Moe Lane

Well, lines:

If the cane toad can survive so much, then it can evolve, and the signs are that it’s already doing so. The evidence was buried in last week’s report, but I underlined it and I’ve got it here in front of me. This is the bit you probably haven’t heard yet, but I think it might be crucial. As the advance guard of the cane toad army moves west, its leading members are developing longer and stronger legs.

Have you got that? The cane toads are getting bigger and smarter. Soon they’ll be learning to drive. There is a school of thought, not necessarily paranoid, which holds the opinion that cane toads with human skills have already penetrated the Australian media and are even appearing as presenters of reality television shows.

Yes, I’ve mentioned cane toads before. I apparently have an unhealthy fascination with the species.

It being Sunday, we shall remove Rules for Radicals and replace it with Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: The Classic Regency Romance – Now with Ultraviolent Zombie Mayhem!: as I noted earlier, this book delivers on its promise.

I would also like to revisit this post, mostly because I’m pleased with the way that it had turned out…

Very possibly. From Fausta:

Cuba: U.S. Embargo to End?

The Fifth Summit of the Americas is coming up next week, on April 17-19 in Trinidad-Tobago. The Summit’s theme is “Securing Our Citizens’ Future by Promoting Human Prosperity, Energy Security and Environmental Sustainability.” It will be interesting to watch what the Obama administration has planned for the Summit regarding Cuba.

As readers may recall, last February the Lugar Report concluded that “progress could be attained by replacing conditionality with sequenced engagement, beginning with narrow areas of consensus that develop trust,” and recommended changing US policy towards Cuba. Following the report, in March the omnibus spending bill changed travel restrictions on American citizens with family in Cuba to once a year, and last week the Wall Street Journal reported that President Obama plans to lift U.S. restrictions on Cuba, allowing Cuban-Americans to visit families there as often as they like and to send them unlimited funds.

(more…)

The DEKA arm being a prototype for a prosthetic that’s just… impressive:

When Americans are wounded in Afghanistan or Iraq, no expense is spared to save their lives. But once they’re home, if they have suffered an amputation of their arm, they usually end up wearing an artificial limb that hasn’t changed much since World War II.

In all the wonders of modern medicine, building a robotic arm with a fully functioning hand has not been remotely possible.

But as 60 Minutes correspondent Scott Pelley reports, that is starting to change. One remarkable leap in technology is called the DEKA arm and it’s just one of the breakthroughs in a $100 million Pentagon program called “Revolutionizing Prosthetics.”

And this is just the first step; the next is wiring up these things to a patient’s nervous system, or at least coming up with a way for the prosthetic to detect impulses from a patient’s nervous system. Read/watch the whole thing: it’s both engrossing and very, very cool.

And yet, it does:

Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. 10am Saturday morning, the day before Easter, thousands of kids waited and watched while the easter bunny dumped tens of thousands of eggs from a helicopter at Harvest Hills Park. The eggdrop was put on by Northview Church in Oklahoma City and was free to the public.

Possibly it’s because of the bunny suit.

Via Blue Crab Boulevard.

Bare bones here: short version is that Phillips apparently went over the side again and the Navy did the rest. 3 dead, 4th captured, and that’s pretty much just the way you want these things to go.

See also AoSHQ.

Crossposted to RedState.

…they’ve finally picked out the White House’s First Dog. Portuguese water dog; apparently a gift from Senator Ted Kennedy’s estate. The kids have named him Bo.

Cute dogs.

Moe Lane

PS: Nah, he said that he was considering a shelter animal, but that there were allergy considerations for one of his daughters. I have a low opinion of the President, but not about his family life.

Crossposted to RedState.

…no smartass videos or funny links.

Just, “Happy Easter.” It’s a nice day out down here: go and get some fresh air.

(Via Glenn Reynolds) I’d submit this without comment:

…except where’s the fun in that? Not that I have much to add: when you have members of your group saying things like “The typical American is not a good citizen” further commentary may seem a touch unfair. I will note that if this group is typical then the NWF people are building up quite the conspiracy theory for themselves; par for the course, mind you, but still worth pointing out. They also don’t seem to like the rest of us very much.

Which is also par for the course.

Moe Lane

PS: If there was a protester with an American flag at that rally, I missed it. Didn’t see any in the DC video, either. Boulder? Nope.

Hmm. Do I detect a theme?

Crossposted to RedState.

From the New York City gathering‘s page of New Way Forward :

Bob Kerrey is done.

And not in the “he’s on his way out the door” sense.

The kids at the New School in NYC screamed, ranted, and raved at him back in December. Then they chased him through the streets (just a reminder; Kerrey’s a disabled war veteran). He didn’t do anything about that at the time, but Kerrey must have noticed with some interest the way that ‘arresting the petulant man-children’ seemed to work out for NYU, because when the New School protesters came back for a second go the college President decided to just call in the cops to clear things up and be done with it. Which the cops did. (more…)

…which promises to be above the usual webcomic filler: various cultural artifacts as part of “an informal survey of serial storytelling” and lots of guest blogs from other people doing Lovecraft-themed webcomics. Sounds like fun.

I’d also like to note again that Tour de Lovecraft really is an immensely accessible survey/refresher of Lovecraft’s work.