Weird News Stories

[Raithe]

If you want to find out who your friends are....Crowdfund your movie

 

 

 

by Penn Jillette

 

Here's a little experiment you probably don't want to run. Yeah, keep this one a thought experiment. It shouldn't be more than a gedanken. You might not want this experiment to get empirical. You might learn things you don't want to know.

 

Try this: Think about all your friends who would do you a favor. Now think about how much more willing those friends would be to do you that favor if that favor was talking about what an **** you are. Run that experiment, but only in your head.

 

I have wonderful friends. My old friends, Neil Gaiman and Stephen Fry, are two of the greatest writers and thinkers of all time and my new friend, Trace Adkins is . . . well, he has a really low voice. These guys would all do anything for me. I have called in favors from all of them many times and they always deliver. I owe them all for the rest of my life and beyond, and only one of them even believes there is a beyond. That's what good friends they are.

 

If I asked them to help me get attention for a movie I was making -- they would help. If I asked them to help me raise money for a movie I was making -- they would help. Two of the three would give me a false alibi under oath without being asked. One of them would lie under oath just for the sexual thrill. These are good guys.

 

The joke idea of our FundAnything.com campaign to raise money for "Director's Cut" is that I want to be a really bad guy. So, I asked a lot of my friends to make videos about how the campaign was working. How I was becoming a bad guy. We've posted a lot of these videos on the Fundanything.com page and there are still a bunch more to come. They're all really funny, smart, and really great. I'm getting a big kick out of this whole project.

 

Trace, Neil, and Stephen also came through for me. And when I first watched their videos explaining what an **** I was and how I'd lost my moral compass, I thought, "Wow, they are really great actors." And then I watched them a few more times and thought, "Yeah, they're really good actors." There are some obvious jokes in Neil's and Trace's, and Stephen's is all one big joke, right? Stephen is a very experienced actor; he's in that Hobbit **** for christ's sake. So, the fact that he acts like I've really become an **** is a tribute to what a great actor he is, right? I mean the way you can look into his eyes and believe him right to his core? He does no obvious jokes, because the whole thing is a big joke, right? Right?

 

 

http://youtu.be/wTTCK3KA2ng

 

 

http://youtu.be/vjUkphQJYAY

[kgambit]

The British Navy's newest weapon in the fight against Somali Pirates:

 

BRITNEY SPEARS!

 

Can Britney Spears ward off a group of swashbuckling pirates? According to the British Royal Navy, the answer is aye aye, Captain.

The "Toxic" singer's catchy early hits like "Oops! I Did It Again" and "...Baby One More Time" have been used by naval officers to ward off Somali pirates off the east coast of Africa.

"Her songs were chosen by the security team because they thought the pirates would hate them most," Merchant Navy Second Officer Rachel Owens, who works on supertankers, told Metro UK.

 

 

http://music.yahoo.com/blogs/music-news/britney-spears-songs-leave-somali-pirates-saying-arrr-174010868.html

 

I wasn't sure if this belonged in funny things or here.  Britney Spears?  Okay that's weird .... 

[Raithe]

BBC News - Kenya: Call for AK-47s in every church

 

 

Kenyan churches should be supplied with assault rifles so clergy can defend themselves from violence, one pastor has suggested.

 

An evangelical preacher made the demand after two colleagues were murdered in the coastal region around the second largest city, Mombasa, reports NTV. "Every church should be provided with an AK-47 to prevent our churches from being torched, our property from being looted, and Christians and our pastors from being killed," the unidentified clergyman was filmed telling cheering colleagues and mourners at the funeral of one of the victims this week. His Bishop, Kepha Omae from the Redeemed Gospel Church, later told the channel that while he didn't want clergy armed, it could be necessary to train church leaders to protect congregations.

 

However, Muslim leaders and clergymen from the Anglican Church of Kenya warn that arming priests isn't the solution and insist it's the government's job to provide security. Religious tensions have been rising in the coastal area, where economic deprivation is said to be driving many youths towards Islamic extremism. Last year, the assassination of a Muslim cleric - who'd encouraged citizens to rise up against government forces fighting militants from neighbouring Somalia - sparked retaliatory attacks on churches.

[ShadySands]

Talk about going whichever way the wind blows

 

.. Or how I learned to stand up for standing for nothing

 

Nevada politician would endorse slavery

 

 

A Nevada assemblyman came under fire Monday after a YouTube video surfaced in which he told a Republican gathering he would vote to allow slavery if that is what his constituents wanted him to do.

 

“If that’s what they wanted, I’d have to hold my nose … they’d probably have to hold a gun to my head, but yeah,” Assemblyman Jim Wheeler told members of the Storey County Republican Party at a meeting in August.

The comments have not been well received by Nevada Republican leaders, who are rushing to distance themselves from the GOP state lawmaker. The Republicans’ state Senate leader, for example, suggested Wheeler “find a new line of work.”

 

For his part, Wheeler published an explanation of sorts on his personal website, saying that his point was only that he’s inclined to support literally any position embraced by his constituents. It’s not that he endorses slavery, only that he would allow slavery if his constituents wanted him to.

 

Remember, this is supposed to be his defense.

 

Wheeler then seemed to shift gears a bit, saying the exact opposite: “If my constituents wanted to do something as outlandish as bring back an abhorrent system, then I simply couldn’t represent them anymore. They would remove me from office, or I’d have to resign.”

[Keyrock]

 

Talk about going whichever way the wind blows

 

.. Or how I learned to stand up for standing for nothing

 

Nevada politician would endorse slavery

 

 

A Nevada assemblyman came under fire Monday after a YouTube video surfaced in which he told a Republican gathering he would vote to allow slavery if that is what his constituents wanted him to do.

 

“If that’s what they wanted, I’d have to hold my nose … they’d probably have to hold a gun to my head, but yeah,” Assemblyman Jim Wheeler told members of the Storey County Republican Party at a meeting in August.

The comments have not been well received by Nevada Republican leaders, who are rushing to distance themselves from the GOP state lawmaker. The Republicans’ state Senate leader, for example, suggested Wheeler “find a new line of work.”

 

For his part, Wheeler published an explanation of sorts on his personal website, saying that his point was only that he’s inclined to support literally any position embraced by his constituents. It’s not that he endorses slavery, only that he would allow slavery if his constituents wanted him to.

 

Remember, this is supposed to be his defense.

 

Wheeler then seemed to shift gears a bit, saying the exact opposite: “If my constituents wanted to do something as outlandish as bring back an abhorrent system, then I simply couldn’t represent them anymore. They would remove me from office, or I’d have to resign.”

 

"Holy smokes this guy's a flip-flopper, and I should know." - John Kerry

[Walsingham]

Illegal butchers cleaning with underpants.

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-bristol-24733189

 

What kind of NUTTER deliberately buys underpants and cleans a food preparation area with them, rather than cloths. It's not as if cloths are expensive.

 

...Also, WTF were his dustmen thinking? Dozens of bloodstained pants turning up in the refuse!

[Wrath of Dagon]

20th century headlines re-written to get more clicks : http://xkcd.com/1283/

[ShadySands]

not news but...

 

[Raithe]

BBC News - Pilots and Skydivers escape mid-air crash

 

Well, if you're going to be involved in a mid-air collision, I guess it works best if you happen to be a group of skydivers...

 

 

Details have emerged of how nine US skydivers and two pilots escaped as their planes crashed in midair, turning one of the aircraft into a "fireball".

Four skydivers were preparing to jump when their plane collided with another, carrying five skydivers, at 12,000ft (3,600m) in the state of Wisconsin.

All the skydivers safely jumped. One pilot ejected with a parachute and the other safely landed the second plane.

 

The Federal Aviation Administration is investigating Saturday's near tragedy.

 

All of the skydivers were either instructors or coaches who have completed hundreds of previous jumps.

 

'Boom'

 

Instructor Mike Robinson, 64, said that he and three other skydivers had climbed out on to the step of the Cessna 182 in preparation for their jump.

"We were just a few seconds away from having a normal skydive when the trail plane came over the top of the lead aircraft and came down on top of it," he said.

"It turned into a big flash fireball, and the wing separated. All of us knew we had a crash. The wing over our head was gone, so we just left."

He watched as the aircraft fell in pieces from the sky.

 

The pilot of the plane, who ejected with a parachute that could not be steered, suffered minor injuries.

The second pilot landed the plane safely at Richard I Bong Airport, Douglas County.

 

A witness on the ground told the Duluth News Tribune he heard a "boom and looked up and there's a fireball and smoke".

Braydon Kurtz said one plane "was circling down and one was going down straight".

 

Mr Robinson said while everyone responded professionally and quickly, they were lucky to have been in place to jump when the collision happened.

"It might've been a lot worse," he said. "Everybody, to a person, responded just as they should, including the pilots."

 

A skydiving accident in Belgium last month killed 11 people when a plane went into a nosedive as part of its wing broke minutes after take-off.

[Malcador]

Cool video too

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=KeWqAWAQIMI

 

Nice to know everyone lived.

[Cultist]

A suspected vehicle burglar didn't do the best job of hiding some of his contraband on Monday.

It was through Antwan Mayes, open pants zipper that police spotted a slew of stolen cards including a driver's license and credit cards, according to a Boca Raton Police Department arrest report.

"Through Mayes' open zipper, I could see them sticking out of the front slit of his underwear," an officer wrote in the report.

An officer watching the L.A. Fitness parking lot after two nearby vehicle burglaries spotted the 27-year-old Fort Lauderdale man driving a white SUV and stepping out to look into vehicles, according to the report.

Police later pulled Mayes over and found marijuana, a light fixture stolen from a car at another gym, several smartphones, jewelry, foreign money along with mail from a Coral Springs burglary in the SUV.

[Oerwinde]

http://www.theprovince.com/touch/story.html?id=9124456

 

BC school bans Kindergardeners from touching. Afraid they might hurt someone.

 

Its sad what the world has come to.

[AGX-17]

not news but...

 

http://www.ted.com/talks/jackson_katz_violence_against_women_it_s_a_men_s_issue.html

[Raithe]

So when their budget is slashed, and they're buried in red-tape, they're still making plans to get out there...

 

MSN - Innovation - Orion ; Nasa's Plans to Land Men on Mars

 

 

 

Mars is never far from the news. Indeed, only yesterday India's space agency became the latest one to have a go at reaching the 'red planet', alongside the US, Russia and Europe. Meanwhile, the Kennedy Space Center, in Florida, last week saw the switching-on of what could be a landmark space vehicle fit for future trips to Mars.

 

With the space shuttle programme over, the search is on to find a new reusable spacecraft to take astronauts and cargo to the International Space Station (ISS) and beyond. Regular visits to low-Earth orbit are one thing, but Nasa is after something that can transport humans far beyond, to other worlds in our solar system.

 

The US space agency's answer is the Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle – known simply as Orion – which can take up to six astronauts on journeys as long as 210 days to near-Earth asteroids, the moon and even Mars.

 

“This spacecraft is capable of taking humans farther into space than they’ve ever gone before,” said Cleon Lacefield, programme manager for Orion at the aerospace manufacturer Lockheed Martin. “For over a year, the team has been developing, testing, and installing critical equipment to the crew module, which has now been shown to integrate flawlessly – it’s an incredible engineering achievement.”

 

The recent test of Orion – which can carry crews of between two and six astronauts on missions beyond low-Earth orbit – kick-starts six months of tests to establish that its complex computer systems are all in working order. Now begins a countdown of 10 months before Orion's first scheduled test flight next year.

 

The baptism of fire for Nasa's Orion capsule will now take place in September 2014 when it begins its first mission, the Exploration Flight Test-1 (EFT-1). Orion will be sent skywards by Nasa's Delta IV Heavy rocket – a hangover from the space shuttle missions – from Florida's Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.

 

Crucially, it won't be a piloted mission; this is all about testing Orion's safety system at high altitude. “EFT-1 is a two-orbit, four-hour mission that will send Orion, un-crewed, more than 3,600 miles above the Earth’s surface,” says Nasa

 

During its test flight Orion will plunge into an orbit about 15 times farther than the ISS' current track around the globe; Nasa is clearly equipping Orion for more distant destinations.

“During the test, Orion will return to Earth, enduring temperatures of 4,000 degrees Fahrenheit while traveling 20,000 miles per hour, faster than any current spacecraft capable of carrying humans,” says Nasa.

 

Orion's heat-shield will thus be fully tested, as will its ocean splashdown, which is crucial to test before humans can be sent aboard. “The data gathered during the flight will inform design decisions, validate existing computer models and guide new approaches to space systems development,” says Nasa.

 

Given its rather basic-looking design, the Orion capsule has been criticised for not looking all that different to those used in the original Apollo missions to the moon. However, appearances can be deceptive.

 

Orion is all about cutting-edge avionics – built-in and fully networked systems that comprise navigation, communications and the integration of highly innovative power and data distribution technology.

 

It was this 'heart and brains' that was tested recently, but there's six months' worth of testing ahead; though Lockheed Martin is the prime contractor to Nasa for Orion, dozens of companies have been involved in supplying the estimated 66,000+ custom-made components used so far.

 

Orion's importance shouldn't be underestimated, thinks Nasa. 'Orion will take humans farther than we've ever been before, and in just about a year we're going to send the Orion test vehicle into space,' said Dan Dumbacher, Nasa's deputy associate administrator for exploration systems development in Washington.

 

Nasa insists that it's the flexibility of Orion as a capsule just as suited to a long-range crew mission around the solar system as it is to taking cargo back and forth to the ISS, that gives the US “an entirely new human space exploration capability”.

 

Nasa has asteroids in its sights. 'The work we're doing now, the momentum we're building, is going to carry us on our first trip to an asteroid and eventually to Mars,” said Dumbacher. “No other vehicle currently being built can do that, but Orion will, and EFT-1 is the first step.'

 

Next up is the unmanned Exploration Mission-1 (EM-1), Orion's debut 'real' mission flight set for 2017. EM-1 will orbit the moon once during a seven to 10-day trip.

Four years later Nasa's Exploration Mission-2 (EM-2) will see Orion flying 43,000 miles past the moon to orbit for a few days, but this time with four astronauts inside. This ambitious mission will attempt to rendezvous with an asteroid orbiting the moon, perhaps even capturing it. The mission will last 25 days, and is part of President Barack Obama’s stated ambition for Nasa to investigate a near-Earth asteroid during the 2020s.

 

Although Nasa initially plans to launch Orion atop its Delta IV Heavy rocket, the EM-1 mission will see the debut of the agency's next-gen rocket called the Space Launch System (SLS). It's destined to be Orion's long-term launch companion on trips into space.

 

Weighing 77 tonnes, the SLS will be the largest launch vehicle ever built – and have around 10% more thrust than the Saturn V rocket used by the Apollo missions. A second version of the SLS, which weighs 143 tonnes, will have 20% more thrust that Saturn V. The SLS will take Orion from the launchpad of the Kennedy Space Center to the edge of space in just eight minutes.

 

However, before astronauts can pilot Orion around the moon and back – the farthest man has travelled for over 40 years – there is work to be done.

In the first 'ascent simulations' carried out since the space shuttle programme was shut down, in September this year, 10 crews of two Nasa astronauts all experienced what it will be like to operate Orion. Happily for the crew, the space capsule has just three computer screens; compare that to the space shuttles' 10 screens, 1,200 switches, dials and gauges, and myriad complex procedure manuals – mostly on paper. “It sounds promising and saves a lot of weight, but designing it is challenging,” said Jeff Fox, the Orion crew systems integration lead. “We don’t want the crew to have to search through a lot of drop-down menus when they need to quickly access key systems and information.”

 

What comes next? After Orion has completed its 2021 mission around the Moon to snag a lunar asteroid, Nasa wants to plan a mission to a near-Earth asteroid in deep space. The Nasa Exploration Systems Development team wants to send four astronauts into space for an entire year to study asteroids – in what will be a purely scientific endeavour – though the end-game is a manned mission to Mars.

 

It's a vision that replaces Nasa's previous 'Moon, Mars and Beyond' ambition, known as the Constellation Program, which was cancelled. In effect, Nasa has now swapped the moon for asteroids. However, propelling Orion deep into space on such missions all hinges on the success of the SLS rockets.

 

Although the Orion capsule is now coming to life, it's not the only space capsule in development. At the vanguard of a predicted new age of privately run space industry is SpaceX, whose chief designer and CEO is Elon Musk. A co-founder of PayPal, the billionaire is also involved in the high-end electric car company Tesla Motors, and is responsible for the highly innovative Hyperloop concept of transport that, he says, could make the trip from LA to San Francisco in a mere 30 minutes.

 

His plans for space exploration are just as bold; SpaceX's Dragon capsule has already visited the ISS three times to deliver cargo as part of a 12-journey contract with Nasa worth $1.6 billion. For now it uses SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket to launch, but a reusable rocket from SpaceX called Grasshopper is also in the making.

However, Musk wants humanity to become a 'multi-planet species', and is aiming to fund a mission to Mars – and even establish an 80,000-strong colony there – within the next 20 years.

 

Will Nasa's Orion capsule get there first? Or will Musk's Dragon make humanity's debut on the red planet? Watch this space.

 

 

[Malcador]

Well, what do you expect them to do ?

[Raithe]

Clean up the bureaucracy. While I'm impressed with a lot that NASA does, pretty much most things I read about things they do at the moment are seriously wrapped up in red-tape,  bureaucratic coverings, and cost overruns.

[Malcador]

Not sure why their Orion plans exclude that as a possibility, but carry on.

[Walsingham]

Clean up the bureaucracy. While I'm impressed with a lot that NASA does, pretty much most things I read about things they do at the moment are seriously wrapped up in red-tape,  bureaucratic coverings, and cost overruns.

 

I think that a lot of problems are down to just bollocks accounting, and predictions.

 

If every single government project exceeds predicted spend, then your predictions are ****ed, not the projects.

[Raithe]

Not sure why their Orion plans exclude that as a possibility, but carry on.

 

The Orion plans don't exclude it. But it's pretty much a problem throughout Nasa. Cost overruns, project management that gets massive delays, political shenanigans. Obama laying out great speeches of "We're going to go to Mars" and then slashing NASA's budget even more.

 

If you can't get your house in order in the first place, your chance of getting to Mars in a decade doesn't really feel that good to me.

[Malcador]

Your leading comment to the article seems to indicate they should spend their time elsewhere, though. Seems like that is just standard stuff for a government agency just about anywhere. I guess that's why everyone says private enterprise is the answer

[Keyrock]

This is less weird and more just plain sad and pathetic, but I didn't want to make another thread called "There's No Hope Left For Humanity Thread" so I put it here:

 

Calgary School Bans Honour Roll

 

 

CALGARY — A Calgary school’s decision to stop rewarding students for their academic achievements has reignited a debate over whether such award programs should remain in the classroom.

 

Roughly 250 students in Grade 7 to 9 will no longer compete for the honour roll after St. Basil Elementary and Junior High School axed academic awards and year-end ceremonies.

 

“Awards eventually lose their lustre to students who get them, while often hurting the self-esteem and pride of those who do not receive a certificate,” school officials said in a letter to parents explaining the decision

And so the there are no winners and losers movement spins even further out of control.  This is the same bull**** that removed scoring from Little League games and makes sure that everyone gets a participation trophy for everything.  What better way to encourage young people to strive for excellence than by removing all incentives and recognition for achieving excellence.

 

If there is a higher power up there listening and watching, send the asteroid, make sure it's big enough to do the job completely.  There is no hope for the human race.  Wipe the planet clean, maybe the ****roach race that takes over will be less retarded.

 

Edit:  LOL at the forum auto-censoring <name of insect> 

Edited November 6, 2013 by Keyrock

[Malcador]

Really should focus on making one's self-esteem more resilient rather than preventing it from taking a hit in the first place

[Gfted1]

My daughter just made the honor roll. As a feat that her father never accomplished I was very proud of her. Plus I pony up cash for every "A" so she made out well this semester.

[Amentep]

And the nerfing of kids and childhood continues...

[Walsingham]

I don't see how it's any different to any number of other lunatic doctrines to teach. I can scorn it, but I'll not condemn.