Clarion Content

Our look at what the teens and tweens of America are watching. You may have caught some of our earlier episodes, if not follow this link and [scroll down].

In this case what they are watching is Shinee, which according to their Wikipedia entry is pronounced like shiny. They are, if this conglomeration of phrases can hold any collective meaning, a contemporary R&B South Korean boy band. Now you have got them pegged, right? Here is their latest single, "Lucifer."



One thing is for sure, they can dance.

Labels: what they are watching

Friend of the Clarion Content and the erstwhile Cozmik Gangsta, Ned Phillips, has penned a fascinating vignette about life as an American abroad. Ned knows and the Clarion Content agrees, it is all about building your network. Spread the word, do good and it will come back to you in spades. Check it out here at St. Christopher's U.K. newsletter.

Labels: Europe, Pop Culture

Welcome to our latest edition of Pithy F*rging Sayings gathered from the singularity.

As always the citation of these sayings, quotes and dialogues does not necessarily imply endorsement, the goal is to provoke thought.

We are grateful to Guy Kawasaki's book The Macintosh Way as our source for these quotes.

"Remember that as a teenager you are in the last stage of your life when you will be happy to hear that the phone is for you."---Fran Lebowitz

"The better the advertisement, the worse the product."---J. Gordon Holt

"Critics are like eunuchs in a harem: they know how it's done, they have seen it done every day, but they're unable to do it themselves."---Brendan Behan

"If you would like to know what the Lord God thinks of money, you only have to look at those to whom he gives it."---Maurice Baring

Labels: Sayings

The pundits are debating the depth of the Great Recession and arguing about whether a double-dip recession is impending. Or are we in a Japanese style, "Lost Decade?" Perhaps we are facing a repeat of the 1970's style stagflation? These discussions about nomenclature hold little interest for the Clarion Content. We can see reality from ground level.

And it ain't so good, brother.

Yesterday day saw the release of another telling statistic from outside the cloistered world of Wall Street and the Federal Reserve. The United States birthrate has fallen to its lowest level in at least a century. Historically birth rate decline has tracked economic decline.

According to the San Francisco Chronicle, "The birthrate dipped below 20 per 1,000 people in 1932 and did not rise above that level until the early 1940s. Recent recessions, in 1981-82, 1990-91 and 2001, all were followed by small dips in the birthrate."

Good news for the outliers born this year, bad news for the rest of us.

Labels: ecology, economics

The first annual Durham Squirt Gun and Water Balloon fight and free-for-all was a huge success. The Splash Mob event was organized by Flywheel design and publicized by word of mouth (and Facebook). It was a smash hit. No pun intended. More than 100 folks of all ages turned out. The Clarion Content's fearless correspondent took these pictures at risk of life, limb and digital camera.


Mayhem, early on...


It was held at the Durham Farmer's Market site, across from Durham Central Park.


Admittedly we were ducking during this photo, but please note the guy in the distance hurling a balloon at various dry (at that moment) photogs.


The action got more intense from here, but we had to put the camera in a safe dry place and take up a vigorous defense.

It is our observation that water ballooners under the age of five are the most dangerous opponent. Too young to have a conscience, they are vicious. More than once our correspondent helped fill and tie a water balloon for an anonymous youngster, only to have the balloon immediately hurled back at us. Fortunately, there were huge buckets under the filling station taps which could be emptied on the offending children's heads.

Special thanks to friend of the Clarion Content, April, for loaning us her extra fully automatic squirt gun. This young lady packs the heat!

Labels: Durham, photos

The producers of a documentary film about legendary Duke Track Coach Al Buehler are looking for photographs, audio, video, testimonials and other archival materials of track meets at Duke between 1971 and 2000. Buehler's Duke cross-country teams captured six ACC titles and finished second on ten other occasions. He was part of the U.S. Olympic Track and Field program at 1972, 1984 and 1988 Olympic Games.

The filmmakers project entitled, "Starting at the Finish Line: The Coach Al Buehler Story" hopefully will be screened at the Full Frame Documentary Film Festival next year. If you have any material or information that might help these folks you can contact Amy Unell at coachbuehler@gmail.com. Check out the film's website here.

Special thanks to our friends at the Community Sports News for alerting us to this story.

Labels: Durham, sports

Let your vision get a little blurry and you will see the picture the mural forms.

Alerted by the vigilant blogger who has been running from the man since 2007, we urge you to support the Pavlovsk Experimental Station. The seed bank is in deep trouble after a Russian court ruled yesterday that the Russian Housing Development Foundation can take the land the seed bank is on and sell it to private home developers. (See all totalitarian countries have eminent domain policies, not just America.) It is home to 5,500 varieties of edible plants, mostly fruit. And like the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, it attempts to perform a crucial service helping to (literally) insure Earth's biodiversity.

According to Boing Boing, the Pavlovsk Experimental Station's collection made it through World War II and many of its varieties can be found nowhere else on Earth. They note that seed banks like this can be used as breeding stock, to impart useful traits like drought tolerance or weed resistance to more common varieties. These efforts are ever more important as Monsanto and their ilk attempt to patent, horde and neuter seeds. Moreover, as the effects of development increase the pace of the sixth species extinction, such breeding could become crucial to human survival.

Labels: ecology

These beavers may not be as innocent as they appear...

That's right sports fans, Oregon State Beaver alumni could not be prouder today. They are trying to move their football team to the same level as the Oregon Ducks, a program that has recently burst on the national scene, both for their on-field ability and for the off-field likelihood of their athletes ending up in the slammer.

The incident: A drunk, naked Oregon State offensive lineman, Tyler Patrick Thomas, broke into the home of a thirty-two year-old woman in Corvallis, Oregon. Illegal and unimpressive, however what happened next is about the wackiest college football arrest since Lawrence Phillips of Nebraska fame broke into his ex-girlfriend's house and "made a tail."

According to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, the nineteen year-old Thomas, who hails from Kalispell, Montana was ordered by the police to get down on the floor. The bare ass Thomas assumed a three-point football stance and charged in his birthday suit at the cops. They tasered him into submission and took him into custody. He was charged with first-degree criminal trespass, second-degree criminal mischief and resisting arrest, as well as possession of alcohol by a minor.

Ooops.

He has been kicked off of the Oregon State football team.

Incidentally, Lawrence Phillips, who played parts of two seasons with the Rams and was the reason why the team gave away future Hall of Famer, Jerome, "The Bus" Bettis to the Steelers, is now serving thirty-one years in California State Prison for various violent crimes.

Ahhhh, college football season.

Labels: college football, Ethically questionable

Hot off of the internet...

It is long past time for a new traunch of our fantabulous, magically amazing, interesting links. If you are interested in looking at our old interesting links posts click here and scroll down. Most of these links over the years were compiled from reader submissions, so if you have neat-o links, please send'em our way...

Up first, we offer a link about an internet social networking system that we briefly mentioned last month in our article about Twitter, Chat Roulette. Chat Roulette is a website that pairs random people from around the world together for webcam-based interactions. Chat Roulette is going viral and taking off with the younger set. In doing so, it is pulling the popularity of Skype along with it. The teens of today grow up with a mindset that considers the "video phone" routine. Visitors to the site randomly initiate an online chat with another site visitor. Either user may leave the current session and initiate another random conversation at the push of a button. Read an interesting article from New York Magazine about what's up with Chat Roulette here. This link was sent to us by the latest edition to our Durham salon.

Our next interesting link is also about on-line social networking. It goes to one of the stickiest things about social networking, the reality and unreality of folk's on-line personas. How much of what we tell each other about ourselves on-line is real? How complete is the picture? Back in the day, MySpace used to allow users to create accounts for things like their pets and plants, if they so desired. A popular dog in the Chapel Hill area had more followers than some people. In an interesting twist on this premise, Lauren Mechling and Laura Moser have been writing a serialized novel on Slate.com that takes place in part on Facebook and Twitter. The authors created and are maintaining a fake Facebook page for their main character, a sixteen year-old named Natalie Pollock. Read all about here in the New York Times.

This next link highlights a more insidious possibility that these false on-line personas raise. Hundreds of people in the information security, military and intelligence fields were recently fooled by Thomas Ryan, the co-founder of Provide Security. Mr. Ryan used photos and imagination to create a fictional persona named Robin Sage on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. She was portrayed as an attractive, flirtatious, computer geek, with a degree from MIT and a prestigious prep school in New Hampshire. Many of her on-line "friends" freely shared their personal information and photos. Some invited the fictional threat analyst to conferences and asked her to review documents. Some "friends" at multi-national companies, including Google and Lockheed Martin, expressed an interest in hiring her. Mind-boggling (except for the part about her being hot). Read the whole article here in ComputerWorld.

We have one final technology related link for you, dear readers, although we will spare you, for now, any more thinking about the narcissism and other dangers of social networking. This link is a far more positive story about the future of computing. Last month the government of India unveiled a prototype of a touchscreen, tablet computer which it is going to sell for a mere thirty-five dollars! The device runs on a variation of the Linux operating system. It has no internal memory for storage, however it is able to store data on a memory card. It has a built in word processor, video conferencing capability, and a web browser. Even more remarkably, it can run on solar power! How's that for good news about the future of computing? While it is starting in the third world, the cost and capabilities are likely to have it migrating quickly west as part of the thin client, cloud based, computing model of the near future. Read the whole story here in PC World.

Labels: interesting links, Pop Culture, Predictions, technology

Three quickies:

Straussburg and Kerry Wood
The irony was not lost on the Clarion Content this week when Steven Straussburg was removed from a Washington Nationals game suffering from pains in his forearm on the same day that the last great fireballing phenom Kerry Wood broke Pedro's record for the fastest pitcher to 1,500 strikeouts. Wood, of course, was a huge splash for the Chicago Cubs. He was overused and overthrew very early in his career. Fourteen trips to the disabled list later, he is the test case G.M.'s refer to when they place innings limits on young pitchers. Here is hoping that Straussburg does not travel the same road.

Joe Votto going for the Triple Crown
The Clarion Content has heard much noise about Detroit's Miguel Cabrerra shooting for the first A.L. Triple Crown since 1967. Where is the love for the Cincinnati Reds Joey Votto going for the first N.L. Triple Crown since Joe "Ducky" Medwick in 1937? He is leading the N.L. in hitting by .005 over Placido Polanco and Martin Prado. In homers, he is three behind Albert Pujols and two behind the slumping Adam Dunn. He is also three RBI's behind Pujols. Can he do it? It is a long shot, especially with Scott Rolen and Johnny Gomes hitting behind him.

Finances outed
Finally someone who was sick and tired of the lying and posturing by Major League Baseball has outed several franchises, by leaking to Deadspin their audited financial statements. These financial statements show that, among other teams, the Pittsburgh Pirates have deliberate pursued a strategy of losing. They make more money by spending less on player salaries and accepting revenue sharing from competitive clubs than they would by attempting to win and increase ticket sales. The Pirates have put their fans through eighteen straight losing seasons. They play in PNC Park built with more than $180 million in public funds and a $40 million team contribution. Are they giving any of that money back? Are they providing the city of Pittsburgh with a quality product? No and no. But ownership has made a tidy $29.4 million in the last two audited years available. Their primary concern? Tracking down who leaked the financials that showed their skulduggery. Read more here in the NY Times.

Labels: baseball, Ethically questionable, Sports Economics

In the vast array of lies told by King George the II and his advisers it is easy to sometimes forget a few. One of the whoppers that Bush-Cheney brought to us, not quite as patently false as the Iraqi's have uranium cake, but perhaps more politically significant, was that America's invasion is bringing peace throughout the region. Look at the knock on effects, places like Lebanon are being becoming peaceful and democratic.

It seems hard to believe but once upon a time, Lebanon was referred to as the Switzerland of the Middle East. It was looked upon as beacon of multi-cultural, pluralistic statehood. Of course, that was gone back in the Reagan era, long before King George even got the silver spoon out of his mouth. However, he and Dick had the temerity to claim that invading Iraq had once again led to multi-ethnic, inter-religious peace in Lebanon.

That was lie was put to bed a couple years ago when Israeli and Hezbollah fought a war in southern Lebanon. The Bushies and their delusional friends claimed that because this was a war prosecuted by Hezbollah and that all that needed to happen was for the right government to be put in place in "democratic" Lebanon and peace would flower.

Of course, multiple offensive wars against fellow Muslims helped continue the process of radicalizing the entire state, insuring the next war Israel fights in Lebanon will not only be against Hezbollah, but also against the army of the state of Lebanon. Well done, a-holes.

We saw a little precursor earlier this month. According to the Debka file, "By its cross-border sniper attack on Israeli forces Tuesday, August 3, which provoked a major clash, the Lebanese Army laid down a new fact of life in the Middle East: The next war against Israel will be fought - not only by the Hezbollah militia, but by the Lebanese army. Its mission has been merged with the radical objectives of the Iran-backed terrorist group."

Wait, no olive branch? We thought King George the II's other Middle East achievements brought peace and multi-party democracy to Lebanon?

The Debka File continues, "The border tensions brewing for weeks on the Lebanese-Israel border boiled over...into a heavy exchange of cross-border fire. Lt. Col. Dov Harari, 45, from Netanya, brigade commander of the eastern Lebanese border sector, was killed on Israeli soil...Lebanon reported three soldiers and one civilian killed in heavy Israeli retaliation.

When the shooting started, the Israeli officers were watching Israeli soldiers clearing brush on their side of the border near Kibbutz Misgav Am opposite the Lebanese village of Adeisseh to clear the line of vision for surveillance cameras. The UN later confirmed that it had been given due notice of the work and had informed the Lebanese government in advance.

The incident escalated when Israel opened up with tank, artillery and helicopter fire and the Lebanese brought in mortars and RPGs."

Wow, we had been told by Dick and his King that Lebanon was another of those places that benefited from their offensive war in Iraq.

Maybe not so much.

Labels: Middle East, Politics, war

We ran across an ecological believe it or not out of Oregon this week for our truth trumps fiction every time files. The Associated Press is reporting that residents of Newport, Oregon and surrounding areas have discovered that shrimp bought from some local stores glows in the dark. Yep, you read that right, it glows in the dark.

Local marine biologists at Oregon State University's Sea Grant Extension say say it's due to marine bacteria that are not harmful. It can, however, apparently cause shrimp and other seafood to appear luminescent. Reportedly, the bacteria can grow at refrigerator temperatures, especially on seafood products where salt was added during processing.

Brilliant?

Labels: ecology, Pop Culture

SSDD

The reality and the political spin are a little bit different when it comes to North Carolina and high speed rail. We know, you are thinking, "News Flash: What? The spin and the political reality don't match!?! Say it isn't so..."

But seriously, dear readers, once again the claims of Washington do not exactly measure up to the reality on the ground. Our local Congressman, here in Durham, David Price, sent an email around to constituents, including some of the Clarion Content's staff, reading in part, "Recovery investments that will have a lasting impact are creating or sustaining thousands of jobs in the Fourth District...A $500 million recovery investment will make the twenty year-old dream of high-speed rail from Charlotte to Raleigh a reality."

On the website of the North Carolina Office of Economic Recovery & Investment the story reads a little differently, "Today [July 12^th, 2010], Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood announced that the U.S. Department of Transportation and the State of North Carolina have finalized a grant agreement for $20.3 million, the first installment of the $545 million awarded to the state."

Read that again.

Less than 4% of that $545 million authorized by the Feds is actually on the way to the state. This is not exactly what one would have garnered for ol' Congressman Price's email.

Moreover this money will not actually be used on installing high speed rail system, tracks, trains or corridors! Nope the North Carolina Office of Economic Recovery & Investment website continues, "The North Carolina Department of Transportation will use the $20.3 million to refurbish passenger coaches and locomotives to expand rail service across North Carolina. The Department of Transportation’s Federal Railroad Administration is actively working with the North Carolina Department of Transportation on additional grant agreements for the remaining $525 million to further develop the state’s high-speed rail corridor."

Read that again.

They are not spending a penny of this $20 million on high speed rail. They are using it to fix up and clean-up existing locomotives and passenger cars. A semi-worthy cause we are quite sure, but not forward looking or forward thinking, and certainly not high speed rail. These cars and locomotives likely won't even be compatible or usable on a high speed rail system. But that is where the bureaucratic inertia is sending our dough.

Unfortunately, this lack of vision, this inertia is endemic. The use of the stimulus funds and recovery money follows a strict routine lofty promises, loftier pronouncements, limited distribution of funds in a backward looking manner that kowtows to status quo interests.

Change? Yeah, right!

Labels: Economy, Politics

SSDD

The reality and the political spin are a little bit different when it comes to North Carolina and high speed rail. We know, you are thinking, "News Flash: What? The spin and the political reality don't match!?! Say it isn't so..."

But seriously, dear readers, once again the claims of Washington do not exactly measure up to the reality on the ground. Our local Congressman, here in Durham, David Price, sent an email around to constituents, including some of the Clarion Content's staff, reading in part, "Recovery investments that will have a lasting impact are creating or sustaining thousands of jobs in the Fourth District...A $500 million recovery investment will make the twenty year-old dream of high-speed rail from Charlotte to Raleigh a reality."

On the website of the North Carolina Office of Economic Recovery & Investment the story reads a little differently, "Today [July 12^th, 2010], Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood announced that the U.S. Department of Transportation and the State of North Carolina have finalized a grant agreement for $20.3 million, the first installment of the $545 million awarded to the state."

Read that again.

Less than 4% of that $545 million authorized by the Feds is actually on the way to the state. This is not exactly what one would have garnered for ol' Congressman Price's email.

Moreover this money will not actually be used on installing high speed rail system, tracks, trains or corridors! Nope the North Carolina Office of Economic Recovery & Investment website continues, "The North Carolina Department of Transportation will use the $20.3 million to refurbish passenger coaches and locomotives to expand rail service across North Carolina. The Department of Transportation’s Federal Railroad Administration is actively working with the North Carolina Department of Transportation on additional grant agreements for the remaining $525 million to further develop the state’s high-speed rail corridor."

Read that again.

They are not spending a penny of this $20 million on high speed rail. They are using it to fix up and clean-up existing locomotives and passenger cars. A semi-worthy cause we are quite sure, but not forward looking or forward thinking, and certainly not high speed rail. These cars and locomotives likely won't even be compatible or usable on a high speed rail system. But that is where the bureaucratic inertia is sending our dough.

Unfortunately, this lack of vision, this inertia is endemic. The use of the stimulus funds and recovery money follows a strict routine: lofty promises, loftier pronouncements, limited distribution of funds in a backward looking manner that kowtows to status quo interests.

Change? Yeah, right!

Labels: infrastructure, Politics

The former Governor of New Mexico, Gary Johnson

Call it a follow-up to a follow-up, after running you through the list of possible Republican Presidential contenders for 2012 twice already in the last month we saw one more name being touted by one of our favorite conservative writers and thinkers, Andrew Sullivan. Sullivan currently does most of his work for The Atlantic monthly and the full piece can be found here.

Sullivan is a small "c" conservative. He notes the importance especially now of backing a candidate, "who share[s] [one's] professed beliefs, as opposed to helping ciphers who'll advance... [one's] agenda out of a combination of policy ignorance, malleability, and personal indebtedness."

The outside the box candidate that he likes is the former governor of New Mexico, Gary Johnson.

Labels: 2012 presidential election, Politics

Accused Craigslist killer Philip Markoff apparently committed suicide in jail yesterday. He was found dead with a plastic bag over his head. He had been living quite the secretive double life before the murder. He was attending medical school at Boston University and planning to marry when he was arrested at age twenty-four with his fiance.

His fiance was cleared and apparently had no idea. She rapidly called off the wedding. In addition to the murder, he was also charged with armed robbery and kidnapping in two similar incidents in which the victims were solicited via Craigslist, but were not injured.

Authorities said that Markoff allegedly shot Julissa Brisman, a New York masseuse who traveled to Boston after placing an advertisement for her services on Craigslist, three times with a handgun on April 14, 2009 after they struggled in the doorway of her room on the 20th floor of the Marriott Copley in Boston.

He had been awaiting trial ever since.

Labels: constitutional issues, cop stories

We spotted this bumper sticker yesterday in Durham, "Under Republicans, man exploits man. Under Democrats, it is just the opposite."

Love it.

Labels: political quips-n-quotes, Politics, Pop Culture

When is it just a bit outside, Mr. Uecker?

The year of the pitcher is full swing. Although it must be noted, aside from the number of no-hitters, most of the early season hype was overclaim. The Rockies Ubaldo Jimenez is not going to win 30 or even 25. Nobody is coming anywhere near Bob Gibson's legendary 1.12 ERA. It is nevertheless a pitching centric year. Team ERAs are down across the board, run scoring is at a nearly two decade low. Home runs titles are back to the forty dinger neighborhood.

The question that has reverberated around the game is why. We know steroids and PEDs have been on the run for the last couple of years. So why the quantum leap for pitching this year? The whispered wisdom in the clubhouse is that is the lack of "Greenies," or amphetamines that were so popular in baseball for many years. Baseball's rulers have finally eliminated the use of Greenies. Players, whose schedules include tons of travel and games twenty-nine out of thirty days at times, have long used amphetamines to aid in rapid recovery, especially for a day game after a night game. No more. They miss them.

The other equally significant factor is the extension of the outside corner. Umpires are calling the outside strike this year like they haven't in ages. Students of the game will recall that this was the initial response to PEDs. When the umpires realized that Bud Selig and the powers that be were going to look the other way on performance enhancers, they took matters into their own hands in the early 90's. Gradually, things got so far out of wack that when the Atlanta Braves of the Glavine era took on the Kevin Brown led Florida Marlins in the 1997 NLCS that strikes were being called literally a foot off of the plate. Things are nowhere that ridiculous this year, but there is a determined and consistent effort to expand the outside corner. Even an inch or two off the corners of the plate, if given repeatedly, makes a tremendous difference to the pitcher's benefit. The Clarion Content has watched a ton of baseball this year and most assuredly the umps are giving the pitchers that extra inch or two. Consequently, ERAs are down, run scoring is down, homers are down, slugging is down. In our view, games are more fun, they have more tension and filled with subtleties and nuance.

While it is not 1968 (again baseball mimics and parallels real life; things are topsy-turvy, but it is not 1968) the year of the pitcher is in full effect.

Labels: baseball, Politics, sports

Anecdotally, the Clarion Content has seen a massive increase in the amount of dragonflies in the Durham County area this Summer. Always, with one eye open for the decline of the keystone species, either in Gaia, or in micro-local ecosystems, this has stood out. Dragonflies are everywhere. They are born and bred in standing water and we had a rainy Winter, but this seems exceptional. It is unclear what their natural predator in our area might be.

Has anyone else noticed this?

We recall reading just a few short years ago about the year of the missing acorns in Northern Virginia which quite literally drove local squirrels stark raving mad.

Labels: Durham, ecology

Ryder Cup Captain, Corey Pavin

This is not news to those of you who have been following his career for the long haul. Jim Gray has been a tactless, pompous ass for many years, long before he ambushed Pete Rose. His attitude and self-aggrandizing style is part of why he is working for the Golf Channel rather than holding down the NBC network gig that he used to have. Gray, known as butt smoocher, has been legendarily tight with various narcissistic sports jerks, including Barry Bonds.

Gray demonstrated his lack of personal tact and character again yesterday when Ryder Cup Captain Corey Pavin called him out for misquoting him. Gray ran with a story saying Pavin was going to add Tiger to the Ryder Cup team regardless of whether or not he was the automatic qualifier. Pavin vehemently denied it at a press conference. Gray, in his usually snaky style, waited until the rest of the media had cleared the room, and confronted Pavin. He called Pavin a liar, waived a finger in his face, and tried to slap Pavin's wife's i-Phone out of her hand when he realized she was videotaping the incident.

He finished with an impotent threat, warning Pavin, "You are going down." Really Jim Gray?

Aren't you the idiot who convinced LeBron that the hour long free agent made for TV special was going to be good for his career? (Or at least your Q rating...) Gray makes Jerry Springer look like a class act.

Labels: golf, Pop Culture, sports

Social City is one of Playdom's leading games...

How big has on-line gaming become? Walt Disney bought social networking games developer Playdom for $563.2 million. Playdom is a leader in games designed for and played on the social networking platforms Facebook and MySpace. Playdom was a start-up founded by a couple of UC Berkeley grads just a few short years ago.

Disney is positioning itself not only to grab a large chunk of the on-line gaming market, but grabbing new intellectual property for perspective future character vehicles: movies, cartoons, toys, etc. According to Disney CEO Robert Iger, "This acquisition furthers our strategy of allocating capital to high-growth businesses that can benefit from our many characters, stories and brands, delivering them in a creatively compelling way to a new generation of fans on the platforms they prefer."

Thanks for the heads up goes to the DailyFinance.

Labels: Pop Culture, technology

This is the single best job quitting we have seen at the Clarion Content in a long time. Follow this link for a good belly laugh.

Farmville?

Labels: humor, interesting links, Pop Culture

We are not talking about Obama meeting and greeting ladies. We are talking basketball. And when you are the Prez, you can get some sweet run for your pick-up games.

President Obama decided to test that theory with Michelle in Spain wrapping up a five-day vacation with their younger daughter, Sasha, with a visit to King Juan Carlos and Queen Sofia on Majorca. Their older daughter, Malia, is at sleepaway camp. And when the wife and kids are away, Dad will play.

Basketball, people, basketball.

And play he did. The game was at Ft. McNair in front of an audience of wounded troops. Participants, in addition to the President, included Carmelo Anthony, Shane Battier, Chauncey Billups, Derek Fisher, Chris Paul, Derrick Rose, Etan Thomas, Dwyane Wade, David West, Pau Gasol, Maya Moore Alonzo Mourning, Bill Russell, Grant Hill, Magic Johnson and LeBron James.

Kobe Bryant made an appearance but not play. LeBron is happy to goof around in an exhibition. Kobe plays for blood or not at all. (If someone isn't throwing a table leg through someone's heart, than it had better be an NBA game.) Don't hate the player, hate the game.

One further question, Etan Thomas? Etan Thomas? How did he get here? Does he know Reggie Love from high school or something?

Special thanks to the Caucus Blog over at the New York Times for sending this our way.

Labels: Pop Culture

Our look at what the teens and tweens of America are watching. You may have caught some of our earlier episodes, if not follow this link and [scroll down].

In this case "What they are watching" is a young, North Hollywood dance sensation, who appears poised to leap into stardom...Kyle Hanagami. He is beautiful and a bad ass dancer. His videos have garnered hundreds of thousands of views.

Labels: music, Pop Culture, what they are watching

Earlier today, we published a fiery invective from our small "c" conservative hearts about ridiculous government interference in the minutia of our lives. Read it here. This issue touches that same nerve, but in a much bigger picture way.

As reported by the Washington Post, "A federal appeals court ruled for the first time Friday that police cannot use a Global Positioning System device to track a person's movements for an extended time without a warrant."

This will move the issue towards the Supreme Court because federal circuit courts in New York and California have previously upheld warrantless GPS tracking of vehicles by the Man and his flunkies.

This time a D.C. Circuit court ruled that, "such surveillance technology represents a leap forward in potential government intrusion that violates constitutional protections against unreasonable searches."

The Post reports, "The federal government has mandated that U.S. cellphone carriers make nearly all their phones trackable... However, companies say that the federal law that allows them to turn over data to law enforcement without subpoenas is prone to abuse."

No kidding. So, they can and already are tracking you with your phone.

Thanks a lot, King George the II!

And way to stand-up to him, you knock-kneed Democrats!

Law enforcement defends their right to use the technology as a cost savings to taxpayers. Brilliant! If it is cheaper for the cops, who needs our rights?

It is always Danger Will Robinson time when we reach the courts as the last line of defense for our freedoms.

Labels: constitutional issues, cop stories, Politics, technology

This is just the kind of b.s. from certain government a-holes that fires the engines of our libertarian, small "c" conservative hearts. When we tell you that you are not going to believe this story, you are not going to believe this story. Get the man out of our lives, stop the administration!

This tale takes place in Portland, Oregon. Where a seven year-old, Julie Murphy and her mom, set up a lemonade stand at a local neighborhood art fair. Julie had become enamored with the idea of having a stand after watching an episode of the cartoon pig Olivia running one, her mother, Maria, told the Oregonian. Unfortunately, cold-hearted government flunky, Jon Kawaguchi, an environmental health supervisor for the Multnomah County Health Department decided he had to throw his weight around. Claiming concern for public health, from gallons of bottled water mixed with Kool-Aid, a-hole in chief, Kawaguchi told seven year-old Julie that she had to shut down her lemonade stand for failing to obtain a $120 temporary restaurant license.

The guy was not kidding. According to the Oregonian, a "lady with a clipboard" came over and demanded their license. When Julie's Mom explained they didn't have one, the woman told them they would need to leave or possibly face a $500 fine. Surprised, Mom started to pack up. The people staffing the booths next to them encouraged the two to stay, telling them the inspectors had no right to kick them out of the neighborhood gathering! [This is America you, fascists!] They also suggested that they give away the lemonade and accept donations instead and one of them made an announcement to the crowd to support the lemonade stand. That's when business really picked up -- and two inspectors came back, Mom told the Oregonian. Young Julie started crying, while her mother packed up and others confronted the inspectors. "It was a very big scene," her mother reported.

Way to go jerks! Off to Russia with you overly bureaucratic scum...

Of course, their boss, another government flunky wasting our tax money, Eric Pippert, the food-borne illness prevention program manager for the state of Oregon's public health division told the Oregonian, "Technically, any lemonade stand -- even one on your front lawn -- must be licensed under state law." Heaven forbid common sense should intercede! He did admit, "County inspectors are unlikely to go after kids selling lemonade on their front lawn," centering his pathetic excuse making and defending his right to suckle the tit of government largess around the fact that Julie and her Mom had been at a public, neighborhood art fair.

Locals are organizing a Lemonade Revolt for the last Thursday in August.

Labels: cop stories, economics, Politics, Pop Culture

How to? Ask Google, of course.

We always love a fascinating sociological query here at the Clarion Content's editorial desk. We thought we might clue you into one we check on, for shits and grins, fairly regularly. As you probably already know the Google search box autoprompts responses to what you are typing in, that is to say, it makes suggestions. So if you type, "Harry Pott" Google is already guessing ahead to "Harry Potter" and "Harry Potter and the deathly hallows," as things you might be searching for.

One of our favorite little sociological games is to type the phrase "How to" into the Google search box and check out the autoprompts for what kind of stuff folks are trying to figure out how to do. We gave it a whirl today and as always the answers were amusing, if not particularly illuminating.

From Google, the top ten "How to" autoprompts...

1. How to tie a tie
2. How to train a dragon
3. How to
4. How to kiss
5. How to remove a tick
6. How to destroy angels
7. How to lose weight fast
8. How to get a passport
9. How to grill corn
10. How to draw

Almost as amusing from Google, the top ten "How do" autoprompts...

1. How do magnets work
2. How do I love thee
3. How do I get a passport
4. How do websites use cookies
5. How do I find my IP address
6. How do clouds form
7. How do you get pregnant
8. How do pirates dress
9. How do you get pink eye
10. How do you like me now

Discuss amongst yourselves.

Labels: Pop Culture, technology

This bad ass picture of Merle Haggard came from here...

Labels: music, photos

A third Bush...

Allow us a quick follow-up to our post the other day about the early Republican contenders for 2012. New York Times blogger Ross Douthat penned a similar piece the next day. He brought one name to the table that we did not, as Douthat dubbed him, the ultimate insider, Jeb Bush. Douthat says that insurgents like Palin and Huckabee normally struggle to win the nomination of the Republican party. He believes that enthusiasm for the "his turn" candidate, Mitt Romney, is very limited.

Could we really get another Bush? Read the whole article here.

Labels: 2012 presidential election, Politics, Predictions

Two interesting notes from last night's Washington Nationals game, a rather mundane 3-1 victory over the Arizona Diamondbacks on the road. The first one sports related, Nationals catcher Ivan Rodriguez became only the fifth catcher ever to reach 300 homers with his second dinger of the season. He joined a very short list featuring Johnny Bench, Yogi Berra, Carlton Fisk and probable juicer Mike Piazza. All of them, save for Piazza, are in the Hall of Fame.

The other note from the game was political. A small group of fans in left field caused a delay the first inning by draping a sign addressed to Diamondbacks owner Ken Kendrick over the outfield wall to protest the new immigration law in Arizona. A law, it should be noted, that the libertarians at the Clarion Content strongly oppose. Government should not have the power of racial profiling. Plate umpire Angel Hernandez halted the game when he saw the large sign that read: "Mr. Kendrick ... Stop the hate. Say no to SB1070." It is unclear why he felt compelled to do so. The Diamondbacks and their owner sent a security guard to pull the sign off of the wall. Ironically, Hernandez, widely considered one of the very worst umpires in baseball, is Cuban.

Labels: baseball, Ethically questionable, Politics, sports

Billboards avoided...

The Durham City Council rejected a two year campaign by Fairway Outdoor Advertising to relocate some of its billboards, upgrade some others and convert still other billboards to digital operation. The council was unanimous in its vote, 7-0 against. The Raleigh News & Observer quoted Councilman Mike Woodard, who reported receiving more than 1,000 e-mails in opposition to Fairway's request and seven in favor of it, "This issue has united Durham like none other." The City/County Planning Department also recommended against the change, "No substantial positive effect has been identified for Durham's economic development," by changing the ordinance.

Labels: Durham, Politics

Sweetest mashup video we have seen in some time...

Labels: Art, music, Pop Culture, sports