"She didn't seem to care for the hawker selling goats' heads. But she did stop when a young, well-dressed fellow ambled over to her and said: 'You have captured my liver.'" This and other stories from a very well-detailed article on the three-day dating festival of the Berbers of Morocco.
posted by XQUZYPHYR on Sep 12, 2003 - 5 comments

Judge, citing al-Qaida-Iraq link, awards $104 million to Sept. 11 families A judge ruled yesterday that lack of evidence should be no barrier to suing people who cannot be found. "The judge wrote that lawyers relied heavily on 'classically hearsay' evidence, including reports that a Sept. 11 hijacker met an Iraqi consul to Prague, Secretary of State Colin Powell's remarks to the United Nations about connections between Iraq and terrorism, and defectors' descriptions of the use of an Iraq camp to train terrorists." --This would hardly be the first documented example of a court being overtly political, but the judge himself has no problem commenting on how shoddy the case was. "The judge noted that the experts provided few actual facts that Iraq provided support to the terrorists." --Apparently, the judge had just been waiting for Saddam to cease to be a diplomatically immune head of state before ruling against him. Is the low standard of evidence needed for civil rulings allowing the courts to begin establishing something that the military and intelligence can't? [more inside]
posted by Ignatius J. Reilly on May 8, 2003 - 33 comments

Shooting the messenger. "The Bush administration, under fire for its handling of the economy, has quietly killed off a Labor Department program that tracked mass layoffs by U.S. companies." (via madamjujujive)
posted by four panels on Jan 4, 2003 - 38 comments

Photos of neked boys popping up during your powerpoint presentations at work? Could be a computer virus.
posted by found missing on Nov 23, 2002 - 27 comments

What fun it must be to be gay and in the military. Seems like the military can't make up its damn mind about whether or not gay people are ok to serve.
posted by 4midori on Feb 15, 2002 - 16 comments

Fear of flying? New security measures are being discussed. Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta says, "These terrorist acts are designed to steal the confidence of Americans. We will restore that confidence."
posted by prozaction on Sep 12, 2001 - 9 comments

Toy Yoda... Expecting a Landcruiser, but getting the land speeder instead, a Hooter's waitress uses the Force to fight against her employer's dark side in court.
posted by fooljay on Jul 28, 2001 - 21 comments

Chinese-American congressman denied entrance to Department of Energy offices U.S. Rep David Wu (outspoken and rather instrumental in the Wen Ho Lee case) was denied entrance twice, despite having Congressional identification. "Energy Department officials told Wu's office the caution was justified because congressional IDs are easy to fake... But Capitol Police recalled only one incident of possible congressional ID forgery, 20 years ago and never proven."
posted by Dean_Paxton on Jun 4, 2001 - 40 comments

The dog mauling case in San Francisco continues to make for some bizarre news. Turns out that the possible sexual abuse of the animals did in fact happen. The dogs had also previously attacked another woman.
posted by crushed on Apr 1, 2001 - 15 comments