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Thursday, December 16, 2010

News Good Morning, News!

Posted by Denis C. Theriault on Thu, Dec 16, 2010 at 9:29 AM

Plastic bag ban coming next fall? In a pre-legislative session hearing in Salem, grocery lobbyists and environmental groups bless the proposal. Expect a lawsuit and indignation, in any case, from the American Chemistry Council (don't let the high-minded name fool you; that's just the PLASTICS INDUSTRY.) This would be even better if Legislature also required paper bags to come with handles. I'm looking at you, Fred Meyer near my house!

Twitter is really useful. Seattle cops are sending 140-character (or fewer) tweets about some of the city's 3,000-plus stolen cars—shit like make and model and license plate, etc.—and, hey, they got one back!!

There was never any question, despite all the noise. And after a lot of posturing and theater, the tax cut deal is expected to clear the House of Representatives sometime today. Meanwhile, Senate Republicans are now angry about other things.

Civil unions: Now for straight people! In France, where they allegedly let children drink wine, enjoy rich foods, and sleep in the afternoons (um, fucking right on?), couples are telling the justice of the peace to shove it. For every three married couples, there are now two bound in civil unions.

Keep up those assassination pools. WikiLeaks' Julian Assange goes free (on bail) after fending off an appeal from prosecutors to keep him locked up while he fights extradition to Sweden.

From the Magic World of Embalming: Larry King Larry King's show dies tonight.

This might alarm you, if you're a tax cheat. This year, the IRS is auditing more of the poor suckers who actually pay taxes (they're called tax shelters, dummy! look it up!) And if you're a wealthy sucker, you're even more likely to get snared.

This might alarm you, if you're a parent. Drop-side cribs apparently kill an unacceptably high number of babies. And with that threshold met, the federal government will now ban them.

This might alarm you, if you're eating hallucinogens. Or not.

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