MISCmedia by Clark Humphrey » Blog Archive RANDOM LINKS FOR 3/9/12

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RANDOM LINKS FOR 3/9/12

March 8th, 2012 by Clark Humphrey

kirkland reporter

Hendrix fetish art objects are, by definition, creepy. Here’s one that’s even creepier than most. It’s a sculpture of the musician shaking hands with former local DJ (and current rehab-center spokesman) Pat O’Day. It’s being auctioned off, having been seized from O’Day’s son to help settle a lawsuit involving the son’s onetime Kirkland jewelry store. That store closed suddenly in ’03. Several customers then claimed they’d consigned jewelry to Jerry Oâ€™DayÂ that was neither returned nor paid for.
The Kalakala’s current would-be rescuer says the drive to restore the streamlined ferry has busted him and rendered him homeless.
The Husky men’s basketball squad’s predestined appointment w/destiny was done in by the First Brother-in-Law.
One pundit’s prediction for the ’12 Mariners? Not as dreadful as last year.
Facebook: Bringing people together. Including one local man’s two (simultaneous, unknowing) wives.
One fifth of the Port of Seattle’s container traffic is moving to Tacoma.
George Monbiot describes Ayn Rand’s worldview (i.e., what the Ron Paulies and even many Tea Partiers aspire toward) as “the philosophy of the psychopath, a misanthropic fantasy of cruelty, revenge and greed.” Speaking of whichâ€¦.
Yes, there really is a Republican war against birth control.Â And yes, there really is no floor of utter sleaze beneath which today’s Republicans will not descend. (They’d advocate the return of slavery and poll taxes if they thought it would “test well among the base.”)
Could one of America’s worst housing markets really be roaring back to life?
The battle over e-book pricing heads (potentially) to the courts, as the Feds prepare to sue Apple and five of the Big Six U.S. publishers. The allegation: by letting publishers set retail e-book prices, Apple and the publishers conspired to keep said prices up.
A Facebook zillionaire named Chris Hughes has bought The New Republic. Result: the usual inaccurate media descriptions of the opinion magazine as a “liberal bastion” and “influential in progressive circles.” TNR ceased to be liberal before Hughes was born. In recent decades it has (heart)ed Joe Leiberman, the Iraq War, and just about everything Reagan and the Bushes ever did. Hughes, who’s worked on Obama’s ’08 campaign, just might bring TNR back to what people who’ve never read it think it still is.
ForÂ Intl. Women’s Day, theÂ Guardian profiled a new addition toÂ Forbes‘ list of world billionairesâ€”a woman who’d earned her fortune (she didn’t just inherit it). She’sÂ the inventor of Spanx undies.
Said billionaires’ list includesÂ eight (male) Washingtonians. You already know about Gates, Allen, Ballmer, Schultz, Bezos, and McCaw. The other two are the founders ofÂ Oakley sunglasses (who moved to the San Juans from Calif.) and video-game makerÂ Valve Corp. In total,Â Forbes countsÂ 1,226 billionaires, up from 140 in ’87. The 1% just keep getting 1%-er.