City officials in Stockholm are feeling the heat over rabbit fuel. The city relies on green technology, including biofuel to reduce pollution and global warming. So, when thousands of rabbits had to be culled from Sweden’s parks and streets, they were used as fuel in the city heating plant. Now, people are hopping mad, but officials are having “burn, bunny, burn.”
Continue reading “Bunny Briquettes: Stockholm Burns Rabbits to Heat City”
Category: Politics
Keith Bardwell, justice of the peace in Tangipahoa Parish, Louisiana has become an infamous figure overnight after he refused to marry an interracial couple out of concern for their possible children. However, he helpfully explained “I’m not a racist. I just don’t believe in mixing the races that way.”
Continue reading “Louisiana Justice of the Peace Refuses to Marry Interracial Couples”
In light of the recent disclosure that President Obama was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize just 12 days after taking office and was initially opposed from the majority of the Committee (here), there is some interest on who was stepped over for the honor. The most striking “loser” in the competition was Dr. Sima Samar, an amazingly brave Afghan woman who has risked her life to fight for the rights of women and girls in both Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Continue reading “Meet Dr. Sima Samar — The Person Obama Beat Out for the Nobel Prize”
Various people, including civil libertarians, have criticized the award of the Nobel Peace Prize to President Obama given his expansion on Bush policies and his opposition to war crimes investigations. Others have criticized the fact that he was nominated after less than two weeks in office and selected after less than a year in office. Now, it appears that the majority of the Nobel committee had the same objections and had rejected him for the award.
Continue reading “Majority of Nobel Committee Reportedly Objected to Awarding Obama Prize”
President BarackN Obama, the world’s newest Nobel peace laureate, is again expanding on the policies of former President George Bush and fighting to conceal evidence of U.S. torture and abuse. As did the Bush Administration, the Obama Administration is seeking to change the law after courts rejected its absurd argument that the President can withhold photos of detainee abuse simply because they are embarrassing to the United States. Democrats in Congress are assisting in the effort to try to stop the Supreme Court from considering the issue by preempting the litigation.
While we recently discussed criticism of the evolving “nanny state” in England, it appears that Canada may also have a degree of runaway paternalistic regulations. Truck driver Brad Weber, 44, was fined recently for smoking in his workplace. Of course, his workplace is the cab of his truck, which he owns and operates alone.
Continue reading “Canadian Trucker Fined for Smoking in a Workplace: His Own Truck”
First there was Al Qaeda, then Swine Flu, and . . . now that you think you are over the worst of it . . . here come the Gnome Nazis.
Detroit has long held the reputation as one of the worst run cities in the nation, particularly with its top politicians continually the subject of corruption scandals and criminal indictments, here. Now, an internal report has revealed that the city spent more than $18.5 million on an in-car computer system that is so poorly designed and used that investigators found that “its most common use today is a platform to play solitaire.”
There is an important decision out of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit where the conviction of Laval Farmer was overturned due to the prosecutors’ repeated use of his nickname “murder.” After all, his nickname is not “Attempted Murder” Farmer, which is what he was tried for. My only regret is that he was not represented by Richard “Racehorse” Haynes so that the prosecutors could have told the jury not to let “a race horse clear murder.”
Continue reading “Murder, She Spoke: Court Overturns Convictions Due to Prosecutors Use of Defendant’s Nickname “Murder””
School officials in Newark, Delaware have given the nation another example of mindless “zero-tolerance” abuse. In this case, officials suspended 6-year-old Zachary Christie because the boy brought his new cub scout camping utensils to school to eat his lunch. Because the utensil had a small knife, he was suspended and ordered to spend the next 45 days in the district’s reform school.
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Nicolas Cage has been hit by a lien for over $6,257,005 in unpaid income tax for 2007. It is not known if the IRS has started digging near Mount Rushmore.
Continue reading “National Treasure: Nicolas Cage Owes IRS Over $6 Million”
Richard Strandlof lived a life of distinction. He spoke to children and the media as a survivor first of the attack on the Pentagon on 9/11 and then survived a roadside bomb that killed four fellow Marines. He will now add a further distinction as a defendant in a rare “stolen valor” prosecution after his claims of service were proven false.
Here is this week’s column from Roll Call. It explores the interesting selection of cases this term for the Supreme Court. Justice Sonia Sotomayor’s colleagues could not have selected cases more carefully to address areas of uncertainty from her confirmation hearing. Whether by accident or design, this docket is front-loaded with cases that will force Sotomayor to show her true colors in the first few months of her tenure as an associate justice.
Continue reading “Simply Sonia: Sotomayor’s Colleagues Pick Docket Virtually Tailored To Force Her To Choose Sides”
It appears that when I suggested Woody Allen was the last person Polanski who want as an advocate (here), I spoke too hastily. As the French continue their campaign to force the return of Roman Polanski to their country (and avoid extradition to the United States for his rape of a 13-year-old girl in 1997), a new controversy has emerged from the Sarkozy government. The culture minister advocating for the famed director is the nephew of the late Socialist French president Francois Mitterand — Frédéric Mitterrand. Mitterrand appears to have more than a platonic interest in the underlying controversy.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed not to allow any Israelis to stand trial for war crimes even if demanded by the United Nations or world court. It is a position that defies the entire basis of international legal process created by the Nuremberg Tribunals since no country has a right to determine its own innocence. As previously noted, the Goldstone Commission found credible evidence of war crimes in the Gaza campaign.
Continue reading “Netanyahu Vows to Block Any War Crimes Trial of Israeli Official”