I'll be away from this blog for a a short period of time! From Today - 3/6- until Wednesday morning - 3/11

I may be gone but don't let that stop you from checking out my archives. You're bound to find something interesting.

image via Google Images

The Ongoing Meltdown: RNC Member wants Steele to resign!

This interesting news from The Hill web site is going to provide the "talking heads" from both parties with plenty of ammo. Watching the GOP Party thrash around trying to find a new identity is almost painful to see. Who will emerge from this chaos carrying the Republican flag to victory in the next election? My guess is Rush Limbaugh after recent events exposed the GOPs slavish following of an entertainer-who just happens to be an conservative extremist who wants the country to fail unless his buddies get their way about whose going to run things. Steele probably isn't wacky enough for the confused elephant-worshippers. Stay tuned...

By Reid Wilson

Michael Steele should resign as Republican National Committee (RNC) chairman, according to a committee member from North Carolina.
In an e-mail to fellow RNC members obtained by The Hill, Dr. Ada Fisher, North Carolina's national committeewoman, said Steele is "eroding confidence" in the GOP and that members of his transition team should encourage him to step aside. Fisher added Steele's personal e-mail address to the e-mail."I don't want to hear anymore [sic] language trying to be cool about the bling in the stimulus package or appealing to D.L. Hughley and blacks in a way that isn't going to win us any votes and makes us frankly appear to many blacks as quite foolish," Fisher wrote.

Click here to read the rest of this controversial column advocating recently-elected Republican Party Chair Steele to step down. AP/News Photo

Classic paintings meet Classic Horror in these artworks

 

Classic Masters paint Classic Horror, with a good dose of the pop-culture camp.
This is only a part of the larger series, located at Worth1000.com.

Vintage Consumer Packaging: products in their infancy

 

 

If you're interested in vintage kind of stuff then go to this web site where there's 912 products featured. It's kinda fun noodling around and reading the labels and recalling the ones you used to use when you were young.

Taipei Lottery: American lotteries should offer a prize like this...the peace would be priceless!

Boy wins rights to tropical island in lottery

TAIPEI (Reuters) – A 4-year-old boy has won the use of an uninhabited tropical island, with white sand beaches and clear turquoise waters, in a Taiwan lottery aimed at boosting spending during an economic downturn.

Officials said Yeh Chien-wei, who won the prize at Thursday's draw, will get exclusive rights to the tiny plot in the Taiwan Strait from May through September.

Penghu County, an offshore archipelago, will provide food, drinks, water and electricity to the boy. He has been quoted in local media saying he wants to play in the sea.

"Penghu has a lot of islands, and that one has water and electricity, so someone can really enjoy it," said county economic promotion official Lu Yan-chang, explaining why use of the island, which also has a cabin, was offered as a prize.

Counties elsewhere in Taiwan have offered cars, houses and other prizes to encourage locals to spend consumer vouchers worth T$3,600 ($103) that the government gave to every citizen in January to encourage spending to help boost the sagging economy.

Penghu, which comprises 64 islands, is known for its beautiful beaches and water sports.

According to the terms of the prize, the boy and up to seven family members can visit the island five times, for trips that last a maximum of three days.

(Reporting by Ralph Jennings, editing by Miral Fahmy)

Art via www.shafferfineart.com/The_Art_of_Walfrido.htm

One Man's Pork is another Man's Stimulus Package: See who is in Hog Heaven!

IT'S OINK TIME AGAIN... AS THE SENATORS WALLOW IN THEIR PERSONAL PORK PACKAGES! AFTER ALL OF OBAMA'S GRAND SPEECHES ABOUT ELIMINATING EARMARKS "BY GOING OVER THEM LINE-BY-LINE" THIS IS OUR REALITY...

By Richard Simon

The Los Angeles Times

''Reporting from Washington -- A massive spending bill expected to be approved by Congress this week is filled with more than 8,500 earmarks -- those pet projects that lawmakers love -- costing $7.7 billion.

Despite the tough economy, mounting federal budget deficit and pledges by President Obama and members of both parties to crack down on the practice, a number of lawmakers have defended their earmarks as important to the nation's economic recovery.'' Click here to see which state is in "Hog Heaven!"

pig image via Google Images

 

Republicans 'Rush' to apologize to their LimBoss!

  

I'm Sorry, Rush
"My intent was not to go after Rush - I have enormous respect for Rush Limbaugh..."
"I was maybe a little bit inarticulate... There was no attempt on my part to diminish his voice or his leadership."
"I went back at that tape and I realized words that I said weren’t what I was thinking..." Michael Steele.

The parodies of Republicans saying their sorry to entertainer Russ Limbaugh are popping up all over the Web. Here's one site (set up by the Democrats) that allows you to craft your own letter to Russ.

images via Google Images

I've always been an Edgar Rice Burroughs fan...

 Edgar Rice Burroughs
"The Living Dead"
(Carson of Venus series)
© Fantastic Adventures, Nov 1941
Escape on Venus, 1946 (below)
-This book is a rare find. If you have it, then you should hold on to it.

This book is part of the last Burroughs series: "Carson Napier on Venus".

"It reminded me of Alan Burt Akers "Scorpio" series, with the strange flying machines, fantasy-like aliens and clockwork primitive plot. Of course, Akers (pen name of Kenneth Bulmer) imitated Burroughs, but... Akers did it more engagingly, me thinks. Here, formulaic adventure is not as exotic and lush, as one might expect from Burroughs - however, it does contain one of the future staples of space opera: putting our heroes on display (hanging from a hook) in an alien museum, and their subsequent inevitable escape.
It seems the movie is in the works based on "Pirates of Venus" series. Should be a colorful CG experience. By the way, I was pleasantly surprised to learn that there is a term "Sword and Planet" used to describe the whole sub-genre in science fiction. Very convenient; I am going to use it now on a ton of pulp and paperback fiction reviews (Robert Moore Williams, Lin Carter, Akers, etc.) "

images and write-up via darkroastedblend.com

America needs jobs: Not dueling senators over semantics!

I"M SURE TIRED OF THE RHETORIC IN THE SENATE. IT SEEMS OUR POLITICOS CARE MORE ABOUT IDEALOGIE THAN REALITY...I FOUND THIS COLUMN ON THE AMERICAN PROSPECT WEB SITE AND FELT IT WAS VERY WELL DONE. WALDEN CUTS THROUGH THE CHAFF ANDS LAYS THE BATTLE OF WORDS BEFORE ALL TO SEE IN THEIR STUPID ENTIRETY! 

Good Work, If You Can Get It                               

          By Paul Walden

"Every national politician, in good times and bad, will talk about "jobs" -- creating jobs, building jobs, saving jobs, bringing jobs. Or as they sometimes put it, "jobs, jobs, jobs." But as the current debate on the Obama administration's stimulus package has shown, not everybody has the same understanding of what a "job" is. The problem is that philosophy is getting in the way of reality."

Click here for the whole column.

image via Google Images

Little Miss Muffet didn't know this spider sat beside her!

Spiders (not necessarily jumping spiders) may use different mimicry. Some, like crab spiders, may blend with flowers and wait for insects... Do you see the hiding "Yellow Death"?

image credit: Hannes Mitchell)