Christopher Hitchens has passed away. And some words for more than a few fellow Christians...

The sad news broke early this morning that Christopher Hitchens, the celebrated, provocative and brilliant journalist/essayist, has passed away at the age of 62 following a battle for the past year and a half with cancer of the esophagus.Even when I disagreed with Hitchens - and those times were numerous - I had to have grudging respect for the man, because it can't be said...

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New poster for THE HUNGER GAMES movie adaptation

I know practically nothing about The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, apart from this book being everywhere when I go into any of the local bookstores. In fact, the synopsis for the upcoming film adaptation - which I just read a short while ago - is all that I know about it at all...Every year in the ruins of what was once North America, the evil Capitol of the nation of...

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The Iraq War is officially over

On this day, the Iraq War has officially drawn to a close. It began in March of 2003, lasting nearly nine years (more than twice as long as the United States took to fight and win World War II across both the Pacific and European theaters).The Iraq war cost our own country nearly one trillion dollars. It also cost the lives of more than 4,500 American military personnel and more than 100,000 Iraqis (many of whom were innocent civilians not attached...

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Time for... THE LOBO PARAMILITARY CHRISTMAS SPECIAL!

This was posted on the blog a number of years ago, minus an embeddable video. That's since been fixed and hey, it is too good not to share once again!It's The Lobo Paramilitary Christmas Special! Adapted from the eponymous one-shot special published in the early Nineties, DC Comics' resident badass and intergalactic bounty hunter Lobo (one of Superman's more colorful enemies) is hired by the Easter Bunny to kill Santa Claus. A bit of warning:...

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Newt Gingrich: The GOP's John Kerry in waiting

I once met Newt Gingrich. He's a strong writer and speaker. I think he's got a very good mind for history. I also happen to share many of the views that he holds.Nonetheless, I've got to say it...Newt Gingrich is poised to become for the Republican Party in 2012 what John Kerry was for the Democrat Party in 2004.Meaning that if Gingrich is the GOP's nominee for President, that will most likely assure that Obama will be re-elected.Part of me is...

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17-year old creates cancer-destroying nanoparticle (and wins lots of $$$ to boot!)

Angela Zhang (left) is probably like the vast majority of other teenagers in most respects. But how many other teens out there are also developing radical new therapies for cancer that might very well lead to a veritable cure?That's what Zhang has been doing for the past two years, spending over a thousand hours researching and creating a microscopic means of destroying tumors....

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One reader's tale of incompetence at the Internal Revenue Service

Way, waaaaay back when this blog was just getting started, I posted an essay titled "People who should be shot when the revolution comes". It was a tongue-in-cheek (kinda) piece about who in our society should be the first ones to be thrown against the wall if and when the citizens of this country finally get their fill and overthrow those who have gotten too uppity for anyone's good.That this particular post should come to mind more than seven...

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Has the Dan Cooper skyjacking case finally been solved?!

Two weeks after the fortieth anniversary of his dastardly deed, it looks like the mystery of Dan Cooper might have been cracked at last.And if true, it means that Cooper did survive his crazy stunt after all! In the image above, you see one Lynn Doyle Cooper on the left and on the right, one of the sketches of Dan Cooper (or "D.B. Cooper" as he was erroneously referred to...

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The one who voted against war with Japan

Yesterday was the seventieth anniversary of the Empire of Japan's sneak attack on Pearl Harbor: the event that catapulted the United States into World War II. On the following day President Franklin Roosevelt delivered the famous "Infamy Speech" before a Joint Session of Congress. Less than an hour after Roosevelt's address, Congress passed an official declaration of war...

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George Burns presents CHRISTMAS CAROL II: THE SEQUEL!

AMC has been doing multiple broadcasts of A Christmas Carol, the 1984 television movie adaptation with George C. Scott as Ebenezer Scrooge, for the past few nights. It's easily my favorite version of Charles Dickens' timeless potboiler (no really, he only wrote it to sell and pay some bills) although Patrick Stewart's one-man performance runs a very close second.But have you ever wondered what happened after Scrooge changed his ways at the end of...

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Harry Morgan has passed away

The sad news is coming out this afternoon that Harry Morgan, the already prolific actor before finding eternal fame on two of television's most classic series - as Bill Gannon on Dragnet and then Col. Sherman Potter on M*A*S*H - has passed away at the age of 96.This guy shined in everything that he was in, during a career that stretched all the way back to 1942. The following...

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Seventieth Anniversary of the Day of Infamy

Perhaps the most iconic photograph from the attack on Pearl Harbor: the battleship U.S.S. Arizona suffers a hit to her magazine by a Japanese torpedo.1,177 sailors and officers perished aboard the Arizona. To this day, most of them are still there.Today, seventy years later, there are approximately six thousand who survived the Pearl Harbor attack who are still among us.Remembering...

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MUSIC FROM THE TRANSFORMERS TRILOGY (Look! Real physical CD!)

First things first: I have yet to hear any news about a CD release of the score from Transformers: Dark of the Moon, which was once again masterfully composed and orchestrated by Steve Jablonsky. A bunch of readers have been asking me about this for the past several months (and quite often more than once!). No word either on the rumored box set that would have Jablonsky's...

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Zoe and Wally are in the first ever I Can Has Cheezburger? daily calendar!

Awright you're probably wondering: Chris who the heck are Zoe and Wally?!They're my girlfriend's two cats. And two years ago she submitted this wacky photo of the two of them laying on her futon to the popular humor site I Can Has Cheezburger?...Zoe is the black and white and orange one sitting at the far end, and Wally is the orange dude screaming (or whatever the heck he's...

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Leaking roof could lead to revealing of the Ark of the Covenant

There's no way that I'm going to make a post about this and not include a pic from my all-time very most favorite motion picture...But if you thought that the Ark of the Covenant made its way to a warehouse in Area 51 (or a warehouse in Arlington, Virginia as one of my history professors said years before Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull), it's been the longstanding...

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Star Wars cello battle!

I am actually genuinely surprised that my good friend Brian (aka Darth Larry) had nothing to do with this, since he's a bigger Star Wars geek than even I am and also an accomplished cello player!Here's the video that has musicians and saga fans alike everywhere talking today...Thanks to Geoff Gentry for being the first among many to pass this along ...

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How The Salvation Army created modern music

So it's December 1st and I'm finally allowing myself to enjoy the music of the holiday season! Not that I'm a grinch or anything. It's just... I've never liked how the Christmas stuff now seems to start coming out the day after Halloween (and lately even before then). It only "feels" like Seasons Greetings when it's after Thanksgiving, and maybe several days after that...

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