If you’ve been thinking of giving up meat for the new year, read on. This article from The New York Times, cuts right to the chase and might push your decision over the edge… for good. The bit about McDonald’s, Burger King and grocery chains using Beef Products in their ground beef is utterly revolting, as bad as anything we learned from Fast Food Nation:

Eight years ago, federal officials were struggling to remove potentially deadly E. coli from hamburgers when an entrepreneurial company from South Dakota came up with a novel idea: injecting beef with ammonia.

The company, Beef Products Inc., had been looking to expand into the hamburger business with a product made from beef that included fatty trimmings the industry once relegated to pet food and cooking oil. The trimmings were particularly susceptible to contamination, but a study commissioned by the company showed that the ammonia process would kill E. coli as well as salmonella.

Officials at the United States Department of Agriculture endorsed the company?

 
I have a love/hate relationship with CNN’s Rick Sanchez—I mostly like him, but his show can just as easily prove goofy rather than great. He’s CNN’s best showman right now, by far, but he can let off some real howlers from time to time, too (which, as I think about it, is probably why I find his show so watchable). Watch here as he really goes after scandal-chased—and conservative Christian, natch—Republican Senator John Ensign. The fun really starts at 1:32 in.

Senator?

 
“You’ve pissed off God, you’ll see what he’s got…”
 
Like a particularly bad case of herpes, the Phelps family are the comedy gift that just keeps on giving. Happy New Year!
 
Westboro Baptist Church prepares to protest Lady Gaga St. Louis concert
 

 
Have a very new year.
(thx Matt Devine !)

 
The New York Times reports that an important work from 1876 by the Impressionist painter Edgar Degas, has been stolen from a museum in Marseille:

According to the police, ?

 
Variety reports that as the efforts to challenge Proposition 8 are set to begin next month in San Francisco, a media coalition of the major networks, Hearst Corp. and Dow Jones & Co is asking for the permission to broadcast the court proceedings. TruTV (formerly Court TV) would broadcast everything, from start to finish, daily.

Defenders of the anti-gay marriage proposition are objecting, complaining that witnesses would face harassment and “the potential for intimidation.” Oh, you mean like the kind of harassment and intimidation they’re sowing against gays and lesbians? Are these people for real?

In a letter sent to (Judge) Walker on Monday, their attorney, Charles Cooper, referred to the aftermath of the 2008 election, a time marked by protest rallies, marches and, in some cases, boycotts of those who contributed to the Yes on 8 campaign, including one website that identified donors and their addresses with a Google map overlay.

Indeed, some potential witnesses have indicated that they will not be willing to testify at all if the trial is broadcast or webcast beyond the courthouse,” Cooper wrote.

—snip—

Attorney Thomas Burke, representing the media coalition, said that they anticipated there would be some opposition to the effort, but he noted that because the trial will be public, witnesses will be identified whether cameras are present or not.

Burker further added: “Moreover, given the historic nature of the case, interest among the public in the details of the proceedings are significant.”

Count me as real interested, how about you? These busybody religious people took it upon themselves to try to RESTRICT THE HUMAN RIGHTS OF OTHER AMERICAN CITIZENS. They sponsored Prop 8, they paid for it and they are actively trying to amend the constitution of the state of California! Do it in the the light of day, folks, if you are so sure God is on your side. Do it in the daylight if you have the courage of your convictions. Own your deeds if you’re so proud of yourselves—and shouldn’t gays and lesbians (and intelligent people in general) have the right to know who these preposterous people are so they can boycott their businesses? If not, why not?

A matter this important deserves a PUBLIC hearing. Let’s hope we get one. This whole matter is a waste of brain cells and tax payer money. It’s an embarrassment to California.

 
(via Minds Delight)

 
David Mitchell, writing in the Arkansas Law Review, argues that a new trial is warranted for the so-called West Memphis 3. If the Supreme Court reads the Arkansas Law Review, things might begin to look a little brighter for Damien Echols, Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley.

The first paragraph from the press release below is rather telling, don’t you think? Still an Arkansas judge turned down their requests for new trials!

New evidence in the case revealed that while no DNA of the convicted young men was found at the crime scene, DNA from Terry Hobbs, stepfather of Stevie Branch, was found in the ligature binding the hands and feet of one of the other children. In addition, some of the country?

 
“Who knows what happens to these young people if they go to the Olympics and lose. Are they ever seen again?”

 
Our favorite story gaining traction around the Interwebs today has to do with Anglican priest Rev. Tim Jones, who more or less told his congregation that it’s OK to steal from retail giants like grocery chain Tesco if your family is hungry. Makes sense to us, but Rev. Tim (who is not as liberal as it might seem) has been taken to task by conservative politicians and some in the British media for advocating this teensy-weensy exception to the 8th commandment. Here’s what he told his congregation:

“My advice, as a Christian priest, is to shoplift. I do not offer such advice because I think that stealing is a good thing or because I think it is harmless, for it is neither.

“I would ask that they do not steal from small family businesses but from large national businesses, knowing that the costs are ultimately passed on to the rest of us in the form of higher prices. I would ask them not to take any more than they need. I offer the advice with a heavy heart. Let my words not be misrepresented as a simplistic call for people to shoplift.

“The life of the poor in modern Britain is a constant struggle, a minefield of competing opportunities, competing responsibilities, obligations and requirements, a constant effort to achieve the impossible. For many at the bottom of our social ladder, lawful, honest life can sometimes seem to be an apparent impossibility.”

It’s not like Rev. Tim is saying “Go forth and mug people” or that the poor should burgle their neighbor’s homes. He’s basically saying “feed yourself, illegally if you must, just do it in a way that doesn’t harm society.” Given the choice between starving or allowing your family to starve, shoplifting a frozen pizza sounds like a morally acceptable no-brainer to us in these troubled times.