This is why I love Mayor Bloomberg.
The mayor responding to questions about New York City’s plan to kill 18,000 Canadian geese to improve air safety:
“People are not going to stop flying and we have to make a decision. It’s geese or human beings.” And which faction does the mayor support in this inter-species warfare? “I can tell you where I come out on that. I don’t think you need a quote from me.”
[via New York Mag]
Definitive proof that the French hate freedom:
A pack of robbers armed with baseball bats beat and robbed 60-year-old Geoffrey McDonald) and his wife in their villa in the south of France.
McDonald’s is in Eygalières, a village in Provence where Brangelina recently purchased a $15 million mansion. The thugs stole $360,000 in cash, jewelery, and passports from the “severely shocked” couple. France is too dangerous, Geoffrey—come home to America, where we will revere you as a demigod and protect you and your loved ones with our lives.
Chrysler’s new ad men are doing a bang-up job. And no, I don’t care that the cars in the ad were actually made in Canada.
From the Detroit Free Press:
Amanda McBride went into labor last week as she was on her way to North County Regional Hospital, the Bemidji Pioneer reported.
General Motors said Wednesday that it would give a year’s supply of diapers to the Minnesota woman who delivered a baby while driving a Chevy car.
She was driving a red 2005 Chevrolet Cobalt.
Joseph Phillips, the expectant father, was riding shotgun because he suffers from seizures.
“She yelled at me to grab the wheel,” Phillips told the newspaper.
He did. And she pulled down her pants. “And then the baby just came right out,” the woman was quoted as saying. “I was just sitting on the seat, and he just slid out. It really wasn’t bad at all.”
She held the baby, turned the heat up in the car and allowed Phillips to steer them to the hospital where everyone arrived safely.
I stumbled on this booth while walking around Coney Island last weekend.
Booze + Public Consumption + Free Refills = God Bless America!
Turns out, it is Chinese mine fires.
Via Marginal Revolution:
China alone loses between 100 million and 200 million tons of coal each year to mine fires, as much as 20 percent of their annual production, according to the International Institute for Geo-Information Science and Earth Observation, based in Enschede, Netherlands. The Institute estimates that carbon dioxide emissions from these fires are as high as 1.1 billion metric tons, more than the total carbon dioxide emissions from automobiles in the United States. Second to China is India, where 10 million tons of coal burns annually in mine fires, contributing a further 51 million metric tons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere.
I guess that means we call all feel better about cruising around with the our windows down and the A/C blasting.
A little more than a decade after it pulled out, Dunkin Donuts is planning a big comeback in Russia. The coffee and donut retailer recons that the introduction of Starbucks to the Russian market and the recent proliferation of domestic coffee shops has softened up the ground enough to make another go at it.
The plan is to open 50 outlets in Russia over the next few years. There are currently 27 Starbucks in the country. We can only hope that the combined Dunkin/Starbucks/McDonalds onslaught will make the Russian coffee market safe for Americans (unlike the horrible coffee situation in France).
The only question I have is will the donuts be 89 cents like they are in America or nearly $2 like they are in Berlin?
As if we needed any more proof that the push for cell phone bans is driven emotion and fear more than rational debate. But I guess since the main effect of this legislation is to appease stay-at-home moms and technophobic seniors, signing the bill on the Oparh show is probably a good stunt.
LANSING, Mich. — A ban on the use of cell phones to send text messages or e-mail while driving in Michigan will be signed into law by Gov. Jennifer Granholm on Friday’s “TheOprah
Winfrey Show.”
The Michigan House passed the third and final bill in a texting ban package by an 82-22 vote Wednesday. The Senate already has passed the bill.
The Legislature passed the main bills in the package earlier this month.
The ban is to take effect July 1. It makes texting a primary offense, meaning police could pull over motorists for texting alone.
A first offense would cost $100 and repeat offenses would cost $200.
I’ve said it before, but it is worth repeating. According to a comprehensive study by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (who supports such laws), banning cell phones in cars does not save any lives. None.
Just the other day I was thinking that the drudgery of cracking eggs was really cramping my style. Fortunately, after thousands of years of hassle, American innovators have found a way to save us from the minor inconveniences that come from making breakfast.
Introducing: The EZ-Cracker, a tool that helps you crack eggs. It can even do the scrambling for you. If that is not progress, I don’t know what is.
God Bless America!
(Hat tip, Donn)
