Larry Jankens's blog

Faulty Bomb Detectors, Government Incompetence, On Thursday Morning

Larry Jankens — Thu, 22 Jul 2010 15:49:30 +0000

Generally, I’m a pretty happy-go-lucky kind of guy. I’m a firm believer that people should be allowed to do whatever it is they wish if doesn’t harm anybody else - live and let live is what I say, especially if I’ve had a few beers in me. However, there are a few things that this dude cannot abide. Two of which are wasteful government spending and unnecessarily putting people in harms way. So you can imagine my response when I found out about a product that the Iraqi government spent over $80 million (of our money, mind you) on that has resulted in the unnecessary deaths of Americans and Iraqis – I was pissed.

The ADE 651 Bomb Detector ASTC costs between $40K and $65K a pop and is used at checkpoints to find bombs on persons or vehicles. Sounds like a good idea, I know, till you find out what it is and how it works. The ADE 651 is basically a dowsing rod consisting of a plastic handle and metal antennae sticking out of the handle. For anyone who is unfamiliar with dowsing, it was created in 15th century Europe to find caches of resources underground, water, gems, ore, etc. Effects which were attributed to the success of dowsing can now explained with orthodox science, specifically sensory cues, expectancy effects and probability.

According to the manufacturer of ADE 651 it works on nuclear quadrupole resonance (NQR) or nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) or electrostatic magnetic ion attraction (EMI). The only problem with these explanations is that none of them have been proven scientifically and they sound decidedly made up. If you have to come up with 3 sciency sounding names/reasons for how your product works, chances are it’s not at all scientific. Meanwhile, people (not just Americans, apparently civilians count as casualties too) got blown up because the US gov was equipping its soldiers with this faulty device to detect bombs.

Even though the method of dowsing has been debunked, lives were sacrificed in Iraq, and the US gov’s own guide to buying explosive detection devices warns against getting taken in by fake equipment, we spent $80 million dollars on the ADE 651. Thankfully the maker of the ADE 651, Jim McCormick, has been arrested by the UK authorities for fraud related to his “bomb detectors”, but this is still a disturbing example of incompetence.

Topics:

Politics

Breaking News: Milwaukee Politician Is Really Really Dumb

Larry Jankens — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 17:33:32 +0000

And we have reached a new low.

So my last post was a collection of media cuts that made Republicans look like idiot arse-nuggets. In the post I stated that I was sure that there were plenty of dummy Democrats but they were not as vocal as the stupid Republicans. Basically saying that both parties have a structural defects because they keep nominating complete dolts to run this country.

The following clip is of Milwaukee county supervisor, Democrat Peggy West stating that Arizona has no right to weigh in on the immigration debate with their recent controversial legislation because it doesn’t border Mexico. Another council person had to take time to point out that however Mrs. West feels about the legislation itself, AZ does in fact border Mexico.

There is a certain thing that stupid people do when they are talking about something that they have no idea about where they sound like they are making it up as they go along and in this clip West does just that. She sure is passionate about immigration, but she’s also a moron. Let’s watch!

http://www.breitbart.tv/county-supervisor-doesnt-know-arizona-borders-me...

Another side of the asinine partisan coin.

Topics:

Politics

Republicans Say the Darndest Things

Larry Jankens — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 20:06:17 +0000

I'm sure you could put clips of Dems saying stupid things together, but I don't think that it'd be this ridiculous. Some of the stuff these people say is astoundingly dumb.

My questions are as follows:

1) Are Reps just stupid or out of touch with reality?

2) Does pandering to the religious right really allow you carte blanche to be an idiot?

3) Which was the most blatant lie in the video?

4) Am I the only one who wants to put a power drill to my temple after watching this video?

Discuss among yourselves.

Topics:

Politics

Vote With Your Dollars, Or Stop Whining

Larry Jankens — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 18:58:31 +0000

I got to thinking the other day about the last time I voted. It was 2002 in west Mesa, AZ at a church with a bunch of really Mormon-looking people. The voting “booth” was a long table with a series of cardboard dividers set up past the eye line and it reminded me of my work cubicle and that it cost me an hours pay to come down and vote in a election that I could give two sh*ts about. Then I started I started doing the math about how valuable my vote was to the overall electoral process - if a million people voted my vote would be worth .000001%. And that ain’t worth a whole lot. There’s more than .000001% of mercury in your drinking water, but that small amount is deemed harmless, like your one vote to a politician.

My point is based upon this premise: If you acknowledge that U.S. politicians are beholden to the corporate overlords who fund their campaigns and not necessarily the people that vote, than the best way to effect political change is to wisely allocate your money to the proper corporate overlords, not voting. So why waste your time voting when you could be working to earn income to spend on the corporations who are the real architects of political change?

Granted, one could make a similar argument that your measly $27,000.00 a year is a drop in the bucket to the over all economy even less than .000001%, and that would be correct, but if you have to make/spend money to live anyway, you should do so with businesses that are not evil. For instance, if everyone agreed that BP having the worst safety record of any oil company and destroying the Gulf of Mexico is a bad thing and stopped buying BP oil, the company would disappear. We surely can’t count on politicians to hold them accountable (unless you consider having to listen to Senator Waxman as sufficient punishment, which, don’t get me wrong that’s pretty bad).

This will take more work on your part, in terms of researching companies and going out of your way to consume goods from good corporations, but I would argue that it is a better use of your time than voting and has a greater effect on the outcome of elections. Vote with your dollars and the corporations that are not evil assholes will thrive while the evil assholes themselves will parish in the free market.

This idea isn't new or original, you can read more about it by following these links:

Wiki-Guide:

Learn where your favorite companies allocate their funds (and web 2.0, no less):

Always quality, sometimes wacky, AdBusters:

Oldie, but a goodie:

Quick tips:

Topics:

Politics

Abolish Nuclear Abolition

Larry Jankens — Thu, 13 May 2010 17:14:02 +0000

My formative years were spent watching two hours of Simpson’s cartoons a day, an hour block from 6-7pm and a follow up block from 10-11pm. Consequently, most of my worldviews are based on Simpson’s episodes – hence I surmised that nuclear weapon abolition is stupid.

In the second Treehouse of Horror, Lisa uses the magical severed monkey hand to wish for world peace and all of earths weapons are destroyed bringing an unprecedented era of peace and prosperity for everyone. A good thing right? Nope. Kang and Kodos, everyone’s favorite human-hating aliens, attack earth and since humanity is defenseless, take over the world. Their plan is thwarted when Moe, everyone’s favorite alcoholic-enabler, chases them off with a stick with a nail through it.

Lesson learned? Even if you abolish all weapons we humans will find another way to mete out violence. That’s kind of how we roll.

I’m not an advocate of producing nuclear weapons and distributing them to everybody, but I have a logical objection to the idea that the world would be inherently better if nuclear weapons were abolished. Even if nobody had nuclear weapons, we would still be able to destroy the world with other parts of our arsenal, scorched earth, smart bombs, ICBMs, chemical warfare, “lasers” and other deadly innovations.

I want our country to have the best weapons in the world, including nukes. Not because I want to use them, but because I’d rather us have them than the Chinese, or the French, or the English. A world without nukes is a nice pipe dream, but it is nonetheless a pipe dream that is quickly quashed when someone invents a new pipe bomb that can take out a few city blocks.

Instead of abolishing nuclear weapons we would be better served by focusing on solving problems that threaten actual peace: Israel and Palestine, imperial foreign policy, world cup soccer, etc.

Topics:

Politics

The Market is Like Gambling, And That's a Good Thing

Larry Jankens — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 15:28:52 +0000

The Goldman Sachs Senate Hearings turned out to be crappy, sh*tty, one might say, over and over again while giggling inside that you just said sh*tty on C-SPAN. If you are going to curse at least throw a f*ck in there. It’s the difference between campy PG-13 horror movies and gory R horror movies. If you are going to go for it, go for it. Had Senators truly wanted to prove their points they could have asked better questions, not just do a sh*tty rendition of a high school principal chewing out unruly students.

If you'd been playing a drinking game and taken a shot every time Senator Jon Tester, Republican, Arizona asked what exactly “is” a CDO by the end of his squiggly line of questioning you would have had liver poisoning. If I were a gambler, I’d bet that either he has a learning disability or his staff couldn’t muster the brain power to learn about CDO and relay it to the Senator. At one point he equated Goldman Sachs investments to gambling. Well, duh.

Of course it’s gambling you idiot! Just like gambling, a free market is built on risks and rewards, that’s what keeps it going. It’s not the fun type of gambling like in Vegas, but if you know the right stuff and right people, your win a lot of money, and that is pretty entertaining. I’m not saying its always fair or that it’s always right, but there is no denying that because it involves calculated risk based upon possible yield it's by definition gambling.

I’m sure Goldman Sachs does some shady stuff to make a lot of money, I can tell because they make a lot of money. If the government really wanted to stop Wall Street from destroying our economy or prevent Wall Street from doing it again, they would have done it or be doing it right now. Holding a hearing and pussyfooting around the real issue of restructuring the financial sector to reward prudent risk and not wild speculation doesn’t solve anything.

And for Senator Tester and his staff, a CDO is a bundle of loans bought and sold between financial institutions.

Topics:

Politics

A Pro-Equality Letter to Rachael, Who is Not an Idiot

Larry Jankens — Sun, 25 Apr 2010 08:32:53 +0000

So I was bopping around Facebook when I saw that someone wrote a post supporting gay marriage. I added my two cents by posting a link to a dagblog I wrote about the issue. A woman by the name of Rachael took exception to the post and posted a comment back. In turn, I took exception to her taking exception and this prompted her to write a direct response to my blog on her blog. The following is my response to her response. You can check out her response here.

Dear Rachael,

Aren’t epistle styled debates fun?

Unfortunately, I think you are confusing my jocular tone for one of disdain and malice. You shouldn’t take the internet so personally. The problem I had with your initial response was that you wanted to write off my reasoning simply because I used a few naughty words and joked around and I assumed that was because you couldn't understand the arguments I put forth and didn't have compassion for the gays. I am delighted and appreciative that you have taken the time to craft a well thought out response. I love challenging my own opinion by exposing myself to arguments against it. And while I may not agree with you, I like hearing the other side of an argument.

You state the the “…the burden of responsibility lies with you to craft an argument that is both [sic. you go on to list three things, not two as connoted by “both”] intelligent, comprehensible, and most importantly, respectful enough to engage the readers…” I understand you get distracted by harsh vernacular and humor, but you implying that my arguments were both unintelligent and incomprehensible just because they were not delivered in an Oxford style debate is intellectually dishonest. Further, my main goal was not to win the hearts and minds of the opposition of the debate, but rather to take three common arguments against LGBT equality and show how ridiculous and self centered they are. Whether or not those who hold those opinions are won over to my side is ancillary to my overall purpose. If I were to craft an argument to try to bring the opposition around to my side I wouldn’t have called them idiots in the title, included a picture of 3 deer humping, or used the term “Sanctimonious F*ck Hole.”

That being said, I am honored that you have decided to get off your high horse and talk to a lowly person like me despite your reservations. I’ll try to keep what you call “cheap shots” to a minimum. I won’t call Lassie a lesbian or envision your reply given to me by someone who speaks in a southern twang and has a myopic world view. I’ll be as straight forward as I can, allowing for humorous tangents of course. In interest of readability, I have organized my responses regarding the three arguments I make and your attempt to refute.

Tab A Slot B Argument

You erroneously state that I “…equated and justified a homosexual lifestyle to impulsive behaviors of animals.” You misunderstand the point of my point and extrapolate it improperly. My point is that the argument put forth by anti-equality advocates that males and females having the sex is the only natural course of action in nature is misinformed and inaccurate. It happens in nature all the time and is therefore natural, your moral misgivings about animal homos notwithstanding.

You then say that despite homosexuality happening in nature it does not make it “…suited to be duplicated in my own life.” I agree that not all things that happen in nature are suitable for humans. It’s why I defecate indoors and am not afraid of the vacuum cleaner, but your opinion of superiority for having a heterosexual “mamonogamous” [sic.] relationship is just that, your opinion, and you have a right to it, but not to adversely harm gay people, which is what opposing gay marriage does.

For some reason you go on to imply that I demonize people of your inclination. Chide? Yes. Poke fun of? Sure. But don’t take it so personally that I jest while making a point of reason. Also, there are plenty of folks, unlike you, who are a bit more sinister and uncompassionate (violent even) towards gays and those folks are horrible people who should be called out on as being horrible (shout out to Matthew Shepard, R.I.P.).

The Bible Says So!

You start by saying, “…you have again asserted that the faith based bunch supports or approves of the Inquisition.” I don’t know where else I refer to the Inquisition that would have you say “again,” but that’s besides the point: it was a joke and hyperbole. Of course I don’t literally think that you and your ilk want to ensure papal supremacy by expelling the Jews, repressing Moriscos and Protestants, and censor those who disagree with the Catholic church. I was drawing a parallel between those who participated in the Inquisition and anti-LGBTers in the sense that both groups are over stepping their bounds by imposing their paradigm on others. It is a common thing done in literature, you take two things that though dissimilar in many aspects, have parallels and compare them to one another.

I’m not going to get into the country being founded upon Christian values (Christian should be capitalized btw, it’s disrespectful to Christians not to refer to their religion as a proper, noun as you do). If the founding fathers wanted to keep this country Christian they would have written it into the Constitution. It is the principles of fairness and logic that allows pro-equality folks to speak their minds, not Christianity. As for citing your faith as what gives you the ability to tolerate homos and “…grace to stop living that life [homosexuality] if they choose.” I don’t see that as very graceful. Nor is it graceful to say that at least the US doesn’t kill gays like the Islamic countries do. Whoopity freakin’ do – the real grace would be letting other people live their lives how they choose and not sticking your nose in it.

You state, “I oppose gay marriage because it conflicts with my understanding of marriage. This issue, like many others, cannot be reconciled with the principles of my faith.” This goes to the heart of my argument: You don’t have to understand why two gay people want to get married, it is none of your business. You don’t have to reconcile it with your faith, it has nothing to do with your faith. Your faith is yours and you should be able to worship how you choose, just as others should be able to worship how they choose. It’s okay that you think homosexuality is not the best choice for you. I agree, it’s not the best choice for me either, but what is not a choice is following the ideal that everyone in this country should be treated equal in the eyes of the law, hence, gays should be able to marry just like non-gays.

It Will Threaten the Sanctity of Marriage

You inappropriately assume, “…your [my] article suggests again that heterosexual couples are predestined to destroy the sanctity of marriage all by themselves, exempting the homosexuals from any relational [sic.] failures.” No, Rachel, just no. I’m suggesting that the idea of treating marriage as a sacred institution solely built upon religion is categorically incorrect. Marriage has religious components to it if you are religious, but regardless of whether or not you are religious there are legal aspects to it that gays are being denied, for what I see as no good reason.

If you are indeed “…equally saddened by those who enter into a marriage covenant and debase it by not honoring that covenant,” as you claim, you should fight to make that illegal. Since you want to keep gay marriage illegal because it debases the marriage covenant – why not cheating on your spouse, or divorce?

Rach, can I call you Rach? Well, I just did. Rach, I’m not saying you hate gay people or wish them ill will. I’m saying that you are unacceptably forcing your religious beliefs on the legal system. One of the the things that this country was founded on is that the government shouldn’t use religion to determine the legality of something. It’s why they wrote the Bill of Rights, so that the Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.

Rach, clearly you are not an idiot, but the ideas that homosexuality is not natural and therefore bad, that your faith takes precedence over others' legal rights, and that marriage is inherently a sacred institution to everyone religious or not, are idiotic.

Respectfully yours,

Larry Jankens.

P.S. Here is a picture of a gay pig.

Topics:

Personal

Let's Go Out to the Movies: Movie Trailer Reviews: VIDEOS

Larry Jankens — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 14:52:23 +0000

If you are like me you have been fooled by movie trailers too many times. I’ll see a movie trailer and think to myself, “Hey that kinda seems cool, I’ll go see that in theaters,” and then go to the theaters and be severely disappointed. Or I’ll see a movie trailer and think to myself “Hey that seems like a flaming piece of crap that I will never waste my time on,” and then I’ll see the movie and it will actually be good. The problem is when you condense a feature length film into two or so minutes, it is easy to make it look great or horrible without actually revealing whether or not the movie is in fact great or horrible. So to be safe I only watch pirated movies on the internet. That way save my money to spend on important things like video games that have cool trailers. Since I won’t see any of these movies I’ll instead review their trailers, and give a grade on both the trailer and the movie. You can watch the movie and let me know how close I am. Trailer #1: The Other Guys, Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg Trailer Grade: C This trailer starts off pretty cool, Samuel L. Jackson and The Rock driving through NYC catching bad guys and quipping it up, but it gets a little boring at the 58 second mark when the trailer turns to what the movie will focus on: a buddy cop movie with Ferrell and Wahlberg. The apparent twist in this movie is that both of these cops who are also buddies a kind of douchy. What I found most humorous was when they make fun of Hollywood movie cliché explosions and then go on to include a several Hollywood cliché action stuff. Movie Grade Prediction: D Ferrell has a lot of street cred with some of his hits that were genuinely good (Talladega, Stranger Than Fiction, Anchorman, and all the Funny or Die stuff), but has recently fallen off (Step Bros., Curious George, Land of the Lost, Bewitched), so it is hard to get a bead on whether Ferrell running around with his shirt off (you know it’s going to happen) will be funny enough to save the movie. This may be one of the many examples of a movie trailer having all the cool stuff that movie has and thereby making the movie impotent and lame. Trailer #2: Human Centipede, Freaky German Guy Trailer Grade: B Let me start by saying I have a fear of Germans. Whether it is there Nazi past or their weird porno, I don’t like them and don’t trust them. I’m not racist, but I… Okay, maybe I am racist against Germans, but that is beside the point. From what I can tell, this movie is about a German surgeon who has a dream of making a human centipede by connecting 3 people face to ass – that’s right. Remember when you’re parents told you you could grow up to do anything you wanted, I think this is an exception. I mean really, WTF? That being said, the trailer is scary, Germans and sadistic experimental surgery. Movie Grade Prediction: F- First, why does this guy want to connect people ass to mouth – oh right he’s German. Second, I’m no MD, but I’m pretty sure this is impossible and therefore stupid. Third, this movie does a disservice to German people everywhere. How am I supposed to get over my irrational fear of German people when I watch a movie about Dr. Mengele’s son? Trailer #3: Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, Michael Cera Trailer Grade: D It is way to short of a trailer to get a real feel for the movie and the beginning is a bit slow a mushy, but the rest of the trailer is promising. Michael Cera (of Arrested Development fame) doing what he does best: be an awkward teenaged boy, except in this movie he is fighting comic book villains. Based on the cult comic book classic of the same name, this movie combines aesthetics of comic books and awkward teenage love. It is hard to tell from the trailer if this is cool or lame. However, the fact that Ann (Her? Yes her, Michael Cera’s longtime girlfriend from Arrested Development) makes an appearance is a positive. Oh, and Cera’s love interest: Pick a hair color and stick with it. Movie Grade Prediction: C The only reason I’m giving this movie a C (as opposed to a D or F which I was originally going to give it) is because the guy who directed Shawn of the Dead and Hot Fuzz (two of my all time favorite movies) is in charge of this movie. That being said, this could be a real stinker, especially because Michael Cera awkwardly adorable routine is starting get a little lame.

Topics:

Media

Facebook Rejection Letter: Why Click "Ignore" When You Can Tell Them How You Really Feel?

Larry Jankens — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 15:49:23 +0000

This is an email I’m planning to send to this guy who we will call “Phil” who sent me a friendship request on Facebook. If you have any suggestions on a better way to word my displeasure, do share - you’ll have to trust me that this guy deserves to be talked to like this.

Dear Phil,

I feel obligated to respond to your friendship request on Facebook so I can be more explicit and clear in my rejection than clicking the ignore button allows me to be. I hope this letter finds you more educated then when I last saw you, because if you have not improved upon your mental faculties from our last encounter or more likely, if you have lost brain function due to various poor decisions resulting in head trauma, I fear you will not fully grasp what it is I want to tell you.

First, I can tell from your status picture, your mother was quite wrong when she told you it was a phase and you’d grow out of it. Adulthood has only enhanced your cagey looks making you appear to be a deranged pedophile. I’ll give you credit for the truth in advertising, but you really should change your picture to something more flattering, perhaps with less light, maybe even no light. It’s hard to pick your best side unless you’re out of full view.

I’m not quite sure what I did to indicate that we should become Facebook friends. I don’t want to be friends with you in real life, having a digital version of a friendship with you is even less appealing. Granted, I, unlike the women we worked with three summers ago at the steakhouse, didn’t recoil in disgust every time you said something to me, but that doesn’t mean that I want to know your woeful status updates or see pictures of you looking like you are trying to lure cub scouts into your basement to give them merit badges in hugging pantless and ignoring shame.

Perhaps I miss read your friend request. Did you mean it as a sarcastic friend request? Like a cruel joke? If I didn’t want to brush my brain clean with a Sham-Wow every time I think of our brief experiences together, I would appreciate the ironic gesture.

If you have been able to process anything thus far through that mung bean sized brain of yours, please understand this: You are a repugnant egomaniac who is too stupid to realize that no one ever liked him. Why don’t you start a facebook fan page for that? You’d meet other repugnant egomaniacs and not have to bother people like me who aren’t fans of repugnant egomaniacs. That one’s for free, you can take this idea and run with it. I know you have hard time coming up with things like ideas, or money you owe people, or common decency.

I chose not take the time to list some of the many horrible and despicable things you have done because you should know. And if you don’t, I don’t see much use in telling them to you. It is that ignorant state of mind that has gotten you to where you are in life. Ever wonder why no one ever calls you? Everyone hates you! Ever wonder why employers seem to hate you? You’re an awful employee and they do hate you! Ever wonder why you are so poor? Because you deserve to be! Ever wonder why even your family doesn’t like you? The answer is in the mirror!

In summary, I’m denying your friend request. In fact, I’m now lobbying Facebook to put an “enemy request” feature so that I can become your clear enemy, showing everyone else that I’m in opposition to you and whatever the hell it is you’re doing with yourself that I don’t give a mouse’s fart about enough to accept your friendship request to find out. I clicked the ignore button not just because I want to ignore you, but because there wasn’t a “drop into a pit of hungry tigers” button. I ask you to never ever contact me in anyway shape or form unless you want to apologize monetarily, but since we both know that you are doomed to failure in everything that’s not going to happen so what’s the point?

Very truly,

Larry Jankens

P.S. You are a goatse.

Topics:

Humor & Satire

What ChatRoulette Says About the Internet, And D*ck Jokes

Larry Jankens — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 15:27:01 +0000

When the internet was invented by Al Gore’s uncle I wonder if Unky Gore realized that while it would revolutionize the digital world it would also become a freak show. And not just the traveling kind with a bearded fat lady, dog boy, and some guy with way too many weird tattoos, but the holy shit I can’t believe how depraved and psychotic people are freak show. Need I remind you of two girls, one cup? I’ve never actually seen the two girls or the one cup in question, but I had it described to me in vivid fashion and I think that’s enough.

Like every technology, the internet is a double edged sword, both useful and scornful. A good example of this is the relatively recent phenomenon of Chat Roulette. In case you’ve been living under a digital rock, Chat Roulette is a blah blah blah – if you don’t know by now, figure it out. As everyone has discovered by now, the site is full of men being perverts, not surprising seeing as most of the internet is dedicated to men’s perversions. How surprised should you really be?

Who are these guys? Who is sitting around Saturday night and thinking to themselves: You know I could really go for exposing myself to stranger tonight. It’s be a real hoot to wave my shlong at an unsuspecting victim.

Maybe I’m old fashioned, but I like to get to know a person before I flash my stash. I don’t have to know them that well mind you, just well enough to know that my junk is a welcomed attendee to the party. I don’t need a written RSVP, but… you get the point. Enough about my views on proper penis viewing – I could go on and on.

Below are some fun, dick-less (at least in reference to anatomy), videos from Chat Roulette. I applaud the creators of Chat Roulette for giving the internet a new venue for finding out what freaks everybody is – now that’s entertainment!

Freestyle Piano: This dude has some serious skills “Mutha-F*cking 3!”

Daily Show: Hilarious send up with news guest spots

Na’vi vs. Chat Roulette.

A short documentary - a minimentary if you will

Topics:

Humor & Satire