Watercooler Sensation

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A Profile In Irony

• In what can only be described as an attempt at anecdotally defining irony, the Department of Homeland Security detained the British International Development Minister in Dulles Airport in Washington, DC. [Sky News]
• An honest mistake, right? Why’s it so outrageous?
• Well, Shahid Malik, Britain’s first Muslim minister was in the country as a keynote speaker at a Homeland Security-sponsored event.
• Aha! They knew he looked familiar! Or maybe it was due to his detention last year at JFK in New York. …Oops.
• Mr. Malik’s hand luggage was analyzed for traces of explosive material during the 45 minute detention. Oh, that should play out well in the European media.
• Other notable DHS airport detainees include: Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA), Brit rocker Morrissey, and British author and journalist Elena Lappin. [New York Times] [Guardian] [The Register]
• And some lesser-known equally unthreatening detainees: Michelle Green, a Master Sergeant in the USAF and mother of three; John Shaw, a 74 year-old retired Presbyterian minister from Washington; and Alexandra Hay, a 22 year-old Vermont college student studying abroad in Paris. [ACLU]

Understatement of the day: Mr. Malik, “The US system does not inspire confidence.”

Global Warming Hates Children, Puppies, Happiness

Regardless of the fact that their grandparents had to walk 90 miles, uphill (both ways), through knee-deep snow in order to get to school, kids today are still leading a hard-knock life. And that’s due, in part, to global warming. [USA Today]

Yesterday, the American Academy of Pediatrics announced a report that claims that “global warming is likely to disproportionately harm the health of children.” But how might the world’s little tykes bear the brunt of climate change? Take a look:

Air pollution does more damage to children’s lungs, causing asthma and respiratory ailments, because their lungs are still developing, they breathe at a higher rate than adults and are outdoors more.

Waterborne infections, such as diarrhea and other gastrointestinal problems, hit children especially hard. These infections rise sharply with more rain, which is expected as the climate warms.

As mosquitoes are able to move to higher ground, the malaria zone is expanding. Kids are especially vulnerable; 75% of malaria deaths occur in children younger than 5.

There’s evidence that children are likely to suffer more than adults from climate change, says the report’s lead author, Katherine Shea, a pediatrician and adjunct public health professor at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. “We already have change, and certain bad things are going to happen no matter what we do,” Shea says. “But we can prevent things from getting even worse. We don’t have the luxury of waiting.”

Malaria and gastrointestinal problems: definitely worse than being grounded.

Iranian Dolphins Hitch Ride On Hale-Bopp

• Dolphins are dying by the hundreds off the coast of Iran. What do they know that we don’t? [AFP]
• 152 dolphins have washed themselves up on the shores of southern Iran in what local researchers are calling a “mass suicide.”
• Iran’s state run-newspaper reported that, “locals tried to put the animals back in the water but they refused to return.” [Press TV]
• Pollution was everyone’s first guess, but oddly, according to Mohammad Baqer Nabavi, deputy head of Iran’s environmental protection organization, “We did not spot any kind of pollution in their digestive system that could have been caused from eating poisoned fish, and we also have not spotted any viruses or parasites.”
• Scientists now believe that the dolphins got caught in large fishing nets at the bottom of the Persian Gulf and drowned, their carcasses floating free to wash up on beaches.

So long, and thanks for all the fish.

The Media and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Campaign Coverage

• What: A new study on how the media is covering the 2008 election. Hint: It’s not going very well. [USA Today] [Washington Post]
• Done By: The Project for Excellence in Journalism and Harvard University’s Joan Shorenstein Center of the Press, Politics and Public Policy.
• How: They checked out election coverage on 48 different media outlets, including television, radio and newspapers.
• Finding A: Election coverage is all about the sexy stuff like who’s ahead and how much money they have, rather than on how the candidates come down on the issues. In fact, 63% of all election stories focused on political tactics instead of substance.
• Finding B: The general public says they want more attention on policies, views and records of the candidates. You know, the knowledge stuff.
• Finding C: Fewer than one out of every four people pays attention to campaign news (or as we like to say, A + B = C)
• Other Stuff:
• Finding: Candidate Hillary Clinton has received the most media coverage so far this term, as the main topic of 17% of all stories. (This is in part due to right-wing radio’s fascination with her.)
• Finding: The GOP candidate with the most coverage: Rudy Giuliani, with 9% of the stories.
• Finding: John McCain has the most negative coverage of all of the candidates; 48% of all stories about him were negative.
• Finding: Barack Obama has had the most positive coverage, followed closely by Fred Thompson.

Maybe if they report it, readers will come?

Who’s A Living Genius (Hint: Not You)

We like to consider ourselves especially gifted, especially when it comes to channel-surfing. Thing is, as it turns out that doesn’t qualify us as “geniuses.” At least according to this new report published in the UK. [Guardian]

The latest listing ranks 100 “living geniuses,” and includes names that span academic fields ranging from astrophysics to animation to terrorism (Osama bin Laden clocked in at number 43). It was compiled after the global consulting business Synectics asked 4,000 people in the UK to nominate up to 10 living people they considered to qualify as a genius.

But enough with the chit-chat. Let’s look at the top 10 people who are smarter than you’ll ever be.

1. Albert Hofmann (Swiss) chemist
2. Tim Berners-Lee (British) computer scientist
3. George Soros (American) investor and philanthropist
4. Matt Groening (American) satirist and animator
5. Nelson Mandela (South African) politician and diplomat
6. Frederick Sanger (British) chemist
7. Dario Fo (Italian) writer & dramatist
8. Stephen Hawking (British) physicist
9. Oscar Niemeyer (Brazilian) architect
10. Philip Glass (American) composer
11. Grigory Perelman (Russian) mathematician

We’re content to sit on the couch.

By the Numbers

Burger king

Caution: These numbers aren’t for the slight of heart...or full the weak of stomach. We’ve never really understood competitive eating (we’re not the competitive type), but that doesn’t mean we can’t appreciate a guy’s ability to put away more than 100 burgers in less than ten minutes — and that’s exactly what Joey Chestnut did in Tennessee over the weekend. Take a look. [Fox]

103

The number of burgers at Joey put away at the Krystal Square Off in Chattanooga, TN.

2 1/2 inches square

The size of the burgers (okay, okay...they were sliders).

8 minutes

The time in which he did it.

$10,000

How much cash Joey’s stomach of steel earned him.

97

The number of burgers that the previous champion — Japan’s Takeru Kobayashi — ate.

“Lingering jaw pain due to wisdom teeth extraction”

Kobayashi’s excuse for not competing in this year’s competition.

Celebrities: Unfiltered

“After I killed that first [squirrel], I burst into tears, then carefully buried it in one of the garden beds after saying a prayer. After I’d killed four or five, I called my therapist.

‘I’m killing squirrels,’ I confessed. My therapist is from rural Tennessee and had killed some squirrels in his day, but he had long since abandoned the practice. I thought he would tell me I had to abandon the practice, too, but instead he stressed the importance of mindfulness, referring to my newfound activity as a ‘killing meditation.’ My therapist believes everything we do is an opportunity for growth. That winter, I killed more than fifty squirrels.”

— An excerpt from the forthcoming Garden and Gun magazine. Or, as we like to call it, Martha Stewart: Shooting.[Jossip]

Speed Round

FREE TACO DAY!

Don’t forget, it’s free taco day at Taco Bell! Stop by any Taco Bell between 2-5pm today and pick up a crunchy beef taco, courtesy of Red Sox player Jacoby Ellsbury and his stolen base. [MLB]

MOVIE NEWS

We’ve finally come to terms with the fact that NYT reporter Judith Miller will be played by British Hottie Kate Beckinsale in the upcoming movie based on the Valerie Plame leaks. What we’re not sure we can handle is the part of Heartthrob Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald going to…Matt Dillon? [Page Six]

THE RUMBLER

Some DC police cars are now using a vibrating device called “The Rumbler” to physically shake pedestrians and other cars out of their way. [Washington Post]

CELEBRIDIRT

Truly horrifying: Dina Lohan, mother to trainwreck Lindsay, will start filming her own reality show about how to be a “successful single mother” this week. Yep, she actually used the word “successful.” [People]

POTTY MOUTH

“Eat it, lick it, snort it, f*$! it!” – Concerned mother Britney Spears, on her feelings about last week’s child custody hearing. Just like our mom used to say…[Celebritology]

WAIT. ANN COULTER EATS?

Just because gay-bashing Ann Coulter says the F-word, and then turns around and chows down with her gay friends at West Hollywood restaurant Murano, that doesn’t make her fabulous. Or sane, for that matter. [Towelroad]

BUTTAFUOCO

Amy Fisher’s husband apparently has a death wish. Why else would he sell a sex tape and then get back together with the ‘Long Island Lolita’ who once tried to kill her lover’s wife? [NY POST]

BETTER DO DRUGS

That’s the inadvertent message on bracelet’s being handed out to children in Iowa. Livestrong kids. [DES MOINES REGISTER]

RED CARD

A youth soccer coach has been suspended for apparently ‘mooning’ the opposing team (of 14 and 15 year-old girls) after a heated match. Nice. (Via Fark) [SF CHRONICLE]

405-410 YEARS

The suspected age of a clam found off the coast of Iceland—the oldest living animal ever found. “This means the clam was in its infancy when Queen Elizabeth I was in power and Shakespeare was writing Othello and Hamlet.” [Press TV]

$0

The estimated amount of money the United States saves from the switch back and forth from daylight savings time, according to research done by a professor at UW-Stout. [Dunn County News]

ADIRONDACKS

The Nature Conservancy purchases 161,000 acres of beautiful land in upstate New York. Only catch: as part of the deal, they have to keep logging it. [NY Times]

LEAD

“Dishes, toys, jewelry and backpacks that have not yet been recalled contain a worrisome level of lead,” says Consumer Reports. [Reuters]

GREEN CHINESE CARS

GM is opening up a new plant in Shanghai to “explore alternative fuels and improve the fuel efficiency of its vehicles sold in China.” [LA Times]