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The sight is so odd that Holly Hill resident Quinn Woodward said, “I could not believe what I was seeing. It’s unbelievable.”

The bird is like the feathered equivalent of Steve Martin’s Wild and Crazy Guy routine when the comedian would prance around stage with an arrow sticking out both sides of his head.

Except this is no fool, having eluded the capture of well-meaning humans and hungry hawks for at least four days.

“I have captured hundreds of birds,” said an exasperated Bob Hunt, a volunteer with the Bird Rescue Center in New Smyrna Beach. “You would think this would be one of the easier ones.”

Michael Brothers, the manager of the Marine Science Center in Ponce Inlet, said the wound must be superficial because it “flies so well.”

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A little Mormon boy in Utah, Timmy Poppleton, wrote his senator begging him to intervene: “I’m only eight years old, but I know that Lieut. Calley was defending our freedoms against Communism.” His mother–many mothers–had explained that the villagers of My Lai must have done something to deserve it.

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De Stichting Brein heeft geen recht op de gegevens van abonnees van internetproviders. Dat heeft het gerechtshof in Amsterdam donderdag bepaald. Vorig jaar kwam de rechtbank in Leeuwarden tot dezelfde conclusie.

Brein vroeg het hof vijf Nederlandse internetaanbieders te dwingen om de persoonsgegevens van hun klanten bekend te maken. De stichting wil dat wordt opgetreden tegen mensen die illegaal muziekbestanden aanbieden op het wereldwijde web. Het hof stelt dat zo’n inbreuk op de privacy onrechtmatig is.

Brein vindt dat die inbreuk kan worden gerechtvaardigd, omdat de personen om wie het gaat ook onrechtmatig handelen. Internetproviders zijn wat Brein betreft verplicht te helpen bij het bestrijden van de illegale uitwisseling van bestanden.

De rechter vindt de door Brein gewenste werkwijze niet in overeenstemming met Europese regels die de privacy moeten garanderen. Het hof besloot daarom negatief op de vordering die de stichting had ingesteld tegen de internetproviders Essent, KPN, Tiscali, Wanadoo en UPC.

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A McDonald’s fast-food outlet in the south east of the Netherlands has agreed to remove urinals that are shaped liked wide-open red lips.

Degrading to women or toilet cartoon fun?
The decision was taken after a shocked American customer complained to the McDonald’s head office in the US.

Owner Giel Pijper said on Wednesday that the bright red, mouth-shaped urinals, named ‘Kisses’, are works of art. But a different view is taken of them in America. The urinals are being removed and will be sold off. “I’m not going to harp on about a pair of urinals,” he said.

Virgin Airways was forced to scrap plans in 2004 to install two of the ‘Kisses’ at New York’s John F. Kennedy airport after complaints they looked like women’s mouth.

They are the work of Dutch woman Meike van Schijndel. She is the designer at the Utrecht-based firm Bathroom Mania!

Speaking to Expatica in 2004, she said the urinals were designed as a fun cartoon mouth and not as a woman’s mouth.

She stressed that the idea her urinals represented a man peeing into a woman’s mouth never occurred to her, nor to many men and women she had spoken to. Her company was inundated with orders after the Virgin Airlines controversy, Van Schijndel said.

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You probably have not heard, but yesterday the president signed a bill entitled Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation Act of 2006. There was not much fanfare surrounding it. Apparently, this little passage within the bill was of great offense to Bush.

(c) Oversight Report- Not later than 90 days after the date of enactment of this Act, the Commandant of the Coast Guard, in consultation with the Government Accountability Office, shall submit to the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation of the Senate and the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure of the House of Representatives a report on the status of the Coast Guard’s implementation of the Government Accountability Office’s recommendations in its report, GAO-04-380, entitled `Coast Guard Deepwater Program Needs Increased Attention to Management and Contractor Oversight’, including the dates by which the Coast Guard plans to complete implementation of such recommendations if any of such recommendations remain open as of the date the report is transmitted to the Committees.

“Contractor Oversight”? We certainly can’t have that in this administration. A veto would attract too much attention and give Congress a chance to override the President’s actions. So the President decided to do what any good Unitary Executive would do, he made a signing statement.

The executive branch shall construe section 408(c) of the Act, which purports to make consultation with a legislative agent a precondition to execution of the law, to call for but not mandate such consultation, as is consistent with the Constitution’s provisions concerning the separate powers of the Congress to legislate and the President to execute the laws.

Voila. The President, with the sweep of a pen, has gotten rid of the Legislature’s demand for oversight of Coast Guard contractors. The American corporate kleptocracy is now free to go on, unimpeded by that pesky Congressional oversight or government transparency.

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Wrestlers wait to compete in the Mongolion capital Ulan Bator at the annual Naadam Festival, which this year coincides with celebrations to mark the 800th anniversary of the founding of the Mongol Empire.(AFP/Peter Parks)

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Tony Blair’s flagship identity cards scheme is set to fail and may not be introduced for a generation, according to leaked Whitehall e-mails from the senior officials responsible for the multi-billion-pound project.

The problems are so serious that ministers have been forced to draw up plans for a scaled-down “face-saving�? version to meet their pledge of phasing in the cards from 2008.

However, civil servants say there is no evidence that even this compromise is “remotely feasible�? and accuse ministers of “ignoring reality�? by pressing ahead.

One official warns of a “botched operation�? that could put back the introduction of ID cards for a generation. He added: “I conclude that we are setting ourselves up to fail.�? Another admits he is planning Home Office strategy around the possibility that the scheme could be “canned completely�?.

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Northrop Grumman forecast Wednesday a potential “very large” market for a laser-based system it has developed to shield airports and other installations from rockets, ballistic missiles and other threats.

Los Angeles-based Northrop said it had already pitched the system, called Skyguard, to Israel, which worked with the company and the Army to develop the technology.

Northrop also is pushing Skyguard – described as capable of generating a shield five kilometers in radius – to each of the armed services and the Department of Homeland Security, company executives told a news briefing.

Setting up a protective “bubble” around a typical airport might cost $25 million to $30 million once enough systems were installed, said Mike McVey, vice president of directed energy systems at Northrop’s Space Technology business unit.

[..]

Northrop described Skyguard as capable of destroying rockets, mortars, artillery shells, unmanned aerial vehicles, short-range ballistic missiles, as well as cruise missiles. Against shoulder-fired missiles, which are relatively easy to heat with a laser and destroy, the protective shield would extend to a 20-kilometer radius, Wildt said.

I see “laser” and I see “bubble.” Clearly, this plan involves some frickin sharks at some point.

This technology has never actually worked in a carefully controlled test, but it will be on sale! Politician, spend now and show the scared Citizen that you care!

I’ve decided it’s time to show you where you can call me while I’m on vacation…