Only in America!
Gary Delsohn in the Sacramento Bee reports State is suing ex-dry cleaners:

CHICO -- Vart Vartabedian is 93 years old, and he's being sued for $1.4 million by the California attorney general's office.

His wife, Jean, who is in her late 80s, isn't named in the suit, but she's worried that her two sons, eight grandchildren and three great-grandchildren could be stuck with the bills after she and her husband are gone.

And the Vartabedians aren't alone.

Their longtime friends Bob and Inez Heidinger -- he's 87, has Alzheimer's disease and is blind in one eye; she's 83, has bone marrow cancer and needs shoulder surgery -- also are being sued.

So are Betty Rollag, a Chico widow, and about a half-dozen other retired and elderly residents of this college town who the state says are responsible for poisoning much of the city's water.
...
Also named in the suit are the city of Chico, whose sewers in the contaminated area are cracked and leaking, and Paul Tullius, a 57-year-old retired Air Force pilot, and his wife, Vicki, who own a warehouse that last housed a dry cleaner in 1972 -- 16 years before they bought the building without knowing its entire history.

"This is the most draconian law you could ever imagine," said Tullius, who's worried his children might somehow wind up with the responsibility to pay some of the costs. "I fought in two wars. I thought I've done everything right and now -- can you imagine getting a bill like this for something we had absolutely nothing to do with? Can you imagine what that does to your life? I'm sort of thinking this isn't the country I thought it was."

You got that right, Paul. More on the old folks in the article, but let's just consider Mr. Tullius:

Tullius bought a warehouse in downtown Chico in 1988 to store old cars he used to collect. He said he had no idea it had housed a dry cleaner from 1964 until 1972, and even if he had, he wouldn't have thought much of it.

But because his name is on the title to the building, which he's leasing to a Chico homeless shelter, he's been told that he and his wife are liable, too.

Tullius has filed a few court motions with the help of a lawyer friend, but he said he refuses to spend the estimated $75,000 to $100,000 he figures it would cost to hire an attorney for the long, drawn-out litigation.

As for the man who sold him the building 15 years ago, Tullius said: "He's sort of become a friend, but I'm going to have to sue him, and I suppose he'll have to sue the person he bought it from."

And more on that theme:

The lawsuits have done something else the defendants find difficult to live with: They've pitted longtime friends against one another.

Bob Heidinger and Vartabedian used to be close. When the men were single, Vartabedian said, they "ran around together."

But the Superfund statute has a civil law provision called "joint and several" liability.

It allows an injured plaintiff, in this case the state, to recover damages from one or more of a combination of defendants -- even if one or more defendants can't pay and if it's impossible to prove exactly how much each defendant contributed to the pollution.

So, to protect themselves against the possibility of being stuck with all the costs, defendants in such suits typically sue one another.

"I'm not unsympathetic to anyone in this suit," said attorney Johnson. "It's just a symptom of our industrial age that we're not competently dealing with. It's just one of those things you find yourself in. You do the best you can and end up feeling bad for everybody."

That's not quite how I would describe the feeling it gives me.

"Holy Hans Blix! Look Who's Sixty-Six."

Saddam Hussein celebrated his 66th birthday today with the traditional cake and ice cream with friends and family.

The surprise party, organized by one of his wives, came as quite a shock to Mr. Hussein.

"When we jumped out from behind the chemical drums and shouted 'Surprise!', Saddam just fainted dead away," said an unnamed wife.

It's ScrappleFace.

I speak Korean!
'North Korea will disarm if the US drops its hostile attitude'

Translation: We would deal you some rounds of 3 Card Monte if you send tons of cash and ask nicely. Also send a big electric train set for Kim Jong-Il.

Where's the peanut farmer? This sounds like his kind of deal!

Don't snort anthrax alert!
Egyptian sailor dies in Brazil from anthrax-police:

BRASILIA, Brazil, April 28 (Reuters) - A crew member of an Egyptian merchant ship has died in northern Brazil, almost certainly from anthrax, after opening a suitcase suspected of containing the substance which he was taking to Canada.

A spokesman for Brazilian federal police in the Amazon state of Para said on Monday an autopsy of the Egyptian man, whom he named as Ibrahim Saved Soliman Ibrahim, showed that he had died after vomiting, internal bleeding and multiple organ failure.
...
Castro said Ibrahim had been given the suitcase in Cairo by an unidentified person and was due to deliver it to somebody in Canada. But he doubted Ibrahim knew what the content of the bag was otherwise he most likely would not have opened it.

"He opened it because he was curious," Castro said.

Modulo it's Brazil and the story might change tomorrow, it sounds like our little pals are up to more tricks.

Wafting on the breeze
Mass. Meeting to Have Scent-Free Zones:

SHUTESBURY, Mass. - People who attend Shutesbury's upcoming town meeting will be segregated by scent to avoid disturbing those hypersensitive to chemicals and odors.

Splitting the meeting hall into three sections May 3 is part of a two-year-long effort that also has produced "fragrance-free" hours at the library.

One section of the room will be reserved for people who never use perfumes or scented deodorants, detergents or other products. The second will be for those who sometimes wear fragrance but not on the day of the meeting, and the third will be labeled, "Seating for those who forgot and used cologne and perfume."

Using fragrances in public is similar to smoking, said Town Administrator David Ames, who is also responsible for making the town compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act. He said the Massachusetts Office of Disabilities recommended establishing the fragrance zones.

Hmmm, where's the section for people who eat beans?

UPDATE: Wait, there's more! Check out this screed by Ziporah Hildebrandt, Chair, ADA Committee for the Town of Shutesbury. (That's Americans with Disabilities Act to you civilians.)

Q: Why do we have to bother with being fragrance free?

A: Fragrance free is a civil rights issue. ...

Q: What if I am already contaminated with terrible smells but I have to go somewhere that is Fragrance Free?

A: If you can, shower beforehand using baking soda instead of soap and shampoo. ...

And to top it off:

Recent visitors to the Spear Library on Monday mornings have seen a new sign announcing Fragrance Free Hours.

This sign lists products that are strictly barred from the library from 10:30-noon, so that patrons disabled with severe Multiple Chemical Sensitivities (MCS) can enter the building. These community members can be seriously affected with severe pain, fatigue, cognitive dysfunction, respiratory distress and other symptoms from just one whiff of many chemicals?even "natural" products.

The ADA Committee requests that the community offer maximum support from patrons who use the library at this time. Strict adherence to the requirements of the Fragrance Free Hours are necessary for the health and safety of disabled residents of Shutesbury, and their right to access library services.

If Fragrance Free Hours do not receive the voluntary cooperation of every patron, other measures (translation: expensive accommodations) will be necessary to ensure that disabled people have access to library services.

Oh yeah, Ziporah thinks she suffers from MCS herself. What a surprise!

Remember library patrons - no farting in the stacks!

Soon to be on the remainder table at a bookstore near you
Hillary Clinton's Memoirs to Hit Stores:

WASHINGTON - After laying out a seven-figure advance for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's memoirs, her publishers are counting on seven-figure sales.

The account of her years in the White House will have a first printing of 1 million copies, her lawyer told The Associated Press. The 576-page book, entitled "Living History," is scheduled for release June 9. An audio version, read by Clinton, will be released the same day.
...
The book, which took two years to write, will be billed as a "complete and candid" accounting of her years in the White House, from the health care debate to impeachment to the launching of her own political campaign in 2000.

"Complete and candid" - tell me another one!

Here's an "improved" snap of the front cover:



Dang, that's scary!

More fun than a barrel of monkeys!
Don't worry Teresa, it's not about John. We're just following Tim Blair (hyperlinks are bloggered, go here and search the page for Face for Peace) to www.facesforpeace.org . And he's found the mother lode of wingnuttery. Check out Kaushalya, catalyst for change, for a sample. Or kate who opines "i have been involved in peace and social justice since before i can remember."

But the best part is that you can submit a face! After filling out a questionnaire and uploading a picture, you'll get a URL you can send to all your friends. But it's a transitory pleasure - they seem to be censoring the "faces" that are actually linked in the main "rally" to guarantee peacenik proclivities. The URLs for "faces" that don't make the grade start returning a 500 - Internal Server Error after they catch on. Good coding, goofballs.

Hmm, I wonder how long before the parody boys, Parrott and Treacher make the scene?

Something stinks!
(Via Instapundit) Stephen F. Hayes has an interesting expose of journalists and others who were taking Saddam's Cash. I can't even begin to summarize the whole thing, but here are a few excerpts:

Some of the transactions were straightforward cash payments, often in U.S. dollars, handed out from Iraqi embassies in Arab capitals--luxury cars delivered to top editors, Toyotas for less influential journalists. "This was not secret," says Salama Nimat, a Jordanian journalist who was jailed briefly in 1995 in that nation for highlighting the corruption. "Most of it was done out in the open."

Other transactions were surreptitious or deliberately complex--coveted Iraqi export licenses for family members of politicians, oil kickbacks through third parties, elaborate "scholarship" arrangements. In a region where leaders count their fortunes by the billion and workers by the penny, such payoffs are common. The Saudis, of course, have financed public works throughout the Middle East and Africa. But no one played the game like Saddam Hussein.
...
"To lots of people, Saddam Hussein and his regime was a godsend," says a Washington-based columnist for a prominent Arabic-language newspaper. "Only a few journalists [in the Arab world] didn't take money from him."

But it wasn't just non-Iraqi Arabs. How about Saddam's US "friend", Shakir al-Khafaji?

Al-Khafaji first came to public notice after revelations that he gave former U.N. weapons inspector Scott Ritter $400,000 to produce a film that criticized the United States for its role in the inspection process.
...
On October 25, McDermott received a check for $5,000 from Shakir al-Khafaji. The money, first reported by Amy Keller in Roll Call, had been deposited in an account for the McDermott Legal Expense Trust, a fund the congressman set up to pay legal bills in a lawsuit brought against him by Rep. John Boehner. (In 1996, McDermott had released to the media the transcript of a phone conversation between Boehner and Newt Gingrich, taped by a Florida couple.)

No one has accused McDermott of being a mouthpiece for Saddam Hussein simply for financial reasons. Indeed, McDermott has been saying stupid things for years with no evidence anyone has paid him to do so. A spokesman for McDermott says he "doesn't know off the top of [his] head" whether McDermott has plans to return the money.

Short Eyes Scotty and Baghdad Jim! It's the dynamic duo!

But here's the best part:

Still, Bush administration sources say they have recovered enough Iraqi government and Baath party documents to fill 100 semi-trailers. "We're overwhelmed with information," says one Pentagon official. "It's going to take a long time to go through it all."

That process is just now beginning--a fact that is surely rattling nerves around the world.

The fun's just getting started.

Meme Alert!
The Dixie Chicks' "explanation" for their nude pose on the cover of Entertainment Weekly merely served to demonstrate once again that they are quite a few fries short of a Happy Meal:

"It's not about the nakedness," said Maguire. "It's about clothes getting in the way of labels."

Say what? But it certainly has struck a responsive chord. No surprise that the Farkers jumped on it (my fave), and Registered weighed in with this beauty. However, the mainstream is on the case as well - Gary Varvel in the Indianapolis Star:

I was wondering about that
One hears so many outrageous tales of hijinkery that one tends to become jaded. I had forgotten about the Rev. Al's latest until I spotted this NY Post editorial today - The Rules Apply to Rev. Al:

April 27, 2003 -- Rev. Al Sharpton "officially" became a presidential candidate last week.

What's that you say? Hasn't he been running for weeks, participating in presidential debates and referring to himself as a candidate?

The answer is yes.

Which is why the Federal Election Commission thought it a little odd that - of all the nine announced Democratic candidates for the presidency - only Sharpton had failed to file the legally required campaign-finance statements.

Maybe his dog ate them?

Sharpton's campaign tried to contend that he wasn't really a candidate yet: He was still in the "exploratory" mode.

Until last week's announcement.

This was - to be polite - baloney.

FEC rules state that an individual has crossed the line from exploration to running when he "makes or authorizes written or oral statements that refer to him or her as a candidate for a particular office."

Which Sharpton had done by attending the candidate forums and referring to himself as a "Democratic presidential candidate."

So, was it sloth or deceit that caused Sharpton to delay filing?

I tend never to ascribe to malice what can be explained by incompetence, but we're talking the Rev. Al here.

The fact is, anyone who has been watching Al Sharpton for the last 20 years is hardly surprised by any of these shenanigans.

Sharpton has never been candid about where his personal money comes from - particularly when he was fighting the Tawana Brawley-related defamation lawsuit from former prosecutor Steven Pagones.

Sharpton hasn't even been candid as to where he lives - is it New Jersey or Brooklyn?

Previous runs for office have ended with suspicious fires in his campaign office just before he was supposed to make public his financial information.

(That changed this year - the fire broke out at Sharpton HQ at the beginning of the campaign.)

The real question is whether the FEC will really do anything about this chisler. And it will be interesting to see if any of the other Democrat candidates have enough gumption to even mention it. Stay tuned for the next episode in the Rev. Al show - he claims that he will be releasing a financial statement tomorrow.

Hmm, maybe it will be written in crayon on a Big Chief tablet?