Overnight Open Thread

Neo-neocon: The Conspiracy of Kennedy Conspiracists

There are Kennedy conspiracists and then there are writers who write about Kennedy conspiracies. The former may be kooks and fools, but the latter are knowingly dishonest.

I’ve been reading a book by Vincent Bugliosi entitled "Reclaiming History", which purports to definitively prove that Oswald killed JFK by himself and was not part of any conspiracy. Bugliosi amasses a mountain of evidence (almost literally; the book is huge) and strikes down each and every conspiracy theory point by point by point.

...Bugliosi makes an especially interesting point in his introduction, one I hadn’t really thought of before, which is that although most of the people who believe in the various conspiracies are probably sincere in their beliefs, many of those who actually write the conspiracy books are not. They are lying and they know it, but they count on their readers not to realize this.

Bugliosi notes that conspiracy sells, and he is correct. There is no question that some of the motivation to write these things is to make money. But for at least some of the conspiracy authors and promoters there is probably another reason, which is that belief in conspiracies undermine faith in our government as a whole.

Vitamin D and Prevention of Chronic Diseases
Okay the title of this video may not seem very exciting, but don't be fooled by it: this is a wonderful lecture by Dr. Hollick covering his life's research on the importance of vitamin D. It's snappy, funny, interesting, detailed, educational, and may make you wish you had gone to medical school instead of Ace Diesel Academy. If only all medical lectures could be this awesome.

And oh yeah, it turns out that many of today's chronic diseases are related to lack of vitamin D. You really should be getting 1000ius a day at a minimum.

5 Things You Didn’t Know About Margaret Thostaer
#1. By training she was a chemist:

In 1943, an 18-year-old Margaret Roberts headed to Oxford on a scholarship and began studying natural sciences. The future prime minister specialized in chemistry, and she was particularly interested in crystallography. She had good teachers, too. Her tutor, Dorothy Hodgkin, would go on to win the Nobel Prize in 1964 for her work in x-ray crystallography.

After earning a postgraduate BSc degree and an MA, Margaret Roberts took a research chemist job with BX Plastics in Essex. However, chemistry quickly took a back seat to politics.

Women Valiantly Try To Defend Their BMW From Vancouver Rioters
So a bunch of pussies decide to destroy the girls' car because they can get away with it in the crowd. The girls fight back. And yet not a single man came to their defense. For shame Canada.

How Do You Tell Identical Twins Apart?
Answer: Get a dog.

How Old Are You?
Well if you can explain the relationship between these two items, then you're probably over 40.

The Death of the 'Stache'?

Maybe it's just me or the corner of the country that I live in, but I cannot remember the last time I saw a guy sporting a mustache. Of all men's facial hair trends, this one seems to have fallen by the wayside in recent years. I still see plenty of goatees, beards, and the occasional soul patch but nary a 'stache.

Weekly AoSHQ Commenter Standings
Top 10 commenters:
1 [415 comments] 'garrett' [58.25 posts/day]
2 [394 comments] 'ace'
3 [360 comments] 'Vic'
4 [344 comments] 'Y-not'
5 [342 comments] 'Kratos (Ghost of Sparta)'
6 [338 comments] 'YRM'
7 [326 comments] 'arhooley'
8 [317 comments] 'toby928▒'
9 [310 comments] 'kbdabear'
10 [300 comments] 'twiceblessedmom'

Top 10 sockpuppeteers:
1 [121 names] 'kbdabear' [16.98 unique names/day]
2 [66 names] 'toby928▒'
3 [65 names] '18-1'
4 [60 names] 'garrett'
5 [55 names] 'Cicero'
6 [52 names] 'A Balrog of Morgoth'
7 [43 names] 'Fa Cube Itches'
8 [34 names] 'Wyatt Earp'
9 [33 names] 'fluffy'
10 [33 names] 'Ace's banhammer'

The group. Yeah.

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posted by Maetenloch at 09:38 PM

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