GlitchNYC.com

Rethinking Coffee Lawsuits

I've always had a negative opinion of the lady who sued McD for burning herself with their hot coffee.

After reading this to-the-point and well thought out post on Slashdot (yes, they exist,) I may have to change my views...

Re:Caveat (Score:4, Informative) by cat_jesus (525334) on Monday March 14, @04:36PM (#11936934)
The other problem with the McDonald's case is the coffee was hot enough to cause third degree burns. It is illegal to sell food in a restaurant that is inedible or dangerous. The lady in question knew she did a dumb thing but she suffered third degree burns on her inner thighs which required skin grafts. She could not afford to pay her medical bills(she was very old and on a fixed income) and asked McDonald's to pay. She was not seeking any compensation past her own medical bills. When the jury found out that McDonald's knew their coffee was too hot, knew people were getting injured and figured the number of people getting third degree burns was acceptable, they stuck it to McDonald's.

If anything, this was a case that demonstrated why we need to be able to sue the shit out of a company when it deliberately harms people.

The devil is in the details.

8:36 pm | permalink | /life/politics | 0 writebacks |

Rumsfeld OK.d harsh treatment of suspects in U.S. war on terror

Yet more proof that my crazy theory was spot on.

Rumsfeld OK.d harsh treatment of suspects in U.S. war on terror (USA today)

Looking back at my conspiracy theory story now, it doesn't look crazy at all.

10:03 am | permalink | /life/politics | 0 writebacks |

Sometimes No News Isn't Good News

There's nothing going on in the nation right now. No bombings, no terrorism, no real change in Iraq.

I know this, not because the news hacks at CNN + elsewhere actually come out and say it, but because they've spent the last 5 days covering Ronald Reagan's funeral.

Yes, it's sad that he died. Yes, he was a president. The problem is, these are the only to facts that have been full and accurate truths in all of the "over and over" coverage. I only watched for 5 minutes here a nd there while I was trapped in an office or store where it was on the tube.

Jimmy Breslin's article over at NY Newsday sums it up beautifully.

1:37 am | permalink | /life/politics | 0 writebacks |

Conspiracy Proof 2: Report: Rumsfeld approved operation that led to Iraqi prisoner abuse

Two major indications in one day point to the now all-too-real possibility that my conspiracy theory was anything but crackpot.

I just saw this on the front of google news - Report: Rumsfeld approved operation that led to Iraqi prisoner abuse

The New Yorker will run this story MONDAY - two days from now.

Read the theory. It's suddenly not that off the wall.

10:53 pm | permalink | /life/politics | 0 writebacks |

Conspiracy Proof 1: Powell: If asked, U.S. will leave Iraq

Well, 3 days after posting my conspiracy theory, history has taken a MAJOR step in the direction I suggested in the piece.

From the Washington Post: Colin Powell "said yesterday that if the incoming Iraqi interim government ordered the departure of foreign troops after June 30, they would pack up without protest, but emphasized he doubted such a request would be made"

Read the rest of the article here

If you haven't read my theory/story yet, give it a look. This gets creepier by the day. What do you think - am I off my rocker, or is it more likely than it seems?

12:28 pm | permalink | /life/politics | 0 writebacks |

(Alternate?) Bush Reality

I'm not usually one for conspiracy theories, but I've been watching this one brew for almost a year and a half, and it's time to put pen to paper and get it down so that when it comes to pass (as keeps continuing to do) I can say "see, I'm not crazy" and have proof.

Well, maybe not proof, but at least other people will have shared my crazy notions with me.

What follows is, as far as I know, an entirely fictional work based upon current events and the possible actions which led up to them. Let's hope I'm wrong and it stays that way.

July 25, 2003

XXXXXXXXXX Golf Course, XXXXXXX, FL

"So, you're telling me..." The President begins, as he lines up his shot. He's deep in the rough of the 3rd hole. "What you're saying to me is that..." SssshWHACK! The President hacks down a chunk of grass and sends his ball popping back up onto the fairway. "Is that there's absolutely no way out." The President hands his club to his man, taking a towel. He looks towards the high sun, and wipes his sweat covered brow. "I tell ya, I don't know how Jeb does it. Too damn humid for me... 4 Iron" He says, taking the club as it is offered by his assistant and walking towards his ball, away from a very severe looking Donald Rumsfeld.

"What I'm saying, Mr. President, is that we have a problem"

"Well no shit we have a problem - that's what this whole mess is about." The President says, stopping his game for a moment and leaning his weight on the top of his 4 iron. He looks Rumsfeld straight in the eye. "Let's go through this again, piece by piece. We've got to be missing something."

See more ...

2:45 am | permalink | /life/politics | 0 writebacks |

Yup, this about sums it up.

http://www.JohnKerryIsADoucheBagButImVotingForHimAnyway.com

Stolen from lvx23

5:44 pm | permalink | /life/politics | 0 writebacks |

Bush on Broadband

G.W. was all over the news declaring his new initiative to bring "Broadband to The People" today.

This is my reaction.

Download this image as SVG line art

Like everything else on my site, this is released under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike license, so feel free to distribute, modify, and use this image as you see fit, provided you link back to the site and that your own work is released under the same license.

Think it could use a little tweaking? Want to use the image of Bush for a zinger you've got in your head?

Go for it.

Sodipodi is a great, free tool for manipulating SVG files (just save often!)

I'd love to see a collaborative effort to create open licensed political cartooning come together. Political cartoons encourage thought and spark debate - it'd be wonderful if the tools to create them were one step closer to the politically, but not necessarily artistically, inclined.

12:32 am | permalink | /life/politics | 0 writebacks |

Crazy Bush Quote Poem

Dear god I hate forwards, but I appreciated this one enough to post here, and it's relevant to my earlier post about G.W.B. This poem is made up entirely of quotes from our President, completely verified by Snopes.com

MAKE THE PIE HIGHER

I think we all agree, the past is over.
This is still a dangerous world.
It's a world of madmen and uncertainty
And potential mental losses.

Rarely is the question asked
Is our children learning?
Will the highways of the Internet become more few?
How many hands have I shaked?

They misunderestimate me.
I am a pitbull on the pantleg of opportunity.
I know that the human being and the fish can coexist.
Families is where our nation finds hope, where our wings take dream.

Put food on your family!
Knock down the tollbooth!
Vulcanize society!
Make the pie higher!

4:34 pm | permalink | /life/politics | 0 writebacks |

I've Figured out How Bush is Surviving all the Bad Press

Well, it seems G.W.'s poll numbers have held steady and are maybe even climbing, and everyone at this point is screaming "how in the hell?"

It seems pretty simple to me - if you already hated him, well, this just confirms it. If you were one of those people who was saying "He's not that dumb" back when he was still working on how to pronounce Afghanistan, this whole "Plotting the Iraq War" has you saying "You see? We told ya he knew how to plan!"

10:59 am | permalink | /life/politics | 0 writebacks |

What the F#@$ is Wrong With The Post?!?!?!

Okay, I'll put it in the best way I can think to put it, since I know I tend to get ranty with this subject.

If there was some scandalous sex act in the news, no self respecting (or FCC fearing) publication, TV show, or presidential campaign ad would run footage or photos of the act itself.

Yet, when something so shocking, so soul-shattering as someone throwing themselves to their death happens, they run images of it happening with no concern for the outcome, the feelings of those involved, or the collateral damage.

Inside your pages, maybe. On historical footage, ok. ON YOUR GODDAMN FRONT PAGE? I don't want to see it. I know I don't want to see it, so I won't buy your filthy rag, yet you keep pushing this garbage in our face.

That was a real girl. She's really dead. I didn't want to see her mid-air, you scumbags. Neither did the little girl sitting next to me on the subway while 5 people read the paper across from us, holding the paper up at her like so many posters.

The Post now officially joins the list of my boycotted media, along with Fox news for running footage of the WTC jumpers in a commercial for their "Year after" special during American Idol (read: kids watching.) I'd avoided seeing that footage through the whole ordeal, another year and a half later, it's still burned on my retina.

I'm all for freedom of choice. Anyone else can watch anything they want - but in both cases, most watchers didn't know what was coming until they saw it and had no choice.

UPDATE: I'm not alone.

Arrg. I'm also venting at Gothamist where I actually saw the thing. Not big fans of theirs for running the photo on their front page as well. The comment thread (no picture) is here

3:34 am | permalink | /life/politics | 0 writebacks |

Media Coverage: Flowers for Al And Don

Following up my post from the 20th: The donation total has jumped to over $8,000, and Wired news is covering the flower-giving phenomenon. Wired news often seems to be a precursor to wider media coverage when it's not "too geeky," so this bodes well that the issue may be picked up in less niche-y publications.

Keep your fingers crossed: if this becomes a hot enough issue, it may end up on the democratic political radar during the upcoming 2004 elections.

5:51 pm | permalink | /life/politics | 0 writebacks |

Flowers for Al and Don

So, I don't often pull headlines right off of BoingBoing, but I want to help get the word out about this one. Earlier today, someone posted with the idea of sending flowers to one of the random couples waiting to express their right to matrimony on the steps of city hall in San Francisco.

As anyone who has a significant other knows, it's a bit cost prohibitive to send flowers at all, let alone to be delivered to a specific place at a specific time.

With that in mind, Darren has orgainized a "bulk buying" of flowers, and is raising money through paypal to get us all the most flower buying bang for the buck that we can get. He's been vouched for and is well known in the blogosphere, so you can be pretty certain it's not a scam.

I threw in a bit of money, in part because I want one of these couples to know that some random person out there cares, but also in part because I want the media to know that lots of random people out there care.

So I issue this challenge. I've donated $25. If you don't have the funds, throw in $1, if you've got the cash, match my $25. If you've got lots of gusto, donate more and let me know and I'll match the difference*.

Donate what you can, or maybe up the ante?

Read on for my matching fine print

See more ...

12:06 am | permalink | /life/politics | 0 writebacks |

Cost of War With Iraq Nears $100,000,000,000

The cost of war counter (which, strangely enough, can be found at CostOfWar.com) Is nearing 100,000,000,000. One hundred billion. Money enough to solve hunger, homelessness, and poverty throughout the US, fix our education system, and put one hell of a dent in world starvation, disease, unrest, and other terrorism inducing afflictions.

Cost of the War in Iraq

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To see more details, click here.

11:50 am | permalink | /life/politics | 0 writebacks |

CNN: Philadelphia schools ban soda sales; Snapple, Inc. President Cackles Evilly.

Well, this is genius.

PHILADELPHIA, Pennsylvania (Reuters) -- Philadelphia officials have banned the sale of sodas throughout the public school system, a move nutrition experts said Thursday would help guard children against obesity.

The article says they're expecting kids to drink more juice (AKA. Snapple or Fruitopia, depending on which owns the rights to the schools marketing impressions... I mean... Students.)

See more ...

2:23 pm | permalink | /life/politics | 0 writebacks |

It's quiz night!

Yeah, I can't sleep, so I took another quiz!

	TIED WITH
According to the SelectSmart.com Belief System Selector, my #1 belief match is Secular Humanism. What do you believe? Visit SelectSmart.com/RELIGION		According to the SelectSmart.com Belief System Selector, my #1 belief match is Unitarian Universalism. What do you believe? Visit SelectSmart.com/RELIGION

1:46 am | permalink | /life/politics | 1 writebacks |

The Political Compass

Tearsong found a remarkable new site today - it's called The Political Compass, and basically, it measures a bunch of your political viewpoints and places you on a map along with other notable politicians.

This would be neat enough on it's own, but the authors of the site have gone a step further and abolished the traditional left-right scale and replaced it with a 2D left-Right x Authoritarian-libertarian matrix. It's pretty uncanny in it's accuracy, and my results certainly shocked me a bit! So much for being left-middle!

My Score:
Economic Left/Right: -7.25
Libertarian/Authoritarian: -6.62
Basically what that means is that I'm a hard line lefty as far as economics go (industry must be regulated, corporations will NOT do the right thing if left to themselves, etc...) BUT i'm very libertarian when in comes to the personal freedoms of the individual - basically, if you're not hurting someone else, it's none of my, or the government's business. Some of my more radical views about the well off individual's responsibility to help those lost in the generational cycle of poverty landed me way in the corner of this little graph.

Find out where you lie on the political compass

1:01 am | permalink | /life/politics | 0 writebacks |