Martin World News

ITEM:  Welcome back for a new week of worldly mayhem!

ITEM:  First up comes a couple notes on why it is so hard to take politicians serious.  And if anything can magnify the stupidity of politicians who should have better things to do, it's Twitter.

The post by Russia's deputy prime minister Dmitry Rogozin included side-by-side images of the two presidents. In one, Putin is confidently holding a majestic leopard. In the other, a notably younger Obama is holding a small, fluffy dog. 

The caption: "We have different values and allies." 



Or how about this report from IJReview, questioning the news focus of MSNBC?

MSNBC, the network of Chris “Tingles” Matthews, Al Sharpton and Ed Schultz, fell to fourth place – behind HLN – in the July ratings battle.
Why, you ask? Here’s a recent example of the hard-hitting, investigative reporting and analysis that occurs on the troubled network, as reported by NewsBusters:

On a truly idiotic segment of the July 29 edition of Ronan Farrow Daily, the host of the Lean Forward network’s “next-generation news show” discussed the current state of emojis with linguist John McWhorter, CNet’s Maggie Reardon, and journalist Dave Cullen.

Farrow commented how the popular emoticons are “becoming more and more the fabric of the kind of communication you see,” and truly out-liberaled himself with his question to McWhorter, who happens to be black.

After wondering whether emojis, which originated in Japan, could alter “tech-driven communication across international lines,”  Farrow asked McWhorter:: “Do you think there’s a limitation we’re suffering from in terms of the racial diversity of these emojis?” 

Incredibly, the linguist responded to the question seriously, but had a different take:

“No, I think that actually what we’re going to see more is a gender skew. Apparently women are more likely to use them and more richly.” 

So, that settles it; emojis are both “racist” and “sexist.” 

While Farrow & Co. may have had good intentions here, this is yet another example of trivializing racism, which, in the long run, only serves to numb us to the real thing.


So if you learn nothing else from politics, remember:  You can't be a man without a leopard in your lap, and emojis are racist.

"Damn it, I thought he said, you can't be a man without a LEOTARD in your lap!"

ITEM:  Who says I never get you important news?  From The Real Blogger Status, here is the real reason why spammers send those stupid comments (they call them "nice blog spam") to your comments section:


...All that the spammer has to do is publish a "nice blog" spam comment, against a typical Blogger blog post, and select the option to "Send me replies".

Any comments published later against that post, and including the commenters actual email address, would be delivered directly to the spammers inbox. Knowing the email address - and the blog URL (how many comments do not include a link to a blog?) - the hacker would go straight to work. 


And soon they go on to say, you have a situation like the unfulfilling for them incident I reported earlier, where a million or so spam comments came to an abandoned blog.  So those of you who have links to your blog that automatically pop up underneath your comments.... You might wanna look into this.


ITEM:  So let us move onto the seedier side, starting with, what IS grandma doing at that retirement home?

A married grandma of 14 faces six months behind bars after she had public sex with a man who was not her husband at a public pavilion in Florida.
Peggy Klemm, 68, and her 49-year-old copulation co-conspirator, David Bobilya, were sentenced Wednesday after their romp at Lake Sumter Landing Market Square, Click Orlando reports. Apparently, a retirement community there called The Villages, which houses 100,000 people, is known for its wild nights, $3.75 cocktails and public sex.

As you can see by the links, this is not uncommon at The Villages (and wouldn't you know, it's in Florida), a 25,000 acre complex which has even celebrated the arrest with a new drink at one of its many bars (yes, bars right at the retirement community) called Sex On The Square.  But this was the tip of the, er, iceberg:

Following that arrest, the Daily Mail launched a much-needed investigation into life inside The Village and found, among other things:

— There are "ten women to every man" and there's a black market for Viagra in the community of 100,000 residents.
— "All of the women work hard to look good... Turn your back for a minute and someone will try to steal your husband," said resident Belinda Beard, 62.
— Contrary to what your standard calendar would have you believe, "every night is Saturday night," according to author and expose-er, Andrew Blechman.

All this at a place whose slogan is "Creating a retirement community where a person's dreams can come true."  All just fun and games, right?

In 2009, the New York Post came back from Florida with similar findings.
The Post claims that an unidentified gynecologist "treated more cases of herpes and human papillomavirus at The Villages than she did when she worked in Miami."



ITEM:  Maybe you can send Grandma to Brazil for the Miss Butt contest:

RIO DE JANEIRO, Aug. 8 (UPI) -- The Brazilian soccer team may have disappointed during the World Cup last month, but that doesn't mean the country is done with competitions.
The contestants for the 2014 Miss Bumbum Competition, also referred to as "Miss Butt Brazil," have been announced.
Twenty-seven women will compete for the coveted title this year and the winner will take home a $22,000 prize.
The field will be trimmed down to 15 after an online vote and a jury will pick a winner during a ceremony in November.


ITEM:  Boy after all that sex, how about a drink or two?

Sobelman's Bar in Milwaukee started out with one called the Bloody Masterpiece, which was a huge bloody mary with a (I can't make this stuff up) bacon-cheeseburger slider on top.  Well, now they have moved on to the Bloody Beast, which has, not a cheeseburger, not a chicken sandwich, but...

...that's right, an entire fried chicken on top!  The story fleshes it out a bit more:

...features all the same garnishes -- cheese, sausage, pickles, olives, onions, mushrooms, asparagus, scallions, shrimp, lemon, Brussels sprouts, tomatoes, celery -- as the Masterpiece.
And, see the seeming shish-kebobs, those are actually called Baconadoes- bacon-wrapped jalapeno cheese balls.  All that indigestion for a mere $50!


ITEM:  And here is perhaps our first customer:

Oklahoma schoolteacher Lorie Ann Hill, 49, was allegedly spotted drunk and without pants on her first day of work at Wagoner High School Monday, Fox 23 reported.
“She was found in a room kind of disoriented,” Police Chief Bob Haley told Tulsa World. “By the time we got there she was in a room and wearing shorts.”


Mrs. Hill, even more deplorably, was just hired as a special-ed teacher.  Whether she had a Bloody Beast or not is unclear, but she did admit to drinking vodka.


Perhaps she should have tried to get a teaching job in India- because...

ITEM:  (From my friends at the BBC:)

An Indian state school says one of its teachers has been absent for 23 years of her 24-year career.

Sangeeta Kashyap was recruited as a biology teacher in the central state of Madhya Pradesh in 1990.
School authorities say they do not know when she was last paid a salary, but she is still listed as an employee.
State education officials told the BBC the teacher would be removed her from the post. She is thought to have set an Indian record for staff absenteeism.
Ms Kashyap spent her first year teaching in a school in the town of Dewas, after which she took three years of leave.
In 1994, she was transferred to a school in the city of Indore but then applied for maternity leave and has never turned up for work.
Letters sent by the school to her address have remained unanswered, Sushma Vaishya, principal of the Government Ahilya Ashram School in Indore, said.
An education department official said they had written to education authorities in the state capital, Bhopal, to have Ms Kashyap removed from her post.

"I have no idea why nothing was done. We are writing to them again to remove her," Sanjay Goel told BBC Hindi's Shuraih Niyaazi.

Now, any of you that watch news about India these days think her case is probably "change of career plans".  Her disappearance is surely not amusing.  The efficiency of the imbeciles officials in Bhopal, however is.

Hey, if I can blame my plagiarism on PTSD... you could probably blame this on Union Carbide...

ITEM:  Finally, how's this for irony?

Meet Bradley Hardison, who was arrested a day after beating the assembled cops and firemen of Elizabeth City, NC in a doughnut-eating contest.  Sour grapes?  No, it seems that he had warrants out for his arrest for breaking into a pair of grocery stores- and his picture in the paper finally jogged their memories.

The perp got away with unknown goods from the stores and 8 doughnuts in 2 minutes.