They’re approaching carnival season over in Europe, so, in true Rabelaisian style, that means it’s time to mock and jeer the powers that be.  The above float, for Cologne, depicts Barack Obama as a Fort USA-guarding cowboy, while Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad leads towards him a nuke-containing Trojan horse.  Ha!  The float below shows Obama bending over for Lady Liberty.  That’s also for Cologne, not, as one might assume, for last week’s festivities in Tennessee. 
 

 
Barack Obama And Silvio Berlusconi Feature On Satirical Carnival Floats In Europe

 
Lonely this Valentine’s Day, bucko? Adopt a pet! If you or someone you know has been thinking of adopting a new pet and you live in Los Angeles or San Francisco, this Valentine’s Day between 11 and 3pm, Amoeba Records, the best record stores in the entire world (or at least the parts I’ve been to) will be there to make your love match with a pooch or kitty.

Amoeba Pet Adoption Day

Thanks Ramie Becker!

 
I read about the beta-launch of something called Chatroulette this morning on a German blog I frequent called Nerdcore and something tells me this thing is gonna be HUGE. As in huge, huge. Facebook huge.

First off, it’s super easy to use—hit the “start” button, and you’re off. The people you’ll meet are from all over the world and Chatroulette works in real time (like Skype) and there’s audio, too.

What makes this thing so exciting/addicting/cringeworthy all at the same time is easy to summarize: You never know WHO you’re going to get when you click that button. My friend and I tested it out today. Our first interaction was with a male in his mid-20s. He said he was from China. Fifth go around we got the Jonas Brothers. No shit, it was the real Jonas Brothers. “Are you guys the Jonas Brothers?” They said they were in New Jersey. It looked like they were in an airport.  There was a lot of starring and smiling going on. They asked if I was a fan of theirs. I said nothing. Awkward moment. Screen went black, we lost contact.

But seriously, there is lots of WEIRD shit going on here. Lonely guys jacking off in front of their computers, couples having sex and waving at you, monster mask pole dancing, obese women masturbating, lesbian orgies, guys eating pizza watching football, folks wearing clown masks, wholesome families waving at you, people smoking joints, teenagers yelling “show me your tits!’... it’s endless.  I was truly shocked by what I was seeing, but that’s not to say we weren’t laughing so hard we were crying for several hours.  Aside from teen pop star siblings—I mean, what are the chances?—we also encountered a hillbilly mom and her son who looked at us on her screen and murmured “They must be ‘hipsters.’ I’ve heard all about them” as well as a man… and his dog, let’s just say, and leave it at that…

This isn’t going to end well. Not at all.
 
UPDATE: I was punked! Chat Roulette With The Jonas Brothers
 
If you want to know more about Chatroulette, read The Human Shuffle: Is ChatRoulette the future of the Internet or its distant past?
 
Chatroulette (NSFW)

 
Spotted in Royal Flush, the Motor City Madman himself weighs in on the current scene.  Here are some of the choicer meatier tidbits:

EVER THOUGHT OF TRYING TO GO VEGAN?
If I really wanted to maximize the death toll, I would go into business creating tofu for the vegetarians.  ’Cause in order to create tofu, you have to take that wonderful giant tractor, you have to go across that field and every songbird, every gopher, every squirrel, every turtle, every rabbit, every mouse, every shrew, every snake, every bug, everything there must die.  In order to go full tofu, you have to have 100% complete annihilation of all life forms.  To the vegetarians, how deep is the cloak of denial?  How can you pretend that Paul McCartney isn’t responsible for killing anything?  I kill stuff one arrow at a time.  Meanwhile, Paul McCartney, master of the final solution, only thinks of his tofu consumption.  I believe that every bowl of tofu is responsible for the death of billions of things.  I can’t compete with that and I can’t compete with Paul McCartney’s death toll.

WHAT DO YOU THINK OF OBAMA?
I think that Barack Hussein Obama should be put in jail.  It is clear that Barack Hussein Obama is a communist.  Mao Tse Tung lives and his name is Barack Hussein Obama.  This country should be ashamed.  I wanna throw up.

WHAT WOULD YOU DO IF SOMEONE STEPPED ON YOUR LAWN?
Trespass on my property and I will kill you.  Now, that may seem harsh, but that’s tough shit.  Because ­ guess what ­ nobody’s getting killed, and nobody’s trespassing.  It’s working perfectly.

Oh, Nuge, you might indeed put an arrow in my neck if I cross your lawn, but that’s okay, we’ll always have this:

 
As Foreign Policy reports, it’s entirely possible.  Already overrun with Islamic militias claiming links to al Qaeda, Somalia must also protect its coastline from the piracy that impedes the delivery of needed food and aid.  Kenyan Vice President Kalonzo Stephen Musyok, though, is now of the mindset that the two scourges are connected:

“Piracy is another issue which I think has a direct link with these extremist militant groups.”  It’s an odd idea at first.  Al Shabaab has built its image on the harsh brand of Sharia that they hope to impose, and during the Islamic Courts government earlier this decade (of which al Shabaab was a part), piracy was banned.

Not anymore.  Last December, a Canadian intelligence report indicated that Shabaab was in fact training pirates for their “duties.”  Further reporting from Jane’s (summarized here) notes how taxes are levied on the pirates’ booties.  Yes, the pirates and the Islamists are definitely in cahoots.

One way they know that both are getting worse?  “n Nairobi today, property prices today are still rising, and we think this has a direct link with the piracy.” In other words, all those wealthy pirates are buying up fancy homes. And they’ve got a lot of cash to spend.