Extra Cheese
Oh. Yeah.
Are you in? Like Flynn I’m in. With a big ol’ grin, drinkin’ a tonic and gin, I’m in.
by Burt Likko · October 22, 2013
Oh. Yeah.
Are you in? Like Flynn I’m in. With a big ol’ grin, drinkin’ a tonic and gin, I’m in.
Tags: Big Ass Spider
Burt Likko
Pseudonymous Portlander. Homebrewer. Atheist. Recovering Republican. Recovering Catholic. Recovering divorcé. Editor-in-Chief Emeritus of Ordinary Times. Relapsed Lawyer, admitted to practice law (under his real name) in California and Oregon. On Twitter, to his frequent regret, at @burtlikko. House Likko's Words: Scite Verum. Colite Iusticia. Vivere Con Gaudium.
December 10, 2018
April 8, 2016
From CNN:
Comment →In the end, four people were shot dead at the intersection in Miramar, authorities said, including two robbery suspects, a bystander, and hostage UPS driver Frank Ordonez -- a man who relatives say had been substituting for a colleague who had called out from work that day.
The slain robbers and hijackers were Lamar Alexander, 41, and Ronnie Jerome Hill, 41, both of Miami-Dade County, the FBI said. Authorities haven't released the name of the bystander who was killed.
Numerous questions about the chase and its finale remain, including who shot Ordonez and the bystander.
[caption id="attachment_322423" align="aligncenter" width="709"] Creator: Trikosko, Marion S., photographer; Related Name: O'Halloran, Thomas J. , photographer [Public domain][/caption]
The House Judiciary Committee will be kicking off their portion of the impeachment inquiry, with coverage and live stream you can watch here:
The House Judiciary Committee is taking the reins of the impeachment inquiry, holding its first hearing with testimony on the constitutional grounds for impeachment.
The committee, which will be responsible for drafting potential articles of impeachment, is hearing from four constitutional law experts: Noah Feldman, Pamela Karlan, Michael Gerhardt and Jonathan Turley, who is also a CBS News legal analyst.
What say you? The commentareum is raring to go on this topic, join in.
Comment →[caption id="attachment_323188" align="aligncenter" width="750"] Photo by Gage Skidmore via Wikimedia Commons[/caption]
Senator Kamala Harris' once promising campaign for the Democratic nomination for president has ended.
To my supporters, it is with deep regret—but also with deep gratitude—that I am suspending my campaign today.
— Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) December 3, 2019
But I want to be clear with you: I will keep fighting every day for what this campaign has been about. Justice for the People. All the people.https://t.co/92Hk7DHHbR
Comment →Harris told aides of her intentions in an all-staff call. A person familiar with the call said she sounded distraught. While Harris had qualified for the December debate in her home state, she was running dangerously low on cash — lacking the resources to air TV ads in Iowa — and her staff was gripped by long-running internal turmoil.
Story Continued BelowStill, the news came as a shock to some of her biggest supporters. Just as Harris was announcing the news internally, a super PAC had cleared more than $1 million in TV ads in Iowa to boost her struggling campaign. The ad, which argued she was the best-equipped candidate to take on Trump, was canceled.
“Eleven months ago at the launch of our campaign in Oakland I told you all: ‘I am not perfect.' But I will always speak with decency and moral clarity and treat all people with dignity and respect. I will lead with integrity. I will speak the truth. And that’s what I have tried to do every day of this campaign. So here’s the truth today,” Harris wrote in a note to supporters. “I’ve taken stock and looked at this from every angle, and over the last few days have come to one of the hardest decisions of my life. My campaign for president simply doesn’t have the financial resources we need to continue ."
Harris, who spent Thanksgiving in Iowa with family, took a deep look at the campaign’s resources over the holiday and decided she did not have a path to the nomination. A Harris campaign aide said the expected impeachment trial in January further complicated the situation.
She made the decision Monday after discussions with her family and senior aides. Harris will travel to the early states this week to thank staff and supporters for their dedication to the campaign.
[caption id="attachment_323152" align="aligncenter" width="750"] Photo by Gage Skidmore via Wikimedia Commons[/caption]
No, not Katie Hill, who made a good run at the biggest scandal in the Cali delegation but fell short to Duncan Hunter. The still Representative of CA-50 will reportedly change his "not guilty" plea Tuesday in court.
The change of plea, if entered and accepted by the judge, also would close the complicated appeal that Hunter filed earlier this year. In an unusual move, the East County congressman appealed his prosecution in July to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeal even before his trial opened.
Hunter, who will turn 43 on Saturday, and his wife were charged in August 2018 with 60 criminal counts related to their use of Hunter’s campaign contributions and each faced decades in prison if convicted on all charges.
Both pleaded not guilty to the charges when they were arraigned.
Margaret Hunter, 44, changed her plea in June to guilty to a single count of conspiracy and agreed to testify against her husband. She faces up to five years in prison when she is sentenced in April, but is likely to serve substantially less time.
The couple has three children.
According to the indictment, the Hunters relied for years on campaign contributions to pay routine family expenses such as dental bills, home repairs and fast-food meals. They also used the donations to pay for exotic vacations, private-school tuition, video games and plane tickets for Margaret’s mother to travel to and from Poland.
The Hunters used more than $500 in campaign funds to fly the family’s pet rabbit, Eggburt, across the country with them, Margaret Hunter admitted in her plea agreement.
The initial indictment also alluded to several unnamed “individuals” who appeared to have more than professional relationships with Duncan Hunter.
Earlier this year, as the congressman continued to deny his guilt and prosecutors disclosed more of their evidence in public court filings, it became clear that Hunter had extramarital affairs with at least five different women over many years -- and paid for them with campaign funds.
Though never identified publicly, three of the women were noted to be lobbyists and two others were reported to be congressional staffers.
Hunter is still in Congress but has been stripped of all committee assignments and is not being endorsed or supported by the Republican Party, drawing strong candidates looking to take his seat.
Comment →[caption id="attachment_322780" align="aligncenter" width="750"] AG William Barr meets with DOJ officials. Photo by The United States Department of Justice [Public domain][/caption]
Attorney General William Barr said he initially had his own suspicions about financier Jeffrey Epstein’s death while behind bars at one of the most secure jails in America but came to conclude that his suicide was the result of “a perfect storm of screw-ups.”
In an interview with The Associated Press, Barr said his concerns were prompted by the numerous irregularities at the New York jail where Epstein was being held. But he said after the FBI and the Justice Department’s inspector general continued to investigate, he realized there were a “series” of mistakes made that gave Epstein the chance to take his own life.
“I can understand people who immediately, whose minds went to sort of the worst-case scenario because it was a perfect storm of screw-ups,” Barr told the AP as he flew to Montana for an event.
Barr’s comments come days after two correctional officers who were responsible for guarding the wealthy financier when he died were charged with falsifying prison records. Officers Tova Noel and Michael Thomas are accused of sleeping and browsing the internet — shopping for furniture and motorcycles — instead of watching Epstein, who was supposed to be checked on every 30 minutes.
Epstein took his own life in August while awaiting trial on charges he sexually abused girls as young as 14 and young women in New York and Florida in the early 2000s.
His suicide cast a spotlight on the federal Bureau of Prisons, which has been plagued by chronic staffing shortages and outbreaks of violence. The indictment unsealed this week against the officers shows a damning glimpse of safety lapses inside a high-security unit
This will, of course, have precisely zero effect in settling down those pesky "Epstein Didn't Kill Himself!" feelings many folks have.
Comment →Andrew Donaldson // 45 Comments
Not the Bi-Partisan Impeachment They Were Looking For
December 6, 2019
Sunday Morning! “Have You Seen the White Whale?”
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December 8, 2019
December 8, 2019
Beyond December 7th: A Pearl Harbor Remembrance
December 7, 2019
Saturday Morning Gaming: Gaming As A Service
December 7, 2019
The Days of Christmas Tree Preparation
December 7, 2019
Not the Bi-Partisan Impeachment They Were Looking For
December 6, 2019
Devin Nunes and the Very Delicate Feelings
December 6, 2019
December 6, 2019
Chik-Fil-A: Why Can’t a Chicken Sandwich Just Be a Chicken Sandwich?
November 20, 2019
Pete Buttigieg Tops Latest Iowa Polling
November 12, 2019
Public Impeachment Hearings Begin
November 13, 2019
December 2, 2019
November 26, 2019
November 18, 2019
Obligatory Impeachment Hearings Something or Other
December 4, 2019
I’m Dreaming of a Bike Christmas
December 5, 2019
I've heard of feeling like a million bucks, but a billion just sounds greedy.
That’s… just… WOW!
So damn creepy! [SHUDDER!]Report
I know, right? So much awesome there.Report
All it would need for perfection is the hero to build some kind of junkyard mecha to go toe to toe with the beastie.Report
Brought to you by Toyota.
http://jalopnik.com/toyota-recalls-870-000-cars-because-of-freaking-spiders-1447758469Report
Here’s a post Burt or someone else should do:
Why is it that once an actor/actress has been in any sci-fi/horror TV show or movie – no matter how bad it was or how dreadful they were – they are granted a career in sci-fi/horror movies for the rest of their lives? Not only a career, but one in which DVD boxes will say things like, “Featuring Walter Koenig of STAR TREK!” even if they have, like, 2 lines?Report
Typecasting and fan love.Report
Walter Koenig? The guy who played Bester on B5 was in Star Trek too!?!!1! Awesome! Literally space awesome!Report
You really didn’t know that? He played Chekov, the Navigator, sat next to Sulu on the bridge. Spoke with a doofusy fake Russian accent.Report
(I knew that. Just being silly. “Where are your nuclear wessels?”)Report
And did you know Wings wasn’t Paul McCartney’s first band?Report
@mike-schilling that would be the Kingsmen, wouldn’t it?Report
Wings? You mean that crappy sitcom? Buffalo style? Wings Hauser ( only noted for crappy movie fans)? Was there another Wings?Report
And did you know Wings wasn’t Paul McCartney’s first band?
Who is Paul McCartney?Report
Ringo Starr’s bass player.Report
I never understood the appeal of this kind of entertainment and probably never well.
Keep in mind “so bad its good” has always gone over my head. Same with Camp and Kitsch.Report
It can be a fun social activity. It’s simple enough that you can talk to people while you’re watching it without missing much. You can make fun of it together.Report
I care about art too much. Life is too short and there is too much good art out there. I can’t imaging wasting time on the campy/kitschy stuff.
Though I also don’t quite get passive entertainment either. Perhaps my brain is just hyper active.Report
Life is too short for humor?Report
James,
There is plenty of intentional comedy that I can watch and laugh with and at while still avoiding this stuff 🙂 Stuff with actual wit and intelligence.Report
Oh just ignore NewDealer, he plain doesn’t get it.
Let him have his high-brow artsy-fartsy “humor”, we can all enjoy this excellent beer & pizza movie without his belly-aching the death of wit.
😉Report
MRS,
The Philadelphia Story isn’t funny?Report
MRS was a Navy man. There’s nothing “funny” about covert invisibility experiments resulting in time-traveling destroyers. 😉Report
The time-travelling part is fine by this Navy man. It’s the sailors embedded in bulkheads that give me the williies.Report
@newdealer
Not compared to Bringing Up Baby.Report
NewDealer,
Surely you’d laugh at folks reading the stage directions??
I’ll quote:
“This is quite homoerotic”
You’ve done theatre, surely you can laugh at people doing it wrong?
(Note: additional hilarity ensues when someone tries to make a bad
show, and instead makes a /good/ one).Report
I agree with Rod, the whole “sailors in the bulkheads” bit was unfunny, the rest was pretty cool.Report
“I never understood the appeal of this kind of entertainment and probably never well.”
what is this…emotion…you humans call…fun?Report
Cute. I have fun.Report
This reminds me of “8 legged freaks”.Report
Another classic!Report