like, about six feet under if you’re prone to slippage.

The man in question is working on the second floor from the top, third window from the right. I had to shrink the picture, so he’s a bit tough to make out. Larger, vertigo-inducing pix here.

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CBC Sunday ran a long documentary on the fiscal crisis in the States. What a fine piece of journalism that was, featuring an interview with the famously unbiased George Soros.

Host Evan Solomon was rather coy, too, about what caused it all. I suspect he looked into it, didn’t like what he saw, and so confined himself to airy allusions about (Republican) greed, deregulation, and . . . Ronald Reagan (cue stock footage, scary music).

It’s impossible to look at the issue objectively and not see the grubby fingerprints of Democrats everywhere.

Bloomberg.com:

The clear gravity of the situation pushed the legislation forward. Some might say the current mess couldn’t be foreseen, yet in 2005 Alan Greenspan told Congress how urgent it was for it to act in the clearest possible terms: If Fannie and Freddie ``continue to grow, continue to have the low capital that they have, continue to engage in the dynamic hedging of their portfolios, which they need to do for interest rate risk aversion, they potentially create ever-growing potential systemic risk down the road,’’ he said. ``We are placing the total financial system of the future at a substantial risk.’

What happened next was extraordinary. For the first time in history, a serious Fannie and Freddie reform bill was passed by the Senate Banking Committee. The bill gave a regulator power to crack down, and would have required the companies to eliminate their investments in risky assets.

If that bill had become law, then the world today would be different. In 2005, 2006 and 2007, a blizzard of terrible mortgage paper fluttered out of the Fannie and Freddie clouds, burying many of our oldest and most venerable institutions. Without their checkbooks keeping the market liquid and buying up excess supply, the market would likely have not existed.

But the bill didn’t become law, for a simple reason: Democrats opposed it on a party-line vote in the committee, signaling that this would be a partisan issue. Republicans, tied in knots by the tight Democratic opposition, couldn’t even get the Senate to vote on the matter.

That such a reckless political stand could have been taken by the Democrats was obscene even then. Wallison wrote at the time: ``It is a classic case of socializing the risk while privatizing the profit. The Democrats and the few Republicans who oppose portfolio limitations could not possibly do so if their constituents understood what they were doing.’’

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that Red Bull doesn’t give you wings?

Fanhouse:

This is Russian high jumper Ivan Ukhov failing miserably on a jump at the Lausanne Grand Prix, going under the bar instead of over it: So what was Ukhov’s problem? It hasn’t been reported in the English-language media, but in other countries the stories say that he was jumping under the influence of Red Bull and vodka.

Another view here:

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Al Capone’s (recreated) digs at Eastern State Penitentiary (in Pennsylvania) where he was keeping a low profile following the Valentine’s Day Massacre.

It’s just one of many photos at Opacity, an ambitious (and beautiful) project to document abandoned infrastructure (schools, hospitals, prisons, power plants, etc.) in the northeastern U.S.

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Yeah, yeah, I know that the R-word is politically inflammatory; on the other hand, just try to come up with a more-fitting adjective for Coldplay’s Chris Martin (right), in action.
Link.

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Warning: Enhanced sound effects. Either that or the cat can throw one helluva punch.

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Before I Die is an Internet project in which people send in Polaroids of themselves with their final ambitions scrawled in felt pen on the white lower margin. The woman above wrote:

Before I die I want to be carried out of my home feet first

Not to be anal and all nitpickey about this, but isn’t that what you sort of plan for after you die?

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Best Week Ever:

A model walks the runway at the Thom Browne Spring 2009 fashion show during Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week at Exit Art on September 9, 2008 in New York City.

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barbrastreisand.com:

John McCain has served this country. No one in this election is denying him that. But his selection of Governor Palin has demonstrated that he is willing to put his desperation to win this election above the welfare of the American people. As someone who has spent over 40 years advocating on behalf of women both politically and philanthropically, as someone who was a strong supporter of Hillary Clinton and as someone who cares deeply about the health and welfare of all women, hear me Senator McCain: “This calculated, cynical ploy to pull away a small percentage of Hillary’s women voters from Barack Obama will not work. We are not that stupid!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Dear Barbra,

As your new writing coach, may I offer some advice?

Contrary to popular opinion, decorating your sentences with excessive punctuation does not convey—some might say it even detracts from—the cogency of your argument!!!

Furthermore, the intensity of your feelings is best communicated by proper attention to word selection and cadence!!!!! Ending your, um, essay with nineteen (19) exclamation marks (I counted them) just makes you look . . . stupid!!!!!!!

Sincerely,

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You don’t get to this point without a lot of hard work.

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An inspired genre-blend of Bloons And Tower Defence. Click the picture or here to start.

Warning: Sound, but you can mute it with a button at top right.

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Long-known to robotics researchers and cognitive psycholgists, the problem of the Uncanny Valley is lately of most interest to games designers.

Basically, it’s the puzzle that the closer we get to simulating human beings, we seem to retain a near-universal and infallable ability to distinguish between the fake and the real. It seems to be almost hard-wired into us. Wikipedia article here.

But now a company named Image Metrics has come closer than I’ve ever seen to jumping the chasm. Watch the video and be prepared for a surprise about the 1:20 mark.

Warning: Sound, but no screaming zombies.

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Iowahawk knocks one out of the Colosseum one of those Greek amphitheater thingies his misspent years of Classics Studies:

Speak to me, O Muse, of this resourceful man
who strides so boldly upon the golden shrine at Invescos,
Between Ionic plywood columns, to the kleig light altar.
Fair Obamacles, favored of the gods, ascends to Olympus
Amidst lusty tributes and the strumming lyres of Media;
Their mounted skyboxes echo with the singing of his name
While Olbermos and Mattheus in their greasy togas wrassle
For first honor of basking in their hero’s reflected glory.
Who is this man, so bronzed in countenance,
So skilled of TelePrompter, clean and articulate
whose ears like a stately urn’s protrude?
So now, daughter of Zeus, tell us his story.
And just the Cliff Notes if you don’t mind,
We don’t have all day.

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Roseanne, I dont think youre very bright at all.

Dan O’Brien puts on the hip boots and wades manfully into the wreck otherwise known as “Roseanne [sic] World” to review the blog therein. Somebody had to do it, I guess.

His report here. Or you can cut directly to the chase.

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Pixifood (PIKZ-ee-food), noun: Any food substance that is highly pleasant to the taste as a child and tastes shockingly unpleasant once you become an adult.

Joe Posnanski:

OK, beyond the obvious vegetables question, I have another one: What do they mean AT LEAST six essential vitamins and minerals. Might there be more? Have those just not been discovered yet? Are scientist working in the SpaghettiO labs non-stop and occasionally shouting out, WAIT, I found one! Oh, no, sorry, that was some lint from my pocket. Damn. False alarm. Or does it depend on what you consider to be essential? Like do these have Calcite in them, but many Moms dont feel thats essential?

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Playing God is tougher than it looks, which is why no one’s offering me the job, I guess. Before you conjure into being your first universe (which really sounds like a lot of work), you might want to try your hand at organizing a simple solar system. Try to not crash the planets, Zeus.
Click the picture or here to start.

Warning: Music and sound effects. You can turn them off with a button at the top right.

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to fill my manly mug, Ma’am. (Large print on cup says, “Happy Wildness Men.” Indeed.)

Via Engrish.com

Shocking news from the music world: Citing “creative differences” and “general dishevelment and belligerence,” the rock band The Police has parted ways with founder and vocalist/bassist Gordon (Sting) Sumner (bottom right).

I’m happy to report that he’s on the rebound, though, landing a position with Huutajat (The Shouters), a Finnish men’s choir.

I didn’t know he was that short.

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An interesting little simulation.I didn’t have a lot of time to play with it, but I suspect your strategies can get quite involved. Click the picture or here to start.

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And lo, there was a conflict in Georgia, and the sound of it reached the Obamessiahs ears, and he was not pleased.

And lo, the Obamessiah stretched forth his hand, and said unto Atlanta, “Let there be a cease-fire!”

And verily, the peoples of Atlanta replied unto the Obamessiah, “Wrong Georgia, pal.”

And lo, after much um-ing, and er-ing, and uh-ing, the Obamessiah turned his face upon the correct Georgia, and called out unto it, “Let there be a cease-fire!”

And verily, it did come to pass, that a cease-fire was announced (though no one truly believed it to be so), and the Obamessiah saw it to be so on MSNBC, and he pronounced it good.

Let the Obamessiah bless the reading of these words until election day.

Commenter “Frozen Tex” at Hot Air

This cake is so disturbing, I’m almost glad the picture doesn’t include the whole thing. The plastic clone babies wearing naught but mohawks is bad enough, but then they’re also riding carrots. What do you do with that? It looks like some kind of perverted vegetable rodeo, or maybe a bizarre clone military exercise, what with their little plastic fists raised high in identical salutes.

And by “somewhat short” I mean that you’ll laugh until you cry, though that’s more of a tribute to the blog’s writer and commenters, who have a wonderfully-droll style.

For more conventional notions of cake pulchritude, see here.

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CTV:

Popular Maritime singer Rita MacNeil said she had no idea she was under RCMP surveillance during an investigation into the 1970s Canadian feminist movement.

In an interview with CTV Newsnet from her home in Big Pond, N.S., MacNeil called the investigation “a little bit silly.”

Two historians recently uncovered files showing RCMP spies infiltrated the women’s liberation movement in Canada. Investigators conducted undercover surveillance on marches and rallies, and compiled biographical sketches on some participants, including MacNeil.

I’m glad the RCMP were keeping an eye on these troublemakers.

Feminist music festivals were invariably grim and dour spectacles, as witness the photo above. And that was before the “music” started.

Worse, being largely bereft of talent, feminist musicians left to their own devices are at high risk of metastasizing into Raging Grannies (below), itinerant annoyances who show up at any given left-wing demo, performing unfunny, offkey parodies of folksongs wjth their quavery, little-old-lady voices. They do make a powerful (albeit unintended) argument for involuntary euthanasia, though.

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Ezra Levant:

Some 900 days after I became the only person in the Western world charged with the offence of republishing the Danish cartoons of Muhammad, the government has finally acquitted me of illegal discrimination. Taxpayers are out more than $500,000 for an investigation that involved fifteen bureaucrats at the Alberta Human Rights Commission. The legal cost to me and the now-defunct Western Standard magazine is $100,000.

The case would have been thrown out long ago if I had been charged in a criminal court, instead of a human rights commission. Thats because accused criminals have the right to a speedy trial. Accused publishers at human rights commissions do not.

And if I had been a defendant in a civil court, the judge would now order the losing parties to pay my legal bills. Instead, the Edmonton Council of Muslim Communities wont have to pay me a dime. Neither will Syed Soharwardy, the Calgary imam who abandoned his identical complaint against me this spring.

Both managed to hijack a secular government agency to prosecute their radical Islamic fatwa against me – the first blasphemy case in Canada in over 80 years. Their complaints were dismissed, but it is inaccurate to say that they lost: They got the government to rough me up for nearly three years, at no cost to them. The process I was put through was a punishment in itself – and a warning to any other journalists who would defy radical Islam.

Ezra needs to drag these thugs into a real court and have them explain why they don’t owe him every penny he’s had to put out, along with some hefty punitive damages. Until the complainants (and the spineless politicians who enable them) realize there are real and negative consequences for this type of abusive behavior, we’ll just see more and more of it.

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Penthouse’s fabled fact-checkers take a long-overdue look at the readers’ fantasy section, the Forum:

In the letter “Rent Payments,” the letter writer described his landlady as having “the flawlessly tanned and toned body of a much younger woman” and “full, pouty lips that promised-and later delivered-satisfaction.” The landlady, in fact, does not exist. Nor does the letter writer possess “an impressive love-tool that all the ladies crave.” He did, however, totally make out with this one girl once and they were so going to do it, until his mom came home. Really.

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. . . tackle? Nope. Mastertacklers? Nope.

Truly, the pun is the lowest form of humor. ‘Cause I’m just not getting it.

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