Enjoy!

1. To kick things off, go visit Lauren at Oh Dear Lauren.com, a collection of open letters she’s written to various individuals, entities, random objects, and body parts.
2. Arkansas Fire Chief Don Payne launches into a long overdue tirade about police abuse of power while fighting multiple traffic tickets in court.  The police response?  Shooting him in the ass.
3. Blah blah blah dude who has no problem eating meat gets a bug up his ass when he is served whale in Japan.  Oy, whiners like him are enough to make me want to go vegan again.
4. Vice writer Thomas Morton complains about the extreme nature in which writers love to discuss Detroit.  Though I’m not fond of the (accurate, IMO) comparisons between Philly & Detroit, I do enjoy that neither city gets articles focusing on regular people just doing their thing.  It’s either gotta be about drugs and abject poverty or some hipster sustainable green collaborative hopeful change led by college educated yuppies.
5. As someone who is technically homeless, I understand why some people view Brianna Karp’s story as problematic.  Initially, I did as well, until I read her introduction and something about it just resonated with me.  No, she might not look or act like the guys panhandling on the Delaware Ave median, but she understands why “omg! just, like, get, like, a j-o-b” is dismissive, problematic, and makes you look like a fucking idiot.
6. Cops fuck up and kill a Georgia man during a drug bust.  The man was a preacher, which is naturally becoming the focus of the story.  Personally, I don’t care if he had a brick of smack shoved up his ass, if I saw a team of cops who frankly looked like carjackers, I wouldn’t be clamoring to stop.
7. In shocking news: I agree with something Katherine Mangu-Ward has written regarding Teh Grate Gmail Outage 2009!
8. Courtesy of The Tax Foundation’s blog: Is Twix Candy? Don’t answer that question without first reading.
9. In “other blogs that amuse me” news: check out 11points.com, a blog of Top 11 (not 10!) lists.
10. I think that Lew Rockwell got too excitable by the Union-hating language in the first line of this little diddy of retardation; it’s the only valid explanation for his linking it: John Zmirak blames the rising cost of college tuition on the lack of COLLEGIATE LEVEL remedial classes and other gibberish.  I guess the concept that some people weren’t meant for college is just inconceivable.
11. Speaking of people who weren’t meant for college: this fucking winner thinks it’s a great idea to “help a guy with his baby seat” when his car is running in the middle of Center City.  What’s even worse is that the Phila. SVU CAPTAIN has apparently never heard of that little known serial killer….TED BUNDY, who, despite Cpt. Darby’s claims to the contrary, used pretty similar methods when kidnapping women.
12. But you know what?  I can excuse her idiocy, because at least she can chalk it up to ingrained female politeness (and maybe she will tap into her feminist fury in the future).  But this fucking idiot thought it was a great idea to stop his bike to watch a flash mob get out of control. Shockingly, he wound up getting assaulted by the out of control mob.
13. We’ll wrap up with some oh-so-encouraging news: Capmark distress may signal bank failures topping 100.  But I thought stimulus funds were ‘sposed to fix ev’rything?

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