This is a new thread where we can bring up interesting/frustrating/humorous events we read about in the news. Try to remember to be civil and state your opinions without denigrating or bullying others.

Not every news item need be serious, either.

Inmate Delivers Baby In Jail

If it turns out the comms system in the jail was not malfunctioning, I would fire every single officer on the night shift pulling duty inside the station. If the comms system was malfunctioning, I would sanction all the leadership, and fire the OIC for the night shift for dereliction--there's no excuse for someone not physically checking on prisoners more than not-at-all in a four hour time-span. If that's part of their SOP--not checking on prisoner welfare throughout the night--the Station Chief should be relieved.

Just my opinions based on the article.

Sounds like prison to me. All the money they save on food goes directly to not maintaining the place...

I found this to be hilarious:

White House Corrects Conference Call Number After Directing Reporters to Sex Line

Anytime a mistake like this is made it's just too funny. I almost spit Dr. Pepper on my keyboard when I read it. I also wonder how my reporters might have stayed on the line for a while....

A couple of days ago I saw a headline "Man arrested for drunk driving on a motorized bar stool"
I would link it but I have no idea where it is.

Woman testifies about cell phone in throat

INDEPENDENCE, Mo. - Prosecutors say a man shoved a cell phone down his girlfriend's throat because he was angry and jealous. But defense attorneys insisted as a trial got underway that the woman swallowed the phone intentionally to keep the defendant from seeing whom she had been calling.
Marlon Brando Gill, 24, is charged with first-degree assault in the December incident involving 25-year-old Melinda Abell. Abell has given inconsistent accounts of what happened before she was taken to a hospital, where an emergency room doctor removed the phone.
She testified Tuesday on the first day of Gill's trial that she couldn't remember how the phone got in her throat, saying she had too much to drink that night.
She said in court that she could not recall writing a statement to police after the incident, in which she said: "I think he thought I'd been talking to other guys. ... He took my phone to see who I had been calling."
The statement added: "If I didn't want him to see my phone, I would have just thrown it out the window and busted it."
Much of her testimony centered on her relationship with Gill, of Kansas City, which started in 2004.
"It was good at first, then it got rocky," Abell said.
She testified that he had verbally and physically abused her, but under cross-examination she acknowledged she never told police about the abuse and continued to live with Gill until the cell phone incident.

We all know how well Superman IV worked out.

Howard Stern show prank-calls FOX News about Binghamton shootings.

If you give a squirrel a peanut...

This is just ridiculous.

Obama Fried Chicken.

I had a sociology professor who once told us if the leading generation of any given time would simply ignore these slings and arrows, the next generation would move on without them. The idea is that if we stop being offended by the last generation's negative epithets, then they won't be negative epithets for the next generation.

Here's an example from my life: I am 33 years old. Until a year ago I had no idea that the word 'spooks' is racially charged. To me a spook is a ghost or a spy. Now, it is one of the words I feel I should teach my kids to abjure.

I found this to be hilarious:

White House Corrects Conference Call Number After Directing Reporters to Sex Line

Anytime a mistake like this is made it's just too funny. I almost spit Dr. Pepper on my keyboard when I read it. I also wonder how my reporters might have stayed on the line for a while....

I'm glad I found this section because this is very absurd!

PETA protests WoW

You read that right. Now I'm all for not needlessly killing animals, but its a frakking videogame!!

I'm glad I found this section because this is very absurd!

PETA protests WoW

You read that right. Now I'm all for not needlessly killing animals, but its a frakking videogame!!

For your regular fix of weird news, I recommend News of the Weird.

I was once even listed as a "news ranger" for my report of really weird eastern practises (in some church here in Germany, they thought it would be swell to beat chocolate easter bunnies to death and tell the kids "There is no easter bunny. Easter is about sharing" or something like that. I bet child psychologists rejoyced!)

I'm glad I found this section because this is very absurd!

PETA protests WoW

You read that right. Now I'm all for not needlessly killing animals, but its a frakking videogame!!

8 year old girl married to a 47 year old man in order to settle her father's debts.

Get the f*#% out of the dark ages!

I am absolutely disgusted with the culture and legal system that allows such a thing in the year 2009. Abhorrent, aberrant, and despicable.

Woman jumps into polar bear enclosure.

When I first saw this video, I could only assume it was a strange suicide attempt. However, reading the accompanying article, it was apparently just profound stupidity on the woman's part. I mean...zoo or no zoo, how is one able to see a full grown polar bear and have no instinct that it is not something to get close to?

EPA vs Bedbugs

The Combined Operational Load Bearing External Resistance Treadmill

Epic-win :-)

I don't have a link for this, but what is this I am hearing about "Tea Parties"?

Taliban Religious Police Execute Eloping Lovers in Town Square

CNN headlines this story as an execution. If it happened anywhere else in the civilized world, it would be called murder.

Even bank robbers are "down sizing."

Here is a link on the tea parties.

Basically rallies for people who are tired of the high taxes and out of control government spending. Although the Republican party is trying to leach onto the event after the fact, it wasn't organized by them.

Edit-

Found another link on the tea parties, the ones in San Diego.

I particularly like the pic of the guy carring the sign "Next Time Read the Bill".

Taliban Religious Police Execute Eloping Lovers in Town Square

CNN headlines this story as an execution. If it happened anywhere else in the civilized world, it would be called murder.

Recession fueling right-wing extremism, U.S. says

Some good points here, especially about the returning military personnel. As if our good men and women didn't already have to face crumbling VA facilities....

Doctors remove fir tree from patient's lung.

Doctors remove fir tree from patient's lung.

Snakes on a Plane!!!

Fish swims up boy's...ahem

Now I wonder how that really happened...

The Sun is awesome.

What Sells in a Recession: Canned Goods and Condoms

You may be a Canadian if....

There's even an associated video. I nearly spit beer all over the computer when I watched it.

Captured Pirate Arrives in NYC for Trial

No offense, but I'd be smiling, too. US Prison must be a better life than war-ravaged Somalia.

Captured Pirate Arrives in NYC for Trial

No offense, but I'd be smiling, too. US Prison must be a better life than war-ravaged Somalia.

Fat People are a causing Global Warming.

The wide-bodies are leaving a deeper carbon-footprint, so it seems.

Fat People are a causing Global Warming.

The wide-bodies are leaving a deeper carbon-footprint, so it seems.

I was metaphorically scratching the noggin...what's a twelvest?

Hippie makes Most Wanted Terrorists List.

1 billion downloads and 1 happy teenager.

Ambiguous Daters

OK, this is not actually news, it's a lifestyles article. When I was in college, usually girls were the abmiguous ones and, as far as guys go, well, this is exactly the kind of 'boyfriend' girls were after.

I think women have created this monster...

[pause for flames...]

Ambiguous Daters

OK, this is not actually news, it's a lifestyles article. When I was in college, usually girls were the abmiguous ones and, as far as guys go, well, this is exactly the kind of 'boyfriend' girls were after.

I think women have created this monster...

[pause for flames...]

So I don't know. I'd love to say it's all the girls' fault because I've endured more than my share of The Friend Talk, but I don't know if that's the case. I think it's the prevalent desire to "play the field".

"Ambiguous dater"? Um, yeah. Again, I have to blame "emo" music.

Australian councillor, Hajnal Ban, has legs broken to become taller

Ouch!

Man exonerated after 16 years behind bars

This man was convicted when he was 13 years old and sentenced to 50 years in prison.

Illinois owes this guy some serious cash. He should be taken care of for the rest of his life.

Man exonerated after 16 years behind bars

This man was convicted when he was 13 years old and sentenced to 50 years in prison.

Illinois owes this guy some serious cash. He should be taken care of for the rest of his life.

Andrew Turner wrote:

Man exonerated after 16 years behind bars

This man was convicted when he was 13 years old and sentenced to 50 years in prison.

Illinois owes this guy some serious cash. He should be taken care of for the rest of his life.

I know the Feds get stuck paying $1000 a day for every day someone is wrongfully locked up. I helped a dude that was locked up ten months past the day he was supposed to be released paid. Getting him the time credit and the money was the only case I ever won in my "jailhouse lawyer" career.

houstonderek wrote:

Andrew Turner wrote:

Man exonerated after 16 years behind bars

This man was convicted when he was 13 years old and sentenced to 50 years in prison.

Illinois owes this guy some serious cash. He should be taken care of for the rest of his life.

I know the Feds get stuck paying $1000 a day for every day someone is wrongfully locked up. I helped a dude that was locked up ten months past the day he was supposed to be released paid. Getting him the time credit and the money was the only case I ever won in my "jailhouse lawyer" career.

6 million is a nice figure--please don't tell me the government taxes it...

Australia's "sexting" awareness campaign"

I'm thinking we here in the states should take a page from the playbook of our friends down under. They're trying to make their teens aware of the consequences of putting private things like this out into the public sphere, like having their reputations marred.

In this country, we charge them with child pornography for sending out naked pictures of themselves and get them stuck on a registered sex offenders list for the rest of their lives, thus marring their reputations.

Government seizes 1500 acres of land to build 9/11 memorial in PA

Over 2.3 square miles to build a memorial? That's a pretty big block of granite...

In case you're wondering how big 1500 acres is, it's the exact size of the National Mall in DC.

Government seizes 1500 acres of land to build 9/11 memorial in PA

Over 2.3 square miles to build a memorial? That's a pretty big block of granite...

In case you're wondering how big 1500 acres is, it's the exact size of the National Mall in DC.

Andrew Turner wrote:

Government seizes 1500 acres of land to build 9/11 memorial in PA

Over 2.3 square miles to build a memorial? That's a pretty big block of granite...
In case you're wondering how big 1500 acres is, it's the exact size of the National Mall in DC.

I wonder why the erosion of property rights doesn't disturb the general public. It almost never comes up in political discourse, but it's happening everywhere.

Good news story out of Afghanistan

Andrew Turner wrote:

Government seizes 1500 acres of land to build 9/11 memorial in PA

Over 2.3 square miles to build a memorial? That's a pretty big block of granite...

In case you're wondering how big 1500 acres is, it's the exact size of the National Mall in DC.

I wonder why the erosion of property rights doesn't disturb the general public. It almost never comes up in political discourse, but it's happening everywhere.

Cuchulainn wrote:

Andrew Turner wrote:

Government seizes 1500 acres of land to build 9/11 memorial in PA

Over 2.3 square miles to build a memorial? That's a pretty big block of granite...

In case you're wondering how big 1500 acres is, it's the exact size of the National Mall in DC.

I wonder why the erosion of property rights doesn't disturb the general public. It almost never comes up in political discourse, but it's happening everywhere.

Eminent domain is noted and very loosely regulated by the U.S. Constitution. I'm not sure calling this an erosion of property rights is the best way to put this, given that this "erosion" has existed, legally, as long as the country has.