Vincent Ferrari

Lobster tiara? Check
Translucent plastic dress? Check
Zombie hand bracelet? Check
Tribute to Swiss boobies? Check

Yep. I love this woman.

Lobster tiara? Check
Translucent plastic dress? Check
Zombie hand bracelet? Check
Tribute to Swiss boobies? Check

Yep. I love this woman.

White House economic adviser Larry Summers said on Monday winter blizzards were likely to distort U.S. February jobless figures, which are due to be released on Friday.

“The blizzards that affected much of the country during the last month are likely to distort the statistics. So it’s going to be very important … to look past whatever the next figures are to gauge the underlying trends,” Summers said in an interview with CNBC, according to a transcript.

And there you have it, folks. Global warming has now been tied to unemployment.

White House economic adviser Larry Summers said on Monday winter blizzards were likely to distort U.S. February jobless figures, which are due to be released on Friday.

“The blizzards that affected much of the country during the last month are likely to distort the statistics. So it’s going to be very important … to look past whatever the next figures are to gauge the underlying trends,” Summers said in an interview with CNBC, according to a transcript.

And there you have it, folks. Global warming has now been tied to unemployment.

Worst Regular Order of Fries
Five Guys Fries (large)
1,464 calories
71 g fat (14 g saturated)
213 mg sodium

Unfortunately, Five Guys doesn’t offer anything but fries in the side department. Your safest bet, of course, is to skip the fries altogether (you’d be better off adding a second patty to your burger), but if you can’t bring yourself to eat a burger sans fries, then split a regular order. That will still add 310 calories to your meal, but it beats surrendering more than 75% of your day’s calories to a greasy paper bag. 

Beth and I went to Five Guys for the first time a few years ago. On our first visit, we each ordered a regular fry. Holy crap were we stupid. They were very good and all, but they also filled the whole bag with fries. It was way more than we could handle. Now when we visit? 4 of us get one regular fry and it’s more than enough.

I do love Five Guys, but the fries… Excess doesn’t even begin to describe it. Way too much for one person. A bit much for two. Probably a more comfortable serving for 3 or 4.

And that’s the regular. The large? Don’t even bother trying to classify it.

Worst Regular Order of Fries
Five Guys Fries (large)
1,464 calories
71 g fat (14 g saturated)
213 mg sodium

Unfortunately, Five Guys doesn’t offer anything but fries in the side department. Your safest bet, of course, is to skip the fries altogether (you’d be better off adding a second patty to your burger), but if you can’t bring yourself to eat a burger sans fries, then split a regular order. That will still add 310 calories to your meal, but it beats surrendering more than 75% of your day’s calories to a greasy paper bag. 

Beth and I went to Five Guys for the first time a few years ago. On our first visit, we each ordered a regular fry. Holy crap were we stupid. They were very good and all, but they also filled the whole bag with fries. It was way more than we could handle. Now when we visit? 4 of us get one regular fry and it’s more than enough.

I do love Five Guys, but the fries… Excess doesn’t even begin to describe it. Way too much for one person. A bit much for two. Probably a more comfortable serving for 3 or 4.

And that’s the regular. The large? Don’t even bother trying to classify it.

President Barack Obama’s new health care plan really socks it to New York taxpayers and its bad news for residents of New Jersey and Connecticut, too.

The numbers are eye-popping. President Obama’s plan to tax investment income to pay for his health care package would force New Yorkers to fork over an additional $4.8 billion in taxes on money they get from interest, dividends and other investments.

But here’s the rub: a study by the Manhattan Institute finds that New Yorkers will pay 12 to 15 percent of all the funds raised by the new investment tax. New Jersey residents will pay 7 to 9 percent. That’s nearly 25 percent of the entire tax.

The hit to area taxpayers is so staggering that experts wonder how our congressmen and senators can support it.

It’s easy to understand.

Barack Obama is a Democrat.

They’re all Democrats.

For someone like Marcia Kramer, who’s a vet reporter (and a damn good one) to ask such an obvious question makes me think that people aren’t really willing to accept uncomfortable answers when talking about this issue.

President Barack Obama’s new health care plan really socks it to New York taxpayers and its bad news for residents of New Jersey and Connecticut, too.

The numbers are eye-popping. President Obama’s plan to tax investment income to pay for his health care package would force New Yorkers to fork over an additional $4.8 billion in taxes on money they get from interest, dividends and other investments.

But here’s the rub: a study by the Manhattan Institute finds that New Yorkers will pay 12 to 15 percent of all the funds raised by the new investment tax. New Jersey residents will pay 7 to 9 percent. That’s nearly 25 percent of the entire tax.

The hit to area taxpayers is so staggering that experts wonder how our congressmen and senators can support it.

It’s easy to understand.

Barack Obama is a Democrat.

They’re all Democrats.

For someone like Marcia Kramer, who’s a vet reporter (and a damn good one) to ask such an obvious question makes me think that people aren’t really willing to accept uncomfortable answers when talking about this issue.

The media did Barack Obama no favors when they deified him, when they tried to turn  him into a saint during the presidential campaign. Now the American people are seeing that he’s not transformational, not post-partisan, not post-political — all the wonderful things he claimed to be, with hardly a raised eyebrow by his pals in the slobbering media.

He has repeatedly told us, with great eloquence, that for big issues to become law, 50-plus-one isn’t good enough.  Big ideas need big coalitions.  They need consensus.  They need Democrats and Republicans.  Now the same Barack Obama tells us that 50-plus-one is just fine with him.  Forgive me for stating the obvious:  Barack Obama is nothing more than an old-fashioned politician, the kind we’ve seen a million times before.  The kind that gives hypocrisy a bad name. There is nothing transformational about him, nothing post-partisan, nothing post-political.  What we got in Mr. Obama is an old pol who reeks of hack.

Yep, that pretty much sums it up.

The media did Barack Obama no favors when they deified him, when they tried to turn  him into a saint during the presidential campaign. Now the American people are seeing that he’s not transformational, not post-partisan, not post-political — all the wonderful things he claimed to be, with hardly a raised eyebrow by his pals in the slobbering media.

He has repeatedly told us, with great eloquence, that for big issues to become law, 50-plus-one isn’t good enough.  Big ideas need big coalitions.  They need consensus.  They need Democrats and Republicans.  Now the same Barack Obama tells us that 50-plus-one is just fine with him.  Forgive me for stating the obvious:  Barack Obama is nothing more than an old-fashioned politician, the kind we’ve seen a million times before.  The kind that gives hypocrisy a bad name. There is nothing transformational about him, nothing post-partisan, nothing post-political.  What we got in Mr. Obama is an old pol who reeks of hack.

Yep, that pretty much sums it up.

Male claims made up about 12 percent of all cases a decade ago, but the percentage has continued to rise even as the overall number of sexual harassment complaints has declined. And last year, the percentage of lawsuits the EEOC filed on behalf of male victims hit an all-time high, making up 14 percent of all cases.

“It’s certainly possible that there’s more sexual harassment of men going on, but it could just be that more men are coming forward and complaining about it,” said Ernest Haffner, an attorney in the EEOC’s Office of Legal Counsel.

While some cases allege harassment by female supervisors or co-workers, most charges involve men harassing other men. Sometimes it’s unwelcome romantic advances. Other times, men are picked on because they are gay, perceived as being gay or not considered masculine enough for the work setting.

In the past, some employers might have shrugged off such antics as “boys will be boys” horseplay or fraternity-type behavior. But the EEOC has been filing more lawsuits involving male victims, saying it wants to send a message that such behavior is unacceptable and unlawful.

I always wondered why the media never really latched onto these stories even though we all knew they were out there. Now I think I finally have it figured out. When it was just hetero men getting harassed by women, that’s not good, but if you notice, the article goes out of its way to point out the growing number of harassment cases in the context of what it’s like to be gay and harassed.

Now that, my friends, is very interesting.

In fact, a scant mention is given in this article to the dark secret of harassment cases; that it sometimes does involve women, meaning the stereotype is continued: macho men picking on girls or effeminate boys.

*sigh* Such sloppy biased reporting.

Male claims made up about 12 percent of all cases a decade ago, but the percentage has continued to rise even as the overall number of sexual harassment complaints has declined. And last year, the percentage of lawsuits the EEOC filed on behalf of male victims hit an all-time high, making up 14 percent of all cases.

“It’s certainly possible that there’s more sexual harassment of men going on, but it could just be that more men are coming forward and complaining about it,” said Ernest Haffner, an attorney in the EEOC’s Office of Legal Counsel.

While some cases allege harassment by female supervisors or co-workers, most charges involve men harassing other men. Sometimes it’s unwelcome romantic advances. Other times, men are picked on because they are gay, perceived as being gay or not considered masculine enough for the work setting.

In the past, some employers might have shrugged off such antics as “boys will be boys” horseplay or fraternity-type behavior. But the EEOC has been filing more lawsuits involving male victims, saying it wants to send a message that such behavior is unacceptable and unlawful.

I always wondered why the media never really latched onto these stories even though we all knew they were out there. Now I think I finally have it figured out. When it was just hetero men getting harassed by women, that’s not good, but if you notice, the article goes out of its way to point out the growing number of harassment cases in the context of what it’s like to be gay and harassed.

Now that, my friends, is very interesting.

In fact, a scant mention is given in this article to the dark secret of harassment cases; that it sometimes does involve women, meaning the stereotype is continued: macho men picking on girls or effeminate boys.

*sigh* Such sloppy biased reporting.

Sacha Baron Cohen has successfully lampooned dignitaries and political leaders from around the globe, but there’s one group that Cohen won’t be able to publicly jab any time soon: Academy Award nominees.

Cohen — best known for his alter egos Borat, Brüno, and Ali G — was slated to be a presenter, along with Ben Stiller, at this Sunday’s Academy Awards. But now, just a few days before the Oscars broadcast, Cohen is no longer listed as a presenter.

The likely reason behind the removal of Cohen from the show’s lineup is that the Academy Awards producers prefer to play it safe so as to avoid offending their viewership, and Cohen’s award-show antics have led to complaints in the past.

Look I don’t find the guy all that funny, and I thought Borat sucked platypus nuts, but let’s be honest here: he’d be at that awards show if he made fun of anything but gay people in his last movie. Being controversial is suddenly grounds for being removed from an awards show?

Since effing when?

What a joke.

Cohen was a genius when he was parodying backward immigrants. Now he parodied gays and WHAM. Hollywood pulled his “you’re cool card.” Whether the movie sucked or not is immaterial at this point; what’s happening is as plain as the bullshit on your shoes.

Sacha Baron Cohen has successfully lampooned dignitaries and political leaders from around the globe, but there’s one group that Cohen won’t be able to publicly jab any time soon: Academy Award nominees.

Cohen — best known for his alter egos Borat, Brüno, and Ali G — was slated to be a presenter, along with Ben Stiller, at this Sunday’s Academy Awards. But now, just a few days before the Oscars broadcast, Cohen is no longer listed as a presenter.

The likely reason behind the removal of Cohen from the show’s lineup is that the Academy Awards producers prefer to play it safe so as to avoid offending their viewership, and Cohen’s award-show antics have led to complaints in the past.

Look I don’t find the guy all that funny, and I thought Borat sucked platypus nuts, but let’s be honest here: he’d be at that awards show if he made fun of anything but gay people in his last movie. Being controversial is suddenly grounds for being removed from an awards show?

Since effing when?

What a joke.

Cohen was a genius when he was parodying backward immigrants. Now he parodied gays and WHAM. Hollywood pulled his “you’re cool card.” Whether the movie sucked or not is immaterial at this point; what’s happening is as plain as the bullshit on your shoes.

Stop me if you’ve heard this one: despite its iron-clad grip on the sales charts, the Wii is headed for heartbreak. Sony and Microsoft are catching up. Nintendo’s day of reckoning is right around the corner, just over the horizon, a few months away.

This, dear gamers, will be the year the Wii falls.

Of course, industry pundits have been making that bold prediction pretty much every year since the Wii shipped in November of 2006, but it’s yet to come to pass. Despite a couple of minor stumbles last year, the Wii reasserted itself as the king of the consoles with a record-setting December leading to another solid month atop charts in January.

So why will 2010 be the year the Wii starts to sink? Because for the first time ever, Nintendo has admitted as much.

During an interview at a recent media summit, Nintendo executive VP Cammie Dunaway told Wired that going into the Wii’s fifth year, Nintendo is “probably not going to sell as many units next year as we sold this year.” She goes on to explain the expected slump to be little more than the “course of a cyclical business.”

A sales dip is hardly shocking: considering they’ve sold nearly 70 million Wii’s worldwide, they’re quite literally running out of consumers. They’re bound to slow down sooner or later. But Dunaway told Gamespot that Nintendo isn’t planning on unveiling a “Wii 2″ any time soon, fueling the belief that the company is going on continue riding this horse until it stops paying off.

Trouble is, for big third-party companies like EA and Capcom, it stopped paying off months ago.

The reason the Wii will start to fail this year is a simple one: no one outside of Nintendo is making games worth playing.

Basically, it’s the old knock on Nintendo for the Gameboy, 64, Gamecube, and DS all coming out all over again.

Stop me if you’ve heard this one: despite its iron-clad grip on the sales charts, the Wii is headed for heartbreak. Sony and Microsoft are catching up. Nintendo’s day of reckoning is right around the corner, just over the horizon, a few months away.

This, dear gamers, will be the year the Wii falls.

Of course, industry pundits have been making that bold prediction pretty much every year since the Wii shipped in November of 2006, but it’s yet to come to pass. Despite a couple of minor stumbles last year, the Wii reasserted itself as the king of the consoles with a record-setting December leading to another solid month atop charts in January.

So why will 2010 be the year the Wii starts to sink? Because for the first time ever, Nintendo has admitted as much.

During an interview at a recent media summit, Nintendo executive VP Cammie Dunaway told Wired that going into the Wii’s fifth year, Nintendo is “probably not going to sell as many units next year as we sold this year.” She goes on to explain the expected slump to be little more than the “course of a cyclical business.”

A sales dip is hardly shocking: considering they’ve sold nearly 70 million Wii’s worldwide, they’re quite literally running out of consumers. They’re bound to slow down sooner or later. But Dunaway told Gamespot that Nintendo isn’t planning on unveiling a “Wii 2″ any time soon, fueling the belief that the company is going on continue riding this horse until it stops paying off.

Trouble is, for big third-party companies like EA and Capcom, it stopped paying off months ago.

The reason the Wii will start to fail this year is a simple one: no one outside of Nintendo is making games worth playing.

Basically, it’s the old knock on Nintendo for the Gameboy, 64, Gamecube, and DS all coming out all over again.

Yesterday Mayor Bloomberg announced (from the set of Law & Order!) a $120,000 “Made in NY” Production Crafts Training Program, which will help women and minorities in the television and movie industry “move up the ladder to well-paying union production jobs,” according to the Post. The program will go into effect this spring, with about two dozen trainees learning specific labor union craft skills.

So let’s do some quick math here.

$120,000…

Divide that by $800 (the price of a year’s worth of rides with a Student Metrocard which most students will be losing due to budgetary constraints)…

That’s 150 needy students that could’ve been sent to school that we’ve told we can’t afford.

Yep. Our priorities are just fine.

Yesterday Mayor Bloomberg announced (from the set of Law & Order!) a $120,000 “Made in NY” Production Crafts Training Program, which will help women and minorities in the television and movie industry “move up the ladder to well-paying union production jobs,” according to the Post. The program will go into effect this spring, with about two dozen trainees learning specific labor union craft skills.

So let’s do some quick math here.

$120,000…

Divide that by $800 (the price of a year’s worth of rides with a Student Metrocard which most students will be losing due to budgetary constraints)…

That’s 150 needy students that could’ve been sent to school that we’ve told we can’t afford.

Yep. Our priorities are just fine.

In a potential reversal, White House advisers are close to recommending that President Barack Obama opt for military tribunals for self-professed Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed and four of his alleged henchman, senior officials said.

The review of where and how to hold a Sept. 11 trial is not over, so no recommendation is yet before the president and Obama has not made a determination of his own, officials said. The review is not likely to be finished this week.

Officials spoke Thursday on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to discuss private deliberations.

Un.

Effing.

Real.

Even when this moron and his administration of morons gets something right, they try to go out of their way to get it wrong.

In a potential reversal, White House advisers are close to recommending that President Barack Obama opt for military tribunals for self-professed Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed and four of his alleged henchman, senior officials said.

The review of where and how to hold a Sept. 11 trial is not over, so no recommendation is yet before the president and Obama has not made a determination of his own, officials said. The review is not likely to be finished this week.

Officials spoke Thursday on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to discuss private deliberations.

Un.

Effing.

Real.

Even when this moron and his administration of morons gets something right, they try to go out of their way to get it wrong.

President Barack Obama’s budget proposal would generate bigger deficits than advertised each year for the next decade, with the 10-year shortfall totaling $1.2 trillion more than the administration estimated, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

The nonpartisan CBO, in an annual analysis of the White House budget proposal, said today that under Obama’s plan deficits would never shrink below 4 percent of the economy between now and 2020. The cumulative deficits would total $9.76 trillion, and debt held by the public would amount to 90 percent of the nation’s gross domestic product by 2020, the CBO said.

By 2020, the federal debt would grow to $20.3 trillion under Obama’s budget, according to CBO.

Bad, getting worse, and showing no sign of getting better.

President Barack Obama’s budget proposal would generate bigger deficits than advertised each year for the next decade, with the 10-year shortfall totaling $1.2 trillion more than the administration estimated, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

The nonpartisan CBO, in an annual analysis of the White House budget proposal, said today that under Obama’s plan deficits would never shrink below 4 percent of the economy between now and 2020. The cumulative deficits would total $9.76 trillion, and debt held by the public would amount to 90 percent of the nation’s gross domestic product by 2020, the CBO said.

By 2020, the federal debt would grow to $20.3 trillion under Obama’s budget, according to CBO.

Bad, getting worse, and showing no sign of getting better.

In March 2009, a girl and a boy in the sixth grade at the Hunts Point School in the Bronx were fooling around and each drew a line on the other’s desk with an erasable marker. The teacher told them to erase the lines, and the kids went to get tissues. This blew up into a major offense when school safety officers became involved.

The safety officers, who have been accused in many instances of mistreating children, are peace officers assigned to the schools. They wear uniforms, work for the New York Police Department and have the power to detain, search, handcuff and arrest students. They do not carry guns.

In this case, the officers seized the two pupils and handcuffed them. Before long, an armed police officer showed up to question the youngsters. The girl asked for her mother and began to cry. Tears were no defense in the minds of the brave New York City law enforcers surrounding this errant child. They were determined to keep the city safe from sixth graders armed with Magic Markers.

The children were transported in handcuffs to the local precinct.

There are some tough schools in the city, which is why the NYPD took over school safety in the first place. That being said, the way they act, in general, is an embarrassment.

It’s funny, when you think about it, because the biggest dicks in the NYPD work for the Division of School Safety (not real cops) and the Traffice Enforcement Division (also not real cops). I wonder why that is?

Hint: It starts with “inferiority” and ends with “complex.”

In March 2009, a girl and a boy in the sixth grade at the Hunts Point School in the Bronx were fooling around and each drew a line on the other’s desk with an erasable marker. The teacher told them to erase the lines, and the kids went to get tissues. This blew up into a major offense when school safety officers became involved.

The safety officers, who have been accused in many instances of mistreating children, are peace officers assigned to the schools. They wear uniforms, work for the New York Police Department and have the power to detain, search, handcuff and arrest students. They do not carry guns.

In this case, the officers seized the two pupils and handcuffed them. Before long, an armed police officer showed up to question the youngsters. The girl asked for her mother and began to cry. Tears were no defense in the minds of the brave New York City law enforcers surrounding this errant child. They were determined to keep the city safe from sixth graders armed with Magic Markers.

The children were transported in handcuffs to the local precinct.

There are some tough schools in the city, which is why the NYPD took over school safety in the first place. That being said, the way they act, in general, is an embarrassment.

It’s funny, when you think about it, because the biggest dicks in the NYPD work for the Division of School Safety (not real cops) and the Traffice Enforcement Division (also not real cops). I wonder why that is?

Hint: It starts with “inferiority” and ends with “complex.”

Illinois State Senator Dale Risinger (R, Peoria) has offered a bill in Springfield that drives our society further along the path of making parts of the human body a commodity, undercutting the sacred status of human life.

SB 3613, the Presumed Donor bill, amends the Illinois Anatomical Gift Act to define all Illinois patients as “presumed donors” unless they specifically avail themselves of the opt out clause. In other words, unless you tell the government that in the case of your presumed brain death you don’t want your body parts cut out and donated to other patients, they will be cut out and given to others.

As the law stands now a potential donor has to opt in to the organ donor program in order to allow the government to authorize usage of organs in case of brain death. One must inform the state ahead of time that one will agree to donate his organs. This bill would reverse that process of consent. If SB 3613 passes all patients will be assumed to be fodder for transplants unless they’ve specifically told the state that they do not want their body parts to be parceled out to other people.

As the synopsis of the bill states: This bill, “Provides that, on and after July 1, 2012, each resident of Illinois who is of sound mind and who has attained the age of 18 years is presumed, by operation of law, to have given all of his or her body for any organ donation purposes.”

Proponents of this bill say that it will help alleviate the desperate need for donor organs and will help hundreds of patients live that might otherwise die due to their disease and lack of donor organs.

Holy shit on a shingle. There’s no way in hell this thing sould pass and yet you know some crackpot dumbass will pass it.

I guess once the state runs out of stuff to take out of your pocket, they have to take stuff literally from your heart.

Or your actual heart.

Wow.

Illinois State Senator Dale Risinger (R, Peoria) has offered a bill in Springfield that drives our society further along the path of making parts of the human body a commodity, undercutting the sacred status of human life.

SB 3613, the Presumed Donor bill, amends the Illinois Anatomical Gift Act to define all Illinois patients as “presumed donors” unless they specifically avail themselves of the opt out clause. In other words, unless you tell the government that in the case of your presumed brain death you don’t want your body parts cut out and donated to other patients, they will be cut out and given to others.

As the law stands now a potential donor has to opt in to the organ donor program in order to allow the government to authorize usage of organs in case of brain death. One must inform the state ahead of time that one will agree to donate his organs. This bill would reverse that process of consent. If SB 3613 passes all patients will be assumed to be fodder for transplants unless they’ve specifically told the state that they do not want their body parts to be parceled out to other people.

As the synopsis of the bill states: This bill, “Provides that, on and after July 1, 2012, each resident of Illinois who is of sound mind and who has attained the age of 18 years is presumed, by operation of law, to have given all of his or her body for any organ donation purposes.”

Proponents of this bill say that it will help alleviate the desperate need for donor organs and will help hundreds of patients live that might otherwise die due to their disease and lack of donor organs.

Holy shit on a shingle. There’s no way in hell this thing sould pass and yet you know some crackpot dumbass will pass it.

I guess once the state runs out of stuff to take out of your pocket, they have to take stuff literally from your heart.

Or your actual heart.

Wow.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev demanded Monday that sports officials step down over the country’s dismal performance at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver.

Russia, a traditional winter sports powerhouse, won just 15 medals — with only three golds — in one of its worst performances. Officials said before the games that 30 medals and a top-three finish in the medal standings was the target.

Russia placed 11th for golds and sixth in the overall medal count.

In televised comments, Medvedev said if those responsible for preparing the athletes don’t resign then the decision will be made for them. He did not mention anyone by name.

“Those who bear the responsibility for Olympic preparations should carry that responsibility. It’s totally clear,” Medvedev said. “I think that the individuals responsible, or several of them, who answer for these preparations, should take the courageous decision to hand in their notice. If we don’t see such decisiveness, we will help them.”

Oof. Wouldn’t want to be one of those guys. Those meetings won’t be going well.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev demanded Monday that sports officials step down over the country’s dismal performance at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver.

Russia, a traditional winter sports powerhouse, won just 15 medals — with only three golds — in one of its worst performances. Officials said before the games that 30 medals and a top-three finish in the medal standings was the target.

Russia placed 11th for golds and sixth in the overall medal count.

In televised comments, Medvedev said if those responsible for preparing the athletes don’t resign then the decision will be made for them. He did not mention anyone by name.

“Those who bear the responsibility for Olympic preparations should carry that responsibility. It’s totally clear,” Medvedev said. “I think that the individuals responsible, or several of them, who answer for these preparations, should take the courageous decision to hand in their notice. If we don’t see such decisiveness, we will help them.”

Oof. Wouldn’t want to be one of those guys. Those meetings won’t be going well.