So far while watching this VH1 show about '90s music, I have spent $5 on iTunes.
Meanwhile, on American Idol, the people who vote on contestants are complete morons. #popcultureupdates
Things for which expertise was once valued: how to build a fort.
Why can a blow to the head potentially lead to sudden genius?
On NY1's "Inside City Hall," a (white) representative of the Manhattan Institute says that stop-and-frisk "saves minority lives by stopping crimes before they happen" and that "10,000 minority males are alive today" thanks to the drop in crime since 1990.
She didn't mention that as stop-and-frisks have spiked recently, the crime rate hasn't dropped at an equivalent degree. The host did. Her response: there used to be more stop-and-frisks, but they weren't reported as much.
The Miami Herald has a gallery of the photo evidence released today in the Trayvon case.
The photos appear to show two shell casings, as well as what appears to be Trayvon's cell phone and his iced tea.
Among the items collected from Trayvon's body at autopsy: one dime.
Looks like the shell casing photos are it buried in the grass and then a second photo of the same one, measuring length.
Added info: At the crime scene, they collected $40.15 from Trayvon's body.
Remember the report of Trayvon's knuckles being injured? I don't see where the autopsy report says exactly that.
After describing the bullet wound, it reads:
Other injuries: There is a 1/4 x 1/8 inch small abrasion on the left fourth finger.
That's all I see. There's not much question the two fought. But where'd the story of abraded knuckles comes from?
The contractors the Army Corps of Engineers hired to build a prison in Afghanistan did a great job, except the part about being able to confine people.
Trayvon had traces of "the drug THC"? Man! Also: I'm probably going to consume the drug C2H5OH at some point soon.
Calling traces of pot in the blood "the drug THC" is basically the most biased thing that's been done so far in this huge biased mess.
I mean, not to even comment on the fact that the story is predicated on Trayvon having "drugs" in his system.
Might as well line up everyone who has "the drug THC" in their systems and let dudes gun them down. Keep society safe.
Obviously before the THC news. RT @BreakingNews: Sanford police: Encounter between Trayvon Martin, George Zimmerman was 'avoidable'
Right now, the journalists at Drudge Report are debating if they pull the "Obama born in Kenya" header for this THC news.
Some guy who tweeted "to me it proves he's not as innocent as everybody wants to make him out to be" wants me to explain my bias comment.
Romney plane is the former McCain plane, flight attendant says.
— Emily Friedman (@EmilyABC) May 17, 2012
Ha.
On "the new black atheism". Fascinating look at a tricky cultural position.
Given how many pigeons there are, why do we so rarely see dead ones?
Looking at images from Facebook's launch and using sophisticated age progression software, I've created this image of Zuckerberg at 80.
Trapped inside a piece of amber, a 100-million-year-old insect coated with ginkgo pollen.
The first recorded prank phone call appears to have been in 1884.
Via @dkthomp. [ Also from @dkthomp. ]
Band-Aids don't really do anything.
Greenery as status symbol: the correlation between per capita income and the presence of trees.
Via @johnmcquaid. [ Also from @johnmcquaid. ]
Brietbart proves Obama was born in Kenya, since promotional materials created by third parties are always without error.
In Focus has a must-see gallery of photos from Mexico's drug war, fueled by America's cravings and weaponry.
That's the cost in Mexico. Here, it's this: DEA calls for scanning all license plates on a stretch of road in Utah.
Clear Channel rejects a billboard because it "would not approve a billboard that criticized corporations."
Via @drgrist. [ Also from @drgrist. ]
Somewhere Herman Cain is sitting in a room, curtains drawn, listening to "The Power of One" and coughing on his tears.
Stress I'm feeling about taking the dog in for a procedure that requires anesthetics makes me think that a kid will give me a heart attack.
The dog is home, fine, groggy. Back to regular life.
What robot news reporters are to journalism, 3D rendering software is to photographers: low-hanging fruit pickers.
Honda has developed what is basically a Segway unicycle.
Here is the history of the taco.
Via @thebrowser. [ Also from @thebrowser. ]
How the lack of judicial recourse for patients and families in the Chinese hospital system is increasing incidents of violence.
Via @abesauer. [ Also from @abesauer. ]
Dish Network unveils "Auto Hop," a technology that automatically erases ads from recorded shows. Guess who's mad about it!
America is now majority minority -- at least in new births. Fewer than 50% of babies born in 2011 were white.
Why the translation of the first line of The Stranger ("Aujourd'hui, maman est morte.") matters for the rest of the book.
Via @openculture. [ Also from @openculture. ]
The owner of the Cubs mulls a ridiculously stupid and offensive attack ad against the President.
Remind me again why we're supposed to be afraid of how unknown Obama is at this point? Why we should worry about Jeremiah Wright? The guy's been President for four years. He's not some schlub off the street.
Here's the storyboard for one proposed ad. It's just... dumb. But it's probably also exactly what you'd get if some rich guy gave you money and said, "make me as scary an ad as you can." That's about as scary as it gets.
My two favorite parts:
The group suggested hiring as a spokesman an "extremely literate conservative African-American" who can argue that Mr. Obama misled the nation by presenting himself as what the proposal calls a "metrosexual, black Abe Lincoln."
"Extremely literate." Nothing racist about that. "Metrosexual"? Not at all homophobic.
My other favorite part is the suggestion next to the first voiceover: "(Jon Voight?)"
Why is Fred Davis developing an ad based on Rev. Wright? Because someone might pay him to.
Didn't realize that Ricketts also runs New York news start-up DNAinfo.
Wednesday
This is a rabbit jumping competition in Sweden. ("Yumping".)
Breaking: 47% of Americans would hire Obama as their life coach. So even if he loses, he'll land on his feet.