News of the Weird (June 1, 2014)
News of the Weird
Weirdnuz.M373, June 1, 2014
Copyright 2014 by Chuck Shepherd. All rights reserved.
Lead Story
In April, Anton Purisima filed a claim in Federal District Court in New York City that the Lowering The Bar blog calculated was for the largest monetary demand ever made in a lawsuit--“$2,000 decillion” (or 2 followed by 36 zeroes, which of course is many times more money than exists on planet Earth). Purisima’s lawsuit names Au Bon Pain, Carepoint Health, Kmart, the New York City Transit Authority, and LaGuardia Airport among the parties allegedly causing him so much distress (by fraud, civil rights violations, and even “attempted murder”). Lowering The Bar also noted that “$2,000 decillion” could also have been accurately nominated as “$2 undecillion” or even “two octillion gigadollars.” [Purisima v. Au Bon Pain, et al, Case No. 1:14 CV 2755 (SDNY, 4-11-2014) via Lowering The Bar, 5-13-2014]
The Continuing Crisis
Only in Florida: (1) Calvin Rodriguez was arrested in Port St.. Lucie, Fla., in May as the man who had been using a shaved key to steal a series of cars from parking lots. His spree came to an abrupt halt as he sped away from police in a stolen Honda Civic only to crash into a huge alligator in the road. (2) On May 1st, trappers called to Pine View School in Osprey, Fla., south of Sarasota, removed four alligators (one, eight feet long) from the campus while classes were in session (but without disruption). (3) Beachcombers in the Gulf of Mexico town of Redington Beach, Fla., were treated on May 17th to the sight of a full-grown elephant treading water about 20 yards offshore. (The animal had momentarily gotten free after being unloaded for a commercial birthday party appearance.) [WPTV (West Palm Beach), 5-15-2014] [Sarasota Herald Tribune, 5-2-2014] [WTSP-TV (St. Petersburg), 5-19-2014]
Democracy in Action: (1) During a regional session of Spain’s parliament in February, a photographer from the newspaper El Diario Montanes captured a shot of legislator Miguel Angel Revilla looking at a picture of a nude woman (in a magazine otherwise concealed inside a folder). (He explained later that he was of course just reading the articles.) (2) In May, U.S. Rep. Joe Garcia of Florida was captured on a C-SPAN camera during a House Judiciary Committee hearing casually eating his earwax. In the sequence, described on a Time magazine blog, he dug into his ear, inspected the results, placed them in mouth, then went “back for seconds.” (Rep. Garcia explained later that he was actually dealing with a “hangnail.”) [Daily Mail (London), 2-25-2014] [Time.com, 5-14-2014]
One of the leading theories as to the cause of a radiation leak at nuclear waste dump near Carlsbad, N.Mex., in February is the facility’s recent, unanticipated switch to “organic” kitty litter. Previously, an unorganic variety had been used to absorb liquid in the waste drums shipped to the facility from bomb-making plants that had been temporarily storing the waste pending creation of a permanent nuclear waste storage site. [Associated Press via SFGate.com (San Francisco), 5-13-2014]
First Things First: Trustees of the University of Illinois announced in March that, based on an unreported number of suggestions by students, it would expand the student health insurance plan soon to fix an apparently glaring oversight: the absence of coverage for student sex-change surgery (which, according to the school, would increase students’ premiums by only $2 a semester). [Associated Press via Crain’s Chicago Business, 3-6-2014]
Latest Religious Messages
In April, India’s Delhi High Court judges declined to halt the local government’s program of posting pictures of deities on the walls of buildings in order to discourage public urination (that surely no one would soil his lord). The plaintiffs pointed out that the campaign was so clearly ineffective that perhaps the deities’ images were even making the problem worse--that “evidence” so far shows that confronting the images might even increase “pressure on the bladder.” [India Today, 4-12-2014]
An unnamed, 60-year-old Buddhist monk was arrested in Nantou County, Taiwan, in April after, said a convenience-store manager, he was caught red-handed swiping packets of beef jerky. "I don't know why," he told police, "but lately I had this craving for meat." He also had trouble with honesty, initially denying his guilt before finally confessing to the officer that "I have let Lord Buddha down." (Buddhists traditionally are strict vegetarians.) [Taipei Times, 4-13-2014]
Fine Points in the Law
The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals ruled in 2013 that it was not necessarily illegal for teachers to send students sexually-oriented text messages--that the state law banning the practice violated “free speech.” As a result, in February 2014, prosecutors in Tarrant County dropped their case against a junior-high teacher who had exchanged 688 text messages with a 13-year-old female student over a six-day period in 2012, on topics such as “sexual preferences and fantasies” and whether either of them ever walked naked around the house. The messages would be illegal, the Court had ruled, only if they led to a meeting or an offer of sex. [KTBC-TV (Austin), 2-24-2014]
Despite a 1971 decision by the U.S. Supreme Court declaring that governments could not punish people who are merely “annoying,” dozens of towns (according to a March Wall Street Journal report) continue to regard the behavior as criminal. (The justices decided the word is too “vague” to give fair warning of which behaviors are illegal, but an Indiana deputy attorney general told the Journal that anyone with “ordinary intelligence” knows what is annoying.) New York has such a law, as do Lawrence, Mass., and Cumberland, Md.--among the 5,000 mentions of forms of “to annoy” in a computer search of municipal ordinances. (Britain’s House of Lords in January blocked a proposed anti-annoyance law.) [Wall Street Journal, 3-29-2014] [BBC News, 1-8-2014]
Among the discretionary punishments authorized to Georgia judges is banishing an offender from the county in which he committed the crime. Complained driver Ricardo Riley (who as of February is barred from Walton County), “I didn’t commit no murder, I’m not a sex offender, I’m not a criminal. I just got a speeding ticket.” Judge Brad Brownlow, perhaps irritated at Riley’s request to reduce the original $250 fine, instead piled on punishments--including banishment. Walton County is just outside the Atlanta metro area, and Riley, from adjacent Gwinnett County, has friends and co-workers who live in Walton--but whom he can no longer visit. [WSB-TV (Atlanta), 2-6-2014]
Perspective
The U.S. Treasury Department’s inspector general for tax administration, in his latest report on agency employee bonuses in April (covering late 2010 through 2012) disclosed that $2.8 million of the high-performance prizes went to employees with discipline problems--including about 1,150 workers who owe about $1 million in back federal taxes. The inspector general acknowledged that the bonuses “appear to create a conflict” regarding the “integrity” of the program. (The Treasury Department pointed out somewhat proudly that the Department’s rate of tax delinquencies is only about one-eighth the delinquency rate in the United States as a whole.) [Associated Press via WTOP Radio (Washington, D.C.), 4-23-2014]
Least Competent Advertising Writer
The Asia Pacific branch of the worldwide advertising agency Ogilvy & Mather finally apologized in May for a recent “Bounce Back” ad in India for Kurl-On mattresses (whose general theme proclaims mattresses so comfortable that users “bounce” up after landing on them). Previous versions had lauded Steve Jobs (for “bouncing back” from his mid-career firing by Apple) and Mahatma Gandhi (for “bouncing back” to become a spiritual leader). In the problem ad, the Pakistani teenager Malala Yousafzai (who was nearly killed in 2012 by Muslim extremists) is shot in the head in a cartoon but “bounced back” after landing on a Kurl-On mattress. [Yahoo News, 5-15-2014]
Update
Ethan Couch, 17, was convicted of DUI manslaughter last year after killing four people but benefited at sentencing from a counselor’s testimony describing him as a victim of "affluenza"--that children of wealthy families hopelessly feel “entitlement” and are prone to irresponsibility. In April, the Vernon, Tex., hospital providing Ethan’s court-ordered rehabilitation announced that Ethan's “wealthy” parents would nonetheless be billed only for about 6 percent of the cost of treating the “affluenza”--$1,170 of an anticipated $21,000 monthly tab--with Texas taxpayers picking up the remainder. [KDFW-TV (Dallas-Fort Worth), 4-11-2014]
Thanks This Week to Gary DaSilva and Robin Daley, and to the News of the Weird Board of Editorial Advisors.
Weirdnuz.M373, June 1, 2014
Copyright 2014 by Chuck Shepherd. All rights reserved.
Lead Story
In April, Anton Purisima filed a claim in Federal District Court in New York City that the Lowering The Bar blog calculated was for the largest monetary demand ever made in a lawsuit--“$2,000 decillion” (or 2 followed by 36 zeroes, which of course is many times more money than exists on planet Earth). Purisima’s lawsuit names Au Bon Pain, Carepoint Health, Kmart, the New York City Transit Authority, and LaGuardia Airport among the parties allegedly causing him so much distress (by fraud, civil rights violations, and even “attempted murder”). Lowering The Bar also noted that “$2,000 decillion” could also have been accurately nominated as “$2 undecillion” or even “two octillion gigadollars.” [Purisima v. Au Bon Pain, et al, Case No. 1:14 CV 2755 (SDNY, 4-11-2014) via Lowering The Bar, 5-13-2014]
The Continuing Crisis
Only in Florida: (1) Calvin Rodriguez was arrested in Port St.. Lucie, Fla., in May as the man who had been using a shaved key to steal a series of cars from parking lots. His spree came to an abrupt halt as he sped away from police in a stolen Honda Civic only to crash into a huge alligator in the road. (2) On May 1st, trappers called to Pine View School in Osprey, Fla., south of Sarasota, removed four alligators (one, eight feet long) from the campus while classes were in session (but without disruption). (3) Beachcombers in the Gulf of Mexico town of Redington Beach, Fla., were treated on May 17th to the sight of a full-grown elephant treading water about 20 yards offshore. (The animal had momentarily gotten free after being unloaded for a commercial birthday party appearance.) [WPTV (West Palm Beach), 5-15-2014] [Sarasota Herald Tribune, 5-2-2014] [WTSP-TV (St. Petersburg), 5-19-2014]
Democracy in Action: (1) During a regional session of Spain’s parliament in February, a photographer from the newspaper El Diario Montanes captured a shot of legislator Miguel Angel Revilla looking at a picture of a nude woman (in a magazine otherwise concealed inside a folder). (He explained later that he was of course just reading the articles.) (2) In May, U.S. Rep. Joe Garcia of Florida was captured on a C-SPAN camera during a House Judiciary Committee hearing casually eating his earwax. In the sequence, described on a Time magazine blog, he dug into his ear, inspected the results, placed them in mouth, then went “back for seconds.” (Rep. Garcia explained later that he was actually dealing with a “hangnail.”) [Daily Mail (London), 2-25-2014] [Time.com, 5-14-2014]
One of the leading theories as to the cause of a radiation leak at nuclear waste dump near Carlsbad, N.Mex., in February is the facility’s recent, unanticipated switch to “organic” kitty litter. Previously, an unorganic variety had been used to absorb liquid in the waste drums shipped to the facility from bomb-making plants that had been temporarily storing the waste pending creation of a permanent nuclear waste storage site. [Associated Press via SFGate.com (San Francisco), 5-13-2014]
First Things First: Trustees of the University of Illinois announced in March that, based on an unreported number of suggestions by students, it would expand the student health insurance plan soon to fix an apparently glaring oversight: the absence of coverage for student sex-change surgery (which, according to the school, would increase students’ premiums by only $2 a semester). [Associated Press via Crain’s Chicago Business, 3-6-2014]
Latest Religious Messages
In April, India’s Delhi High Court judges declined to halt the local government’s program of posting pictures of deities on the walls of buildings in order to discourage public urination (that surely no one would soil his lord). The plaintiffs pointed out that the campaign was so clearly ineffective that perhaps the deities’ images were even making the problem worse--that “evidence” so far shows that confronting the images might even increase “pressure on the bladder.” [India Today, 4-12-2014]
An unnamed, 60-year-old Buddhist monk was arrested in Nantou County, Taiwan, in April after, said a convenience-store manager, he was caught red-handed swiping packets of beef jerky. "I don't know why," he told police, "but lately I had this craving for meat." He also had trouble with honesty, initially denying his guilt before finally confessing to the officer that "I have let Lord Buddha down." (Buddhists traditionally are strict vegetarians.) [Taipei Times, 4-13-2014]
Fine Points in the Law
The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals ruled in 2013 that it was not necessarily illegal for teachers to send students sexually-oriented text messages--that the state law banning the practice violated “free speech.” As a result, in February 2014, prosecutors in Tarrant County dropped their case against a junior-high teacher who had exchanged 688 text messages with a 13-year-old female student over a six-day period in 2012, on topics such as “sexual preferences and fantasies” and whether either of them ever walked naked around the house. The messages would be illegal, the Court had ruled, only if they led to a meeting or an offer of sex. [KTBC-TV (Austin), 2-24-2014]
Despite a 1971 decision by the U.S. Supreme Court declaring that governments could not punish people who are merely “annoying,” dozens of towns (according to a March Wall Street Journal report) continue to regard the behavior as criminal. (The justices decided the word is too “vague” to give fair warning of which behaviors are illegal, but an Indiana deputy attorney general told the Journal that anyone with “ordinary intelligence” knows what is annoying.) New York has such a law, as do Lawrence, Mass., and Cumberland, Md.--among the 5,000 mentions of forms of “to annoy” in a computer search of municipal ordinances. (Britain’s House of Lords in January blocked a proposed anti-annoyance law.) [Wall Street Journal, 3-29-2014] [BBC News, 1-8-2014]
Among the discretionary punishments authorized to Georgia judges is banishing an offender from the county in which he committed the crime. Complained driver Ricardo Riley (who as of February is barred from Walton County), “I didn’t commit no murder, I’m not a sex offender, I’m not a criminal. I just got a speeding ticket.” Judge Brad Brownlow, perhaps irritated at Riley’s request to reduce the original $250 fine, instead piled on punishments--including banishment. Walton County is just outside the Atlanta metro area, and Riley, from adjacent Gwinnett County, has friends and co-workers who live in Walton--but whom he can no longer visit. [WSB-TV (Atlanta), 2-6-2014]
Perspective
The U.S. Treasury Department’s inspector general for tax administration, in his latest report on agency employee bonuses in April (covering late 2010 through 2012) disclosed that $2.8 million of the high-performance prizes went to employees with discipline problems--including about 1,150 workers who owe about $1 million in back federal taxes. The inspector general acknowledged that the bonuses “appear to create a conflict” regarding the “integrity” of the program. (The Treasury Department pointed out somewhat proudly that the Department’s rate of tax delinquencies is only about one-eighth the delinquency rate in the United States as a whole.) [Associated Press via WTOP Radio (Washington, D.C.), 4-23-2014]
Least Competent Advertising Writer
The Asia Pacific branch of the worldwide advertising agency Ogilvy & Mather finally apologized in May for a recent “Bounce Back” ad in India for Kurl-On mattresses (whose general theme proclaims mattresses so comfortable that users “bounce” up after landing on them). Previous versions had lauded Steve Jobs (for “bouncing back” from his mid-career firing by Apple) and Mahatma Gandhi (for “bouncing back” to become a spiritual leader). In the problem ad, the Pakistani teenager Malala Yousafzai (who was nearly killed in 2012 by Muslim extremists) is shot in the head in a cartoon but “bounced back” after landing on a Kurl-On mattress. [Yahoo News, 5-15-2014]
Update
Ethan Couch, 17, was convicted of DUI manslaughter last year after killing four people but benefited at sentencing from a counselor’s testimony describing him as a victim of "affluenza"--that children of wealthy families hopelessly feel “entitlement” and are prone to irresponsibility. In April, the Vernon, Tex., hospital providing Ethan’s court-ordered rehabilitation announced that Ethan's “wealthy” parents would nonetheless be billed only for about 6 percent of the cost of treating the “affluenza”--$1,170 of an anticipated $21,000 monthly tab--with Texas taxpayers picking up the remainder. [KDFW-TV (Dallas-Fort Worth), 4-11-2014]
Thanks This Week to Gary DaSilva and Robin Daley, and to the News of the Weird Board of Editorial Advisors.
Comments
Anton Purisima By the time he pays the lawyers off he won't be left with enough to buy a "Happy Meal".
Flo-Ridda Gooooooooo Gators & Elephants.
Politicians This word translates into many, many languages without loosing a single nuance.
New-Clear Going "green" just ain't everything it's cracked up to be, is it?
Delhi High Court Of all the problems in India this doesn't seem to rise to the level of a 'high court' ruling.
Buddhist Monk We are OMNIVORES, deal with it!
The I.R.S. Does the "S" stand for stupid or scandalous?
Supper time, see y'all later.
Flo-Ridda Gooooooooo Gators & Elephants.
Politicians This word translates into many, many languages without loosing a single nuance.
New-Clear Going "green" just ain't everything it's cracked up to be, is it?
Delhi High Court Of all the problems in India this doesn't seem to rise to the level of a 'high court' ruling.
Buddhist Monk We are OMNIVORES, deal with it!
The I.R.S. Does the "S" stand for stupid or scandalous?
Supper time, see y'all later.
Posted by Expat47 in Athens, Greece on 06/01/14 at 01:59 PM
Univ. Illinois - not to be outdone, US taxpayer will soon be paying for the same operation for confused senior citizens through Medicare.
Buddhist monk - alas, the jerky did not quench his craving for meat. He should visit SF instead.
Texas Court of Criminal Appeals - what's the big deal? Junior High public school teachers are already providing instruction on proper use of a condom, the joys of anal and oral sex, and the evils of suppressing carnal desires.
Judge Brad Brownlow - why doesn't the US just banish all the illegals from the country? Sounds so simple.
Treasury Department - the Government is people too.
Buddhist monk - alas, the jerky did not quench his craving for meat. He should visit SF instead.
Texas Court of Criminal Appeals - what's the big deal? Junior High public school teachers are already providing instruction on proper use of a condom, the joys of anal and oral sex, and the evils of suppressing carnal desires.
Judge Brad Brownlow - why doesn't the US just banish all the illegals from the country? Sounds so simple.
Treasury Department - the Government is people too.
Posted by RobK on 06/02/14 at 12:18 PM
alligator crash- :lol: :lol: :lol:
elephant- Cool, I'd liked to have seen that, probably better than the show.
radiation leak- See there, that organic stuff is gonna kill us all!
don't pee on God- If they tried that here somebody would sue.
Buddist- Sometimes you just gotta have meat.
Texas- Way to open that door for pedos.
IRS- What do you expect from a gov agency.
elephant- Cool, I'd liked to have seen that, probably better than the show.
radiation leak- See there, that organic stuff is gonna kill us all!
don't pee on God- If they tried that here somebody would sue.
Buddist- Sometimes you just gotta have meat.
Texas- Way to open that door for pedos.
IRS- What do you expect from a gov agency.
Posted by Patty in Ohio, USA on 06/02/14 at 08:44 PM
Elephant: eh, let it. There was no chance of it drowning anyway - they do more than tread water, they swim very well indeed. IIRC they've been spotted swimming between Indonesian islands. They do, after all, have a built-in snorkel!
Buddhists: are not necessarily strict vegetarians (consider the number of Thai chicken and lamb curries...), but I believe Buddhist monks are.
Supreme Court: if annoyance were illegal, they'd have to prosecute both themselves and all politicians.
Georgia: proving my previous point.
Affluenza: clearly the judges suffer from the same disease.
Buddhists: are not necessarily strict vegetarians (consider the number of Thai chicken and lamb curries...), but I believe Buddhist monks are.
Supreme Court: if annoyance were illegal, they'd have to prosecute both themselves and all politicians.
Georgia: proving my previous point.
Affluenza: clearly the judges suffer from the same disease.
Posted by Richard Bos on 06/03/14 at 10:37 AM
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