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Gingrich Pledges Not To Commit Infidelity A Third Time, Reaffirms Opposition To Marriage Equality

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© Unknown
As Iowa's FAMiLY Leader prepares to endorse a presidential candidate ahead of the Jan. 3 Iowa caucuses, Newt Gingrich has issued a statement affirming the Leader's pledge to oppose marriage equality for gays and lesbians, deny women access to abortion, and reduce the debt. Read his full response here and the marriage excerpt below:
Defending Marriage. As President, I will vigorously enforce the Defense of Marriage Act, which was enacted under my leadership as Speaker of the House, and ensure compliance with its provisions, especially in the military. I will also aggressively defend the constitutionality of DOMA in federal and state courts. I will support sending a federal constitutional amendment defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman to the states for ratification. I will also oppose any judicial, bureaucratic, or legislative effort to define marriage in any manner other than as between one man and one woman. I will support all efforts to reform promptly any uneconomic or anti-marriage aspects of welfare and tax policy. I also pledge to uphold the institution of marriage through personal fidelity to my spouse and respect for the marital bonds of others.
Vander Plaats welcomed Gingrich's affirmation saying, "We are pleased that Speaker Gingrich has affirmed our pledge and are thankful we have on record his statements regarding DOMA, support of a federal marriage amendment, defending the unborn, pledging fidelity to his spouse, defending religious liberty and freedom, supporting sound pro-family economic issues, and defending the right of the people to rule themselves."

Smoking

'Smoking can make your nipples fall off': Plastic surgeon warns of gangrene following breast lift

bra,smokes
© AlamySmoking not only kills but can also disrupt the healing process after cosmetic operations such as breast lifts

Smoking can make your nipples fall off - this is the astonishing claim by Dr Anthony Youn, one of American's top plastic surgeons.

The practitioner from Detroit, Michigan, was quick to point out this applied to patients who underwent breast lifts to perk up their chests.

He said the nicotine and carbon monoxide taken in during smoking can disrupt blood flow to different parts of the body and so disrupts the healing process following surgery.

Smiley

Darth Vader's Legal Blunder

Vader
© NZ Herald
What do you get when you cross Darth Vader and Maria von Trapp? A swift response from the patent lawyers of LucasFilm, as power retailer Powershop found out. It seems their online advertisement (left) featuring Darth caused a fair amount of disturbance in the force and Powershop responded by pulling it from circulation. But CEO Ari Sargent says he isn't giving up completely, "not while hope for freedom still exists in the galaxy ..."

Attention

Russia: Medvedev involved in obscene Twitter outburst

Russian president Dmitry Medvedev caused shock on Wednesday after an obscene insult directed at political opponents appeared on his official Twitter feed.

The Kremlin chief and his more powerful mentor prime minister, Vladimir Putin, have been facing growing opposition to their rule by protesters who say parliamentary elections on Sunday were not fair.

The offensive post appeared to have been retweeted on the @MedvedevRussia feed at 33 minutes past midnight, according to cached copies of the feed and a notification of the post received by a Reuters reporter.

Bad Guys

US: The Deep Shallowness of Professor Gingrich

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© Wikipedia
Mea culpa, I misspoke, my bad -- I stand corrected.

In past commentaries, I have called Newt Gingrich a lobbyist. Apparently, he hates that tag, even though he has indeed gotten very wealthy by taking big bucks from such special interest outfits as IBM, AstraZeneca, Microsoft and Siemens in exchange for helping them get favors from federal and state governments. But Gingrich, his lawyers and staff adamantly insist that it's rude and crude to call him a lobbyist. No-no, they bark, The Newt is -- ta-da! -- "a visionary."

Major corporations, they explain, pay up to $200,000 a year to the corrupt former-House speaker's policy center, seeking nothing more from Newt than the sheer privilege of bathing in the soothing enlightenment of his transformative vision. Also, as the man himself constantly reminds everyone, he has a Ph By-God D. So he's "Dr. Newt," the (SET ITAL) certified (END ITAL) visionary.

Yet the sales pitch to lure potential corporate clients to his center makes crystal cleat that the visionary services he offers entail precisely doing what (excuse the term) lobbyists do. For example, the center brags that Newt has "contacts at the highest levels" of government, and that being a paying customer "increases your channels of input to decision makers." One corporate chieftain who hired the well-connected Washington insider for $7,500 a month (plus giving him stock options) says that Gingrich "made it very clear to us that he does not lobby, but that he could direct us to the right places in Washington."

Dollar

SOTT Focus: Economic Armageddon Crisis: LIVE, As it Happens and Will Continue to Happen

President Obama meets European Union leaders, shakes hands, puts on some smiles for the press, pretends he doesn't already know what the plan is and shakes his head thoughtfully. Obama says the US is willing to use its magic wand to help put smiles on European faces in time for Christmas. Markets climb despite a warning from several three or four letter acronyms lurking in the shadows and pulling the strings that Europe will slide into a 10 mile deep sink-hole - and Britain will follow - unless each Eurozone country delivers 13.4% of its peasants minced, lightly seasoned, vacuum packed and oven-ready to JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs in under 45 minutes.

Debt Crisis
© Carlos Latuff
This page will automatically invent apocalyptic scenarios of catastrophic proportions every 90 seconds - OFF
- Obama says even though he is married he will spend the night with Mrs Merkel if he has to
- Fitch says US downgrade possible if anyone from the Rothschild family sends an SMS
- IMF's Lagarde says their new technocrats in Italy and Greece are behaving themselves
- Despite having bad dreams, world markets go up a bit and down a little, pretty much like they normally do
- Europe 'in sink-hole' - and could take global economy with it
- JP Morgan says it's tired of waiting for downtrodden European peasants and import its own from China

21.35 It's been a long day of satirical expose of Debt Crisis Live and other such live-blogging. They don't half like creating a drama out of a crisis and it can only mean one thing...

21:25 We're currently in YAMC - Yet Another Manufactured Crisis

Info

US: Maryland Prisoners Learn to Knit Behind Bars

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© Karl Merton Ferron, Baltimore Sun
In 2009, Lynn Zwerling asked a crowd of 600 prisoners at the Pre-Release Unit in Jessup, Maryland, if any of them would like to knit.

The response was predictable:

"They looked at her like she was crazy," GOOD reports.

Despite that initial baffled reaction, over 100 prisoners have learned to knit since then - and there's a waiting list of dozens.

"I have guys that have never missed one time in two years," Zwerling, 67, said of the students at her Thursday evening class. "Some reported to us that they miss dinner to come to class."

Zwerling brought knitting to the men's prison after she successfully started a 500-member knitting group in Columbia, Maryland.

Crusader

Stewart: Is Fox News 'turning into The 700 Club?'

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© Comedy Central.
Annoyed over Fox News attacking President Barack Obama for not saying "God" in his Thanksgiving Address, Jon Stewart asked Monday evening if the network was "turning into The 700 Club?"

The Daily Show host took the network to task once again for their latest, peculiar over-reaction in a segment titled "Much Ado About Stuffing."

"Seriously, failing to mention God in your Thanksgiving address, not a huge Thanksgiving faux pas," Stewart said. "I could understand if instead of pardoning two male turkeys, he had married them. Then I could understand Fox getting bent out of shape."

Stewart wasn't even accepting Fox's attempt to "be fair" to Obama, as the network mentioned that he wasn't the first president to leave out God in his Thanksgiving address.

"Who did you make look up that shit on a holiday weekend?" he asked. "Who did you do that too?"

Fox News later told its viewers that Obama did indeed mention God in his written Thanksgiving address instead of the Youtube broadcasted message. By that time in the segment, Stewart was ready to move on.

"This is about turning Thanksgiving into yet another one of those Christian persecution culture war type things," he said. "Don't you do it! Don't you do it to Thanksgiving! I'll give you the war on Christmas, we are trying to f@@k that up. This is all reformed Jews have left."

Camera

Facebook is Run by CIA!!


Mr. Potato

US nuclear aircraft carrier George Bush crippled by toilet outages

Sailors drenched as bottles of piss emptied into wind
flight carrier, george h.w. bish
© unknownWell goddammit you guys, you shoulda gone before we set off

The US Navy's newest and mightiest nuclear aircraft carrier, the USS George H W Bush*, has been plagued by continual failures in its lavatories, according to reports. Sailors have been forced into increasingly desperate measures to relieve themselves.

The Navy Times, following up initial stories of the problems appearing on blogs, quotes members of the 5,000-strong ship's complement as stating that at times there hasn't been a single working head - as lavs are known at sea - anywhere aboard the entire mighty hundred-thousand-ton warship. Reportedly the Bush is fitted with no less than 423 thrones, but it appears that problems with the suction flushing system can easily knock out large numbers of these at once - or even all of them.

According to the NT's unnamed sources, crewpersons aboard the carrier have struggled to cope with the situation. It seems that desperate sailors must often hunt for long periods to find a functioning head, and if they do discover one there may be a lengthy queue. Some of the unfortunate matelots have apparently resorted to urinating in sinks or showers, or in some cases off the towering sides of the ship (parts of it are as high above the waves as a 20-story building). The latter is a risky practice, however, as it is against regulations: at least one sailor has been put under punishment for doing so.