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U.S.S. ENTERPRISE

At Sea
November 28, 1941

BATTLE ORDER NUMBER ONE

1. The ENTERPRISE is now operating under war conditions.

2. At any time, day or night, we must be ready for instant
action.

3. Hostile submarines may be encountered.

4. The importance of every officer and man being specially
alert and vigilant while on watch at his battle station
must be fully realized by all hands.

5. The failure of one man to carry out his assigned task
promptly, particularly the lookouts, those manning the
batteries, and all those on watch on the deck, might
result in great loss of life and even loss of the ship.

6. The Captain is confident all hands will prove equal to
any emergency that may develop.

7. It is part of the tradition of our Navy that, when put
to the test, all hands keep cool, keep their heads, and
FIGHT.

8. Steady nerves and stout hearts are needed now.

G. D. MURRAY,
Captain, U.S. Navy
Commanding

Approved: November 28, 1941.
W. F. HALSEY,
Vice Admiral, U.S. Navy,
Commander Aircraft, Battle Force

Consume

Then and Now Salem, IL

Hat Capitol posted this wonderful image. Go check it out... cool picture, eh? The street signs made me curious, and sure enough... here's the intersection today.
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Bernard Berrian meets the Streisand Effect

The (almost) always hilarious Kissing Suzy Kolber had a gentle piece up mocking the media for the over-reaction to Bernard Berrian's over-reaction to a fan's tweet. Well BB's PR firm C&D'd KSK for some obvious parody tweets that KSK posted in which faux-Berrian tweets. KSK not wanting a legal squabble pulled the post and asked "Does Bernard Berrian Hate Iraq War Veterans."?

So anyway here are the fake Bernard Berrian tweets that were pulled

WWII Marine

I found this old photo of my grandpa. He served on Tarawa and Pelielu (sic). He fixed aircraft.

10 Places for the Temporal Anthropologist to Visit (part 1)

Noted temporal anthropologist Dr. Wendell A. Howe is currently investigating the immigrant experience by traveling from Liverpool to New York on the RMS Umbria.  He debarked at Ellis Island with the rest of the steerage passengers, spent a couple of days processing through immigration, and most recently hit the slums of New York with social reformer and muckraker, Jacob Riis.  Not a bad trip for your average 27th century time traveler looking to learn about the details of one of the most famous immigration paths in history.

Dr. Howe's travels, along with a recent article on the "Top Ten" destinations for a a time traveler got me to thinking what would be my Top Ten destinations in time.  For the purposes of this list we're going to assume the Babel Fish has been invented (and thus that God has been proven not to exist). We'll also assume that my appearance will be suitably altered so that for example when I show up in Japan in 1281 I'm not instantly put to the sword for being an unwelcome foreigner in a closed land.

In no particular order here we go:

Off Trafalgar October 1805:
The greatest battle in the Age of Fighting Sail, Admiral Lord Nelson led 27 British ships of the line against 33 French and Spanish ships of the line under French Admiral Pierre de Villeneuve. Nelson was killed, but his destruction of the combined fleet saved Britain from invasion by Napoleon. Nelson's flagship, HMS Victory, took numerous casualties so I probably don't want to hang out on the Admiral's flagship, but a perusal of the order of Battle of Trafalgar shows HMS Conqueror as having received three dead and nine wounded for a casualty rate of 2% amongst its officers and ratings. I'll take those odds.

The British casualties across the fleet were relatively light, but for the Victory and the HMS Royal Sovereign casualties were heavy with 20% of the men in each ship either killed or wounded. Of all British casualties at Trafalgar 80% were from two the first two ships in Nelson's weather line and the first six ships Vice-Admiral Collingwood's lee line. The combined French Spanish fleet suffered indiscriminately with an estimated 5000 dead and another 10,000 wounded or captured sailors and marines.

Alexandria circa 100BC and Baghdad circa 1100AD:
Eventually these two places would see two of the greatest crimes in human history committed. Once you've beaten the other side's army, kill the women and rape the cattle, but DO NOT destroy the largest compendium of human knowledge ever gathered up that point. Just don't do it.

The Library at Alexandria seems to have survived Julius Cesaer's unintentional burning of it, and it's later reduced history is clouded in mystery. The House of Wisdom was sacked after the Siege of Baghdad by the Mongol Hordes in 1258. It is claimed, perhaps apocryphally, that the waters of the Tigris ran black for six months following the the library's destruction from all the books and scrolls the Mongols threw in the river.

Whatever their later histories in 100BC and 1100AD the two libraries were at or near the height of their collections. Some temporal anthropologist could spend a lifetime at either of these two institutions, but as I'm more a temporal tourist I'd just like to spend a year or two at each surreptitiously scanning knowledge that's been forever lost to humanity. Though this list is generally without order, these would be the first two places I would visit.

Jerusalem circa 30-33AD:
We're gonna see what all the fuss is about. Basically this one is pretty simple. Was Western history worth it? It's pretty straightforward really. I'm gonna go back and hang with Jesus. If he is the Son of God, he'll know why I am there. If he looks at me like I just fell off the last donkey in the crazy convoy, well, sorry people, we've been had. Either way, I gotta know.

Come back for Part 2.

what?

I'm not doing this twitter thing right

Ok first off my real account http://twitter.com/mcsey 400 or so hard earned followers over what three years or so that I first started making noises on Twitter. 2400 tweets of varying quality, but for me at least exactly what I was looking for. I can scroll back through my timeline and find what I was thinking about or doing on whenever.

On Friday @ferris_bueller_ @cameron_ and @sloanepetereson_ started recreating "Ferris Bueller's Day Off" via twitter and foursquare. Thinking it would be a funny one off joke I made an @Prin_Rooney account, posted Principal Rooney as my profile pic and tweeted "I'm onto you @ferris_bueller_ I will catch you this time." And then started arriving at places they marked on foursquare just after they got to the next place, and generally tweeting like I was confused about the differences between 1986 Chicago and today (WTF is Willis Tower, and how do I get there?)

In a word... bullshit.

I got a few followers on Friday, and then went home for the weekend. I get in today, and well...

http://twitter.com/Prin_Rooney 510 followers in three days, now how do I leverage that? I should have just used a gimmick account to begin with.

Why Coakley Lost

A commenter on Balloon Juice nails it down tight.

Balloon Juice Blog Archive Like Deja Vu All Over Again: "And the reason this happened is very simple. The people handed the Democrats a tremendous amount of power and said “We want change.” And the Dems responded by saying that they like the status quo just fine so long as they’re in charge. It’s not surprising that they’re suffering consequences for this."

I'm reading a lot of "we lost because we're too liberal" from Democrats. That's bullshit. Coakley lost because in 2008 the American people said "Change please", and they didn't get it. They didn't get it from a lily-livered spineless Congress, and they didn't get it from Obama. Remember his slogan was "Hope"? Maybe it should have been "Wish" or "Pipe Dream".

Rafa or Hicks & Gillett

There are legitimate complaints about Rafa. His selections and substitutions often leave me mystified. We spent 20 million for Aqui to bring him in as a 80th minute sub?  We have by various estimates 47, 52, 62 or 913 senior level players, and what we saw against Stoke is the best line-up that we can produce regardless of injuries?  Not pretty.  Not pretty.  But, and this is huge, Rafa is not the one that forced Liverpool to use its profits to service its debts instead of buy players, and Rafa's not the one with the history of running sports clubs into the ground.  

Hicks and his company destroyed Corinthians in Brazil.  They went from a FIFA World Club Cup championship shortly after Hicks' purchased them to relegation and financial ruin before Hicks sold them.  The Texas Rangers are nothing special, but after Hicks defaulted on $525 million in loans to the Rangers and his NHL team the Dallas Stars, the Rangers couldn't even make payroll twice last year and MLB had to loan money to the Rangers just to pay the players.  Rangers fans want Hicks just as gone from their team as we Reds do from ours, and the Rangers stunk even before Hicks took over and okayed the single dumbest contract in sports history.  The Dallas Stars are the only team he's ever owned that's won anything well into his tenure as owner, and what do they have to show for it -- one Stanley Cup -- a single championship.  Outside of Liverpool Hicks has owned mediocre teams, and now that mediocrity is starting to show up at Anfield.  Hicks is one half the problem, and I bet you can guess what the other half is.

George Gillett until recently owned a franchise that is the Liverpool FC of its league.  The Montreal Canadiens are the most decorated franchise in NHL history.  The team has won 24 Stanley Cups.  They have won at least one Stanley Cup per decade every decade of the team's existence going back to the second decade of the twentieth century -- except for the last decade when they were owned from 2001 till earlier this year by George Gillett.  Since Gillett took over the Canadiens have missed the playoff three times and never made it out of the second round when they did qualify. If hockey had a table without conferences and divisions, Montreal would've finished in following positions:

08-09 -- 14

07-08 -- 3

06-07 -- 17

05-06 -- 15

04-05 -- (No season. NHL lockout)

03-04 -- 11

02-03 -- 22

01-02 -- 18

Save for the 07-08 season those are not inspiring finishes in a 30 team league and with those early playoff exits the Canadiens didn't get a whiff of the Stanley Cup during Gillett's tenure as owner. To be fair to Gillett those performances are actually an improvement  over the three previous years before Gillett took over (the club was at a historic low point); however, he certainly didn't get very far towards his "vision is to restore the franchise as the greatest team in hockey."  Does that remind anyone of a certain joint statement issued by Gillett and Hicks?  "This is truly the largest sport in the world, the most important sport in the world, and this is the most important club in the most important sport in the world... Liverpool is a fantastic club with a remarkable history and a passionate fanbase. We fully acknowledge and appreciate the unique heritage and rich history of Liverpool and intend to respect this heritage in the future."

We all know what happened next.  The most important club in the most important sport in the world proved no more important to these men then breakfast cereal.  The "blueprint of what not to do" as Hicks described the Glazers' purchase of ManU turned out to be exactly the plans used to purchase Liverpool.  Debt has mounted.  Not securing stadium financing before the recession has left the stadium in limbo for the foreseeable future.  And now the mediocrity that has been the hallmark of all previous franchises owned by Gillett and/or Hicks is starting to seep from the boardroom onto the pitch.

I may not agree with or understand some of Rafa's football related decisions, but I trust that he is making decisions that he feels are the best for Liverpool FC.  I trust the he is working his hardest at "coaching and training" his players, and doing his all to make certain that LFC puts the best football team it can on the pitch.  I certainly cannot say the same about the business decisions made by Hicks, Gillett, and the rest of the boardroom.  They've already proven that Liverpool is worth no more to them than a bowl of bland unsweetened cereal.  They'll do whatever they can to wring a dollar out of the brand, and if they happen to win while doing so so be it. If they don't, oh well...

A simple comparison of records -- Rafa's teams have won La Liga twice, the UEFA Champions League, the UEFA Cup and the FA Cup during his tenure at the top of the bootroom.  Hicks and Gilletts' teams have in all sports have won one Stanley Cup and one FIFA World Club Cup between them at the top of the boardroom.  That World Club Cup came the same way our only success (CL Runner's Up) has come since they purchased the club... namely right after they did so, and before they could screw the club up.  Hicks and Gillett, not Rafa, brought mediocrity to Liverpool.  The longer that they stay the lower that we will sink regardless of who the manager is. 

It was Thanksgiving but we had a ham

edit: Man blogger compresses the heck out of the video.

Sean

My sister Jordan wrote this a while ago...

Sean was my cousin. Sean was also like a brother to me - though he beat on me less than my actual siblings did. Growing up, we spent a lot of time together, as
family members, as friends. We went through a lot together, and I'd like to share a few of the moments Little Sean and I went experienced.

When we were small, Sean and I would make up dance routines to such classics as "Rock around the clock" and Barbie and the Rockers' "Born with a mic in our hands." Then we'd practice them until they were perfect, and we'd drag whatever unsuspecting adults who were around to watch us perform. Sean always had a flair for drama. He performed in plays in high school, too. He was particularly proud of his role as Fenris Ulf, Captain of the Queen's Guard, in The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. During that play, Sean and Lexy and I would dance and sing even offstage, though none of us, Sean included, had much in the way of talent for singing or dancing. Whathe did have was a gift for the absurd. He once came up with a dance we called the "Mating Dance of the Whooping Crane" which mostly consisted of standing on one leg whilst bobbing your head, flapping your arms, and squawking as loudly as possible. Sean was a very good actor, a talent he must have sharpened by being a closeted gay teenager in a small, straight town.

As most everyone here probably realizes, Sean was an exchange student in high school. He went to Denmark. Sean loved Denmark. Upon his return, the phrase "When I was in Denmark..." quickly became a cliche. I know it was one of the most important experiences in his life. Away from home, out of the country, he grew up. Though he had already had a wealth of experience standing on his own two feet, his experiences in Denmark made him realize that he could make it alone. He also came to terms with some truths about himself, like that he was gay, and that he was okay with that. He learned that he loved travel, and began to see himself as a citizen of the world. This is not to say that he didn't also enjoy Denmark's rather lax laws about substances generally forbidden to 17 year olds in the United States.

Sean was so charming. He
could befriend anyone, anywhere, and he often did. He collected
interesting people, and interesting people collected him. My life,
my family's lives have been so enriched by the people who Sean
brought to us. I personally am very grateful to Sean for befriending
all of the mean girls in high school, and thus keeping them from
beating the tar out of me. I remember meals around the table, with
Sean and our friends, everyone stuffing their faces, and having
casual one-upmanship put down contests. Sean could no more resist a
good insult than he could resist a good story. But really who can?
He hardly ever meant any of his insults, and his stories may have
been exaggerated. Both were always top quality though.

Of course, along with all
of his fabulous qualities, Sean did have a few flaws. He was the
most stubborn person I have ever met. He probably inherited that,
along with the nose, from the Ryans. He could insist that something
was true, even if it was demonstrably not so. You knew that you'd
done well in an argument with Sean if you could get him to admit that
his point only should be true, but perhaps wasn't. He was also stoic
to the point of ridiculousness. In Savanna, once, when he was 12 or
13, he took a long ride down a steep hill, partially on a bicycle,
but mostly on his face after the bike's brakes failed. He didn't
admit to any pain, or cry, even though he was all torn up. There was
gravel involved. Instead, he calmly suggested a trip to the doctor.
He could be like that with his emotions, too. But that stubbornness
and stoicism served him well as battled cancer. He was determined to
survive, and he faced his illness with resolute optimism and fierce
grace. I firmly believe he survived as long as he did because of his
mule-headed, pig-headed stubbornness. It bought him years, then
months, and then days.

Clearly, since I'm here,
crying and speaking in public, both of which I hate to do, even world
caliber stubbornness will only get you so far. Which leaves me
speechless, and sort of angry. I don't know what to say, beyond: I
hope to see you again someday. Jag alskar du, Seanie. We'll miss
you so much.

Everything you ever needed to know about Glenn Beck

From Glenn Beck becomes damaged goods | Salon News:

"The animosity between Beck and Kelly continued to deepen. When Beck and Hattrick produced a local version of Orson Welles' 'War of the Worlds' for Halloween -- a recurring motif in Beck's life and career -- Kelly told a local reporter that the bit was a stupid rip-off of a syndicated gag. The slight outraged Beck, who got his revenge with what may rank as one of the cruelest bits in the history of morning radio. 'A couple days after Kelly's wife, Terry, had a miscarriage, Beck called her live on the air and says, 'We hear you had a miscarriage,' ' remembers Brad Miller, a former Y95 DJ and Clear Channel programmer. 'When Terry said, 'Yes,' Beck proceeded to joke about how Bruce [Kelly] apparently can't do anything right -- about he can't even have a baby.'"

Joe Wilson at the Gettysburg Address