Saturday Evening (News) Post

Like the cheap champagne we're going down in flames...

O'Reilly's O'Meltdown
So it seems Bill O'Reilly got into a shoving match with an Obama staffer at an Obama event, an event where the crowd was very, err, unhappy to see him to start with.

When the popular Fox News entertainer arrived at the Obama event in Nashua, people turned to him but not always approvingly. "Hey O'Reilly," yelled a man. When O'Reilly turned he got a single-finger salute. A few people approached Bill to shake his hand but the overwhelming sentiment was unfavorable. "O'Reilly hatemonger," yelled a woman. A few other people gave him the bird. "I hate you Bill," yelled a man. "You can't stop us Bill," yelled another. I thought someone might brain him with one of those Obama "Hope" signs.

A number of people shouted falafel, the word O'Reilly used in a racy set of telephone conversations with a young woman he was trying to seduce as he described a shower they might take together. He meant loofa, which is not a Middle Eastern delicacy but a bath item.

That would be a funny enough story in itself, but it seems O'Reilly lost his cool completely when the Obama staff failed to show him the deference to which he is accustomed.

The incident was triggered when O'Reilly--with a Fox News crew shooting--was screaming at Obama National Trip Director Marvin Nicholson "Move" so he could get Obama's attention, according to several eyewitnesses. "O'Reilly was yelling at him, yelling at his face," a photographer shooting the scene said.

O'Reilly grabbed Nicholson's arm and shoved him, another eyewitness said. Nicholson, who is 6'8, said O'Reilly called him "low class."

"He grabbed me with both his hands here," Nicholson said, gesturing to his left arm and O'Reilly "started shoving me." Nicholson said, " He was pretty upset. He was yelling at me."

Secret Service agents who were nearby flanked O 'Reilly after he pushed Nicholson. They told O'Reilly he needed to calm down and get behind the fence-like barricade that contained the press.

Yeah Bill, err, acting angry, agitated and physically aggressive around a Presidential candidate might not be the best move you could make. Those Secret Service guys will drop you without giving a second thought to Fox News' primetime ratings if they think you're going to go all whacko on the candidate.

Though, man, that'd be entertaining.

Source: Slate
blogs.suntimes.com

Cute Stunt, But Careful Now...
So the Lakota Sioux, after something like two decades of debate, have decided to unilaterally withdraw from their treaties with the United States and reform their nation.

At least, on paper.

In practice of course, rather a large number of other people live there now and that would make for a headache. For now one supposes they just want to set their own laws without interference on whatever reservation territory they have left.

Given that, while drawing up maps of your new country might be funny, it might not be the best idea...

Source: Jazz From Hell

So the Drama
The National Academy of Sciences puts out a book detailing the relationship between science education and evolution, which pans creationism and says it has no place in the classroom.

NBC, far from recognizing the obvious and letting the statement of said obvious things lie, decides it'd make a racier story if it was a 'controversy', so they whip one up, and have an idiot from the Family Research Council on as an opposing viewpoint to thousands of educated scientists.

This is just..... garghhg.

Source: Raw Story

Random Sweeney Related Thing
So the roommate was curious where Johnny Depp was from, and we looked up his wikipedia bio. Turns out, Kentucky, of all godforsaken places.

Later in his bio it said he played a slide guitar. I didn't know what that was, so I looked it up. Short answer: a guitar you play with a thing over your finger that you slide up and down the strings. Neato.

There's a nifty picture of how to play one using a coke bottle as the slide.
Source: Wikipedia

Rethuglican Post-Iowa Meme
So Obama's victory in Iowa has the thuggish Republicans scared, and when they get scared, they turn to conspiracy theories.

Now the theory being advanced is that the Democrats are running Obama because white people will be afraid not to vote for him, or else the big, scary black mobs will rise up and burn down their houses.

Seriously.

Source: Glenn Greenwald

Saturday Morning News Coming Down

W00t, Kinkos called about our evil surprise.

Kids Do the Darndest Things
So you hear a lot about kids imitating this or that, and how it's therefore the victim of imitation's responsibility to make a product that kids either won't want to imitate, or won't die from imitating.

But what if, and here's a radical thought, kids are just sort of, you know, stupid, and could die playing any number of games? What if they could, gasp, imitate beneficial behavior as well?

Cases in point. First, a four year old British girl who apparently hung herself by accident, again apparently imitating a Go, Diego Go episode. I'm not sure how they know exactly what she was playing at, since nobody was watching her, but that's the story they're going with.

On the other hand, a young boy tried to defend his mother with a toy lightsaber from some random jackass who assaulted her on the street. Police were thinking that the commotion (and if it wasn't a cheapo saber perhaps the flashing light and sound) helped to drive off Mr. Happy-Fist.

The Lesson here? Maybe we should just remember that kids are kids, and the world is a big, scary place, itself only a fragile soap-bubble thin shell over the howling gulf of madness, and therefore, you might want to supervise the children rather than trying to child-proof Planet Earth.

Sources: Fox Noise
Fox Noise

The Old Axiom Is Probably Right
You know, the one about something seeming too good to be true...

Well, anyway, there's an air-powered car coming to market, promising 200km a tankful of air, a cost of only 7k dollars, and a top speed near 70. It's made of fiberglass and uses a compressed air engine of sorts to power itself.

Great, huh? Well...

If you look at the fine print, it's not that they're lying, but sort of exaggerating the novelty here.

The deal is, this is an electric car. An extremely, extremely light electric car. Tiny too. Instead of using Lithium-Ion batteries as the energy storage mechanism, it uses a tank of compressed air, that it can charge up by being plugged into a wall socket, where it then draws your juice to compress its own internal air supply.

So what you have here isn't a magic air-car, it's a fiberglass alterna-Prius.

Also, they 'hope' to see compressed air charging stations that would allow the car to fill up as fast as a gasoline car, which of course is the same fallacy as hydrogen cars; it'll never happen. There's no economic incentive for Big Oil to become Big Air Compressor.

So that leaves its electric car capabilities. How are those? Sort of.. beta.

It takes quite a while to charge, it's an ultra-light with a low top speed, and it has little bugs like not yet having a heating system worked out, since its engine doesn't generate heat.

Which will come in really handy, from a French automaker. It's not like they have winter in Europe,

right?

*shrug*

I'm all for alternative energy storage mechanisms, but let's not pretend we're reinventing the wheel when all we're doing is changing the number of spokes.

Sources: Raw Story
Promo Site

Texas Still Sucks
So a black couple tried to move into a white neighborhood in Arlington, Texas. Some of the locals were not impressed with this decision, assaulting the woman and spraypainting the house with racist grafitti.

The cops duly charged the woman who performed the assault with, well, assault, and the city is making a big show out of unity or something like that. But the big thing on everybody's mind in Arlington isn't that, you know, their city is full of racist, violent fucks, but that... the victimized homeowner doesn't want to take down the graffiti.

See, the guy has this funny idea that, you know, maybe the Texas town should have to bear its racist shame publicly. The cops, the neighbors, the city, the local media, they all are rather opposed to this idea, and are pressuring the man, trying to make him remove the graffiti. Despite there being no law on the books to compel him to do so, as the victim of the crime.

They're even holding fundraisers and such, as if the problem was that he couldn't pay to get a new garage door (the old one now being colorfully decorated in red spray paint with 'Die Nigger' and so forth.

However, many neighbors were annoyed. "Everyone gets the drift," said one. "It needs to be taken off."

Oh, we get the drift all right. Southerners are happy enough, coddling racist extremists, but they dislike it when the rock is removed and all their animal-lovin cousins scurry out from underneath in full Klan regalia. Bad for the public image and all that.

So once again, I say: Texas sucks.

Source: Raw Story

Privacy For Me, Not For Thee
So a judge has been forced to resign after somebody nicked, and then released to the cops and the press, an audiocassette he made. Apparently the judge likes to indulge in some rather kinky voice recordings. The cops got the impression that there was something horrible going on, until they investigated, it was leaked to the press, who are now suing to get access to the tape to publish it, and the judge, despite having committed no crime, has been pressured into resigning from office.

For what? For having a private life and hurting no one? Come on, people. You can't abuse a dictaphone. Get over yourselves. Here, let me sacrifice my chances at ever being a judge.

I loooove to kill puppies. Their dead, limp bodies feel so soft and squishy. Their fur is so much nicer as it cools, and they make great throw-pillows until the guts start to putrefy. Hmm, guts. I could stab ice picks into their tiny brains all day long, it'd be so much fun, I wish the neighborhood had more dogs!

There. See. I wrote something disgusting. Apparently my public life is over now.

Sort of a relief, really. Who wants to dedicate their life to public service when the public are such a bunch of pearl-clutching pansies, hunched perpetually over their fainting couches?

Source: AZCentral.com

Idiot Science Watch
So some nutbars at Yale have conducted a study they claim shows that women and gays are worse drivers than straight men.

If you think that sounds a bit out there, and would be skeptical, Good for you!

First the headline: Women and gay men are 'worst drivers'

Wow, that sounds pretty ironclad. Let's check the article.

Research has revealed that both perform poorly in tasks involving navigation and spatial awareness when compared to heterosexual men.

Psychologists at Queen Mary, University of London, who conducted the study, believe the findings mean driving in a strange environment would be more difficult for gay men and women than for straight male motorists.

Oh, so they didn't test driving at all. They tested 'navigation and spatial awareness'. Well, that sounds a bit fishy. What does that even mean?

The research team, led by Dr Qazi Rahman, used virtual reality simulations of two common tests of spatial learning and memory developed at Yale University.

In one, volunteers had to swim through an underwater maze to find a hidden platform, while the second involved exploring radial arms projecting from a central junction to receive 'rewards' .

So, what the study actually 'showed' is that women and gay men are worse at playing a couple of videogames, developed at Yale.

That's not nearly as big of a news story though, is it? Gee, I wonder why they would have extrapolated so wildly....

This part in particular makes me chuckle.

The results back earlier studies supporting the stereotype that women are poor navigators.

Although women are more successful in tests requiring them to remember the position of objects, men consistently do better in tasks requiring navigation and uncovering hidden objects.

God knows you never need to remember where stuff is when you're FINDING A PLACE.

Lolz. Seriously, these people are nitwits. You have a result that shows, potentially, if your copy of Tron there is actually a decent proxy, that women and gay men might have poorer navigational skills. So you run out and start screaming that they're poor drivers?

Might you want to, I dunno, actually put some subjects behind the wheel first? Test the actual, you know, driving?

Why do I have to know how to do these peoples' jobs better than they do?

Source: The Telegraph

Riches: Update

Went with the Angel comics. Feh. It's a mix of confusing and goofy. Maybe it just can't be made to work without good acting and directing, but it feels terribly weak overall.

I think I'll decline future issues of this particular series.

An Abundance of Riches

So today I've been hitting the comic haul from the comics store, both some leftovers from a while ago before Naruto ate my soul, and the last trip.

Today I read Marvel Zombies vs. Army of Darkness (very nice), Marvel Zombies 2 issues 1-3 (extremely nice), and Black Summer 2-5 by the great Warren Ellis.

Now I'm trying to decide what to read next. The first two issues of the new Angel comic book series by Whedon? Volume 2 of the horror manga Alive? A selection or two from one of the roommate's extensive Lovecraft collection?

Soon I have to go place a custom order at the comic store though. The back of the Warren Ellis comics lists a ton of new releases and collections of his that I want, as well as a bunch of new Night of the Living Dead comics.

First on my list: the Blackgas hardbound trade.

Ellis + Zombies + Hardbound == Bliss
Literacy is fun. More Americans should try it.

News News Newsity News

Because it hates me actually using my tabs for some reason.

Looney Tunes
McCain, at a campaign event, equates our troop presence in Iraq with Korea, and then says he'd be fine

with us being in Iraq for another hundred years

Can someone give this man a psych exam? Please?

Source: Mother Jones

Someone Please Mess with Texas
So Texas has an astoundingly high rate of false convictions being overturned by DNA evidence. Color me shocked.

Three times during his nearly 27 years in prison, Charles Chatman went before a parole board and refused to admit he was a rapist. His steadfastness was vindicated Thursday, when a judge released him because of new DNA evidence showing he indeed wasn't. The release of Chatman, 47, added to Dallas County's nationally unmatched number of wrongfully convicted inmates.

...

Dallas has freed more inmates after DNA testing than any other county nationwide, said Natalie Roetzel of the Innocence Project of Texas. Texas leads the country in prisoners freed by DNA testing, releasing at least 30 wrongfully convicted inmates since 2001, according to the Innocence Project.

One of the biggest reasons for the large number of exonerations is the crime lab used by Dallas County, which accounts for about half the state's DNA cases. Unlike many jurisdictions, the lab used by police and prosecutors retains biological evidence, meaning DNA testing is a viable option for decades-old crimes.

District Attorney Craig Watkins also attributes the exonerations to a past culture of overly aggressive prosecutors seeking convictions at any cost. Watkins has started a program in which law students, supervised by the Innocence Project of Texas, are reviewing about 450 cases in which convicts have requested DNA testing to prove their innocence.

"It is time we stop kidding ourselves in believing that what happened in Dallas is somehow unique," said Jeff Blackburn, the founder of the Innocence Project of Texas. "What happened in Dallas is common. This is Texas."

Why do we let them pretend to be a state? It's a joke.

Source: Raw Story

Wasn't There a Fairy Tale Like This?
So a kneeboarder (yeah, I had to look it up too), lost a nose stud in some rough waves while out doing their hybrid waterskiing/wakeboarding thing.

Then her boyfriend went fishing and apparently caught a fish that had, err, eaten her nose stud.

My only question is, how do they know for sure it's hers? I thought studs were sort of plain and generic.

It could be a hoax for the publicity I guess.

Maybe I'm just being cynical because the story is from Fox Noise.

Source: FoxNews.com ()
Kneeboarding pic

Number One With a Bullet
Ok, listen up, retards. I'm only going to state this once, for the painfully dense.

When you fire a bullet into the air, it will come down somewhere. Quite rapidly. Your gun does not in fact allow anything to reach escape velocity for the Planet Earth.

A family in Oregon whose kids were thankfully asleep on the floor on New Years found, in the morning, a 2 inch hole in the roof above their kid's room, and a BULLET ON THE PILLOW

What is wrong with you gun toting nuts? The first thing my stepdad ever told me about using guns before I was allowed to shoot one was, 'Never point a gun at anything you don't intend to destroy'.

Do you intend to destroy the sky? Or just random strangers?

Morons.

Source: Fox Noise

Zombie Nutrition Guide
Zombies need to eat healthy too!

Handy Guide!

"Democracy" In America

I want to put this myth to bed, once and for all.

Every four years we get to witness the spectacle of the election of the President, here in the United States. With grand pomp, ceremony, and an ungodly amount of money, the American people come together and choose a leader for the country in the flagship election of Western Democracy.

Right?

Wrong. Wrong, wrong, stupid, dumbheaded, ignorant, ill-informed, and again, very, very wrong.

Not that I blame the average citizen for believing this to be the case. A lot of very powerful interests and individuals, combined with the culture of American Exceptionalism, the hagiography of the Founding Fathers, and the like, forge an unholy alliance to keep people under the delusion that their votes count, that they're equal participants in the process, and that the quadrillenial process is anything to be proud of.

Ok, let's start with a little history True and False, to correct some of the longer running misconceptions about the way we handle elections in America.

Myth: The Founding Fathers, in their infinite and godlike wisdom and generosity, devised a series of clever checks and balances, orderly branches of government, overseen by regular elections to both protect the people and give them a voice and power over their government.

Fact: The Founding Fathers, actually, either hated or feared the American populace, and set up any number of roadblocks in the way of direct participatory democracy, to ensure that the people, who they saw as generally reckless and ignorant, could not burn the country to the ground.

To be perfectly fair to these men, a fair portion of the country did try to do just that, over a tax on Whiskey, during the first failed government of the United States, our Confederacy.

They gloss over the fact that we had a government before the Constitution in most of your civics classes and high school history texts, because it contradicts the mythos about the founding of this nation, and the Wise Old Men who created it. They were human, and their first attempt to create a lasting social compact? Almost fell apart over whiskey. Seriously.

So, when they created the system by which the national government was selected, they wanted to give the appearance of democracy, without actually allowing the masses much of a say. In this, at least, they were remarkably clever.

First, they gave the people half of Congress to elect for short terms, to allow them to exercise their indignation on a regular basis and feel involved. This was the least powerful part of the new government in many respects. Just look at the way the Legislative branch is laid out; the House starts impeachment, but the trial? That's decided by the Senate. The House has a huge number of members (435 currently), whereas the Senate is limited to 2 per state. Thus each Senator's individual power is far greater than a Representative. Finally, with 6 year terms, Senators are far more secure to work to enact their agenda, and since they're only up for election a third at a time, they're insulated from public retribution if they do unpopular things, as an aggregate.

Oh, did I mention, the Founders never intended that you get to pick your own Senators? It's true.

Originally, Senators were picked by the States, by whatever method each individual state felt appropriate. Usually this meant they were selected by the State government. This provided yet another additional layer of protection between the (admittedly) unwashed masses and actual levers of power.

But the Presidency was an even greater prize, and they had grand plans to make sure that the people never got a meaningful say in that contest at all.

First, they set up an indirect method of election for the Presidency, much like they had with the Senate. Only here was a twist; whereas with a Congressman, you elected by direct popular vote in your district, and for a Senator, you elected the people who would select them by direct popular vote in other districts, with the President, there would be no direct popular vote at all. That was too risky.

Rather, they invented the Electoral College.

This is a stunning bit of slight of hand. First, each state is allotted a number of Electors, determined by their number of Representatives plus their Senators. Then an elaborate farce is conducted whereby the rubes are convinced, by those silly ballots they fill out, that they are voting directly for a person to fill the office. In fact, you're voting for an elector for that person, who is not, in fact, actually compelled to vote for them in the actual College that determines who sits in the White House. They usually, but not always, do. (Electors themselves are picked by whatever process the state feels necessary, and are usually members of the American Aristocracy looking for a sinecure to pad their career. The idea is that you never actually know the name of your Electors; if you're a good pet American citizen, you never know that they exist at all).

This ensured that the Founders could always override a popular vote if they needed to.

The Electoral College itself is profoundly undemocratic. In high school you usually hear the arguments that the Senate, even though it's not apportioned by population, was necessary to appease the small states. Perhaps that's true. But the Electoral College compounds that error by adding another layer of indirect representation with the ability for the ruling elite to ignore your vote entirely.

As a further insult, they thought it'd be hilarious to hobble the office of the Presidency by having the Vice President be the runner up in the Presidental Election. This led to, naturally, bitter, intractable rivalries between the two most powerful men in the Executive Branch. Not surprisingly, this system didn't last long, and more or less prevented meaningful work from being done for the first few years of the New Republic.

So, in the original setup, it went like this.

Joe Bob in State X Votes for State Legislature
State Legislature Picks National Senators Out of Hat
Joe Bob is Convinced He Matters

Joe Bob in State X Votes for "President Y"
In reality, Joe Bob has voted for an Elector who has pledged, informally, to vote for "President Y"
Elector, out of a pool selected by State Government, picked by Joe Bob, can, or can choose not to, vote for "President Y"

Yay Democracy!

This setup was later replaced by the infamous smoky back-room deals of the early political parties, where the powerful party rulers would get together, in secret, and pick their respective nominees. No caucuses, no primaries, nothing. You, Joe Bob the III, on election day, got your two choices, picked by the rich Washington Elite, both more or less determined to rape you up the butt for four years.

Pull the lever, monkey! Get your banana!

In turn, as national parties gained prominence outside of their Washington elite, the process changed yet again, to appease the rubes who were getting just a little bit wiser.

First, they allowed direct election of Senators.

Then they started allowing you to pick your party's Presidental candidate. Sort of.

The first idea was the Caucus system you see in ignorant, backwater places like Iowa to this day. Here, a small group of electors is again selected, pledging to vote for a candidate, in a miniature Electoral College of its own. Big surprise how that turns out. These people in turn select a delegate to go on to a process we'll see in just a bit.

When the plebs dared to voice concern over this raw deal, they invented the Primary. Now here is a hoot. You get a direct election to pick your candidate, right? Wrong.

See, what you're doing with the Caucus and with the Primary is, yet again, picking an indirect group, who then go on to the Nominating Convention in the summer of the election year for their party. There, they can, or can not, vote as they were elected to do, for the candidate Joe Bob the VI thought he voted for.

Oh, and if Joe Bob didn't vote for the candidate who got a plurality of the vote? He might as well have taken that ballot and used it for toilet paper. Winner take all, baby (in most cases).

So now the system looks like this:

Joe Bob the VI goes to a Primary or Caucus.
Joe Bob votes for 'Candidate X'
Joe Bob's vote for 'Candidate X' either actually goes to Caucus Member Y, or directly toward selecting Primary Delegate Y.
Caucus Members pick Delegates, if a Caucus was used; so now you have Delegate Y.

Delegates Y, from all over the country, converge on the Nominating Conventions of the two major parties. Keep in mind, there is no legal role for political parties in the American Constitution; in fact, they weren't supposed to exist at all. They simply evolved as a way to allow the rich and powerful to further manipulate the vote, as you'll see.

So now you have Delegates Y, for various Candidates, from Various states. They go into a big hall, and pick Candidate X, Y, Z or Q.

So what Joe Bob did, in effect, was vote for a guy, who votes for another guy, who votes for a Third guy, who may or may not be the Presidential Candidate Joe Bob wanted when he cast his ballot.

Then the two parties, having thoroughly buggered the concept of democracy, go on to the General Election. Where the process largely repeats.

Joe Bob VI on election day, votes for Candidate X
In fact, Joe Bob VI has voted for a Electoral College member who pinky-swore to vote for X. Doesn't have to though.
Electoral College meets, laughs over brandy, and picks your next president no matter what you wanted.

Four years of elected monarcy follow.

Cynical Enough yet? Oh, don't stop now, it gets better!

For not all State Primaries or Caucuses are created equal. Some are held earlier than others, and by the time many are held, so many candidates have dropped out or one has gathered such a commanding lead that their primary or caucus is one, giant game of patty-cake.

Thus we have the current Iowa situation. The ultimate in the rape of democratic principles. Iowa is a state comprising roughly 1% of the population. Roughly 6% of its population turns out for their caucuses. The race in Iowa is trumped up by endless campaigning, huge ad buys and money spends, and the media, which loves their paegentry and small town hucksterism, into a much bigger deal than it actually is. The Iowa Caucus eliminates roughly half of YOUR choices for President, right off the bat; if you don't do well here, you can't get donors or media coverage for subsequent contests, and you're doomed, even if you don't want to quit.

So. The final evolution of American Democracy, in terms of a Presidental Election, looks like this:

Joe Bob the VIII watches the news on Iowa Caucus day.
The Iowan political elite, representing .06% of Americans, narrow the field of both major parties by half.
Then it goes on in New Hamsphire, where the field is further narrowed by a Primary run in a state full of lunatics and weirdos. After New Hampshire you're usually down to two, maybe three candidates on each side.

Another couple batches of primaries, and before the vast majority of the country even gets to vote for their party's candidate, it's down to one Republican and one Democrat for the General Election.

Where you don't even get to vote directly for a Candidate.

And where, in a close election, the Supreme Court, or rarely, the Congress, gets the ultimate say anyway.

And Joe Bob? His candidate lost in Iowa and dropped out. He's out of the process by the first week of election year. He gives up on the system and stays home on Election Day.

As do most Americans.

This is our celebrated Democracy folks. Remember that as you hear the CNN anchors bleat about how 'informed' the Iowan caucus goers are, or read blog posts about what a 'Great job' they did.

The only job they did was to further the rape of American Democracy, and the disillusionment of its citizens. Whether that's a good thing, I guess, I'll leave up to you.

God Told Me This News

He also said your mother's a whore.

It's Pat!
Seriously, there's something very wrong with this man.

On Wednesday, Robertson, 77, implied that God informed him who will be elected president in November.

“He told me some things about the election, but I’m not going to say, because some old man on “60 Minutes” would make fun of me, so I’m not going to tell you who the winner’s going to be,” Robertson said, in apparent reference to CBS humorist Andy Rooney, who turns 89 on Jan. 14.

...

UPDATE: Robertson also said that this year, God told him China will become a Christian nation: “God’s going to give us China. And China will be the largest Christian nation on the face of the earth. They’re going to come to Jesus.”

Yeah. China, a Christian nation. Keep dreaming.

I guess to be fair, he never said for sure he was told who'd win, just that he was told 'some things'. By God.

That makes it all right.

Source: ThinkProgress

Toyota Beats Ford
So Toyota is now the #2 auto seller in the US. This is due in part to a sharp drop in Ford's fuel guzzler sales and a rise in sales of Priuses and so forth.

American automakers just refuse to learn.

Source: Raw Story

Dragging My Name Through the Mud
So Sears, the store, set up a customer portal, and then required that you download some nasty spyware that would watch everything your computer did for a week, and hid this fact as well as possible.

What an odd thing to do. Maybe they were just trying to collect a massive list of porn websites or something.

Source: Yahoo News


World Trade Center Invaders
So there's a new version of a flash game out that has you defend the WTC on September 11th, 2001 from an endless series of hijacked planes. Ala Missile Command, or Space Invaders.

The original version was received as a grim commentary on the day's feelings of helplessness and impotence; the new version of the exact same game, a few years later, is seen as crass. I'm not sure either label is really justified.

Tasteless or not, let the people make their game. It's not killing anyone. For some reason it's ok when the Left Behind game, which has you kill atheists and unbelievers to get into heaven, is sold in American stores, to kids no doubt, but this is not. Even though there you're teh killer, here you're the.. defender. Or whatever.

I can't really care too much about this nonsense.

Source: Raw Story

National Igloo
This video is great.

Source: Sadly No

Just So I Actually Remember and Buy the Right CD Next Time

I Hate You Obama People

Seriously, what is it about the guy you love so much? The emphasis on phoney 'bipartisanship'? The milquetoast political positions? The lack of any relevant experience? His reliance on Republican talking points? His self-importance?

You were right there, you ignorant cow-tippers. You had the chance to vote Dodd, or more realistically Edwards, and you went with Obama. Sickening.

Oh yeah. As expected, Republicans chose Huckabee. Snore. Let's see how fast he can wrap up this nomination so we can get to exploring just how crazy he is.

Then we can move on and hopefully ditch these thumb-up-their-butt Midwestern tools and their antiquated, nonsensical, anti-democratic nomination process that has such a grotesquely unfair and disproportionate influence on national politics. I'm so sick to death of hearing about how 'informed' these corn-husking backwoods hicks are; how useful it is to have our national presidential candidates parade in front of 6/100ths of 1 percent of America, pretending to care about their coffee and their grocery stores and their endless farm subsidies, only to fly out of the state and avoid it for 3 years THE NIGHT THE FRIKKIN RESULTS COME IN.

Are you people that big a bunch of narcissists that you think you deserve this power? Or that they care about you at all? Fools. Tools. Useless inbred hicks.

I Ran With the Devil, Left a Trail of Excuses News

Good day to all on 'A Small Band of Whackos In a Midwestern Hellhole of a State Decide Your Future' Day

Republican Round-Robin
This short article detailing the serial destruction of various Republican campaigns is hilarious.

It also reeks of the desperation the Republican elites feel at this point, trying to find ANYONE but Huckabee to win their nomination.

Source: Raw Story

Top US Senator? Only In His Fragile Little Mind
Biden takes the opportunity to remind the world he's still breathing by denouncing that the Bush administration approved the sale of a bunch of F-16s in late December amidst the madness of the Bhutto assassination.

Yeah. The Bush administration did something stupid. Big surprise. But the timing isn't really relevant, Senator "Bankruptcy Bill" Biden. It's actually never a good idea to sell high tech military hardware to small, highly unstable countries full of internal strife and religious fanatics, armed with nukes and run by an inept yet brutal dictator.

So, please... just go crawl in a hole somewhere and die already.

Source: Raw Story

Orwellian America
Much like 1984, it's both scary and ludicrous at the same time.

A report out blasts the US for slipping into the worst group of surveillance happy societies, and reminds me of a hilarious story I had forgotten, where the FBI had been using their access to your supermarket purchasing records (from those handy discount cards they give you) to try and track terrorists... by what they eat.

However, according to Jeff Stein in Congressional Quarterly, the FBI "sifted through" grocery store data around San Francisco in 2005 and 2006.

"The idea," Stein writes, "was that a spike in, say, falafel sales, combined with other data, would lead to Iranian secret agents in the south San Francisco-San Jose area."

I have several boxes of falafel mix in my kitchen cabinet, but the last time I checked I'm not an Iranian secret agent.

Though if, you know, Iran is hiring, they could send me an offer...

Source: Raw Story

Reasons Not to Bother With The Mainstream Press
A former reporter for NBC's Dateline is making the rounds attacking them for being grossly stupid and obsessed with fitting the news into their profit model.

Some of this stuff is hilariously tragic. Tragilarious, if you like.

In another instance, Hockenberry claimed a story he did about a Weather Underground member wouldn't appear on the Sunday edition of "Dateline" unless its lead-out, the 1960s family drama "American Dreams," did a show about "protesters or something."

See? News programs should only serve as advertising for our family drama crap!

Then of course there's this tidbit:

Another bombshell is Hockenberry's claims that General Electric, NBC's parent company, discouraged him from talking to the Bin Laden family about their estranged family member. Hockenberry asked GE, which does business with the Bin Laden family company, to help him get in contact with them. Instead, a PR executive called Hockenberry's hotel room in Saudi Arabia and read a statement about how GE didn't see its "valuable business relationship" with the Bin Laden Group as having anything to do with "Dateline."

Yes, god forbid someone ask the BIN LADEN FAMILY about, err, their ties to terrorism. Or an American corporation not, err, line their pockets.

Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeesh.

Source: Reuters

Bhutto's Secret File
Seems like Bhutto was about to accurse Musharraf of completely rigging the election immediately before her violent death. Wow, not the least bit suspicious.

According to CBS News, which has obtained a copy of the report, it "alleges widespread plans to stuff ballot boxes, rig voting lists, and intimidate, even kill, opposition voters."

CNN quotes the document more specifically as saying, "Where an opposing candidate is strong in an area, they have planned to create a conflict at the polling station, even killing people if necessary, to stop polls at least three to four hours."

...

CNN analyst Peter Bergen noted, "There's no reason to believe that she was killed because of this dossier, because the people behind her killing almost certainly are al Qaeda and the Taliban, and they've got nothing to do with this election." That is the official Pakistani position, based primarily on allegations of intercepted phone calls from a pro-Taliban warlord who has denied any involvement.

Honestly, CNN. Do you even try any more?

Whatever Bottomless Gulf May Yawn News

The world advances one step further toward madness and dissolution.

A Popularity Contest Infinitely Cooler Than Stupid Karaoke
Cassini Photographs, sorted by 'kewl' factor. Some awesome stuff there. The big winner is naturally the now-famous photograph that combines a total eclipse of the Sun by Saturn with, in the very distance, through the rings of Saturn, our tiny blue dot of a planet.

Lovely.

Source: Ciclops (Cassini Imaging Laboratory)

Oh Those Adorable Poor Folks!
The tone in this incredibly condescending article is sickening. A woman left a check for a very large sum of money behind; a man returned it. That's all that's relevant.

Oh wait... the man is a poor minimum wage worker on food stamps! And he didn't try to cash the check! Which he never could have done

A fast-food worker who found a $185,000 check on the sidewalk said he didn't think twice about trying to cash it. Reggie Damone, 47, who receives food stamps and works at McDonald's in Lisbon, managed to track down the owner of the check, a landlord.

Yes, because banks commonly let you cash checks for almost 200 grand without ID! What a plausible option!

Damone said although he knew the $185,000 could pay his rent and other bills for a long time, he was never tempted to try to cash it and splurge.

He said he remembered his mother's words: If you take something, you lose three times that amount — and if you do something good, something good comes back to you.

Isn't it nice that there are poor people you don't have to beat with your ivory topped cane? Guffaw, guffaw.

The landlord's niece gave him a fifty for returning the worthless paper. I'm oscillating between that being a miserly gesture, considering the supposed value of the check, or generous, considering how damn useless it would be to anyone to try to steal it. I guess it could just be a gesture without any particular meaning; the AP article just has me in a very cynical place.

Source: Raw Story (AP feed)

Republican Party Desperation
So, ahem, *someone* is trying to warn Huckabee supporting pastors off publicly supporting him. Not anyone else; just him.

True, I hate religious figures getting a tax-exempt bully pulpit where they're allowed to do everything BUT actually say the words "vote for X", but this is sad. I mean, it's right out of the Republican Dirty Tricks Handbook... circa 1992.

Source: Raw Story

Never Forget, Never Forgive
An vintage article talking about how the press corps make sure politican candidates grovel properly, and punish them if they don't. They gave Dean a commemorative t-shirt after they destroyed his campaign! Isn't that cute?

They thought it was clever, calling his Iowa speech 'I have a Scream"! How witty!

Yeesh.

Source: SeattlePI.com

Minamata Memorial
I really like this memorial to the victims of corporate greed at Minamata, the famed site of massive industrial mercury poisoning in Japan.

Well, I have to wonder about the silvery orb. Probably meant to remind people about mercury. But I love the murky flowing water effect. Eerie.

Source: Wikipedia

It's Too Cold For News

Nevertheless, I brave the elements for you.

Interview with the Doctor and the Baron
Just so everyone can have a taste of what our Saturday Nights are like.

Source: Atomic Age Cinema (Youtube)

Gee, I Never Saw This One Coming
Whenever you hear the term 'voter fraud', in America, just substitute the words 'complete Republican fantasy'.

Simply put, there is no significant voter fraud in America. It doesn't exist on any scale to concern people. It's a phantasm of the Right, that hates the dark skinned people with such a passion that the thought that just ONE of them might vote without having registered first drives them into a blithering rage.

They always craft these laws to deny as many minority voters the right to, err, vote, as possible. It's a classic strategy to shave votes off the Democratic candidates.

Source: USAToday



Fundraising Oddities
The Polar Bears club swam off of New York in 42 degree water as part of a traditional New Years event/fundraiser for sick kids. All well and good.

It's not so much the swimming in icy water as the swimming in New York's icy water that shocks me, personally. Though the cold might help to lull the Lovecraftian horrors into a deeper sleep, and thus actually make it safer. Who knows.

Source: Raw Story

Being Religious Means Never Having to Say You're Sorry
They're trying to make a big deal out of this story on the Right, I suppose. A woman was loudly reading the Bible to her kids on a public bus and was asked to, you know, be quiet so as not to disturb the other passengers. She refused, they threw her off for being disruptive.

She claims it's religious discrimination. Of course, if you were reading Harry Potter, she'd probably spit in your face and say you were trying to molest her kids.

Folks, don't be noisy on a public bus. It's not your right; it's rude. I don't care what you're reading.

Source: Some Local TV Thingummy

Papal Induglence

Pope Sideous appeared via telecast at a massive gay-hating rally in Spain, where people were getting all huffy over gay people getting rights and married people being able to get easier divorces.

Benedict Arnold, err, Pope Sideous, went on to explain that the traditional family, with its union of man and woman, was key to world peace.

Then he turned off the video link and retired to the company of his attractive male secretary in the midst of a cloistered, all male secret compound the size of a small city, filled with art, wine and fine clothing to delight the senses, and nary a child to be found disturbing the peace.

The Marquis de Sade would be so proud.

Source: Page One Q

Modern Technology, Medieval Politics

Sometimes You Feel Like a Nut (In which case, try the Middle East)

Accusing Saudia Arabia of Abusing Liberty? You've Gone Too Far!
So the Saudis have arrested a blogger critical of their lousy, festering, tottering theocratic monarchy.

I'm so shocked I just might have to blink.

No, wait. It passed.

Source: The Washington Post

Highly Speculative Report Says Pakistani Military Offed Bhutto
That's not the part that really interests me about this article though. Anyone can speculate. But take a gander at this:

"It's worrying when half of your lower or mid-level Pak intelligence analysts have bin Laden screen savers on their computers," a former official of the CIA was reported to have commented.

Yeah, that IS troubling. Since when did Osama have a screensaver anyway?

Source: UPI


Man Wraps Car Around Pole, Blames Prehistoric Reptile
Seriously. He blames his car wreck on a giant winged reptile.

Wenatchee police cited the man with first-degree negligent driving. A breathalyzer test showed "a minimal amount of alcohol," said Wenatchee police Sgt. Cherie Smith.

A MINIMAL amount?
Dude, I think it's time you had that breathalyzer checked out. It seems to be reading a bit low.

Source: HeraldNet


Blackwater Kicked Out of Mercenary Club
There's apparently a trade organization for international killers for hire, aka mercenaries. This organization is booting Blackwater for being too savage.

Not making this up.
Source: OpenLeft

Vomit In Your Mouth
Finally, in a story to truly sicken anyone with a conscience or sense of decency of any kind, the last of the Haditha psychos has seen their murder charge dropped. No one will face murder charges for the slaughter of 24 innocent civilians in Iraq.

Not. One. Person.

They killed two dozen people, over several hours, in a rampage of sheer terror, and not one gets a trial for murder.

Not one.

Source: The BBC

This Holds Equally True for Most Proms and All Sororities

If all the girls who attended the Yale prom were laid end to end, I wouldn't be a bit surprised.
Dorothy Parker
US author, humorist, poet, & wit (1893 - 1967)

Source: Quotationspage.com

Huckabee Is Nuts

This really needs to be highlighted.

First, Huckabee creates his first negative campaign ad against Mitt Romney.

Then he calls a press conference to show it off.

Then at the conference, he forswears the ad, saying it was a mistake and he's pulling it.

Then he insists on showing the ad to the reporters, supposedly to prove it existed (and not at all so he can claim he stayed positive when he went negative, nope).

But the ad itself is a doozy....

Excerpts from the not-quite-killed spot, via ABC's Political Punch:
HUCKABEE: I'm Mike Huckabee and I approved this spot because Iowans have the right to know the truth about Mitt Romney's dishonest attacks on me and even an American hero, John McCain.
NARRATOR: Romney's record? Over 700 million in new taxes. Left office with a deficit. No executions. Supported gun control. And Romney's government-mandate health plan provided a $50 co-pay for abortion.
HUCKABEE: If a man's dishonest to obtain a job, he'll be dishonest on the job. Iowans deserve better.

Emphasis mine.

So Huckabee is fightin' mad that, amongst other things, Mitt didn't kill anybody while he was Governor, at least in an official capacity. This savage bloodthirsty bible thump maniac is your Republican frontrunner, ladies and gentlemen.

Waiting on Some Sign (News)

If magic was soaking your spine, you'd probably be in trouble. That's supposed to be cerebrospinal fluid, I think.

Huckabee Stands By 'Christ Comment'
I stand by pledge to hate him. It all works out.

For reference:

Mike Huckabee, a Republican relying on support from religious conservatives in Thursday's hard-fought presidential caucuses, on Sunday stood by a decade-old comment in which he said, "I hope we answer the alarm clock and take this nation back for Christ."

Source: Raw Story

Is the Universe a Cosmic Snowflake?
Warren Ellis must be having kittens. There's a very untested theory out now that the universe is a 57 dimensional object containing 248 dimensions of symmetry. It's typically depicted as a snowflake sort of thing.

Example

Some days it really does feel like we're living in an issue of Planetary. Though it's a fairly tame one. Probably filler.

Source: The Telegraph Online

The Kids are Alright
So a new study finds that library use among adults decreases with age, not increases, and that libraries are increasingly being used as information depositories, rather than merely as stacks of books.

Which is what the university environment has been saying should happen for years and years. The purpose of a library should never have been about *books* per se; books are a storage medium for content. Libraries should be places to archive, organize, distribute and analyze that content. If they function that way, there's no reason to fear their obsolescence, unless we, you know, all snuff ourselves, Twilight Zone style, leaving just one guy with bad eyes and no large print books.

Source: Reuters

TSA: Keeping Up Your Fear Quota
So now they're rather severely restricting the number of lithium batteries you can bring with you when you travel, and making you carry all of them on your person, not checked.

(Ostensibly, one supposes, their rationale is that lithium batteries can go into thermal runaway and burst, emitting smoke and so forth. If this was the reason for banning them though, since it can happen to about all chemical batteries, why just the lithium? For that matter, why not focus your ban on the brands that have actually malfunctioned in the past, if any, rather than a blanket restriction?)

Bizarrely, though, you can check them if they're plugged into a device, and hence active, and hence, generating heat. (Wtf?)

In the best Orwellian tradition, they don't ban them by anything the end consumer can measure; they ban them by the weight of the lithium compounds inside the battery. The uncertainty and fear should keep the plebs on their toes.

The especially cynical among you might note that professional photographers and the intellectual class use these batteries when they travel, and cracking down on their use might be helpful to a government not particularly interested in free expression. Shame on you.

Source: Department of Transportation

Ohio National Guard's Biggest Deployment Since World War II
Not that we're in an unwinnable, endless conflict or anything. Go buy something! For 'Merika!

Source: The Toledo Blade

PS: Is it just me, or does this sound a bit menacing:

As a result, the Guard is beginning or strengthening:

• A youth mobilization camp that allows military children to meet other children in their same situation.

Personally, I don't like 'mobilizing' our youth. That's creepy.

100th Post Take Two

Note the (hopefully) working new format, which makes linking to sub-sections easier. Wheee.

Fungi From Yuggoth

So it seems that there's a fungal infection, commonly called Valley Fever, that has long afflicted the Southwest, from Texas to California. The spores live in the soil, so it's best not to disturb the dusty, arid wastes if you can help it. Even so, the vast majority of people who catch it have no real problem, and then get lifelong immunity. For a couple percent, though, it's a pretty gruesome death.

However, things are a bit different in the 'Gee This Sounds Like a Horror Movie Locale' town of Pleasant Valley. There, the disease has always been rampant, and a prison in the area has been crippled with the fever.

(We discussed this a bit at Atomic Age with some friendly fellow down from Indy in search of a Rocky Horror show, who had stumbled upon our gathering instead. Basically, if you want certain death, you name your town something idyllic and peaceful. Pleasant Valley, Crystal Lake, you know the type. So we proposed that, in the name of public safety, you should name towns things like 'Reeks of Open Sewer', 'Pedophile Town', or the Pratchettian 'Don'tgonearthe Town')

At any rate, despite being a soil born illness, it's spreading and sickening larger numbers. Arizona had to declare it an epidemic, and the range overall is expanding. Nobody knows why, though new construction might be to blame.

So, yeah. The fungi from yuggoth are here to kill us all.

Source: The New York Times

50 Worst People

An interesting list of people to despise. Though I imagine they might get misunderstood for their item on 'The Troops'. From context it's pretty clear they mean the mythological, monolithic block that a Republican is always referring to... "We've got to make sure The Troops get what they need", "We've got to support The Troops", and the like.

The Republicans obviously don't mean real soldiers; if they did, we wouldn't be slashing their benefits, warehousing them in shitty barrack housing while they wait for VA care, denying them treatment for their mental illnesses after they get home, and the like. No, it's all for these Troop fellows, which I think is their point as well.

Whoever those jerks are, they should stop mooching from our Veterans.

Source: The Beast<

The Huckabeast
So Huckabee says that homosexuality is a 'choice', that his faith defines him, and that he'd be ok with atheists in his cabinet.

Good luck finding one who'll work for you, bible-thump. Though some people can swallow almost anything for money; you might try to find an atheist streetwalker.

Source: Raw Story

Hungry in America
Here's a story to turn your stomach, no pun intended.

There's a little girl named Hannah Devane who is allergic to pretty much all food. She has a rare immune condition that causes part of her immune system to attack her esophagus whenever it detects food that she's allergic to. Which is unfortunately just about all food. The damage from these attacks is progressive and cumulative, so it's best to avoid any food that would cause them.

Fortunately there is a process, though agonizing, to find safe foods to eat. There is also a hypo-allergenic foodstuff/fluid that is safe for such people to eat in the meantime.

Unfortunately, her insurance won't cover it. They'd rather she starve.

But the insurance program that covers her family through her father's job as a New York City police lieutenant has stopped paying for the formula, which costs $1,200 a month. Food supplements and other over-the-counter items are not covered under the family's insurance, the prescription plan administrator said.

It's nice that a paper pusher gets to make our medical decisions for us, isn't it?

Dr. Barry Wershil, a pediatric gastroenterologist at The Children's Hospital at Montefiore in the Bronx, doesn't hide his indignation over the insurance hurdle.

"This kid can't eat food," he said. "This formula is her only source of nutrition. The insurance (provider) saying they will not cover it is a travesty. It's like telling a diabetic they can't take insulin."

I say to you all: Hell is too good for these insurance people.

Source: Lower Hudson Online

Pink Floyd Was Right

So the Children's Minister in England has put out a report telling teachers to mellow out when little boys want to play with toy guns or lightsabers, that it's not the apocalypse if a kid wants to be a little rambunctious.

The teachers groups are responding with outrage at this assault on their never-ending battle to snuff out all joy and happiness in their charges.

Hey, teachers, leave them kids alone!

Source: The Guardian

Blah Blah Jenny is Talking (Test Formatting Post)

Blahbity Blah






Girls Sure Never Shut Up, Huh?
It's something I've noticed.





They have angry little fists though
Which they use. A lot. That's bad.





She's Standing Over Me Like The Grim Spectre of Death
Just waiting to punch my soul.





Also, Nitpicking the Creative Process
Isn't that great.




(This was a post to test out methods to more easily refer to subsections of longer news posts, and in no way is meant to reflect my burning hatred of my roommate, who is certainly not threatening to mutilate me in such a fashion that I could audition for a castrato role)

Wipe Your Tears Away (News)

Blame Autovaughn for the lyrical title, if you like.

Harry Potter and the Search for More Money
So J.K. Rowling is now hinting that she might write another book in the Potter universe, though it wouldn't necessarily be about him.

I guess those new writing projects of hers aren't going so well, huh?

Source: The Daily Mail

Is There Anyplace Safe From These Annoying Fucktards?
So Ron Paul, endorsed by prominent US Nazis, fundraiser from Stormfront, conspiracy theorist extraordinaire, he has the wacky supporters. True nutjobs.

His only real problem is that, outside of the ones who wear the armbands and pointy white hats, they're all internet people who never leave their homes. So where can he hold a rally?

World of Warcraft!

No, seriously. His supporters are going to have a march. In World of Warcraft.

Source: Raw Story

He Held His Breath Until Poor Kids Turned Blue
So I guess by stamping his feet and whining long enough, El Presidente forced the whimpering, useless tools that make up our Congress to send him the SCHIP bill that doesn't expand the program to cover additional poor kids.

What an ass.

Source: Raw Story

Out Damn Spot
So it seems that an hour after the Bhutto assassination, the government was already trying to wash away the evidence. Literally; they took a high pressure fire hose to the crime scene.

That's hardly suspicious at all.

Also, apparently, despite their claims that 'nobody asked', under Pakistani law autopsies are mandatory for criminal cases. So that turned out to be a rather transparent lie as well. The question is whether her family will exhume her at this point, I suppose.

Source: Raw Story

It Couldn't Be Another Corrupt Republican
So I think I've written about the very suspicious and obviously political prosecution of a guy named Siegelman, former governor of Alabama, who faces all sorts of bizarre legal hurdles and whose case is being absurdly manipulated by an unfriendly judge and a prosecution willing to free convicts so they can flee being witnesses in his appeal, and the like.

Turns out the guy he narrowly 'lost' to in the 2002 election (where apparently the victory was handed to the Republican when a few thousand votes 'suddenly' changed columns and the Republican secretary of state blocked a recount) is, err, corrupt. He's been caught taking illegal political contributions from corporations.

Republicans sure do project their sins on others, don't they?

Source: Raw Story

Protests Planned for Rose Parade
People are all upset that anti-Endless War activists and victims of China's, err, 'vigorous' approach to government are going to protest at the Rose Bowl. In particular, the Chinese Americans are upset by the huge float China has in the parade this year to promote the Olympics they're holding in lovely, smog-filled Beijing.

Oh Noes! Democracy might ruin our pretty flower parade!

Won't somebody think of the children?

Source: Raw Story

It's Long Past Time to Face Reality, Folks
Listen, Americans. Hamas may be a violent organization. But they're also the legitimate, fairly elected head of (half, anyway) the Palestinian state. They got where they are today in terms of popularity not so much by hating Israel (which in Palestinian politics is like going to Sunday church in American Presidential camapaigns), but by humanitarian outreach, things like feeding their starving people even as the Israeli government tries to bleed them out by denying fuel for hospital generators and the like.

So, yeah. It's time we dealt with this reality on the ground and stopped stamping our petulant feet over how not every election turns out the way we want.

Hence the good news to be found in a massive lawsuit against various Muslim charities being overturned. The suit operated on the grounds that, since an American was killed in Palestine, it must have been Hamas, and giving money to Hamas to feed starving people means you're in bed with the murder.

By that logic, when I pay my taxes, since the same body that collects those taxes pays Blackwater, I'm legally liable for the murder of Iraqi civilians.

Somebody sue me already.

(This is opposed to being MORALLY liable, of course)

Source: Raw Story

Fox-Hunting Continues; British Still Look Like Goits
So the fox-hunting people are all upset over not being able to use dogs to tear a fox into little bloody chunks anymore. Boo frickin hoo.

They consider the ban on siccing a pack of ravenous animals on a wild creature to be 'stupid' and 'prejudiced', and will continue to kill the foxes any legal way they can.

Geebus, what did the little fur coats ever do to these idiots?

Source: The Telegraph

By the way, Telegraph, nice job not having ONE opposing viewpoint in that article.

Comcast Sucks
So the same company that can't afford to get enough cable installers to actually make their appointments can afford to ink an agreement to pay their CEO's family five years of his salary if he dies on the job.

They literally put dead men ahead of customer service.

Lovely.

Source: Raw Story

Advertising Hijinks
So it seems McCain had an ad made a while back that attacks Romney for being a flip-flopper. Which he is. Said ad never aired, and the people who made it now work, ironicaly, for Romney. It has been conveniently leaked now, though.

Republicans are just odd.

Source: TPM EElection Central