Tarzan Toy - A Boys Favorite Plaything?

This one is amazing, and just in time for Christmas!

Tarzan Fail
by failblog

Dubai Awash In Debt - Asks For Hiatus On Repayments

The city state of Dubai, also known as what I call the "Architecture Factory" is putting on the brakes. Driven by immense debt incurred in it's insane building projects, like the worlds tallest skyscraper in the middle of the desert or the palm shaped islands, the emirate is over $60 billion in debt.
The call for a debt standstill for 6 month has shaken the world markets. Seems everyone is surprised that Dubai is in trouble. I have to wonder do these folks who are the power brokers in he world markets every do some basic arithmetic?

Sheik Mohammed has been spending like a drunk who thinks he won the lottery and now everyone else is figuring it out. Certainly hope he doesn't take the rest of the middle east down with him.

GOP Rewriting History Again - No Terror Attacks Under Bush?

Sure feels like 1984 at least the fictional one. Dana Perino is trying to rewrite history in an interview where she claims there were no terrorist attacks under the Bush administration. Hummm? So what was 9/11 and that Anthrax thing?

Atlanta Police Sued By Eagle Patrons

Lambda Legal is representing 19 individuals in a lawsuit over the police raid on the Atlanta Eagle. From an interview in OnTop Magazine, Greg Nevins, supervising senior staff attorney in Lambda Legal's Southern Regional Office made this statement:

“The illegal activity going on in the Atlanta Eagle that night was committed by the APD (Atlanta Police Department).... If it is APD procedure for elderly men and wounded veterans to be thrown to the floor and harassed simply for being in a bar having a drink after work, then the APD should change its procedure."

During the raid, no one was allowed to leave the building and police forced 62 patrons to lay prone on the floor while they collected IDs. Anyone questioning their activity was told, “Don't speak until spoken to” or “Shut up.”

Maybe the patrons of the Rainbow Lounge should take note? The Fort Worth Police and TABC have clearly covered up their tracks with their lame investigations that found no wrongdoing, yet one of the men they detained was sent to the hospital with a brain injury. Where is the outrage?

An Ocean On Mars?

Last night my partner and I were looking at Google Mars. It's a wonderful program developed from the photographs taken by several Mars probes and includes details I had never seen before. We were postulating the features that are obviously due to erosion.

Today, I find this article which states that Mars once had a great ocean in its northern hemisphere and was a damp and rainy place. Pretty cool stuff. Especially when you consider how similar Mars and Earth are and that leads to the obvious question, was there life on Mars?

Hummm? Damp rainy, oceans, most likely a richer atmosphere? I suspect it is only a matter of time before we find the first Martian fossils.

I hope I am around to see that. I can only wonder how it will affect the theology of folks who cannot envision a God big enough for life on other worlds. Should be some interesting crises of faith.

Anti Gay Hate Crimes Rise Alarmingly

The latest report from the FBI shows that hate crimes against LGBT people are rising at a rate of nearly 11%. That is reason for alarm.

The statistics are a bit dusty, since these were from 2008, but I guess it takes time for law enforcement officials from around the country to compile them. Of the 1706 people who were targets of sexual orientation hate crimes here is the breakdown according to the FBI:

57.5 % were victims of an offender’s anti-male homosexual bias.
27.3 % were victims because of an anti-homosexual bias.
11.6 % were victims because of an anti-female homosexual bias.
2.0 % were victims because of an anti-heterosexual bias.
1.6 % were victims because of an anti-bisexual bias.

The breakdown reflects a couple of strange things, first the general anti-homosexual category seems odd anbd the lact of "transgendered" as a category is also troubling. With the new Byrd/Shepard Hate Crimes Act in place I suspect the next compilation will include trangendered victims as well.

DADT Hearings On Hold - Indefinitely

Senator Carl Levin, who in October said that Don't Ask Don't Tell would be brought up at a Senate hearing in November has apparently decided it is not a wise move and has pulled it off the table.

In an article on the blog LezGetReal.com sources are quoted as saying the issue will most likely be tucked into next years DOD appropriations bill. This confirms what Barney Frank intimated in an Advocate magazine interview last week.

Once again the Democrats are delaying LGBT issues. I have to wonder if they really plan to do anything or just delay hoping we will forget? Here's the deal, we won't forget!