If I Badmouth Australia Do I Get $31 Million Too?

Some background for non-Australians.

Telstra, the former government owned telecommunication company over here, used to be run by a man called Sol Trujillo. I don't know if he did a good job at all, because I don't really care about Telstra.

All I do know is that during his reign is that it seemed like their quality of service went down the toilet, like the share price.

Added to that was the small thing of Trujillo getting rather large amounts of money when as far as everyone could tell, he didn't actually do anything.

Apparently he's sad now because those big mean Australians were apparently racist.

Meh. Of all the criticism that I ever read regarding him, not one of the things would classify as "racist".

For example:

In the interview, Mr Trujillo cited Australia's "very restrictive" immigration policies and rigid rules on company privatisation as his evidence for the nation being backward and racist.

Yes, you read that right, because we don't just let any old person into the country we're racist. So to not be racist we would have to remove immigration laws?

And we're backward because we don't subscribe to US values regarding government and business. Gotcha.

You know, I frankly don't care if he was Hispanic. I'm not going to remember him for that.

But he got $31 million for his troubles. On top of all the money that he got destroying the share price of Telstra.

If I was to leave and say "Australia is backwards and full of racists" will someone give me $31 million too?

Alexander Rybak Borked

Ok, like many people who watched the Eurovision, I didn't mind the Norwegian entry. Considering the standards of Eurovision it was actually very good. I'm guessing it's because he wrote his own song, so it would be to his standards and not to Eurovision standards. I've posted a video of his entry below:




Unfortunately after I heard him say some stuff in Norwegian at the end, all I could think of was the Swedish Chef from the muppets. I know that firstly, the Swedish Chef isn't real and neither is his language, and secondly that Sweden isn't Norway, but real Swedish and Norwegian sound similar.

Yet I couldn't shake it. I kept on thinking about it so much that I used the Bork Bork Bork! add-on and went to a lyrics site and used it. This is my result:

Yeers egu, vhee I ves yuoonger
I keend a leeked, a gurl I knoo
She-a ves meene-a und ve-a vere-a sveet heerts
Thet ves zeen, boot zeen it's trooe-a
I'm in lufe-a veet a feurytele-a
Ifee thuoogh it hoorts
Coose-a I dun't cere-a iff I luse-a my meend,
I'm elreedy coorsed

Ifery dey ve-a sterted feeghting
Ifery neeght ve-a fell in lufe-a
Nu oone-a ilse-a cuoold meke-a me-a sedder
Boot nu oone-a ilse-a cuoold leefft me-a heegh ebofe-a
I dun't knoo vhet I ves dueeng
Vhee sooddenly ve-a fell epert
Nooedeys I cunnut feend her
Boot vhee I du ve'll get a brund noo stert
I'm in lufe-a veet a feurytele-a
Ifee thuoogh it hoorts
Coose-a I dun't cere-a iff I luse-a my meend,
I'm elreedy coorsed

She's a feurytele-a yeeh
Ifee thuoogh it hoorts
coose-a I dun't cere-a iff I luse-a my meend,
I'm elreedy coorsed

It does actually sort of work, if you sang the song with those lyrics.

Odin Must Have Too Many Rings

Odin had a ring called Draupnir, which would, every ninth night, drop off eight copies of the ring. But considering how much time has passed that would mean that Odin would probably have a warehouse full of rings by now.

If we say assumed that the world was made from the remains of Ymir about 300 000 years ago (remember this is a completely arbitrary number) and then we assume that he got the ring about 250 000 years ago then 91 310 625 would have passed since then until now. Every nine nights he gets eight new rings that are exactly the same but don't make more rings. That would mean that he would have 81 165 000 rings by now.

What the hell would he do with 81 million rings? It's not like he can give them to the other Gods as a Yuletide present. I could imagine it.

"What did you get from Odin this year Thor?"
"What do you think Njord?"
"Another ring right?"
"Yep. Did you get your ring this year too?"
"Yep. I wonder if he just does this because he can't be bothered making the attempt to find us something?"

I guess he could start giving them out to people.

A Response Of Some Kind

About 322 days, 5 hours and 53 minutes ago on a cold July afternoon I wrote "Debunking911.com Is A PNAC Front.

View wise it's the most successful thing I've ever written because of the nice referrals I get from the site in question.

Anyway, enough background.

I've received a comment from a chap calling himself "Chuck Boldwyn" challenging a debunking of something that he managed to calculate that shows that what he has done proves that the September 11 attacks could not have happened the way they actually did.

Unfortunately, comment wise, I can't really say anything. I've only had some instruction in classical mechanics and I'm also not an engineer. I've never even pretended to be one on TV (incidentally I'm not on TV...).

I can, and will, only comment on things that I have noticed.

As far as I can tell from the post in question though, it seems to be using the assumption that the tower was essentially acting as one big block of steel. That seems to ignore structural elements like joints etc. I would have thought that the force acting downwards upon the building would affect the load bearing columns and the joints and so on.

There is a bunch of maths which to me seem to work. By the way, if a proper engineer happens to read this could you please tell us whether the equations are being used correctly together?

But then we get to an interesting bit:

This means the the lower 94 block of steel could support 100 blocks of 94 floors before possible total collapse could occur.

This also means that the lower 94 block of steel could support 588 blocks of 16 floors before possible total collapse could occur, since one 94 block is equal to 5.88 16 floor blocks.

588 Vector Force units of upward support (stressed Normal Force)against 1 Vector force unit of downward gravity weight force, all by its lonesome.

Now apply Vector math Addition to opposing Forces to find that the top block could never in one's wildest dreams totally collapse the lower 94 floor block of powerfully strong and very thick,
4 inches, steel.

588 Force units of upward support
minus
1 force unit of downward weight Force
gives 587 force units of non-collapsing support.

1 Force Unit(FU) = 1 DL(16)

(588 FU up) - (1 FU down) = 587 FU up.

This is something I don't understand. What the hell is a "vector force unit". I'm well aware that force is already a vector, so "a vector force" is rather redundant statement. Where does this "1 force unit" come from?

I do question why such "hard hitting" research is being posted here and not being sent to an engineering journal to undergo peer-review. Hell, even a letter to one would be better then posting it here. But I'm not expecting him to sent his work in to a credible journal because of this statement here:

That is the Final & Ultimate answer as to why the twin towers could never, ever collapse under the conditions offered by NIST, the Government, the Mass Media, and the big name University and corporate PHDs.

Since the confirmed discovery of the red and gray nano Thermite active and explosive particles in the WTC dust samples, there is no leg to stand on by the NIST, government and all the "quack" PHDs hired by the Government to do their lying diry work with the Mass Media.

(emphasis mine)

Basically to him there are no "peers". There are only "shills".

"Confirmed discovery of red and gray nano Thermite" [sic]? Yes, by a man whose entire argument was "I've found things that would be in thermite therefore there was thermite", without determining whether the elements and molecules analysed would appear in any regular office.

There are also two other posts that don't really have any substance. One links to a youtube video, and they both go on mentioning "patriotism" and "traitors".

For those that haven't read anything else on this blog, I'll mention this here. I am not an American. I don't hold US citizenship, I also don't live in the US. I am an Australian. Accusing me of being a traitor to the US is like claiming that Saddam Hussein was a traitor to the Sudan. It doesn't work.

I'm going to post his last comment in it's entirety:

This "Anti Truth Movement" site has been completely and 100% debunked with no mercy. You are all fools, dupes, idiots, numbskulls, morons, and retards if you still, yet, support the government's and the Mass Media's Theis Conspiracy. You will now be a supporter of mass murderers. Be careful of what you support.

Next time, use your brain, if you have one...

Two small things:

1. Re: support of mass murderers. I can claim the exact same thing to you. By not supporting my side (which, by the way is the one supported by far more evidence then yours) you support Al Qaeda. Al Qaeda are mass murderers. Therefore you support mass murder.
   
   So next time you argue this, don't try to label people. (Yes, I am aware of the fallacy above.)


2. I have used my brain. When will you start using yours properly?
   

The Orang-utans Are Revolting

There was an enclosure break at the zoo today. An Orang-utan managed to escape from his (or her) enclosure at the Adelaide Zoo. Regardless of the sex we're going to have to prevent it from breeding. Because you know who else was a smart Orang-utan?

Dr. Zaius.


If we don't prevent this intelligent creature from breeding then he'll be the result. It's a slippery slope people.

Either we let all the Orang-utans breed and watch as they rise up and overthrow us, or we selectively breed them and ensure that we remain top ape.


Ok, actually I think good on it. It figured out what the electric fence was and a way to get across it without being shocked. I know they offered a refund, but I would have paid money to see that, because it just shows that our Orang-utan cousins aren't as stupid as some people think them to be.

Update: This is what I get for not checking my local paper, or at least the umbrella site for it. The Orang-utan is female, and she was enticed into her night enclosure. And her name is Karta. By the way, why not see what PZ said on the issue.

Media Watch Calls Out Peter Popoff

For those that aren't in Australia, Media Watch is a show on the ABC (the government station) that basically spends its time pointing out breaches in broadcasting regulations and also silly things some times.

This week they did a segment on Peter Popoff and his "miracle water" scam. (side note, I know in the past that sometimes ABC websites aren't accessible to non-Australians, so just in case I'll put up a youtube or other video site link when I find it.)

Basically the problem is that he might be misleading, but since nobody actually knows whether he's actually breaking a regulation means that it's difficult to determine whether he's done anything wrong.

This is because Channel 9 haven't stated whether he's paid for the timeslots or not. So if it's actually a programme it falls under a different body then if it was actually an ad.

The plus side is that he's on at a time when nobody watches them. Like all the other religious programmes on the commercial stations.

I did learn something new though. Apparently the Sandgropers have done some good. They have a whole page on their website ScamNet dedicated to him. So good on you Sandgropers. I, a Croweater, salute you.