News

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Saturday News: Taxes, gas, and LOLbears

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I refuse to give up image macros
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  • A new “DNA spray” is being used in Amsterdam to catch thieves by covering them with a non-washable mist in the event of a hold-up, which is filled with chemical that correspond to a specific time and place. Invisible to the naked eye, it can be seen under a UV light, and can also be used on objects.
  • A new study by the Congressional Budget Office shows federal taxes are for the third year in a row lower than under the Bush administration, and are actually at their lowest level since the Truman administration.
  • Gas prices are at a record high for this time of year.
  • Are you ready for this one, dog lovers? Inmates at a Missouri prison taught a deaf dachshund to respond to sign language, and then gave him to a school for deaf children.

Happy Saturday, crasstalkers.

Tonight in the WingNutverse

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Well, it has been an exciting week in politics. There was revolution in Egypt, scandal in the House of Representatives, and probably a lot of secret, gay sex at CPAC. All of the usual pundits have weighed in with the predictable, self-serving “analysis.” However, if we want some really entertaining commentary we need to transport ourselves to the less lucid part of the Internet. We need to take a trip to the WingNutverse. Here’s a smattering about the topics that are important to the batshit crazy tonight:

At Glenn Beck’s The Blaze, Glenn explains how the Egyptian revolution is all a conspiracy against Israel and will kill us all. I think, he’s really hard to follow. Anyway, he includes this handy organizational chart to clear the whole thing up.

Best quote: “I hope these things don’t happen, but I fear they will.”

Bonus points: He blames The New York Times.

Over at Newsmax (home to Ann Coulter) they want to give you the truth about Islam. Their hard-hitting report addresses important issues:

  • Home-grown terrorists and their “stealth jihad”
  • A violent struggle for Shariah in Detroit
  • Rape and murder — disturbing incidents “justified” by Shariah

Are you terrified yet? Want to know more? It will only cost you $4.95 to find out. Waiting only means that someone will rape and kill your family.

Bonus points: You do get a free radio with your order. I’m not kidding, follow the link.

Let’s go to Andrew Breitbart’s Big Government (hold me). Tonight we are discussing how the presidential nominating process could favor Donald Trump (I am going to need you to keep holding me). Apparently The Donald has the media savvy and star power to capture the Republican nomination (fuck it, just shoot me).

However: BG’s crazy readers are skeptical.

Bonus points: This is how much I hate Mr. Breitbart.

All right, that’s enough with the scary stories tonight. Let’s all go back to celebrating Egypt, being reasonable, and pretending these people don’t exist.

She Has a Special Valentine Offer

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Are you lonely? Are you once again dreading the onset of the 14th of February, otherwise known as Russell Stover’s Eve? Do you want to know if someone–anyone–out there cares about you?

Well, at least one person cares. This woman cares. She cares a lot, actually, and all she asks is that you leave your “email ID” for future electronic correspondence.

The sea is always beautiful, sigh.

It Began With a…

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Do you know how some of the companies that you use everyday got their start?

Visa – 60,000 cards were mailed by Bank of America to people in Fresno, CA.  Visa allowed other banks to issue cards and eventually turned over control in 1970 to a consortium.  In 2008 Visa was the largest IPO in US history ($17.9 billion).

UPS – UPS started as small delivery service and grew to be a package delivery company in Seattle when shoppers at Nordstrom and The Bon Marché wanted an easier way to get their purchases home.

Starbucks – You all know they got their start in a small store at the Pike Place market in Seattle.  It was just a couple people who thought coffee desered better than the swill that the WWII vets were used to.  And those better beans originally came from the Berkeley, CA coffee copmnay Peet’s Coffee and Tea.  Peet is still pissed.

Williams-Sonoma –  It was started by Charles Williams in Sonoma, CA.  I’m still now sure how they got their name though.

All of this to say that big things often start in very small ways.

Viva La Revolucion!

Would a scrotum by any other name smell as sweet?

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What’s in a name? A lot, if you are a resident of Fort Wayne, Indiana, and have a stake in the naming of a government building. Apparently, the people have spoken – and they want the building to be named after esteemed former Mayor Harry Baals.

Not everyone is so enthused. Enter curmudgeons:

I’m guessing Richard Fuchs shouldn’t run for office in Indiana.

[Boingboing]

A Horrible Confession

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I like The New Radicals and Fall Out Boy.

I have a degree in sound design from CalArts (technically, I have a BFA in theater, but CalArts has a sound design program that I studied). I spent a lot of time in college hanging out with the music school students. Were I more talented, my days would be spent creating masterpieces on the guitar and synth (the big analogue ones with the patch cables and such. My work has an original Moog Modular that I restored and constantly play with). My music collection runs from Phoenix to Aphex Twin to Brian Eno to Penderecki to Mozart. I consider myself a music snob. I don’t listen to terrestrial radio because I can’t stand the repetitive playlist. I get my music from the underground station on Sirius, and blogs, and the What.CD staff picks, and Becomes Eclectic on KCRW (everyone who doesn’t know about this show, it’s run on Los Angeles’ NPR station every weekday morning, and is amazing. They stream it online.). I am the insufferable prick who points out that the Beatles’ “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da” is a ripoff of “You Never Can Tell” by Chuck Berry.
Back in the nineties, when I was in college (class of 2000), I was watching MTV. The video for “You Get What You Give” came on. The video was fairly innocuous: a bunch of kids take over a mall and let the pets out and something and I think Robin Sparkles is there. I don’t know. I’ve had a lot to drink since then. The point is, the song was pretty good. I went out and bought the CD. There were songs about ODing, I think some stuff about suicide, altogether some pretty subversive material coated in catchy pop hooks. I love this album. I am the only one of my friends that does. Well, except for one, but he loves it in the way I love the Breakin’ movies and Snakes On A Plane – because they’re shit.
Fall Out Boy is a band with a great name. They also have some really fun songs. “Sugar, We’re Going Down” is on my playlist for when I shower in the morning. Altogether, these guys write solid songs, and divorce the Simpson girl without the boobs. The second part would usually make me not even want to try their music, but I didn’t know about that when I first heard them. I am the only one of my friends that likes this band as well.
I don’t want you to think that all of my friends are a bunch of hipster music snobs like me. My best friends, who I have known since I started high school, love Matchbox 20 and Blessid Union Of Souls. If that name isn’t enough to drive you away, they’re the guys responsible for that “Hey Leonardo (She Likes Me For Me)” piece of shit that was mildly popular back around 2000. These guys have horrible taste in music, and they don’t like either of these bands.
In college, a buddy of mine who was getting his Master’s in sound design went out and bought Blink 182’s big album. This guy was a music major at Oberlin, and a huge fan of Wendy Carlos’ work in “A Clockwork Orange.” Wendy Carlos is the one who made “Switched On Bach,” which, as a big analogue synth fan, I listen to pretty regularly. Anyway, this guy who had a degree in music from a pretty serious school, and could wax philosophical about classical music reworked on a Moog, loved Blink 182. He sat in the sound studio at school and listened to that album for three hours with headphones on. He heard a band that was tailor-made for that day’s youth. I heard a band that couldn’t play their instruments, and whose mastery of the English language paled in comparison to a third grader. I opened up to him about my love for The New Radicals, and he laughed at me.
These are my guilty pleasures. Now I only listen to them in my house, or through earphones so no one will laugh at me.
These are my guilty pleasures. I know I shouldn’t like them, but I do

BREAKING: Details Of Mubarak’s Resignation

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Reports are coming out that the CIA intercepted emails between former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and an unnamed 34 year-old middle-aged woman from suburban Maryland, purporting to show Mubarak shirtless and posing.  These yet-unreleased photos, described by one CIA analyst as “racy” show a topless dictator posing in the mirror, taking a self-portrait with smartphone of unknown manufacture.

The CIA has yet to confirm the exact nature of the emails but it is believed that Mubarak had been sending emails to the woman for some time.  Reports differ as to whether Mubarak and she connected via Craigslist or through the back pages of The Village Voice.

It is now believed that President Mubarak’s resignation was not caused by growing civil unrest but, rather, the impending release of the photos and emails.

Around the web: weird and wonderful news

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Servicey
The little bastards have done nothing but piss you off all day anyway.

  • Wired reports a study that found that the combined computational power of every computer on Earth is equal to one human brain’s processing power. In terms of storage, our total storage capacity is equal to the amount of data in one adult’s DNA.
  • The Pentagon has issued a DADT repeal plan. Hallelujah! The full document is available at the previous link, the PowerPoint presentation put together by the Marine Corps command is here, courtesy of OutServe.
  • Officials in Fort Wayne, IN are inexplicably reluctant to name a new government center after former four-term mayor Harry Baals.
  • Police arrested a man in South Pasadena after he climbed a tree to, he claimed, escape a pack of pumas. Yes, he was drunk. No, there are not roaming packs of pumas in South Pasadena, to the best of my knowledge at least.

Enjoy your Friday, Crasstalkers! Just not quite that much.