Archive for March, 2008

"Bookninja"

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Posted: March 11th, 2008
at 8:00pm by Koookiecrumbles


Categories: apple

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Adobe Light-Field Camera

Adobea€™s recently uncovered a fascinating bug-like multi-lens product that snaps pics at various depths, allowing photographers to later decide the focal length. Basically, it gives 2 dimensional images a 3rd dimensiona€¦.best part is that ita€™s an attachment, so, no new camera, just a new component to latch onto your gear to take some sweet images.

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via designverb

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Posted: March 11th, 2008
at 6:00pm by orangemenace


Categories: myninjaplease,weaponry,photo,fo' real?

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Tetris Ice Cubes

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Czech designer, Martin Zmpach‘s Tetris ice cube tray, via designboom.

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Posted: March 11th, 2008
at 4:03pm by orangemenace


Categories: myninjaplease,home

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The Wire writers wage war on the Drug War

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Check out what the writers of HBO’s phenomenal (and now sadly over) series The Wire have to say about the Drug War and its effects on American society…

The drug war has ravaged law enforcement too. In cities where police agencies commit the most resources to arresting their way out of their drug problems, the arrest rates for violent crime a€" murder, rape, aggravated assault a€" have declined. In Baltimore, where we set The Wire, drug arrests have skyrocketed over the past three decades, yet in that same span, arrest rates for murder have gone from 80% and 90% to half that. Lost in an unwinnable drug war, a new generation of law officers is no longer capable of investigating crime properly, having learned only to make court pay by grabbing cheap, meaningless drug arrests off the nearest corner.

What the drugs themselves have not destroyed, the warfare against them has. And what once began, perhaps, as a battle against dangerous substances long ago transformed itself into a venal war on our underclass. Since declaring war on drugs nearly 40 years ago, we’ve been demonizing our most desperate citizens, isolating and incarcerating them and otherwise denying them a role in the American collective. All to no purpose. The prison population doubles and doubles again; the drugs remain.

Our leaders? There aren’t any politicians a€" Democrat or Republican a€" willing to speak truth on this. Instead, politicians compete to prove themselves more draconian than thou, to embrace America’s most profound and enduring policy failure.

"A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong, gives it a superficial appearance of being right," wrote Thomas Paine when he called for civil disobedience against monarchy a€" the flawed national policy of his day. In a similar spirit, we offer a small idea that is, perhaps, no small idea. It will not solve the drug problem, nor will it heal all civic wounds. It does not yet address questions of how the resources spent warring with our poor over drug use might be better spent on treatment or education or job training, or anything else that might begin to restore those places in America where the only economic engine remaining is the illegal drug economy. It doesn’t resolve the myriad complexities that a retreat from war to sanity will require. All it does is open a range of intricate, paradoxical issues. But this is what we can do a€" and what we will do.

**)full article here(**

****on a side note, Dennis Lehane grew up in my neighborhood, and was my high school graduation speaker, does that make me famous?****

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Posted: March 11th, 2008
at 2:11pm by trizlam


Categories: apple

Comments: 3 comments


7 New Deadly Sins? 7 New Holy Virtues?

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With the introduction of seven new deadly sins by the Vatican, Catholic ninjas around the world were left wondering if there would be seven new holy virtues to accompany and ultimately balance out the list. We all know that the pride goeth before the fall; but the question on many of my ninjas’ minds today is what goeth before obscene wealth.

The seven deadly sins, also known as the capital vices or cardinal sins, are a classification of vices that were originally used in early Christian teachings to educate and instruct followers concerning (immoral) fallen man’s tendency to sin. The Roman Catholic Church divided sin into two principal categories: "venial", which are relatively minor, and could be forgiven through any sacrament of the Church, and the more severe "capital" or mortal sin. Mortal sins destroyed the life of grace, and created the threat of eternal damnation unless either absolved through the sacrament of confession, or forgiven through perfect contrition on the part of the penitent. Beginning in the early 14th century, the popularity of the seven deadly sins as a theme among European artists of the time eventually helped to ingrain them in many areas of Christian culture and Christian consciousness in general throughout the world.But One means of such ingraining was the creation of the mnemonic SALIGIA based on the first letters in Latin of the seven deadly sins: Superbia, Avaritia, Luxuria, Invidia, Gula, Ira, Acedia.[1]

Listed in the same order used by both Pope Gregory the Great in the 6th Century AD, and later by Dante Alighieri in his epic poem The Divine Comedy, the seven deadly sins are as follows: Luxuria (extravagance, later lust), Gula (gluttony), Avaritia (greed), Acedia (sloth), Ira (wrath), Invidia (envy), and Superbia (pride). Each of the seven deadly sins has an opposite among the corresponding seven holy virtues (sometimes also referred to as the contrary virtues). In parallel order to the sins they oppose, the seven holy virtues are chastity, abstinence, temperance, diligence, patience, kindness, and humility.

The identification and definition of the seven deadly sins over their history has been a fluid process and the idea of what each of the seven actually encompasses has evolved over time. This process has been aided by the fact that they are not referred to in either a cohesive or codified manner in the Bible itself, and as a result other literary and ecclesiastical works referring to the seven deadly sins were instead consulted as sources from which definitions might be drawn. Part II of Dante’s Divine Comedy, Purgatorio, has almost certainly been the best known source since the Renaissance.

[LINK]

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By Flavia Krause-Jackson

March 10 (Bloomberg) — The Vatican has put together a list of seven "social" sins that includes excessive wealth, drug abuse, littering, genetic tampering and creating poverty.

Echoing the concept of the seven cardinal vices — set to paper by Pope Gregory I in the sixth century — the new list adds a social dimension, Bishop Gianfranco Girotti, head of the Apostolic Penitentiary, said in an interview yesterday with the Vatican’s official newspaper l’Osservatore Romano.

"You offend God not only by stealing, taking the Lord’s name in vain or coveting your neighbor’s wife, but also by wrecking the environment, carrying out morally debatable experiments that manipulate DNA or harm embryos," said Girotti, who is responsible for the body that oversees confessions.

Pope Benedict XVI has spoken out on social issues throughout his three-year papacy. He backs a current political initiative to outlaw abortions after 90 days and encouraged Catholics to abstain from a 2005 referendum on easing restrictive laws on fertility treatments, which failed to achieve the 50 percent participation level to make the vote to change the law binding.

The seven social sins are:

1. "Bioethical’ violations such as birth control

2. "Morally dubious" experiments such as stem cell research

3. Drug abuse

4. Polluting the environment

5. Contributing to widening divide between rich and poor

6. Excessive wealth

7. Creating poverty

[LINK]

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Posted: March 11th, 2008
at 1:50pm by Black Ock


Categories: life,green,business,politricks,weaponry,fo' real?,real life news,science

Comments: 1 comment


Who Got the Vocab?!

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VinAAcenAAtian … /vEASnEsEasnEE™n/ … [vin-sen-shuhn] Pronunciation Key -
a€"noun
1. Also called Lazarist. a member of the a€oeCongregation of the Mission,a€A founded in France in 1625, engaged chiefly in conducting missions and clerical seminaries.
a€"adjective
2. of or pertaining to St. Vincent de Paul or the Vincentians.

On the eve of the French Revolution St Lazare was plundered by the mob, the congregation later suppressed; it was restored by
Napoleon in 1804 at the desire of Pius VII, abolished by him in 1809 in consequence of a quarrel with the pope, and again restored in 1816. The Lazarists were expelled from Italy in 1871 and from Germany in 1873.

[LINK]

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Posted: March 11th, 2008
at 11:21am by Black Ock


Categories: weaponry

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Fidel - a graphic novel

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The Cuban Revolution of 1959, spearheaded by the young Fidel Castro along with his companion in arms, Ernesto a€oeChea€A Guevara, is mythic in both its dream and reality. Fidel offers a uniquely readable and illustrated account of the struggle for Castro to define and defend his nation in the face of fear and opposition from the United States, Cubaa€™s neighbor a scant ninety miles away. In addition to discussing the Bay of Pigs and the Cold War, the author examines Cuban influence in Latin American insurgencies, the student protests of 1968 Europe, the African American uprisings of the United States, the liberation of Vietnam, the decolonization of Africa, the end of apartheid, and the rise of Cuban ally Hugo ChA¡vez, the president of Venezuela.Along with entertaining comics and photographs, this short read traces the ambitions of Castro as he aims to endow the face of socialism with creative, intelligent, and humanitarian features, and shows a man indistinguishable from his revolution and his country.
NA‰STOR KOHAN, born in Buenos Aires in 1967, is the author of a number of Spanish-language books on Marxism, Che Guevara, and social movements in Latin America.
NAHUEL SCHERMA is an Argentinian filmmaker and documentarian. Fidel is his first book of illustrations.
ELISE BUCHMAN worked in childrena€™s theater for twenty years, and is now a childrena€™s poet. She has written for several online publications and co-authored a book in Spanish on theatrical fencing. This is her first book translation.

An illustrated guide through Fidel Castroa€™s Cuba and his revolutionary dream.

Publisher Seven Stories Press

[LINK]

Looks kinda ill. Buy it, my ninjas. Thanks to the Nation of Trizlam for this link.

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Posted: March 11th, 2008
at 10:30am by Black Ock


Categories: life,politricks,contemporary

Comments: 1 comment


Hillary’s Home Video

This whole youtube election thing is a trip, but, I must say… WTF took them so long. It’s not like the internet just came out. Some of ya’ll who watch the fake news on TV may have noticed that we here at MNP have a tendency to be late with our posts on news that’s too popular. That’s just our style. We actually think about what we write [even though that is not readily apparent to the average reader].

So Hillary went and released this video of herself at quite a convenient time. I just posted it because I thought it was pretty interesting. What kind of WASPy mofos were running around with video cameras in 1954? This is the bourgiest working-class-candidate campaign I’ve ever seen by either party in my short tragic life. Can we please see your financial statements?

Now I agree that this post kind of counts as negative advertising, but the whole 3 AM commercial thing got me a little bit mad. I mean, she’s basically proffering the idea that Barack is at home eating chicken or something, totally unprepared for a potential emergency call. And her experience as First Lady somehow qualifies her?

For the naysayers, I digress, you may be right. My own mama postulated that Hillary probably has plenty experience being awake at that time. Who knows where Bill was… probably off eating chicken in Southeast.

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Posted: March 11th, 2008
at 9:35am by Black Ock


Categories: youtube,mnp is for the children,politricks

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The Definition of TMI

Omg. So…

From planetsave:

The recent revelation by The Associated Press that our tap water contains traces of pharmaceutical drugs, hormones and disinfectants elicited a bit of a€oeI told you so!a€A from The Environmental Working Group when I spoke to them this morning.

Way back in 2005 they published a report, The National Assessment of Tap Water that found that:

Tap water in 42 states is contaminated with more than 140 unregulated chemicals that lack safety standards. In an analysis of more than 22 million tap water quality tests, EWG found that water suppliers across the U.S. detected 260 contaminants in water served to the public. One hundred forty-one (141) of these detected chemicals a€" more than half a€" are unregulated.
They posted an update on their report today with this comment from Jane Houlihan, EWG Vice President for Research

a€oeOnce again, the press is doing EPAa€s work when it comes to informing the public about contaminated tap water.a€oe

Actually this extends beyond The EPAa€™s purview which is only to supervise public drinking supplies. Bottled water, which as we have discovered over the past few years is frequently tap water in a bottle ( Pepsia€™s Aquafina, Cokea€™s Dansani) actually has lower standards than tap water .

The FDA which supposedly regulates the production of bottled water also misses those scary drugs and also allows for some contamination by E. coli or fecal coliform. Yuck. If you thought you could get around this tap water issue by drinking bottled water. Think again.

Read the rest ->

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I’m just sayin’, yo…

From ecoscraps via planetsave:A new study found traces of common drugs including: an anti-seizure medication, a mood stabilizer for treating bipolar disorders, ibuprofen and naproxen, and an antibiotic typically given to cattle in the water of 24 out of 28 US metropolitan areas.

Most wastewater and drinking water treatment systems are incapable of removing those drugs. Some scientists said there is probably little human health risk; others fear chronic exposure could alter immune responses or interfere with adolescentsa€™ developing hormone systems.

Read the rest ->

This explains a near multitude of things, including my more than four hour erection. All this time I thought it was Hilary Clinton. From now on I’m only drinking that ‘drank.’

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Posted: March 11th, 2008
at 9:00am by Black Ock


Categories: life,not ninja-worthy,fo' real?,real life news,science

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