China time

Sweatin' in the shop

While PT's busy packing I feel compelled to do a China post. A Google search indicates there are people still wringing their hands over horrible conditions in Chinese sweatshops. I'll admit I wouldn't want to work in one even if that woman in the purple bikini was working beside me. However, it should be mentioned that there's well over twenty million workers in China who still can't find a shop to sweat in.

Everyone knows that enterprising Chinese emigrants have historically settled over much of the world in search of opportunity. According to Jim Rogers that's been a blessing for mainland China as over 80% of all investment in the country comes from Chinese living overseas. I suppose it compares to Mexican immigrants in the U.S. sending money home for their families to spend in Mexico.

Jim Rogers is well known for traveling all over the world in search of investment opportunities, and for showing investors that they needn't be traders with nerves of steel to invest in the commodity market. I'll have to take his word for it because I don't have any experience in investing due to a lack of...well that list is too long to get into now. The point is that he sold his house in the U.S. and moved his wife and two daughters to Singapore to be closer to where the action is. He's still an American citizen and still pays taxes here but has found our government to be increasingly hostile to business. (Clik title for a good Rogers interview.)

China's Communist government, on the other hand, likes capitalists and makes it comparatively easy to do well there. After Mao Zedong was buried a new slogan became popular: "It's glorious to be rich." While capitalists appear to enjoy greater freedom in China than here, ordinary Americans are still living with more liberty than their Chinese counterparts, but for how long?

What I'm really wondering is whether there will eventually be an exodus of youthful American entrepreneurs looking for some glorious wealth that they feel could best be created in another country. If that should happen hopefully they - like the Chinese and Mexicans - would send some of their new riches to the "old country" because I think we're going to need it.

Weekend Election Odds and Ends

Obama National Anthem from Glenn Beck (click)

The newspapers and television news shows in the US are so blatantly biased in favor of Obama that the Russian news outlets have noticed (Gateway Pundit). Today's reporters were schooled in activist 'I want to make a difference' journalism, the style spawned by opposition to the Viet-Nam war and emboldened by the Watergate take-down of President Richard Nixon. They are anxious to report the story of a lifetime: a black president (Mark R. Levin). Some of the journalists themselves are embarrassed by the lack of professional objectivity in the media coverage of this election (Michael Malone).

The Fourth Estate wants Republicans to assume the election is already over and Obama has won. We might as well stay home an election day and get our guns and 401k papers ready to hand over to Uncle Sugar. If you have a son or daughter in the military service or off working for a defense contractor, you might want to spend the day getting their room ready for them to come back home.

The media goes on about Sarah Palin's clothes while Obama's blatant voter fraud (NewsBusters) and campaign finance shenanigans (Atlas Shrugs) (Mark Steyn) are largely ignored. If a reporter does an interview that actually brings up the issues, as Barbara West of WFTV Orlando (watch it at NewsBusters) did with Joe Biden, they are roundly criticized and promptly thrown under the bus.
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On a more positive note, it was heartening to see this video of Fred Thompson making sense of the choices facing voters the coming election. Here is an excerpt:

Let there be no doubt that an Obama administration and a heavily Democratically controlled Congress would change the face of this nation. Only you can decide whether or not the ways in which they would change it would be a good thing.

I don’t believe it. And John McCain doesn’t. John McCain’s entire life has been devoted to defending those principles that made our country great. It has been one of duty, honor, dedication and sacrifice. He has been involved in every major domestic and foreign policy issue for three decades and has fought to reform and change Washington in ways that would change our country for the better.

Don't like to watch Fred? Read the script here.
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Because it is the weekend and because the old feeder has become mulishly doctrinaire, embarrassingly cynical and even insensitive in his election rants and comments of late, I shall try to include some levity. I really do need to lighten up, especially now that I can't take my nerve pills any more.

DadGum tipped me off to this little bit of election related Zydeco music he found at Small Dead Animals. The video looks like it was filmed at the feedlot. Did I mention that the old I'm part Acadian French on my Father's side of the family? Probably not.
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I am Bill by the IowaHawk is sure to get a laugh. The preamble:

Every time I turn on the internet these days, it seems like another right wing blogger is digging up more baloney on Professor Bill Ayers. Apparently these people would rather talk about Bill Ayers' passionate youthful rambunctiousness than the issues that really matter to us, like Sarah Palin's shoe bill. Well, I've got a message for you, Mister Google cache McCarthy fascist: I'm mad as H-E-double sippy straws, and I'm not going to take it any more. No longer will I remain silent while you smear and slur this great America-hating American with his own quotes. Hear me now: when you mess with Bill Ayers, you're messing with me.

Because I AM BILL.

The IowaHawk says the post is "preemptive compliance with the coming Fairness Doctrine". Ayers says "call the oinkers!"
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Now that you are warmed up, here's a real knee-slapper: Signs Pointing To A McCain Victory by Steven M. Warshawsky at the American Thinker.
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Cheesecake Update: You may have heard of Frank Marshall Davis, the bohemian, communist, pornographer, poet, amateur photographer, jazz fan and early mentor to Barack Obama. Mr. Davis was also an friend of Obama's mother and her father. Now it appears that Barack's mother may have appeared in some of Mr. Davis' home-made cheesecake nudie photos. I'm not going to touch these naughty poses with a 10 foot pole, but you can see them here.

Nude Pictures of Barack Obama's Mother?

These pictures, combined with a few other possibly coincidental facts and a perceived similarity between Barack and a son of Frank Davis, have fueled speculation that Frank Marshall Davis might be Barack's biological father. That might explain, among other things, Obama's reluctance to produce a long-form birth certificate. Posts from the Astute Bloggers sum up the convoluted mess: here and here and here.

This kind of stuff makes my head hurt. The story may be titillating, but I know I wouldn't like folks plastering nudie pictures of my mother on the internet. And what difference would it make if Barack's bio dad was Frank Davis or the gardener or anyone else? (Assuming he would still be a 'natural born' US citizen and thus eligible to hold the office of president.)

Before these naked pictures hit the blogs, I was already concerned about the influence that the degenerate communist Frank Marshall Davis had on young Barack Obama. The facts of that relationship made me suspicious. If this stuff is true, it will make me sick. [H/T the Mickeys]

Ames, Iowa: Urban deer hunt opens early this year

Bowhunting in town?

Somehow, the idea of an Urban Bowhunt in the town where I went to college sounds like fun. I picture scantily clad, dangerously armed Iowa State coeds cavorting in Brookside Park as the tame deer stand still for the kill. Its only a short drive away, but I don't think I'll go. Both of my ex-wives live in Ames.

Steamboat Gardens Calendar - 1977

Click Calendar to "Lift Here"

Steamboat Gardens has been a fixture in Waterloo, Iowa since 1933. The original building actually was built to resemble a steam tugboat. Waterloo has been an industrial and railroad town for as long as the Gardens has been serving burgers, and the restaurant is a gathering place for workers from John Deere and other local factories.

The hamburgers were excellent the last time I ate one there, but that was in 1977, when I picked up this nifty peek-a-boo pinup calendar. I see from their online menu that you can still get the frog legs.

The building may have changed, but one thing sure hasn't. It wouldn't be a good idea to wear your "Stamp Out CommUNIONism" shirt to Steamboat Gardens. Waterloo is a union town.

Claudia Cardinale's birthday

Today is Claudia Cardinale's birthday. I'm just posting this because I got tired of seeing Smilin' Geoff Davis from the previous post at the top of the page. More photos of Claudia can be seen here. The old babe is still working.

I liked her breast best in The Professionals.

Money Honey

Maria Bartiromo

CNBC anchor, interviewer and author. If you're reading this you probably know more about her than I do. If not, click title.

Eye Candy: Lupe Velez

Muerte por amor

It is the day before Thanksgiving, there is a nice tracker's dusting of snow and the old feeder is stuck in town. I'm warm, well fed and can watch cable TV. Today's matinee is Mexican Spitfire Out West starring the drop-dead gorgeous Mexican hottie Lupe Velez. I guess there is a Mexican Spitfire marathon on Cox.

Lupe started out in silent films in the 1920's. The Mexican Spitfire proved to be too hot for this world and offed herself by taking pills and drowning in the toilet. The most recent cultural reference to Lupe Velez is found in a down-beat episode of The Simpsons, "Homer's Phobia" where the character voiced by John Waters mentions the store Lupe Velez bought the toilet she drowned in.

Hired Hand

Hired Hand

I thought we could use a little help with chores around the Feedlot so I hired this gal thinking it would take some of the load off PT, but it's not working out and I'm kinda afraid of her and mike said he'd stop by and fire her but I haven't seen him. I thought the FC was Feedlot Chick...Kisser? Hell, I don't know what I was thinking.
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ptg here. Thanks for the day off, DG. I spent the morning in the feedlot galley, making chili. Mike hasn't shown his mug around here yet. At least you could have gotten a really big, strong chick like this one that helps out over at ChicagoRay's digs.

Low Rider - Long Legs

Fender Candy

The IowaHawk has a cool look at Low Rider Magazine #1.

Just another pretty face?

Tuesday Weld

The young feeder spent many hours thinking about Tuesday Weld. The other day I decided I would publish a picture of her when she was young and beautiful. Ms. Weld has had an interesting life, to be sure, but I fell for her when she was still a teen-ager.

The photo I liked was posted at a "Boomer's Pinup" web site, but it looked as though it had been scanned from an old faded magazine. What have I spent my early morning hours doing? Restoring the old picture of Tuesday Weld with Paint Shop Pro. Here is the picture as I found it.

What say you? Was I wasting my time?

Miss Rodeo Nebraska 2008

Kristen Schott - Rodeo Queen

She's a good looking cowgirl, and not from western Nebraska. Kristen Schott is from tiny Battle Creek and has previously won several rodeo pageants. These competitions are much like other beauty pageants, but the girls are also judged on their western-style equestrian ability. The object is to become Miss Rodeo America. I don't know if they have rodeos anywhere else, or if there a Miss Rodeo World.
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The old feeder has heard all sorts of beauty queens, like garlic queens, pork queens, beef queens, poultry queens and dog queens, but I can't find any 'vegetarian queens'. I assume they are all too scrawny and sickly for beauty pageants.

Summer Outfit

Painted Woman

As an old house painter I can't help admiring a good paint job.

Until the wind blows

Painted Ladies

So when does the hurricane season start, you might ask. Anytime, the experts say.

Down in Key West painted women seem oblivious to last year's boarded up buildings and evacuations.