At Washington, DC’s direction, dozens of groups operating as 501(c)(4)s were flagged for IRS surveillance, including monitoring of the groups’ activities, websites and any other publicly available information. Of these groups, 83% were right-leaning. And of the groups the IRS selected for audit, 100% were right-leaning.
h/t EBD
Utility-scale solar plants have come under fire for their costs – [Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating Station] costs about four times as much as a conventional natural gas-fired plant but will produce far less electricity–and also for the amount of land they require.
That makes for expensive power. Experts have estimated that electricity from giant solar projects will cost at least twice as much as electricity from conventional sources. But neither the utilities that have contracted to buy the power nor state regulators have disclosed what the price will be, only that it will be passed on to electricity customers.
But they make one heckuva frying pan.
h/t Ed S.
And that’s why my escape plan includes a CZ7 Zodiac. (h/t Anthony K)
Tonight’s tips video may be of most interest to car buffs, as we watch some fairly good-quality rear-window footage of a drive down Wilshire Boulevard in Beverly Hills, 1935.
The comments thread is open, as always, for your Reader Tips.
What’s the Strange, Snake-Like Image Captured by Radar Off the Australian Coast?
Gizmodo: Somebody Hacked Into Silk Road 2 and Stole All the Bitcoins
What’s the problem? They gave their consent.
Former New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin was convicted Wednesday on charges that he accepted bribes, free trips and other gratuities from contractors in exchange for helping them secure millions of dollars in city work while he was in office, including right after Hurricane Katrina’s devastation in 2005.
Nagin is best remembered for his impassioned pleas for help after levees broke during Katrina, flooding much of New Orleans and plunging the city into chaos.
Related: Eight paragraphs in, the CBC finally uses the word “Democrat”.
National Intelligence Director James Clapper Was asked by Senator John McCain during a Senate hearing whether he had seen the documents, published by an array of media outlets including CNN, as potential proof of atrocities by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s government.
Clapper said he had, and that he believed they were real.
“They’re terrible. And when you consider the humanitarian disaster in addition to the 2.5 million refugees, the 6.5 million or 7 million that are internally displaced, the 134,000 plus people that have been killed, it is an apocalyptic disaster,” he said.
Heckuva job, Barry – Only 11% of chemical weapons removed from Syria
At the CSA, the ‘c’ stands for “Club”;
The CSA tends to locate their offices beside golf courses. In Tennessee, they’re located beside the Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club. RestoreCSA isn’t familiar with yacht clubs either, but it seems that CSA picked a nice one. The Bluegrass Yacht club has “one of the most prestigious marinas” and “the best in fine dining” for an “exemplary experience in an elegant setting.” The place is “a cherished Member haven.” […]
[In Chicago] the CSA office is 3 minutes from the Hinsdale Golf Club. What is Hinsdale?
Well, Hinsdale is a very prestigious, and very old, private golf and country club. Its nice, its rated 4 stars by Golf Digest. “Founded in 1898, the Club’s amenities include a traditional 18-hole golf course, a swimming pool, clay tennis courts, a new paddle tennis facility, skeet shooting in the winter and a stately Tudor-style clubhouse.”
Obviously, “the standardization of engineering materials” can only really happen in a “Tudor-style clubhouse.”
Michelle Obama’s dress cost more than worldwide median yearly household income.
As only feminist students can:
As some readers may be intrigued by the notion of all-female feminist pornography, here’s a brief description: “It begins with a group of girls sitting around a library table taking their shirts off. As the film progresses, the girls engage in activities including kissing, rubbing eggs on their bodies and twerking around a chicken carcass.” The finished political opus, titled Initiation, also features the somewhat lacklustre use of a riding crop, extended scenes of floor-wiping and what feels like an eternity of general aimlessness. Those hoping for red-blooded boi-oing fuel may be disappointed.
Rep. Alvin Holmes, D-Montgomery, just said on House floor that he doesn't like Clarence Thomas because "he's married to a white woman."
— Mary Sell (@DD_MarySell) February 11, 2014
More at Hotair.
Of course they did.
Judge Thomas, 65, a conservative, who grew up in Georgia during the tumultuous civil rights protests against racial segregation, also said that “northern liberal elites” treated him worse than whites in the segregated South of his childhood.
“My sadness is that we are probably today more race and difference-conscious than I was in the 1960s when I went to school,” he told students at Palm Beach Atlantic University, a Christian college in Florida.
Because for “liberal elites”, civil rights has little to do with combating racism and everything to do with enhancing their moral superiority bona fides. I was going to say such people display their solidarity with minority causes like a peacock does his tail feathers – but that’s unfair to peacocks. A peacock brings his tail feathers back home to his neighborhood at night.
In tonight’s amusement en route to the tips William Boyd, as the fictional character Hopalong Cassidy, tells the story of America’s forest fire-preventin’ bear Little Smokey.
The comments are open, as always, for your Reader Tips.
Just watch it: “and the budget will balance itself.”
An American sports writer pokes a little fun at his fellow countrymen, praising Canada in the process:
As of Wednesday morning here, the U.S. was in fourth place with just seven medals, a mere two gold. Canada has nine and four, respectively. The United States is also trailing Norway – which leads all nations in medals – and the Netherlands – which is in third behind Canada – but who knows anyone from Norway? Who even knows where it is? And the Dutch are too nice to hate. Or so everyone says.
Canada is a different story. They’ve been waiting for this for years, the chance to get all politely smug up there – “team’s doing well, eh?” – quietly mocking us over mogul races and dreaming that their ridiculous bastardized version of football will somehow gain supremacy.
The province of Quebec has six medals alone, so maybe the solution is simple: 51st state. The Canadians will warn that Quebec is a handful. It’s a little nutty, too prideful and always threatening to secede. This is no problem for us; it’s just Texas with poutine rather than Frito Pie.
If something cannot go on forever, it won’t.
Tell the nice government official what you are thinking:
Treasury officials said Monday that businesses will be told to “certify” that they are not shedding full-time workers simply to avoid the mandate. Officials said employers will be told to sign a “self-attestation” on their tax forms affirming this, under penalty of perjury.
h/t Black Mamba
Related: “Is it Over, and We Just Don’t Know It?”