Crisisville

Can we still play Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, or is it Seven now?

Now that there are six.five billion of us, we may have to start eating algae. Seriously, it's in the article.

My fear is that over-population will lead to more outlandish inequities, with greater lawfullness following, greater terrorism, and then war, among other things. But may the gods of fertility spare us to make even more babies. Malthus says we should be dead by now, anyway.

P.S. How many of them look like Conan O'Brien?

So much for those group orgies...

..as the bombs fall.

Kissing many 'risks meningitis':


French kissing with many different partners can quadruple a teenager's risk of meningitis, a study has found.

How do you spell terrorist?

From VOA News:

The Washington Post newspaper reports Wednesday that the U.S. government database of alleged international terrorism suspects and their associates now contains 325,000 names......Counterterrorism center officials say the actual number of people on the list is approximately 200,000, because the same person may appear under different spellings or aliases.

It could be me, but I think a great use of the $42.7 billion dollar homeland security budget would be hiring good spellers who could figure this out. I think spelling, in fact, would be a key counter-terrorism skill.

It sounds silly, but this is exactly the scope of some problems in the preparedness sector. Huge budgets lead to uncreative thinking, which leads to silly mistakes in infrastructure that's really needed. I mean, this is standard ducks in a row sort of stuff--although I'm sure there are mitigating factors, huge obstacles, people wanted to have lives, blah blah blah.

Mo money, mo problems, as a wise man once said.

Out of Africa...right now

Who are you really? And what were you before? What did you do and what did you think? Huh?

Well, I used to be a grand, mythical land full of natural wisdom and tribal infighting. And now I'm a barren, globally heated land full of avian flu and, well, tribal infighting. Single, Pan-Racial Continent seeks break, you know?

On the plus side, if the theory that the world will end where it began is accurate, all this bad news does bolsters Africa's claim as the womb of humanity.

Bump and Whined

Because social distancing in a pandemic would take handshakes out of vogue, the World Health Organization is telling people to do the bump. Elbows, that is. Not tooshies.

No, you don't have to do it now. But I say we should practice. God knows: enough diseases spread through handshakes, anyway. So, the next time your boss sticks out his hand with a hearty Good morning!, offer to bump him. Hard and fast, so as to prevent infection. See what he says.

Of course, the real losers here are horny adolescents. Now, they go park somewhere fairly discreet, where nobody thinks anything of fogged up windows--and do what? Stare til they orgasm? Well, use protection. No telling what those mental rays can do.

Arcadians stop, drop and roll.

From an announcement for an ACTION meeting in Arcadia, Califonia:

Representatives of the Arcadia Fire, Police and Public Works Services Departments, and others will provide survival tips.

“People, please! If an explosion is running toward you, for God's sake don't run toward it! Run away! Run Away!”

We do this stuff a lot, now. I guess it's good. I see hordes of middle-aged homeowners taking copious notes on running at 90 degree angles from chemical plums while they vote against the next mitigation bill that claws its way onto their ballot.

FISA FARCI

I’m a liberal straight man, but Arlen Specter gives me a total hard-on. The way he can actually seem to look at an issue, analyze it, and make what seems like a reasoned decision about it baffles me. I don’t see many other people doing that in Crisisville.

Take the FISA fiasco. There’s a surveillance program the President has staked his reputation on--and one that the majority of Americans seem to approve of. And there’s a law that is supposed to cover surveillance programs just like that (the FISA Court) which Jimmy Carter signed into being-with a thumbs up signing statement, no less. And President Bush is blatantly not following the law.

More on Ready Kids

The kid-friendly program features an adventurous mountain lion mascot named Rex, a website (www.ready.gov) and classroom teaching materials being sent to 135,000 middle school teachers in the nation's 25 largest metropolitan areas.

There are two great things about this program. First, I’m sure that it will terrify children into nagging their parents to buy that water barrel they’ve been needing.

Second, after the apocalypse comes, the children left wandering the earth can now prepare extravagant ritual sacrifices to Rex the mountain lion, metrosexual feline god of that wander the earth with kerchiefs and flashlights. Look into his eyes...Rex loves you....he can take you away from all this.

Toddlers: Paranoid or Just Right?

From USA Today : Homeland Security campaign schools kids in preparedness:

An idea launched as part of the Homeland Security department's $9.6 million Ready campaign, the effort is the latest by the nation's security leaders to get parents and children thinking about emergency planning...[it] offers instructions on how families should prepare for emergencies and lists item they should keep in stock, including a three-day supply of non-perishable food, a battery-operated radio and duct tape. “You and your family can collect items for your emergency-supply kit during a family scavenger hunt!” the site says.

“Sally, honey, here are a list of clues. I need you to go in Wal-Mart and figure them out, sweetheart. If you don’t figure them out--and a Cat 5 hurricane comes or an asshole terrorist bombs us--our whole family will die. I’ll give you about twenty minutes. Good luck, sweetie!