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Well, as long as you want to explore the Nazi side of it...

"It is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country."

Reminds me of Vietnam and the war in Iraq. Unfortunately it was Hermann Goering who said it. reference

Makes me think of the movie "The Paper" where they send some klutzy photographer out to get a picture of the two boys. She can't get through cause everyone else is getting shots and she ends up falling on the ground in front of them, they look at her and she either took the shot or the camera went off by accident - ended up being a great shot.

Just never know what you're gonna get and what will be good. Such as this classic

Bullshit

The truth about the 'Vice-President Al Gore claimed that he "invented" the Internet' urban myth.

Which immediately makes me wonder which was the first commerical manned vehicle to unofficially enter space. Did this guy finally get some larger balloons?

Best of luck, Space Ship One! May your design be sound and your crew be safe.

No, it's not.

Yeah. We have a relative who's always forwarding internet chain mail/urban myth letters.

I finally got pissed off and told her, that I wouldn't mind if she directed it to me specifically and asked, "Is this for real?", but if I got them as part of a chain, my wife and I would be very pissed off at her.

It seems to be working... I've gotten three "is this real?" emails in the past two weeks. I let her know if it's bogus or true, often with a Snopes reference (warning -- popups), or a reference to CIAC.

Sometimes just telling someone to check their facts first works (yeah, I know, about the weather report in Hell).

I thought that was an urban legend

>The people as a whole are far smarter than anti-democrats think they are.

If only. To prove adults are just as stupid, Penn and Teller did their own DHMO questionnaire and presented it to a set of people who should be best informed on such issues, environmentalists. The majority of them voted in favour of banning water.

People don't talk about scurvey much these days, but it's still a very serious medical condition.

Check out the story on Snopes. Scurvy is near impossible to get, even with the worst diet.

Not that I'm saying other bad things can't happen to you if you cut out the fruit.

A bit like This guy? ;-)

Then, there was the First World War, aka the war to end all wars. That's what they were told, and that's how it was known, untill WW II... Turns out the peace was not a perfect peace after all...

But by stamping out Nazism and establishing democracy, which was the object of WW II, we could get more stability.

And indeed no two democracies has ever gone to war against each other. Democracy is good at that, undoubtedly.

But as Bush has recently established, it is easy to get people to go to war in a democracy as well. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism, and exposing the country to greater danger.

...[Kerry] protested side-by-side, at Jane "Hanoi Jane" Fonda's protests...

At least it wasn't E.T.

Just take your DV cam to the next public birthday party they attend. Preferably, his own. Then you can lock up all his friends, supporters, and major financial contributers. :-)

Are you talking about the "The Madness of King George III" story?

It's the story of the "Human Couch". The guy probably found it on Snopes.

MYTH ALERT!!

This isn't true. I refer you to Snopes.com

Put this in your dick and smoke it.

You're buying into the liberal, Moore-esque, anti-Disney, anti-family foundations on which my America was built. I won't stand for it.

Sincerely,
Seth Finklestein

SIG: Michael Sims stole the Censorware Project away from good, hard-working, talented individuals. Let's steal his web site. Go to www.stealbackfromsims.com for more information.

Way back, THE LITTLE MERMAID video had to be recalled because the box-art sported a phallus among the castle spires (courtesy of an enterprising/bored Disney artist).

Geez, doofus, get your own facts straight. He never claimed to invent it, just that he and some other people supported the legislation that funded its development.

Yes, I know you're a troll, but anyway... Snopes - Al Gore

...or are you just ignorant?

Actually, they didn't ban a bunch of songs from their radio stations. They did make suggestions though.

Oh, and don't get me wrong, I hate Clear Channel too.

This is incorrect according to Snopes.com. This page states that it was more of a "list of songs you may not want to play at the moment" than a "list of songs you will not play."

Their biggest arguments for not drinking diet coke are: doesn't taste well, aspartam is dangerous for your health.

Urban legend alert -- aspartame is _not_ dangerous, unless you suffer from one or two well known and easily diagnosed conditions that cause a phenylalanine intolerance. And you'll probably know about it if you do.

http://www.snopes.com/language/misxlate/machine.ht m

Israel is the only U.S. friendly country in the middle east. It is also the only democracy. Coincidence? Perhaps, but a democratic Iraq really can't be any less friendly. China is the big threat to the U.S., but china is controllable through oil. Their economy grew at over 9% last year and they have an insatiable appetite for oil. I'm sure that is one of the reasons we are in Iraq.

That's an urban legend, according to this.

Some people believe that cell phones can start fires. Even though there's no evidence, some people still believe it's better safe than sorry.

Just nod and smile, nod and smile.

Now I'm going to finally get Bill Gates and tons of other companies to finally pay up!

Coca Cola Used to Contain Cocaine

. . . SCO has about as much a chance of winning as does Andy Kaufman does COMING BACK FROM THE DEAD!

Hell, even Elvis doesn't have a Blog

Snopes

To add to the sibling post, here is a link to the snopes article which shows the quote to be falsified.

anyone know if there is any truth to the story about OPEC buying the ~100MPG carb and shelving it?

The russians solved the problem by taking pencils to space (subtracted weight from the problem, as well).

I call bullshit.

Yes, using the Anti-gravity hoverboards that mothers-groups had banned, because they were unsafe... you know, like they showed in Back to The Future.

It's a minor point, but they've actually changed their name to "just" SBC, since they no longer cover just the Southwest.

This is like America On-Line becoming "just" AOL to make it more international, and Kentucky Fried Chicken becoming "just" KFC to de-emphasize the fried part (or, if you are inclined to believe such things, because what they serve is not really chicken. :))

For a while, they kept regional names whenever they bought out a phone company, but they've dropped those too now. So when they bought Pacific Bell, they kept it as "SBC Pacific Bell." Now it's all just "SBC." This will be familiar to anyone who paid attention when they changed PacBell Park in San Francisco to SBC Park.

Be careful though who listens in -- if the tune resembles anything well-known, the *AA will come right after you!.

C'mon, people... This horse died a lonnnnnnng time ago. It has been:

--Beat to death on 'Mythbusters...'

--Debunked on Snopes...

--Generally derided as an urban legend, with good reason.

I have absolutely no issue using my cellphone while fueling, because I know, as a tech, that there's no way the thing could generate even half the energy required to trigger a spark hot enough to ignite anything.

HOWEVER -- The one thing I absolutely do NOT do is get back into my car, slide across the seat while getting out again, and then touch the pump nozzle. That's a sure way to generate a dangerous spark.

Translation: RF energy is not the issue here. Static electricity is. If RF were an issue, we'd have police, fire, and other public-safety people causing explosions every time they had to use their mobile or portable radios while fueling up (and I can tell you from direct experience that said radios generate a heck of a lot more power -- anywhere from 3-5 watts for a portable to over 100 watts for a mobile) than any wireless phone handset (outputs of less than 100 milliwatts, typically).

Can we please bury this long-deceased equine? The smell is really getting nasty...

This is not the first time Hollywood marketing freaks thought up this alliance. Its just that things are now getting profitable.

Look at Tron; the video game out-grossed the movie.

Look at Krull; the video game was done before the movie!

Remember that the in the Early 80's the video game industry was viewed as "hot" and making lots of money. Cross overs seemed inevitable.

Then, we had the video game industry crash (thanks,ET!)

Now that the video game industry is back on top and making lots of money, its cross over time again.

Does anyone not know the history of the videogame industry on Slashdot? Try 1976. That was the year Warner Communications (think Warner Bros. Pictures) purchased Atari, Inc. By the early 1982, Atari accounted for 3/4's of Warner's profits. So in your analysis, you are 22 years off on the video game industry's importance to Hollywood.

In case any of you got that "May 19th is Gasoline Boycott Day!" e-mail, here are some articles on why it won't work:

Article by Matt Helms

Snopes Article

If all the idiots don't get gas tomorrow, just means less of a wait for me!

References from The Source Of All (Or At Least Most) Wisdom:
Fuelish Pleasures
Static Quo

References from The Source Of All (Or At Least Most) Wisdom:
Fuelish Pleasures
Static Quo

Wasn't a guy. Happy Birthday was copyrighted by Mildred & Patty Hill. And the estate of Mildred & Patty Hill has been strenuously defending their copyright ever since they won the initial case that decided that "Happy Birthday" was too close to the Hills' "Good Morning To All"

Cite.

(Which, of course, is surprising and silly, but significantly less so than this thing about Google)

--AC

Go Here. This has long been an urban legend, and this particular instance may still be an urban legend...

People keep saying that women cause most of these fires because they are more prone to getting back into the vehicle. That little factoid comes from a well-known urban legend; no statistics exist to back it up. Check out the urban legend site at snopes.com.

Further coverage of this myth here.

They did a thing about this on Mythbusters on Discovery, and were unable to start a fire this way. They pretty much concluded that the static you build up from getting in or our of the car during a fill-up can cause a spark if you touch the car. And doing that near the fueling point can cause a fire. Of course, the worst thing you can do then, which most people do, is pull the hose out of the tank and proceed to spill a LOT of gas into an already burning fire. Not good, especially when you are the one removing the hose. Leave the handle and hose right where it is and get the hell out of there.

And here is a little more data on this urban myth.

I got an email about that the other day! AOL, Intel and Microsoft have teamed up to reward users! Bill Gates is sharing his wealth! Just reply with your e-mail address, and I will forward all the information you need. Forward it to as many people as you can think of. The more people you send it to the more money you get!

It's a good time to keep an urban legend going..
(snopes.com) - how a fully clad diver ended up in the middle of a forest fire