Last week, the internet learned about a writer who found out that her story was plagiarized wholesale, byline and all, by a magazine called Cooks Source. She asked for an apology, and a donation to Columbia School of Journalism in her name. The astounding part of all this was the response from Cooks Source. Here’s […]
Paul Constant
Posted inBooks
In Bookstores Tomorrow: George W. Bush’s Book, a Protest Against George W. Bush’s Book
Galleycat brings news of a Facebook group that is trying to “protest” tomorrow’s publication of George W. Bush’s memoir Decision Points by urging customers to move the book to their bookstore’s crime section. The blog hopes readers will move Decision Points inside the bookstore and “put Dubya where he belongs.” Waging Nonviolence scheduled the protest […]
Posted inMedia
Magazine Steals Articles, Claims the Internet Is Public Domain
Consumerist has the story: A writer was surprised to discover that an article she wrote for a website in 2005 was reprinted wholesale by Cooks (sic) Source Magazine. She contacted Cooks Source and asked them to apologize and donate $130 to the Columbia School of Journalism. The e-mail she received in response is amazing: Yes […]
Posted inPolitics
The Death of the Tea Party
2008 was a dismal time for the Republican Party. They had sunk so low, and become so bound to Bush’s failed presidency, that they had to fragment their brand in order to achieve legitimacy again. Make no mistake: Dick Armey’s Tea Parties were a brilliant idea. They repositioned the Republican Party, turning back the clock […]
Posted inGirls Only!
That Woman Is Not Making Comics in Order to Be Sexually Attractive
Some comments by cartoonist Kate Beaton and a cartoon by Gabby Schulz about the relationship between female cartoonists and their male fans has caused the requisite commenter shitstorm on the comics nerdblogs. Here’s the opening of the comic: But you should read the whole thing. And then you should wonder at the terror of the […]
Posted inPolitics
The Tea Party Was Born in the Confederacy
In case you needed a reminder of how awesome literary journal n+1 is, their new issue has a good, hard look at the willfully ignorant racism in the Tea Party and how it has roots that stretch all the way back to the Civil War. The present blooming fantasy of white victimization has roots in […]
Posted inBooks
Nobody Is Poisoning Halloween Candy
The Wall Street Journal has a great story about how America has gone stranger-danger-crazy, especially on Halloween: Halloween is the day when America market-tests parental paranoia. If a new fear flies on Halloween, it’s probably going to catch on the rest of the year, too. Take “stranger danger,” the classic Halloween horror. Even when I […]
Posted inTech
Apple Made More Money Than God Last Quarter
Apple just announced that they’ve sold more iPads than Macs and more iPhones than iPods in the third quarter of 2010. As Engadget says: “It all added up to an all-time record for Apple of $20.34 billion in revenue for a net profit of $4.31 billion.” (This means that Apple has sold some 7 million […]
Posted inPolitics
Obama Billboard: Wow. WOW.
This billboard, reposted at Buzzfeed, does the impossible: It portrays everything that right-wing extremists hate about “DemocRATS” in one concise image—depicting Obama as a series of crude stereotypes: terrorist, gangster, Mexican immigrant, and a homosexual—and it manages to shock me while doing it. I thought that after all the Glenn Beck clips, my soul had […]
Posted inPolitics
Christine O’Donnell Allegedly Has Loud Sex, Doesn’t Really Go to Church
It’s important to reiterate here that nobody would be digging into Christine O’Donnell’s bedroom habits if she didn’t make her bedroom (and everyone else’s bedroom) such an important issue. But she does, and so Wonkette is: [O’Donnell} had a man over her house all the time, and a neighbor complained about this, because “the walls […]
Posted inTech
Today Is the Big Day for Windows Phone 7
Engadget and Gizmodo both covered the big official announcement of Microsoft’s new Windows Phone 7, which will go on sale on November 8th. If you’re looking for hardware comparison—just about every major manufacturer will have at least one Windows Phone 7 handset at launch, and it will be available on almost every carrier worldwide (except […]
Posted inMedia
Are Fox News Reporters the New Catholic Priests?
Award-winning Fox 5 news reporter Charles Leaf was charged with sexually abusing a 4-year-old girl at his Wyckoff home, Bergen County Prosecutor John Molinelli said. Leaf is being held in the Bergen County Jail on $250,000 bail and will be arraigned on Nov. 4 in Wyckoff Municipal Court. Gawker says that Leaf is best-known for […]