Well, Better This than Being a Bond Villain

Whoever came up with the site Ship Your Enemies Glitter is clearly of a deeply diabolical bent, and having a silly revenge web site is better than having a lair in a volcano with nuclear weapons.

As such, I heartily endorse this product, and state for the record that I have received no considerations from this enterprise for my review:

We hate glitter. People call it the herpes of the craft world. What we hate more though are the soulless people who get their jollies off by sending glitter in envelopes.

We've had enough so here's the deal: there's someone in your life right now who you can't stand. Whether it be your sh%$ty neighbour, a family member or that bitch Amy down the road who thinks it's cool to invite you to High Tea but not provide any weed.

So pay us money, provide an address anywhere in the world & we'll send them so much glitter in an envelope that they'll be finding that sh%$ everywhere for weeks. We'll also include a note telling the person exactly why they're receiving this terrible gift. Hint: the glitter will be mixed in with the note thus increasing maximum spillage.

Like I said.  It's this, or going full Bond Villain.



H/T Neo at the Stellar Parthenon BBS.

Quote of the Day

I've seen lemmings with shallower learning curves. Because of the last war for which Fred Hiatt shook his moneymaker, the influence that the United States can bring to bear on centuries-old internal conflicts in Iraq is slightly less than that wielded at the moment by the Carolina League. Our aid makes us one friend and makes for that friend a hundred enemies.

—Charlie Pierce on WaPo editorial page editor Fred Hiatt's repeated calls for boots on the ground.

Why does Fred Hiatt still have a job?

I don't buy into the Post's self image of greatness, but they deserve better than to have the 2^nd worst^* opinion page in the nation.

^*It is self evident that the worst OP/ED page in the nation belongs to The Wall Street Journal.

After 30 Years and Billions of Dollars the Missile Defense Contractors Still Cannot Solder a Wire Correctly

Notwithstanding the myriad tough technical problems that are involved, one would think that the Missile Defense Agency would at least be able to make the manufacturers make the interceptors to spec:

Two serious technical flaws have been identified in the ground-launched anti-missile interceptors that the United States would rely on to defend against a nuclear attack by North Korea.

Pentagon officials were informed of the problems as recently as last summer but decided to postpone corrective action. They told federal auditors that acting immediately to fix the defects would interfere with the production of new interceptors and slow a planned expansion of the nation's homeland missile defense system, according to a new report by the Government Accountability Office.

As a result, all 33 interceptors now deployed at Vandenberg Air Force Base in Santa Barbara County and Ft. Greely, Alaska, have one of the defects. Ten of those interceptors — plus eight being prepared for delivery this year — have both.

Summing up the effect on missile-defense readiness, the GAO report said that "the fielded interceptors are susceptible to experiencing … failure modes," resulting in "an interceptor fleet that may not work as intended."

………

One of the newly disclosed shortcomings centers on wiring harnesses embedded within the kill vehicles' dense labyrinth of electronics.

A supplier used an unsuitable soldering material to assemble harnesses in at least 10 interceptors deployed in 2009 and 2010 and still part of the fleet.

The same material was used in the eight interceptors that will be placed in silos this year, according to GAO analyst Cristina Chaplain, lead author of the report.

The soldering material is vulnerable to corrosion in the interceptors' underground silos, some of which have had damp conditions and mold. Corrosion "could have far-reaching effects" because the "defective wiring harnesses" supply power and data to the kill vehicle's on-board guidance system, said the GAO report, which is dated May 6.

………

Chaplain told The Times that based on her staff's discussions with the Missile Defense Agency, officials there have "no timeline" for repairing the wiring harnesses.

The agency encountered a similar problem with wiring harnesses years earlier, and the supplier was instructed not to use the deficient soldering material. But "the corrective actions were not passed along to other suppliers," according to the GAO report.

L. David Montague, co-chairman of a National Academy of Sciences panel that reviewed operations of the Missile Defense Agency, said officials should promptly set a schedule for fixing the harnesses.

"The older they are with that kind of a flawed soldering, the more likely they are to fail," Montague, a former president of missile systems for Lockheed Corp., said in an interview.

The second newly disclosed defect involves a component called a divert thruster, a small motor intended to help maneuver the kill vehicles in flight. Each kill vehicle has four of them.

The GAO report refers to "performance issues" with the thrusters. It offers few details, and GAO auditors declined to elaborate, citing a fear of revealing classified information. They did say that the problem is different from an earlier concern that the thruster's heavy vibrations could throw off the kill vehicle's guidance system.

The report and interviews with defense specialists make clear that problems with the divert thruster have bedeviled the interceptor fleet for years. To address deficiencies in the original version, Pentagon contractors created a redesigned "alternate divert thruster."

The government planned to install the new version in many of the currently deployed interceptors over the next few years and to retrofit newly manufactured interceptors, according to the GAO report and interviews with its authors.

That plan was scrapped after the alternate thruster, in November 2013, failed a crucial ground test to determine whether it could withstand the stresses of flight, the report said. To stay on track for expanding the fleet, senior Pentagon officials decided to keep building interceptors with the original, deficient thruster.

What sort of moron structures a multi-billion dollar multi-year defense system in such a way that there is absolutely no quality control?

To accelerate deployment, then-Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld exempted the missile agency from the Pentagon's standard procurement rules and testing standards.

(emphasis mine)

OK, that kind of moron.

Why the hell is the MDA still operating this way? 

Rumsfeld has been "spending more time with his family" for about 9 years, so one would think that the pentagon would be able to correct at least one of his f%$#-ups in the interim.


H/T the hairiest Saroff, aka Bear who Swims.
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Bloated Billionaire Bellyaching Bitch Bleats Bogus Beef*

It appears that yet another hedge fund billionaire is upset that politicians don't fawn over him like the people he employs:

"I don't need anybody crapping all over what I do for a living," Cooperman told CNNMoney's Cristina Alesci Monday.

Cooperman is the founder of hedge fund Omega Advisors, which has about $9 billion in assets.

He thinks Clinton is a hypocrite for painting a nasty picture of hedge fund managers and then asking them for money and trying to befriend them.

"[She] hangs out with all these people in Martha's Vineyard and in the Hamptons and then the very first thing she has to say is to criticize hedge funds," Cooperman, said.

Cooperman, 72, said he isn't looking for praise, but declares he's the living embodiment of the American Dream.

"I have nothing to apologize for. I've made a lot of money. I'm giving it all back to society," he says, emphasizing his large donations to places such as Hunter College in New York, Columbia University and Saint Barnabas Medical Center in New Jersey.

You are not the embodiment of the American dream, motherf%$#er, you are a parasite who got particularly lucky.

You poor delicate little flower.

How about you take your billions of dollars and a nice warm warm cup of shut the f%$# up.

^*Yes, the fact that I could use this amusingly alliterative title was one of the reasons that I Posted this.^†
†Yes, I did spend more time on the hed than I did on the article. I'm kind of lame that way.

This Is Not The ……… OK ……… It IS Kind of The Onion

Just when you thought that the FIFA scandal could get any more surreal, or more pathetic, one of the FIFI officials accused of bribery and money laundering has cited an article from The Onion to defend himself from the charges:

Jack Warner, a former vice president of FIFA, was arrested last week in connection with a sweeping United States Justice Department investigation that slapped 14 bigwigs with charges of racketeering, wire fraud and money laundering.

Warner, apparently unfamiliar with The Onion, defended himself against these charges Sunday by holding up an article from the news satire website — “FIFA Frantically Announces 2015 Summer World Cup in the United States” — stating that “all this has stemmed from the failed U.S. bid to host the World Cup.”

“If I was so bad, if FIFA is so bad…why is it the USA wants to keep the FIFA World Cup?…Something has to be wrong,” Warner says.

This is f%$#ed up and sh%$.

It's also funny as hell, but it's f%$#ed up and sh%$.

Not The Onion

Andrew “Buddy” Donohue has been appointed Chief of Staff for the Security and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Before his appointment, Mr. Donohue was a lawyer for Goldman Sachs:

The Securities and Exchange Commission confirmed Thursday that it hired a managing director of Wall Street titan Goldman Sachs Inc. to serve as chief of staff, prompting critics to decry a revolving door that links the corridors of finance and power.

Chairman Mary Jo White has hired Andrew “Buddy” Donohue, the SEC said in a news release, tapping the influential Wall Streeter to become chief of staff of the agency in charge of protecting investors. He’ll serve as a senior adviser to White on policy, management, and regulatory issues.

Most recently, Donohue worked as a managing director and associate general counsel at Goldman Sachs. Previously, he led the SEC's Investment Management Division between May 2006 and November 2010, spanning two administrations and the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.

“I am thrilled that Buddy will be returning to the SEC to provide his extensive knowledge and expertise to the agency,” said SEC chief White said in a statement. “Buddy is a seasoned professional whose previous SEC and private sector experience will be invaluable in advancing all aspects of the agency’s mission.”

White said Donohue’s background will be “especially useful” as the commission advances new rules for risk management and weighs a uniform fiduciary standard for the investment community.

Yeah, sure.

It is, "Especially Useful,"  for the, "Managing director and associate general counsel at Goldman Sachs," to work on rules for risk management and a fiduciary standard for brokers.

FWIW, holding brokers to a fiduciary standard, which requires them to act in the best interest of their client, is something that the financial industry has been fighting tooth and nail, and the man from Goldman Sachs is Chief of Staff for the organization which is drawing up the regulations for this.

Reform, my flabby white ass.

Deep Thought