“ Aug. 16 (Bloomberg) — A small South Carolina parts supplier collected about $20.5 million over six years from the Pentagon for fraudulent shipping costs, including $998,798 for sending two 19-cent washers to an Army base in Texas, U.S. officials said.
The company also billed and was paid $455,009 to ship three machine screws costing $1.31 each to Marines in Habbaniyah, Iraq, and $293,451 to ship an 89-cent split washer to Patrick Air Force Base in Cape Canaveral, Florida, Pentagon records show.
The owners of C&D Distributors in Lexington, South Carolina — twin sisters — exploited a flaw in an automated Defense Department purchasing system: bills for shipping to combat areas or U.S. bases that were labeled “priority” were usually paid automatically, said Cynthia Stroot, a Pentagon investigator.
C&D and two of its officials were barred in December from receiving federal contracts. Today, a federal judge in Columbia, South Carolina, accepted the guilty plea of the company and one sister, Charlene Corley, to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and one count of conspiracy to launder money, Assistant U.S. Attorney Kevin McDonald said.
Corley, 46, was fined $750,000. She faces a maximum prison sentence of 20 years on each count and will be sentenced soon, McDonald said in a telephone interview from Columbia. Stroot said her sibling died last year. ”
She needs to go to jail for 20 years and forfeit everything she owns to pay us back for the money she stole.
Except for you, mom, and you, Aunt Sissy. And if Uncle Mike or Aunt Toni is reading this, you might not like it. But then again, you might. If you did not find the 40 year old virgin or Knocked Up funny, then you will not find this funny either. But if you did….damn, it was funny.
Three high school seniors try to get alcohol to a party to hook up with high school girls. Not an original plot, but the execution, well, it was insanely good. One of the boys gets a fake ID in the name of “McLovin.” No first name, just “McLovin” The cops were great, the kids were great, the jackasses at the party, everyone played their role very well. And the activities and events that happened were all believable within the scope of the movie. If that makes sense.
The language was foul. But, it was appropriate to the characters. That’s how young men speak amongst themselves. And the gags were crude sometimes, but still funny. At one point I, and the rest of the audience was laughing so hard I have no idea what was said for a minute or two.
Anyway, go see it. But not till you’ve seen Stardust first. Really, they need a bit of a box office boost, and Super bad you know will be out for a while, so see them in that order. Stardust, then Superbad.
I now own an Atlas 618 metal lathe. I have all the parts, just needs some assembly and a new chuck, or maybe just the threads chased on the chuck, as it doe snot seem to want to go all the way on the spindle. From the same guy I may be buying a Burke #4 horizontal mill. The price is right, but the table is mostly missing, and is rack & pinion anyway. So…depending on how much a “new” table costs, it might not be such a good deal. Dunno, I’ll see what I can find out this week and maybe ask at the HSM meeting next Saturday.
This is my lathe:
This is what the mill would look like if all the parts were there:
“CAUSE
When a control is installed for run time use only (such as those installed by an application created with Visual Basic), if the Visual Basic Development Environment is installed onto the same machine afterwards and the existing control is of equal or higher version than that from the CD, the license key for that control is not updated.
RESOLUTION
If the control in question is any of the ones listed below, then find and double-click on the file Vbctrls.reg on the Visual Basic CD-ROM:
• AniBtn32.ocx
• Gauge32.ocx
• Graph32.ocx
• Grid32.ocx
• KeySta32.ocx
• MSOutl32.ocx
• Spin32.ocx
• Threed32.ocx
This will update the design-time licenses for these controls. For Visual Basic 5.0, Vbctrls.reg is found in the \Tools\Controls folder. For Visual Basic 6.0, it is found on Disk 1 in the \Common\Tools\Vb\Controls folder, and for Visual Studio 6.0, it is in the same folder of Disk 3. The Visual Basic 6.0 CD-ROM also contains these files for the Visual Basic 5.0 Custom Controls that were discontinued in Visual Basic 6.0:
• Dbgrid.reg
• Mschart.reg
For more information, please refer to the Readme.txt file in the same folder.
If the control in question is not among the controls listed above, please do the following:
1. Locate Regsvr32.exe on your machine. Note its path.
2. Locate the offending OCX file(s), usually found in the Windows\System folder for Windows 95, Windows 98, and Windows Me, or the Windows\System32 folder for Windows NT and Windows 2000.
3. On the Start menu, click Run.
4. In the Run dialog box, type the following:
“When you try to use some components in VB5 or VB6, a message box appears with the message “License information for this component not found. You do not have an appropriate license to use this functionality in the design environment.” The problem stems from missing registry information, and can be repaired by running the version-specific Microsoft license fix utility listed on under the Control Fix section on the Dev Resources page.
While these utilities will repair missing or damaged registry entries for controls provided with your version of Visual Basic, only those controls for which the VB version applies will be repaired. In other words, if you are attempting to use a VB control installed on your machine but not provided with your VB version (for example you have Learning Edition and you are trying to use a control provided with the Enterprise version) these utilities will not enable use of those unlicensed controls.”
“Wissam Al-okaili
An Iraqi elderly woman inspects a bullet which she says hit her bed during an alleged overnight raid by US and Iraqi troops in Baghdad’s impoverished district of Sadr City. Insurgents opened fire on the heavily fortified Green Zone in central Baghdad Tuesday, killing at least three people, as US President George W. Bush rejected a new wave of opposition to his strategy for the strife-torn country. ”
Looks unfired to me. Also kinda looks fake, like something someone made on a lathe real quick. Think maybe she’s just holding a rod turned to a point.
Also looks like it’s the same photographer and the same lady. Look at the tattooed eyebrows and the nose.
Buy tickets at moviephone or whatever it is that advertises heavily with the dumb ass ad about the biker kid taking out the rich girl, or the old man who is lonely. On second thought, don’t buy through them, it will only encourage them to make more dumb ads.
Seriously, if you are reading my site you will enjoy the movie. It’s got fencing, fighting, escapes, danger, true love, miracles, revenge, magic, humor, and air pirates. What’s not to love?
“(If you’re in two minds about Stardust, about whether or not to see it or even when to see it, please go and see it this weekend. Friday night if you can. Take friends. If necessary, take them at gunpoint. They will love the movie so much they will forgive you afterwards. And if they don’t forgive you, you can dispose of them quietly—you’re the one with the gun, after all—and you will have a wonderful time for the rest of your life with the new friends you made at the Stardust screening.)” - Neil Gaiman (the writer of the novel and graphic novel that the movie is based upon)
Oh man, this kills me. Can you spot the problem with this? Iraq Photos
“An elderly Iraqi woman shows two bullets which she says hit her house following an early coalition forces raid in the predominantly Shiite Baghdad suburb of Sadr City. At least 175 people were slaughtered on Tuesday and more than 200 wounded when four suicide truck bombs targeted people from an ancient religious sect in northern Iraq, officials said.(AFP/Wissam al-Okaili)”
(In case they change the photo, I guess I better put a copy here)
Do you think? Could that big ball of flaming gas in the sky really be heating the earth up? Naaaaaaah!
“A team of water experts says the pattern of droughts and floods in South Africa shows our global warming was triggered by the variability of the sun’s irradiance rather than by human-emitted CO2. They say variations in South African rainfall patterns are keyed to periodic reversals of the sun’s magnetic field—and to the constantly changing distance between the sun and the earth as both move through space.
In South Africa, alternate 11-year sunspot cycles produce opposite rainfall results. One complete “double sun cycle” occurs every 20.8 years: the “first” cycle brings a big flood, followed by a small drought; the next brings a big drought, followed by a small flood.
Lead author Will Alexander used the double sunspot cycle to publicly predict the end of major South African droughts in both 1995 and 2006. He notes that South African droughts have often been broken at 11-year intervals by severe floods associated with sunspot maxima—as in 1822, 1841, 1863, 1874 and 1885. The research summary appears in the June 2007 issue of the Journal of the South African Institution of Civil Engineering.
The South Africans’ conclusion is reinforced by Dr. Robert Baker of Australia, who told a recent meeting of the International Geographical Union that he has found the same 21-year cycle in Australian drought and rainfall. Baker says “the sun is like a musical instrument, vibrating in complex patterns,” with all of the planets moving in similar relationships.
H. N. Bhalme and D. A. Mooley published similar conclusions about India’s floods and droughts in the Journal of Applied Meteorology, September, 1981, based on an Indian flood index compiled from 1891 to 1979. They reported that “a highly significant 22-year cycle in the flood area index was nearly in phase with the 22-year double sunspot cycle.” Bhalme and Mooley also noted that the western U.S. has a similar relationship with the double sunspot cycle and severe flooding.
Clearly, what these water experts are all describing is a global climate connection with the sun.
The number of sunspots on the sun, and their intensity, varies in a cycle averaging 11 years. The distance between the sun and the earth keeps changing slightly and predictably because 1) they move on slightly varying paths through space; and 2) both bodies accelerate and decelerate constantly depending on the combined gravitational forces of the other big planets.
These factors apparently produce the moderate 1,500-year climate cycle on earth, which was discovered in the Greenland ice cores in 1980s and has since also been found globally in seabed and lake sediments, fossil pollen, tree rings and peat bogs.
Earth’s recent global warming occurred too early—before 1940—to be blamed on human CO2 emissions. The net global warming since 1940 is only 0.2 degrees C, with none at all since 1998. There’s little correlation between the earth’s recent temperatures and CO2 levels, but a strong correlation between the sunspot index and subsequent changes in our sea-surface temperatures.
The 1,500-year climate cycle shifts temperatures about 2 degrees C above and then 2 degrees C below the long-term average at the latitude of Washington and Paris, with greater temperature changes near the poles. Temperatures change little near the equator, but rainfall patterns can change greatly; for example, 5,000 years ago the Sahara was wet enough for grazing and hunting, while Kenya was very dry.
The UN climate change panel has declared the solar variations “too small” to produce the climate warming of the past 30 years. However, a recent Danish experiment showed that the solar variations may be amplified fourfold because they create significant changes in the earth’s cloud cover. More clouds cool the earth by deflecting more of the sun’s heat back into outer space.
The evidence for a sun/climate connection keeps pouring in, while all we hear from the Kyoto crowd is “The computer models agree with each other.””
“After it was pointed out that celebrity NASA scientist James Hansen’s work on the US surface temperature record contained flaws that resulted in 1998 being listed as the warmest year on record, NASA quietly changed its records.
The work being done by Steve McIntyre at Climateaudit is truly outstanding. First up, he completely debunked the statistical validity of the iconic Hickey Stick and now he has demonstrated that the US surface temperature record is wrong.
Climate Brown Shirts, of course, claim that the correction only makes a 1-2% change to the global record and that 1998 is still the warmest year on record.
The problematic nature of surface station temperature gathering is being uncovered at Anthony Watts’ terrific Surface Stations project in which he and his growing army of volunteers are studying the method used to collect the data.
Here’s an example of well-sited equipment along with the temperature record:
And now here’s an example of one that is clearly got a few problems:
The good site shows no temperature increase while the poor site has a clear warming bias.
Check out Surface Stations and be prepared for some common-sense-curdling placement of recording equipment.
We’re told that thousand of climate scientists agree et blah but it only took a couple of amateur investigators to uncover the truth. Naturally, they’re accused of being part of a well-funded industry conspiracy to obfuscate the argument - which comes as news to them.
Bit by bit the data underpinning the anthropogenic global warming argument is being debunked. Will the media do their job properly and report this stuff honestly so that the public can understand how it’s been deceived or will the media’s political agenda continue to rule the day?
With 1998 being replaced by 1934 as the warmest year in the record when will we see the mainstream media print the following data?
Top 10 GISS U.S. Temperature deviation (deg C) in New Order 7-Aug-07:
Year
Old
New
1934
1.23
1.25
1998
1.24
1.23
1921
1.12
1.15
2006
1.23
1.13
1931
1.08
1.08
1999
0.94
0.93
1953
0.91
0.90
1990
0.88
0.87
1938
0.85
0.86
1939
0.84
0.85
Here’s the old order of top 10 yearly temperatures.
Four of the top 10 years of US CONUS high temperature deviations are now from the 1930s: 1934, 1931, 1938 and 1939, while only 3 of the top 10 are from the last 10 years (1998, 2006, 1999). Several years (2000, 2002, 2003, 2004) fell well down the leaderboard, behind even 1900. (World rankings of temperature are calculated separately.)
There is an urgent requirement for the quality of all surface station temperature data from around the world to be quality checked. Somehow, I don’t think that Climate Brown Shirts will be moving too quickly to get that task done. “
I have drawn a blank of birthday/Christmas presents for most of the family this year.
Little Michael is getting two really cool dinosaurs
Jake is getting a book on how guns work
Joey is getting a woodworking and metal working book, and a book on man powered projectiles
Katie is getting…dunno. I think I bought her something already but don’t recall what it is
Caroline is getting a bright flashlight to compliment last years pepper spray
Melissa is getting pepper spray
Jordan is getting coal or maybe a book on how to use a shovel
Leona is getting, surprise! a book or two
Where bacon goes to slowly rot over a years time. In a clear lexan cube so we can see what it looks like as it does so. Also an egg in another cube. Pretty gross. Yet fascinating.
“An open letter to redistributionist celebrities, politicians and lefties:
If you want *me* to give more money to charities/programs, please do the following before I consider your pandering to be sincere:
1) Sell your houses and mansions. Move into a 3-bedroom, one bath house or apartment.
2) Give away your income until you live off $50,000 a year - maximum.
3) Drive a mid-priced car, no more than $25,000.
4) Shop for clothing and pay no more than $50 for jeans, $40 for shirts, and $30 for shoes.
If I saw even an iota of these people practicing what they preach, I’d perhaps take them seriously. But while they flit around in private jets, wear Gucci, and live in mansions with bathrooms bigger than my whole apartment it’s hard for me to swallow the line that I need to give more of my income because I’m being greedy if I want to keep a roof over my head, food in my mouth, and clothes on my back.“
“Closed circuit video footage from the scene of Friday’s shooting in Jerusalem’s Old City shows the Israeli Arab assailant grabbing a security guard’s pistol and shooting him repeatedly at close range.
The footage, which was released on Sunday by Jerusalem police, belies claims by the attacker’s family that he was shot by the security guard’s partner without cause.
The video clearly shows Ahmed Mahmoud Khatib, 29, from Kafr Manda in the western Galilee, following the guards, Alex Nepelvich and Mikhail Popov, as they patrolled the narrow cobblestone streets of the Old City. Then, as the guards start to enter a kiosk, Khatib snatches Popov’s gun and runs away.
The guards give chase through the crowded street, and Khatib tries to shoot Popov, but failed since the pistol was locked, the video shows. The two men scuffled and this time Khatib succeeded in shooting Popov, before fleeing.
“My weapon was taken from me by complete surprise, and then he is pointing the weapon at me with his face to me,” Popov, 31, recalled from his bed at Jerusalem’s Shaare Tzedek Medical Center.
“I jumped on him, and he cocked the gun, and at that second I grabbed his hands. At that minute he started shooting.”
Nepelvich is seen on the video standing next to a wall and shooting at the terrorist.
At first, Nepelvich failed to hit Khatib. After a resumed chase, Nepelvich caught up with Khatib and killed him.
Ten people, including Popov, were wounded in the shoot-out.
The footage ends with Khatib being shot and slumping to the floor while continuing to fire, but does not show his last moments or whether the guard “confirmed the kill,” meaning shot him after he was helpless.
Police officials said Khatib was still firing when he fell to the ground, and that Nepelvich acted professionally and appropriately in view of the danger.
Israel Police chief Insp-Gen. David Cohen has praised the actions of the security personnel as “exemplary,” and the police plan to award them certificates of merit.
The security guards were employed by a private firm, Modi’in Ezrahi, at the behest of the state.
Popov said that an Arab shopkeeper who witnessed the shooting was the first to help him and Jewish children who had been wounded in the shoot-out.
Khatib’s family and associates said over the weekend that he came to Jerusalem for Friday prayers on the Temple Mount and was killed because he had left his identity card at home.
The Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) is investigating whether Khatib - who had a criminal record but no terror-related offenses - acted on his own or was affiliated with a terrorist organization.
Khatib, who is survived by his pregnant wife and young daughter, was buried on Sunday in Kafr Manda in a funeral attended by thousands, carrying green Islamic Movement flags.
The funeral began with a speech by Sheikh Raed Salah, the leader of the Islamic Movement’s northern branch. “Those who murdered Ahmed Khatib are criminals, terrorists and cowards” he said. He also promised that those responsible will be cursed by Ahmed’s blood.
Ahmed’s father, Mahmoud, said that the security tapes were a fabrication, claiming that police had told him that evidence was still inconclusive. He blamed the security guards for his son’s death, but said that ultimate responsibility lay with the Israeli government.”
Yeah, your son stole someone’s gun, then is shot, after shooting 10 people (9 people other than the security guard were shot), and it’s the Israeli government’s fault.
Bought a used Dumore high speed drill press, model 37-021, Friday night. $45! New the same model is $3200! Granted, this is a used one, but still, what a deal. We’ll use it for drilling holes in bone and ivory, since you need a high speed to do that with out cracking. May actually get Wes’ wedding present knife finished now.
Talking to the guy selling it, turns out it came from a widow lady down the street whose husband built circuits and such and would I be interested in the equipment he had for that? Sure! Let’s go look! Turns out he had converted his two car garage into a shop and ran a nice business from there. Made all his circuit boards himself, and had lots of equipment for doing so. Also plenty of good arbor presses and dies and some sheet metal tools. All made in the US. Van got real interested when I called him, and more so when I emailed him some pictures. He’s thinking about buying the whole setup from the widow. Hope he does. If not, or even if he does, I may buy the arbor presses and if Van does not, then the sheet metal gear, too. That’s always handy to have.
Going to Cabelas this weekend to buy primer and powder.
IMR 4198
IMR 4895
Bullseye or RedDot, which ever is cheaper
CCI Small Pistol Primers
CCI Large Pistol Primers
CCI Small Rifle Primers
CCI Large Rifle Primers
Then I should be able to reload!
The bill should be about $200! But, I’ll be able to reload about 4,000 rounds with all that, so that’s like $0.05 a round.
I hear that the cost of primers and powder is going up soon. Something about the military using up all the components, so there is little left over for civilian sale. And with China and India buying up all the copper they can get their hands on, the price of brass also keeps going up. So I probably should be buying quite a few primers. hmmmmm…
I may also get a case tumbler from Cabelas, I think they run about $50. Then over to PetSmart for crushed walnuts and then we can clean up the buckets of brass.
“The House of Representatives almost turned into the Fight Club Thursday night, when Democrats ruled that a GOP motion had failed even though, when the gavel fell, the electronic score board showed it winning 215-213 along with the word FINAL. The presiding officer, Rep. Mike McNulty (D., N.Y.), actually spoke over the clerk who was trying to announce the result.
In the ensuing confusion several members changed their votes and the GOP measure to deny illegal aliens benefits such as food stamps then trailed 212-216. Boiling-mad Republicans stormed off the floor. The next day, their fury increased when they learned electronic records of the vote had disappeared from the House’s voting system.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi made matters worse when she told reporters, “There was no mistake made last night.” Majority Leader Steny Hoyer had to rescue her by acknowledging that, while he thought no wrongdoing had occurred, the minority party was “understandably angry.” Under pressure, the House unanimously agreed to create a select committee, with subpoena powers, to investigate Republican charges the vote had been “stolen.”
Congress appears to be gripped by a partisanship that borders on tribal warfare. In a forthcoming book, Los Angeles Times columnist Ron Brownstein compares it to a “second Civil War” that has led to “the virtual collapse of meaningful collaboration” between the two parties. Public disenchantment with Washington is such that now both New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Democratic former senator Sam Nunn of Georgia are musing openly about an independent run for president. But Congress itself has to act if it doesn’t want to degenerate into one of those fist-wielding European or Asian parliaments we occasionally see on TV.
The breakdown has been a long time coming.”
This is really scary. You don’t fuck with votes, not in a democracy. Lie , steal, cheat, sure, politicians do that all the time, but you can not screw around with the vote and then disappear the voting records. Someone needs to go to jail for that, by the way.
