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Nader Challenges Black Box Voting in NH
posted by snakey at 8:42 PM PST - 50 comments

The Lancet recently claimed that up to 100,000 Iraqi civilians are dead as a result of the war. Believable or not?
posted by homunculus at 8:20 PM PST - 29 comments

Neon lights - shimmering neon lights. And at the fall of night, this city's made of light. - Kraftwerk.
posted by adamgreenfield at 6:08 PM PST - 20 comments

Brave Woman I bring to you via Monkeyfilter
posted by crunchburger at 6:01 PM PST - 32 comments

EVIL/LIVE is a 28 minute edit of the first debate featuring Bush listening to and debating with himself. It may be broadcast, copied, distributed, edited etc. without permission. (170 MB / 635 MB) [via nettime]
posted by boost ventilator at 5:38 PM PST - 8 comments

Ever wonder how the world is going to hell in a handbasket if gay marriage runs amok? Our own digaman recounts his ceremony from a couple years ago, after being together with someone for ten years. Sounds like every other wedding I've ever been to (except for the lack of bridesmaids). I'm always telling family members that don't have gay friends like I do: don't fear them, I assure you they're just as boring as you and I.
posted by mathowie at 5:14 PM PST - 219 comments

Saturn's enigmatic moon Titan holds on to its mysteries. Radar images reveal quite a bit of variation but no clear interpretation. The hazy atmosphere prevents the sudden shock of discovery that characterized the Voyager and Galileo flybys of the moons of Jupiter, revealing little more than fuzzy Rorschach blobs. With less than 1% of the surface mapped, researchers suspect that Titan has a young surface shaped by processes that have yet to be revealed.
posted by KirkJobSluder at 3:14 PM PST - 5 comments

A long-lost treasure too toxic to touch: Construction at New York City's Harlem Community Justice Center recently revealed a room piled high with records documenting the building's former life as an early 20th century prison. They offer a peek into the street life of ca. 1900 NYC and scholars are already interested - there's only one problem: the room also contains decades worth of toxic pigeon droppings. (NY Times - registration required). Photos (click on the "records rescue" link at the bottom) of the room are available at the great correctionhistory.org which also offers histories and photos of other out-of-the-way corners of NYC like the Hart Island Potter's Field.
posted by ryanshepard at 2:59 PM PST - 9 comments

It's like EverQuest...only pink. Well, maybe not exactly like EverQuest. But Sanrio is entering the world of online gaming with their new MMORPG, Hello Kitty Online World. Preliminary views indicate that it's going to be a fully-realized 3D world where players can control both their own avatar and an "angel," which seems a little bit like a witch's familiar. The Sanrio characters are, of course, NPCs - you can't make Hello Kitty punch Spottie Dottie, because that's just not what Kitty-chan would do! There will be countries, populated with player homes (you can decorate it with a Titanic poster!), and you can also adventure, train, and form alliances.
posted by etoile at 2:51 PM PST - 10 comments

One soldier's opinion. "If you voted for Bush, didn't vote, or voted no on gay marriage, I hope you get drafted. I hope they stick you in my unit, and you go with me to Iraq when my unit goes back in September. I will laugh when you see what soldiers in that country face on a daily basis. I hope you work with gay soldiers too. I did. One of them saved my life. Think he shouldn't have the right to get married? Fuck you. He fought just as hard as I did and on most days, did his job better than me. Don't tell me gays don't have the same rights you do. Think the war in Iraq is a good thing? I'll donate my M-16 to you and you can go in my place."
posted by insomnia_lj at 2:46 PM PST - 53 comments

Star Wars: Episode III teaser trailer.
posted by Quartermass at 2:40 PM PST - 33 comments

Unionized Clergy?! Some members of the clergy with the United Church of Canada are looking to unionize over four thousand pastors across the country. Their compliant, bad working conditions and sweatshop wages. Bad working conditions? Give me a break. via
posted by Coop at 2:07 PM PST - 13 comments

City of Heroes Costume Contest.
posted by tranquileye at 2:05 PM PST - 16 comments

The history and technology of Technicolor. The iconic color process, however, had some competition. There's plenty of other fun stuff to read at the Widescreen Museum.
posted by neckro23 at 1:45 PM PST - 3 comments

A bizzare pattern of impossible anomalies This has long been known : the welter of financial ties of Diebold and ES&S to the radical religious right (with stakeholders currently, it seems, on the secretive CNP) and Bob Fitrakis notes : "Wherever Diebold and ES&S go, irregularities and historic Republican upsets follow." Howard Ahmanson was the original funder for Bob and Todd Urosevich's Data Mark,which became ES&S, Bob later left to head Diebold ,maker of HAVA Act mandated touch screen voting machines used in Ohio and Florida and elsewhere....Ahmanson is a Christian Reconstructionist (a form of Dominionism ) who has talked of imposing Biblical law on the US - including the death penalty for gays and drunkards - and is also a main funder of the Chalcedon Foundation. However, the most bizzare patterns of anomalies in Florida came not from touch-screen but optical scan machines. Florida's central vote tabulator also is Diebold made, raising questions on the a bizzare pattern of anomalies in which a large number of counties in Florida had increases in Republicans votes over expected levels - by an overall average of 50% to 100% and - in one county, as high as 700%. Meanhwhile, here are graphs of variance between exit poll results for battleground states.
posted by troutfishing at 1:13 PM PST - 85 comments

Updating this mefi story here where a set of extremely abusive parents who abused their children into their teens were sentenced to only 9 months prison. A judge now deems that sentence "demonstrably unfit" and resentences the mother and father to 5 and 4 years in jail, respectively. Thanks to t r a c y for the update.
posted by shepd at 12:18 PM PST - 4 comments

Tight Little Stitches in a Dead Man's Back
The tattoo is of a great, blue mushroom cloud, and in the cloud, etched ghost-like, is the face of our daughter, Rae. Her lips are drawn tight, eyes are closed and there are stitches deeply pulled to simulate the lashes. When I move fast and hard they rip slightly and Rae cries bloody tears. That’s one reason for the martial arts. The hard practice of them helps me to tear the stitches so my daughter can cry. Tears are the only thing I can give her.
East Texas writer Joe R Lansdale has written horror, science fiction, fantasy, mystery, suspense, westerns, "men's adventure," and just about every other kind of writing you can think of. On his website (see main link) Lansdale makes a story available for free every week to his readers.
Lansdale also wrote a novella featuring an aging Elvis Presley who teams up with a delusional, African American John F. Kennedy to battle an ancient Egyptian mummy with a predilection for anal soul-rape. It made it to the big screen, too: Bubba Ho-Tep. With Bruce Campbell and Ossie Davis. More inside.
posted by matteo at 12:17 PM PST - 9 comments

We're so unbelievably sorry, everyone...
Seriously. We're not even kidding.
posted by Parannoyed at 11:43 AM PST - 84 comments

Machine Error Gives Bush Extra Ohio Votes An error with an electronic voting system gave President Bush 3,893 extra votes in suburban Columbus, elections officials said.

Franklin County's unofficial results had Bush receiving 4,258 votes to Democrat John Kerry's 260 votes in a precinct in Gahanna. Records show only 638 voters cast ballots in that precinct.

do the math.
posted by specialk420 at 10:51 AM PST - 133 comments

Best.Gig.Ever.
posted by srboisvert at 10:42 AM PST - 17 comments

To Whom It May Concern: This letter is to be considered an authorization to condantiques, a seller on Ebay, to offer on auction, for the Feinstein Foundation, the 1919 Original Ruth contract to the highest bidder which exceeds the reserve. All proceeds of this sale will go to charity.
posted by anathema at 9:08 AM PST - 8 comments

I always thought a future filled with robots would be kinda cool, but I find the Robowatch home security robot kinda creepy. It's expensive (50k euros), looks pretty obvious patrolling around, does have a slick futuristic controller, but finding the three stooges is about the best it can do. I suppose this would be like having your own googlebot around the house.
posted by mathowie at 9:07 AM PST - 5 comments

From the vantage point of my office window, one might wonder: "Presedential Library, or world's largest mobile home?"
This part of the country hasn't seen modern architecture like this, Newsweek lamented....the Clinton presidential library is an architectural tour de force that introduces the Midsouth to a structure more significant than anything it's ever seen. ..but from the vantage point of the Interstate 30 bridge, to the average columnist or cross-country trucker, didn't it kind of look like a trailer?"

For Arkansas, the grand opening of the center — which houses the Clinton Library — will be one of the biggest events in the state's history. All former presidents and President Bush will attend.
posted by thisisdrew at 8:01 AM PST - 25 comments

Woman controls blender by making noises at it. Is it wrong that I find this strangely erotic? [sfw, via]
posted by adampsyche at 7:17 AM PST - 30 comments

Sidewalks without dog shit, angels, and Hustler: the day after the election the way-left paper Die Tageszeitung explained what's better in America.
posted by kenko at 7:04 AM PST - 37 comments

AskYahoo.
posted by luser at 6:18 AM PST - 21 comments

The Foundation For A Better Life. A non-profit, non-partisan, non-religious, organization that doesn't want your money, but that simply believes, "the values we live by are worth more when we pass them on." What kind of values? Strength. Dedication. Vision. Sacrifice. Soul. Persistence. Commitment. Compassion. Hard Work, Class & Courage, and more. Their billboards and TV ads are all around, but if you're like me, you probably had trouble figuring out who they were from...
posted by NotMyselfRightNow at 6:15 AM PST - 32 comments

Maybe the rest of the United States could take a lesson from Delaware's long-standing tradition of Return Day. Return Day started in the 1800's, when residents of Sussex County would gather in the County seat two days after the vote to hear the election returns announced, close out their races, and start looking ahead to the next election. It has grown to a day-long festival featuring a ceremonial burying of the hatchet and a parade in which opposing candidates for each race have to share a carriage. Of course, sometimes the hatchet-burying is only ceremonial. This year's campaign for Governor was ugly and so, apparently, was yesterday's carriage ride. On the other hand, in a local County Council race, now in a recount with a difference of three votes, the trailing candidate was heard to joke to the leader yesterday "Lynn, I can't stand this. Why didn't you just beat the hell out of me so I didn't have to do this?" Oh yes, and Punkin' Chunkin' starts today.
posted by mmahaffie at 5:36 AM PST - 8 comments

The British Steam Car Challenge... hey no sniggering at the back! Turbines in cars are cool but they aren't new. You may know about turbines in wind farms, planes, real choppers, toy choppers and awesome boats, what about taking the virtual nuclear reactor tour? So, how does a turbine work?
BIK'er [BushIraqKerry] Free Thread
posted by DrDoberman at 4:34 AM PST - 9 comments

Onward Christian soldiers or the Divided States of America "In the wee small hours of November 3 2004, "a new country appeared on the map of the modern world: the DSA, the Divided States of America." But is this really anything new? In his novel "Sybal"or "The Two Nations" Benjaman Disraeli described the England of his day and said that it comprised not one but "two nations between whom there is no intercourse and no sympathy; who are as ignorant of each other's habits, thoughts, and feelings, as if they were dwellers in different zones, or inhabitants of different planets; who are formed by different breeding, are fed by a different food, are ordered by different manners, and are not governed by the same laws." Out of the divisions of Watergate and the Vietnam war the modern American Right Wing built it self up from the ashes of the Nixon downfall and the party has labored for the past 30 years to build a powerful and united party with the help of of its very own homegrown American mullahs. And of course, no one has been better at surfing this Republican wave than the Bush family. And for the right wing the revolution has just started.
posted by thedailygrowl at 12:41 AM PST - 71 comments