This is going to backfire: $9.35/hour to mint gold coins?

We're running this ad today:

http://cdapress.thejobnetwork.com/job/11705950

There is a company in the town I live in that manufactures bullion coins from silver and gold mined in Idaho. They run four 12-hour crews. You work 12 hours and get off 36. Problem is, they only pay $9.35/hour to the day-shift workers and only $9.85 to the night-shift workers. Even for this town that's low, and most jobs don't come with built-in temptations like these do.

What Mitt Romney's explanations for his loss have always reminded me of

Remember Jake trying to talk Carrie Fisher out of killing him in the third act of The Blues Brothers?

How to solve the NFL and NBA's "bad boy" problem

Mandatory corporate sponsorship.

Think, if you will, of auto racing. As Darrell Waltrip once put it, "what makes a race car go fast is what's painted on the hood" - the logo of some product. The companies who own those logos won't put up with The Face Of Our Company being a criminal off the track, and they'll make a team get rid of a driver quick if he becomes an embarrassment. The drivers know this, and they behave.

The NFL and NBA are different: teams are named after the town they're supposedly from, and the players tend to run amok. I don't think Ray Rice would have initially received a two-game suspension if he played for the McCormick Ravens. Nor do I think the football team based in Washington, DC, would have the name it has if it was sponsored by Lockheed Martin.

I am starting to wonder about Vice President Biden's security

It's becoming more and more apparent President Obama has a security force not worthy of the name. How about the vice president? "President Boehner" is an unsettling thought.

My preference right now would be to find all the troops who like President Obama in the Army's Special Forces, 75th Rangers and 82nd Airborne - there can't be all that many, but you know there are some - and have THEM guard the president until we can get a new Secret Service detail that takes its job seriously.

To prove your wingnut bona fides, bring up pirates

Today I have the sad duty to report some seriously whacked-out shit. This was reported in the Columbia Basin Herald, but it's not on their website.

Washington's 4th CD is currently represented by Doc Hastings, who's retiring. Vying for his seat are two Republicans: Dan Newhouse, conservative and tree fruit farmer, is challenging Clint Didier, teabagger, potato farmer and retired Super Bowl-winning NFL tight end.

There was a debate between these two on Monday in Othello. They started talking about how best to deal with ISIL, and Mr. Didier said all these words:

"In the Constitution they said if there is no country to declare a war against, as we had that problem back in the day with the Barbary pirates, let us marque and reprisal. 'And therefore we put forth letters of marque and reprisal.' We mark the guys that need to be taken out. We have the special forces to do it."

Let me see...
1) A "letter of marque and reprisal" is a pirate hunting license, not a way to "mark" the guys you want to kill.
2) It's issued to private vessels, not to government forces.
3) The United States hasn't issued one since 1810.
4) There's been an international treaty banning the issue of these letters since 1859.

There's a reason the Washington Potato Commission is NOT endorsing the potato farmer for Congress.

Anyone familiar with Fenway Park?

If so, which would be more reasonably priced: a used 400mm lens and a seat in the bleacher section, or a seat close enough to the infield that I can use my 200?

Sprint car fatality update: Tony Stewart cleared, Kevin Ward stoned

Eating a police car is a felony in Idaho

No link yet...

One Staci Anne Spence, 42, of Sandpoint, Idaho, allegedly "doused" two people with pepper spray while they were sleeping in a van parked alongside a road northeast of Sandpoint. The Bonner County Sheriff's Department is all too familiar with Ms. Spence; they pulled out her mugshot, got positive ID and went out to her place to pick her up.

Skipping past all the abuse she threw at the cops...they wound up having to cast her into irons and transported her to jail lying face-down on the back seat of the county's Tahoe. While en route, she gnawed through the upholstery and started eating the foam underneath. It cost the county $2000 to replace the seat...she was charged with malicious injury to property at the felony level (the dividing line between misdemeanor and felony is $1000 in Idaho), battery, battery on a law officer, driving under the influence and resisting arrest.

Walgreen's is now dead to me

Today I went out to do laundry and to get a roll of film developed. There's a Walgreen's near the laundromat and I've had quite a bit of film developed at Walgreen's, so I went there...

Now they ship the film out to be developed, and the envelope has a terrible notation on it: "Your negatives will not be returned." They scan it on a mini-lab scanner, burn the files to a CD then throw away your negatives...unfortunately, the negatives themselves are what I wanted.

I shall not darken their door again.

It's official: Jack Chick has gone out of his fucking mind

Can anyone figure this shit out?

http://chick.com/reading/tracts/1088/1088_01.asp