HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: vkochend@nyx.cs.du.edu (vance kochenderfer)
Subject: Re: Peanuts/Schulz UL?
X-Disclaimer: Nyx is a public access Unix system run by the University
	of Denver for the Denver community.  The University has neither
	control over nor responsibility for the opinions of users.
Organization: Nyx, Public Access Unix at U. of Denver Math/CS dept.
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 92 21:51:33 GMT

In article <1992Nov14.165955.7668@organpipe.uug.arizona.edu> rperkins@astro.as.arizona.edu (Rachel J. Perkins) writes:
>In article <1e1conINN1a8@darkstar.UCSC.EDU> cspot@cats.ucsc.edu (Christopher Edward Hilker) writes:
>>
>>All right, I can't remember where I heard this, but I know I'm not
>>making it up myself.
>
>AFU motto of the weekend?
>
>rachel "yes, i miss hsr4 too" perkins

Ahh, reminds me of the classic line from the movie Strange Brew...

"And you see, this tape has a time code on it, which is difficult to fake."
"Would you please explain to the court what a 'time code' is?"
"Just because I don't know doesn't mean I'm lying."

Vance "just a pinch of snuff between your cheek and gum" Kochenderfer
Virginia Tech                     |   "Trust me, I know what I'm doing"
vkochend@nyx.cs.du.edu            |                     -Sledge Hammer
Xref: sparky alt.folklore.urban:28756 alt.conspiracy:12251 alt.politics.perot:5537
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.conspiracy,alt.politics.perot
Subject: Re: Tomorrow's Conspiracy Theory, brought to you today.
From: kmcvay@oneb.almanac.bc.ca (Ken Mcvay)
Date: Tue, 17 Nov 92 00:54:55 GMT
Organization: The Old Frog's Almanac

In article <1992Nov16.193308.29316@ulysses.att.com> smb@ulysses.att.com (Steven Bellovin) writes:

>It's like this -- when you qualify for the ballot in some state, you
>also designate a slate of electors.  If you win the state, your electors
>are chosen.  For LaRouche -- or Perot, or Marrou, or Fulani, or Bush,
>or Clinton, or whomever -- to subvert this would require that the trick
>the party organization into designating the wrong people.  I doubt that
>that's feasible in any large scale.

While my memory of Yankee electoral politics is admittedly waning, I do
recall that there is _no_ legal imperative whatsoever for the electors to
vote for the candidate you might expect them to vote for.

I believe, in fact, that at least one American election turned out as a bit
of a surprise when the electors followed their noses instead of the popular
ballots - perhaps a history major can fill in the blanks here.

The fact that Clinton's machine selected Elector "A" does not automatically
mean Elector A will vote for Clinton. Why this is so has always been beyond
my understanding :-)


-- 
The Old Frog's Almanac - Public Access UseNet for Central Vancouver Island
     (604) 245-3205 (v32) (604) 245-4366 (2400x4) Waffle XENIX 1.64
 Ladysmith, British Columbia, CANADA. Just south of Tupperware Central...  
                      (Sssssssh.... Hard disk dying...)
Xref: sparky alt.folklore.urban:28884 misc.legal:20078
From: tjc50@juts.ccc.amdahl.com (Terry Carroll)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,misc.legal
Subject: Re: The amazing disappearing British Constitution
Date: 17 Nov 92 22:21:16 GMT
Reply-To: tjc50@juts.ccc.amdahl.com (Terry Carroll)
Organization: Amdahl Corporation

In article <1992Nov14.100422.12880@Princeton.EDU>, 
niepornt@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (David Marc Nieporent) writes:
> >1) Does the judicial power necessarily include the power to declare a law 
> >void as unconstitutional?  That's the point of contention here.  My 
personal 
> >belief is that it does, but I don't consider my belief dispositive.  An 
> >equally valid interpretation of this clause, on its face, is that the 
> >judicial power is limited to adjudication of disputes arising under the 
laws 
> >of the United States, and not to the validity of those laws.  Again, my 
> >belief is that the Framers' understanding of the "judicial power" was that 
it 
> >included the function of judicial review, but that's just my humble 
opinion.  
> >In any event, Calvert is correct if his position that the judicial review 
> >function is not explicitly provided for in the US Constitution; it's 
implicit 
> >in the term "judicial power".
> 
> It isn't *just* your opinion that the Framer's intended it this way.
> It's explicit in Federalist 78.  

But, it's not explicit in the Constitution.  A strict constructionist judge 
wouldn't consider things like the Federalist papers to construe the 
Constitution, just as he wouldn't use a legislative history to go beyond the 
textual content of a statute.

Terry Carroll - tjc50@juts.ccc.amdahl.com - 408/992-2152
The opinions presented above are not necessarily those of a sound mind.
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: thumper@engin.umich.edu (Bob Topping)
Subject: UL Alert:  Blue blood!!
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 92 01:40:20 EST
Organization: University of Michigan Engineering, Ann Arbor

Well, here's one that I haven't seen pop up here on afu--

One of the shelvers at the library where I work was telling me
today that blood is blue while its inside your body, and doesn't
turn red until it is exposed to air.

I think she was a little bit offended when I started to laugh
uncontrollably.  Oh well, she's a good kid; she'll get over it.

The really sad thing is that she said that her geology prof told
her this.  He's got a PhD you know... 

 Bob "My blood is plaid actually" Topping.


-- 
@ "Our lives are better left to chance; +       PLEASE E-Mail to:           @
@  I could have missed the pain, but    +  bob.topping@um.cc.umich.edu      @
@  I'd have had to miss the dance."     +  phy_astrclub@emunix.emich.edu    @
@       -- Garth Brooks, The Dance.     +     ** RETURN OUR HURON! **       @
Xref: sparky alt.folklore.urban:28635 soc.culture.african.american:11116 sci.skeptic:19605
From: weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,soc.culture.african.american,sci.skeptic
Subject: Re: 1950's Darryle, damnit.
Date: 15 Nov 92 17:00:26 GMT
Article-I.D.: netnews.97719
Reply-To: weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener)
Followup-To: alt.folklore.urban
Organization: The Wistar Institute of Anatomy and Biology
In-reply-to: pmmst8+@pitt.edu (Paul M Mweene)

In article <9652@blue.cis.pitt.edu.UUCP>, pmmst8+@pitt (Paul M Mweene) writes:
>Lets suppose some one was on fire (being accused) for creating HIV
>virus, would it not be a good way to escape to claim that the Virus
>had been there even beforfor longer than his accusers claimed?

No, it would not be a good way.  HIV mutates very rapidly, providing
a way to trace lineages.

>Is such a difficult thing to infect 30 or 40 year old serum with any virus?

The British sailor who died ~1962 had symptoms that we would today
recognize as AIDS.
-- 
-Matthew P Wiener (weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: rhca80@melton.sps.mot.com (Henry Melton)
Subject: Re: Is my father lying?
Organization: /etc/organization
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1992 22:52:43 GMT

In article <168A7CCA7.C521832@MIZZOU1.missouri.edu> C521832@MIZZOU1.missouri.edu writes:
>My dad told me this, and I'm curious about it. I also think that, if true,
>it's likely to crop up at some point.
> 
>He's worked as a DJ at an AM radio station for more than 20 years. He says
>AM transmitter antennas are dangerous, in that if you touch one while
>standing on the ground, you will be electrocuted--the current will go
>through you to the ground and fry you.
> 
>He says ladders on the sides of such towers (for engineers) begin a foot
>or so off the ground. Engineers have to make a little hop onto them
>to avoid touching the ground and the tower at the same time.
> 
>Periodically, he says, kids or engineers (equally likely!) get zapped.
> 
>SO: Is this true? And if so...well, just keep it in mind! It may come up..
> 
>Rev "tore down a homemade Shergold flyer recently to my girlfriend's horror"
>John


This is quite true.  The radio stations where I worked used the whole
tower as an active element.  I used a wooden ladder to get up on to
the tower.  The huge metal tower actually was balanced on a large
insulator, held in place by the guy wires.  I have gotten surface
burns on my hands even without bridging to ground.  It is also
interesting the tricks used to get the power feed necessary to run the
aircraft warning lamps.  One tower had the power line wound into a
huge coil, making an inductive trap.  Another had a very funny looking
transformer with the primary and secondary interconnected like the
links of a chain, but with lots of clearance so they didn't touch.

I know of no cases where anyone has been killed this way, but I have
had to strip away charred weeds that have attempted to grow up and
touch the tower.

--
Henry Melton rhca80@melton.sps.mot.com or henry@hutto.cactus.org    
Read my story "The Christmas Count" in CHRISTMAS STARS  TOR books
From: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: Soldiers breaking step across bridge
Date: 20 Nov 92 14:10:02 GMT
Reply-To: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner)
Organization: Columbia University

In article <BxyD5z.L0C@rahul.net> phil@rahul.net (Phil Gustafson) writes:
>>
>The Bay and Golden Gate bridges were built at about the same time, and
>seem quite sound.

Aren't there some bridges that, like diodes, only have flow in one direction?

cj "what about diode bridges?" l
(When all diodes are bridges, there'll only be bridge rectifiers)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: fehr@ms.uky.edu (Jeff Davis)
Subject: Re: What is it about Batman Returns...
Followup-To: rec.arts.movies
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1992 20:09:55 GMT
Organization: Austerlitz, Gershovitz, and Carmichael

nwc1@midway.uchicago.edu writes:

>Here's what someone told me: that the Batman Returns story is really
>about Jewishness and Anti-Semitism. Note the similarity of the Penguin
>to Moses in the basket. Also the fact that the Penguin hates Christmas.
>Things like that. Is this a crackpot idea? "I was just wondering..."

Good answer. Wrong group. Basically it seemed to be, as more than
one joker put it: Edward Beetleman's Big Adventure. 

-- 
Jeff Davis <davis@keats.ca.uky.edu> 
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: rob@lynx.msc.cornell.edu.UUCP (Rob Vaughn,302 Thurston Hall,50637,2730428)
Subject: Re: Tales not for the weak of heart
Originator: rob@snoopy.msc.cornell.edu
Organization: Cornell-Materials-Science-Center
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1992 14:04:03 GMT

billw@aixwiz.austin.ibm.com:

>    The story was that the woman had been felating her husband and started
> having an epileptic seizure.  He was unable to force her off of his 
> member, and she had no control over her body, so he wound up dragging
> her into the kitchen and stabbed her in the head with a fork until she
> let go.

My brother is a diagnosed "petit mal" epileptic who uses phenobarbritol
to prevent seizures (he hasn't had one since he started using the
medication.)  Having witnessed several of these seizures and having been
through family discussions with his doctor about it, I feel qualified to
take a shot at this one.

Most "petit mal" persons (who I believe make up a large majority of
those diagnosed with the disease) do not abruptly experience a full
seizure - usually they can tell something is wrong and know what it is
once they've experienced it a few times.  A typical seizure runs for 
several minutes, building up to a peak and then slowing down to a halt.
An epileptic would most likely have plenty of time to stop doing
something before they completely lose control.

Once a seizure starts, there is little, if anything, one can do to make
that person respond.  Physical restraint is difficult and ill-advised.
Communication is often impossible.  Stimulus like pain, such as "stabbing
someine in the head with a fork" will produce no response at all.
Victims can break bones during a seizure due to the thrashing, and it
will not cause them to stop.

Lastly, since nearly all of the muscles in the body are effected by the
attack, an epileptic's mouth will often open and close involuntarily,
which has caused my brother to lose baby teeth and bite his tongue on
ocassion.  If this were the case, the man would have had some serious
damage done to his member.  Having stupidly put my finger in my brother's
mouth during an attack to prevent him from choking on his tongue, I can
tell you that it takes bone to stop the teeth from closing completely.
This is no longer advised.  One should simply roll the epileptic on their
side or stomach to prevent the tongue from lodging in the back of the
throat.  Never insert anything into the mouth during the seizure.

If the attacks were the kind where the epileptic loses control and
"freezes", then the man would have been able to simply wait until the
attack passed, and should have been able to remove his member from the
mouth with little or no trouble.

Verdict: urban legend.  I'll have to tell my brother this one - he'll get
a kick out of it, I'm sure.

Rob

-- 

Rob Vaughn, Fugitive Systems Guy
Mat. Sci. Center Computing, Cornell University
rob@msc.cornell.edu - rob@crnlmsc2.bitnet
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: billn@hpcvaac.cv.hp.com (bill nelson)
Subject: Re: Tomorrow's Conspiracy Theory, brought to you today.
Organization: Hewlett-Packard Company, Corvallis, Oregon USA
Date: Tue, 17 Nov 1992 01:03:17 GMT

dpm1960@tm0006.lerc.nasa.gov (snopes) writes:
: 
: >Gee, I thought it was because the upper (and upper middle) class snobs who
: >wrote the constitution wanted to give power to the masses, but not _too_
: >much.  If the great unwashed voted for somebody who was obviously wrong, the
: >upper class `Electoral College'' could set things right.
: 
: Partly true.  If a populist unacceptable to the upper classes manages to gather
: broad national support, there's nothing they can do about it.

Sure they could. I bet a fair share of the electoral college members could be
bought - one way or the other.

Bill
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: manley@optilink.COM (Terry Manley)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: furrfu??
Keywords: TERRY, KIBO, SIL, SPOT
Date: 19 Nov 92 01:26:13 GMT
Organization: DSC/Optilink Access Products

In article <1992Nov18.002046.754@hpcvaac.cv.hp.com> billn@hpcvaac.cv.hp.com (bill nelson) writes:
>: In article <2824@israel.nysernet.org> warren@nysernet.org writes:
>: >Why is it that when you rot-13 a messages in rot-n that contains the
>: >number n, it doesn't change to n+/-13?

>It does, unless the number goes over 26 - that is why you can rot-13
>a rot-13 message, and get the original text back.

>A rot-13 message would be the same as a rot-29 message.

What in Terry's name are you talking about? Rot only rotates the
characters A-Z and a-z.  I'll say it again: IT DOES NOT DO ANYTHING
WITH ANY OTHER SYMBOL. Warren asked why a message that contains a
number, i.e "42" or "666", does not get changed to 42+13.  There are
two problems here: one, numbers do not get rotated, two, if they did
it would be on a per character basis - you wouldn't add 13 to it. 

You are quite correct that rot-13 allows the same process to encode
and decode since there are 26 symbols.  It's a good thing we don't
have an odd number of symbols in our alphabet.

Ob???: Anybody ever hear of kids injecting peanut butter or mayonaise
       in attempts to get high, and dying as a result?

---
Dave "ebg guvf" Manley
From: km@cs.pitt.edu (Ken Mitchum)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: Smoke pipes -- leave later!
Date: 24 Nov 92 00:37:11 GMT
Reply-To: km@cs.pitt.edu (Ken Mitchum)
Organization: Univ. of Pittsburgh Computer Science

In article <Nov.23.10.36.52.1992.8973@cadenza.rutgers.edu> masticol@cadenza.rutgers.edu (Steve Masticola) writes:
|
|And then there's a study that found that pipe smokers live an average
|of two years _longer_ than nonsmokers! It was in the papers a couple
|of years ago; I can probably dig up the reference if anyone's
|interested. 

Yes, but the problem is they spend those two extra years fiddling
with their pipes. Back when I smoked a pipe, I spent a good ten
minutes fiddling with it for every minute I smoked it.

 -km
From: pashley@sdcc13.ucsd.edu (Montykins)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: Media rantings
Date: 20 Nov 92 10:40:53 GMT
Organization: University of California, San Diego

In article <BxzIBv.JAs@unx.sas.com>, sasbmt@jjoyce.unx.sas.com (Bruce Tindall) writes:
>
>Bruce "I was told we wouldn't have to do arithmetic in 
>Journalism school" Tindall

Great! I was hoping this thread would resurface . . .

About a month ago, some NFL team or another lost its tenth coin flip
in a row. This was reported with a line like "According to the
team's PR department, the chances against this are 1023 to 1!" Naturally,
my first reaction was "According to the PR department? You couldn't
verify this yourself?"

They lost the next flip. Next week, "The PR department says that the
odds are 2047 to 1 against this!" Well, at least the PR department
is good at multiplying.

The next week, after the twelfth straight miss, the blurn snuck into
a feature story. "Player X, along with being an excellent athlete,
claims to be good at math. He says he's calculated that the odds
against twelve straight coin flips going against the team are 4093
to 1! [sic]"

In each story, regardless of whether the numbers were right or
wrong, the reporter didn't bother to check the accuracy.

 -Paul "Monty" Ashley
   (Possibly more frightening is that 2^12-1 is considered something
requiring "calculation" and someone "good at math")
   (The first time I did this article, I accidentally put all three
figures correctly)
-- 
All just the opinions of pashley@sdcc13.ucsd.edu.
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: wisp@dcs.warwick.ac.uk (Wisp)
Subject: Re: Child Molestors - internationally organized?
Organization: Department of Computer Science, Warwick University, England
Date: Wed, 18 Nov 1992 11:20:16 GMT

In article <1992Nov16.215112.15463@hpcvaac.cv.hp.com> billn@hpcvaac.cv.hp.com (bill nelson) writes:

[earlier claims deleted...]
>
>According to some people from the UK - pedophilia seems to be fairly
>well established there. It is not in the US.
>
>Here in the US - most child molesters are relatives of the child, usually
>the father or uncle. There are no organized groups anywhere in the world,
>that has been documented.
>
>There are police officers etc - who believe both exist. But then, there
>are police officers who believe in devils and evil satanic cults also.
>The FBI, amoung other investigative bodies, has denied finding any evidence
>of any such groups - Child molesters, pedophiles, devils or evil satanic
>cults.
>
>Until some real evidence, and not the hysterical ravings of some rather
>unbalanced people, I think we will have to assume that they do not exist.
>At least, not here in the US. I have never been able to get anyone in the
>UK , or elsewhere in Europe, to provide me with anything more than claims
>that such exist there.

Well, in the Uk there have been several cases/incidents that speak of 'gangs.'
About 5-6 years ago, a large 'child pornography ring', called the Pedophile
Information Exchange, if memory serves, was broken up and several people were
prosecuted. Among the delights found was a handy list of customers, which
caused the premature retirement of several senior civil servants, judges etc.
All hearsay (or from my recollection of newspapers, which may be worse...):
I'll try to find the legal refs over the next few days.

There are also periodic scares about people (usually women) who show up on the
doorsteps of families with young children in the deprived areas of big cities,
claiming to be social workers. They get to examine the kid (usually <2 yrs
old), then say it must be taken into care. No-one has actually lost a child
this way, but several attempts at this sort of abduction have been reported in
the Press... No prosecutions, either, so no more info available on this one.

The latter case may well be a red herring, something out of all proportion to
the events. The first one, though, the PIE case, will definitely be on record
somewhere. Anyone in the UK with a legal database could help me out here:
we haven't got one at Warwick...

Later,

The Wisp.
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: billmcc@seanews.akita.com (Bill McCormick)
Subject: Re: Water Tower Suicide.
Organization: SEANEWS - Seattle Public Access News & Mail
Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1992 02:29:27 GMT

In article <1992Nov20.161844.18666@pony.Ingres.COM> sweeney@Ingres.COM (Tony Sweeney) writes:
>In article <1992Nov18.194510.17942@mnemosyne.cs.du.edu> bwatson@nyx.cs.du.edu (bruce watson) writes:
>>There is a well in London, England which the residents said the
>>water had an interesting taste. Recently, it was discovered that
>>the underground stream went under a nearby cemetary.
>>
>Oh YEAH? There ahsn't been an artesian well in London since shortly
>after WWII. Just where exactly was this, and what is your source?

Um, wouldn't an artesian well, by definition, not be part of an
underground stream.  Isn't an artesian well where a natural aquifer
is above the point where the well is drilled?

Bill
-- 
SEANEWS  []  Seattle News + Mail  []  Public Access  []  +1 206 747 NEWS
E-mail for PGP key.   MD5 (no sigs) is: 8e253e95133365a292261c7d0da58bcb
Xref: sparky alt.folklore.urban:28903 misc.legal:20088
From: tjc50@juts.ccc.amdahl.com (Terry Carroll)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,misc.legal
Subject: Easterbrook Opinions (was: Question about "T." in James . . .)
Date: 17 Nov 92 23:56:31 GMT
Reply-To: tjc50@juts.ccc.amdahl.com (Terry Carroll)
Organization: Amdahl Corporation

In article <1992Nov14.195251.1198@midway.uchicago.edu>, 
thf2@ellis.uchicago.edu (Seventh Circuit Bound) writes:
> Ted "*another* excellent opinion, Judge Easterbrook! How *do* you do it?" 
Frank

I ran across a cute Easterbrook opinion the other day.  US v. Beasley, 809 
F.2d 1273 (Cir. 7, 1987)  [for you Maroon bookers: the volume is 809, the 
page is 1273; also, the little hand is on the 5 and the big hand is on the 
12].

Beasley was apparently a chem Ph.D. who'd done a lot of experiments on 
chemicallly simulating growth in plants.  He was accused of unlawfully 
obtaining prescription drugs.  His version of the story was that he was just 
conducting experiments on the plants. 

Anyway, J. Easterbrook's most excellent line is "Beasley says the vegetables 
took their medicine.  The U.S. Attorney believes that the drugs were sold on 
the black market and turned at least one person into a vegetable."

Terry Carroll - tjc50@juts.ccc.amdahl.com - 408/992-2152
The opinions presented above are not necessarily those of a sound mind.