...so that a marker can be placed in cyberspace, forevermore...
If a pollster called me today and popped The Big Question, I would give George W. Bush a Favorable rating.
I would DEFINITELY vote for George W. Bush again, if not for the 22nd amendment.
He has acquitted himself incredibly well in this latest world war, the war on terror, the one that so many would have you believe is going so badly. Once all the dust settles, and radical Islam is defeated -- as did Reagan to the Communists, as did FDR to the Nazis, as did Washington to the British, as did Salk to polio, as did Jenner to smallpox, and on and on and on -- those with eyes to see and ears to listen will not be able to avoid the truth. The truth that We Won, They Lost, again...
He has successfully nominated two judges to the Supremos that are young (for justices) and unshakably conservative. The rewards for this effort are already bearing fruit in protection of the unborn. At this point in time, only those in Deep Denial still don't acknowledge that A Baby Is A Baby, inside or outside the womb. Technology has made it clear. The law is catching up with technology, once again...
He has presided over an economy that has been well-nigh Rocky Balboa-ish since the mess inherited from Wilhelm Jaifferson Clintoine, and Enron/Worldcom, and 9/11, and Katrina. Bloodied, puffy-eyed, and suddenly off the ropes with startling aggression and forward movement. Larry Kudlow is right: This is The Greatest Story Never Told, and here again, time passages will put these incredible times into their proper light. People forget about what it was like in the late '70s. I don't. I'd just purchased my first car. Times sucked. And I had a guaranteed job back then! Forget and repeat, people, forget and repeat...
He has reminded us all what the White House looks like when it's inhabited by adults.
He has reminded us all what a redeemed, believing Christian Presidency looks like. Sure, the "scandals" have been laughably lame; if Al Gonzalez's firing of incompetent/partisan lawyers is all you got, MSM, you got some weak beer. But I keep reading in the conservative rags these days about Bush's "problem" in being too loyal to the people he hires. Imagine that. As if two-faced, back-stabbing, tell-all memoir writing whoredom was Business As Usual in our nation's capital. Imagine that...
George W. Bush doesn't like Washington. You know what? Neither do I. Bully for George W. Bush. The haters will fade away, melting themselves with rage. The legacy and achievements of the 43rd President will stand, and not fade away. We win. They lose.
Again.
Thursday, May 31, 2007
Wednesday, May 30, 2007
Power Sans Merit
Reading about the latest internet death threat vid from Adam Gadahn, the American Taliban 2 (he's actually A.Q., but hey, what's the real diff?), as well as some background info courtesy of LA's CityBeat, Otto is once again reminded of the basic profile of a terrorist. "Loser" would be a bit harsh, but not too far off the mark.
You can theorize and psychoanalyze this kind of stuff all day, but in the end it comes down to One Main Thing: Getting chicks. With the benefit of almost fifty years' thinking on this subject, I will propose that there are three (3) basic ways to get chicks:
1) Be incredibly good looking. Jude Law. Tom Selleck. Early Mel Gibson. Rugged jaw. Heart-melting smile. Soulful eyes. This doesn't happen too often, so your chances here are pretty slim.
2) Be good. Sure, it may not win the hand of the Angelina Jolies and Keira Knightleys of the world, but the average chick does place large stock in common decency and kindness in a guy. The problem with this approach is that you typically wind up being in a relief pitcher role, sitting on the bench for long long innings, and are only called into the game after the starting pitcher (See numbers 1 and 3) messes up big-time. It's a long wait, and some can't wait that long. So then, finally, there's...
3) Obtain power. This can occur by getting rich, or once in a great while by being lucky enough to be born into it. But there is another way...yes, a way that's not been talked about much by anybody in The Chattering Class in this present day and age. That way is to become a Muslim.
Why? Because the whole system is geared towards guys. Need proof? Just two words will make the nut: Clitoral circumcision.
The typical way to get rich is to work hard, in school and in your job. No matter how many times the mindless Left wants to hollah that The Game Is Rigged, working hard is still the surest way to bucks. Merit leads to bucks, which lead to power.
But if you don't want to go that route, if the whole grind-it-out approach leaves you cold, then radical Muslim would surely be an easier way to power. Power sans merit.
Now you got your chicks. What could be sweeter?
You can theorize and psychoanalyze this kind of stuff all day, but in the end it comes down to One Main Thing: Getting chicks. With the benefit of almost fifty years' thinking on this subject, I will propose that there are three (3) basic ways to get chicks:
1) Be incredibly good looking. Jude Law. Tom Selleck. Early Mel Gibson. Rugged jaw. Heart-melting smile. Soulful eyes. This doesn't happen too often, so your chances here are pretty slim.
2) Be good. Sure, it may not win the hand of the Angelina Jolies and Keira Knightleys of the world, but the average chick does place large stock in common decency and kindness in a guy. The problem with this approach is that you typically wind up being in a relief pitcher role, sitting on the bench for long long innings, and are only called into the game after the starting pitcher (See numbers 1 and 3) messes up big-time. It's a long wait, and some can't wait that long. So then, finally, there's...
3) Obtain power. This can occur by getting rich, or once in a great while by being lucky enough to be born into it. But there is another way...yes, a way that's not been talked about much by anybody in The Chattering Class in this present day and age. That way is to become a Muslim.
Why? Because the whole system is geared towards guys. Need proof? Just two words will make the nut: Clitoral circumcision.
The typical way to get rich is to work hard, in school and in your job. No matter how many times the mindless Left wants to hollah that The Game Is Rigged, working hard is still the surest way to bucks. Merit leads to bucks, which lead to power.
But if you don't want to go that route, if the whole grind-it-out approach leaves you cold, then radical Muslim would surely be an easier way to power. Power sans merit.
Now you got your chicks. What could be sweeter?
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Why Hillary Will Win, Part 1
Yeah, I can't help it...way too wired on polly-tiks to write about Mustangs all the time...
Between now and, let's say, next March -- the way our primary system is going, with dates continually being changed to earlier and earlier in the year...imagine a world where like 8 states will have their Prez primaries on January 2nd or something -- I may post one, or ten, or a hundred and thirty seven entries on why Hillary Clinton will win the Demmie nomination for President. I have already bet Uncle Art 50 dollars on this, last September, and while I'll never pursue the collection of the money, the bragging rights quotient will be huge. He's a Truman Democrat, a populist, who ranches out in Kalispell, MT, and fashions himself the REAL voice of the Democratic party.
We stood their, mano a mano in a friendly way, as he declared to me there was NO WAY The Hill was gonna come outta the primary season on top.
These numbers, though, pretty much doom Art.
It may be true that what you view as the most reliable poll is the one that comes closest to validating your own set of beliefs about The Way Things Are. So forgive any personal bias there. But one can't help but looking at those Party ID numbers by gender, ESPECIALLY in the Women, Age 45 and up groups. I mean the Demmie gap is just huge.
And when it comes down to a woman vs. anybody else, be he black or white or red or straight or gay or big hair or no hair or actor or whatever else you can come up with...women are going to vote for the woman. That is a STONE LOCK.
I have a perfectly perfect vision of who those women are. I see 'em all the time out here in the People's Republic. They don't color their hair -- it goes gray, and they leave it that way -- you hardly see 'em with a man in the car at all, and they ALWAYS have at least one bumper sticker of some lefty nugget like:
Bush Rapes Our Mother, Rapes You, and Your Children Too -- Torture And Kill Bush!
Oh, and they're always frowning.
You cannot win against these people, Uncle Art. Hillary is why they freakin' breathe, why they get out of bed each morning. They are monomaniacal. And they will NOT vote for Barack. Sorry, Art.
Between now and, let's say, next March -- the way our primary system is going, with dates continually being changed to earlier and earlier in the year...imagine a world where like 8 states will have their Prez primaries on January 2nd or something -- I may post one, or ten, or a hundred and thirty seven entries on why Hillary Clinton will win the Demmie nomination for President. I have already bet Uncle Art 50 dollars on this, last September, and while I'll never pursue the collection of the money, the bragging rights quotient will be huge. He's a Truman Democrat, a populist, who ranches out in Kalispell, MT, and fashions himself the REAL voice of the Democratic party.
We stood their, mano a mano in a friendly way, as he declared to me there was NO WAY The Hill was gonna come outta the primary season on top.
These numbers, though, pretty much doom Art.
It may be true that what you view as the most reliable poll is the one that comes closest to validating your own set of beliefs about The Way Things Are. So forgive any personal bias there. But one can't help but looking at those Party ID numbers by gender, ESPECIALLY in the Women, Age 45 and up groups. I mean the Demmie gap is just huge.
And when it comes down to a woman vs. anybody else, be he black or white or red or straight or gay or big hair or no hair or actor or whatever else you can come up with...women are going to vote for the woman. That is a STONE LOCK.
I have a perfectly perfect vision of who those women are. I see 'em all the time out here in the People's Republic. They don't color their hair -- it goes gray, and they leave it that way -- you hardly see 'em with a man in the car at all, and they ALWAYS have at least one bumper sticker of some lefty nugget like:
Bush Rapes Our Mother, Rapes You, and Your Children Too -- Torture And Kill Bush!
Oh, and they're always frowning.
You cannot win against these people, Uncle Art. Hillary is why they freakin' breathe, why they get out of bed each morning. They are monomaniacal. And they will NOT vote for Barack. Sorry, Art.
Sunday, May 27, 2007
Look Ma, No Modem!
And so the incredible continues...
I am composing this blog from our cabin in Double-You-Vee. Minus modem.
It's unbelievable, really.
Left work Friday afternoon and came straight up -- which meant I had my work computer, a laptop, as part of the luggage. That computer has a wireless card. I'd experimented a couple of times with WiFi, pretty much unsuccessfully, 'cause I just don't know how to work the dang thing. What signals are available? How do you find them? What secret decoder ring do you need to get in? These things are beyond my current understanding.
So last night, semi-bored, I just cracked the laptop open, hit IE and typed in the Google URL. And the thing came up!
I have little idea how. I have NO idea where, as in where this signal is originating from. It just works.
Unbelievable.
It was 1998 when my brother and cousin and I were in a minivan, traveling from MPLS to North Dakota for my grandma's funeral, and Crazy Cuz Harry whipped out his laptop to show us some of the crazy vid clips he'd downloaded. That was only 9 years ago, and I still remember those moments very clearly, because it seemed like a miracle. Road trips in my early years were AM radio (maybe, it there were any stations in the area), windows down for cooling, and four boys in the back seat of the station wagon. And thirty years later, it was AC with controls that let you hit the cabin temperature to the degree, captain's chairs front and middle, and freakin' Ashley Judd at the Academy Awards.
And now it's only 7 years after that, and I'm sitting here connected to the Web with no visible means of support.
People are always gettin' all down about stuff. Buck up, folks. These are incredible, cutting edge times we live in. I'm gonna go hit the AllFordMustangs site.
I am composing this blog from our cabin in Double-You-Vee. Minus modem.
It's unbelievable, really.
Left work Friday afternoon and came straight up -- which meant I had my work computer, a laptop, as part of the luggage. That computer has a wireless card. I'd experimented a couple of times with WiFi, pretty much unsuccessfully, 'cause I just don't know how to work the dang thing. What signals are available? How do you find them? What secret decoder ring do you need to get in? These things are beyond my current understanding.
So last night, semi-bored, I just cracked the laptop open, hit IE and typed in the Google URL. And the thing came up!
I have little idea how. I have NO idea where, as in where this signal is originating from. It just works.
Unbelievable.
It was 1998 when my brother and cousin and I were in a minivan, traveling from MPLS to North Dakota for my grandma's funeral, and Crazy Cuz Harry whipped out his laptop to show us some of the crazy vid clips he'd downloaded. That was only 9 years ago, and I still remember those moments very clearly, because it seemed like a miracle. Road trips in my early years were AM radio (maybe, it there were any stations in the area), windows down for cooling, and four boys in the back seat of the station wagon. And thirty years later, it was AC with controls that let you hit the cabin temperature to the degree, captain's chairs front and middle, and freakin' Ashley Judd at the Academy Awards.
And now it's only 7 years after that, and I'm sitting here connected to the Web with no visible means of support.
People are always gettin' all down about stuff. Buck up, folks. These are incredible, cutting edge times we live in. I'm gonna go hit the AllFordMustangs site.
Friday, May 25, 2007
Getting blown
The ne plus ultra, the mega mother, the big cheese, the shite, the be-all-end-all, of major horsepower gains in automobiles always comes down to two little things: air and fuel. And I very quickly learned, after falling in love with Dixi and wanting to do just about ANYTHING for her, that the Stairway To Heaven was supercharging. Or, as the boys like to say, "getting blown."
The MMR tube discussed yesterday is one in a series of incremental upgrades you can make to increase horsepower. It's the car version of Small Ball, a single here, a stolen base there, a sacrifice bunt to move the runners up...little dinky things that, taken separately, are essentially not noticeable when you park yer booty in the driver's seat. I've seen people claim they can tell or feel the difference in a 5 horsepower increase. I can't, at least not yet. So the Small Ball approach means purchasing a whole bunch of things and getting an overall additive increase -- which in The Dix's case is about 40 hp -- in bits and pieces that you probably can't even detect. It's like that summer you did all your growing...you didn't FEEL any taller, day to day, but over the course of six months it was like, damn, how'd these pants shrink so much?
The beauty of the supercharger is that you get a bathtub full of hp in one fell swoop. If I took the plunge and decided to get Dixi blown -- Danger, Will Robinson, similes and metaphors not working in concert! -- it's 80-120 hp, boom, instant butt-kicker.
For around $6,000.
Yeah, you read that right. The kits available for the V-6 are running between $3800 and $4600 right now, and they all say "10-12 hours installation." I'd have NO SHOT doing that myself -- don't have the tools, or the skeels -- so at $80 an hour, the going rate for car performance shops in the mid-Atlantic region, you're talking another grande or so. Add tax, the inevitable "few extra parts", and you're at 6K.
And when you do the math, as per previous post, on hp per dollar...you'll see that a blower ain't that great a deal either. $50 per horsepower, as compared to $40 for the MMR tube. Which argues in favor of a Small Ball approach.
The problem is...you run out of choices pretty quickly. And then you're either happy with what you've got, or you keep wanting more. More cowbell. More power.
So here's a great article about air, and the basics of getting blown. I'll do it, someday...it's inevitable...maybe when the new version of the Stanger comes out, at which point the prices for aftermarket stuff on the older models will go down. It's an illness, this modding...a terminal illness...
The MMR tube discussed yesterday is one in a series of incremental upgrades you can make to increase horsepower. It's the car version of Small Ball, a single here, a stolen base there, a sacrifice bunt to move the runners up...little dinky things that, taken separately, are essentially not noticeable when you park yer booty in the driver's seat. I've seen people claim they can tell or feel the difference in a 5 horsepower increase. I can't, at least not yet. So the Small Ball approach means purchasing a whole bunch of things and getting an overall additive increase -- which in The Dix's case is about 40 hp -- in bits and pieces that you probably can't even detect. It's like that summer you did all your growing...you didn't FEEL any taller, day to day, but over the course of six months it was like, damn, how'd these pants shrink so much?
The beauty of the supercharger is that you get a bathtub full of hp in one fell swoop. If I took the plunge and decided to get Dixi blown -- Danger, Will Robinson, similes and metaphors not working in concert! -- it's 80-120 hp, boom, instant butt-kicker.
For around $6,000.
Yeah, you read that right. The kits available for the V-6 are running between $3800 and $4600 right now, and they all say "10-12 hours installation." I'd have NO SHOT doing that myself -- don't have the tools, or the skeels -- so at $80 an hour, the going rate for car performance shops in the mid-Atlantic region, you're talking another grande or so. Add tax, the inevitable "few extra parts", and you're at 6K.
And when you do the math, as per previous post, on hp per dollar...you'll see that a blower ain't that great a deal either. $50 per horsepower, as compared to $40 for the MMR tube. Which argues in favor of a Small Ball approach.
The problem is...you run out of choices pretty quickly. And then you're either happy with what you've got, or you keep wanting more. More cowbell. More power.
So here's a great article about air, and the basics of getting blown. I'll do it, someday...it's inevitable...maybe when the new version of the Stanger comes out, at which point the prices for aftermarket stuff on the older models will go down. It's an illness, this modding...a terminal illness...
Thursday, May 24, 2007
A Mighty Wind
So I suppose I could give you a long history of the upgrades, piece by piece, item by item, and yes, bill by bill, for Dixi and Luci. I think that will come out, eventually, if I just jump into the narrative as to where we're at right now and take it from here.
Dixi has a Cold Air Intake (or, if ya wanna get hep with the car lingo junks, CAI) made by Steeda -- it was one of the first mods made, right after the JBA axleback exhaust. The CAI is a nice item, big ol' filter and a sturdy, sheet-metal type shroud with padding to boot...but it did not (and still doesn't) come with a custom intake tube to the engine. If I knew two years ago what I know today -- no, wait, that's not right -- Steeda was pretty much first out of the box with the CAI for the V6, so I would have bought it, period -- anyways, there are now several CAIs on the market, and most of them have a custom tube.
Of course, I now have Tube Envy and have been contemplating this piece from MMR:
So why buy it? "Because it looks cool," cooeth the right brain. "Because of the horsepower gains," declareth the left brain. Both brains are correct, at least for this mod and this Pony Owner. The folks at MMR are claiming "up to an additional 7 RWHP!" I could definitely do at least one blog entry on those two little words "up to" and what they REALLY mean...but not now...suffice it to say that the stock intake tube sort of looks like this:
~
except the curves are sharper, and it's just common knowledge that if air has to run through that kind of obstacle course before mating up with the gasoline and producing those happy explosions that move the pistons that turn the crankshaft that rotate the back tires that make Dixi GO...well, the air will be tired and not as enthusiastic and you'll get less power.
Or something like that.
Actually, the whole process and mechanics of the internal combustion engine is freakin' unbelievable. It's one of those things that is so far outside and above my radius of expertise, it's like magic. I'm sure I could learn it -- want to learn it, in fact, hopefully will have the time in my "golden years" to get into all that, maybe take an auto shop class or two -- but right now it's like, God bless the man or men who came up with this, because if it had been left to me we'd still be hoofin' it.
What the MMR tube purchase really comes down to, and what ALL power adder mods come down to, is price per horsepower. The tube is $170 plus probably 20 beans shipping, tax...let's say an even $200. I'm guessing this will get The Dix an additional 5 hp, max...which means $40 per hp. The good thing about this piece is that I think I can install it myself, so there will be no additional labor/shop cost. And as you will see, as the story of Pony girls Dixi and Luci continues...those costs are not trivial. Far from it.
I'll probably order this soon. Just letting the thing germinate, or ferment, or whatever, for now. I'm getting better about impulse buying on this stuff...at least a little...
"Wait for it, wait for it, give it some time..."
-- Howard Jones, "Everlasting Love"
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
Heard ya missed me...
...actually, not really. There's nothing like a long period of blog inactivity to help you figure out who your readership is. In Otto's case, it was about two people.
That's fine. I didn't start this thing to get famous. And I sure as H don't have the time, right now anyways, to begin a Reynolds-like blitzkrieg of blog posts, even with this new Google-based platform that lets me e-mail a blog entry (!). (Thus giving a whole new meaning to the phrase "mailing it in.") I've advanced a bit at work, which requires more time out of my life. Daughter is now home for the summer again, from WVU -- actually, she got an internship at my place of business -- and appropriates our home computer a fair share. There are other reasons too.
But probably the main one is cars. PONY cars, to be exact. Ever since that red-letter day, a little less than two years ago, when I purchased The Dix, a great deal of my free time gets spent on cars. PONY cars, to be exact. Plural. Yeah, I got another one. An '06 GT, in Legend Lime, auto. Last September. I couldn't resist the 0%, 72 month deal that FoMoCo came out with around Labor Day.
I just love these cars to death. And because the aftermarket market, heh, for power adders and bling and effects and just about everythang, is so huge for Mustangs...there's always new stuff to look at, to think about, and to purchase.
Maybe I should just turn this into a Mustang blog. I mean, they say you should write about what you're interested in, eh? I may just do that, as I get meself back in the bloggroove.
Here's my two baby girls -- Dixi Candace and Luci Elinor. They are The Greatest Generation, of Ponies or any other vehicle ever made. Looks, price, power, performance -- they are The Greatest. I so love my Pony Girls.
And yeah, their asses are still so HOT.
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