WTF moment of the day

Gitmo Admiral: Detainees pretty much live in a fraternity house

Detainees released from the prison at Guantanamo Bay have complained about inhumane conditions there, but according to the admiral in charge, their living situation is "pretty much" like that in a fraternity house.

Rear Admiral Mark Buzby, who is completing a one-year assignment as the commander of the Joint Task Force Guantanamo recently held a conference call with defense bloggers to discuss the treatment of detainees.

Except that there are no keggers and the hazing violates the Geneva Convention, other than those small differences.... I wasn't in a fraternity, so I might be wrong.
Of course this begs the question: Just what fraternity was Admiral Buzby in?

You've seen the news

Credit: Office of Senator Edward M. Kennedy

I'm not a praying person, but any of you who are, please say a few for Ted Kennedy.

I met Kennedy when I was four or five. I had gone to Washington for exams and surgery at Walter Reed. My dad was in the Air Force and had died when I was four and I got that good old government funded health care via survivor benefits.

Anyway, in one of my outings with my mother, we went to the Capitol. I was in a wheelchair. I guess we were in the rotunda, and Teddy came walking through. He saw yours truly, a pitiable little kid in a wheel chair, and came over to say hello. I knew he was somebody famous; I may have thought he was JFK. He spoke with my mother, then whisked me away to ride the senators' private elevator and go onto the floor of the senate. That's all.

He's done a lot for this country, but I remember him because he was good to me as a little kid and I wish him well.

Words of wisdom from the good Joe

Biden tells it like it is. (and is surprisingly concise)

Biden calls Bush comments 'bulls**t'

From CNN Congressional Producer Ted Barrett
Biden had some strong words for the president.


(CNN) — The chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Joe Biden, D-Delaware, called President Bush’s comments accusing Sen. Barack Obama and other Democrats of wanting to appease terrorists "bulls**t” and said if the president disagrees so strongly with the idea of talking to Iran then he needs to fire his secretaries of State and Defense, both of whom Biden said have pushed to sit down with the Iranians.

“This is bullshit. This is malarkey. This is outrageous. Outrageous for the president of the United States to go to a foreign country, sit in the Knesset…and make this kind of ridiculous statement,” Biden said angrily in a brief interview just off the Senate floor.

“He’s the guy who’s weakened us. He’s the guy that’s increased the number of terrorists in the world. His policies have produced this vulnerability the United States has. His intelligence community pointed that out not me. The NIE has pointed that out and what are you talking about, is he going to fire Condi Rice? Condi Rice has talked about the need to sit down. So his first two appeasers are Rice and Gates. I hope he comes home and does something.”

He quoted Gates saying Wednesday that we “need to figure out a way to develop some leverage and then sit down and talk with them.”

Put this out there.

Will he stop at nothing?

Barack Obama is shown here pandering to the pushmi-pullyu constituency.

REUTERS/Jason Reed

(I am not Dr. Dolittle and I approved this message.)

Metaphor alert

REUTERS/John Gress

The brown competitor wins. The female second-place competitor has to be put down after the race. Will Dr. Dean do the honors?

Some like it NOT

(AP Photo/Pat Sullivan)
(HT to Tengrain for this inspiring pic.)

Auditions have been closed for the remake of "Some Like it Hot".

The casting director has found two actors who are even less convincing as women than Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon.

Whoa!

I'm thinking this may signal the beginning of the end times. I thought the only thing green about the Rockefellers was their piles of cash. From Forbes:

Even though Exxon Mobil is posting record profits, some shareholders aren't happy. A group of them said Wednesday the company is overlooking its effect on the environment and the future of alternative energy. But these aren't just any shareholders. They're Rockefellers, the first family of American oil.

They proposed four shareholder resolutions Wednesday to be voted on at Exxon Mobil's (nyse: XOM - news - people ) annual meeting May 28. The family is calling for the company to reduce greenhouse gases from operations and products, to establish a task force to study the effects of global warming and to adopt of a renewable energy policy.

Note: The Time cover is from 1974!!! Average gas price 52.3 cents/gallon!

100 years

A hundred years? Take a few moments to see MoveOn.org's latest ad.

A visit to the dentist

REUTERS/Romeo Ranoco

Well, Mrs. Cheney, I could replace the filling, but I can't guarantee that you'll stop receiving NPR.

Sir!

(AFP/HO)

"Right here, sir, it says 11:00 AM: Volvo oil change and lattes."

"You idiot, that's the liberal agenda."

Today in history

Celebrate!
I was born a few years ago on this very date. I share my birthday with Barbara Streisand and Shirley MacLain (current incarnation). Heck, I'd even share my birthday cake with them.

Other notable events
April 24: Great Thursday in Eastern Christianity (2008); Republic Day in the Gambia; Genocide Remembrance Day in Armenia.

* 1800 – The Library of Congress, today the de facto national library of the United States, was established as part of an act of Congress providing for the transfer of the nation's capital from Philadelphia to Washington, D.C.
* 1877 – Russia declared war on the Ottoman Empire, starting the Russo-Turkish War.
* 1915 – The Armenian Genocide in the Ottoman Empire began with the arrest and deportation of hundreds of prominent Armenians in Constantinople.
* 1916 – Irish republicans led by teacher and political activist Patrick Pearse began the Easter Rising, a rebellion against British rule in Ireland, and proclaimed the Irish Republic an independent state.
* 1967 – The Soviet spacecraft Soyuz 1 crashed in Siberia during its return to Earth, killing cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov, the first in-flight fatality in the history of spaceflight.
* 1990 – The Hubble Space Telescope was launched by the Space Shuttle Discovery in mission STS-31

Flags as graphs

European Union
Check out this link for more countries.

I first saw this over at the ever vigilant Leisure Guy's blog.

He always finds an amazing array of interesting stuff.

Whaaatttt?

REUTERS/Tim Shaffer

"You want me to smile? I'm already in debt and I have doody in my diaper. Only Vitter smiles for that."

What is this?

(Mike Segar/Reuters)

World's creepiest roller coaster

Feel free to add your own caption.

I love this song

Where is the future --Mudhoney


And this video is a great companion to it.

I saw Mudhoney back in April at a club in Hoboken. They're great.