California: Killing the Environment to Save Jobs

Californians, get ready to vote this November! Your ballots will now include the California Jobs Initiative. With unemployment rates at a frightening 12%, who wouldn't vote for such a heroically named law?

Now, while this law may not directly create any jobs, it does do the important duty of repealing global warming law AB32, which caused "higher utility rates and fuel prices," and paid subsidies to over 300 renewable energy companies. Lowering prices on fossil fuels and killing off that unproductive upstart industry of clean energy is clearly the best way to deal with an economic crisis. That must be why the guardians of public good, oil companies, covered 78% of the $3 million it took to get this law on the ballot.

Yes, the oil companies are going to protect YOU from that pesky environmental law that's making energy "so expensive." I mean, California oil companies can't help that oil comes with all these extra costs, like cleaning up the COSCO Busan spill in 2007 or the billion dollar BP mess of today. We just need to remove taxes on oil for a little while to let everyone get back on their feet! The California Jobs Initiative won't remove environmental standards forever, just until the state's unemployment rate drops below 5.5% for a full year. Sure that would require some of the lowest unemployment rates in California history, but with big oil protecting your jobs I'm sure we can all expect a new golden age to hit the state soon.

Mastectomy Fever Sweeps Iran

Fashion update: Breasts are officially an undesirable feature in Iran!

The Vice Police ordered the chop-chop for these mannequins while cracking down on "Un-Islamic" practices in Tehran.

In America I get annoyed just looking at super curvy plastic buttocks in the store window. Obnoxious and over the top for sure, but at least it's a cheerful image. Meanwhile, these dolls are frowning and shutting their eyes, more dismal than a dead nun. You can practically hear the sighs of all those plastic ladies wishing they didn't have awkward inhuman stumps showing through the front of their thawb.

How can this possibly attract women to shop at the store? "Oh yes, see how modest these dolls look in our clothes. With a robe like this you would never attract the attention of a man! So even though the ideal of not having womanly assets may be a bit out of your reach, our clothing is the next best thing."

Yep, breasts are totally disgusting. I mean, people might look at you and be reminded that you are a WOMAN! So keep them out of sight until you need them for the only thing they're good for:

feeding newborns, of course!

Geoengineers, the All-Stars of Science

Have you ever heard of geoengineering? It's a great new science that lets us FIX our climate! Brains from all around the world have been coming together this year to discuss ways we can lower the earth's temperature and keep global warming at bay.

Some of their lovely ideas include:

• spraying sulfuric acid into the stratosphere (this creates aerosols which block solar radiation)
• creating brighter clouds that produce more rain and block more sunlight
• sucking CO2 from the air and storing it where it can never escape--cleverly named Carbon Capture!
• shooting reflective disks into space.. at the exciting rate of 1,000,000 a MINUTE for 30 years!

Now, I know some people might worry that such hip and snazzy methods could be a little risky:

"But geoengineers, your sulfur particles that block the sun are the same ones that cause acid rain!"

Not to worry, concerned public: Sulfur aerosols that geoengineers create will be put above rain clouds, not into them! As Austrian physicist Jason Blackstock said, "by putting them higher, they stay up longer because they're above the clouds, which means they aren't raining out as acid rain all the time." And as long as you don't have acid rain ALL THE TIME, everything should be just fine.

Also, that guy who said what goes up must come down? He clearly wasn't at the conference.

Wildlife Holocaust

Since the disastrous oil spill, BP has been working to keep journalists away from the Gulf Coast. Looking at these pictures, you don't have to wonder why:

These were taken along the Gulf Coast by AP photographer Charles Riede. I can't make any sort of joke about this, so I'll include the words of a commentator who said it best, Karen S :

With photos like this we get a glimpse of the amount of suffering, but what is taking place out of sight is truly a wildlife holocaust. We won’t know the scope of it for years. The Gulf will be a silent ocean for who knows how long, because it’s dying. If BP doesn’t stop the leak soon the health of the North Atlantic will also be at risk.

Unfortunately there are no plans to stop it soon. The leak is still going and BP has said the flow is too strong to plug it. Their new plan is to drill more wells to relieve the pressure and pull away the oil from the leak. These two "relief wells" are due to be completed in August.

So I guess we have two more months of oil-covered corpses coating the shores...how is this an acceptable plan?

Tweet Tweet! You're Busted

Twitter now allows you to add a location to your tweets. The problem? It auto-tracks your location and inputs straight from your IP address.

So you don't actually have to type in anything, it just broadcasts your city wherever you go, until you turn it off. Sounds really easy-to-use...most likely too easy. Just because you can do something, doesn't mean you should. Example 1: Last year's GPS fail, that guy who lost his job by forgetting his GPS was auto-broadcasting.

Example 2: People often tweet from their phones when they are out partying, goofing off and maybe even *gasp* intoxicated! Does this sound like a good time to be letting the world wide web know exactly where you are? Now even a vague message like "Lady Gaga is sooooo good!" can prove to your parents/friend/boyfriend that you weren't home studying, if the location shows you left town. Gosh forbid if they get a more exact tracker that gives your address, because then everyone will know exactly which gay* club you hang out at that plays Lady Gaga.

*I use this term in the most friendly way. Lady Gaga is both gay and quality, as many other things can be.

Beeware of Cellphones

Researchers in India recently found that cellphones can be pretty bad for bees...

See, bees navigate like little compasses, using magnetite in their body to tell direction. Cellphone radiation ruins their compass! Beehives exposed to radiation lost all ability to produce honey, and hives ran out of food in three months.
i.e. Bees starving!

Queens also stopped laying eggs by 50%. So, less baby bees!

Gosh, this all sounds really tragic. But, is it enough to get people to stop using their cellphones...?

Maybe people need to know that bees are crucial to agriculture and food production. Or maybe, the bees just need a new spokesperson like the girl at right...

If girls in lingerie can't save the bees, who can?