Salon.com > Salon Staff http://www.salon.com Fri, 04 Jan 2013 10:00:00 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 Dumb tweet of the day: Colin Powell or Simon Cowell? http://www.salon.com/2013/01/03/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_colin_powell_or_simon_cowell/ http://www.salon.com/2013/01/03/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_colin_powell_or_simon_cowell/#comments Thu, 03 Jan 2013 22:04:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13161190 [embedtweet id="286933985903398912"]

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/01/03/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_colin_powell_or_simon_cowell/feed/ 4 Cleric “gang rape” story debunked http://www.salon.com/2013/01/03/cleric_gang_rape_story_debunked/ http://www.salon.com/2013/01/03/cleric_gang_rape_story_debunked/#comments Thu, 03 Jan 2013 16:32:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13160751 Salon re-published a story Wednesday from one of our partner sites, AlterNet, with the headline "Saudi religious leader calls for gang rape of Syrian women." The story reported that cleric Sheikh Mohammad Al-Arifi had urged Syrian fighters to satisfy their sexual urges in "short-term marriages" as a means of boosting morale in their fight against the Assad regime. AlterNet has since retracted the story, saying it was "based on a false report," and published an explanation for how a story so flawed could be published. Salon has removed the story from our archives, and regrets running the original story.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/01/03/cleric_gang_rape_story_debunked/feed/ 13 Dumb tweet of the day: “Who invented sex?!” http://www.salon.com/2013/01/02/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_who_invented_sex/ http://www.salon.com/2013/01/02/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_who_invented_sex/#comments Wed, 02 Jan 2013 22:19:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13160123 [embedtweet id="286591846656901120"]

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/01/02/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_who_invented_sex/feed/ 13 Dumb tweet: Hopefully they forget about guns http://www.salon.com/2012/12/28/dumb_tweet_hopefully_they_forget_about_guns/ http://www.salon.com/2012/12/28/dumb_tweet_hopefully_they_forget_about_guns/#comments Fri, 28 Dec 2012 22:32:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13156966  

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/12/28/dumb_tweet_hopefully_they_forget_about_guns/feed/ 7 Jeff Bridges making “The Giver” movie http://www.salon.com/2012/12/28/jeff_bridges_making_the_giver_movie/ http://www.salon.com/2012/12/28/jeff_bridges_making_the_giver_movie/#comments Fri, 28 Dec 2012 19:40:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13156757 Jeff Bridges will be bringing Lois Lowry's young adult fiction, "The Giver," to the big screen, the author confirmed this week. According to Studio 360, Lowry told Kurt Anderson:

I’ve just heard within the past couple of days that The Giver, which they’ve been trying to make into a movie for 15 years, is finally on the road... Things have ratcheted up, and they have producers and money and a director and a star. They hope to start shooting it in the spring.

Jeff Bridges will play the Giver, the powerful elder who holds all of his community’s memories in a dystopian society in which emotional depth has been replaced with a regime of "Sameness."According to the book's author, the other protagonist, Jonas -- a young boy who gradually learns the disturbing truths about his placid, controlled environment -- has yet to be cast.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/12/28/jeff_bridges_making_the_giver_movie/feed/ 0 Dumb tweet of the day: “President DOWNGRADE, President PORKULUS” http://www.salon.com/2012/12/27/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_president_downgrade_president_porkulus/ http://www.salon.com/2012/12/27/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_president_downgrade_president_porkulus/#comments Thu, 27 Dec 2012 22:25:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13156089 [embedtweet id="284399925192687616"]

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/12/27/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_president_downgrade_president_porkulus/feed/ 3 Why is Apple fading? http://www.salon.com/2012/12/26/why_is_apple_fading/ http://www.salon.com/2012/12/26/why_is_apple_fading/#comments Wed, 26 Dec 2012 22:55:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13155295 Apple stock closed at $513 a share today -- that's down another 1 percent, and rapidly approaching the stock's lowest price since it began a months-long swoon back in September.

So why is the once-unstoppable favorite suddenly in such a fix?

Yes, Apple is up some 25 percent for the year. But it was only four months ago when the price per share sat at $700.

In the New York Times, economist Edward Zabitsky suggested that "as Samsung has surpassed Apple as the leading handset maker, apps have become more important than the devices that carry them, and handsets are increasingly being evaluated on their ability to access the cloud and interact with other devices." Zabitsky, long bearish on Apple, suggested those trends are bad news for Apple's long-term competitive situation.

In Business Insider, Henry Blodget posited several theories, many of them also suggesting concern that Apple's long dominance may be waning as the smart phone market evolves and lower-priced -- and lower-profit margin -- phones take a larger piece of the annual sales.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/12/26/why_is_apple_fading/feed/ 22 Dumb tweet of the day: “Osama Bin Lardin” http://www.salon.com/2012/12/26/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_osama_bin_lardin/ http://www.salon.com/2012/12/26/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_osama_bin_lardin/#comments Wed, 26 Dec 2012 22:21:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13155241 [embedtweet id="284038327005503490"]

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/12/26/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_osama_bin_lardin/feed/ 1 Bono spends Christmas Eve busking http://www.salon.com/2012/12/26/bono_spends_christmas_eve_busking/ http://www.salon.com/2012/12/26/bono_spends_christmas_eve_busking/#comments Wed, 26 Dec 2012 20:50:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13155124

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/12/26/bono_spends_christmas_eve_busking/feed/ 1 Philadelphia mayor: NRA plan a “dumb-ass idea” http://www.salon.com/2012/12/26/philadelphia_mayor_nra_plan_a_dumb_ass_idea/ http://www.salon.com/2012/12/26/philadelphia_mayor_nra_plan_a_dumb_ass_idea/#comments Wed, 26 Dec 2012 19:33:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13155047 The mayor of Philadelphia has some straight talk for the NRA.

On MSNBC, he said the group's post-Newtown plan to put armed guards in schools is a "dumb-ass idea."

Mayor Michael Nutter said that the ludicrousness of the argument was underscored when a gunman shot and killed two firefighters in upstate New York.

"I guess that Mr. LaPierre would say that firefighters need to have armed guards go with them. I think it just shows that that was a completely dumb-ass idea from the start,” Nutter said. “We need to ban assault weapons. We need to ban the high capacity clips and magazines. We need serious background information system upgrade.”

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/12/26/philadelphia_mayor_nra_plan_a_dumb_ass_idea/feed/ 5 FBI had counterterrorism agents investigate Occupy http://www.salon.com/2012/12/26/fbi_had_counterterroism_agents_investigate_occupy/ http://www.salon.com/2012/12/26/fbi_had_counterterroism_agents_investigate_occupy/#comments Wed, 26 Dec 2012 16:40:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13154870 The New York Times reports that the FBI had counterterrorism agents to investigate Occupy Wall Street, and that "F.B.I. personnel around the country were routinely involved in exchanging information about the movement with businesses, local law-enforcement agencies and universities."

The Partnership for Civil Justice received the records after a Freedom of Information Act request. They show that once again the agency used counterterrorism agents to track domestic activists -- like they have in the past with environmental, anti-poverty and animal rights groups.

The Times reports that:

The memo said agents discussed “past and upcoming meetings” of the movement, and its spread. It said agents should contact Occupy Wall Street activists to ascertain whether people who attended their events had “violent tendencies.”

The memo said that because of high rates of unemployment, “the movement was spreading throughout Florida and there were several Facebook pages dedicated to specific chapters based on geographical areas.”

The F.B.I. was concerned that the movement would provide “an outlet for a lone offender exploiting the movement for reasons associated with general government dissatisfaction.”

The records provide one of the first glimpses into how deeply involved federal law-enforcement authorities were in monitoring the activities of the movement, which is sometimes described in extreme terms.

An agency spokesman told the paper that “The F.B.I. recognizes the rights of individuals and groups to engage in constitutionally protected activity. While the F.B.I. is obligated to thoroughly investigate any serious allegations involving threats of violence, we do not open investigations based solely on First Amendment activity."

 

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/12/26/fbi_had_counterterroism_agents_investigate_occupy/feed/ 9 Did David Gregory break gun-control law on “Meet the Press”? http://www.salon.com/2012/12/26/did_david_gregory_break_gun_control_law_on_meet_the_press/ http://www.salon.com/2012/12/26/did_david_gregory_break_gun_control_law_on_meet_the_press/#comments Wed, 26 Dec 2012 14:11:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13154725 When "Meet the Press" host David Gregory showed National Rifle Association chief Wayne LaPierre what looked like a 30-round gun magazine during their contentious interview Sunday morning, the NBC journalist may have broken the law.

Gregory was aggressively questioning LaPierre about whether he would support any new gun control laws when he may have run afoul of some which already exist in the District of Columbia.

And now, according to a report in Politico, Washington, D.C., police are investigating.

“The Metropolitan Police Department is investigating this matter,” said police officer and spokesman Araz Alali in an interview Tuesday. “There are D.C. code violations, D.C. code restrictions on guns, ammunition. We are investigating this matter. Beyond the scope of that, I can’t comment any further,” he said.

As Politico notes, D.C. has a restrictive gun control law -- and it's possible that whoever purchased or possessed the magazine could have crossed the line.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/12/26/did_david_gregory_break_gun_control_law_on_meet_the_press/feed/ 13 LaPierre: Foaming at the mouth http://www.salon.com/2012/12/23/lapierre_foaming_at_the_mouth/ http://www.salon.com/2012/12/23/lapierre_foaming_at_the_mouth/#comments Sun, 23 Dec 2012 19:44:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13153877 [embedtweet id="282867364159160320"]
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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/12/23/lapierre_foaming_at_the_mouth/feed/ 99 Dumb tweet of the day: How liberals “love money and hate our children” http://www.salon.com/2012/12/21/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_how_liberals_love_money_and_hate_our_children/ http://www.salon.com/2012/12/21/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_how_liberals_love_money_and_hate_our_children/#comments Fri, 21 Dec 2012 22:06:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13152615 [embedtweet id="282174916462272513"]

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/12/21/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_how_liberals_love_money_and_hate_our_children/feed/ 31 Last-minute holiday shopping list! http://www.salon.com/2012/12/21/last_minute_holiday_shopping_list/ http://www.salon.com/2012/12/21/last_minute_holiday_shopping_list/#comments Fri, 21 Dec 2012 17:57:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13122456 Joan Walsh, Editor at Large 
1. Drivable Wheel Loader

Ah, the perfect Christmas gift. Hands down the best gift I ever gave was a little driveable wheel-loader to my then-2-year-old nephew. He's 15 now, and it's still his favorite gift ever. But it's not really a reliable go-to gift unless you've the Octomom or the Duggers and you've always got preschoolers on your list.

2. Mexican Cocoa Pacifica Candles

I love Pacifica candles, in all sizes and fragrances. This year my favorite is Mexican Cocoa. It smells like Christmas to me, but it works to make a house smell homey – which means, to me, that it smells like you have time to bake – any time of year.

3. San Francisco Giants swag 

Every year someone on my list gets some kind of San Francisco Giants swag; when my team wins the World Series, everyone gets something. That's now two out of the last three years: I'm happy about that, but it's getting expensive.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/12/21/last_minute_holiday_shopping_list/feed/ 1 Dumb tweet of the day: Cartoon Harry Reid http://www.salon.com/2012/12/20/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_cartoon_harry_reid/ http://www.salon.com/2012/12/20/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_cartoon_harry_reid/#comments Thu, 20 Dec 2012 21:53:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13151304 [embedtweet id="281863588912701440"]

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/12/20/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_cartoon_harry_reid/feed/ 1 David Sirota on CNN: The media doesn’t profile white men http://www.salon.com/2012/12/20/david_sirota_on_cnn_the_media_doesnt_profile_white_men/ http://www.salon.com/2012/12/20/david_sirota_on_cnn_the_media_doesnt_profile_white_men/#comments Thu, 20 Dec 2012 18:06:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13151032 Salon columnist David Sirota spoke with CNN to elaborate on his observation that recent mass shootings have been perpetrated by white men, and that "if this was any other kind of demographic, you would be hearing that in a much different way, a much uglier way."

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/12/20/david_sirota_on_cnn_the_media_doesnt_profile_white_men/feed/ 15 Dumb tweet of the day: On guns and climate change http://www.salon.com/2012/12/19/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_on_guns_and_climate_change/ http://www.salon.com/2012/12/19/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_on_guns_and_climate_change/#comments Wed, 19 Dec 2012 21:50:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13150010 [embedtweet id="281499526529957888"]

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/12/19/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_on_guns_and_climate_change/feed/ 2 Dumb tweet of the day: “Here comes tax MAN” http://www.salon.com/2012/12/18/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_here_comes_tax_man/ http://www.salon.com/2012/12/18/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_here_comes_tax_man/#comments Tue, 18 Dec 2012 22:28:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13149026 [embedtweet id="281155645858779137"]

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/12/18/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_here_comes_tax_man/feed/ 1 Dumb tweet of the day: It’s not about hunting http://www.salon.com/2012/12/17/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_its_not_about_hunting/ http://www.salon.com/2012/12/17/dumb_tweet_of_the_day_its_not_about_hunting/#comments Mon, 17 Dec 2012 23:27:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13148025 [embedtweet id="280809585458176000"]

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