Nudes in the News

Yet another chapter in "The Naked News" or "All the News That's Fit to Bare"

Our first entry has to be the DeBlasio war on Boobs. I've seen it now several times, including, shockingly, an almost sensible column by Catherine Rampel in today's Post: New York City’s bizarre uproar over topless women:

The city that never sleeps has good reason to remain sleepless these days. A new terror imperils New York, threatening to destroy all that it — nay, America — holds dear.

No, it’s not a bomb, underground al-Qaeda network, hurricane, alien invasion, asteroid, animatronic Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man or any other favorite bugaboo of the silver screen. Nor is it even the latest stock market panic.

It’s boobs.

Well yes, Bill de Blasio is a boob.

Yes, boobs. Bare breasts bouncing in the breeze in Times Square, to be specific. New York City has recently lost its mind because a few women have lost their shirts.

In Times Square, a handful of topless women have joined the hordes of buskers, proselytizers, balloon artists and costumed Disney characters hustling for tips. Wearing nothing but thongs, feather headdresses and star-spangled body-paint across their otherwise exposed chests, these women pose for photos with gawking tourists and accept tips given in appreciation for being what they call “entertainers” or “ambassadors” of this great city. They offer a photogenic souvenir tourists can take home, frame and mount on their mantelpieces.

And it doesn't take up any room in your suitcase!

Unorthodox though their wardrobe choices may be, these women are on the right side of the law. More than two decades ago, the state’s highest court ruled that prohibiting women, but not men, from baring their chests in public amounted to discrimination on the basis of sex. Panhandling is likewise legal, and any attempt to shut the desnudas down would likely run into First Amendment problems.

It's New York! Who cares as long as they don't scare the horses!

None of this has stopped a major freakout from the New York Daily News, followed by infuriated comments from Police Commissioner William Bratton. Bratton promised the city was investigating every possible legal avenue to expel the exposed women from Times Square . . . Mayor Bill de Blasio is seriously considering the idea and even commissioned a task force to consider available options. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has also expressed his displeasure with Times Square’s painted ladies and has pledged his support in cracking down on such “illegal” activities.

My guess is that they are irritated that most of them are painted like American flags.

Naked Baristas Took Over A Coffee Shop And The Customer Reactions Were Amazing

Nestle's new Coffee-Mate Natural Bliss creamer contains only four ingredients, making it one of the healthiest coffee creamers on the market. But how to promote it?

In a brilliant marketing move, the company hired a bunch of actors to play naked baristas in a coffee shop to show just how natural they can get.

Some of the customers were very confused. . . 

Hell, read me the whole menu, and the calorie counts.

The Sexy UFO Religion Behind Go Topless Day

Go Topless Day was founded in eight years ago by a man who calls himself Raël, the spiritual leader of the Raëlian Movement, in reaction to the arrest of Phoenix Feeley, a topless activist who was arrested for going topless in New York in 2005. Because toplessness is legal there, Feeley scored a $29,000 settlement from the city for her wrongful arrest. However, she was arrested again in New Jersey for going topless in 2013.

This might even be 2015's March

The Go Topless events started out in four cities in 2007, according to Lara Terstenjak, who produces it annually in Venice Beach. It is now held in over 60 cities, and how topless you can go depends on each city. Since women can't go topless in L.A., they must wear pasties or tape over their nipples. It's been legal for women to go topless in New York since 1992, so women there don't bother with the pasties. In San Francisco, being naked is pretty whatever, so only two women actually showed up their event in 2013. And while the breasts are freely bouncing in those cities, a woman was cited in Chicago last year for showing up to the event with only paint covering her nipples.

Manhattan, 2015 Go Topless Day

The eighth annual Go Topless Day is scheduled for Sunday, August 23. Basically, Go Topless Day wants to end that silly rule that men can go shirtless, but women must cover their nipples. We went to the one in Venice Beach last year and found a handful of women with tape over their nipples, a few male supporters wearing bikini tops, a number of male spectators with cameras who we're pretty sure hadn't been assigned to the event by any media outlet, some angry Christians with signs about Hell, and some bored police officers making sure things don't get too wild.

Damn, I missed it again!

This is the Latest Breast Feeding Controversy that is BLOWING up the Internet

A woman has sparked a controversy after posting a picture on social media showing her breastfeeding a friend’s toddler son – but the boy’s mother says she has nothing but gratitude for the wet-nurse.

Jessica Anne Colletti, from Pennsylvania, shared the photo – which shows her feeding both her own 16-month-old son, Lucian, and her friend Charlie Interrante’s 18-month-old son, Mateo – on a pro-breastfeeding page.

The picture of Mrs Colletti, 26, and the two boys, who she dubs ‘milk siblings’, has divided users on Facebook. . .

This is so 19th century. Back then it was commonplace for wealthy women to hire wet nurses to suckle their infants. It allowed them to have the lovely social life of the upper class without having to run home and feed the little monster. I don't see the issue, but if it's social media, you have to have one.


Chrissy Teigen strips completely naked for new shoot as she admits she only works out in order to eat more and would love to get pregnant so she has an excuse to put on weight

Hey, me too! Except the pregnant part of course. I'm far too old and wise for that, not to mention, the wrong gender.

'I used to take pride in the fact I didn't have to work out, and then I hit that age where you have to,' she said. 'I want to drink champagne and have hearty dinners, so I would rather work out for an hour and be able to do what I want.. . .I've always had to watch myself. My family is not naturally thin and we put on weight quickly. I find low-carb works for me.'

Chrissy also revealed that she can't wait to have children with John and is excited about the chance to not worry about her weight during pregnancy.

She said: 'I'm waiting for things to slow down, but things don't seem to be slowing down, ever, so I think, "Just have one and deal with it." I'd love to have an excuse to be bigger. People will know as soon as I'm pregnant because I'll stop drinking.'

Chrissy is not the only star to pose for the magazine, with former The Only Way Is Essex star, Lucy Mecklenburgh, also stripping off. Lucy, who is the founder of fitness site Resultswithlucy.com, admitted being on the reality TV show was not good for her figure.

But nudity is not all rainbows, unicorns and cute chicks, sometimes it has a dark side:

Naked man, 81, arrested for 'having sex with bush in his own back garden'

A pensioner has been arrested for allegedly having SEX with a BUSH - in his own back garden. The unsuspecting 81-year-old was caught in the act by a neighbour whose home overlooked the back garden.

He claims that he said the octogenarian acting oddly in the garden while naked so he grabbed his video camera. He claims to have shot images of the man then “humping” a bush while in the buff.

Local reports in Stratford, Connecticut, said the neighbour then raised the alarm.

The Connecticut Post said the man was arrested after police said he was spotted trying to have sex with the greenery in the garden.

Wallace Berg, of Russell Road, was charged with second-degree breach of peace and public indecency.

Shockingly, this did not happen in Florida but rather in stately Connecticut. But I guess I just don't see the point in putting an 81 year old on trial for acting oddly.

Linked at Pirate's Cove in weekly "Sorta Blogless Pinup" and links post. Wombat-socho enters the fray with "Rule 5 Sunday: Hot Babes In Space."

Twenty Years a Roadie

Back when Alex was a mere 14 year old (or thereabouts) it was often my job to take him and his band and their gear to gigs.  So almost a generation later, Alex is the owner of his own Music Center, U Rock Music Center in McMurray Pennsylvania, and on Sunday, I found myself back in the old role, filling the SUV with gear for his students Summer Showcase, held at one of the local eating establishments, Frank I's Bar and Grille. They had some 16 performers (out of 85 students) from 4 different instructors. I took a couple of videos of the band that he has spent the summer working on how to play together:





Alex, of course, is the adultish on the left. The lead singer was supposed to play guitar before an unfortunate dirt bike accident the day before.

Sunken Ship Found Beneath Bay Bridge

Pilot Schooner

200-year-old ship found beneath Route 50 bridge

While clearing debris under the Nanticoke Memorial Bridge in Vienna, State Highway Administration workers uncovered one of the oldest Maryland-built shipwrecks ever discovered, made in the 18th century.

While removing debris in 30 feet of water workers noticed pieces they suspected were ship timbers. When State Highway Association archaeologists arrived, they found an intact keel, frames and other pieces of the wreck on a construction barge.

Pride of Baltimore II
a recreated Baltimore Clipper

 I'll bet the workmen are hating life now. Work is probably stopped until the archaeologists are happy.

The use of wooden pegs in the ship’s construction indicates its age, the SHA said in a release. Details such as saw marks and carved symbols in the wood are still visible.

By looking at growth rings in the timber archaeologists were able to determine is was cut from trees along the coast of the Chesapeake Bay, between the Potomac River and Annapolis. The vessel is likely a 45-foot merchant ship, built at a plantation or small shipyard as a precursor to Chesapeake Bay cargo carrying pilot schooners and the Baltimore Clipper.

Let's see; somewhere between Annapolis and the Potomac? Why, that's just about here. They could have cut timber for that ship of my land.

Lois Lerner Had Another, Secret Email Address

IRS finds yet another Lois Lerner email account

Lois Lerner had yet another personal email account used to conduct some IRS business, the tax agency confirmed in a new court filing late Monday that further complicates the administration’s efforts to be transparent about Ms. Lerner’s actions during the tea party targeting scandal.

The admission came in an open-records lawsuit filed by Judicial Watch, a conservative public interest law firm that has sued to get a look at emails Ms. Lerner sent during the targeting.

IRS lawyer Geoffrey J. Klimas told the court that as the agency was putting together a set of documents to turn over to Judicial Watch, it realized Ms. Lerner had used yet another email account, in addition to her official one and another personal one already known to the agency.

“In addition to emails to or from an email account denominated ‘Lois G. Lerner‘ or ‘Lois Home,’ some emails responsive to Judicial Watch’s request may have been sent to or received from a personal email account denominated ‘Toby Miles,’” Mr. Klimas told Judge Emmet G. Sullivan, who is hearing the case.

This rather reminds me of the EPA email scandal, when Lisa Jackson was caught using an EPA email account under the name "Richard Windsor", which she alleged was the name of her old dog, but which in reality was the name of a famed environmental terroractivist. The account was used to shield certain email from the prying eyes of FOIA and Congress, such as her backroom connivance with environmental groups that was too suspicious for her official email.

It will be interesting to see what kind of material is in Toby Miles' in and out boxes.

Somehow, I don't Think His Allowance is Going to Cover it

Boy stumbles, leaves hole in valuable painting at da Vinci exhibit

The 12-year-old boy may have gotten lucky, however, because the organizers will not ask the boy's family to pay for the cost of restoring the damaged painting, displayed as part of "The Face of Leonardo, Images of a Genius" exhibition at Huashan 1914 Creative Park.

According to Sun Chi-hsuan (孫紀璿), the head of exhibition co-organizer TST Art of Discovery Co. (京銓藝術), the 200-centimeter tall painting is around 350 years old and valued at over NT$50 million (US$1.5 million).

A nice piece of wall covering, but $1.5 million's worth?

Hat tip to Althouse.

Clinton.com Catchup

Five days is really too long to let this go.

Clinton aides’ BlackBerrys likely destroyed - Huma and Cheryl Mills Blackberries were destroyed after Hillary left the Secretaryship. It could be coincidence, but a Goldfinger once told Bond, "once is happenstance, twice is coincidence; the third time is enemy action." I don't have an exact count, but Hillary is at least in double digits.

Judge Grows Irritated with State Department Foot-Dragging on Clinton E-mails - The time for irritation is long past. Judge Sullivan needs to start putting some State Dept employees in the jug until their attitude improves.

The Comical Dishonesty of Clinton’s E-mail Press Conference

As is now clear, Hillary possesses almost none of Bill’s remarkable personal virtues. She’s not warm or spontaneous or alluring or quick. She has no discernible political instincts. She doesn’t even seem to enjoy the human contact on which successful public servants thrive. But boy can she fib with the best of them. From start to precipitous finish, her performance was pure Clintonian evasion. “What I did,” she argued carefully — after trying a quick “nothing to do with me” for good measure — “was legally permitted, number one, first and foremost, okay?”

Special Operations Vets Call For Kerry To Strip Hillary Of Security Clearance

A group of special operations veterans and intelligence community officials have formally asked Secretary of State John Kerry to strip former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton of her security clearance along with three of her top aides, The Daily Caller News Foundation has learned. The organization, called the Special Operations Educational Fund, wrote Kerry August 5 asking that he “immediately suspend the security clearances” because of Clinton’s use of a private unsecured email server and domain name that contains classified information. SOF is a 501 (c) 4 nonprofit group.

The group also asked Kerry to administratively suspend the security clearances of Clinton and aides Cheryl Mills, Huma Abedin and Jake Sullivan.

I understand where the vets are coming from; if they had treated classified information as cavalierly as this bunch, they would not only have their clearances yanked, burned and the ashes  scattered, but they would probably be brought up on charges as well.

Latest pro-Hillary spin: Classifications are dumb, y’all - Sure, I'll bet a lot of classified information isn't nearly as important as they make it out, and yes, I'm sure that material is classified in many cases to cover bureaucratic asses (which require a lot of covering), but the Secretary of State doesn't get to declassify data just so she can mix it on the same private server as Chelsea's wedding and her yoga routines.

G-Men: We Might Prosecute "Ma" Clinton - I can't wait.

Hillary Clinton Campaign Says Classified Emails Were on Server

Pointing to two emails that helped spark the FBI probe, the Clinton campaign said State Department officials considered the material unclassified at the time it was sent. The controversy, said Mr. Fallon, amounts to a dispute between different agencies within the Obama administration about what constitutes classified material and what should be released publicly.

“When it comes to classified information, the standards are not at all black and white,” said Mr. Fallon on a conference call with reporters.

The two emails in question were written by lower-ranking State Department officials and forwarded to Mrs. Clinton by top aides Jake Sullivan and Huma Abedin, who both now work for her Democratic presidential campaign.

Poor little Hillary, just a "passive recipient of unwitting information that subsequently became deemed as classified" according to one of her spokesdouches. Even if true (which I doubt) When you're SecState, you should anticipate that a lot of the email traffic you make will be secret in nature. That's why it's wrong to keep your email on a private, unsecured server. Book her, Dano.

Hillary's rivals in the Democrat Party also exhibit a shocking lack of interest in national security - Hillary’s Democratic competition gets serious, declares email scandal…a distraction. You wouldn't really expect Bernie Sanders or Martin O'Malley to give a damn, but Jim Webb?

Judge says Hillary Clinton's private emails violated policy

A federal judge has added fresh fuel to the incendiary controversy over Hillary Clinton’s email, asserting during a hearing Thursday that she violated government policy by storing official messages on a private server when she worked as secretary of state.

“We wouldn’t be here today if this employee had followed government policy,” said U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan, apparently referring to Clinton, during a hearing on one of the many Freedom of Information Act lawsuits seeking access to her records as secretary of state.

Sullivan’s said Clinton’s actions had complicated the State Department’s ability to respond to requests for records on various topics. He also ordered the State Department to contact the FBI to determine whether the private server Clinton used, which Clinton turned over to that law enforcement agency earlier this month, contains official records possibly responsive to the FOIA suit. . . “We’re not talking about a search of anyone’s random email,” Sullivan added.

Judge orders State to coordinate with FBI about Clinton server

A federal judge on Thursday ordered the State Department to communicate with the FBI about Hillary Clinton’s personal email server, and opened the door to additional demands on the former secretary of state.

Judge Emmet Sullivan told the department to “establish a dialogue” with the FBI about the machine, and be prepared to demand that the FBI turn over documents that may be related to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit.

“I'm surprised that State didn't do that already,” Sullivan told government lawyers. “If you can get the information as result of a dialogue with the FBI... I think I may be satisfied,” he added. “Let's see what the investigation reveals, if anything.”

 Hillary’s email caper: She had inside help

The satellite imagery data had to originate at the Department of Defense. It ended up on Clinton’s server. According to the callers on the audio the DoD intranet is NOT connected with the outside world. Security measures exist to prevent that from being a possibility. In order for Hillary for come into possession of this kind of data on her own homemade server someone would have had to download the information, place it on a device (like a thumb drive or SD card), take the device or card out of the SCIF , upload the information to a conventional server, PC or smartphone, strip off the classified labels and then email it to Hillary Clinton’s private server. It’s called spillage.
. . .

Everyone’s been so focused on Hillary simply having classified information on her server I don’t think anyone’s addressed how that could even happen. Who sent the emails containing the classified information to Hillary? We do need to know. Remember how big a deal Valerie Plame was? This is way, way bigger.

Adding to the mystery- the State Department made no effort to secure Clinton’s server after it was hacked in 2013.

Yep, someone, somewhere, probably in the State Dept. and probably one of Hillary's special henchpeople removed the secret marks on the satellite data and passed it on to Hillary. It had to be pretty much in recognition of the fact that doing so was violating the law. And Hillary had to be aware of the procedure.

Thigh gap - Not Hillary

Some women worry about thigh gap, but Hillary has to worry about air gap:

. . . I’ve gone on at a little length there because I want to make it clear: this classification is pretty heavy stuff, with the potential to cause “exceptionally grave damage,” and containing information that can be identified as coming from both Earth-based and satellite-based collection, that shouldn’t be shared with any foreign national.

This information would always be air-gapped. There is no (legitimate) way that a computer system could be connected to TS//SI//TK//NOFORN data and to the outside world.

What can happen is that someone copies information, onto a piece of paper or a thumb drive (actually systems that can handle TS shouldn’t have thumb drives either, but it’s too easy to sneak one in or out) and then copied into an email in an uncontrolled system – a cell phone or a laptop or an iPad. The person doing it has to know that it’s coming from a secure system, has to know how sensitive the data really is; they go through lots of training, repeated reminders, and come and go to the office through a freaking vault door that would do credit to a bank.

It has to be done on purpose, and it has to be done knowingly. There has to have been conscious intent to do it.

That, folks, is a violation of 18 U.S. Code § 793 – Gathering, transmitting or losing defense information, for which the prescribed punishment is to be “fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both.” Which applies both to the sender, and to the recipient.

Another Hillary Lie: Team Grandmonster Never Informed DHS About Secret Email System, Despite DHS Rules Requiring Updates About Communications Systems

The DHS required regular updates about the security of email systems so they could audit them to discover if they were secure or if they were hackable.

Grandmonster Hillary never told them about this key system, upon which she conducted all of her official State business Pinterest-based Yoga Routine Research.

The State Department does not appear to have submitted legally required information regarding Hillary Clinton's secret computer server to the Department of Homeland Security during her term as secretary, FoxNews.com has learned.
All federal government agencies are mandated to submit a list of systems, vulnerabilities and configuration issues to DHS every 30 days. The department then performs a "cyberscope audit" to ensure security, a responsibility the agency has had since 2010.
FoxNews.com learned of the lapse as a result of a Freedom of Information Act request submitted June 11. It is not clear if State Department officials in charge of compliance with the DHS audits knew of their boss's server, which has been shown to have included "top secret" information in emails.

John Schindler runs down the lies from Grandmonster Hillary's recent statements and concludes:

The prodigious Team Hillary lies must stop. With each new, flat-out lie, she is damaging her party and the country. It’s time to come clean and end this charade. There’s not much time left — the FBI will end its investigation eventually, and I doubt Clinton, Inc. will like what the Bureau finds. . .

WaPo columnist to Hillary: Stop digging

The demand that Hillary Clinton obey the First Law of Holes has as much chance of success as getting Hillary to obey the First Laws of Handling Classified Material, but the plea is noteworthy for its authorship. It’s not George Will or Charles Krauthammer offering Hillary Clinton this advice, but Ruth Marcus, one of the liberal columnists in the Washington Post. Marcus desperately wants Hillary to stop doing damage to her campaign — but this may miss the point of Hillary’s continued digging. . .:

So, my advice: Stop making light. Stop litigating. Stop the high-handed dismissing. Stop the prickliness with the media; we’re not going away. Stop the non-apology apologies (you didn’t do anything wrong, but you wouldn’t do it over again).
You don’t need to grovel or confess to grievous errors. Just dial down the combativeness — as hard as this is for you — and ramp up the reasonableness: You understand people have questions. If classified information was not adequately protected, you’d like to know that and figure out what lessons can be learned.
This problem isn’t going away. The trick, right now, is simply not making it worse.

Wombat-socho enters the fray with "Rule 5 Sunday: Hot Babes In Space."

"I'm Back"

in which our favorite redneck blows stuff up with a shotgun:



Wombat-socho enters the fray with "Rule 5 Sunday: Hot Babes In Space."

Ohiopyle, Butterflies and Fallingwater

Our way home from Canonsburg today took us back down The National Pike (Rt. 40).

Hoping to miss the rush hour in the DC area, we dawdled by visiting first Ohiopyle State Park. . .

At Ohiopyle, I found this fritillary on some cone flowers near the visitors center. Great Spangled or Aphrodite?

I'm trying to talk myself into Aphrodite, but I'm afraid it's probably just another GSF. . . I'll have to send it to BOMA for a sure identification.

UPDATE: Alas, BOMA identified it as just another GSF.

Our next stop was a little farther out was Fallingwater, the house built by famous architect Frank Lloyd Wright for Edgar Kaufmann Sr.

Time cited it after its completion as Wright's "most beautiful job"; it is listed among Smithsonian's Life List of 28 places "to visit before you die." It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1966. 

In the parking lot I found a few of these Swallowtails. I'm hoping they are Appalachian Swallowtails, a separate near relative of our Eastern Tiger Swallowtails.

UPDATE: Nope, just a normal Eastern Tiger Swallowtail.

Similar to Eastern Tiger Swallowtail, but larger. Wings slightly angular and vertical black stripes narrower. Hindwings of males triangular. Underside of forewings with nearly continuous yellow submarginal band. Undersides of hindwings with rectangular submarginal lunules. Female has both yellow and black forms. Both forms with markedly reduced iridescent blue wash on topside of hindwings. The upperside hindwing has a prominent orange marginal spot that is generally smaller than the row of pale marginal spots.

We found this familiar Spicebush Swallowtail in a flower bed. . .

Along with this Silvery Checkerspot; the second I've seen for sure.

Hanging around the house itself I found this Eastern Comma. . .

Which attached itself to my foot for a ride as we walked around the house.

We only paid $8 each for the "grounds pass", which allowed us to go all around the ground and into unheated spaces (like those terraces). $27 each would have bought a guided tour including the inside. But we would have needed an hour to start, and we weren't willing to hang around that long.

The classic Fallingwater picture.

Cruz Takes on the Lesbian Mafia

By way of Stacy McCain; Radical Feminism and the ‘Equality’ Trap

Radical lesbian activist @EllenPage decided that @TedCruz needed a lecture from her about equality and discrimination:

DES MOINES — Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and actress Ellen Page, of “Juno” fame, got into a testy and free-wheeling discussion Friday over gay rights here at the Iowa State Fair.
“I’m happy to answer your question but not to have a back-and-forth debate,” Cruz told Page, as she pressed him about discrimination against LGBT citizens, approaching him as he flipped pork chops over an open grill.

. . .
“Imagine, hypothetically, you had a gay florist and imagine two evangelical Christians wanted to get married and the gay florist decided, ‘You know what, I disagree with your faith, I don’t want to provide flowers,’” Cruz said.

“I would say they should provide the flowers,” said Page, who earlier charged Cruz’s argument was the same used to justify segregation.. . .
The senator went on to say that the much bigger challenge for gay people comes from the Middle East, where they are deeply persecuted by the Iranian government as well as the leadership of ISIS.
“On the left you hear complete silence” — “That’s not true!” Page interjected — “about Iran hanging homosexuals, and yet the Obama administration is sending over $100 billion to a regime that murders homosexuals,” Cruz continued. . . . .
“Why does the Obama administration not stand against this?” Cruz said.
“I don’t know, I’d love to talk to Obama about it,” Page replied
“Then we’re agreed!” Cruz shot back,
“No, no we’re not, don’t do that,” the actress said.
“We’re agreed! Ma’am, we’ve had a long discussion,” Cruz said.
“Yeah, I appreciate it, yeah,” she said sarcastically, and walked away.

Heh!

Unsurprisingly, the liberal media tried to spin this attempted ambush as a courageous triumph for the celebrity lesbian, but Ian Tuttle at National Review isn’t buying the spin:

Alternative headline: “Actress from That One Movie about Roller Derby Confronts Princeton Debate Champ — Goes about as You Might Expect.”

Beyond highlighting Cruz’s expert-level debate skills, the exchange exposed Page’s “rejection of conscience protections altogether, and her endorsement of radical government intervention in all such matters,” as Tuttle says. Her arguments are based in the Equality Über Alles mentality that characterizes not only the militant gay movement, but also the radical feminist movement and the Left in general. Grant them what they demand today, and the radicals will return tomorrow with new demands, because “equality” can never be achieved, not even under the absolute tyranny of a totalitarian dictatorship. The Nobel Prize-winning economist Friedrich Hayek explained that “social justice” is a mirage — it seems to appear up ahead in the distance, but vanishes as soon as you approach it. There will always be someone claiming to be a victim of unfairness, so that to make “equality” (or “social justice” or, more vaguely, “progress”) your goal is to declare war on society itself, to inaugurate what Trotsky called “permanent revolution.”

I don't understand why Cruz isn't doing better among the sweet 16, or whatever number of Republican candidates we're up to now. He's smart, he's conservative, he's civil enough most of the time, with the hard edge that's needed to make a difference when it counts. I'm not saying he's my guy, but he could be.

Wombat-socho enters the fray with "Rule 5 Sunday: Hot Babes In Space."

Pennsylvania Butterflies

During a break from my current position as roadie (more on that as time bandwidth allow), I took a break behind a restaurant, on a quiet street to look for butterflies to photograph:

The first unusual thing I found was this small dark skipper which was trying to puddle on some mud (I kept disturbing him). It's similar to the Horace's Duskywing we see at home, but a bit different. My internet connection was funky, but when it's faster I expect to identify it fairly easily, but now that it's quicker I suspect it's a Juvenal's Duskywing. I think I might have gotten a peek at, but no picture of a Common Checkered Skipper, too

UPDATE: Butterfliesandmoths.org identified it as a Wild Indigo Duskywing. Still a new one on my list.

Next I chased this one (or more likely several different ones) around a while before I got decent pictures. One even landed on me twice in the process:

I'm quite confident it is a Hackberry Emperor, and the tree it (or rather they) were inhabiting was a Hackberry. In theory, they should also be found at home in Calvert County, but apparently not without some Hackberries.

Hackberry Butterflies fly in a fast and erratic manner, and rest upside down on tree trunks. Males perch on tall objects in sunny areas to watch for females.

Don't Spend It All In One Place

World’s oldest message in a bottle ever found finally washes up after 108 years

The world’s oldest message in a bottle to ever be found is believed to have been recovered - after 108 years at sea.

Marianne Winkler, a retired postal worker, was on holiday when she spotted the unusual bottle floating by the German island of Amrum.

She told local paper the Amrum News the clear glass bottle had a note inside bearing only the words: “Break the bottle.”

“My husband, Horst, carefully tried to get the message out of the bottle, but there was no chance, so we had to do as it said," she said.

When the couple unfurled the note inside, they found a message in English, German and Dutch. It asked the finder to fill in some information on where and when they had found the bottle, before returning it to the Marine Biological Association in Plymouth. It said whoever did so would be rewarded with one shilling.

I'm going to throw the bullshit flag on this one. No bottle would survive 108 years in the ocean and look that pristine. It would be covered with barnacles and scum. In fact, I suspect the accumulation of such garbage would sink a bottle that floated for even a few years. Most likely it came from a shelf somewhere; either stolen from MBA or just a collector. If it did actually get tossed into the ocean,it was probably quickly cast ashore and buried in sediments that protected it until recently.

Monday Morning - How About a Cute Kitten Post?

Atomic Kitten:

Bears

5 Cubs? what a handpawful. Stolen from the ONT.

Rule 5 Saturday - Vanessa Hudgens

For some reason this week's Rule 5 post features Vanessa Hudgens:

Vanessa Anne Hudgens (born December 14, 1988) is an American actress and singer. Hudgens rose to prominence playing Gabriella Montez in the High School Musical series. Hudgens has also appeared in various films and television series for the Disney Channel.

The best thing from Salinas since artichokes?

Hudgens was born in Salinas, California, and has lived with her parents along the West Coast, from Oregon to Southern California. Her mother, Gina (née Guangco), held a succession of office jobs, and her father, Gregory Hudgens, was a firefighter. . . Her father is of Irish and Native American descent, and her mother, a native of Manila, Philippines, is of Filipino-Chinese-Spanish descent. All of her grandparents were musicians.

Vanessa was a victim the in internet "selfie" scandal, where nude selfies of a number of stars were stolen and posted on line. Having found a number of these photos in the research process, let me just reiterate my advice to starlets:

There's a reason magazines hire professional photographers with real cameras and not cell phones.

In  GOODSTUFF's 204th issue of his blogging magazine, he features Salma Hayek and Yvonne Craig. Linked at Pirate's Cover in the weekly "Sorta Blogless Sunday Pinup" and links. Wombat-socho brings us "Rule 5 Sunday: RIP Batgirl, Viva Jeannie!"

Up the Road Aways

We successfully completed our days travel to the Canonsburg PA area. We drove Rt 4 to Rt 301 then Highway 32 to I-70 to I-270 to avoid the DC beltway. Traffic was excellent. At Hancock, MD we chose I-68 toward Morgantown WV, but then exited onto Highway 40, the Old National Pike at Keyser's Ridge.  Along the way we stopped for lunch at the Stone House BBQ, a wonderful find.

A little more backwoods navigating got us to Rt. 19 in Canonsburg after 5 1/2 hours, and 295 miles. Not too bad.

Morning Music - "Some Other Time"

We're off to the Pittsburgh area for a few days, so blogging will be a little slow and scattered.




Wombat-socho brings us "Rule 5 Sunday: RIP Batgirl, Viva Jeannie!"

More Jane Monheit:

Nice Guys Finish Last . . .

Even with feminists.  We all know that "normal" women like bad boys, at least to date and fool around with, if not to marry. But it seems that nice guys can't catch a break; even feminists despise them. From Stacy McCain's study of doctrinaire feminists, of course.

‘Nice Guys,’ Failure, Self-Pity and Cruelty

Until yesterday, I had never heard of Bailey Poland, but I included one of her tweets in a roundup about the feminist hashtag campaign #ThingsFeministMenHaveSaidToMe, and someone in the comments remarked, “I loathe Bailey Poland. She’s one of the most loathsome, divisive, and nit picky, yet totally self righteous feminists on Twitter. ”Oh, really? This claim required investigation, and I quickly verified the commenter’s assertion. Then I began to read articles Ms. Poland had written about “toxic masculinity” and “benevolent sexism,” and then finally, “nice guys”:

The “nice guy” has made “being nice to women” his defining trait in attempting to get women to go out with him, and his niceness begins to wear thinner and become more and more brittle as he learns this does not work.
The “nice guy” has an image of himself that is fundamentally at odds with his actual behavior. He often sees himself as chivalrous, respectful to women, attentive to the women he wants to pursue romantically, and deserving of affection or romance in return. He sees his behavior as genuinely nice, and has been told all his life that niceness is rewarded. He will hone in on one woman or a few women and idealize them to the point of perfection, befriending them in the hopes that they will relive a dozen teen movies wherein the romantic interest realizes she should have been with her best friend all along. . . .
His niceness is a sham, and a tool for gaining what he perceives as leverage in earning or winning a romantic relationship. The “nice guy” tends to perceive himself as passionate and tender, while his targets see him as grasping and manipulative. . . .
The basic problem with “nice guys” is their sense of entitlement to relationships or sex with women based on nothing more than being nice to them. However, women see through this — and niceness that is performed in service of gaining something from a woman is not actually all that nice to begin with, and it certainly is not a free pass to demand anything from anyone. . . .
When “nice guys” complain that women only date jerks, they often just mean that women are acting outside the imaginary roles they’ve been assigned — women are dating men who do not meet the “nice guy” ideal of performing very specific types of behavior for a reward. Many of the men who are perceived as jerks may actually not be perfect guys, but they’re often honest about it in ways that allow for the negotiations of an adult relationship to take place. . . .
The other major problem with “nice guys” is that it’s not just their niceness that’s a sham. They also often hate women, but rely on romantic or sexual attachments to fuel their sense of self-worth. When the niceness gambit fails and they feel they have been denied something to which they’re entitled, “nice guy” misogyny often follows close behind. In addition to accusing women of being shallow, sleeping only with jerks, or “friendzoning” them, they will also frequently hurl a variety of gender-based slurs at the very women they claimed to idolize.

You can read the whole thing. . .

But you probably shouldn't. You should shun such people, and make sure they have as little influence in raising your children as is humanely possible. You should also find out who they vote for (as if there is usually any question) and vote the other way.

And while you're at it read ‘No More Fun of Any Kind!’ for the newest outrage; a sorority ad banned for having too many blondes:

The Alpha Phi sorority at the University of Alabama put together a recruiting video. The apparent object of the video was to promote the idea that Alpha Phi girls are pretty, popular and fun. This is not a controversial political idea, except for feminists who hate pretty, popular girls having fun:

It’s a parade of white girls and blonde hair dye, coordinated clothing, bikinis and daisy dukes, glitter and kisses, bouncing bodies, euphoric hand-holding and hugging, gratuitous booty shots, and matching aviator sunglasses. It’s all so racially and aesthetically homogeneous and forced, so hyper-feminine, so reductive and objectifying, so Stepford Wives: College Edition. It’s all so . . . unempowering.
That column by A.L. Bailey resulted in a statement by the university condemning the video, which Alpha Phi took offline:
A video promoting the University of Alabama’s chapter of a largely white sorority has been taken down after being widely criticized online for its portrayal of women and for its lack of diversity. . . .
A statement from the school’s associate vice president for university relations, Deborah Lane, said that the video “is not reflective of UA’s expectations for student organizations to be responsible digital citizens.”

Dear God, has it gone this far? Has political correctness reached the point that it’s wrong for Alabama sorority girls to be pretty? 

Yep.  Boys can't be nice, and white girls can't be pretty.

Dominion to Build Artificial Reef

Dominion aids in bay artificial reef enhancement - Debris connected with LNG project used

Friday afternoon, a bulldozer plopped broken pieces of concrete off a barge into the Chesapeake Bay to serve a dual purpose: to contribute to an existing artificial reef and the implementation of a plan for Dominion Cove Point to use materials resulting from demolition.

On Friday, 100 tons of concrete were unloaded into the bay in the third of a total of six or seven loads. The existing reef near Taylors Island serves as a fish habitat and has been in progress since 1986, said Erik Zlokovitz, artificial reef coordinator for the Maryland Department of Natural Resources Fisheries Service.

All of the material donated by Dominion Cove Point was tested for cleanliness before being deposited into the bay. The concrete was from the foundations of buildings that were demolished to make room for the construction of the $3.8 billion liquefied natural gas export facility at the existing plant in Lusby, said Dominion Cove Point spokesman Karl Neddenien.

The requirement for Dominion to prepare and implement a plan to use concrete is from the Maryland Public Service Commission’s Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity, which was approved in June 2014, according to information provided by Dominion Cove Point.

In the years prior to the reopening of the gas docks, and prior to all the security concerns after 9/11, the Dominion Gas Docks were an important destination for recreational, charter and commercial fisherman. Fish were attracted by all the structure (the pilings and the tunnel that connects to shore), and the strong currents that whip around Cove Point. So I suppose it is fitting that the company is building some alternative structure since its activities have closed off that fishing ground.

The entire reef sits where the water’s depth is about 35 to 40 feet, and the reef is 200 to 300 feet long, 10 to 20 feet wide and 3 to 4 feet high. Included in the reef is more concrete and an old sunken barge. The “beneficial re-use” of such material is sometimes cheaper than disposing of it in landfills, Zlokovitz said.

Without the artificial reef, the bottom of the bay in this area is featureless, with flat sand and silt with some muddy patches. There is not much habitat, so the artificial reef provides a place to settle. It attracts small fish, which attract larger fish that feed on them. In other words, the reef material creates “fish condos,” Zlokovitz said.

If the reef gains enough elevation, it changes the bay currents, which are beneficial for remixing the water and help with oxygen levels.

“Any change in current is attractive to fish,” Zlokovitz said.

However, I'm not so sure about the utility of a 4 ft high reef in 40 ft of water over off Taylor's Island. In summer, 40 ft of water around here is often in the anoxic zone, and colonization by benthos and utilization by fish will be substantially inhibited. I'd rather see it in 20 ft of water, where it would likely be almost continuously alive and well. But I'll be sure to check it out.

Rivers, To Pave or Not?

Two contrasting articles:

Paving over rivers in cities could be causing a major pollution problem

In a paper published in PLOS ONE, lead authors and EPA research scientists Jake Beaulieu and Heather Golden found that nitrates—nutrients that can become pollutants—travel on average 18 times further in buried urban streams than they do in open streams, before they are taken out of the water column.

High nitrate levels in water can be toxic to humans, especially infants.
Plants and other organic matter in streams feed on nitrates, which can be found both naturally and in agricultural or industrial run-off. Nitrate uptake, as this feeding process is called, keeps stream ecosystems healthy and oxygenated.

But if nitrates don't get removed, too many end up flowing through the water and into larger water bodies (think: Baltimore and the Chesapeake Bay). This can result in algae blooms, which suffocate water bodies and can cause massive fish deaths. High nitrate levels in water can also be toxic to humans, especially infants.

Records: California Plant Taking Land for Huge Water Tunnels

State contractors have readied plans to acquire as many as 300 farms in the California delta by eminent domain to make room for a pair of massive, still-unapproved water tunnels proposed by Gov. Jerry Brown, according to documents obtained by opponents of the tunnels.

Farmers whose parcels were listed and mapped in the 160-page property-acquisition plan expressed dismay at the advanced planning for the project, which would build 30-mile-long tunnels in the delta formed by the San Joaquin and Sacramento rivers.
. . .
Brown's administration said re-engineering water flows of the delta - the largest estuary on the West Coast - is essential to undoing mistakes of past water projects and to supplying water to Southern California.

Brown has pushed for a massive delta makeover since his first stint as governor in the 1970s and 1980s. In May, he told critics of the tunnels to "shut up."

Opponents say the tunnels would jeopardize delta farming and destroy vital wildlife habitat. "If these reports are correct, then we have further confirmation that the tunnels project has been a forgone conclusion," state Sen. Lois Wolk, D-Davis, who chairs a committee on the delta, said in an email Monday.

The environmental review, "which should be used to choose a project, is simply being used to justify the favored project," she wrote.

Through October, the project officially is in a period of public comment on the environmental impact of the tunnels. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which opposed an earlier version of the project, also must still weigh in.

Restore the Delta, a group of farmers, fishing associations, environmental groups and other opponents, released the property plan that was obtained with a request made under the state open records law. The plan targets public and private land in Sacramento, San Joaquin, Contra Costa and Alameda counties to be acquired for the project.

Under the plan, landowners would have 30 days to consider and negotiate a one-time state offer, while officials simultaneously prepare to take the land by forced sale if owners declined to sell. "Negotiations to continue in parallel with eminent domain proceedings," the plan notes.

Contractors also appear to call for minimal public input.

A secret plan to force farmers into selling their farms, while the cities steal the water? Sounds like something out of a movie.

Forget it, Jake, it's California.

“He was innocent, so he never thought ISIS would hurt him.”

Shielding Syrian Antiquities, to a Grisly Death at ISIS’ Hands

Now, months after his home fell to the jihadists of the Islamic State, Khalid al-Asaad, the retired chief of antiquities for Palmyra, has fallen, too.

After detaining him for weeks, the jihadists dragged him on Tuesday to a public square where a masked swordsman cut off his head in front of a crowd, Mr. Asaad’s relatives said.

His blood-soaked body was then suspended with red twine by its wrists from a traffic light, his head resting on the ground between his feet, his glasses still on, according to a photo distributed on social media by Islamic State supporters.

Before his death, the jihadists had interrogated him in vain about where to find the city’s hidden treasures, Syrian state news media reported, suggesting that the elderly caretaker may have died protecting the same history he had dedicated his life to exploring
. . .
Reached by phone on Wednesday in the Syrian city of Homs, Mr. Asaad’s son, Mohammed, said his father had refused to leave the city, thinking the jihadist group, also known as ISIS, would not bother with someone his age.

“He was a retired government employee and an old man,” the younger Mr. Asaad said. “He was innocent, so he never thought ISIS would hurt him.”

I would like to thank President Obama, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and current Secretary of State John Kerry for their policies of rapid withdrawal from Iraq, and ignoring the ISIS insurgency until it reached this point.

ISIS needs to be destroyed, root and branch.