Funk Babblings

This seems to be all over the blogs in the last couple days, but it deserves to be everywhere....

Saturday night was the annual White House Correspondents' Dinner, in which the White House press have dinner with government officials from the President on down. The press reports afterward seem to have focused on Bush's comedy routine with a Bush lookalike, but the real highlight was the final speaker, Stephen Colbert. In his I-support-the-president persona, mercilessly skewered most of his audience, including Bush (sitting ten feet away), the Washington press corps in front of him, and some other government attendees such as John McCain. The audience reaction was somewhat muted, both because much of the audience was targeted and because they were amazed he had the guts to say what he did directly to his targets. As I watched it I was certainly amazed that he was saying these things to this audience.

C-Span has RealVideo of the whole event; Bush's routine is about 53 minutes into it, and Colbert's follows at about an hour and six minutes into it.

There are a few different sources of just the Colbert speech. Here's one: part 1 / part 2
And a transcript at dKos.

Update: Bush wasn't exactly pleased with Colbert's performance.


Meanwhile.... "President Bush has quietly claimed the authority to disobey more than 750 laws enacted since he took office, asserting that he has the power to set aside any statute passed by Congress when it conflicts with his interpretation of the Constitution." This is the guy who hasn't vetoed a single bill in five years -- why risk the chance of Congress overriding a veto when you can sign the bill while declaring that you won't obey it? And he can have his government listen in on your phone calls without fear of a court stopping them. Because after all, it would certainly be easier if this were a dictatorship, just so long as he's the dictator.

Ever on top of things, Slashdot just posted a link to this hilarious two-week-old article at AlterNet:
Roomba Cockfight

Oh yeah, and just in case you missed it yesterday, Google's April Fools joke this year was great: Google Romance
Don't miss the tour, in which we learn that despite their different approaches to Google Romance, User A and User B were made for each other.

You've just gotta love MIT.

On the Effectiveness of Aluminium Foil Helmets: An Empirical Study

Abstract:

Among a fringe community of paranoids, aluminum helmets serve as the protective measure of choice against invasive radio signals. We investigate the efficacy of three aluminum helmet designs on a sample group of four individuals. Using a $250,000 network analyser, we find that although on average all helmets attenuate invasive radio frequencies in either directions (either emanating from an outside source, or emanating from the cranium of the subject), certain frequencies are in fact greatly amplified. These amplified frequencies coincide with radio bands reserved for government use according to the Federal Communication Commission (FCC). Statistical evidence suggests the use of helmets may in fact enhance the government's invasive abilities. We theorize that the government may in fact have started the helmet craze for this reason.

(seen on pandagon_net)

Update: In related news - BYU professor thinks bombs, not planes, toppled WTC (his paper here). Any analysis should probably focus on the WTC-7 building, which wasn't hit by planes, but it's more fun to note his previous research, Evidence for Christ's Visit in Ancient America.

I just noticed an AP story headlined Toshiba Unveils New Flat-Panel SED TV. My first thought was: Cool, a practical use for smoke-emitting diodes!

This makes me laugh every time I type it:
vi ~/.emacs

I never watched Farscape enough to make total sense of it or be a loyal fan, but I've watched it about as much as I've watched Star Trek: The Next Generation (i.e. if it's on when I randomly happen to be looking for something to watch), so I'm somewhat familiar with it without knowing all the plot twists and turns.

Slashdot tells us that there will be a four-hour Farscape miniseries on Sci-Fi Channel starting Oct 17, and that a trailer is now online.

But the best bit I got out of the Slashdot post came from the comments: Farscape meets the Muppet Show