Cab Thoughts 4/4/15

The turkey was fed and sheltered for 1000 consecutive days, but this did not mean that the butcher loved him. --anon

A crocodile which walked on its hind legs may have been the most deadly creature on Earth before the evolution of the biggest dinosaurs. The newly discovered Carnufex carolinensis, or "Carolina Butcher," was a 9-foot long, land-dwelling proto-crocodile with huge snapping jaws. It preyed on early mammals and armored reptiles in the Late Triassic Period, around 231 million years ago, when the Earth had just one huge continent, Pangea.

Paleontologists from North Carolina State University and the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences, discovered parts of the Carolina Butcher’s skull, spine and upper forelimb in Chatham County, North Carolina.

The Fort Lauderdale Warlocks was a motorcycle gang consisting entirely of undercover ATF agents.

Dustin Diamond, formerly known as Screech on Saved By the Bell, is on trial for stabbing a guy at a bar last fall. Evidence is being weighed to include an accusation that earlier in the night, the esteemed Mr. Diamond threatened to stab another stranger because he had refused to participate in "Smirnoff Icing," apparently a game of some sort where  one forces a bottle of Smirnoff Ice on an unsuspecting victim and then demands they chug it. These are grownups who presumably have drivers licenses and voters cards.

Chesterton hated impressionism.  “It means believing one’s immediate impressions at the expense of one’s more permanent and positive generalisations,” Chesterton argued in his study of William Blake. “It puts what one notices above what one knows.”

"This strategy of taking out terrorists who threaten us, while supporting partners on the front lines, is one that we have successfully pursued in Yemen and Somalia for years.”--Mr. Obama, 2014

John of Gaunt (really Ghent where he was born) was the son of Edward III, the brother of the Black Prince, the uncle of Richard II, the father of Henry IV and the grandfather of Henry V. He was the richest nobleman and the greatest subject in England, the owner of huge estates and no fewer than thirty castles. According to his biographer Anthony Goodman, Gaunt was possibly the most hated man in England, and he was a major target of the Peasants' Revolt of 1381, when his luxurious palace of the Savoy in London was burned.

Between 2000 and today, the global bond market has nearly TRIPLED in size. Today, it is more than $100 trillion. And it’s backstopping over $555 trillion in derivatives trades.

A French court has convicted a retired electrician and his wife of concealing 271 stolen artworks by Picasso, and ordered the couple to give them back to the artist's family.

The verdict in the southern city of Grasse wraps up an unusual case centering around works that were unknown to the public for decades and have an estimated worth 60-100 million euros (£43-72 million).
Pierre Le Guennec and his wife, Danielle, say Picasso or his wife gave them paintings, drawings, lithographs and collages around 1970 when Le Guennec worked for the renowned Spanish artist. The family says Picasso never did.

500,000 million dollars in U.S. weapons are missing in Yemen. the Pentagon now finds it impossible to account for hundreds of millions of dollars in guns, ammo, explosives, RPGs, vehicles, night-vision goggles, much lost during the hasty evacuation.

Golden oldie:

http://steeleydock.blogspot.com/2010/03/war-and-inflation.html

Reuters reported CCC-rated Ukraine is preparing to issue more debt, debt with a Aa+/AAA rating because it will come with the explicit guarantee of the United States of America. One other place that also issued bonds with a US guarantee was Egypt. Underwriting the US-inspired coup that put the Muslim Brotherhood in power.

Rockets bound for space are now launched from somewhere on Earth about once a week.

Inequality report: A Louisiana man was paid $50 to deliver a summons in a brutality case to a police officer, as he left a courthouse. Hours later, the man was arrested and charged with assaulting the officer; the claim was that he had attacked the officer on the courthouse steps, slapping him with the summons and in effect striking him hard enough to move him back several feet. Charges were supported by two ADAs at the scene. For two years, prosecution against the man proceeded. But, according to reports: "Unfortunately for these particular, conniving officers, the ADAs, and the DA, the man had asked his wife and nephew to film him delivering the summons so he could prove he had done so. Eventually, the case came to the jurisdiction of the Louisiana State AG's office - where all charges were promptly dropped. The man is currently pursuing a civil-rights lawsuit against the law enforcement officials involved."

Of all the oligarchs connected to foreign governments who donated to the Clinton Foundation while she was Secretary of State, Ukraine was at the very top. This is a "Caesar's Wife" question. They know this.

OK: (Also Okay) is a word meaning assent or approval, often unenthusiastic. It can be an exclamation, adverb or adjective. The initials “O.K.” were first published in The Boston Morning Post, according to an exhaustive study by Read. It was meant as an abbreviation for “oll correct,” a popular slang misspelling of “all correct” at the time. (Slang and misspellings with slang were a common contemporaneous joke.)
There are several alternative origins that Read acknowledges are possible. One is an origin in the Choctaw Indian language that actually appears in print; missionaries ended many sentences in their translation of the Bible with the Choctaw "okeh", meaning "it is so". (Interestingly, this might be an elaboration of the West African "Kay" with a similar meaning that the Choctaw might have picked up from their slave-owning, Cherokee relatives.) Another is the common Scots phrase och aye ("oh yes").  A third is from 1840, when supporters of the American Democratic political party claimed during the 1840 United States presidential election that it stood for "Old Kinderhook," a nickname for a Democratic presidential candidate, Martin Van Buren, a native of Kinderhook, New York, who was Andrew Jackson's protégé. Their opponents suggested it was a sign that Jackson, Van Buren's sponsor, could not spell "all correct."

Who is.... Sergei Saltykov?

In the early '80s, Americans had 5 times as many air-conditioners per head, 4 times as many clothes dryers and 7 times as many dishwashers as in 1958; 93% of American homes owned color TVs, as opposed to 1% in 1960. Yet, despite this dramatic increase, people didn't feel happier. The University of Chicago's National Opinion Research Center found that the proportion of Americans describing themselves as "very happy" had remained the same (one third).
For most people, once they've satisfied their basic needs, the pursuit of material wealth does not achieve happiness. That explains why the huge gulf in affluence between, say, the Germans and the Indians, or the Japanese and the Kenyans doesn't translate into a different degree of how happy the people of these countries judge themselves.

According to Wayne Crews, who makes an annual estimate of the cost of compliance with federal regulations alone, “Costs for Americans to comply with federal regulations reached $1.863 trillion in 2013”—which is equivalent to more than 13 percent of national income.

Paul I, Tsar of Russia ,was born in St Petersburg in 1754. He was the son of the Grand Duchess Catherine, later Empress Catherine the Great, who was the wife of the heir to the throne, the Grand Duke Peter, later Emperor Peter III. His natural father was probably Sergei Saltykov, Catherine's lover. After seven years of virginal marriage to an impaired or uninterested husband, Catherine was encouraged to conceive with Saltykov by her senior governess Madame Choglokova, who, in Catherine's words told her, "...that there were sometimes situations in which a higher interest demanded an exception to these rules; where one's patriotic duty to one's country took precedence over duty to one's husband."

Paul I was the Emperor of Russia between 1796 and 1801, when he was assassinated.

The San Francisco linebacker who retired after one year, Cris Borland, received a $617,436 signing bonus. For cap purposes it was prorated over four years. His comments would indicate he will return $436,077 of that bonus.

"There was money moving that included taxpayer U.S. dollars, through non-profit organizations. And there were various liberal groups in the United States that were raising millions to fund a campaign called V15 against Prime Minister Netanyahu," John McLaughlin, a Rube-publican strategist said. He noted an effort to oust Netanyahu was guided by former Obama political operative Jeremy Bird and that V15, or Victory 15, ads hurt Netanyahu in the polls. McLaughlin said the Israeli leader rebounded after delivering a speech to Congress early this month, prompting more critical ads.
V15 was viewed as part of a broader campaign to oust Netanyahu. The group was linked to Washington-based nonprofit OneVoice Movement, which reportedly received $350,000 in State Department grants. Money to OneVoice stopped flowing in November, officials said, before the Israeli elections.

After Netanyahu's win, V15 co-founder Nimrod Dweck said in an interview with Ronan Farrow aired on MSNBC's "Jose Diaz-Balart" that "not a single cent" of State Department or taxpayer money had gone to their campaign.

It's an ugly claim; so which is it?

Scientists from Saarland University in Germany say that 45 minutes nap a day dramatically increases memory.

Argentina is most widely known for their wonderful Malbec varietal. The Torrontés varietal is exclusive to Argentina and has progressed in the international market, it has become the emblematic white wine of Argentina. The varietal is considered to be one of the most aromatic wines around – with huge flavors of lemon, crème brulee, and citrus. The wines made from the Torrontes grape.

AAAAaaaaaaannnnnddddd.....a picture: