eskimos or lugging coal to Newcastle, the American fast-food chain has opened the first in what it hopes will become a chain of 300 restaurants south of the border. Visitors to the Taco Bell in the middle-class suburb of Apodaca in the northern city of Monterrey will be greeted by a word new to both the English and Spanish language: the “tacostadas”.
Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off
Friday, October 12th, 2007
Why did the chicken block the road?
IN HIS 24 years as a traffic officer, Chief Inspector Donald McMillan has chased errant dogs, pigs, horses and, once, a wild boar – but never a chicken.
Until yesterday that is, when, at the crack of dawn, he had to contend with 3,000 of them, all terrified and shrieking, after falling from a lorry that had jackknifed on a dual carriageway.
Mr McMillan arrived at the scene – the A80 Glasgow-Stirling road, near Castlecary – at about 6:30am to find chickens everywhere.
Posted in Animal Rebellion Update, Oops | Comments Off
Friday, October 12th, 2007
How did the gunman in Wisconsin manage to shoot himself in the head three times?
A sheriff’s deputy in Wisconsin killed his ex-girlfriend and five others at a house party on Sunday, then fled. When he was caught hours later, he used his .40-caliber Glock pistol to commit suicide—shooting himself twice from under the chin, and then once through the right side of his head. How’d he manage to shoot himself in the head three times?
He kept missing the brain.
Posted in A Bit of The Old Ultraviolent, Concentrated Criminality, Suicidal Tendencies | Comments Off
Friday, October 12th, 2007
Mexican man arrested in mutilation killing
On the stove, a frying pan with chunks of flesh. In the refrigerator, a leg and part of an arm, both deboned. The bones were stuffed into a cereal box.
Mexico City police made the grisly discoveries this week as they arrested the man the Mexican press is calling the nation’s first cannibalistic serial killer.
Police said Jose Luis Calva Zepeda, 40, was arrested Monday and being held for “probable” homicide after an investigation into the disappearance of his girlfriend. Investigators found the mutilated body of Alejandra Galeana, 30, in Calva’s closet and believe Calva killed and mutilated at least two other women since 2004
Posted in A Bit of The Old Ultraviolent, Cannibal Update, Concentrated Criminality | Comments Off
Thursday, October 11th, 2007
German historian publishes chilling read: Hitler’s fan mail
For around three generations, the enormous bulk of Adolf Hitler’s fan mail remained hidden from the public’s eyes. Some of the contents of this postal multitude have recently been published in a new book by Henrik Eberle, a German historian.
Eberle found the Nazi fan mail in a government archive in Moscow. Excerpts from Dr. Eberle’s book, “Letters to Hitler – a People Writes to its Leader,” were published this week in the German daily tabloid Bild.
…
“Dear good Uncle Hitler,” wrote one ethnic German woman, Annelene K., from northeast Prussia, which is today in Lithuania.
“We’ve been waiting so long for you, when are you coming to our region? We would be very happy if we could belong to Germany again. The Jews and the Lithuanians would all then have to leave, wouldn’t they? The Jews not only take our bread – they also slaughter Christians for Easter.”
Posted in Crazed Dictatorships, Crazy is as Crazy Does, Nazis | Comments Off
Wednesday, October 10th, 2007
So you wanna be a pro video game player?
Victory smells like Red Bull. Maybe it’s body spray. The hall is alive with the sound of small arms fire: popping pistols, thumping shotguns, staccato assault rifles. The crack ‘n’ whistle of sniper rounds; the sudden, terrible boom of exploding frag grenades. There are breathless ooohs! and frustrated groans and the urgent, irritating bleeps of depleting deflector shields, squawking reminders that you are absolutely, positively about to die, or worse yet, get pwned — that is, blasted and humiliated — by some 14-year-old kid wearing a Pokemon Breeders T-shirt.
Posted in Toys! | Comments Off
Wednesday, October 10th, 2007
Crazy Stunt: Air Catapult Launches Man Into the Sky, Requires Parachute to Land
This crazy giant catapult, probably built by Wile E. Coyote out of two construction cranes and ACME industrial-grade rubber bands, is designed to send a man into space with no security cables or net. As you will see in the video, after surviving the bazillion-G-force launch in one piece, he has to open a parachute to return safely to land.
Posted in Hard Core!, Toys! | Comments Off
Wednesday, October 10th, 2007
Dragonfly or Insect Spy? Scientists at Work on Robobugs.
Vanessa Alarcon saw them while working at an antiwar rally in Lafayette Square last month.
“I heard someone say, ‘Oh my god, look at those,’ ” the college senior from New York recalled. “I look up and I’m like, ‘What the hell is that?’ They looked kind of like dragonflies or little helicopters. But I mean, those are not insects.”
Out in the crowd, Bernard Crane saw them, too.
“I’d never seen anything like it in my life,” the Washington lawyer said. “They were large for dragonflies. I thought, ‘Is that mechanical, or is that alive?’ “
Posted in Cloak and Dagger, Most Mysterious, Weird Science | Comments Off
Wednesday, October 10th, 2007
Montana Football Player Tackled by Grizzly Bear
Carroll College freshman wide receiver Roman Morris had never been tackled like this before.
Morris, who was bow hunting with two friends, was crouched on a hillside north of Gardiner at dawn Saturday when a female grizzly bear that was walking by turned and attacked him.
“It charged down the hill and just drilled me,” said Morris, 21, of Whitewater.
Over the next 30 to 45 seconds, Morris fought with the bear as it bit and clawed, severed his left hamstring, punctured his shoulder, chomped at his head and tossed him around.
“I thought the whole time, This is so messed up. I’m going to die, I’m going to die,”‘ said Morris, a pre-med major.
Posted in A Bit of The Old Ultraviolent, Animal Rebellion Update, Kara's Classics | Comments Off
Wednesday, October 10th, 2007
Brain Found in Bag Outside Virginia Apartment Complex
A brain was found in a bag near an apartment complex Tuesday morning, and the state medical examiner’s office was trying to determine whether it was human or animal, police said.
The brain, or portion of a brain, was discovered in an area next to a suburban Richmond apartment complex under construction and near a mall, Richmond police spokeswoman Karla Peters said. She believed the people who discovered the organ were construction workers, but said she had not confirmed that information.
Hat tip to Kara!
Posted in Cryptozoology, Kara's Classics, Most Mysterious | Comments Off
Wednesday, October 10th, 2007
Electronic Chip Finds Mexican Politician Cheated in Marathon
After a humiliating defeat in Mexico’s presidential election last year, Roberto Madrazo appeared to be back on top: He’d won the men’s age-55 category in the Sept. 30 Berlin marathon with a surprising time of 2:41:12. But Madrazo couldn’t leave his reputation for shady dealings in the dust. Race officials said Monday they disqualified him for apparently taking a short cut — an electronic tracking chip indicates he skipped two checkpoints in the race and would have needed superhuman speed to achieve his win.
Posted in Politico Follies | Comments Off
Sunday, October 7th, 2007
Alaska Bird Makes Longest Nonstop Flight Ever Measured
A female shorebird was recently found to have flown 7,145 miles (11,500 kilometers) nonstop from Alaska to New Zealand—without taking a break for food or drink.
It’s the longest nonstop bird migration ever measured, according to biologists who tracked the flight using satellite tags.
The bird, a wader called a bar-tailed godwit, completed the journey in nine days.
In addition to demonstrating the bird’s surprising endurance, the trek confirms that godwits make the southbound trip of their annual migration directly across the vast Pacific rather than along the East Asian coast, scientists said.
Posted in Animal Weirdness, Hard Core!, Weird Science | Comments Off
Sunday, October 7th, 2007
Charges dismissed in sherry enema death
Charges have been dropped against a Texas woman who was accused of giving her husband a sherry enema that killed him, the prosecutor in the case said on Wednesday.
Tammy Jean Warner had been scheduled to face trial for negligent homicide in the May 2004 death of Michael Warner, 58, but Brazoria County District Attorney Jeri Yenne said the charges were dismissed a month ago for lack of evidence.
Posted in Fun with Alcohol, You lucky bastard | Comments Off
Sunday, October 7th, 2007
Smugglers try to use bugs as drug mules
As drug mules, bugs don’t carry much. And they didn’t get by customs in the Netherlands. A customs officer who took a close look at a consignment of more than 100 large, dead bugs sent from Peru to the Netherlands discovered cocaine had been stashed in their backs.
Posted in Animal Rebellion Update, Concentrated Criminality, Drugs | Comments Off
Sunday, October 7th, 2007
Adventurer ends 13-year human-powered world trip
Adventurer Jason Lewis on Saturday arrived in Greenwich, ending a 13-year round-the-world trip using only the power of the human body.
The 40-year-old completed the final leg of his 46,000-mile odyssey by pedalling his 7.9-metre boat Moksha up the River Thames.
Ending a journey that included capsizing in the Atlantic, breaking both legs, being chased by a crocodile and being arrested on suspicion of spying, Lewis then disembarked and carried Moksha across the Greenwich Meridian line at the Royal Observatory with the help of supporters.
Lewis set off from the same spot — zero degrees longitude — bound for Portugal in July 1994. The 16-leg journey included hiking, kayaking, mountain biking and hiking.
Posted in Crazy is as Crazy Does, Hard Core! | Comments Off
Sunday, October 7th, 2007
Ex-McDonald’s employee awarded $6.1 million after strip search hoax
A Kentucky jury has ordered McDonald’s Corp. to pay a 21-year-old former employee $6.1 million US after she was strip searched and sexually abused at one of their restaurants as part of a phone hoax.
Louise Ogborn, 21, had sued McDonald’s Corp. for negligence, claiming it failed to warn her and other employees about a caller who already struck other McDonald’s stores and other fast-food restaurants across the country.
In her lawsuit, Ogborn claimed that in April 2004, someone called McDonald’s in Mount Washington, Ky., pretending to be a police officer.
The caller described a young, female employee and said she had stolen from a customer, the lawsuit said.
The caller instructed an employee to strip search the woman, according to the lawsuit.
Posted in Doh!, Idiot Authorities | Comments Off
Sunday, October 7th, 2007
Danish clash sparks mass arrests
Police in Denmark say they expect to bring charges against many of the 437 people detained overnight following clashes in the capital, Copenhagen.
Police used tear gas against thousands of young demonstrators who were protesting against the closure of a youth centre earlier in the year.
The protesters had tried unsuccessfully to occupy a different building.
Posted in A Bit of The Old Ultraviolent, Anarchy, Commies, Concentrated Criminality | Comments Off
Friday, October 5th, 2007
A meaty tale of sordid murder
Ozgur Dengiz was arrested in the Mamak area of Ankara recently for the murder and consumption of 55-year-old council worker Cafer Er.
Er had been missing for a week when the police discovered his corpse in the public garbage dump in Mamak. On closer examination of the body, it became apparent that Er had been murdered and his body mutilated. Large chunks of flesh had been cut from the soft parts of his body. Further investigation by the homicide squad turned up information that Er had last been seen arguing with a young man in the council park he was responsible for keeping clean.
Posted in A Bit of The Old Ultraviolent, Cannibal Update, Concentrated Criminality | Comments Off
Thursday, October 4th, 2007
Capital markets face shift to opaque investors
Global financial markets face a permanent shift in power from traditional money managers to opaque groups such as petro-dollar investors, Asian central banks, hedge funds and private equity groups, according to a study out Thursday.
These power brokers had amassed $8,400bn in assets by the end of 2006, three times what they held in 2000 when they were “little more than fringe players” in the capital markets, says the report, published by McKinsey Global Institute.
Their holdings now represent 5 per cent of the world’s $167,000bn of financial assets. If current trends continue, they could control assets worth $20,700bn, or nearly three-quarters of the size of global pension funds, by 2012.
Posted in Most Mysterious, Spooky | Comments Off
Thursday, October 4th, 2007
34 Bodies Found in 1800s Moscow House
Workers rebuilding a 19th century Moscow house dug up the remains of nearly three dozen people, and investigators were trying to determine their identities, a city police official said Thursday.
Police also found a rusted pistol in the estate where the remains of an estimated 34 people were found, said Moscow city police spokesman Yevgeny Gildeyev. The property was owned by a famous czarist-era noble family, the Sheremyetevs.
Some of the remains, which were found Wednesday under a basement of a house on the estate, had gunshot wounds to the skull and appeared to date back to the 1930s, and it was possible that more corpses would be found, he said.
The buildings are located in downtown Moscow, about midway between Red Square and Lubyanka, the headquarters of the KGB, where political prisoners were interrogated and executions carried out.
Posted in A Bit of The Old Ultraviolent, Commies, Concentrated Criminality, Crazed Dictatorships | Comments Off
Wednesday, October 3rd, 2007
Programmed to Kill
…Moscow, of course, admitted nothing to us, the leaders of the Soviets’ surrogate intelligence services, about any involvement in the Kennedy assassination. The Kremlin knew that any indiscretion could start World War III. But for 15 years of my other life at the top of the Soviet bloc intelligence community, I was involved in a world-wide disinformation effort aimed at diverting attention away from the KGB’s involvement with Lee Harvey Oswald, the American Marine who had defected to Moscow, returned to the U.S., and killed President Kennedy.
We launched rumors, published articles and even produced books insinuating that the culprits were in the U.S., not in the Soviet Union. Our ultimate “proof” was a note addressed to “Mr. Hunt,” dated November 8, 1963 and signed by Oswald, copies of which turned up in the U.S. in 1975. We knew the note was faked, but American graphological experts certified that it was genuine, and conspiracy theorists connected it to the CIA’s E. Howard Hunt, by then well known from the Watergate affair, and used it to “prove” that the CIA was implicated in the Kennedy assassination.
Posted in Commies, Concentrated Criminality | Comments Off
Wednesday, October 3rd, 2007
Be sure to read the whole thing, including the excellent response from a poster:
Great Moments in Golddiggery
A friend working on Wall Street forwarded an alleged New York Craigslist posting. I thought it might be too good to be true. I reluctantly googled it and found that it was on Craigslist but has been removed. It sounds like it still might be a hoax of some kind. Here’s an similar San Francisco post. Still, with all relevant caveats, here it is:
What am I doing wrong?
Okay, I’m tired of beating around the bush. I’m a beautiful
(spectacularly beautiful) 25 year old girl. I’m articulate and classy.
I’m not from New York. I’m looking to get married to a guy who makes at
least half a million a year. I know how that sounds, but keep in mind
that a million a year is middle class in New York City, so I don’t think
I’m overreaching at all.
Posted in Doh!, Sexual Deviants | Comments Off
Wednesday, October 3rd, 2007
Supernanny kids torch home
A FAMILY who enlisted the services of TV’s Supernanny to help them control their unruly children has been left homeless after their three-year-old apparently set fire to the living room.
Childcare guru Jo Frost spent two weeks with the Young family in 2005, teaching them how to reward good behaviour and to sit their children down on ” naughty stools ” when they misbehaved.
Now, just two years after Supernanny left the Young’s to practice their new disciplinary regime, three-year-old Joel allegedly started a fire in the living room with a kitchen stove lighter.
Posted in Doh!, Fire | Comments Off
Tuesday, October 2nd, 2007
Trouser snake kills Cambodian man
A Cambodian man who took off his trousers, tied the legs at the bottom and wrangled a 2-metre cobra into them died when it bit him through the fabric, local media reported Monday.
Khmer-language daily Koh Santepheap quoted police as saying Chab Kear, 36, saw the reptile swimming in a river just outside the capital last Thursday during a drinking session and captured it in the hopes of selling it later in the day.
Posted in Animal Rebellion Update, Darwin Award | Comments Off
Tuesday, October 2nd, 2007
10,000 Wildebeest Drown in Migration “Pileup”
In a bizarre mishap that conservationists describe as “heartbreaking,” an estimated 10,000 wildebeest have drowned while attempting to cross Kenya’s Mara River during an annual migration.
The deaths, which occurred over the course of several days last week, are said to account for about one percent of the total species population.
The drownings created a grotesque wildlife pileup, after part of the migrating herd tried to ford the Mara at “a particularly treacherous crossing point,” according to Terilyn Lemaire, a conservation worker with the Mara Conservancy who witnessed the incident.
Posted in Animal Weirdness, Oops, Yuck! | Comments Off
Tuesday, October 2nd, 2007
Brasilia Governor Bans Verb Form, Citing Inefficiency
Brazil’s Federal District Governor Jose Roberto Arruda “fired” the present participle from his administration, citing inefficiency.
“The present participle is hereby fired from all federal district entities,” the governor wrote in a decree posted on the government’s Web site last night. “As of today, it is forbidden as an excuse for INEFFICIENCY.”
Banning the verb form, which ends in “ndo” in Portuguese (“ing” in English), was done to prevent government officials from using continuous tenses to obscure progress — or the lack of it.
Posted in Idiot Authorities | Comments Off
Tuesday, October 2nd, 2007
Police Investigate Bizarre Emergency Call From Bishop
Gallup police reported a bizarre set of circumstances following a recent emergency call to the home of Roman Catholic Bishop Donald Pelotte.
The most recent event happened Thursday when Gallup police reported receiving an emergency call from Pelotte, 62.
An incident report from the McKinley Metropolitan Dispatch Authority reported that Pelotte told operators “…gentle little people, about 3 to 4 feet tall, and wearing Halloween masks” were in the hall. The dispatch log reported that Pelotte said he hid in a closet while the people were in his home.
Posted in Aliens, Crazy is as Crazy Does, Most Mysterious | Comments Off
Monday, October 1st, 2007
Burma: Thousands dead in massacre of the monks dumped in the jungle
Thousands of protesters are dead and the bodies of hundreds of executed monks have been dumped in the jungle, a former intelligence officer for Burma’s ruling junta has revealed.
The most senior official to defect so far, Hla Win, said: “Many more people have been killed in recent days than you’ve heard about. The bodies can be counted in several thousand.”
Mr Win, who spoke out as a Swedish diplomat predicted that the revolt has failed, said he fled when he was ordered to take part in a massacre of holy men. He has now reached the border with Thailand.
Posted in Anarchy, Career Limiting Move, Concentrated Criminality, Crazed Dictatorships, War | Comments Off
