The Campbell Report

The Route (Yeah, it's a commercial)

A Rare Parrot

Gary Busey: More Hobbit Talk

Harrison Ford

Filibuster

One reason of hundreds to love Craig Ferguson

Linkstorm: The Message

Salman Rushdie decries self-censorship over Islam in the West. We can put as many drones in the air, agents in the airport, and monitors on the Internet as we want, but if we censor ourselves, terrorism wins.

That's how these assholes operate after all. Case in point: Greece's new Golden Dawn Party. In less than a year, a tiny fraction of the population have managed to frighten both the country's minorities and majorities.They know they only have to be loud and dangerous enough to scare the average person out of speaking up. Then, without a word of protest, they can assume silence is consent, declare a mandate from the populace, and continue on their merry way with a dogma that dehumanizes whoever they don't like this week.

The way to combat it is obvious; oppose them. Don't let them silence anyone in the name of "respect" or "tradition" or "security." Proclaim from every street corner that any totem of authority threatened by free speech is a graven image. Tell them, in the words of Warren Ellis, "Your God Is Not Strong."

Because these aren't strong people. They aren't any more dangerous than monkeys picking up handguns. Look at the case of Ajmal Amir Qasab, the last surviving member of the Mumbai Attacks of 2008 who was just hanged last month. He spent his last few days pleading for clemency and begging for lawyers to find him a way out of his fate. While there are hardened badasses with deep ideological roots in organizations like Al Qaeda, ultimately, their ranks are filled with far more people like Qasab, who only have the courage enough to pick up a gun and shoot it at innocents, only enough vision to think that will change something, and only enough compassion to request immunity from the consequences of their actions.

Real article begins below the cut:

This Scene Had to Have Happened

Geeks and Sports

The craziness that is the conversation about the ability of athletes to speak their minds is still ongoing.

What's weird is that, after watching a few episodes of The I.T. Crowd, I realized what a fucked up status symbol it is for nerds not to like sports and sports fandom. T. Campbell was ahead of the crowd by about a decade when he termed what was then the narrow sub-culture of science fiction and fantasy "fandom." Now, we refer to "geek chic" when we talk about people who love everything from Cougar Town to Twilight, and man, neither of those two things are geek as I understand them. Hell, check out this Comic Critics from a few days ago. Same fucking thing, but from a different angle. Yes, I know that sports, as an interest, is more mainstream than comics or sci-fi and that there are a lot of loud, obnoxious idiots who like sports and can't wrap their heads around why anyone would not love it, but fuck, that sentence is also an exact description of people who like Star Wars so fucking much they reciprocate those feelings towards sports fans.

Linkstorm: Hacks

Writer and comedian Robert Newman applies arguments against providing a welfare state for hypothetically amoral, self-interested recipients to demonstrably amoral and self-interested corporations. (Link)

Stacey Campfield, state senator from Tennessee says some things that all-but-require the "This is what many conservatives actually believe" subtitles at the bottom of the screen.

Bradley Manning is a quarter of the way into his third year of incarceration for allegedly leaking sensitive cables from the US government. His treatment is way, way below board and certainly uncalled for, considering he's being held by the self-proclaimed world leader of democracy, fair trials, individual initiative, and compassionate, Christian attitudes. Considering that his guilt is taken as common knowledge (Aside: He did it.), it's astounding that our government isn't even competent enough to put together a decent case and take him to trial.

Blog in 4000 Words: Rickmanned

From here.

Question and Rant: Here and Back Again

I sound smart when I speak to people, a skill I honed in lieu of any other skills. I did this primarily because I like the sound of my own voice, which is a pity because I'll never have an audience inside of my own head to appreciate the light, yet solid qualities my skull lends it. Despite sounding a bit like a stereotypical mentally challenged person, my sounding-smart skills encourage people who barely know me to ask me about my thoughts on current events. People who really know me skip this in favor of letting me daydream about Magic, comic books, or emo guys, mostly because they know I'll be thinking about those things anyway and don't want to put me to the trouble of pretending that I'm listening to them.

Now because I've had the money to stay away from strangers for the past few years, this hasn't really been something that's happened much. However, if I did still have to meet new people and interact with them, I'm sure these are the questions I'd imagine them asking me while they said boring things.

What do you think about this secret service prostitute thing?

Secret service agents fucking prostitutes in South America is no more connected to Obama than Abu Ghraib is to Rumsfeld.

The Avengers, Part One

The Avengers is fucking awesome. You know it. I know it. A few million people know it.

Mainly because of stuff like this.
Image taken from here.

Spoilers below:

Sunday Morning Soapbox: Does This Mean I Have To Stop Quoting Team America Now?