More and more Americans think Michelle Obama is a man

Posted on August 10, 2014 by Dr. Eowyn

The whispers began on the blogosphere several years ago.

That led me, finally, to post about it on March 14, with the hypothetical non-committal title of “Michelle Obama is a transexual?,” wherein I simply laid out the speculations and evidence.

Then all hell broke loose on July 3, when comedienne Joan Rivers said to a reporter: “We already have [the first gay president] with Obama, so let’s just calm down. You know Michelle is a tranny… a transgender. We all know.“ (See also “‘We all know’ Obama is gay and Michelle is a tranny“.)

Judging by the readers’ comments to a brief AP article and photo of FLPOS Mooch and former First Lady Laura Bush at the US-Africa Summit on Aug. 6, 2014, the cat is REALLY out of the bag.

Below is the AP news photo and article, followed by a sample of readers’ comments.

Susan Walsh reports for the AP, Aug. 6, 2014:

First lady Michelle Obama, left, points out her hairstyle as she sits with former first lady Laura Bush as they participate in the “Investing in Our Future” a discussion at the Kennedy Center in Washington, Wednesday, Aug. 6, 2014, as part of the US Africa Summit. Michelle Obama and Laura Bush, first ladies of different generations and opposing political parties, are uniting for the second time in just over a year to promote U.S. relations with Africa. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

Here is another image of Michael Obama at the same “Investing in Our Future” discussion. Look at those massive shoulders and muscular arms! 

And here are some of the readers’ comments (you can read them for yourself bygoing here), beginning with reader Eatmyshorts, whose comment was lifted straight from my “Michelle Obama is a transexual?” post, but without attribution:

Eatmyshorts: “Bafflingly, even the text of the speech on WhiteHouse.gov says the same thing: ‘Secretary Panetta, thank you for your introduction and for your extraordinary leadership. Members of Congress, Vice President Biden, members of the Joint Chiefs, service secretaries, distinguished guests, and men and women of the finest military in the world. Most of all, Admiral Mullen, Deborah, Michael and I also want to also acknowledge your son Jack, who’s deployed today. All of you have performed extraordinary service to our country.’ Admiral Mullen’s first name is Michael. However, throughout his speech, Obama referred to Mullen as ‘Mike,’ not Michael.”

Mr. UN-PC: “Obama is referring to ‘Michelle’, who is rumored to be ‘Michael’, a tranny. Obama is gay and the daughters are adopted. What an incredible hoax, perpetrated on the American people!!!”

420d: “Michelle has the grace of a Neanderthal.”

Paul: “Michelle Obama’s body language is telling me she is a man. Look at the shoulders on it, and how it slumps them forward to appear smaller. Look at the face! It towers over Barry like an Amazon.”

Lee Goodwine: “OK, I don’t have anything against gays, but I was not aware that Yahoo was so gay-friendly. Here’s a picture of a man in a dress pointing to his head with this rather sizable right hand, and holding a wiener in his left hand. I don’t get what’s going on here. He’s pointing to his head, as if to say, ‘Empty’ and is holding a phallus-like ape-aratus in his other hand, as if to say, ‘I have one of these.’ Well at any rate, it’s good to see that Magic Johnson is still alive and well. I guess his Johnson really is magic…”

joe_the_plumber: “What an angry, ugly, man the U.S. has to represent us at world events.”

Gnu: “Did you ever wonder why there are zero pictures of Michelle Obama while pregnant and also zero images of either of the Obamas holding either of their infant daughters? I wonder whose kids they really are?”

Ahna Capri: “Mrs. Bush is really scraping the bottom of the barrel by beeing seen with Moochell aka Michael. With all the debasing the Odumr’s have done against her husband I wouldn’t be seen within a mile of this pile of trailer trash.”

Sniper: “On the right, you have grace, class, and elegance. On the left, you have Bernie Mac in drag.”

David: “Michael Obama should not be wearing dresses in public.”

CS: “Actually, MO does look like a man.”

Rich: “Transgender Michelle (or should it be Michael?) couldn’t make a good pimple on Laura’s behind!”

TonyZ: “Obama will never be half the man his wife is.”

Michael: “Laura is a classy lady and Michelle is an angry transvestite.”

MackieS: “The First Dominatrix looks like an Oakland Raider fullback after a botched sex change procedure.”

David: “Look at the shoulders and overall muscle tone on Michelle O. I don’t believe she is a woman. The main reason to believe she is a man is because it’s so rediculous to believe the other option. Tranvestite. No joke.”

MOOK: “Michelle looks like a man wearing a sleeveless casual summer dress… He really is classless..”

Joe Schmo: “Incidentally, look at the shoulders and size of the hands on the present first “lady”. Look at the huge feet. Now, tell me you really believe that’s a “lady”.”

Dooki Fried: “And who is the Tr/\nny sitting next to First Lady Bush?”

Lori: “Is that a Chicago Bull in drag?”

Commenter: “Michelle… or is it Mike ? It’s looking more and more like it’s Mike, history will tell…”

Two Wings Downs: “don’t look now BUT I think ‘she’ is actually a HE.”

Glut: “Well one is a man and one is a woman, mrs ovomit is a tranny. i think thats a self evident truth.”

Hilarious!

Michael Obama, your gig is up.    

~Eowyn  http://www.dcclothesline.com/2014/08/10/americans-think-michelle-obama-man/#more-34732

Goal of Booming ‘Internet of Things’: Monitoring, Sensing, Remote Control – Factory Workers First, You Next   ~  time is gonna force it

“If you will not fight for right when you can easily win without blood shed;
if you will not fight when your victory is sure and not too costly; you may
come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves.”

~  time is gonna force it & let it fucking come :)

by Wolf Richter • August 6, 2014 //http://wolfstreet.com/2014/08/06/youll-be-one-of-the-things-in-the-internet-of-things/

The “Internet of Things” is the next Big Thing. A universe of devices connected to data centers: your fridge, toaster, alarm clock, garage-door opener, pickup truck, self-driving car, thermostat, “intelligent toilet,” and other doodads.
They’re equipped with a computer chip, other hardware, sensors, and software that can pick up all sorts of data and transmit it via Wi-Fi, cellular, Bluetooth, ZigBee, RFID, and other wireless technologies to hub devices, such as smartphones or PCs, which then pass it on via the Internet to a trusty data center where the data will be used and monetized by one or more corporations. And as we now know, various government agencies can get access to this data in a snap.
You’ll be able to close your garage door with your smartphone, check how many times your kids opened the fridge and what they took out, and you’ll be able to chart it. In turn, your fridge and your pantry will put your grocery list together, transmit it to your smartphone while you’re shopping, or directly to the company that delivers your groceries. Your car remains in constant contact with a data center, and if it stalls on the highway, the data stream it sends back notifies the data center, and help is on the way. If you’re speeding, it might send the data directly to the proper law enforcement agency so that when you get home, you already have the speeding ticket in the email. Your thermostat senses what’s going on in your home, learns the details, the comings and goings, if anyone is at home, and who, and it also adjusts the temperature.
OK, got it. This is for your own benefit.
Google is at the forefront. It acquired Nest, whose thermostat learns the details of your home and its occupants. It invented Google Glass. It is experimenting with self-driving cars. The possibilities are endless. And based on Google Glass, work is being done to link factory workers to the Internet of Things to make them more efficient. As Automotive News breathlessly reported:

New factory technology is in the pipeline that will turn workers’ clothing into data-emitting devices for plant management. The benefit? Engineers will be able to constantly monitor the air temperature, humidity, and working conditions of a factory process, and track employee motions for ergonomics research and safety concerns.

Internet-connected wearable devices will transmit data automatically, which allows the factory’s computer system to manage and adjust, for example, tooling and equipment on the fly without human intervention, explained Jason Prater, VP of development at Plex Systems, whose Manufacturing Cloud, according to its website, runs the factory operations of “nearly 400 companies.”
Prater was speaking at the 2014 Management Briefing Seminars on Monday. Plex, in collaboration with an automotive metal-stamping supplier, is developing a system centered on Google Glass that workers would wear on the job. These devices would transmit a plethora of data, Prater said, including workers’ movements to maximize assembly-line efficiency and such things as body temperature to monitor their health.
Nothing will remain unexamined.
It’s big business. How big? ABI Research estimates that over 30 billion devices will be connected to the Internet of Things by 2020; Gartner puts the number at 26 billion – not including 7.3 billion PCs, tablets, and smartphones.
That’s a lot of internet-connected things, considering that there are “only” a little over 7 billion people on this planet, including those who recalcitrantly remain beyond the reach of the Internet of Things, or even electricity.
Component costs will drop to less than $1 per device, Gartner predicts, which “opens up the possibility of connecting just about anything, from the very simple to the very complex, to offer remote control, monitoring, and sensing.”
As the Internet of Things spreads across every facet of your work, home, and private life, Gartner expects “the variety of devices offered to explode.” It forecasts that the “economic value-add” will reach $1.9 trillion in 2020. It expects the leaders to be manufacturing, healthcare – maybe you won’t even have to bother going to the doctor anymore – and insurance.
These devices still have novelty status. So an uproar ensued when Nest announced that it would share with Google, its new owner, as well as with third-party services the user data its thermostats have collected, after having promised up and down not to share the data. But as more of these devices enter our lives, such data-sharing will be accepted as the norm, similar to the acceptance of data-sharing by smartphones.
“We take your privacy seriously,” Nest says in its Privacy Statement before laying out what information it collects, “including Personally Identifiable Information (i.e., data that can be reasonably linked to a specific individual or household)….” And it will share this information, very reassuringly, with third parties “only when we think they will provide you with a welcome additional service.”
These hapless factory workers are trailblazers.
“The next wave is wearable technology, like Google Glass, smart watches, and smart vests,” Prater of Plex systems explained. The advantage of these devices is that they “will allow you to continue using your hands without having to input or look for data.” The data will be sent to the factory’s computer where every movement and drop of sweat will be recorded and analyzed. In Gartner’s words: monitoring, sensing, and remote control of people.
“Today, decisions are made instantaneously,” Prater said. “We can’t wait to hear about things after the fact.” And then the industry insider too had an intriguing forecast: “Turning people into essentially walking sensors is going to be the future.”
And how secure are these devices that make you part of the Internet of Things? You don’t need to break a code; you don’t need to capture a server. “Hardcore hackers wouldn’t even bother with it,” said one of the hackers. “They’d find access too easy.” Read….  Google Glass Hacked, Can Record Everything You Stare At

Technology Doesn't Make Us Less Social; It Just Changes The Way We Socialize

from the as-much-as-a-menace-to-society-as-baggy-pants-and-impertinent-hairdos dept

As the technology we hold in the palms of our hands continues to become more immersive, the narrative is pushed that smartphones and tablets are turning us into anti-social screen gazers, more interested in the world contained in the cloud than the world that surrounds us. But is this really a new narrative? Is it only now that we've become so entranced by streams of information that we've begun shutting out the sensory underload of everyday life?

This image, sent to us by Techdirt reader techinabox, shows that not much has changed over the last 100 years.


Yes, the printed word, applied to paper, is more interesting than conversing with others or simply staring vacantly into space. For most people in a forcibly "social" situation -- like waiting for mass transportation -- having a smartphone or newspaper to "disappear" into rather than trying to engage in conversation with dozens of people they don't know or care about is a plus, rather than an indicator of societal collapse. Put these people into situations with friends and acquaintances and its very likely the distractions will recede into the background. And even if they don't, there's likely a lot more "sharing" going on than can be perceived with the predisposed eye.

This "smartphones are inherently antisocial" narrative leads us directly to this -- a wholly hilarious dismantling of a restaurant's haughty pre-judging of its potential customers.

If you can't read/see it, it says in boldly hand-written letters:

NO 'WiFi' ……….
TALK TO EACH OTHER.
CALL YOUR MOM.
PRETEND IT'S 1993.
LIVE.

The internet has no time for your neo-Luddite attitude, unnamed restaurant. Commenters quickly followed the line of thought to its logical conclusion.

NO “TELEPHONES”. TALK TO EACH OTHER. FACE TO FACE ONLY. WRITE A LETTER. SEND A TELEGRAM TO YOUR MOM. PRETEND IT’S 1860. LIVE.

NO ‘WRITING’… TALK TO EACH OTHER. THROW A ROCK AT YOUR MOM. PRETEND IT’S 10,000 BCE. LIVE.

NO ‘HIGHER BRAIN FUNCTIONS’ …USE YOUR REPTILIAN BRAIN
EAT YOUR MOM’S CORPSE SHE DIED TO PROVIDE YOU WITH SUSTENANCE
PRETEND YOU HAVE JUST AROSE FROM THE SEA
SURVIVE

NO “MULTICELLULAR TRAITS”….. USE YOUR SYMBIOTIC MITOCHONDRIA
REPRODUCE ASEXUALLY, YOU’RE YOUR OWN PARENT
PRETEND IT’S 2BYA
EVOLVE

NO “LIFE.” USE FUNDAMENTAL PHYSICAL FORCES TO FORM SPHERICAL OBJECTS REVOLVING AROUND ONE ANOTHER IN SPACE.
FUSE HYDROGEN INTO HELIUM USING GRAVITATIONAL PRESSURE TO PRODUCE HEAT AND LIGHT.
PRETEND IT’S 4.5BYA.
STABILIZE INTO EQUILIBRIA

NO “MATTER”. EXIST IN THE VOID WITHOUT PURPOSE OR MEANING.
THERE IS NO “YOU”, ONLY THE VAST CONCEPT OF NOTHING.
TIME DOES NOT EXIST.
BE

Nobody likes to be talked down to by a handwritten banner, especially one that insinuates that anyone without a WiFi signal will be forced to "live," rather than engage with their electronics. The world was a better place in 1993, according to this sign. It so, then it follows that life was at its truest form before life even began.

Which brings us to restaurants and their uneasy embrace of technology. A number have already declared they will kick out Google Glass wearers and cell phone users. Some chefs have insisted that photographing their food "robs" them of their "intellectual property." And one restaurant in particular blamed smartphones for its slow service, using a lot of anecdotal evidence disguised as research. Oddly, this "message" was delivered in the most "new media" fashion possible, via a (now deleted) Craigslist "rant."

Here's a portion of it.

26 out of 45 customers spend an average of 3 minutes taking photos of the food.

14 out of 45 customers take pictures of each other with the food in front of them or as they are eating the food. This takes on average another 4 minutes as they must review and sometimes retake the photo.

9 out of 45 customers sent their food back to reheat. Obviously if they didn’t pause to do whatever on their phone the food wouldn’t have gotten cold.

27 out of 45 customers asked their waiter to take a group photo. 14 of those requested the waiter retake the photo as they were not pleased with the first photo. On average this entire process between the chit chatting and reviewing the photo taken added another 5 minutes and obviously caused the waiter not to be able to take care of other tables he/she was serving.

Even if everything presented as fact were indeed true, the restaurant blames its service issues on its customers, rather than realizing two things: 1.) a comparison of two nights roughly a decade apart is hardly evidence of anything and 2.) there's a whole lot of positive aspects that are being ignored out of concern over turn time.

As a common venue for celebratory dinners, birthdays, and bachelorette parties, TAO Downtown does take lot of photos, Duxbury says, but that’s “absolutely not” bad for the restaurant. “Those pictures go up on social media, some of them instantly on Instagram and Facebook, and it gets us out there,” he says.

Other chefs, waiters, and restaurateurs echo this sentiment. John Kapetanos, owner of Ethos in Manhattan’s Midtown East—the same neighborhood as the anonymous Craigslist poster—says maybe 10 percent of his customers ask the waiter to take a group photo; it’s a favor that takes less than a minute and doesn’t slow down service. Over the 12 years Ethos has been in business, Kapetanos says cellphones have added maybe five to 10 minutes to the average table time, but that he doesn’t mind as long as diners at one table aren’t bothering those at another. Jean-Marte, a waiter at a French restaurant in Midtown who declined to give his last name, concurs that taking photos of customers doesn’t slow his stride. He adds that smartphones can even be quite helpful when dealing with foreign tourists who don’t understand the menu. “It’s easier for them to go on the website or on Yelp, and they can show you a picture and say, ‘This is what I want,’ ” he explains.

Going further, the march of technology has sped up other aspects of food service, including inputting orders and settling bills.

It’s just part of our lives now,” says Michael Scelfo, chef and owner of the recently opened Alden & Harlow in Cambridge, Massachusetts. “Back in the old days, if you wanted to pay with your credit card, someone had to physically go and carbon-copy it and write information on it. Now they can swipe it on their phone tableside. How much time does that save?”

The fear that technology controls our lives rather than vice versa is omnipresent and moves towards smart cars, connected household devices and Google Glass only feed into that. It's very tempting for even those who tout technological advances to express apprehension about the perceived progression towards a more introverted society that interacts mainly through third parties. This fear isn't entirely misplaced, but the real question is whether it should actually be viewed with trepidation.

Technology has changed the way we communicate, but it hasn't eliminated communication. The supposed dearth of face-to-face interaction can be traced all the way back to dated pursuits like reading newspapers or playing chess. Nothing really changes. We may find more people blundering down the street staring at a phone screen rather than the sidewalk in front of them, but extrapolating carelessness and (yes) rudeness into some sort of societal collapse isn't an original idea, or even a recent one. Anything beneficial is ignored to portray an army of dead-eyed techno-captives ruining the world, one Tweet/Instagram/Facebook update at a time. It's not any truer now than it was back when people stood shoulder-to-shoulder staring intently at the newspaper in front of them.