Party poopers!

China bans strippers at funerals:

China has added strippers at funerals to its burgeoning list of proscribed activities, the BBC reports.

Bare-assed ladies are apparently deployed at rural send-offs to boost mourner numbers, since "large crowds are seen as a mark of honour".
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And just to make sure the ban sticks, the powers that be have set up a hotline where concerned citizens can earn cash rewards for reporting "funeral misdeeds".

Nobody likes a snitch!

We gather that strippers are commonly seen at Taiwanese funerals, where explicit displays are accompanied by hard-core commentary on the deceased's virility. Taiwanese lottery winners also hire strippers to disrobe in temples as a mark of gratitude for their good fortune. The Church of England might like to consider this practice as a way of boosting congregations.

The Donks ought to check Cindy Sheehan's availability. It won't work for normal folks, but it will sure get their base all steamy.

Second Hoot!

Meanwhile in the Holy City of Coral Gables, Steve (pbuh) says Hurricane Season is Dead:

I keep checking Weather Underground for hurricane information. Absolutely nothing is happening. Idiots who actually want storms to form are getting emotional over the teasing now.

The water out there is at or below normal temperatures. Gee, what happened to global warming? Well, as a reader pointed out in a comment, cool water is actually a sign that global warming is real. So is hot water. Hot weather is caused by global warming. Cool weather is caused by global warming. And when the weather doesn't change at all? That's global warming at work. And Bush caused it. Unless it turns out to be a good thing. Then it happened in spite of Bush. And if we don't impeach him, it will go away.

More hijinks by following the link, but I'm really bummed that that there aren't any virgin sacrifices in the offing to appease the Weather Gods^TM. Maybe we could get Al Gore to wear a grass skirt and just pretend?

Code Red "Well, duh!" Alert

Hezbollah night-vision gear was from Britain:

Israeli intelligence officials have complained to Britain and the United States that sensitive night-vision equipment recovered from Hezbollah fighters during the war in Lebanon had been exported by Britain to Iran. British officials said the equipment had been intended for use in a U.N. anti-narcotics campaign.
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The spokesman, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Britain participates, through the U.N. drug-fighting agency, in Iran's interception program, which is run by anti-narcotics forces along the country's eastern border with Afghanistan and Pakistan, both major opium poppy-growing countries.

"We've been encouraging the Iranians as part of their anti-narcotics program, and there was an export in 2003 ... as part of the heroin and opium smuggling program. This is an area where we try not to let the nuclear issue prevent cooperation on countering narcotics," he said, referring to Iran's dispute with the United Nations over its nuclear enrichment program.

Good thing they didn't ask for any jet fighters or tanks to counter those pesky drug traffickers.

In the early phases of the Israeli ground advance against Hezbollah positions across the border region, commanders complained to their superiors that nighttime operations had been hampered by the ability of Hezbollah fighters to observe and counter the Israeli moves. In more than six days of bitter fighting around the village of Mis-a-Jebel, the Israeli army lost six soldiers, and more than 20 were injured.
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"You can also record what you are watching. Then it is connected to computers. You can obtain a perfect intelligence picture in real time about the situation. It is then connected to firing systems or to units that are going to act in accordance with the intelligence they are receiving," Radowicz said during the briefing.

"It is a system that we can find in every serious army in the world."
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"In every village which served as the regional command, you can find the same unit --intelligence, weapons systems, command and control and connection -- with the units which are firing or using the mobile platforms (for firing rockets) for targeting Israel," he said.

What do you bet the Iranians didn't even have to pay for the units either?

Bill Johnson notices that the emperor is starkers

Karr may be crazy, but he's not the right man:

I've had enough. So I will just come right out and say what others in this business apparently will not:

Mary Lacy, that's not your boy.

John Mark Karr as much killed JonBenet Ramsey as Mickey Mouse did. This is a fool's errand you're on, and it won't end pretty.
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What I'm saying is no different than anyone capable of reading a newspaper or watching a television is saying.
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Most journalists in this town and across the globe have been falling over themselves trying not to - in the words of Mrs. Lacy - "rush to judgment" on this fool, all the while rupturing an intestine to keep from laughing.

Not me. I can barely get up off the floor.

I think it's neat the way Karr looks and acts like Ned Lamont without a suntan.