You probably know that Glenn Beck is insane as a shit-house rat. But maybe you don't know that Glenn used to do a lot of drugs. I don't know if he "chased the dragon", but he did do cocaine, pot, and was a huge drunk.
Anyways, here's a little vid of Glenn debating Rob Kampia of the Marijuana Policy Project. I don't know what the fuck Glenn was/is on, but he should cut it out. It's making him act like a weirdo. I also like that Glenn can't come up with any arguments against ending marijuana prohibition, but he's still against it anyways. Why the harping of "they shouldn't do it juts to raise money!" Did it ever occur to Glenn that maybe it's not just the money, but actually because of all the reasons why Kampia mentioned?
That has to suck. Life's a bitch and so you decide to off yourself. In the end, you're such a fuck-up that you can't even do that right. What's even worse is when these people fuck up and manage to not only not kill themselves, but accidentally kill someone else. So is the case for a New Brunswick, NJ man who wound up killing a father of three.
A man who allegedly tried to commit suicide last year by plowing his car into another vehicle — killing the other driver — has been indicted on murder charges.
Steven Osadacz of Spotswood, who survived the crash, also was charged Friday with causing death by auto in the Nov. 10 crash in East Brunswick that killed 46-year-old Stephen Fagbewesa of Old Bridge.
Authorities have said Fagbewesa — a married father of three young children — was stopped at a three-way intersection when Osadacz's sport utility vehicle hit the driver's side of his car. They also say Osadacz — driving on a suspended license — had been drinking and was speeding.
Osadacz remains jailed $1 million bail. It wasn't known if he has retained a lawyer. - Source
Way to go, moron. If you're going to kill yourself, buy a fucking gun. You can get them at Wal Mart. Can't afford that, then jump off a tall building. Can't stand heights, then take a bunch of pills.
Trying to kill yourself by crashing your car into something has to be dumbest fucking way possible to kill yourself. Maybe I need to do what Tender Branson did in Palahniuk's Survivor did and put up suicide prevention stickers with my number on it.
Tonight, a girl calls me from inside a pounding dance club. Her only words I can make out are "behind."
She says, "asshole."
She says what could be "muffin" or "nothing." The fact of the matter is you can't begin to fill in the blanks so I'm in the kitchen, alone and yelling to be heard over the dance mix wherever. She sounds young and worn out, so I ask if she'll trust me. Is she tired of hurting? I ask if there's only one way to end her pain, will she do it?
My goldfish is swimming around all excited inside the fishbowl on the fridge so I reach up and drop a Valium in its water.
I'm yelling at this girl: has she had enough?
I'm yelling: I'm not going to stand here and listen to her complain.
To stand here and try to fix her life is just a big waste of time. People don't want their lives fixed. Nobody wants their problems solved. Their dramas. Their distractions. Their stories resolved. Their messes cleaned up. Because what would they have left? Just the big scary unknown.
Most people who call me already know what they want. Some want to die but are just looking for my permission. Some want to die and just need a little encouragement. A little push. Someone bent on suicide won't have much sense of humor left. One wrong word, and they're an obituary the next week. Most of the calls I get, I'm only half listening anyway. Most of the people, I decide who lives and who dies just by the tone of their voice.
This is getting nowhere with the girl at the dance club so I tell her, Kill yourself.
She's saying, "What?"
Kill yourself.
She's saying, "What?"
Try barbiturates and alcohol with your head inside a dry cleaning bag.
She says, "What?"
You cannot bread a veal cutlet and do a good job with only one hand so I tell her, now or never. Pull the trigger or don't. I'm with her right now. She's not going to die alone, but I don't have all night. - Source
People thought the video game industry was recession-proof. Well, they were wrong as shit about that one. Game studios have been closing down left and right and larger developers and publishers have been trimming jobs in the tunes of hundreds.
According to FiveThirtyEight.com, which gained national prominence for being incredibly accurate in its guess of the 2008 Presidential Election (actually being the most accurate to a nearly uncanny degree), beer sales are declining. Beyond just being very politically savvy, FiveThirtyEight.com obviously has good taste. As they ponder some of the reason's for the decline, they make note and mention of both ThreeFloyd's Alpha King and of famed Maryland brewery, Dogfish Head. And not just mention, but hotlinks as well. Huzzah! While I prefer ThreeFloyd's Robert The Bruce scotch ale, Alpha King is a damn good beer for any hop-lover.
Beer, it seems, is no longer what's for dinner.
The chart that follows details the quarterly change in alcohol purchased for home consumption, adjusted for inflation and dating all the way back to 1959. We can compare this against the quarterly change in real GDP:
As you can see, there has generally not been much of a relationship between alcohol purchases and changes in GDP -- the correlation is essentially zero. Nor have alcohol purchases historically been any kind of lagging or leading indicator.
But something was very, very different in the fourth quarter of 2008. Sales of alcohol for off-premises consumption were down by 9.3 percent from the previous quarter, according to the Commerce Department. This is absolutely unprecedented: the largest previous drop had been just 3.7 percent, between the third and fourth quarters of 1991.
Beer accounts for almost all of the decrease, with revenues off by almost 14 percent. Wine and spirits were much more stable, with sales volumes declining by 1.6 percent and 0.9 percent respectively.
Now, there are several plausible explanations for this. Alcohol sales -- but particularly beer -- had been on something of a hot streak prior to the 4Q, so perhaps there was some reversion to the mean. Perhaps people are substituting Michelob and Coors for more expensive microbrews like Alpha King and Dogfish Head. (This is unpatriotic, by the way, since all the macrobrews are now owned by foreign-based multinational conglomerates. Stimulate your country -- and your tastebuds!).
Perhaps retailers are discounting their prices, or brewers are passing along cost savings to their consumers (there had been a hops shortage for much of 2007-08). All of these are probably factors to some extent or another.
Nevertheless, it's absolutely startling to see a major consumer staple experience a sales decline like this. - Source
FiveThiryEight also notes that both gambling and jewelry/watches are down too, but I couldn't care less about that. I don't wear jewelry nor watches, as the societal norm of wearing a watch on your left wrist feels awkward against my nerve-deadened scar (which basically feels like permanent local anaesthesia), and Virginia doesn't have gambling. And, no, the lotto doesn't count. I mean good, fun gambling, like blackjack and poker.
Oh, Japan. Even though your finance minister shows up drunk, we still love you. In fact, we love you long time.
Japan's finance minister abruptly resigned Tuesday over allegations he made a drunken appearance at a G-7 news conference, shaking Prime Minister Taro Aso's already deeply unpopular government.
Nakagawa has been under fire over allegations he appeared to be drunk at a news conference following the G-7 finance ministers meeting in Rome over the weekend. TV footage showed him slurring his speech and looking drowsy and confused.
Nakagawa has said he took cold medicine, which, along with jet lag, made him groggy. - Source
Ah, yes. The "cold medicine" made him act all loopy. We get ya. *wink, wink* It's okay, dude. Those meetings must be boring as shit. I would sneak some grog in too. Though, not if I was going to have to give a speech.
I don't... Honestly... I can't... This is... FUCK!
This is why trial by jury is fucking stupid. A trial by your "peers" who are made up of fucking complete morons is absolute bullshit. Sure, trial by a jury of your peers sounds great, but it's not. It is so horrendously flawed that the entire concept is beyond just bullshit and falls into the dumb beyond fucking belief category. Proof?
A Brooklyn man who was drunk when he fell into the path of a subway train and lost part of his leg has been awarded $2.3 million by a jury.
Dustin Dibble has admitted that he was so drunk he doesn't even remember the incident at the Union Square subway station in April 2006.
But Dibble's lawyer argued in court that the motorman had time to stop the train when he saw the 25-year-old lying on the tracks 180 feet away — and the jury agreed, assigning most of the blame to New York City Transit. - Source
Obviously, none of these fucking retards understands how a train works. HINT: It's a big fucking heavy piece of equipment that takes a lot of time to slow down, let alone stop.
I don't know if this guy from Natural Bridge, Virginia (hey! that's right near me!) was a fan of the fairly obscure comic, Cadillacs & Dinosaurs, but regardless of his comic book savvy, his exhibit is awesome.
^ Dinosaurs @ 0:35 ^
The bit preceeding the dino exhibit is pretty funny too.
I've said before that I think of YouTube as the cesspool of the internet. It's where the worst shitheads that partly reside in cyberspace congregate to publish their collective ignorance and bigotry. I'm not talking about the vids, but the masses of comments that make you want to bash your face against a large rock. Yes, there is the occasional thought-provoking comment, but you mostly just find, "u r teh ghey" or some derivative. At least 4Chan can be creative with their hate postings.
Through a series of winding videos of interest I saw a response video from, possibly one of the best usernames on YouTube, C0ct0pus. It seems that C0ct0pus is no stranger to controversy. He's a YouTuber, dammit! He speaks his mind, dammit! Even if being a YouTuber does sound like some kind of weird German sex fetish...
Anyways, I took a quick cursory glance at the comments and I suddenly spied this precious gem from C0ct0pus:
how about i look up your mom's giant cunt? - Source
And with that, I nominate C0ct0pus be the face, the emblem, of YouTube. The poster child, if you will. His scruffy appearance, his crazy, glaring eyes, his brilliant mastery of prose... It just screams "I AM YOUTUBE!" And really, the quote's only any good if it's got the pic, and the pic's only good if you got the quote. It might be offensive, crude, and profane, but "how about i look up your mom's giant cunt" really should become YouTube's new slogan.
Some might be crying over this, but to me it's no big deal. When Bass was sold to Interbrew (which is now part of InBev) it went straight down the shitter. The subtleties of the malt bill that made Bass such a wonderful ale to drink at just below room temperature were entirely gone. Now it's hard to stomach a Bass at proper temp or even at ultra-cold temps that companies suggest their shitty beers are best served at. Bass tastes like Coors. What's the point in paying more for an import of a shitty beer whose doppelganger is brewed domestically? (Bass, although owned by InBev, is actually contract brewed by Coors)
Budweiser won't get any worse or any better because it was bought by InBev. It'll still be the rice-heavy bastard-child of pilsner lagers that was solely engineered to make beer using the shittiest, cheapest ingredients possible. The Anheuser-Busch breweries won't close down because it wouldn't make sense for InBev to try and import Budweiser. All this buyout means is the cash flow has changed hands. Other than that, the shitty, bastardized German-based lagered pilsner that was created for women-folk to drink during Oktoberfest will continue to be the beer of choice for numerous American men at various sporting events and will continue to be heralded by the clueless as a "real man's beer."
For details on the merger as well as a list of the more well-known (in the USA) InBev brands, click the jump.
Belgian-Brazilian brewer InBev has purchased St. Louis based Anheuser-Busch in a $52 billion takeover creating the world's largest brewer in St. Louis on July 14, 2008. The takeover from InBev began in May and concluded on July 13, 2008, after the Anheuser-Busch board of directors agreed on a $70 a share in cash. The new company will have net sales of $36 billion a year, offering consumers about 300 brands. InBev chief executive Carlos Brito, 48, is known for cutting costs, and will head the new company, called Anheuser-Busch InBev. Pictured is a brew kettle at the Anheuser-Busch World Headquarters building in south St. Louis on July 14, 2008. (UPI Photo/Bill Greenblatt) - Source
Bass (United Kingdom) Beck's (Germany) Boddingtons (United Kingdom) Hoegaarden (Belgium) Labatt Family (Canada) Leffe (Global) Löwenbräu (Germany) Spaten (Germany) St. Pauli Girl (USA) Stella Artois (Global) Tennent's (United Kingdom)
I'm not a fan of Pabst. It's just, to be honest, not a good beer. I'd much rather have a Yuengling. Still, this is just awesome.
Bill Bramanti will love Pabst Blue Ribbon eternally, and he's got the custom-made beer-can casket to prove it. "I actually fit, because I got in here," said Bramanti of South Chicago Heights. - Source
For a long time it has been thought that the hallucinatory affects of absinthe were caused by thujone. Thujone is a poisonous chemical found in wormwood that, in low to moderate doses, can cause audio and visual hallucinations and feelings of euphoria. In larger doses, Thujone can be fatal. Wormwood was used in absinthe to give it the notorious green color that it is famed for, as well as to give it that peculiar licorice flavor.
Several scientists studying old, stored bottles of absinthe from the 1900s have concluded that the hallucinations and notorious effects of absinthe are none other than good, old fashioned alcoholism induced delirium.
An analysis of century-old bottles of absinthe — the kind once quaffed by the likes of van Gogh and Picasso to enhance their creativity — may end the controversy over what ingredient caused the green liqueur's supposed mind-altering effects.
The culprit seems plain and simple: The century-old absinthe contained about 70 percent alcohol, giving it a 140-proof kick. In comparison, most gins, vodkas and whiskeys are just 80- to 100-proof.
The modern scientific consensus is that absinthe's reputation could simply be traced back to alcoholism, or perhaps toxic compounds that leaked in during faulty distillation. Still, others have pointed at a chemical named thujone in wormwood, one of the herbs used to prepare absinthe and the one that gives the drink its green color. Thujone was blamed for "absinthe madness" and "absinthism," a collection of symptoms including hallucinations, facial tics, numbness and dementia.
Lachenmeier and his colleagues analyzed 13 samples of absinthe from old, sealed bottles in France, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands and the United States dated back to the early 1900s before the ban. After uncorking the bottles, they found relatively small concentrations of thujone in that absinthe, about the same as those in modern varieties. - Source
Today marks a delightful milestone for Americans. The first step of the repeal of prohibition, being able to drink a damn beer. On April 7th, 1933 prohibition was sort of ended. FDR raised the alcohol minimum from 0.5% to 3.2%. True repeal of prohibition wasn't until the following December 5th. With that, the bootleggers and mob connections that profiteered so much from illegal booze soon had to find their dirty money elsewhere. So, today, tonight, raise a mug high and toast what was the first step of regaining your freedom from nitpicking religious fanatics to relax and enjoy a drink.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt had been president barely a month, having been sworn in on March 4 after a landslide victory the previous November. Sweeping into power with him was an anti-Prohibition majority in Congress known as "the wets."
Together they fulfilled their first campaign promise with passage of the Cullen-Harrison Act, which increased the amount of alcohol allowed in beverages from 0.5 percent to a discernible 3.2 percent by weight.
When the act took effect at 12:01 a.m. ET April 7, trucks and carriages burst out of brewery gates bearing cases and barrels of beer for a parched republic -- at least for the District of Columbia and the 20 states whose laws permitted it. Several breweries dispatched cases directly to the White House and the Capitol.
According to the Brewers Association, more than 1.5 million barrels were snapped up in the first 24 hours.
"It's a big deal. ... The whole industry of beer has gotten together to say this date is definitely historic," said Julia Herz, spokeswoman for the Brewers Association, which represents smaller "craft" brewers.
In St. Louis, Missouri, megabrewer Anheuser-Busch is throwing a big bash, complete with historical exhibits and an appearance by the company's famous Clydesdale horses.
Indeed it is a big day. It marks a major milestone in progressive and secular thinking. To some it may be just a semblance to get drunk. For others, such as myself, it represents freedom from oppressive religious fanatics bent on forcing the world to their dogmatic interpretations. Some might see that as a far stretch, but consider much of the fanatic Muslim world where alcohol is prohibited due to religious interpretation. Much of what drove the prohibition movement was, in fact, religious wrangling.
Remnants of Prohibition survive today in the form of state-owned liquor stores and local laws that, for example, prevent sales of alcohol on Sundays or in grocery stores. Some counties remain entirely dry, banning alcohol sales altogether, and 3.2 beer is still sold in six states (Colorado, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Oklahoma and Utah), according to Modern Brewery Age magazine. - Source
Well, obviously not everyone is going to be celebrating. All of this does make me wonder, though... How much longer until we will be celebrating the same with cannabis? It only took a scant 13 years for people to realize that prohibition didn't work with alcohol. How much longer will it take, how many more people will have their lives ruined from incarceration because of cannabis and other soft drugs before the federal government realizes it's the exact same thing? We have the largest number of inmates imprisoned in the world, and estimates are that 15% to as much as 30% of those are non-violent drug offenders.
Anyways, enough of that.
Cheers! Prost! Slainte Mhor! And may we be here for another beer next year and many, many more.
If you like beer, especially if you like learning about beer, then you probably listen to The Brewing Network. If you don't, then you really should. It's a great podcast network, they have great guests, and you can really learn a lot. With the Sunday Session it's not just boring educational beer-snobbery either. There's a lot of cracking jokes, profanity, and drinking going on.
This particular show that I'm linking holds a very personal affinity for me. Why? Because they're chatting with Taylor Smack from Blue Mountain Brewery which I make a point to stop in every time I drive to Richmond. It's right along the way and gives me a good excuse to stop and walk about.
Egads! I can't imagine anything as horrible as enjoying a good beer, chasing a 'roo then, suddenly, being chomped down upon by a croc. "Crikeys!" just doesn't seem to do justice.
Queensland crocodile expert Dr Mark Read yesterday outlined his research into the disturbing trends of "humans doing stupid things" around crocodiles.
Most of the attacks were a combination of alcohol, swimming and the dark.
"People are getting cocky and thinking they know what they are doing, which is bad. It is a case of the number of people who continue to swim in known crocodile habitat; in 80 per cent of the attacks people were swimming or wading in these areas.
"About 40 per cent of these attacks were late afternoon or evening when predators like crocodiles are most active and most dangerous.
"The other outstanding factor was 40 per cent of people attacked were acting under the influence of alcohol." - Source
Everyone normally thinks of Canada as a pretty laid back place. The home of Maple Syrup (yum!), hockey (fuck yeah!), and curling... Anyways, it turns out that Canada isn't that great if you're that loud and disorderly kind of drunk. A recently revealed report on taser usage showed that there is a pattern emerging of Canuck cops routinely using tasers as a first line to subdue boisterous rummies.
A Canadian Press analysis last November of 563 cases between 2002 and 2005 found three in four suspects Tasered by the RCMP were unarmed.
Several of those reports suggested a pattern of stun-gun use as a convenient means of keeping drunk or rowdy people in line, rather than to defuse major clashes. - Source
Now, I understand the need for cops to control people when they're getting out of hand. I've seen my share of out-of-hand drunks. I've even been one of them before. A few times... Ahem. But it seems that tasers have become somewhat of a crutch for many cops. If a subject simply will not comply (such as Andrew Meyer) then the use of a taser is justified, and usually much better in the long run. Numerous subjects have died because they refused to submit causing an escalation of needed force. The taser gives that easy way to force submission without exerting extreme physical pressure. The problem becomes when law enforcement thinks it can be used as an immediate form to create instant compliance. Either way, if you're drunk in Canada, behave yourself.
Remember Super Troopers? Pretty damn funny movie. Remember when they all got drunk and drove around smashing mailboxes, harassing people, and urinating in public? Funny stuff. Would it ever happen in real life? Perhaps. Except, at least in the movie, they managed to not crash the damn squad car.
Andrew Jefferson Page, 33, drove into a guardrail Feb. 16 on northbound Interstate 81, totaling the marked cruiser. He was immediately suspended without pay from the Roanoke Police Department and is no longer employed there as of March 6. [...] "He's very remorseful for what happened," Lawrence said after Tuesday's hearing.
Well, yeah, I'd hope so. I wouldn't think he'd put up a big attitude about it. "Yeah, that's right... I totaled that police cruiser. Y'know what I gotta say about it? 'FUCK YOU!' That's what I gotta say about it. You losers can go fuck yourselves, I'm out of here. And I'm taking one of you shitheads' cruiser, too."
So, not only was Page drunk and driving around in his cruiser (at least he wasn't in uniform), but he was also driving way out in Pulaski county, some 60 miles outside of Roanoke City. Police officers aren't allowed to take their patrol vehicles outside of their jurisdiction. Especially not 60 miles outside for a drunken joyride. Several minutes before Page had crashed, a motorist called 911 to report an erratic driver on I-81. No word on whether the caller mentioned a "drunken fuck in a cop car." The real kicker is that he might not have to pay for the cruiser he totaled. You're not even liable if you break numerous laws, as well as company policy in the process of destroying your your loaned company car? Now that's some job.
Perkins would not say if Page would be responsible for the value of the 2005 Ford Crown Victoria, and Lawrence said he didn't know. [...] According to court documents, a breathalyzer test shortly after the crash showed Page's blood alcohol content to be 0.16 percent, double the legal definition of intoxicated. [...] Page also was charged with a traffic infraction for not wearing his seat belt.
General District Court Judge Glenwood Lookabill suspended a 90-day jail sentence, but restricted Page's driver's license for a year. During that time, Page will be on probation and must attend Virginia Alcohol Safety Action Program classes. He also must pay a $250 fine. Lawrence said he thought Pulaski County prosecutors were fair, treating Page no differently than anyone else charged with DUI.
Um... As someone who has been convicted of a DUI, I call shenanigans. He didn't get the usual, he got the bare mandatory minimum. The usual, as any attorney will tell you, is for the suspect to serve 1 to 5 days in jail. Especially if you were so drunk that you totaled your car. The fact that this man was a police officer, driving around drunk in a fucking cop car , in my opinion, warrants that he be treated a bit more harshly than a typical person. And not wearing a seat belt? Tsk, tsk. Click it or ticket, man.
"It's been very hard on him," Lawrence said. "From the minute that he came to see me, he had all this remorse and regret." - Source
"From the minute he came to see me he felt all bad and shit about getting all blotto and smashing the shit out of some really expensive publicly owned company property. He was all, 'aw, dude, I'm sorry.' And I was all like, 'hey, man. Hey, man... shit happens, okay? Who's my tiger? That's right, buddy. You is.' Then we had snuggle time and it was all good."
how about i look up your mom's giant cunt?
