News Roundup

• From the "Surprise, Surprise, Surprise" Department - Oprah Winfrey has made a non-endorsement endorsement of Barack Obama for reelection.  Those of you who survived the 2008 campaign should recall how Ms. Winfrey made it her personal crusade to put Mr. Obama in the White House, so it should come as no surprise that she thinks four more years of his personal style of presidency is a good idea.  Ms. Winfrey also described Obama as "masterful".  I could go for the cheap joke about a successful black woman using the word "masterful" about another American of African descent, but I'll leave that one alone.  Well, it looks like Obama has the "billionaire black woman from Chicago" vote all sewn up.  I wonder if he'll have the "fat film director from Michigan" vote in November?  Does anyone know where he stands with the "overrated harpie who got their start sitting on North Vietnamese anti-aircraft guns and living off of her father's acting legacy" portion of our populace?
• From the "Never Smile at a Crocodile" Department - Italian police report that a suspected drug dealer used a caiman to guard his stash.  Imagine a caiman as what you would get if you stunted the growth of a crocodile by giving it unfiltered Pall Malls and cheap whiskey as an infant.  Then make it a little grumpier than the average crocodilian.  Apparently someone watched a little too much Miami Vice as a kid.  No word on whether or not the reptile was named Elvis.
• From the "Genius or Bad Idea?" Department - Scientists in Oregon plan to pump millions of gallons of water into a dormant volcano in order to generate steam to drive power turbines.  One has to ask if the steam turbines will generate enough power to outweigh the cost of pumping water into the mountains, but hey, who am I to ask hard questions?  And am I the only one to think that this is something that Dr. Evil would have come up with?  "I will pump millions of gallons of water into a volcano and cause huge earthquakes and steam eruptions unless you pay me one hundred billion dollars!"
• From the "Shocked" Department - The White House has made its reservations about SOPA public.  Well, I'll be dipped.  President Obama is actually taking a position that I agree with and support. Have to mark this day on the calendar.  What's next?  Is he going to come out on Monday and he wants to make massive cuts to entitlement programs in order to better align the federal budget with reality?  Yeah, I know, ever the starry eyed optimist.
• From the "Unintended Consequences" Department - A woman in Louisiana had to have one of her arms and a shoulder surgically removed after she developed a rather nasty infection from injecting bath salts in order to get higher than Everest.  Apparently this is the latest method of slow suicide available to the American consumer.  All I can say is this:  Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.