Hot off the Press: Ancient East German cars to the horizon edition

BP service stations are feeling a public backlash regarding the Gulf Coast oil spill: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/11/business/11bp.html?_r=1&ref=us. This is something I've been meaning to write about since I have heard pleas of support from "local" BP station owners on the radio. Fuck them. I, for one, will never knowingly buy gas or any other products from a BP or subsidiary station again.

A NYT report regarding a nonpartisan Congressional analysis of The Big O's proposal to let the Bush tax cuts expire: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/11/us/politics/11tax.html?ref=us. Good fodder for any arguments I get into with my über conservative uncle, especially this second graph:

Given the progressive nature of the federal income tax system, in which tax rates increase with income, even the richest households would continue to pay the four lower rates on up to the first $250,000 of their income, under the approach being pushed by Mr. Obama and Democratic leaders in Congress.

Obama a Socialist? The man isn't even a Progressivist.

Calls to local law enforcement agencies regarding unexploded souvenirs of war are becoming more common as older veterans die and leave behind grenades and whatnot from WWII, Korea, and Vietnam: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/16/us/16ammo.html?ref=us.

Here's an article from Der Spiegel about the Trabant, the symbolic East German car, which is disappearing from German roadways: http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/0,1518,708896,00.html.

Here's intriguing sidebar to the NYT story about the suicide bombing of Iraqi security force recruits. Both Iraqi and American forces try their best to keep photographers from seeing and photographing the scene until the worst of it has been cleaned up. It's apparently pretty common, as is hauling away survivors so they can't be interviewed: http://atwar.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/08/17/nokialeaks/. Here is an earlier post from April which gives more details: http://atwar.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/04/07/see-no-evil/.

The crème de la crème of car shows: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/17/us/17pebble.html?ref=us. I've been to and walked around the 18th green, where the main picture — the baby blue convertible driving along the walkway — was taken, twice.