…it doesn’t matter how much you have.
Case in point: Almost 80% of NFL players near bankruptcy two years after they retire.
Archive for the ‘n00bs’ Category
When you don’t know how to handle money
Sunday, March 21st, 2010Laws_of_Armed_Conflict.PPT
Thursday, February 25th, 2010The pair of war crime prosecutors who indicted Charles Taylor back in 2003 have created a new firm, CW Group, that offered legal services to Guinea’s military regime. They made a 14-slide PowerPoint presentation, apparently aimed at educating the military’s officers and soldiers about the laws governing warfare (and maybe even get them to not violate them so egregiously?) [FP]
I guess if you’re going to have a military, you should teach your soldiers about the rules of war, somehow… But PowerPoint? Really?
One imagines that in the original .ppt version, these bullet points (pun intended?) “Civilians!” “Medical personnel!” and “Prisoners!” would fly in from the right side of the slide, with that car-zooming-and-screeching-to-halt sound effect.
Perhaps the excessive use of PowerPoint is the real war crime here…
Is Andrew Breitbart coming to take us down?
Tuesday, February 23rd, 2010Breitbart, editor for the Drudge Report and a media figure in his own right, confronted Max Blumenthal at CPAC over Blumenthal’s article on James O’Keefe (summary: the dude who spied on ACORN maybe is somewhat of a white nationalist).
Breitbart’s not done yet. He is having so much fun he now wants to take down the “institutional left,” and he believes this will happen “within the next three weeks”:
He might be referring to his appearance on former Congressman (and radio personality!) Ernest Istook’s Harvard Institute of Politics study group, “Propaganda in American Politics.” Breitbart is scheduled to be a guest speaker next week, which falls within the deadline he gave on a Fox News show that attracts more viewers at 3AM than CNN at 8PM.
This is a must-not-miss event. What better way to take down the institutional left than to corrupt influence the minds of young Harvard intellectuals who will lead the institutions? It worked for Peggy Noonan.
(EDIT: Didn’t happen. Some anti-global warming guy came instead. The institutional left survives.)
[Media Matters via Gawker]
Demon Sheep
Thursday, February 4th, 2010
A newly released ad from Carly Fiorina features a red-eyed “Demon Sheep” which is a guy dressed up as a sheep. Most of the ad sucks, so if you don’t want to watch all 3 minutes of it, skip ahead to 2:25. [WP]
R.I.P. Chris Brown’s Twitter account, killer named and at large
Tuesday, December 15th, 2009CNN writes the obituary. Let us remember the short but great life of Chris Brown’s Twitter, mechanicaldummy:
Brown began using Twitter as a way to connect to his fans after he pleaded guilty and was sentenced for beating his then-girlfriend Rihanna.
Whether it was an attempt to garner favorable public relations in the wake of an image-shattering event or just a late adaptation to the microblogging craze, Brown had spent the months after the incident using his Twitter account to reach and connect with 172,366 followers.
He tweeted regularly thanking his fans for their continued support and sounding off after concerts.
It was unclear what specifically sparked Brown to delete his account, named “mechanicaldummy,” He had started the day with a normal “good morning” message to his fans.
12/14/09. NEVER FORGET.
Now they need to go back to more Tiger Woods coverage.
The Harvard Center for Ethics presents…Eliot Spitzer
Monday, November 9th, 2009No, really:
The title of the lecture is “From Ayn Rand to Ken Feinberg — How Quickly the Paradigm Shifts. What Should Be the Rationale for Government Participation in the Market?” We guess he will talk about how different New York would be if he could take down Wall Street and whatnot. That and/or prostitutes. [Edmond J. Safra Foundation Center for Ethics at Harvard] [Office of the Arts at Harvard]
The Mundell-Fleming GTA Hypothesis
Wednesday, November 4th, 2009Grand Theft Auto IV achievement and trophy loyalists will remember the “Impossible Trinity” reward received after completing the “Museum Piece” mission. Speculation abounded over the nature of the name and its significance, and later it was more or less revealed to be a teaser for the next two playable characters in the GTA IV episodic installments [Kotaku, Giant Bomb]
For me this discussion went by the wayside until just recently, when Professor Jeffrey Frieden lectured about the “unholy/impossible trinity” in international economics (formally derived from the Mundell-Fleming model). Basically, a country can at any time only choose two of three goals: 1) a fixed or pegged exchange rate, 2) an independent monetary policy, and 3) free capital mobility. Given a world where there is free capital mobility or capital controls can be avoided, countries will have to choose between 1 and 2. Although this is a simplistic way of looking at the model, one could argue that the US, which lets its currency float, has chosen 2. More information about this here and here.
What does this mean? Probably nothing. Maybe the person in charge of achievements had studied economics and was just having fun with the idea. Or maybe “impossible trinity” is one of those blanket terms that can refer to many things that come in 3′s, not just economics. Heck, I could write the religious hypothesis after this. But that should not stop the mass speculation! If you can only have 2 out of 3 characters, what are the GTA-specific reasons why you can’t have the 3rd? Is Niko Bellic representative of fixed exchange rates or free capital mobility?
…
Ok, it was probably just a broad term or a reference to religion. Extending economic models and hypotheses to try to interpret video game lore will just lead to a cluster****.
Government on my mind
Tuesday, October 27th, 2009While checking my news feed, I came across this headline: “Azarenka Impresses on Doha Debut.” [BBC]
My instinctual reaction was to ask: Hey, is Azarenka some newly formed nation-state in the WTO? Are other countries praising its commitment to lower tariffs and non-tariff barriers to trade at the Doha Round?
Well, the name actually refers to Belorussian tennis player Victoria Azarenka. The Doha debut is…a tennis match. Oy, this needs to be tagged under both “n00bs” and “win.”
You only have enough money for one
Saturday, October 10th, 2009Do you buy BioShock for $29.99? Or BioShock and Elder Scrolls IV for $29.99?
Choices, choices.
Found at a Best Buy in Cambridge, MA. Right next to each other.
Late night banter
Thursday, October 1st, 2009Gawker posted a small part of what we assume is the greatest late night interview of all time: Tucker Max and Carson Daly, mano a mano. It turns out that Tucker has had a thing for Daly for years. This is what he wrote back in 2005 while chronicling his real-life mythical adventures inside Jimmy Kimmel’s green room :
Then it happened. Possibly the most embarrassing moment of my life, and easily a moment I will eventually have to redeem myself for: Carson Daly walked in the Green Room…and I didn’t punch him in his face.
[. . .]
I saw him, my fight or flight response kicked in, and…well…I ran. Right to the bar, where I downed three vodka doubles in what felt like 30 seconds, got my courage up and went over to blast him in the face…and he was gone. I know, I know. I failed. I am sorry. I can’t remember the last time I was so utterly and completely disappointed in myself. I promised many friends of mine that when I came out here, if I ever saw Carson Daly and I was drunk enough, I would beat his ass. I let my friends down. But don’t worry–this has only begun. I’ll get Carson one day.
About a year later he added that he wouldn’t target Daly anymore:
He admitted on Conan that he is a douche-bag, which kinda steals my thunder. At this point, kicking his ass doesn’t really serve the purpose I wanted it to. If even he knows he’s a douche-bag, what fun is that?
And now with his appearance on Daly’s show to promote himself (and some movie project) the 180 is complete. The end.
Conspiracy theory speculation time!
Monday, September 28th, 2009Via Drudge:
A local TV station that reported on Chicagoans NOT wanting the Olympics has been told NOT to run the report again, insiders tell the DRUDGE REPORT! The Chicago Olympic Committee told FOX Chicago that its broadcast “would harm Chicago’s chances” to be awarded the games. The station’s news director ordered staff to hold fire after the report aired once last Thursday morning, claims a source.
There is just something odd about the group’s website. It looks too slick and polished to be from a source that does not have a vested interest in moving the Olympics to Rio (an interest other than saving Chicago money). My initial guess was that President Lula da Silva created an elite Brazilian PR task force to besmirch Chicago days before the official selection. After watching the Chicagoans in the video, Lula da Silva most likely hired a U.S.-based PR firm instead. Even better, maybe some people in Madrid or Tokyo wanted to kill two birds with one stone and tried to do so by making Brazil look like crap for making Chicago look like crap.
That, or 4chan is playing a big lolnoob on everyone.
Let the countdown to the 2016 LOLympics begin!
EDIT: FOX Chicago reports that the anti-Chicago website may be based in Rio. [FOX Chicago]
…it’s probably all just an inside job from the Chicago political machine.