News – Israel Finally Gets It

On at least one point.

Middle East

In a positive step, Israel has halted the razing of the homes of suspected Palestinian militants. It seems they’ve stopped because of the obvious, often stated fact that the practice does more harm than good. They’re also allowing 16 out of 55 Palestinians expelled from their homes to return to the West Bank. They were expelled previously due to suspicion of being part of the intifada.

Suicide bombers strike mosques in Iraq, killing fifteen in two attacks, one attack partially aborted by alert Iraqi police. The Guardian notes some reports go as high as thirty killed.

Russia President Vladimir Putin says that Iran isn’t making nuclear weapons and that Russia would push ahead with nuclear cooperation with Iran. Do we trust Putin?

South America

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva will be making a massive protected area in the Amazon rainforest to combat illegal logging and rising violence after the killing of a prominent U.S. human rights activist. I think it’s about damn time someone put the region under some sort of protection.

Even more evidence of widespread detainee abuse in Iraq. You’d think they’d have learned to not leave photo evidence by now.

Europe

Nepal’s king still says he’s defending democracy, even as phones are cut off in Nepal. I wonder what the US plans to do about this.

North America

John Negroponte is picked by Bush to be the National Intelligence Director. I don’t know what I think about the man yet, but reading the analysis of some gives me much to think about. Is the state of things that the post has been watered down, but filled with a strong personality? If so, why such a strange contrast?

Bush gets his class action legislation passed, all he has to do is sign it. Now we’ll see what effect it has.

Bush is still trying to mend fences. He’s been doing that for quite a while, seemingly without significant success. Likely because little in terms of his method of doing things has changed, thus giving others little reason to treat him differently than they have thus far.

The hardware in the missile defense shield’s silo is blamed for the failure of the missile to fire this time around. I can’t wait for this thing to be scrapped. The sooner the better.

John Kerry and Hillary Clinton back new legislation to address voting issues that popped up in the 2004 election.

The White House Council of Economic Advisors says that the tax code can be reformed without the more drastic suggestions as to how to do it. We’ll see, won’t we?

General

Melding artificial limbs with the human body and nervous system. Not reality yet, but also not science fiction.

Explainer tells us what ‘drag hunting’ is.

Constantine is hitting theaters and seems to be a movie with it’s perks and problems. It’ll likely be what I see this weekend(Mmmmm, demons..), though I’m also quite curious about Son of the Mask.

Take Two, makers of the GTA series, are facing legal issues again, a lawsuit which says their game is complicit in murder. Yet again, this sort of lawsuit is bull. Some people are just idiots whose minds can be influenced by anything. He could have got his ‘training’ from the news or any number of murder related movies as well. Shall we ban them all next?

Today’s Papers has people taking antidepressants twice as likely to commit suicide according to a study(and not according to others), conservatives displeased that Bush seems open to raising the cap on social security payroll tax, Kurdish leaders spelling out their wants for autonomy and more in the one page news.

Amusements

Take a look at how Warner Bros. is planning on completing the bastardization of your childhood: the new and improved Bugs Bunny for today’s kid.

Man who tied a string around his weener to avoid going to the bathroom will now be facing surgery to repair the damage

Man sets up meeting with beautiful woman he met on the Internet. Man thrilled to end up naked only minutes after meeting her, dismayed that it’s only part of the robbery process

Girl who wears red, white and blue necklace to honor her uncle serving in Iraq faces school suspension because the colors could be considered gang-related

Man, 28, arrested after posing as Enrique Iglesias to pick up 14-year-old girl in Kmart. Unclear if police arrested him for enticement of a minor or simply posing as Enrique Iglesias

Fark Photoshop Challenge: Photoshop this girl about to be attacked by seagulls

Fark Photoshop Challenge: Photoshop Bellagio, the winning Neopolitan Mastiff from the Westminster Dog Show

Fark Photoshop Challenge: Photoshop this parallel landing