NewsLink Briefs

*

*

*

The White House is floating a new climate proposal these days. And No I am not trying to be funny. There was a cool film made a few years ago that showed some results of global warming. Much of the East Coast was under water and stuff was floating away.

Can the White House float in such an environment? I don’t know. But I’m sure there are a lot of politicians who can float really well. They will float out to sea.

Or maybe the sea will even come to them. Then they can float to Albany, New York or Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Whatever floats their boats! Teddy might want to consider taking a plane however.

He has not floated well in the past.

In any case the White House proposed some things and some Republicans got mad and accused it of “appeasement”. And then the White House broke and ran.

Continue Reading »

Previous in series

Popularity: 22% [?]

1 Comment »

*

ASTRONAUTS ATTACH ARMS OF HELPER ROBOT From Wire Reports 3/17/08

*

As some of you may know the space shuttle went back into space recently and one of its prime goals is to work on Dextre the one hundred foot tall robot who is standing on top of the space station at this moment and waving to us all. If you go outside tonight with your child’s telescope and point it towards the space station you will see Dextre waving and you can wave back at him.

He will enjoy that. He has been lonely up there.

But at least he can wave and do other things now since two astronauts attached a fifty foot arm to his body yesterday preparing Dextre for his new job as handyman in outer space.

Here are some of Dextre’s new duties as outlined by NASA in an official news release:

1/ Dextre shall wave at earth’s citizens when they wave at him and be a good ambassador in space.

2/ Dextre shall wave at other passing spacecraft including UFO’s from distant galaxies. However if one of the unknown variety should get within one hundred feet of the space station he will take a swing at it and hopefully expose the strange looking beings inside to the harsh environment of outer space. Hahaha. Let’s see how they like some of them apples.

3/ Dextre shall fix things that fall off the space station. First he will grab them when they fall off and then he will reattach them using his robot skills learned from watching Bill Gates here on earth.

4/ Dextre shall welcome all astronauts who approach the space station in the space shuttle. He will call out their names and help them dock in a safe and timely manner. However, if any of them start to act crazy and want to take the space shuttle to Texas while they are wearing diapers he will restrain them until they can be arrested and taken back to Florida for a speedy trial.

5/ Dextre will under no circumstances ever be allowed to watch 2001: A Space Odyssey.

6/ If the space station ever starts rapidly going around in circles so that Dextre is flung off into outer space every attempt will be made to find him and return him to his new home. Under no circumstances will robot jokes ever be made while he is listening or after he has been flung off into outer space.

7/ Dextre has been designed to lug around the big replacement parts that now require an astronaut to do some heavy lifting. Under no circumstances will Dextre be used for things that are not part of his job description. Specifically at no time will Dextre be allowed to clean the windows on the space shuttle or take out the trash.

8/ And finally if any space station resident should notice Dextre looking in the window at him/her and smiling please refrain from shouting or acting surprised. It’s lonely in outer space as Elton John has been telling us for decades. Don’t hurt Dextre’s feelings. Treat him well and he will treat you well.

Frankly, we don’t even want to think about the alternative.

Popularity: 28% [?]

No Comments »

*

*

“We will follow the rules” Howard said “And we will hope the rules allow themselves to be changed“. I have missed Howard Dean. There was a moment last summer when I was doing some woodworking and accidentally hit my finger with a hammer. I thought of him in that moment as all of the birds in the neighborhood suddenly flew out of their trees.

Who was it that said “Rules are made to be broken?” Was it Howard Dean? Probably not. But it seems clear from this statement that Howard is planning on breaking (or changing as he puts it) some of them. I am not sure exactly what he is talking about but it seems to me that letting politicians change election results that they do not like is not such a great idea.

I hope they are not planning to go there.

In other news a Florida mother was charged with hosing her daughter. Mom was arrested after authorities watched a videotape allegedly showing her spraying her 2 year old daughter with a high pressure water hose at a Florida car wash.

Her lawyer stated that they plan to use the Tripp Isenhour defense. “At no time did she ever believe she would hit the child with spray from the hose when she aimed it at her. “

Mom noted “The chances of hitting her with spray were a million to one. Anybody who thinks differently doesn’t know car washes.”

She told authorities that she didn’t use the high pressure feature on the hose. And you can’t tell from the video. All you can see is the child suddenly exiting the car wash and flying down the street into a local auto dealership. Fortunately she was not hurt. She landed in the back seat of a Cadillac convertible. A nurse reports no visible injuries 11 days after the incident.

What about mental stress? Can she sue Mom? I hear she is going around saying “Git ma Johnny Cochrun”.

We are all glad she is doing well and thinking about her future.

Astronauts are returning to space (hopefully) this week and they are planning to assemble a “monstrous” two armed robot that will rise like Frankenstein from its transport bed.

I didn’t make that last part up. Maybe somebody at NASA made it up. But let’s be clear about this. It’s a male robot. It has lots of plugs in its electronic parts and not so many receptacles.

There has been a lot of talk this past week about “monsters” and a certain presidential candidate. But there is no way we are going to send said candidate to outer space. At least not yet. Politicians have gone up there before. John Glenn. That Nelson guy. But Hillary is not blasting off this week. She has too much to do down here. There are rules that need to want to change themselves. And somebody has to make them want to do it.

The robot’s name by the way is Dextre. And that’s short for Dexedrine. Because Dextre never wants to sit down and shut up. He never gets tired. And someday all his plugs and receptacles are going to come together.

And he is going to fry himself.

But for now he is just going to be a pain in the ass in outer space. Hopefully they haven’t programmed him to talk too much. And please don’t ever show him 2001: A Space Odyssey .

And finally a jury awarded a man 1.3 million dollars saying L.A. deputies used excessive force when they tried to stop his car. Winston Hayes, 46, suffered 9 bullet wounds when deputies fired 120 shots at him at the end of a low speed pursuit.

“Justice was done” said Mr. Hayes after hearing the verdict.

Let’s see. Mr. Hayes was hit nine times. And his car was hit 66 times. So that means that 45 bullets went somewhere else? And he was driving on a public street?

How many more trials are there going to be as a result of this incident? Call J.C. Oh wait. I keep forgetting Johnny is no longer with us.

Call somebody! This thing is not over yet.

And that’s it for today’s News Briefs. Don’t miss a minute of your hard hitting and loose fitting News Briefs. Grab a RSS feed and remember to keep your eyes open when you are driving down the street.

Or in a car wash. Or when you are playing golf.

Pretty much everywhere.

Popularity: 31% [?]

No Comments »

The judge in the corruption trial of a certain person says that the names of the jurors will be kept secret. Opening statements are set to begin in the trial of someone today. And we won’t say his or her name here because in the past this person was associated with someone else who is now running for high office. The judge did leave the door open to releasing some information later.

She noted that information about the assassination of JFK was due to be released fifty years after his death or in just a few years. So she felt we should all be patient and realize that before we all know it the information will be in our cold, dead hands.

The 52 year old defendant who is accused of shaking down companies with money to invest and perhaps (although this is highly unlikely) letting the money sit somewhere near someone who might have picked it up on his or her way to a campaign meeting.

He denies wrongdoing.

A former navy sailor was convicted of “leaking” (haha) details about ship movements to suspected terrorist supporters. Jurors convicted Hassan AbuJihaad, 32, of Phoenix of providing material support to terrorists and disclosing classified national defense information. The convicted sailor faces 25 years in federal prison for (among other things) passing along a drawing of his battle group’s formation and other data before it passed through the dangerous Strait of Hormuz in the Persian Gulf on April 29, 2001.

Mr. Jihaad stated in his defense motion that he was only making an April Fools joke and thought these were acceptable up to and including the last day of April. He also stated that he thought everyone would know it was a joke because, after all, his name was Mr. Jihaad! What fool with a name like that would actually try to sneak something important to his terrorist buds?

And even if he was that stupid wasn’t it clear that he was sorry and would not do it again if they just let him go back to Pakistan and take care of his elderly mother and five wives?

And finally the state of New York fined the personal corporation of Democratic Senate candidate Al Franken $25,000 for not carrying workers’ compensation insurance for almost three years. It was noted that they had sent him notices about this problem but he had apparently not received them.

But now he is aware of the problem and hopes to pay the fine once he is able to contact someone who is on trial somewhere near the Great Lakes.

Anything more that we might say about this could be construed as a political statement. And we don’t want to go there. This is The News. These are News Briefs. And BTW we would like to apologize for suggesting the inner cities of America be razed and parks established in their place. Our wife has reminded us that we have close relatives who live in the center of Boston, Buffalo and Miami. None of them want to move. None of them want to go live in a house boat.

None of them particularly like to fish and they prefer to eat steak. They especially like Filet Mignon once it has traveled through a meat grinder.

So we are very sorry about our suggestions although we think that bringing Pol Pot into the discussion is unfair and underhanded. Maybe the inner cities can be rehabilitated in another way and all the wonderful folks who live there can stay close to home.

Aren’t there rivers running through most cities? Isn’t that why a city is built in the first place? A nice river is found and everyone wants to live near it? So why not put all the house boats in the river that runs through the inner city? And once everyone has moved on to the river the old tenements and slumlord dwellings can be used for some other purpose.

Maybe suburban dwellers can be convinced to buy them up and rehab them by the millions? A moratorium on building new homes could go into effect until all the inner city dwellings are fixed up! The new President could share the news in his weekly radio address!

What a great idea! No flame throwers! No parks! Just new paint and furniture too! But who would live there after they are all fixed up? I don’t know! We will have to figure that out. Let us know what you think!

We can’t be expected to come up with all the answers in just one News Brief. So grab your RSS and return for more solutions to pressing problems SOON!

Popularity: 42% [?]

No Comments »