Guess the sentence!

A guy shows up at your house drunk, starts in wrecking the place and punches you out. Oh and you're an old guy, 73, he's 50, you're pretty sure he's going to kill you. So you find the ancient .22 revolver you've got kicking around and you shoot him in the leg. And he lives.

What do you get from the judge?

1) Good citizenship medal
2) House arrest
3) Hard jail time
4) suspended sentence
5) The cops says "Way to go, Grandad!" and doesn't charge you.

Well, it depends where you live and who you are. If you're some random old guy in Arizona, you get a medal or at least the cop just gives you a pass. If you're a White AngloSaxon taxpaying senior with no criminal record in Ontario, you're going to the Big House baby. If you're The Phantom they probably take you out behind the court house hang you from the old oak tree.  With an ugly rope.
Here's what happens to Canadian ex-diplomats:

A former member of Canada's diplomatic corps[Foster] was sentenced to house arrest Thursday after pleading guilty to shooting another man [Cantwell] in the leg during a scuffle.
The guilty plea allowed Foster to avoid more serious charges that could have resulted in a four-year mandatory prison term. Crown prosecutor Julie Scott said the circumstances of the shooting were "troubling," but the issue of self-defence would have been a live one at trial.
Foster received an 18-month conditional sentence, including nine months of house arrest.
Cantwell, who had once dated one of Foster's daughters, received a 12-month conditional sentence last year after pleading guilty to assault, mischief to property and disturbing the occupants of a dwelling house.

Foster got "house arrest", meaning pretty much nothing, because he's probably connected out the wazoo and got the Special Plea deal. The other guy got "conditional", meaning pretty much nothing, because... well really there's no good reason why they let him skip, but he did.

By the way, the penalty for possessing an unregistered pistol, not using it mind you but just having it, is ten years in jail. Just so we're all clear why its good to be connected.

The Phantom

When you've lost Chris Mathews...

... and you're a DemocRat... you're done like dinner.

The Phantom

OWS retards rediscover the reason we have health regulations.

In a word, tuberculosis. Some bum had it, now siad bum is sharing with the brave, moral freedom fighters.

The home base for Occupy Atlanta has tested positive for tuberculosis.

The Fulton County Health Department confirmed Wednesday that residents at the homeless shelter where protesters have been occupying have contracted the drug-resistant disease. WGCL reports that a health department spokeswoman said there is a possibility that both Occupy Atlanta protesters and the homeless people in the shelter may still be at risk since tuberculosis is contracted through air contact.

There's a reason we don't all camp out in public parks whenever we want, live in tents in winter and generally not wash. Its called DISEASE. You camp out in winter in large numbers, good chance you're going to get sick and die.

I'm waiting for these dumb bunnies to rediscover the need for FIRE REGULATIONS next.  Open cooking fire, closely spaced nylon tents, maybe a couple dozen propane canisters and a nice can of camp fuel or two, BOOM baby!

If you build it they will come... and burn it down.

The Phantom

Wow. More Fast & Furious worms rocketing out of that can.

Wow.  That's all you can say to this. Wow.

Former U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke in Arizona, who resigned in the wake of a congressional probe into the Fast and Furious undercover investigation his office oversaw, has admitted leaking a sensitive document about a federal agent who blew the whistle on the gunrunning operation, according to Sen. Chuck Grassley, Iowa Republican.

Mr. Grassley, in a statement late Tuesday, said the leaked document was "deemed so sensitive by the Justice Department that it was not provided to Congress, except in a secured room at department headquarters."

"Leaking sensitive documents to the press and retaliating against whistleblowers is not good faith cooperation with Congress," Mr. Grassley said.

Apparently although Burke has admitted providing a journalist with said "extremely sensitive" document, he was not the only one who had done so.

Mr. Burke's Phoenix attorney, Lee Stein, said in a Nov. 8 letter to the Justice Department's Office of Inspector General — which was posted on Politico — that his client had provided information to a reporter who was working on several stories involving Fast and Furious. The attorney said "it was clear" to Mr. Burke from their conversations that the reporter already was aware of a memo about Agent Dodson and he wanted "to give context to information the reporter already had."

Because hey, the horse is already out of the barn, right?  Why not open the other door too? Right?... Right?

John Dodson's lawyer was less than impressed, it seems.

Agent Dodson's attorney, Robert Driscoll, said in a statement: "Special Agent Dodson demonstrated both tremendous courage and fidelity to the mission of ATF when he came forward to discuss the misguided Fast and Furious investigation. It is unfortunate that his superiors at ATF and DOJ did not listen to his attempts to address the matter internally, and instead chose to attack him once he, out of necessity, stepped forward." 

 

Mr. Driscoll described Mr. Burke's public acknowledgment that he "participated in such misguided efforts to smear Agent Dodson is welcome, but unfortunately Burke did not act alone in attempting to ruin Special Agent Dodson's career."

If I were Agent John Dodson I'd be moving to Aruba right frickin' smartly.  On a non-US charter, oh yeah.

So if you're an ATF/FBI/Border Patrol/Homeland Security/CIA/ other Man in Black, and you have irrefutable evidence of officials in your agency acting in recklessly stupid and even criminal fashion, you now know that:
A) your superiors will not only ignore you, they will not only order you to shut up, they will not only use every legal and procedural means to punish you,  they will do their very best to crush and smear you publicly. And:
B) you won't even be able to find out how high the rot goes, because the government is rotting from the head down. It goes all the way to the top, baby.  The President himself may have ordered the hammer job on this Dodson guy.

Holy crap my friends.  Interesting times. Keep that powder dry, watch your six.

The Phantom

French media so polite!

Try to imagine what would have happened here if George Bush or Ronald Regan had been President.

The conversation then drifted to Netanyahu, at which time Sarkozy declared: "I cannot stand him. He is a liar." According to the report, Obama replied: "You're fed up with him, but I have to deal with him every day!"
The remark was naturally meant to be said in confidence, but the two leaders' microphones were accidently left on, making the would-be private comment embarrassingly public.
The communication faux pas went unnoticed for several minutes, during which the conversation between the two heads of state – which quickly reverted to other matters – was all but open to members the press, who were still in possession of headsets provided by the Elysée for the sake of simultaneous translation during the G20 press conference.

Open mic three minutes long? Oh, there would be a FEAST on this sucker.  What do we get? One comment.  Why?

A member of the media confirmed Monday that "there were discussions between journalists and they agreed not to publish the comments due to the sensitivity of the issue."
The surprising lack of coverage may be explained by a report alleging that reporters present at the event were requested to sign an agreement to keep mum on the subject of the embarrassing comments.
He added that while it was annoying to have to refrain from publishing the information, the journalists are subject to precise rules of conduct.

Yeah, there's rules for when the POTUS is a Democrat.  Otherwise, not so much.

 The Phantom

This is what happens when you just keep voting DemocRat.

As is well known, Detroit has been a DemocRat Party bastion since Prohibition.  Latest from Motown, no buses downtown.

People who catch the bus in Detroit may be waiting awhile Friday. About 100 Detroit Department of Transportation bus drivers are at work, but are refusing to drive their buses.

Is this some kinda union thing, work slowdown, another taxpayer shakedown?

WWJ Newsradio 950′s Scott Ryan spoke with Henry Gaffney, spokesman for the D-DOT bus drivers union AFL-CIO Local 26, who said this was not an organized maneuver by the union.

Gaffney said it's a matter of bus drivers fearing for their safety, citing an incident that happened Thursday afternoon.

"Our drivers are scared, they're scared for their lives. This has been an ongoing situation about security. I think yesterday kind of just topped it off, when one of my drivers was beat up by some teenagers down in the middle of Rosa Parks and it took the police almost 30 minutes to get there, in downtown Detroit," said Gaffney.

Wow.  They won't drive the BUS through downtown because its too -dangerous-. For real, and no kidding.

I'd like to be the very first to say, POOR BABIES. You sowed the wind, and now you are reaping the whirlwind. Maybe y'all should have a big cup of Shut the F- Up and try WALKING.
For why is the Phantom so dyspectic?  Let us consider for a millisecond the fate of a bus driver who defended himself with a firearm instead of waiting half an hour for the cops to show up.
Would he be fired? Indubitably.
Would he be pilloried in the press? Incorrigibly.
Would he be charged with murder should one of his attackers die of being shot while trying to kill him? Inevitably.

Therefore I say, "Detroit, it looks good on you. Wear it, you illiterate chumps."

The Unsympathetic Phantom

ACORN showing true Leftist form after FOX news story.

Deny, lie, censor and oppress.

Officials with the revamped ACORN office in New York -- operating as New York Communities for Change -- have fired staff, shredded reams of documents and told workers to blame disgruntled ex-employees for leaking information in an effort to explain away a FoxNews.com report last week on the group's involvement in Occupy Wall Street protests, according to sources.

NYCC also is installing surveillance cameras and recording devices at its Brooklyn offices, removing or packing away supplies bearing the name ACORN and handing out photos of Fox News staff with a stern warning not to talk to the media, the sources said.

Weenies dumb enough to take the money are getting the full-on Soviet treatment.

NYCC is also monitoring its staff's behavior, cracking down on phone use and socialization. Officials have ordered all papers -- even scraps -- to be shredded every night, the source said.

"And all the supplies—everything around the office that said 'ACORN' -- is now all in storage until this blows over," the source said. "People literally have to cover up the cameras on the back of their cellphones in the office."

"Now there's no texting in the office, no phone calls in the office. They tell us to take our phone calls out into the waiting room where there's an intercom, and then they turn on the intercom to hear our conversations. They're installing new cameras and speakers around the building so they can hear everything. 

"It's almost like working at Fort Knox."

Love it when these roaches get caught in the middle of the counter as the kitchen light comes on.  SMACK SMACK SMACK!

The Phantom Roach Smacker.

National Post, Canada's CONSERVATIVE newspaper?

I think not.  Comments made in response to this article in the Toronto (Red) Star.  Which, predictably, is 100% fear and loathing propaganda.

The point of getting rid of the gun registry was supposed to be that it criminalized farmers and hunters. But now the Conservatives are delisting sniper rifles and the kind of semi-automatic used in the Norway massacre. Why do farmers and hunters need sniper rifles that can pierce armour from a kilometre away? If the registry is to be killed, shouldn't the government tighten up other controls on dangerous weapons?

Here's three big time "conservative" scribblers take:

Barbara Kay: I think guns are fine for people who need them to hunt or just like them for shooting at targets. But I don't get the semi-automatic thing, since it's only purpose is to mow down enemies by spraying bullets around so promiscuously some of them will kill. They're unsportsmanlike for hunting, obviously, and it doesn't take any special marksmanship to use them.

Kelly McParland: The issue is whether anyone needs to own these guns. The whole anti-registry battle was fought over the issue that farmers and hunters should be allowed to have guns. But no one needs these weapons, so why aren't they just banned?

Jonathan Kay: I don't pretend to understand the gun obsession. But my sense is that gun nuts see their guns as a sort of symbolic totem that allows them to control their fate and protect themselves in a society that is chaotic and communalistic. And that the bigger the gun the more powerful is their sense of self control.

Are you frickin' kidding me?

And they wonder why their damn newspaper keeps losing money.

The Phantom

Security theater... of the absurd!

Apparently, the United States of America has quietly stopped policing its borders.  Amazing.

"Orders have been sent out from Border Patrol headquarters in Washington, D.C., to Border Patrol sectors nationwide that checks of transportation hubs and systems located away from the southwest border of the United States will only be conducted if there is intelligence indicating a threat," the release says.

Those who have received the orders said agents may still go to train and bus stations and airports if they have specific "actionable intelligence" that there is an illegal immigrant there who recently entered the country. An agent in Washington state said it's not clear how agents are supposed to glean such intelligence, and even if they did, under the new directive they still require clearance from Washington, D.C., headquarters before they can respond.

 What are they doing instead?

The situation is similar in upstate New York, where an agent told the AP - also on the condition of anonymity - that a senior manager relayed the new directive during a morning roll call last month. Since then, instead of checking buses or trains, agents have spent shifts sitting in their vehicles gazing out at Lake Erie and Lake Ontario, where few illegal immigrants cross.

"They're already bored," the agent said. "You grab the paper every day and you go do the crossword."

Why does this crossword need done  so urgently by so many agents?

Current and former Border Patrol agents said field offices around the country began receiving the order last month - soon after the Obama administration announced that to ease an overburdened immigration system, it would allow many illegal immigrants to remain in the country while it focuses on deporting those who have committed crimes.

In English, that means the Border Patrol has been ordered not to arrest illegals so the INS doesn't have to process them, and so that Barry can get more of that much needed illegal Mexican vote.

All in all, a great time to be a drug mule.

The Phantom

Sometimes... one is at a loss for words.

Coming to you from Small Dead Animals, a link to a person so fundamentally mental... I'm unable to really grasp what his malfunction is.

The Conservative government's bill to scrap the requirement to register long-guns comes with a surprising clause: it requires the Commissioner of Firearms destroy all records of registered long-guns.
<snippage>
But, personally, I find the destruction of any kind of government data utterly abhorent and contrary to the concept of open government.

In response, I'm posting publicly a copy of the gun registry database I received via the Access to Information Act in 2007.

We used this data in an Ottawa Citizen series called "Rapid Fire" that explored issues involved in gun ownership in Canada.

So here we have a guy, Glen McGregor, who views government records of private citizen's personal property as being so holy, so important, that he's going to post HIS OWN REGISTRY. To, you know, save it. Or something.
Here's what he says about himself, right off the mast head of his web page:

Ottawa Citizen reporter covering government, politics and anything else that interests me. Specializing in data journalism and Twitter evangelism. This is just a place to dump Hill droppings and other found items that are too long for Twitter. Follow me there at @glen_mcgregor or email me at sushiboy21@gmail.com.

Ottawa Citizen reporter. Uh HUH. Nice three day beard dude. You look mahvelous.

And we all wondered -why- the media never ever EVER gives us the straight unvarnished goods in a gun related story. Its because DICKHEADS run it.

My comment on Little Glenny's blog was this:

So Glen, is it ok if I dig up your address and post it on my blog? How about a Google map and a StreetView of your house too? And maybe a list of your major appliances and more expensive possessions, you know, just in case anybody's interested?

Love to hear your opinion on that little undertaking, dude.

Currently awaiting moderation, as of 10:22 pm. So we'll see what Little Glenny has to say. I'm not expecting anything too coherent, I must say.

The Phantom

Barry gathers his troops.

Barry must be having a cow.  He's in Hollywood assembling the First Propaganda Division of Barry's Army.

Among the small group of industry insiders who were invited to attended the early-morning meeting with the president at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel were: Weinstein Co. studio head Harvey Weinstein, CAA managing partner and music head Rob Light, ICM president Chris Silbermann, Modern Family creator Steve Levitan, Atlantic Records chairman Craig Kallman, producer/songwriter Bruce Roberts, talent manger and producer Jason Weinberg, UTA music agent Rob Prinz, talent manager and producer Eric Ortner, Island Def Jam senior vice president Karen Kwak, Warner Bros. Records president Livia Tortella, talent manager Greg Mertz, ID PR publicists Kelly Bush and Mara Buxbaum, talent managers Bruce Flohr, Michael Green, Steve Moir and Bill Silva, Universial Music Publishing Group executive vice president and head of creative Tom Sturges, entertainment attorney Chuck Ortner and actor/activist Kal Penn.

The event was not a fundraiser, and attendees were not asked to donate to the Obama reelection campaign. But those invited have been ardent supporters of the president and were identified as "influencers" with the ability to help Obama shape the national political conversation heading into a tough race in 2012.

Their donations will be more in kind than in money, no doubt. I do believe we will be treated to a big bunch of socialist propaganda movies over the next year.  Huzzah.  And as previously noted, people wonder why media company stocks are circling the bowl...

The Phantom

Duh alert... Media company execs are MORONS.

This just kills me.  Check it out:

The rapid adoption of tablet computers like iPad has not reversed the slide in paying customers for news, as many media company executives had hoped the devices would.

Are you kidding me? There are actually executive corner office types who were doofus enough to think that the -shape- of the computer people surf on would change their willingness to pay for something they can get for free?

"When it was launched, many observers believed that the tablet might help change the experience of news consumers and the economic ground rules of digital news consumption," writes the authors of the Pew Research Center report. "That belief was based on the sense that people would consume information on tablets largely through special applications or apps that provide content from a favorite news organization like the New York Times or one's local newspaper." The survey showed more than 70 percent still use the web browser or a combination of the web and apps to get their news. Just a fifth of tablet users use apps as their primary source for news.

Truly, there are some guys out there living in Fantasy Land. The reason nobody is willing to pay for the "news" is that it ain't NEWS.  Its propaganda for the American DemocRat party and obviously so. The whole blogosphere basically exists as a fact check on the "news". Furthermore nobody wants to live in the walled garden of the Apple Ap-store when the whole web is sitting there free to surf.

Sell that media stock my friends.  Those companies are dead ducks walking.

The Phantom.

Self Inflicted Wounds.

Apparently the people who live around Zuccotti Park are getting tired of the smelly hippies. Poor babies.

New Yorkers who live near the park where anti-Wall Street protesters have been camping out for more than a month are complaining that their quality of life has declined.

At a two-hour meeting Thursday night, some neighbors said protesters urinated in the streets and beat drums in the middle of the night.

"They're defecating on our doorsteps," said Catherine Hughes, a member of the area's community board, a representative panel that helps funnel local concerns to city officials.

That's what you get when you vote the way they always do. You asked for it, you got it. Toyota.

Lets be clear whose doorstep is getting crapped on here.  You live near Zuccotti Park, you've got some -serious- dough to blow on housing.  We're talking millions of bucks for a two bedroom condo.  That would be "million-S" in the plural.
So, what does a big huge bank account get you in NYC?

Some neighbors who attended the packed meeting called for the protesters to vacate Zuccotti Park, the plaza where protesters have set up their base camp.

But the board voted unanimously for a resolution that recognized the protesters' First Amendment rights while calling for a crackdown on noise and public urination and defecation.

Three local elected officials praised the resolution in a statement Thursday.

It gets you nuttin', is what.  Because the "three local elected officials" are  DEMOCRATS, one of whom is Gerold "The Mouth" Nadler. This doorstep-crapping, stairwell-pissing astroturf freak show is -their- personal clown circus, bought, paid for and put on by DemocRats, for the benefit of DemocRats, and screw everybody else.

My questions for today: how stupid are the hyper-rich of New Yawk?  Will they continue to vote for the guys who are happily throwing them under the bus just to get a cheap propaganda show on the TV? Do they realize that this mob could decide to BURN DOWN their apartment buildings pretty much any time?  Do they comprehend that their "local elected officials" are the sole reason that these Occupy Somebody Else's Private Property imbeciles are taking a dump on their twenty million dollar real estate?

Or is it more a matter of going along with the gag so the gravy train your zillions are coming from doesn't come off the rails?  Because zillionairs aren't primarily known for stupidity.

Just wondering.

The Phantom

Wag the dog 2011-style.

Reposted from Small Dead Animals, -proof- of the connection between Big Media, Barry's 2012 campaign, and the collection of pinheads known to the media as "Occupy Wall Street".  99% bullshit, 1% useful idiots.  We've got the email archive, which a mole helpfully posted to the web. Big Journalism's post on the subject is here, and really worth a look.

So just in case you've been wondering why the media is paying so much attention to some smelly hippies leaving raw sewage on private property they don't own in NYC, while they utterly ignored about a third of the country turning out for the Tea Parties, wonder no more.  Its a put up job.  Otherwise known as, the main stream media of the USA (and Canada!!!) is bought and paid for.  And we just proved it.  Again.

The Phantom

What is THE difference between the USA and Canada?

In Canada, this would be legal:

On September 22, 2011, H.R. 3011 was introduced in the House. It is entitled the "Transportation Security Administration Authorization Act of 2011" and it contains some curious language.
...

The language states that it would be illegal to "convey the impression" that you are representing the TSA, but this interpretation would likely be left to federal prosecutors.

In the past, satire was protected under the First Amendment, but it may soon be illegal to poke fun at the TSA or use its logo or even utter its name. Notice there is no exception in the above language for parody.

Political satire is as old as the Greeks and the Bible. But it may now become a punishable crime if this legislation is enacted.

Yes, my fellow Canadians, let's not fool ourselves.  In Canada the Parliament really can pass a law making it illegal to lampoon, parody, or otherwise mock government agencies and/or employees.  In fact, its been done already.  Right now our Supreme Court is grappling with the weighty issue of whether or not to ALLOW us to say mean things about members of certain protected groups.  Not to be mean to them mind you, just to say things about them.

In the United States, this law can't survive its first day in court.  Well, unless Barry and friends find a way to pack the court, of course.  Then all bets are off. 

Kind of like they are here in Canada, our courts got packed in the 1970's.  Frankly, its been pretty much down hill ever since Pierre Trudeau declared war on freedom in this country.

The Phantom

Ass-Backward into the Future!

One of the things I rage on about here constantly is that we have too much government.  This is best seen in the small things, like this:

A tree house is causing controversy in one Falls Church neighborhood after a father built it for his two young boys. Fairfax County officials are considering tearing it down because the tree house violates county rules because it was built in the front yard. He needed a permit first to build the tree house.

One of the other things I rage on about is our too-much-government looking the other way and allowing outrages to be perpetrated.  This is best seen in the large things, like this:

Occupy Wall Street is on the move ... uptown.

Why uptown? Because that's where the rich folks live!

Organizers are planning a march on Tuesday that will visit the homes of JP Morgan Chase (JPM, Fortune 500) CEO Jamie Dimon, billionaire David Koch, hedge fund honcho John Paulson, Howard Milstein, and News Corp (NWSA, Fortune 500) CEO Rupert Murdoch.

The millionaires and billionaires are being targeted for what event organizers called a "willingness to hoard wealth at the expense of the 99%."

Just so we are clear here: you CAN mob the house of people you don't like if you are part of a rent-a-mob for the DemocRat Party, but you CAN'T build a tree house for the kids without a permit.  And likely a bribe for the building inspector.

The Phantom

Andrew Coyne has been reading my mind.

It takes a little while to get to the good part, but this column by Andrew Coyne has goodness in it.

The Ontario Conservatives have lost three elections in a row with this same nicely-nicely, Clever Dick approach; the Manitoba Conservatives, four. At some point, you'd think it would occur to them: this isn't working. But it never seems to.

So let me spell it out for them. Conservatives: unless you give voters a reason to vote for you, they will not. Until you trust in yourselves, they will never trust you. They can smell fear, and they can tell when people aren't being straight with them. Don't want to be accused of hidden agendas? Have an agenda. Don't think you can sell that vision? Find another line of work. You're in the persuasion business.

That's what I'm talking about.  You want to be a Conservative?  BE ONE THEN.  You don't think Conservatism can win? Join the Liberals!!!

The Phantom

Liberals win Ontario election.

We are -so- fracked...

The Phantom

BUSTED!

Eric Holder knew about Fast&Furious in July 2010. 

New documents obtained by CBS News show Attorney General Eric Holder was sent briefings on the controversial Fast and Furious operation as far back as July 2010. That directly contradicts his statement to Congress.

On May 3, 2011, Holder told a Judiciary Committee hearing, "I'm not sure of the exact date, but I probably heard about Fast and Furious for the first time over the last few weeks."

Yet internal Justice Department documents show that at least ten months before that hearing, Holder began receiving frequent memos discussing Fast and Furious.

He lied to Congress. Like a Persian carpet.

How unexpected!

The Phantom

Russel Smith: dude, who cares what you think?

Here's an article by Russel Smith in the Blob and Snail that I read while sitting in the doctor's office yesterday.  Happily, I didn't have to buy the paper, because it generated a very strong wave of "WHAT! EVER!" through my neural network.  To wit:

We old farts did that tiring reporting/interviewing stuff for years before we were allowed to write our opinions on things. I still don't even aspire to this ideal of not being edited; not being edited doesn't seem like a benefit to me. I still have a deep-rooted (and unjustified) instinct telling me that something published has value only if it has been commissioned by someone else.

I am biased in this debate: I don't care so much about the young people's careers, I care about mine, and if they don't play along in the work-for-pay convention, then all of our incomes are undercut. This is why other trades have unions. But creators are not very good at solidarity.

Now, speaking as an Old Fart who writes for free, and purely for the purpose of expressing my opinion before the top of my freakin' head blows off, I have only this to say:

Dear Russel, if it wasn't for the likes of you infesting the Canadian publishing establishment for the last 50+ years, making the whole thing into nothing more than a machine for cranking out Liberal Party of Canada propaganda, maybe your career wouldn't be circling the bowl along with every other print media worker in this country.  You and yours have made Canadian newspapers, magazines, television and radio into a monolithic boulder on the Left side of the political spectrum.  Anybody who wants to do something that hasn't been given official approval by the LPC re-election committee is doing it on the Internet, and there's nobody to blame but YOURSELVES.  I bet almost as many people will read this little rant of mine as read your blather in the Blob, too.

Its probably not too late to change your career to welding.  Better hit the gym, steel is heavy.

The Exploding Phantom