Category: News

I wanted to write a long, beautiful treatise against this, but I just can’t. I read the article and was just too shocked, stunned and gobsmacked to write a single word about it. So I’ll just let the article speak for itself:

If you are taking a painkiller, law enforcement wants to know about it.

The N.C. Sheriff’s Association met with a legislative study committee Tuesday to discuss ways sheriffs can access pharmacy records of people taking high-powered painkillers like Percocet, Vicodin, Xanax and OxyContin.

Eddie Caldwell, a lobbyist for the N.C. Sheriff’s Association, said they want to set up a system to stop overdoses.

No legislation has been drafted but the association and the oversight committee plan to present a package to the General Assembly in 2011 that will outline what kind of power they want. It will stipulate how deep into the public’s medicine cabinets they will reach and what law enforcement officers will do with the information.

Between this, warrentless searches of electronic devices and Obamacare, I’m really starting to wonder what fucking country I live in these days. It’s all the more shocking because this comes out just days after Fidel Castro admitted that the “Cuban model” isn’t working any more. So, just as one of the worst dictatorships in the Western hemisphere shows signs of loosening up… the Land of the (Formerly) Free shows signs of cozying up to Ingsoc.

If you check out the Gaston Gazette link below, be sure to check out the comments. “I think it’s time for a lawsuit”, some say. I say it’s time for a Second American Revolution! That, or are the islands ready yet?

via the Gaston Gazette.

I guess you’ve probably seen this by now, but here’s a video clip of a horrific car crash that was making the rounds a couple days ago:

Wow.

More proof that England’s losing its mind in the race to multi-culturalism: council workers in Greater Manchester have been banned from flying the English flag on their cars. In England. Because that might be racist. To fly one’s own flag in his own country. More:

More than 1,200 workers have been banned from flying England flags on their own cars by managers – over fears they could deemed as racist.

Employees at the housing association were sent a group e-mail warning that decking out their personal vehicles with the St George’s flags could “discriminate” against those who don’t support England during the World Cup.

Call me when the entire United Kingdom collapses into anarchy.

via Mail Online.

– Well, the Lost finale sucked… and not just because of the crappy writing. Entertainment Weekly reports that the finale had 107 commercials, or over 45 minutes worth! A typical hour long show normally has 18-20 commercials per, but the first hour of Lost had 37!

– A dude buys a used paragliding rig for £300 off eBay. He then decides to take it out with no training whatsoever. What could possibly go wrong? Find out.

– European mobile phone operators have suspended the number 0888 888 888 after a string of mysterious deaths connected with it. In fact, every single person who has had that number for the past ten years has died under mysterious circumstances.

– Speaking of spooky, the Amityville Horror house is up for sale. It can be yours for a cool $1.15m.

– Guess what? Not only might sunscreen not prevent skin cancer, it might actually accelerate it! Awesome! Read more here.

You might never have heard the name Leslie Buck, but you just might be familiar with something he designed:

His iconic paper coffee cup was originally designed for the Sherri Cup Company of Kensington, Connecticut. The design proved to be so popular that dozens of companies imitated it, and soon almost any hot beverage served to go in New York was served one of Buck’s cups or a knockoff.

The Greek-influenced cups have appeared in almost every TV show that’s ever been based in New York. Liz Lemon has been seen drinking from the cups in 30 Rock, as did Glenn Close in Damages, and the cups made so many appearances in NYPD Blue and Law & Order that they deserve their own “Best Supporting Prop” award.

Over the past 40 years, the cups have practically become a symbol of the city of New York. Artists have made change purses based on the design. MoMA sells a ceramic version in their gift shop. Online sellers sell them to homesick New Yorkers, and a few enterprising folks even sell paper sleeves that can turn a generic Styrofoam cup into their favorite memory of home! I think all that’s pretty cool.

Buck, born Laszlo Büch in Czechoslovakia, survived the Auschwitz and Buchenwald concentration camps before making his way to New York.

He died at age 87 of complications from Parkinson’s.

– The Smoking Gun has posted the original police report about the Ben Roethlisberger fiasco in Milledgeville here. It’s pretty disgusting.

– Speaking of The Smoking Gun, I just noticed that they have greatly expanded their archive of concert riders. Who knew that Def Leppard ate more like grandparents than rock stars?

– In an interview with Cnet, famous hacker Marc Maiffret has declared Microsoft software to be more secure than Apple’s. Specifically, he says that Apple tries “to market themselves as more secure than the PC, that you don’t have to worry about viruses. Anytime there’s been a hacking contest, within a few hours someone’s found a new Apple vulnerability. If they were taking it seriously, they wouldn’t claim to be more secure than Microsoft because they are very much not.” Read the entire interview – it’s really worth it.

– While we’re on the subject of security… for a while now, I’ve been trying to tell people that the popular “alternative” PDF reader Fox-It is not necessarily any more secure than Adobe Reader. Here’s at least one person who agrees with me.

– Perhaps it surprised researchers, but news that tainted fruits and veggies end up in overpriced inner-city markets rather than the ‘burbs is no news to me.

– Hey, do you have a spare £6.2 million lying around? Then you could have bought a rare 17th century Persian rug from Christies. The rug, which sold for 20 times what the auction house had expected, is now known as the “World’s Most Expensive Rug”.