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snoWatch: summer edition
-- Friday, May 28, 2004 --

There’s no doubt about it. When it comes to predicting snowfall, the Silver Chips Online Weather Team is number one. Over the course of a year, the snoWatch gurus managed to correctly project when school would be canceled nearly half of 50% of the time. Now, due to gross plagiarism of National Weather Service press releases and complete ignorance of anything related to the science of weatherology, Branden Buehler and KC Costanzo have been fired. Before the weather team disbands, however, netslackers is more-or-less proud to present snoWatch: Summer Edition.




Here’s what weather.com is predicting:

June

» Average high: 84 degrees

» 15% chance of scantily clad cute neighbor mowing the lawn

» 80% chance of scantily clad middle-aged hairy neighbor mowing the lawn

» 0% chance of light wintry mix

July

» Average high: 89 degrees

» Possible snow accumulation: 0.1 inches (+/- 0.1 margin of error)

August

» Average high: 87 degrees
» 0% chance of Silver Chips Online-owned van with snoWatch painted on the side becoming a reality . . . . unless you fund it! Send money to:
Save the van project
51 University Blvd. East
Silver Spring, MD 20901
(Only unmarked bills accepted)

» According to the people who know about this stuff: “Blub." - Frosty the Snowman

Chips’ best guess: 100% chance of closure, 100% chance of at least a two-hour delay. MCPS is always on the lookout for signs of a surprise snowstorm such as an unanticipated drop in the temperature, an overcast sky, or the sudden formation of ice cubes in the freezer. Any of these provides the superintendent with justification for shutting down the schools indefinitely or at least until an opportunity to win an award presents itself. With this in mind, you would think school would be open all summer, but it seems likely that school will be cancelled anyway. Sure, it will be sunny. Sure, there will be warm weather. But Superintendent Jerry Weast has already booked a long cruise in the Bahamas, and there’s no way he’s going to cancel it just so you can get another 2.5 months of free education.

snoWatch discussion: Imagine you lived in an area where it was so cold that when you spit, your spit froze in midair. If you sent a video of such an incident to a television station claiming you were “Ice Man," a superhero blessed with the ability to subdue criminals with projectile frozen water, would they believe you?

> KC 4:54 AM [108573451597614910]
> (2) comments

Normally I would respond to a fellow netslacker's message by obnoxiously adding a side note within the text of their preexisting post. Today I felt my obnoxiousness overflowing and decided my mean-spirited answer deserved a post of its own.

Abby - I would love to pretend I cared where you went to college, but alas, that would be dishonest and I feel our friendship is built on trust. If I were to break that trust, the foundation of our amicable relationship would crumble like something that crumbles really fast.

So please, fall backwards into the the trust circle and then onto the ground because no one is going to catch you (OUCH! That was harsh! What did she do to deserve that one? Um, I'll wait for her to do something mean to me and then I will claim I went back in time to seek revenge for it prior to the event actually happening. There, how's that sound? Confusing? Who am I addressing in these parenthetical comments and why am I asking so many questions? The world may never know).

Wait wait. That was entirely too mean . . . and yet I'm too tired to care. I'll reflect back on this negatively in the morning, don't you worry.

In conclusion, Abby, I have five words of advice for you (possibly six depending on whether the last word is actually two): Trust me on the sunscreen.

You should probably go back down and read Abby's post now because if you don't, she will probably beat me with her hurty stick of pain and no one wants that. Especially Abby's neighbors who complain her torture techniques are much too loud.

> KC 1:49 AM [108537826641525611]
> (0) comments

All conventional methods of reason have failed me. I have wandered the vast realm of cyberspace in vain. I have made lengthy (at least, hours long) trips into the netherworlds, searching for clues. Hints. Anything. The books are bupkis. The talk is trash. I can't find anything alliterative to say about the people, but they aren't helping either. The ultimate question remains unanwered.

Where the fuck am I going to college?

The situation as of 3:00 p.m., Friday, May 21: There was college A. They accepted me. There were colleges B through Z. They did not.

The situation as of 3:01 p.m., Friday May 21: There was college A. They accepted me. There is now college B. They also accepted me. They give me until Monday to decide. In this scenario, B stands for Bastard.

This is where you, the faithful reader(s) of netslackers come in. True to proper netslackers form, I am far too lazy to make this decision myself (slash incapable of arriving at any meaningful decision). Therefore, I invite you to make it for me. But don't worry, I will not leave you floundering alone in the wilderness with nought but your wits. I will provide you with a compass--a list of utterly trivial, ultimately meaningless advantages and disadvantages for each school. It's a dented compass, to be sure, and it points somewhat south-westernly, but I invite you to perserve through the thorns and thistles and bad metaphors and cast your vote in Decision 2004.

Ready go

Advantages:

College A:
-Greater possibilities for joining the Russian mafia
-The type of intellectual stimulation only possible through close contact with a large number of heavily intoxicated libertarians
-Opportunity to reenact favorite wilderness scenes from both "The Sound of Music" and "Lord of the Rings"
-Good food

College B:
-Karmic vibes of oneness with the universe flowing through my being every time I step on campus
-Less likely to go straight from college to Hell
-Access to artifacts of great historical importance that will fetch an excellent price on Ebay
-Possibility of not only reenacting favorite scenes from "Lord of the Rings," but getting course credit for doing so

Disadvantages:

College A:
-The type of intellectual stimulation only possible through close contact with a large number of heavily intoxicated libertarians
-Greater likelihood of unexpectede volcanic eruption covering campus and town in molten lava going unnoticed by outside world for several months
-Frostbite

College B:
-No escape from Massive Persistent Situational Irony Syndrome
-No escape from Ralph Nader
-Crappy food

Or you could be really daring and elect for the ever popular but rarely considered third option:

KIB: Kollege In the Basement

You have the information and you have the power. Votes must be cast within the next twelve hours, or I will be forced to extend the deadline. Go.

> Abby 11:48 PM [108537339362559885]
> (1) comments

Ideas. There are none. KC is in darkness. He cannot come up with an update to write. Despair. KC continues to flounder. There is no one for him to turn to. And then, a knight in shining armor. Instant messaging gives KC an opportunity:

KC: branden, your turn to post on netslackers
Branden AUTO-REPLY: making shoes

More despair. KC sinks into a depression. There is no light at the end of the tunnel. But then . . .

KC: chris! write something for netslackers!
Chris AUTO-REPLY: If I liked you, you'd know I wasn't here, and you'd know where I was!
KC: you're in prison taking it from behind
KC: i think i just wrote our next update

There is much rejoicing. KC has avoided spending valuable minutes coming up with something new and original by recycling a conversation. KC goes on to become a Hollywood director.

THE END

> KC 9:30 PM [108501709441830385]
> (1) comments

Many apologies to those who come here expecting laughs. Right now there's very little humor to be found. But! I promise a return to zany antics just as soon as I'm bored enough to write them!

If you haven't read this you need to now. You're going to hear a lot about it in the coming weeks and months. It's an article in the New Yorker by Seymour M. Hersh that has just blown the top off of the Iraqui abuse scandal. If you're too lazy to read the whole thing, at least read the bolded text in the next paragraph.

The roots of the Abu Ghraib prison scandal lie not in the criminal inclinations of a few Army reservists but in a decision, approved last year by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, to expand a highly secret operation, which had been focussed on the hunt for Al Qaeda, to the interrogation of prisoners in Iraq. Rumsfeld’s decision embittered the American intelligence community, damaged the effectiveness of élite combat units, and hurt America’s prospects in the war on terror.

According to interviews with several past and present American intelligence officials, the Pentagon’s operation, known inside the intelligence community by several code words, including Copper Green, encouraged physical coercion and sexual humiliation of Iraqi prisoners in an effort to generate more intelligence about the growing insurgency in Iraq. A senior C.I.A. official, in confirming the details of this account last week, said that the operation stemmed from Rumsfeld’s long-standing desire to wrest control of America’s clandestine and paramilitary operations from the C.I.A.

It's important you go through the whole thing. I'm still trying to figure out what, exactly, Rumsfeld knew. It seems clear he realized his orders would end up in violation of the Geneva Conventions, but I'm not sure yet if he approved any specifics.

The article goes on to explain that Bush knew of Copper Green, but it's kind of vague about whether or not he was in the loop about what it stood for specifically.

In theory, the operation enabled the Bush Administration to respond immediately to time-sensitive intelligence: commandos crossed borders without visas and could interrogate terrorism suspects deemed too important for transfer to the military’s facilities at Guantánamo, Cuba. They carried out instant interrogations—using force if necessary—at secret C.I.A. detention centers scattered around the world. The intelligence would be relayed to the sap command center in the Pentagon in real time, and sifted for those pieces of information critical to the “white,” or overt, world.

Now, of course I can see the value of that to some extent. Some information is time sensitive and going through conventional channels isn't always an option when you're trying to put down an insurgency, but giving carte blanche to an entire group of people to do whatever it wants isn't just dangerous, it's stupid. Not only have we walked all over international law, we're setting ourselves up for more terrorist attacks of the magnitude of 9/11. If the US subscribed to international governing bodies instead of just using them to get what it wants, our country could be looking at several war crimes convictions and we will definitely be pressured by some to turn people like Rumsfeld over (of course we won't. People have cried for Kissinger to stand trial for years and they've been ignored. We don't even recognize the Hague as a legitimate court).

If Rumsfeld isn't toppled by this whole thing, Stephen Cambone looks like he'll be the top official to get knocked off:

One Pentagon official who was deeply involved in the program was Stephen Cambone, who was named Under-Secretary of Defense for Intelligence in March, 2003. The office was new; it was created as part of Rumsfeld’s reorganization of the Pentagon. Cambone was unpopular among military and civilian intelligence bureaucrats in the Pentagon, essentially because he had little experience in running intelligence programs, though in 1998 he had served as staff director for a committee, headed by Rumsfeld, that warned of an emerging ballistic-missile threat to the United States. He was known instead for his closeness to Rumsfeld. “Remember Henry II—‘Who will rid me of this meddlesome priest?’” the senior C.I.A. official said to me, with a laugh, last week. “Whatever Rumsfeld whimsically says, Cambone will do ten times that much.”

Apparently the decision to go ahead with the torture tactics was spurred on by the failure of the intelligence community in Iraq. Insurgents have managed to find out more information about us than we have about them. Thus it was concluded something had to be done and the pictures we've seen of naked Iraqi's in hoods is the result.

Now the difference between what's going on in Iraq and what's going on in Guantánamo is that the Bush administration has declared the prisoners in Guantánamo "illegal combatants" who aren't protected by the Geneva Conventions. While I don't agree with the denial of legal rights to prisoners in Cuba either, the difference has been made clear. The Bush administration had not stated, unilaterally or otherwise, that Iraqi prisoners would not be treated in accordance with international law and if the government hadn't crossed the line before, it definitely has now.

Even worse, Hersh asserts that things were kicked up a notch in Iraq:

Rumsfeld and Cambone went a step further, however: they expanded the scope of the SAP ["special-access program subject to the Defense Department’s most stringent level of security"], bringing its unconventional methods to Abu Ghraib. The commandos were to operate in Iraq as they had in Afghanistan. The male prisoners could be treated roughly, and exposed to sexual humiliation.

What we have now in Abu Ghraib, and most likely elsewhere, is a complete and utter breakdown of military command. No one had any idea who was in charge or who the person standing next to them was. Military officials and agents walked around in civilian clothing and even the people supposedly in charge weren’t clued into who was who and what they were doing in the prison. Brigadier General Janis Karpinski, the one supposedly on top of things at Abu Ghraib is quoted as saying, “I thought most of the civilians there were interpreters, but there were some civilians that I didn’t know. I called them the disappearing ghosts. I’d seen them once in a while at Abu Ghraib and then I’d see them months later.”

The author of the article appeared on CBS and said that according to one general, 60% of the people we have as prisoners aren’t even enemies and the International Red Cross is asserting that number is as high as 90%. So the people being tortured may not have any information anyway, rendering the whole situation even more senseless and inhumane than we assumed before.

The article in its entirety is about ten pages long and I’ve only gotten through 2/3 of it at this point. Again, this is something everyone needs to check out and make their own conclusions on. All I can say is that I personally am pretty appalled our government would condone this kind of “information gathering” against people who most likely have nothing to do with Hussein or the insurgency. It reminds me of the Vietnam War in a way. We created Vietcong by razing Vietnamese villages and murdering Vietnamese families. Of course they wanted revenge against the United States. I’m afraid we’re accomplishing the same in Iraq.

> KC 12:09 PM [108472406854158902]
> (0) comments

As you all know, a bunch of dumb asses in Iraq decided it would be a super-neat idea to photograph themselves abusing Iraqi prisoners. I personally would have had more fun passing the time playing cards or dropping a cinder block on my face repeatedly had I been in their shoes, but hey, some enjoy fucking over the nation they are sworn to protect while forcing prisoners to have sex with each other and some do not. To each his own.

Recently the scandal got a whole lot worse. Congress was shown more pictures of some pretty gruesome shit today and there weren't any slides at the end of the show that said, "YOU'RE ON CANDID CAMERA!" so I think we may really be in trouble here.

Still, Tom DeLay, D-Texas (that's "D" for douche bag, not Democrat), ever the voice of reason, pointed out that people really shouldn't get so upset about this stuff:

House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, said he thought "some people are overreacting."

"The people who are against the war are using this to their political ends," he said.

Yes, clearly it is inappropriate to respond with disgust and horror to pictures of bloody prisoners forced to sodomize themselves while soldiers look on and laugh. Clearly the correct response is to jump for joy and then frolic down the street passing out copies of the photographs to random strangers before returning home to fax death threats to various leaders of Arab terrorist organizations.

So do we release the photos to the public? Well, at first I was going to say "no" even though I'm a journalist. My original thought process was that letting all the photos out would just rally terrorists to seek retribution and therefore subject us all to more danger. On the one hand, I realized the simple fact that these pictures exist at all is enough reason for certain people to want revenge and the world really does deserve to know just how out of hand the Bush Administration has let this whole war get.

In conclusion, I'm beginning to think my decision to attend college in Washington, DC may prove to be a bit more dangerous than I once thought, especially since my univeristy of choice is called American. Yea, I'd have to say on the list of recent decisions I've made, that one is probably the most likely to get me vaporized by a dirty bomb.

> KC 9:26 PM [108441533766526024]
> (0) comments

Bananas. Now that I have your attention, I'd like to talk about sex.

Sex is a good thing and I have of course had lots of it in my 18 years of life. I will now pause so you can clean up the milk you just snorted out of your nose when you began laughing at me. That is assuming you were drinking milk. If you were not drinking milk and had nothing to clean up, please continue reading as though there were no pause in the narrative. Thank you.

Ok, so now that it has been established that I just finished telling a preposterous lie, I will continue speaking as though I have a wealth of knowledge on the subject. Just call me Dr. Sexopolis. Or KC. It doesn’t really matter.

Go up to anyone on the street and ask them if they are fans of sex. Most will respond by producing a flag and a big foam hand with the words “Sex Number One” printed in bold letters. Others will just say “yes.” Either way, my point is proved. People enjoy having sex.

The reason you’re reading this of course is to find out if I can help you get more of it. Well sir/ma'am/Mr. Transvestite, I believe I can. I’d like to announce the single most amazing, 100% full-proof, 10 year warrantee plan I am making up off the top of my head as I type to help you get a little more action.

Here it is: Rent an Indiana Jones movie and then do precisely as he does. If this doesn’t sky rocket your action quotient, I don’t know what will.

Oh, and to get more sex, try touring your neighborhood in a riding mower naked while shouting, “PLEASE COME OUT AND SEX ME UP!” at every house you pass. If you are arrested, tell the police officer you were simply soliciting sex from your neighbors in order to raise money for the oldest profession in the world. They will be forced to let you go as prostitution in the name of charity is completely legal.

> KC 12:44 AM [108433836729781683]
> (0) comments

I am proud to report that yet another rabid netslackers groupie has petitioned to join our elite ranks. Yes, Izaak, too, has succumbed to blog envy. This means that all three of our regular readers want to join! First Izaak, Eric, and Ben. Then, the world.

I'm afraid, however, we must reject Izaak due to his failure to file forms in triplicate. Also, I suspect his motives. It seems he wasn't actually interested in contributing actual content to site (not that anyone else does). He only wanted a picture of the pope to appear next to his name. But there can be only one instrument of the divine voice, and as resident pope of netslackers, I retain the right to petition a hefty smiting from higher powers upon anyone attempting to usurp my position. Failing that, I will throw incense at them and, in their moment of blindness, chuck my ceremonial hat at their head.

Sorry, Izaak. Better luck next time.

> Abby 3:19 PM [108413038288606132]
> (0) comments

MJbites: that link was out of my hands by the way
MJbites: i in no way condone it
MJbites: i believe in traditional american values like "no fucking sea mammals even if you're really horny and desperate"

Just as I do not approve of blow-jobs administered by dolphins (see below), President Bush is not a fan of American soldiers unleashing their yellow rivers of justice on Iraqi prisoners. Sadly, while he did mention he was appalled by the pictures illustrating such abuse, he somehow neglected to let the Arab world know he was sorry. At this point, he should really just send all the leaders of terrorist organizations lacey invitations with calligraphy reading, "The United States welcomes you to blow up any structure you feel represents American imperialism at your earliest convenience. No RSVP required. Shabot Shalom! Haha! Just kidding! Allah Akhbar!"

In other news: Interest in netslackers has recently EXPLODED, by which I mean I have manufactured interest by poking my friends repeatedly and reminding them this website exists. Due to its massive popularity, now when you search for the word "netslackers" on Google, the search engine finds a billion webpages belonging to roughly three websites I submitted a link to (seriously, this one portal called "eatonweb" most have us listed on their site at least a few hundred times as a "similar weblog" to various other blogs we are nothing like). There's also a high demand for jobs here at netslackers. We have been inundated with requests (read: two) to join the writing staff. One applicant, Ben Austin, has been asked to fill out 16 forms (consequently it's the same one over and over again, he just has to use differet color crayons for each and answer creatively) and submit a résumé. The other, Eric Glover, had the following conversation with me which automatically disqualifies him --

Sonixnfire: wanna tell me why i'm still online...? i've got a million jon'ts to do
MJbites: you're on drugs?!
Sonixnfire: you heard me.
MJbites: eric. your life does suck, it's true, but that's no reason to turn to drugs. it's a reason to turn to suicide.
Sonixnfire: don't know what i'd do without you, kc
MJbites: <3

Because he caused me to evoke the heart emoticon (a.k.a.: bizarrely shaped phallic symbol), he will be put to death.

Side note: My girlfriend is pro-choice and pro-death penalty leading me to suspect she is, in fact, the Grim Reaper in disguise. This complicates our relationship somewhat. I mean, I love her, but my feelings of affection are tempered somewhat by my fear that she may arbitrarily decide to put an end to my life.

> KC 9:35 PM [108380731215799309]
> (0) comments