AdamSmith

Chicago Trib posts some audio and transcripts from today's Blagogate proceedings: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/c...56.storygallery

I have always asked, but always been denied. In the politest possible way, of course. My Japanese hosts say the shame of having a guest die on their hands would be impossible to live down.

Submitted without comment... Blowfish testicles poison 7 diners in Japan Unlicensed chef prepared delicacy eaten by thrill-seeking gourmets TOKYO - Blowfish testicles prepared by an unauthorized chef sickened seven diners in northern Japan and three remained hospitalized Tuesday after eating the poisonous delicacy. The owner of the restaurant in Tsuruoka city, who is also the chef, had no license to serve blowfish and was being questioned on suspicion of professional negligence, police official Yoshihito Iwase said. Blowfish, while extremely poisonous if not prepared properly, is considered a delicacy in Japan and is consumed by thrill-seeking gourmets. Iwase said the seven men ordered sashimi and grilled blowfish testicles at the restaurant Monday night. Shortly after, they developed limb paralysis and breathing trouble and started to lose consciousness — typical signs of blowfish poisoning — and were rushed to a hospital for treatment, Iwase said. A 68-year-old diner remained hospitalized in critical condition with respiratory failure and two others, aged 55 and 69, were in serious condition, he said. "It's scary. If you go to a decent-looking restaurant that serves fugu, you would assume a cook has a proper fugu license," Iwase said, using the Japanese term for blowfish. Blowfish poison, called tetrodotoxin, is nearly 100 times more poisonous than potassium cyanide, according to the Ishikawa Health Service Association. It can cause death within an hour and a half after consumption. Three people died and 44 others were sickened by blowfish poisoning in 2007 — most of them after catching the fish and cooking it at home — according to the Health Ministry. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28874327/

P.S. Daddy's new motto! "Gentlemen, you can't fight in here! This is the War Room." http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29czSGSPE7k

So sorry but I have to highjack lookin's highjack! ...channeling not only Strangelove but also...

Eureka likewise! It works. Banish any image of Archimedes lowering himself into an acid bath.

Well, closer to $450. But in that position, who's counting?

I can see Daddy's wanting his forum to be a halfway civil place. But getting out of bed every couple of hours to check for alerts? He is not NORAD. Possibly he saw Hillary's call-at-3am commercial one time too many.

I second all the remarks in this thread. And agree especially that I was a bit flabbergasted the other day when Daddy posted that multiple IDs are okay with him. He qualified it a little bit, but I just absolutely don't buy it. Hate to keep thumping the tub about this, but the only authenticity these online communities can have, it seems to me, starts with each person being who he/she is, and not someone else.

The version pictured is discreetly PG. (OK, R-rated if you deem violence pornographic in its own right.) Is there commercial opportunity for the J.W. Bobbitt variant?

One of today's NYT editorialists opines that this fiasco may well have lit Cuomo's fuse to challenge the governor for the Dem nomination, next election.

One of the commentariat remarked how pathetic for Paterson that Blagojevich, flailing under indictment and threat of impeachment, still managed to act more decisively in naming his Senate appointment.

Sorry, I was not clear. I meant a girl you hire. That takes care of the effort problem. And at least you know the cost up front. I have a routine with my favorite Asian working girl in NYC. She starts the session by pissing on me, then gets fucked by me while I in turn am being fucked by a big built Dominican guy who gets into this whole scene. The reward is very much worth the cost.

Choices, choices. But why choose? Try fucking a girl after first inserting a dildo in yourself. Better yet, have her put it in you and then manipulate it while you do her. Of course you have to find a girl who is game for such entertainments. And has the arms to reach.

You overestimate me. I do think quite a bit of N.C. Wyeth, if that mitigates anything. Jamie has his virtues too. Schulz is of course God. The new biography by David Michaelis is riveting.

OMG This is the best summation of AW that I have ever heard.

George O'Dowd has my sympathy for the morass his life seems to have descended into. But a bright spot in his recent travails is the simple respect accorded his 'rent boy' by the British justice system, with no quibbling that the escort's chosen profession makes him less worthy of his rights than anyone else. Boy George: A hero destroyed by drug 'degradation' An unrecognisable Boy George was yesterday jailed for 15 months for imprisoning a rent boy. The grim, beat-up, overweight old man dressed in black leather, with shaven, tattooed skull, who is beginning a prison sentence for a false imprisonment, could hardly have looked less like the 1980s superstar he used to be. George O'Dowd, who was a household name a generation ago as Boy George, lead singer of Culture Club, was sentenced yesterday to 15 months in jail for false imprisonment, after he chained and beat a man in a cocaine-fuelled outburst of paranoid fury. O'Dowd, who is now 47, listened impassively as Judge David Radford explained why he was going against the advice of experts who had recommended a suspended prison sentence and unpaid community work. Although the judge said news that O'Dowd had kicked his cocaine habit was "welcome", he described the singer-turned-DJ's attack on a male escort as "an act of wholly gratuitous violence" which left his victim "shocked, degraded and traumatised". Afterwards, women were crying outside the courtroom. A large contingent from O'Dowd's extended south-east London family had come to hear sentence being passed, along with some no-longer-young Boy George fans. One woman had candy floss pink hair, and two elderly gay men were exchanging outrageous comments as they waited for the court to resume. "His name's Queen, but he is not well equipped," they said of one man who walked by. At least one court attendant, however, was underwhelmed. "All this fuss about a has-been," he commented. On being reminded that Boy George was a megastar 26 years ago, he added grumpily: "Was he?" Boy George was one of the most intelligent of the so-called "New Romantics" who revived British pop after the slump of the early 1980s. At a time when it was risky to be seen to be gay, even in showbusiness, he always appeared in public heavily made up and dressed like a girl. He grew up in Eltham, in a large, tough, Irish working-class family. One of his brothers was a professional boxer. Yet in his memoirs, written when he was 33, he said: "I wanted people to know I was gay. In many people's eyes, I was the premier poof, the benchmark by which others would be measured." His sexuality did not prevent Culture Club's single "Do You Really Want To Hurt Me?" from reaching No 2 in the US, and No 1 in the UK and numerous other countries. But by the age of 25, he had such a drug problem that one of his brothers denounced him, hoping the shock would jolt him into giving up the habit. Two decades later, in 2005, in a fit of paranoia brought on by cocaine, he told New York police that his flat in Manhattan had been burgled. That led to him doing community service for wasting police time. More seriously, in 2007, he attacked a Norwegian male escort, Audun Carlsen, 28, handcuffing him to a bed in his east London home and beating him with a chain. Both men were high on cocaine before the assault. O'Dowd denied false imprisonment, claiming he had reacted in anger because he suspected Mr Carlsen of downloading compromising photographs from his computer. He was unanimously convicted by a jury in November, and was back in court yesterday for sentence. O'Dowd's counsel, Adrian Waterman, said drugs had sent the singer to "the depths of degradation", but claimed that "he is, when sober and free from drugs, a kind and generous man". He added: "There is something of an irony in that Mr Carlsen will make money out of this while the cost to the defendant is enormous. He will probably now never be permitted to perform in the United States or Japan, where he has an enormous – I believe the word is – fan base. Not only will he lose the money but, more importantly, the chance to do what he loves." But the judge told O'Dowd: "This offence is so serious that only an immediate sentence of imprisonment can be justified for it." He ordered O'Dowd to pay £5,000 costs but said it was for a civil court to decide whether he should pay compensation to his victim. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime...on-1418230.html

RIP, but what a career built on horseshit. MOMA trustees bought 'Christina's World' because they thought it a masterpiece of Surrealism. Only later did they discover that it was because the artist had zero draftsmanship. American painter Andrew Wyeth dies at 91 http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090116/ap_on_...it_andrew_wyeth P.S. Truncated title of this post is because I inadvertently posted too soon, and this forum software allows no editing of thread titles.

Indeed. I should have said yuan. Though even there... Who was it said, "I'd love to, but I'm afraid all my money is tied up in cash"?

Yahoo's new CEO, Carol Bartz, will cut some nuts off and straighten things out. Could it even (disclaimer: I am not qualified to give stock advice etc. etc.) be time to pick up a little YHOO? Assuming one has any spare dinars lying around.

One of my all-time favorite disses was some liberal columnist dismissing her as "that distressing length of gristle."

Exhibit A...

Our cousins across the Great Water can't resist one last laugh. Neither can I: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/interactiv...andom-generator

True enough -- by being relatively closed, the Apple universe bypasses a lot of trouble that Microsoft can't avoid. But give Jobs credit for putting infinitely more weight on the user experience than Microsoft ever has. Even Gates gave him that plaudit in a joint on-stage interview a couple of years back. That deficit at Microsoft stems not from interoperability requirements but rather, by Gates's own admission, from the two men's different priorities in setting product and corporate strategy. Also, in the past Apple charged a premium for a lifestyle statement. But today I think it charges a premium for technology that works better. Interoperability, again, was hardly the cause of everything wrong with Vista, for example. As for Microsoft, I used to think its worst mistake was not biting the bullet, throwing away Windows/DOS and starting over with a UNIX kernel, as Apple did with the Next O/S. But that is small beer compared with its continuing failure to do much of anything effective to meet the new twin threats of "cloud computing" on the one hand, and on the other hand the proliferation of iPhones and all the other personal devices that increasingly untether you from a PC. Gates has long had impeccable timing. His decision on when to leave the burning house was no exception.

Indeed. One gets the sense that he is standing back, watching as Caroline's poll numbers drift down, and sharply aware of the value of this public vetting period before Hillary is confirmed and the seat ready to be filled.