Newscoma

No it’s not real and is an elaborate hoax but still …

Here’s what happened:

In an elaborate operation six months in the planning, 1.2 million papers were printed at six different presses and driven to prearranged pickup locations, where thousands of volunteers stood ready to pass them out on the street.

Articles in the paper announce dozens of new initiatives including the establishment of national health care, the abolition of corporate lobbying, a maximum wage for C.E.O.s, and, of course, the end of the war.

The paper, an exact replica of The New York Times, includes International, National, New York, and Business sections, as well as editorials, corrections, and a number of advertisements, including a recall notice for all cars that run on gasoline. There is also a timeline describing the gains brought about by eight months of progressive support and pressure, culminating in President Obama’s “Yes we REALLY can” speech. (The paper is post-dated July 4, 2009.)

Read the rest here. And here’s the online version of the “special edition”

H/T to Bob.

Cuppa sent me a link yesterday and my world might realign itself to where my dreams have been answered and I can return to my once former cheerful self.

A New York investors group calling itself Bat Boy LLC has bought the one-time supermarket tabloid Weekly World News from American Media Operations Inc., it was announced over the weekend.

Weekly World News, which on its online version refers to itself as “The World’s Only Reliable News,” has for nearly three decades spun out tales of alien invasions, fantastic archeological discoveries, and, most memorably, of Bat Boy, a half-human, half-bat creature found in a cave back in 1992.

The new CEO of Weekly World News,
Neil McGiness, referred indirectly to Bat Boy, which inspired a Broadway play, in the statement announcing the sale.

“The Weekly World News is a powerful brand in publishing, entertainment and online,” he said. “The Weekly World News brand and its characters have inspired musicals, books, feature film projects and television shows over the years. We see tremendous potential for growing the brand and significantly expanding the business.”

I’m for hire, WWN. Get it together and call me.

I’ll do your Bigfoot/Zombie beat.

Image credit

After one of the longest days in history, I was given the honor and the joy of reading and seeing this story that was just about as damned skippy as anything I’ve ever seen.

Raincoaster is just …. ***sigh***

I love crap like this.

And, yeah, the jokes just wrote themselves.

A Siberian mayor is banning some words from city workers’ mouths.

MOSCOW – The mayor of a Siberian oil town has ordered his bureaucrats to stop using expressions such as “I don’t know” and “I can’t.” Or look for another job.

Alexander Kuzmin, the 33-year-old mayor of Megion, has banned these and 25 other phrases as a way to make his administration more efficient, his spokeswoman said Tuesday.

Now, I think a bureaucrat has the right to say “I don’t know” but it should be followed with the words “I’ll find out.”

I am finding myself very interested in this story.

Fark, of course, is not a blog, it’s just, well, Fark. (You should read the comments on this story. Highly entertaining.)

But the whole story about mainstream media using Fark/online media (although Fark is mainly tongue-in-cheek on news stories from around the globe) doesn’t surprise me although according to Mediaverse, there isn’t any indication that Darrell Philips was working with his employer, WHBQ Fox13 out of Memphis.

I think the Memphis folks are probably watching this closely. They tend not to miss a beat.

The other thing that I found to be very interesting is about the way that media needs to recognize there isn’t any transparency about your actions in the world of ISP numbers.

According to Mediaverse, this story is still developing.

I couldn’t hack a coke machine, so all of this is intriguing to me.

H/T to Jack Lail who has a breakdown 

Man, I’ve read some weird stories tonight. I haven’t had a lot of time recently to be rooting around the tubes, but I’ve found some things tonight that have made me smile with glee.

WONEWOC, Wisconsin (AP) — They see dead people on Spook Hill.
They’re walking around the grounds, sitting in the dining hall and in the pews at the abandoned church. Kids, heard by visitors but usually only seen by those trained to see into the spirit world, play outside the rustic and run-down cabins.

“Oh yeah, they’re all over the place,” says Judy Ulch, a jovial 60-year-old who claims not only to see dead people but also receive messages from them that she passes on to their loved ones who pay $40 per half hour for her services.

“Sometimes I see them so close, I see the stubble on their face,” Ulch says.

Of course, there’s a lot more to this story, but when you’re talking about seeing dead people, I’m so there.

Seriously and honestly that would be alright.

I wish to speak to Ethel Merman. I think that she would be easier to get to than Elvis, but that’s just me. I’d pay $40 bucks.

Man, I wish I could see dead people as long as they weren’t staggering around trying to eat my brains.

Or win the lottery.

I’m not choosy.

I think there might be some value in this disease although I have seen the movie Insomnia so I’m thinking not:

Working for long periods in the harsh and unforgiving conditions near the North and South Poles often causes people to suffer a stew of psychological symptoms dubbed “polar madness,” scientists said on Wednesday.

Polar madness?

Wow. I think I might be suffering from “It’s So Damned Hot I’ve Gone Mad” (ISDHIGM) disease. I’m hot, campers.

Painfully hot. There are harsh and unforgiving conditions happening in Tennessee. I don’t know how some folks are even surviving without a/c.

So, if I go whacking folks with a stick, just ignore me. I’m sure it’s ISDHIGM.

Or, it could be a hot flash.

Crap, I forgot about those.

Just saying.

This is different. I’m being interviewed by She Unlimited tomorrow night.

And, no fears campers, the weird news site I sort of mentioned last week is in the works. Unfortunately, I haven’t had a ton of time. As you know, my love of Weekly World News (and their stubborness of not hiring me to go on Bigfoot expeditions or interviewing alien abductees is still a sad and cruel wrench to my heart) has inspired me.

Yeah, it’ll be up soon. As I’m not so good with the CSS, I’m reading this.

I’ll unveil it in the next couple of days. What do you want? Horrorscopes? Ask a Psychic? Weird News? How beer cures all diseases?

You tell me, my kind readers.

Anyway you look at it, this is just frigging weird

Officers responding to a report of an exorcism on a young girl found her grandfather choking her and used stun guns to subdue the man, who later died, authorities said Sunday.

The 3-year-old girl and her mother, who was also in the room during the struggle between 49-year-old Ronald Marquez and officers, were hospitalized, police said. Their condition was unavailable.

The relative who called police said an exorcism had also been attempted Thursday.

“The purpose was to release demons from this very young child,” said Sgt. Joel Tranter.

Officers arrived at the house Saturday and entered when they heard screaming coming from a bedroom, Tranter said.

A bed had been pushed up against the door; the officers pushed it open a few inches and saw Marquez choking his bloodied granddaughter, who was crying in pain and gasping, Tranter said.

Naked woman found chanting
A bloody, naked 19-year-old woman who police later determined to be Marquez’s daughter and the girl’s mother was in the room, chanting “something that was religious in nature,” Tranter said.

The officers forced open the door enough for one to enter, leading to a struggle in which an officer used a stun gun on Marquez, Tranter said.

Marquez died. You just have to read the whole story.

Creepy.

Beer me please.

And this one is on MSNBC.

Crazy or Spooky, you decide. I’m going with both.

America’s space agency was shaken Thursday by two startling and unrelated reports: One involved claims that astronauts were drunk before flying. The other was news from NASA itself that a worker had sabotaged a computer set for delivery to the international space station.

 Drunk astronauts?

Someone clipping wires in computers going to the international space station?

Man, I guess NASA misses the days with the astronaut love triangle from February.

Just saying.

Not really.

Where is Weekly World News? This story, well, they would just love it.

Jumbo squid that can grow up to 7 feet long and weigh more than 110 pounds is invading central California waters and preying on local anchovy, hake and other commercial fish populations, according to a study published Tuesday.

ARAAGGHH!

I love sea monsters. Wait, they are real, aren’t they? I love big sea things. Good thing I live in Tennessee.

Bat Boy (R.I.P. sniff) could save the day. Word has it though that WWN will keep their website.

I was getting afeared.

Woot.

Well, maybe not.

Apparently Tennessee, with about five people saying they were not worthy of being an elected official in the Tennessee Waltz scandal isn’t so bad.

From Cuppa.

While the Tennessee Waltz sting, uncovering bribery, saw two more legislators, Crutchfield and Bowers, enter guilty pleas, the hallways of the state capitol in North Carolina were abuzz with some mighty strange and deranged behavior from a two-term GOP state representative, David Almond.

He resigned late last week in the wake of allegations from a female staffer who says Almond exposed himself to her and chased her about the office uttering some pretty vile stuff. Even more ugly is the fact that Almond was vice-chair on a state committee for children, youth and families.

This is, my friends, not of the good if you were wondering.

Sorry, my title made me laugh.

I, instead of taking angry e-mails where I don’t really care but ask for forgiveness, apologize ahead of time.