Iran may have gotten its missles onto the cover of the LA Times and plenty of other papers, but the New York Times does some debunking: the photo (as evidenced above) was photoshopped.

Karl Rove tries his hand at defining Obama:
“Even if you never met him, you know this guy,” Rove said. “He’s the guy at the country club with the beautiful date, holding a martini and a cigarette that stands against the wall and makes snide comments about everyone who passes by.”
And chief McCain strategist Charlie Black [...]

The Boston Globe reports on Rachael Ray’s apparent terrorist sympathies displayed in an ad for Dunkin Donuts (above) in which she dons a keffiyeh-like scarf. Michelle Malkin, opponent of all meals 30 minutes and all days $40, led the charge to pull the ad:
‘‘Popularized by Yasser Arafat and a regular adornment of Muslim terrorists appearing [...]

Where are we supposed to go to get our arty post-industrial post-apocalyptic photos?
Last November we ran a story about security at the Port of Long Beach; specifically, my ability to meander through restricted areas and openly photograph bridge supports and chemical storage tanks. Not only that, my ability to do it day after day [...]

Shop till you drop

ILLUSTRATION by JOE MCGARRY
Recent news reports have suggested that Al Qaeda operatives are planning to attack Southern California shopping malls during the Christmas rush. This news is—to coin a phrase—terrifying, since bomb-/gun-/pointy-stick-toting terrorists would mean additional competition for mall parking spaces . . . HEY! I WAS WAITING FOR THAT SPOT, DINGUS! [...]

Six years after 9/11, America’s second-largest port is still open for terrorist business

PHOTO by RUSS ROCA
I’m a big one for historical remembrances–1066 (William the Conqueror lands on the English coast), 1945 (the atom bomb dropped twice in a single month), and 1977 (premiere of Three’s Company, with the first episode “A Man About the House”–hilarious)–and, [...]

In the not-so-secret lead up to a potential war with Iran, the FBI traced a peculiar path to find terrorists: falafel sales.
Congressional Quarterly reports that in 2005 and 2006, FBI agents sifted through consumer data from San Francisco-area grocery stores hoping that sales records of falafel and other typical Middle Eastern foods would somehow [...]

RIP:  Irony. You will be missed.
Death often comes unexpectedly. Even when the deceased has been unwell for a long time, it can still be a surprise. Irony had been ailing ever since 1973, when Henry Kissinger, a war criminal, won the Nobel Peace Prize, and the audience at the awards ceremony didn’t burst out laughing. [...]

Today’s Reality Check
This weekend, General Patreaus announced that Al-Qaeda in Iraq has been disrupted to such an extent that it “no longer operates in large numbers in any neighborhood of the capital.” Which is wonderful news.
…And totally meaningless, if you live in Diyala. Today someone rode a bicycle–almost certainly manufactured in Iran!–into a [...]