Vincent Ferrari

A former South Dakota lawmaker convicted of raping his two foster daughters has sent news organizations what he claims is a copyright notice that seeks to prevent the use of his name without his consent.

A letter and an accompanying document labeled ”Common Law Copyright Notice” said former state Rep. Ted Alvin Klaudt is reserving a common-law copyright of a trade name or trademark for his name. It said no one can use his name without his consent, and anyone who does would owe him $500,000.

Klaudt was convicted in 2007 on four counts of second-degree rape for touching his teenage foster daughters’ breasts and genitals in phony examinations he said could help them sell their eggs to infertile couples. He was sentenced to 44 years in prison for rape and 10 more years after pleading guilty to two counts of witness tampering.

The notice, received by The Associated Press and several other news organizations Monday, carried a return address that matched that of the state prison in Springfield, where Klaudt is being held.

Pft. If this isn’t proof that we as a society have a gross misunderstanding of what copyright is and what it applies to, I have no idea what is.

Cool and yet creepy all at the same time.

Wow.

A decade of pesky germs, from SARS to avian flu to H1N1, has given rise to dozens of products bragging about their microbe-killing properties. Everything from hand-sanitizing liquids to products like computer keyboards, shopping carts and tissues tout that they kill 99.9%, or 99.99%, of common bacteria and fungi.

But some of these numbers look like the test scores in a class with a very generous grading curve. They often don’t include all pesky germs, and are based on laboratory tests that don’t represent the imperfections of real-world use.

Heh… Not exactly the impression created by the 99.9% moniker, is it?

Go ahead and read the rest so you have a better perspective on what 99.9% actually means.

Worst Plain Cheeseburger

Five Guys Cheeseburger (plain)

840 calories

55 g fat (22.5 g saturated)

1,050 mg sodium

These burgers might kill ya, but what a way to go!

We’ve started to receive a few e-mails from the International Star Registry saying the usual “name a star after you’re loved one for the holidays.” I just wanted to remind you that while naming a star after your honey bunny is cute and all, and may well make for a romantic gesture, you really ought to know that doing so is, in the eyes of the scientific community, not exactly official.

Oh well… So much for the announcement one day that a meteor that will destroy earth just swung past star Vincenzo-1.

Guy’s got stones; it’s pretty damn hard to get a table at Panera most of the time!

Those were the first words Jay Leno said last night as he welcomed FNC host Glenn Beck on the NBC show. Beck responded, “Me? I’m not a polarizing guy… I find myself just being a dad saying the things that have to be said. Beck’s tea party and 9/12 mentions got some cheers from the LA audience.

Ya know, with all due respect, Leno is a douche.

Everyone that has Beck on has to point out how polarizing he is. How unapologetic he is. How divisive he is. It goes on and on and on.

I’ve never seen similar things said to:

Al Franken
Janeane Garofuckingwhatever
Tim Robbins
Michael Moore (Nope, he’s just a documentarian)
Ed Schultz
Keith Olbermann
Chris Mathews

Need I go on?

I find none of them a great deal less polarizing than Beck, but that doesn’t fit the narrative, does it? We don’t call leftwing kooks kooks, we call them “activists.” We don’t call leftwing pundits pundits, we call them “analysts” or “journalists.” In some cases we call them anchors and reporters.

The perceptions of the right and left are very different in this country. The far left is never framed as the divisive class exploiting bastards that they are, but can you honestly say that about the right?

Hell, many on the left are still attributing a line about Sarah Palin seeing Russia from her house to her even though it was Tina Fey that actually said it.

I thought Jay Leno had a more original brain in his head, but I guess not. He’s just another schmuck with a mic, makeup, and a low-rated show.

This year Chrysler is practically avoiding the hubbub entirely, in that it will have no press conference at next month’s Detroit Auto Show. It won’t be for lack of cars: they’ll have items from all four brands, including some limited-edition models. Chrysler’s head of marketing, Olivier Francois, said that after the big event last month to reveal the long-term plan, “We presented our plans and the next step is to present the cars.”

Understandably, industry observers seem to think that it’s a bad idea for Chrysler to go mum in Detroit. Chrysler’s a private company and no outsider knows what the real situation is inside the castle walls. If Chrysler does go for the splash of a press conference, with no new models to show or even talk about they’ll be ripe for charges of “All that’s great talk now show us the cars!” That makes it sound like a case of being damned either way.

Well isn’t that spayshul? So far this week we learned:

1. Chrysler will not be paying back millions of dollars in bailout money it received before “Chrysler” went out of business and was renamed “Old Carco.”

2. “New Carco,” neé Chrysler, will not be presenting a press conference at the largest and most important auto show in the United States. How does anyone look at that as anything but Chrysler “giving up?” Or better yet, not caring about putting on a good show because they’re doing it with taxpayer money?

Frankly, Chrysler is a disgrace. For all the negativity directed toward GM, they’re going to start paying their money back next year while Chrysler doesn’t seem to have any plans to do the same.

They deserve to go out of business.

The amount of fun you’re having at a party is inversely proportional to the number of times you’ve tweeted about it.”

Last week, I tweeted these deeply profound words to my 4,844 followers. The vast majority took the proper course of action and ignored them. But there were a few exceptions. SGN CEO Shervin Pishevar responded that this should henceforth be known as Kincaid’s Law.

I’d like to append Ferrari’s law to that…

“The amount of tweets you make from a party is inversely proportional to the amount of joy you contribute to the party and the amount of welcome you have at said party.”

There. Never let it be said I miss an opportunity for a good piggy-backing.

They wait on the city’s streetcorners, often shivering in the cold, hoping someone will drive by and offer them a job. Soon, they will be able to come indoors.

Beginning next month, day laborers will be eligible for job training and social service programs in three Queens neighborhoods under a new $1.2 million initiative paid for with federal stimulus dollars.

But advocates say they won’t be satisfied with anything less than full-fledged immigration centers.

“The city is doing a great job trying to create these kinds of services for our community,” said Ligia Guallpa of the Latin American Workers Project, a Jackson Heights-based nonprofit. But, she added, “the city needs to consider creating real, sustainable job centers.”

Sure! Let’s create all kinds of benefits for people here illegally!

Look… I understand it’s a touchy situation and it’s hard to figure out how to deal with it, but let’s be honest. If put to a vote, I don’t know a single American who thinks that the tax money they ponied up, which has already been abused to levels we can’t even comprehend in the real (ie: non governmental) world should be spent to further benefit illegal aliens who shouldn’t be here in the first place.

It’s one thing to allow them to have driver’s licenses and medical care if they’re sick, but to actively train them for free with taxpayer money? Sorry; that I can’t go for.