RTFA: http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/story?id=41836…

A fundamentalist church whose members demonstrate at the funerals of soldiers killed in Iraq and believe God hates gays will protest the Academy Awards and the funeral of Heath Ledger, because the actor played a gay cowboy in the 2005 film “Brokeback Mountain.”

…

A press release posted to the church’s Web site, godhatesfags.com, reads: “Heath Ledger is now in Hell, and has begun serving his eternal sentence there — besides which, nothing else about Heath Ledger is relevant or consequential.”

Wait, is this American church flying to Australia to protest?

RTFA: http://booksthatmakeyoudumb.virgil.gr/

Well, here’s one idea.

Get a friend of yours to download, using Facebook, the ten most popular books at every college (manually — as not to violate Facebook’s ToS). These ten books are indicative of the overall intellectual milieu of that college.

Download the average SAT/ACT score for students attending every college.
Presto! We have a correlation between books and dumbitude (smartitude too)!

Heh - totally funny… but I’d interpret it more as “books that are dumb,” rather than imply some sort of causality.

RTFA: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,325365,00.html

WASHINGTON - The State Department will name former World Bank chief Paul Wolfowitz to head a high-level advisory panel on arms control and disarmament, The Associated Press has learned.

The move by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice marks a return to government for Wolfowitz, a conservative with close ties to the White House. Wolfowitz was replaced as World Bank chief in June after a stormy-two-year tenure. His leadership was undermined by a furor over a hefty compensation package he arranged in 2005 for a bank employee who was also his girlfriend.

Wolfowitz will become chairman of the International Security Advisory Board, which reports to the secretary of state. The panel is charged with supplying independent advice on arms control, disarmament, nonproliferation and related subjects.

The portfolio includes commentary on several high-profile issues now before the administration, including pending nuclear deals with India and North Korea and an offer to negotiate with Iran over its disputed nuclear program.

Wolfowitz is currently a defense and foreign policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative Washington think tank.

RTFA: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/artic…

LOS ANGELES, Jan. 24 — The California Supreme Court ruled Thursday that employers can fire workers who test positive for marijuana even if they have a note from a doctor recommending its use for medical reasons.

The 5 to 2 ruling came in a state that was the first to legalize cannabis for medical use but has followed up with ambiguity and ambivalence about making it a reality.

In the latest ruling, the high court said a Sacramento company had the right to fire Gary Ross in 2001 after a routine drug test came back positive for marijuana. Ross showed RagingWire Inc. a copy of his physician’s recommendation to smoke the drug to relieve chronic back pain from three lumbar vertebrae fractured when he fell off the wing of an F-16 as an Air Force mechanic in 1983.