MetaFilter

Want college aid? Bush insists on total disclosure about prior drug use. "The thing that struck me was the Bush administration stance that a non-answer means you're guilty is ironic, since he spent the entire campaign not answering the question about cocaine," Hlinko said. "I don't care if he did coke 30 years ago, but this is hypocritical." I don't dislike Bush to the same degree as some of you, but this pisses me off.
posted by dong_resin at 11:30 PM PST - 25 comments

Mark Twain - Back from the Dead! I just caught this on the Jim Lehrer News Hour. The tale behind the tale A Murder, A Mystery, and A Marriage. A complete, unpublished manuscript of Mark Twain has surfaced, and after 125 years will finally find its way to the pages of the Atlantic Monthly this summer.
posted by ZachsMind at 9:09 PM PST - 16 comments

Cool little site about the real doings of the mob in America today. I love the affected-but-oh-so-hard-boiled writing style. Updated weekly. My only gripe, a very tiny one, is that there's not enough dope on Asian mobsters. Otherwise, pretty neato.
posted by Bixby23 at 8:51 PM PST - 4 comments

Chain bookstores are the book lover's best friend. A compelling and detailed argument that the national bookstores are the best thing to happen to authors, publishers and readers in the last 20 years. Shamelessly lifted from Jorn.
posted by NortonDC at 7:49 PM PST - 45 comments

Obesity is caused by a virus and it could be contagious!
Yet another excuse to give fat people a hard time.
posted by lagado at 6:48 PM PST - 91 comments

Kickass revenge story: Part I and Part II (thanks Follow Me Here!)
posted by grumblebee at 6:19 PM PST - 37 comments

The Road to Springfield hits the second round! Yeah, technically it's a double post, but this is URGENT. Just look what the second round bracket offers: Monty Burns vs. Fat Tony! Apu vs. Kent Brockman! FRINK VS. MILHOUSE! And for god's sake, HANS MOLEMAN is STILL ALIVE!!! Vote early and often! The new round starts Tuesday!
posted by solistrato at 6:05 PM PST - 1 comments

AOL membership tops 30 million. America Online continues to pad its lead as the largest Internet provider, hitting 30 million members — doubling its vast size in just two and a half years.
posted by Brilliantcrank at 5:43 PM PST - 24 comments

Book your visit from the future - Give them a legally binding invitation. Oh, and if you could go back in time, which one of these would you kill? And why?
posted by Kino at 5:32 PM PST - 20 comments

Latest David Horowitz trolling op-ed piece, this time on gays in the military. With his usual obliviousness to irony, he presumes in this piece that anyone who disagrees with him must be the knee-jerk PC police. Question: does posting a link to a troll constitute trolling in and of itself? Discuss.
posted by hincandenza at 4:56 PM PST - 31 comments

Your chocolate bar contains beans picked by child slaves. From the Philadelphia Inquirer. Part of an excellent report into the Ivory Coast cocoa trade. Awful stuff, especially for a corporation like Hershey Foods, which exists for the benefit of a school for disadvantaged children. Apparently boycotts won't help. If we shouldn't boycott, can't take direct action, what can we do? (Via TurksHeadReview.)
posted by ftrain at 4:43 PM PST - 26 comments

I thought they were content to just sit at home and watch Matlock?! "Community officials in Sun City West, Arizona, have reported that over a dozen senior couples have been caught having sex in public in recent weeks. Sexual incidents of heterosexual and homosexual couples engaged in amorous affairs in parking lots, park benches, and swimming pools."
posted by Brilliantcrank at 4:40 PM PST - 25 comments

CSS behavior tag and HTML Component files are some of the new bits that Microsoft has proposed to the standards boards and which are already implemented in recent versions of IE. Of course, I only discovered them by poking around in microsoft.com's source. What do you think of these tools? It looks like it will make Web apps more powerful and application like.
posted by benbrown at 3:28 PM PST - 20 comments

In Pictures: Race Riots in Burnley, UK. After three days of violent race riots in Oldham last month, the troubles have now moved to Burnley. What, with asian vigilantes running around, and the British National Party receiving a record number of votes.. is racial tension on the up in the UK?
posted by wackybrit at 2:08 PM PST - 8 comments

Are U.S Senator Rick Santorum and his 'intelligent design creationism' friends trying to sneak one by us in the Education bill?
posted by quirked at 1:51 PM PST - 34 comments

A hero for the 21st century. Brilliant or just possessed of plain ol' common sense? In today's world, perhaps having the latter qualifies someone for the former adjective. One has to admire a relatively high profile person who doesn't shy away from telling the truth despite the pressures to hedge and equivocate.
posted by rushmc at 12:54 PM PST - 13 comments

"Many individuals have asked me in past months, Why moist towelette collecting? Why not stamp collecting, or numismatics? To be different, perhaps? Well, I must admit that at first that was part of the appeal, but I have since become aware of the strong movement of Moist Towelette enthusiasts, and accepted that I am not alone in my fascination / hobby."
posted by machaus at 12:51 PM PST - 12 comments

Damn, your media player is ugly. You should fix it. This site has one of the best collections of skins for various programs I have ever seen under one URL. They almost make WinMedia worth it.
posted by jcterminal at 11:33 AM PST - 10 comments

Games!!! Games!!! Games!!! What do you guys play when you've got some free time? (I'm personally most interested in free games, but you're welcome to share anything.)
posted by gd779 at 11:26 AM PST - 58 comments

It's just like The Piña Colada Song, only with a modern twist!
posted by jjg at 11:16 AM PST - 4 comments

The Rise and Fall of the Geeks - Three years ago, they had the power to change the world, make a more than decent living and bask on highbrow success - perhaps a justified retribution after many years of world disdain and incomprehension to the geek community. It didn't last... and the article sheds some lights on the probable reasons.
posted by betobeto at 10:36 AM PST - 34 comments

This is a funny comic too. Don't bother if you are easily offended though.

That bear is just plain wrong.
posted by TiggleTaggleTiger at 10:21 AM PST - 24 comments

Ghost World is made into a movie. The comic on which it is based is by Daniel Clowes, an "alternative" comics author of some fame. I think I'm just a bit shocked that, of all comics, a movie would be made about ... well, anything by Daniel Clowes. Starring Steve Buscemi and Thora Birch from American Beauty. (Thanks to URB magazine (print) for the tip and Memepool for the Clowes interview pointer.)
posted by moz at 9:51 AM PST - 9 comments

Man! What a great comic strip! (read the strips from last year first) I haven't seen one this funny in a long time.
posted by Laugh_track at 9:04 AM PST - 9 comments

Tony Blair wants to nix Double Jeopardy protection. A right that has been considered vital since the days of the Magna Carta is under threat from Labour. Blair wants to make it possible that "someone acquitted of a killing can be put on trial again if new evidence emerges". Why not just be sure of the case in the first place? This would only cause a rush to trial by unprepared prosecutors.
posted by dwivian at 7:47 AM PST - 11 comments

Our Dumb Cinema : Miramax Films signed the popular satirical newspaper writers for The Onion, promising to purchase some undisclosed number of screenplays from Onion writers. But what will they write?
posted by tallman at 7:01 AM PST - 41 comments

For Sale. Pre-owned Search Engine $250,000,000 o.n.o

Google is hinting at an end of year IPO for a measley $250 million. Is this the beginning of the end of the dot-com crash?. Via The Register.
posted by fullerine at 6:45 AM PST - 22 comments

The ACLU has been taken over by psychopathic haters in Hawaii. The First Amendment Conference subcommittee of the state board had planned to invite Clarence Thomas to a public debate with ACLU national president Nadine Strossen, as part of a regular series of such debates that has included many big-name conservatives, including Antonin Scalia. But when certain members of the main state board found out, they flew into a rage and demanded the invitation be recinded. Just SOME of the reasons why these three ACLU board members members, all black, are refusing to allow Thomas to participate (note that these are all direct quotes, publicly stated by state ACLU board members): He is an an Anti-Christ. He is an Uncle Tom. He is an asshole. He is a Hitler. He is a Goebbels. And worst of all, he married a white girl. When the ACLU starts to violently attack freedom of speech and freedom of thought, where else can we turn?
posted by aaron at 6:09 AM PST - 27 comments

Gates interview with ZDNet. Open source advocates and *nix users will enjoy his comments on publishing source code and the GPL. Anyone care to do a line-by-line accuracy check?
posted by goto11 at 6:03 AM PST - 19 comments

Usability Analysis of UseIt.com How well does usability guru Jacob Nielsen fare when his site is analysed in terms of his own usability guidelines?
posted by waterfrog at 12:04 AM PST - 14 comments